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===[COMMITTED]=== Arab Javelineer and Nabatean Archer (Unit Texture)


wackyserious
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4 hours ago, Sundiata said:

No they are not.

  See the history entries of the (old) design document pages for the Ptolemies and Seleucids.

4 hours ago, Sundiata said:

You aim to represent factions as a specific snapshot in time

Not exactly my idea:

Keeping with the design approach that a civilisation should be represented at a specific time in history, the Republican (pre-imperial) Roman civilisation is set in the Polybian period of the Roman Republic, during the Second Punic War (218-201 BC). [Romans]

Although I'm not opposed per se to using things from earlier or later times to fill in the gaps, I do urge caution when extrapolating between centuries.

4 hours ago, Sundiata said:

I figured out a big bone of contention in some/many of your historical critiques.

Everyone is biased, I'm certainly no exception. Do correct me whenever I claim things that are untrue. :)

Polybius is our most important source for the Hellenistic period (and an eyewitness for some events); Diodorus Siculus, Livy, Plutarch, Arrian, and others were also important but lived later.

4 hours ago, Sundiata said:

This is not correct either.

You're right, it is not exactly true. Ptolemy I took Egyptians with him to the Battle of Gaza in 312 BC, some of whom took care of ammunition and the baggage, others were armed and ready to fight (Diod. 19.80.4). Ptolemy II is known to have invited the sons of Egyptian nobles to join his royal guard and it's probable other (Hellenized) Egyptian individuals joined Greek units during the reigns of Ptolemy I-IV.

However, the emergency Egyptian contigent raised for the Battle of Raphia in 217 BC was a first. Those 20,000 Egyptians meant the Ptolemaic phalanx was about 50% larger than the Seleucid's, winning the battle for Ptolemy IV. Polybius (V.107.1-3) is clear about the consequences:

During the so-called Great Revolt of the Egyptians, the Ptolemies lost control of Upper Egypt for two decades (206-186) and at the Battle of Panium in 200 BC against the Seleucids, the Ptolemaic phalanx (this time without an Egyptian contigent) was annihilated, marking the end of the Ptolemaic Kingdom as a great power, necessating military reforms and triggering further Egyptianization, as well as dependence on Rome.

So yes, one could say Raphia was the first and last time the Ptolemies fielded an explicitly Egyptian phalanx.

4 hours ago, Sundiata said:

The Machimoi are even mentioned in the Rosetta Stone (under Ptolemy V).

The word μάχιμος means fit for battle, warlike, a fighting man (from μάχη battle, combat; from μάχομαι to fight). Herodotus uses the term to describe a warrior caste in the (pre-Persian) Egyptian Kingdom. The term also appears in Ptolemaic times, but equating the two is problematic, as is the conclusion that Ptolemaic machimoi were automatically native Egyptians. For a more detailed discussion, see Christelle Fischer-Bovet (2013). EGYPTIAN WARRIORS: THE MACHIMOI OF HERODOTUS AND THE PTOLEMAIC ARMY. The Classical Quarterly, 63, pp 209­-236 doi:10.1017/S000983881200064X.

 

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As for the 10,000 Arabs in the Seleucid army at Raphia, those were volunteers from local tribes, wishing to show their support to the then victorious Antiochus III (Polybius V.71):

And after the battle, those same Arab tribes lost no time in renewing their allegiance to Ptolemy IV (Polybius V.86):

Antiochus III finally acquired Coele Syria in 195 BC, but at the Battle of Magnesia the only Arabs were some camel archers.

7 hours ago, Sundiata said:

There was a very high degree of Hellenization among the urbanite Nabataeans.

Exactly: urbanized and Hellenized.

7 hours ago, Sundiata said:

Here is an example of a Nabataean cuirassed god, Dushārā (Dusares):

And this one is from Bir Wereb, near Palmyra, a trinity of deities with Safaitic inscriptions, 1st half of the 1st century AD. "The lamellar cuirass was inspired by Oriental Hellenism."

https://www.louvre.fr/en/oeuvre-notices/divine-triad

Depictions of gods and kings are not necessarily representative. The question is how ordinary Arabs would have fought. Given their performance at Raphia (Polybius V.85), it seems they were lightly armed, nimble, and avoided melee.

Also, the Nabatean Kingdom was independent of both the Ptolemies and the Seleucids.

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