Something I always found strange in the Total War games was how swordsmen, spearmen, axemen, and so on would always be separated from one another, forming a unit made up of dozens who use the same weapons.
Did soldiers back then actually do that or did did formations have mixed weapons?
Also does anyone know an extremely authentic/realistic reenactment or movie depicting ancient-medieval warfare
Thank you
It would depend on how organized a society was, and the amount of standardization put in by the military state. The Romans certainly had very organized formations even during the early Republic period, with their heavy infantry, light troops, and cavalry separated into distinct units. Then you have less formal armies like those of the early Celtic or Germanic tribes, where every freemen obligated to fight simply bought whatever weapons they had or could afford, and were lumped together into a mixed mob, with maybe the chieftains and their honor guard forming a separate elite unit. With the Hellenic phalanxes, you pretty had to have uniform standardized weapons and protection to work. Usually cavalry was always separated from infantry.
Usually, the more organized the state, the more discrete military formations were. Even early state armies often had soldiers divided along the lines of hierarchy, social status, or experience. If you have soldiers of similar status or means grouped together and armed with whatever they can afford or acquire, they would have pretty much uniform equipment and attire within such formation.
The early Egyptian armies separated themselves into ranks of mounted chariots manned by nobles at the front, and ranks of levied peasants at the front armed with simple clubs, rattan shields, and spears. More experienced veteran were put in the front ranks, with the young or new recruits at the back ranks. They might had kept their archers or skirmishers separated from the rest of the infantry.
The Assyrians certainly separated their ranks between melee infantry and archers at minimal, based upon the artwork they left behind.
From a military standpoint, it makes sense to divide your soldiers into discrete formations with similar equipped comrades. Archers can hardly do their work when mixed in tight, elbow-to-elbow with their melee infantry counterparts. A group of hoplites would better maintain cohesion without having other troop types mixed into their formations.
Of course, things can vary base on situation and tactics. The German Landsknecht had their pikemen supported by foot soldiers with shorter weapons mixed into their pike formations, their job being to cut down any enemy soldiers that slip pass the wall of pikes. The Spanish tercio formations had arquebusiers shoulder-to-shoulder with the pikemen that fenced them from enemy cavalry and infantry.
-https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/40/Batalla_de_rocroi_por_Augusto_Ferrer-Dalmau.jpg
