Thank you u/400-Rabbits for inviting me to do another AskHistorians Podcast! I’m honoured to be asked again, and delighted that I finally got to talk about my Reddit namesake. The life of Iphikrates is tied up with countless aspects of Greek warfare in the Classical period, and I’m sure I could have rambled on for hours more.

Timeline

For listeners who are confused by the many dates mentioned in the podcast, here’s a hopefully helpful chronology of the life of Iphikrates (all dates are BC):

• c.418: Iphikrates is born.
• 404: Athens loses the Peloponnesian War.
• 395-386: Corinthian War. Athens, Corinth, Argos and Boiotia, with Persian backing, declare war on Sparta.
• 394: Sparta loses its fleet at the battle of Knidos. This is probably the battle in which Iphikrates rose to fame as a deck-fighter.
• 394: Sparta wins the pitched battles of the Nemea and Koroneia, forcing the allies to adopt a less direct strategy on land.
• 394/3: Athenians send permanent garrison to Corinth.
• 392: Battle of the Long Walls of Corinth. This is the first and only pitched battle in which Iphikrates is involved. Due to the confined battlefield denying him room to manoeuvre, his mercenaries are defeated along with the rest of the allied army.
• 392-390: Iphikrates operates against Spartan allies around Corinth, using his mercenaries for ambushes and raids.
• 390: Battle of Lechaion. Iphikrates’ peltasts, backed up by an Athenian hoplite phalanx under Kallias, annihilate a mora (army unit about 600 strong) of Spartan hoplites.
• 389: Chabrias takes over as garrison commander at Corinth. Iphikrates is sent to the Hellespont. He ambushes the land army of the Spartan Anaxibios at Abydos, reclaiming most of the Hellespont for Athens.
• 387/6: King’s Peace is signed, ending the Corinthian War. Iphikrates serves as advisor to king Seuthes and king Kotys in Thrace; marries Kotys’ daughter.
• 378-371: Boiotian War. Thebes and Athens join forces against Sparta.
• 378: Persians demand Athenian aid for their campaign against Egypt. Athens sends Iphikrates to command their Greek mercenaries.
• 374: Persian expedition fails due to mistrust between the Persian commander Pharnabazos and Iphikrates. Iphikrates flees back to Athens. Persians demand his head, but Athens defies them and elects him general.
• 373: Iphikrates commands Athenian expedition to Kerkyra. His fleet captures 12 triremes from Syracuse meant to reinforce the Spartans, but when they arrive at Kerkyra, the Spartan army there is already defeated.
• 371: Battle of Leuktra; Sparta defeated. Athens realigns itself with Sparta against the now ascended power of Thebes.
• 370/69: Iphikrates leads the entire Athenian army to the Peloponnese, but fails to do serious harm to the Thebans.
• 360s: Iphikrates retires to Thrace. He causes a scandal by advising king Kotys in his war against Athens on the Thracian Chersonese, but refuses to lead Thracian armies against Athenian targets.
• late 360s: in the midst of a succession crisis in Macedon, Iphikrates is forgiven and sent to find ways to increase Athenian influence in the region around Amphipolis. At this time Philip II's mother Eurydike entrusts her sons' care to him.
• 357-355: Social War. Athens fights Chios, Rhodos, Kos and Byzantion to retain control over its subordinate allies. After Chabrias dies in battle at Chios, Iphikrates is recalled to command the fleet.
• 356: Iphikrates put on trial by Chares for refusing to engage the enemy during a storm. He is acquitted.
• 355: Social War ends in defeat for Athens, ending the Second Athenian Empire. Iphikrates retires from service.
• 353: Iphikrates dies.

Light infantry tactics

As I point out repeatedly in the podcast, the tactics that Iphikrates’ peltasts used to destroy the Spartan mora were very familiar to contemporary Greeks. By the time of the battle of Lechaion, it was a well-known fact that hoplites caught without support from light infantry or cavalry were helpless in the face of missile-armed enemies. These encounters would always play out the same way, which our sources never seem to tire of describing:

Whenever the Athenians advanced, their adversary gave way, pressing them with missiles the instant they began to retire. The Chalkidian horse also, riding up and charging them just as they pleased, at last caused a panic amongst them and routed and pursued them to a great distance.

-- Thucydides 2.79.6

Meanwhile the Aitolians had gathered to the rescue, and now attacked the Athenians and their allies, running down from the hills on every side and darting their javelins, falling back when the Athenian army advanced, and coming on as it retired; and for a long while the battle was of this character, alternate advance and retreat, in both which operations the Athenians had the worst. Still, as long as their archers had arrows left and were able to use them, they held out, the light-armed Aitolians retiring before the arrows; but after the commander of the archers had been killed and his men scattered, the men, worn out with the constant repetition of the same exertions and hard pressed by the Aitolians with their javelins, at last turned and fled.

-- Thucydides 3.97.3-98.2

In short, wherever the Spartans went they would have their assailants behind them, and these light-armed assailants, the most difficult of all; arrows, javelins, stones, and slings making them formidable at a distance, and there being no means of getting at them at close quarters, as they could conquer while fleeing, and the moment their pursuer turned, they were upon him.

-- Thucydides 4.32.4

And when the Greeks, hard-pressed as they were, undertook to pursue the attacking force, they reached the hilltop but slowly, being heavy troops, while the enemy sprang quickly out of reach; and every time they returned from a pursuit to join the main army, they suffered again in the same way.

-- Xenophon, Anabasis 3.4.27-28

The Bithynians, while they gave way at whatever point the Greeks rushed forth, and easily made their escape, since they were peltasts fleeing from hoplites, kept throwing javelins upon them from the one side and the other and struck down many of them at every sally; and in the end the Greeks were shot down like cattle in a pen.

-- Xenophon, Hellenika 3.2.4

The most detailed description of these tactics is, in fact, Xenophon’s account of the battle of Lechaion. At the time of the battle, Xenophon was enjoying the friendship and patronage of the Spartan king Agesilaos, who was campaigning in the area when Iphikrates annihilated the isolated mora. Xenophon’s account is therefore likely to be based on the eyewitness testimony of the Spartan survivors.

Now when the Lakedaimonians were being attacked with javelins, and several men had been wounded and several others slain, they directed the shield-bearers to take up these wounded men and carry them back to Lechaion; and these were the only men in the mora who were really saved. Then the polemarch ordered the first ten year-classes to drive off their assailants. But when they pursued, they caught no one, since they were hoplites pursuing peltasts at the distance of a javelin's cast; for Iphikrates had given orders to the peltasts to retire before the hoplites got near them; and further, when the Lakedaimonians were retiring from the pursuit, being scattered because each man had pursued as swiftly as he could, the troops of Iphikrates turned about, and not only did those in front again hurl javelins upon the Lakedaimonians, but also others on the flank, running along to reach their unprotected side. Indeed, at the very first pursuit the peltasts shot down nine or ten of them. And as soon as this happened, they began to press the attack much more boldly. Then, as the Lakedaimonians continued to suffer losses, the polemarch again ordered the first fifteen year-classes to pursue. But when these fell back, even more of them were shot down than at the first retreat.

-- Xenophon, Hellenika 4.5.14-16

As soon as the first javelins reached them, the fate of the Spartans was sealed. They knew they could neither defeat the peltasts in battle nor retreat to a safe haven. In this hopeless predicament, they held out as long as they could, but when Kallias brought up the Athenian phalanx to finish off the survivors that had withdrawn to a small hill, the Spartan resolve broke and the remaining troops ran for their lives. About 250 of the unit’s 600 men were killed – a far higher casualty rate than any hoplite battle.

Special thanks to Eric Hacke, Will Raybould, Bill Rubin, Elm, Jonathan Wallace, Charles-Eric Lemelin, Mark Katerberg, William Ryan, Stuart Gorman, Daniel Schmidt, Rodney Norris, Alex Gidumal, Michael Moore, Collum Milne, Miles Stapleton, Grant Taylor, Vlad, and Max M. for their generous support of the podcast through the AskHistorians Patreon. And thanks to all our new supporters as well!

And a big big thanks to /u/iphikrates for his bonanza of Classical aptitude!

This month's winner of the book giveaway is... Mark Katerberg! The selection of books we have available this month are:

• Ann Rubenstein's Bad Language, Naked Ladies, and Other Threats to the Nation: A Political History of Comic Books in Mexico, who recently did an AMA with us.

• Karen Leonard's Making Ethnic Choices: California's Punjabi Mexican Americans, recommended by /u/cordis_melum.

• J. E. Lendon's Song of Wrath: The Peloponnesian War Begins, recommended by our guest, /u/iphikrates.

• Robert Wald Sussman's The Myth of Race: The Troubling Persistence of an Unscientific Idea, my recommendation

Want a chance to get a free book? Help support the podcast via Patreon!

First of all: thank you /u/Iphikrates for taking the time to record this podcast! I find the history of non-hoplite Greek military units to be fascinating, because every level of education I've had made it seem like the phalanx was the end all be all of Greek warfare, and rounding out my mental image of the Greek battlefield is very satisfying. And, since (I think) this is my first time posting in a podcast thread, I also want to thank /u/400-Rabbits for putting so much time and effort into the AskHistorians Podcast. I never knew that I could care so much about the chemise a la reine or the history British bread making, but here we are.

Now onto the question!

This is terribly tangential, but I'm curious what you meant when you said on the podcast that Iphikrates became Philip of Macedon's godfather. Was this a rough translation of a specific Greek custom that was analogous to the modern idea of a godfather? Was it specifically religious, secular, or both? Did this Greek concept come to inform the modern, Christian idea of a godfather? This has been rattling around in my brain since I finished listening to the episode this afternoon.

This was a great podcast and I learned an enormous amount.

Is there any more info on Egyptian ultra heavy pike phalanxes besides Xenophon's description in the Anabasis?