Being now in the business of increasing the size of my own
PM: SPQR armies, I have been looking at my own army lists and spotting a few
infelicities and typographical errors, so I thought I may as well record them
here.
On the other hand, no-one has pointed them out yet, so have
either ignored the lists or made their own up, or assumed we cannot count….
Anyway:
P57 Numidian Army list: For some reason the composition
table and the random troop type table have got swapped around. I suppose the
correction is obvious, but I thought I had better mention it.
P59 Dacian Army list: The total number of bases listed in
the composition table is 19. The extra base should be a Dacian light horse.
P59 Dacian Army list: The Youth (skirmisher) bases are interchangeable
with Archer bases. So you can have either 4 youth, or 4 archers, or two of
each, of whatever, totalling 4 bases.
P60 Pontic Army list: The total number of bases listed is
24. This is because you can have either 4 bases of pike or 4 bases of imitation
legionaries, but not both. Nor, in this case, can you mix and match.
As this seems a bit short for one of my normal posts (do I
hear distant cheering?), I thought I would add another scenario below. No
pretty maps, though, sorry, but some ideas for scenarios.
The original manuscript for PM: SPQR actually had loads
(well, nine) scenarios picked up from my various reading, of which only two,
Charonea 86 BC and Mons Graupius 83 AD made the final cut.
Below, then, is a scenario for Nicopolis, fought during 48
BC between the revived Pontic state and a fairly scratch force of Romans and
hangers on. The small army sizes total 20 bases. The large actually attempt to
represent the forces on the field to Polemos: SPQR scale. The medium sized
armies are, of course, somewhere between the two. The formatting of the tables has, of course, gone bonkers, because blogs do not seem to render either columns or HTML tables very well.
Nicopolis 48 BC
Mithradates’ Crimean kingdom was,
with the blessing of the Romans, inherited by Pharnaces, the son of one of
Mithradates’ concubines. During the civil war, Pharnaces resolved to attempt
the recapture Pontus. He had a small army of Bosporan Greeks and some
Scythians.
Initially sucessful, he met with
Domitus Calvinus, one of Caesar’s generals with a scratch force. This consisted
of XXXVI legion with two Galatian legions led by Deiotarus the Galatian
tetrarch and another raw legion raised from Roman citizens of Pontus. Domitus
sent to Cilicia and Cappadocia for auxiliaries and had about 200 cavalry.
Numbers are largely unknown, but we can speculate about 4000 legionaries in
legion XXXVI, 9000 in the two Galatian legions and 5000 in the raw Pontic
legion. We do not know how many Cilician auxilliaries were raised, but could
guess at about 4000. Possible armies are below:
Small Medium Large
Legionaries 4 6 8
Imitation legionaries 12 20 28
Tribal foot (Cilicians) 2 3 4
Skirmishers (Cilicians) 2 3 4
Cavalry 1 2 2
Even less is known about Pharnaces’
forces. His cavalry greatly outnumbered Domitus’, and his frontage was three
legions wide, as this matched Domitus’ deployment. Presumably they consisted of
imitation legionaries and thureophoroi. Later, at Zela, Pharnaces deployed
scythed chariots, so it may not be unreasonable to include a few here, although
their employment usually caused some comment in accounts. The numbers are
speculative, to say the least. Possible armies are below.
Small Medium Large
Imitation legionaries 12 20 28
Thureophoroi 4 6 8
Skirmishers 2 3 4
Cavalry 2 4 6
Scythian light horse 2 4 6
The Pontic army deployed in three or
four lines, and dug trenches between the wings and centre, with the cavalry
outside. Pharnaces was aware of the fact that Caesar was in trouble in
Alexandria and had ordered Domitus to send reinforcement. Pharnaces therefore
believed that he could afford to wait. Domitus, on the other hand, felt he could
not disengage successfully unless he defeated Pharnaces. Domitus formed up with
legion XXXVI on the right, the Pontic legion on the left and the Galatians in
the centre on a narrow frontage. The fighting was fierce and Legion XXXVI broke
the Pontic left and attacked the centre. The Galatian legions, however fled
quickly and the Pontic legion was disordered by the trench and overwhelmed.
This left the XXXVI legion isolated and surrounded. However, they drew off to
high ground and Pharnaces did not further attack them as the battle was won.
Domitus rallied the remains of his army and withdrew.
Pharnaces carried on conquering
Pontus and living the life of an eastern despot. The next year, Caesar himself
marched against him and utterly defeated Pharnaces at Zela. Pharnaces rallied a
few and withdrew to the Bosporous. He was killed fighting against a revolt.
References
Webster, J., The Battle of Nicopolis
48 BC, Miniature Wargaming, October 1999, p 7-8.
Duggan, A., He Died Old: Mithradates
Eupator, King of Pontus, London: NEL, 1976.
Caesar, J., The Alexandrian War, The
Civil War, London, Penguin, 1967.
No comments:
Post a Comment