Nicholas Sekunda, The Athenian Army 507-322 BC (Osprey, 2025)
It is a cliché that in Ancient Greece the Athenians ruled the waves while the Spartans controlled the land with their seemingly invincible army. But as Nicholas Sekunda demonstrates in this new book from Osprey’s Elite series, Athens had an army too and they worked to overcome their challenges in land warfare every bit as much as they put that effort into naval warfare.
Sekunda begins with the reforms of Cleisthenes in 507 that revolutionised the Athenian military system alongside his political reforms. This was the army that was soon to be tested in the Persian Wars from 490, where we find Athenian hoplites trying to solve the problem of Persian archers. By 483, the Athenians had added their own archer contingent, Sekunda finds, along with some tactical changes. Cavalry soon joined the mix, and their numbers were increased in Pericles’ reforms of 442 and horse-archers added. Then came the Peloponnesian War and the use of lighter armed peltasts, which were originally foreign forces, but Athens soon trained poorer citizens in this manner of fighting. Sekunda also covers the doomed Syracuse expedition of 415. With Athenian defeat in the Peloponnesian War came more reforms including the redevelopment of horse archers into dedicated scouts. Another set of reforms followed in the 360s inspired by Xenophon. Both equipment and practices changed, but that did not help the Athenians when they suffered defeat to the Macedonians at Chaeronea in 338. An attempt to throw off the Macedonian yoke in 323 proved disastrous for Athens, all but ending their military system, which Sekunda decides is a useful place to stop.
It might come as a surprise to some readers that armies in the Classical period were not ossified institutions immune to change or tactical subtlety. Sekunda makes clear that the Athenian army certainly made changes when faced with new enemies or tactics. Although his book is a brief introduction, Sekunda packs a lot of information into his text, and he is well supported in the details of costume, arms, and armour by Osprey’s excellent colour plates of Athenian soldiers and the accompanying text. My only quibble is a lack of background on ancient Greek warfare, which would have proved useful to novice readers in this field. Nevertheless, readers looking for a wee bit more meat on the bones for this era in military history will find this book very useful.
