 | Washington Is Next - Megadeth (Fanmade "slideshow") Dave Mustaine is singing about the prophecy in the Biblical Book of Daniel, where Nebuchadnezzar has the dream about a statue made of different metals that represented the world powers that had not fallen yet. Egypt and Assyria had already fallen by the time of the dream, and Babylon, which Nebuchadnezzar ruled, was the current world power. This dream scared him, and none of the king's wise men, fortune tellers, dream interpreters, etc... could tell him what this dream meant except Daniel under divine direction. This video is simply my breakdown of what the dream and the prophecies meant in modern times. The faces of the "diadochi" (or successors to Alexander the Great: Ptolemy, Seleucus, and Lysimachus) are real busts of them. Cassander apparently had none that survived into our day because I could not locate a bust, or even a coin said to represent his likeness. Anyway, you'll get a bit of a history lesson within this video :-) Enjoy! |
 | Freestyle: "War Pigs" War pigs, also known as incendiary pigs, are those pigs speculated to have been used at most rarely in ancient warfare as a countermeasure to war elephants. The pigs were allegedly covered with tar, pitch, olive oil, or other flammable materials, set on fire, and driven towards enemy war elephants, with the intention that the elephants, terrified by the piercing squeals and oncoming flames, would flee in panic through the lines of their drivers' own army. Obviously, a burning pig is difficult to command and thus easily could quickly turn into a loose cannon and cause harm to friendly soldiers in addition to this. However, the hope of stopping war elephants made this a tactic used in war. Pliny the Elder reported that "elephants are scared by the smallest squeal of a pig" and that they were used as such by the Romans against Pyrrhus's army (VIII, 1.27). A siege of Megara during the Wars of the Diadochi was reportedly broken when the Megarians poured oil on a herd of pigs, set them alight, and drove them towards the enemy's massed war elephants. The elephants bolted in terror from the flaming squealing pigs often killing great numbers of the army the elephant was part of (Aelian, de Natura Animalium book XVI, ch. 36). A possible reason for a lack of elephants in ancient warfare could be due to this as pigs were cheap, easy to get, and supposedly effective. The Romans got the idea from the Megarans who used pigs against Gonatas. Related concepts, whether ever actually used or not, include the concept of incendiary monkeys in China as a battlefield weapon, the use of anti-tank dogs supposedly used by the Soviet Union to combat invading German Armor at close range, and the supposed proposal of military dolphins for mine-laying as an anti-ship weapon, and as anti-diver weapons (although these usages have been denied by the US military, the use of military dolphins for mine-hunting is well documented). |
 | Sarisa 99 http://www.aviationlive.org Online Aviation Pics,Videos and Forum Sarisa Greek military exercise The sarissa (or sarisa, Greek "Σάρισσα") was a 4 to 7 meter (13-21 feet) long pike used in the ancient Greek and Hellenistic warfare. It was introduced by Philip II of Macedon and was used in the traditional Greek phalanx formation. The phalanxes of Philip II of Macedon were known as Macedonian phalanxes. Sarissa was very heavy for a spear, weighing over 5 kg (12 pounds). It had a short iron head shaped like a leaf and a bronze shoe (also known as a butt-spike) that would allow it to be anchored to the ground to stop charges by enemy soldiers. The bronze shoe also served to balance out the spear, making it easier for soldiers to wield. Its great length was an asset against hoplites and other soldiers bearing shorter weapons, because they had to get past the sarissa to engage the phalangites. However, outside the tight formation of the Phalanx the Sarissa would have been almost useless as weapon and a hindrance on the march. As the Sarissa was constructed of two halves and joined by the means of a metal collar, it has been suggested that this allowed the Sarissa to be broken down into two more manageable sections for convenience of transport or on the march. The tight formation of the phalanx created a "wall of pikes", and the pike was sufficiently long that there were fully five rows of pikes in front of the front rank of men—even if an enemy got past the first row, there were still four more to stop him. The back rows bore their pikes angled upwards in readiness, which served the additional purpose to deflect incoming arrows. The Macedonian phalanx was considered all but invulnerable from the front, except against another such phalanx; the only way it was ever generally defeated was by breaking its formation or outflanking it. The invention of the sarissa is credited to Philip II, father of Alexander the Great. Philip drilled his hitherto demoralized men to use these formidable pikes with two hands. The new tactic was unstoppable, and by the end of Philip's reign the previously fragile kingdom of Macedon controlled the whole of Greece, and Thrace. His son Alexander used the new tactic across Asia, conquering Egypt, Persia and the Pauravas (northwest India), victorious all the way. The sarissa-wielding phalanxes were vital in every early battle, including the pivotal battle of Gaugamela where the Persian king's scythe chariots were utterly destroyed by the phalanx, supported by the combined use of companion cavalry and peltasts (javelineers). Alexander gradually reduced the importance of the Phalanx, and the sarissa, as he modified his combined use of arms, and incorporated 'Asian' weapons and troops. The sarissa however, remained the backbone for every subsequent Hellenistic, and especially Diadochi army. The Battle of Raphia between the Seleucids and Ptolemy IV may represent the pinnacle of sarissa tactics, when only an elephant charge seemed able to disrupt the opposing phalanx. The Successor Kingdoms of Macedon's empire tried expanding upon Alexander's design, creating pikes as long as 22 feet, but all of these ideas were eventually abandoned in favor of the battle-tried Alexandrian sarissa. Battles often ended up stalemated in what Oliver Cromwell later described as "the terrible business of push of pike". Subsequently a lack of training and too great a reliance on the Phalanx instead of the combined use of arms (Alexander's and Philip's great contributions) led to the final defeat of Macedon by the Romans at the Battle of Pydna. Part of the reason for the rapid deterioration of the sarissa's ability was that, after Alexander, generals ceased to protect phalanxes with cavalry and light-armed troops, and phalanxes were destroyed too easily by flank attacks owing to the sarissa's tactical unwieldliness. The sarissa was gradually replaced by variations of the gladius as the weapon of choice. |
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