Hoplites (/ˈhɒplaɪts/HOP-lytes[1][2][3]) (Ancient Greek: ὁπλῖται, romanized: hoplîtai[hoplîːtai̯]) were citizen-soldiers of Ancient Greek city-states who were primarily armed with spears and shields. Hoplite soldiers used the phalanx formation to be effective in war with fewer soldiers. The formation discouraged the soldiers from acting alone, for this would compromise the formation and minimize its strengths.[4] The hoplites were primarily represented by free citizens – propertied farmers and artisans – who were able to afford a linen or bronze armour suit and weapons (estimated at a third to a half of its able-bodied adult male population).[5] It also appears in the stories of Homer, but it is thought that its use began in earnest around the 7th century BC, when weapons became cheap during the Iron Age and ordinary citizens were able to provide their own weapons. Most hoplites were not professional soldiers and often lacked sufficient military training. Some states maintained a small elite professional unit, known as the epilektoi or logades (means "the chosen") since they were picked from the regular citizen infantry. These existed at times in Athens, Sparta, Argos, Thebes, and Syracuse, among other places.[6][7] Hoplite soldiers made up the bulk of ancient Greek armies.[8]
In the 8th or 7th century BC, Greek armies adopted the phalanx formation. The formation proved successful in defeating the Persians when employed by the Athenians at the Battle of Marathon in 490 BC during the First Greco-Persian War. The Persian archers and light troops who fought in the Battle of Marathon failed because their bows were too weak for their arrows to penetrate the wall of Greek shields of the phalanx formation. The phalanx was also employed by the Greeks at the Battle of Thermopylae in 480 BC and at the Battle of Plataea in 479 BC during the Second Greco-Persian War.
The word hoplite (Greek: ὁπλίτηςhoplítēs; pl. ὁπλῖταιhoplĩtai) derives from hoplon (ὅπλον : hóplon; plural hóplaὅπλα), referring to the hoplite's equipment.[9] In the modern Hellenic Army, the word hoplite (Greek: oπλίτης : oplítîs) is used to refer to an infantryman.
^"hoplite | Definition of hoplite in English by Oxford Dictionaries". Oxford Dictionaries | English. Archived from the original on November 15, 2018. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
^"Definition of Hoplite". www.merriam-webster.com.
^"hoplite". www.dictionary.com. Retrieved 5 May 2019.
^Neer, Richard T. (2012). Art & Archaeology of the Greek World: A New History, C. 2500-c. 150 BC. New York: Thames & Hudson. p. 95. ISBN 9780500288771. OCLC 745332893.
^Gat, Azar (2006). War in Human Civilization. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. pp. 295–98. ISBN 978-0199236633.
^Lawrence A. Tritle (23 June 2014). Phocion the Good (Routledge Revivals). Routledge. pp. 77–8. ISBN 978-1-317-75050-5.
^Daniel J. Geagan (9 September 2011). Inscriptions: The Dedicatory Monuments. American School of Classical Studies at Athens. p. 94. ISBN 978-1-62139-001-5.
^Cartwright, Mark (9 February 2013). "Hoplite". World History Encyclopedia. Retrieved 1 December 2016.
^Schwartz, Adam (2009). "Reinstating the hoplite. Arms, Armour and Phalanx Fighting in Archaic and Classical Greece". Historia Einzelschriften 207: 25.
Hoplites (/ˈhɒplaɪts/ HOP-lytes) (Ancient Greek: ὁπλῖται, romanized: hoplîtai [hoplîːtai̯]) were citizen-soldiers of Ancient Greek city-states who were...
and effective. The hoplite phalanx of the Archaic and Classical periods in Greece c. 800–350 BC was the formation in which the hoplites would line up in...
the rise of the city-states evolved a new style of warfare: the hoplite phalanx. Hoplites were armored infantrymen, armed with spears and shields. Seen...
Strategos, plural strategoi, Latinized strategus, (Greek: στρατηγός, pl. στρατηγοί; Doric Greek: στραταγός, stratagos; meaning "army leader") is used in...
The hoplites were soldiers from Ancient Greece who were usually free citizens. They had a very uniform and distinct appearance; specifically they were...
Niphadoses hoplites is a moth in the family Crambidae. It was described by Ian Francis Bell Common in 1960. It is found in Australia. Nuss, M.; et al....
the army. The following spring, the Allies assembled the largest ever hoplite army and marched north from the Isthmus to confront Mardonius. At the ensuing...
Thermopylae with a small force of 1,200 men (900 helots and 300 Spartan hoplites), where he was joined by forces from other Greek city-states, who put themselves...
Greece, the hoplite was a common form of heavy infantry. All hoplites had a shield and spear, and perhaps a helmet as well. Wealthier hoplites were able...
infantry. Philip's military reforms were a new approach to the current hoplite warfare which focused on their shield, the aspis; his focus was on a new...
fastening for the forearm at the center, known as the porpax. This allowed hoplites more mobility with the shield, as well as the ability to capitalize on...
Archidamus II, who launched several invasions of Attica with the full hoplite army of the Peloponnesian League, the alliance network dominated by Sparta...
range advantage over shorter infantry spears. Under Philip II of Macedon, hoplites were equipped with extremely long spears (up to 21 feet) called sarrisae...
army's core: they participated in the Assembly (Apella) and provided the hoplites in the army. Indeed, they were supposed to be soldiers and nothing else...
ὅπλον (hóplon) means "arms". Thus, panoply refers to the full armor of a hoplite or heavily-armed soldier, i.e. the shield, breastplate, helmet, and greaves...
vases have also been found showing hoplites (men wearing Corinthian helmets, greaves and cuirasses, holding hoplite spears) carrying peltes. Often, the...
hoplite phalanx had not been obvious. Marathon was the first time a phalanx faced more lightly armed troops, and revealed how effective the hoplites could...
borders of Thessaly, and thereby block Xerxes' advance. A force of 10,000 hoplites was dispatched to the Vale of Tempe, through which they believed the Persian...
armed in the hoplite manner, with a large concave shield (Aspis) and a spear (Dory), in addition to spolas or linothorax body-armor, hoplite's helmet, greaves...
of the hoplite phalanx formation – the sole pictorial evidence of its use in the mid- to late-7th century, and terminus post quem of the "hoplite reform"...
in 2013, Hyde, while dressed in a maroon-colored sweatsuit and clad in hoplite-esque breastplate and greaves, delivered a prank TEDx talk titled "2070...
than hoplite warfare. Others have argued that the Spartans at that time were still developing hoplite tactics or that they were adapting hoplite tactics...
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