:beerchug:
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Now this was a solid response! I still don't agree with it but now at least I understand where you are coming from, now that you've listed other sources, not just Quesada Sanz, and laid out a methodical approach and criticism of the sources I brought to the table. I wasn't sure there even was a historiographic trend towards this way of thinking, but now you have convinced me to investigate these sources. Iberian military history is definitely not my field of study, so perhaps this new branch of thought in the realm of Iberian history is so recent that it just slipped my radar? After all, you said 1992 was way too long ago. Bro! Freaking Wayne's World and Reservoir Dogs were in theaters that year. You're making it sound like I'm blowing off the dust on the earliest leather-bound book cover Edward Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire and defending his arguments. :tongue:
Your argument about the quality of the sources and credentials plus specialties of the authors is obviously important, so I will weigh that when coming across additional sources that talk about guerrilla warfare. I generally tend to trust things printed by a university press, though, especially something so recent as Queiroga (2003), which has been obviously vetted and peer reviewed by people who have access to all the latest scholarship on any given matter. Still, your sources are within the same caliber, such as Jimenez (2011), so that's not something I will protest about. Max Boot is a legit military historian and Yale University alumni, but he is more into general military history and popular history, so admittedly his work that I cited (2013) isn't one that focuses exclusively on ancient Iberian warfare.
I am concerned, however, about the overall acceptance of Quesada Sanz's works and interpretations of primary sources like Dio Cassius and Appian, if encyclopedias by ABC-CLIO are still producing statements as late as 2016 with contradictory terminology for subjects like Quintus Sertorius and the Celtiberians under his command labeled as guerrillas. Laqueur (1976) might be an old source, but he laid out a rather convincing argument for why the guerrilla term has been applied to Viriathus' Lusitanians and some other Iberian groups, as emphasized in Roman historiography. The "robbers" and "highwaymen", whether they were appropriately applied to Viriathus or not, seem to be general terms the Romans used to describe rebels in Hispania, as Laqueur mentioned. It doesn't mean the Lusitanians didn't have proper field armies, it just means that guerrilla warfare existed alongside it, as far as I can tell, which would be no different than the Napoleonic occupation of Spain when Spanish armies fought French ones in the field but loosely related guerrilla forces fought elsewhere simultaneously along remote country roads and in steep northern valleys.
You're welcome. I look forward to seeing them. ;) I always thought the Lusitanians looked a little rough and preferred the Celtiberians over them, but judging by the new models on the Twitter feed they look stupendous! Keep up the good work there.Quote:
Edit: thanks for your kind words about my modding of the Iberian Peninsula. I think that the new Lusitanians will be great and fun.
For the moment nobody answered to the view of Quesada Sanz. Even Visoni-Alonzo in his chapter is not disputing his view, he is only quoting his work in a reference as a rebuttal but he is not giving his opinion. The reference is neutral.
https://i.ibb.co/0tXL8hK/image.png
Names and works invoked as authority is not a valid argument. In general, only the arguments should be disputed.
Not a valid argument but also far more relevant than someone without credentials offering blog opinions on the matter. Thanks for sharing the passage from Visoni-Alonzo. I wonder, though, how Quesada Sanz is received by any number of these historians, including archaeologist and Professor Valerio Massimo Manfredi who bluntly calls the tactics of Viriathus as guerrilla warfare, as does basically this entire video documentary:
The History Channel, a source you can trust! :surprise:
I can't speak for Spain, but living in Vietnam and frequently motorcycling around the countrysides, I can attest to an inherently treacherous geographical make-up IN THE NORTH. There is one large fertile plain that is extremely open and administratively efficient; this plain, apart from the sea-facing side, sits in isolation inside a ring of mountainous terrain. Key note: the mountainous terrain consists mostly of large hills and low-rise mountains, so not impassable - there are a multitude of small passages criss-crossing the jungle and mountains. Adding to the landscape is the area in northern-central Vietnam where there are rings of high-rise mountains that are impassable - natural fortresses; the valleys inside the rings become little Kasmirs where autonomy from central authority is virtually guaranteed.
An invasion force from the northern Sino Court has 2 options: marching in thin columns across the mountain terrains to get to the central plain or stage an amphibious invasion by sea. The former option is prone to ambushes and supply disruptions as the locals can easily navigate the criss-crossing networks of small paths to disperse and concentrate at any point along the enemy column/supply lines. Any long-term occupation of northern Vietnam relies heavily on the ability to flush out hostile elements over a wide mountainous while maintaining outposts and small fortifications along the supply lines from China to the central plain in north Vietnam. Spoiler alert: it's super difficult, and the moment a rebellion becomes successful enough to reverse all these efforts, it's back to ground-zero for the northern invaders. This is the primary reason why once a major revolt becomes successful, it takes 10s of years to re-subjugate this part of the world.
How about the sea-route, I hear you protest. I'm a motorist, so I'm speculating here. The tides in Vietnam water are extremely volatile, I hear. On high-tide, it could support a major warship going deep inland, but during low-tide, they became sitting ducks for smaller crafts. This drastic different in the water level also allows for a medieval-equivalent of a minefield. Stakes with ironed-tips were planted at various locations along the river route. During high-tide, the water was so deep they were invisible to observers, but as low-tide cames, the water was so low that they protruded out in open-sight, and that, as records showed, could puncture the bottom decks of warships. Imagine your supply lines going to the river ports losing 10% to attrition everyday during low-tides.
And those mini-Kasmirs in the northern-central Vietnam are extremely effective sallying point to launch attacks into the central plain. You cannot conquer them, but they routinely send out groups of young warriors into your vulnerable administrative centers to disrupt your supply lines and kill your high-quality bureaucrats. It just sucks to occupy northern Vietnam alone because of the especially treacherous setup of the geography.
In contrast, it's extremely easy to occupy and hold southern Vietnam, thanks majorly to the super friend geographical setup there.
I'm not taking a position, but I'm sure you read plenty of professors blindly repeating outdated stereotypes, especially on military matters, simply due to either:
1) lack of knowledge of the most recent research on very specific matters
2) lack of will to change their own decade-old, well-established views
As far as his documentaries are concerned, V.M. Manfredi seems to belong to one of the above categories. As Genava said, better not to judge a paper or book from his author, but for the arguments it carries.
As an example, I hope to be wrong, but I would be willing to bet that most academics in Italy still thinks Celts fought like mindless brutes. :doh:
P.S. Maybe I can't take V.M. Manfredi very seriously after I read a novel he wrote about flying chinese kung-fu ninjas vs. roman legionaries, or something... :laughter:
Yep, the Red River Delta, like many other river deltas, makes it easy to get around, including an army if you have the right vessels for transport, but ironically the Chinese were never able to conquer Champa in southern Vietnam. Likewise the Kingdom of Dai Viet in northern Vietnam, after winning independence from the Chinese in the 10th century AD, wasn't able to conquer Champa until the 19th century! Not long after that point the French then took over the entire country as the colony of French Indochina.
Most people in the West just view Vietnam and other East Asian countries as big monolithic nations and ethnic blocks, but in reality Vietnam, due to its hellish terrain, especially in the north, has been able to retain various different regional cultures and ethnic enclaves, including Hmong people and many others. This is obviously comparable to northern Spain with the semi-autonomous regions and the traditionally independent realms of Navarre, Catalonia, Aragon, and the Basque countries that for a long time operated outside the control of the Crown of Castile and have found ways to avoid the central authority of Madrid.
The History Channel is autistic like that. Can't deny it. :tongue: I usually divorce the terrible reenactment stuff from the scholarly narrative lectures going on in the background by actual accredited academics.
I think the Chinese would take offense at being compared to Japanese ninjas if that's the case. :tongue:
I also think most academics get the idea that the Celts used actual tactics, not just swarms and unorganized blobs of bare-chested berserkers, and moved their forces around strategically like they did when opposing Julius Caesar in his landings in the British Isles after he secured Gaul.
Sometimes, I suspect that movie people are contractually obliged to have at least 90% bows among the missile weapons depicted for any pre-modern or fantasy culture, regardless of timeframe, culture, or other context, and regardless of genre. I blame the bowyer mafia.
That, plus you need to consider that theirs is a high degree of specialization in one particular sub-field of one particular field of study, and thusly, you can have a history professor who knows everything about ancient Rome but nothing about ancient China, etc. And I do think that most of them are not very well acquainted with historical martial arts etc. A person can be highly edcated in one field, yet hold extremely silly views on another.
I didn't even know Manfredi was an archaeologist and historian; I read one of his novels and assumed he was just another crafter of purple prose.
Looking up the Celts, or other "barbarian" groups like China's Four Barbarians or the Persian's Sakas, the issue seems to go far beyond our Western society. It's like if peoples were nails, monoliths are hammers.
You'd think so, but those Naruto stalls I saw when visiting China say otherwise. And I wouldn't be shocked if most Katanas existing in the world right now were literally Made in China.
And if there's China, there's repeating crossbows too. Always with the **** repeating crossbows. Same goes for performance Wushu.
Perfectly said. I'd add that many are not even that interested in the "history of violence", seeing it as something despicable. I think this transpires in many articles and books I read, where authors wrote many things about ancient armies from their academic point of view, but didn't seem really that interested in how they actually worked. Personal impression of mine.
I wrote in Italy though. There's still plenty of Roman fanboys here. :tongue:
After all this thread. I'm wondering if we can get some Events or scripts that trigger in Spain that make it hard to conquer as a Hellenistic or roman faction. I know where getting more rebellion chances script. But i also think certain areas should get some specific scripts for them to really be a pain to conquer.
Regarding the Iberian warfare, I think that I forgot to suggest this paper that is written in English:
https://www.researchgate.net/publica...ellenistic_Age
You see this, Devs? This is what happens you take too long to make a release.