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100-527: The Macedonian phalanx ( Greek : Μακεδονική φάλαγξ ) was an infantry formation developed by Philip II from the classical Greek phalanx , of which the main innovation was the use of the sarissa , a 6-metre pike. It was famously commanded by Philip's son Alexander the Great during his conquest of the Achaemenid Empire between 334 and 323 BC. The Macedonian phalanx model then spread throughout

200-676: A Celtic-style longsword or an Iberian falcata . Together with the Gallic nobles, it was likely these horsemen who at the Battle of Cannae charged and then broke the Roman and Italian cavalry. The ancient Greeks called armoured cavalry Kataphraktos (pl. Kataphraktoi ) which translated means roughly "covered, protected" or "armoured". The term was later borrowed by the Romans (the Latin variant in

300-455: A 10-by-10 square with very few experienced troops. The phalanx was later changed to a 16-by-16 formation, and while the date for this change is still unknown, it occurred before 331 under Philip's rule. Philip called the soldiers in the phalanx pezhetairoi , meaning 'foot-companions', bolstering the importance of the phalanx to the King. Philip also increased the amount of training required for

400-461: A 45-degree angle in an attempt to ward off arrows or other projectiles. The secondary weapon was a shortsword called a xiphos . The phalangites also had a smaller and flatter shield than that of the Greek aspis , measuring about 24 inches and weighing about 12 pounds. The shield, called a " telamon ", was made of bronze plated wood and was worn hung around the neck so as to free up both hands to wield

500-454: A Celtic burial in Ciumesti in modern-day Romania. Mail and occasionally bronze armour were restricted generally to the nobility and chieftains of Celtic society, and the additional cost of maintaining a horse trained for the din and chaos of battle ensured that those men who could afford a full panoply of mail and a good quality warhorse were highly motivated, not merely by their status but by

600-660: A backplate, instead of a full cuirass, as well as a helmet. By 1705, the Holy Roman Emperor's personal forces in Austria included twenty cuirassier regiments. Imperial Russia formed its own cuirassier regiments in 1732, including a Leib Guards regiment. The Russian cuirassier units took part in the Russo-Turkish War . Cuirassiers played a prominent role in the armies of Frederick the Great of Prussia and of Napoleon I of France . The latter increased

700-577: A basis for coinages: anthropology , photography , telephony , isomer , biomechanics , cinematography , etc. Together with Latin words , they form the foundation of international scientific and technical vocabulary ; for example, all words ending in -logy ('discourse'). There are many English words of Greek origin . Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European language family. The ancient language most closely related to it may be ancient Macedonian , which, by most accounts,

800-408: A battle and then slid together when they were being used. At close range such large weapons were of little use, but an intact phalanx could easily keep its enemies at a distance. The weapons of the first five rows of men all projected beyond the front of the formation, so that there were more spear points than available targets at any given time. Men in rows behind the initial five angled their spears at

900-538: A bullet. A regiment of cuirassiers killed the Swedish king Gustavus Adolphus at the 1632 Battle of Lützen . The French introduced their own cuirassiers in 1666. However, the amount of armour worn by the cavalry of the European armies in battle had been substantially reduced, with even the cuirass often worn only to the front. The heavy cavalry's use of plate armor covering most of the body greatly diminished after

1000-711: A ceremony known as " dubbing ", swearing allegiance to his feudal masters, charity, and protection of other Christians, as well as to respect the law of the land. Muslim military advances in Sub-Saharan Africa relied heavily on armoured cavalry, playing a similar role to that in medieval Europe . The Heavy cavalry of the Oyo Empire located in what are now Nigeria and Benin entailed cavalrymen armed with heavy thrusting spears and swords and protected by mail armor. Selected horses were larger imported horses from other neighbouring kingdoms. In China, heavy cavalry

1100-484: A devastating charge. Given the increased bullet velocity and accuracy of 19th century firearms, already during the Napoleonic era, the cuirass of the cuirassers of the time was intended primarily as protection from melee attacks (bayonet thrusts, sabre cuts, etc.), rather than from enemy gunfire . Cuirassiers of the 19th century could no longer rely on their armour to largely withstand firearm projectiles, unlike with

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1200-661: A dual-purpose role as horse archers and cataphracts. Ammianus Marcellinus , a Roman general and historian who served in the army of Constantius II in Gaul and Persia, fought against the Persians under Julian the Apostate and took part in the retreat of his successor, Jovian . He describes the Persian cataphract as: All their companies clad in iron, and all parts of their bodies were covered with thick plates, so fitted that

1300-558: A fairly stable set of consonantal contrasts . The main phonological changes occurred during the Hellenistic and Roman period (see Koine Greek phonology for details): In all its stages, the morphology of Greek shows an extensive set of productive derivational affixes , a limited but productive system of compounding and a rich inflectional system. Although its morphological categories have been fairly stable over time, morphological changes are present throughout, particularly in

1400-508: A faster, more convenient cursive writing style with the use of ink and quill . The Greek alphabet consists of 24 letters, each with an uppercase ( majuscule ) and lowercase ( minuscule ) form. The letter sigma has an additional lowercase form (ς) used in the final position of a word: In addition to the letters, the Greek alphabet features a number of diacritical signs : three different accent marks ( acute , grave , and circumflex ), originally denoting different shapes of pitch accent on

1500-416: A few years they became a squire , an apprentice and personal assistant to a fully fledged knight, responsible for maintaining the knight's horse and equipment, as well as arming him for battle. At this point he could choose to remain a squire or become a knight, though many remained a squire due to the restrictions and expense of becoming a knight. A squire was made a knight by his superior lord or king through

1600-540: A foreign language. It is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, " Homeric Greek is probably closer to Demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English ". Greek is spoken today by at least 13 million people, principally in Greece and Cyprus along with a sizable Greek-speaking minority in Albania near

1700-426: A means of securing the loyalty of knights to the king . Knighthood was a hereditary title , and was usually passed on by a father to his eldest son. All prospective knights were trained from childhood in the knightly traditions of chivalry as well as war. At the age of six, they first became a servant, or page , in another knight's or lord's household, where they learned etiquette as well as basic combat, and after

1800-467: A new kind of Byzantine army, which is known as the Komnenian army . Yet it seems that the cataphract was eventually superseded by other types of armoured cavalry. The emperor Manuel I Komnenos , for example, re-equipped his elite cavalry in the style of western knights. It is difficult to determine when exactly the cataphract saw his final day in battle. After all, both cataphracts and knights fulfilled

1900-428: A self-perpetuating 'hammer blow' tactic where the cataphract lancers would charge again and again until the enemy broke, all the while supported by cataphract archers. Contemporary depictions however imply that they were not as completely armoured as earlier Roman and Sassanid types—horse armour is noticeably absent. Byzantine cataphracts of the 10th century were drawn from the ranks of the middle class landowners through

2000-400: A similar role on the medieval battlefield, and the armoured knight survived well into the modern age. The Byzantines called all heavy shock cavalry kataphraktoi . The Byzantine army maintained units of heavily armoured cavalrymen up to its last years, while neighbouring Bulgars , Serbs , Muscovites , and other eastern European peoples emulated Byzantine military training and equipment. In

2100-425: A straight-bladed, double-edged one-handed sword (an evolution of the medieval arming sword ) and a rider pistol (the first pistol firearms having been invented in the 16th century), or (ii) the demi-lancer - an armoured lancer wearing three-quarters plate armor that continued the mounted man-at-arms lancer traditions established in the late Middle Ages (e.g. in the 15 century). The Polish-Lithuanian winged hussars and

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2200-804: Is also found in Bulgaria near the Greek-Bulgarian border. Greek is also spoken worldwide by the sizable Greek diaspora which has notable communities in the United States , Australia , Canada , South Africa , Chile , Brazil , Argentina , Russia , Ukraine , the United Kingdom , and throughout the European Union , especially in Germany . Historically, significant Greek-speaking communities and regions were found throughout

2300-773: Is an Indo-European language, constituting an independent Hellenic branch within the Indo-European language family. It is native to Greece , Cyprus , Italy (in Calabria and Salento ), southern Albania , and other regions of the Balkans , Caucasus , the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor , and the Eastern Mediterranean . It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system

2400-479: Is an Indo-European language, but also includes a number of borrowings from the languages of the populations that inhabited Greece before the arrival of Proto-Greeks, some documented in Mycenaean texts ; they include a large number of Greek toponyms . The form and meaning of many words have changed. Loanwords (words of foreign origin) have entered the language, mainly from Latin, Venetian , and Turkish . During

2500-617: Is later thought to have helped stimulate the creation of early knightly classes in the Carolingian empire . It has controversially been argued that the stirrup was responsible for the development of feudalism, though this is not fully accepted. Byzantine cataphracts were a much feared force in their heyday. The army of Emperor Nicephorus II , the 'Pale Death of the Saracens' himself, relied on its cataphracts as its nucleus, coupling cataphract archers with cataphract lancers to create

2600-519: Is protected and promoted officially as a regional and minority language in Armenia, Hungary , Romania, and Ukraine. It is recognized as a minority language and protected in Turkey by the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne . The phonology , morphology , syntax , and vocabulary of the language show both conservative and innovative tendencies across the entire attestation of the language from the ancient to

2700-825: Is sometimes called aljamiado , as when Romance languages are written in the Arabic alphabet. Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Greek: Transcription of the example text into Latin alphabet : Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in English: Proto-Greek Mycenaean Ancient Koine Medieval Modern Heavy cavalry Iranian tribes such as

2800-526: Is spoken by at least 13.5 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey , and the many other countries of the Greek diaspora . Greek roots have been widely used for centuries and continue to be widely used to coin new words in other languages; Greek and Latin are the predominant sources of international scientific vocabulary . Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around

2900-763: Is still used internationally for the writing of Ancient Greek . In Greek, the question mark is written as the English semicolon, while the functions of the colon and semicolon are performed by a raised point (•), known as the ano teleia ( άνω τελεία ). In Greek the comma also functions as a silent letter in a handful of Greek words, principally distinguishing ό,τι ( ó,ti , 'whatever') from ότι ( óti , 'that'). Ancient Greek texts often used scriptio continua ('continuous writing'), which means that ancient authors and scribes would write word after word with no spaces or punctuation between words to differentiate or mark boundaries. Boustrophedon , or bi-directional text,

3000-599: Is the Greek alphabet , which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary . The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin , Cyrillic , Coptic , Gothic , and many other writing systems. The Greek language holds a very important place in the history of the Western world. Beginning with

3100-469: The Battle of Delium showing how their intervention could turn the tide of a battle. The city-state of Thebes was particularly famous for its cavalry, with the famed Theban commander Epaminondas using his heavy horse to great effect both at Leuctra as well as Mantineia to rout the Spartan cavalry, and in the process disrupting the legendary Spartan phalanx as well, helping his own hoplites win

Macedonian phalanx - Misplaced Pages Continue

3200-495: The Eastern Mediterranean , in what are today Southern Italy , Turkey , Cyprus , Syria , Lebanon , Israel , Palestine , Egypt , and Libya ; in the area of the Black Sea , in what are today Turkey, Bulgaria , Romania , Ukraine , Russia , Georgia , Armenia , and Azerbaijan ; and, to a lesser extent, in the Western Mediterranean in and around colonies such as Massalia , Monoikos , and Mainake . It

3300-516: The Goguryeo era (37 BC–668 AD). Lamellar armour was used for both men and horses, with the soldiers carrying lances. Another Goguryeo-era mural shows an armoured cavalryman wielding his lance using both hands, unlike the couched-lance used by medieval European knights. During the Koryo dynasty (918–1392) barding (horse-armour) was still used, but the number of barded heavy cavalry remains unknown. By

3400-729: The Hellenistic world , where it became the standard battle formation for pitched battles. During the Macedonian Wars against the Roman Republic (214–148 BC), the phalanx appeared obsolete against the more manoeuvrable Roman legions . In 359 BC, following the Macedonian defeat by the Illyrians , which killed the majority of Macedonia 's army and King Perdiccas III of Macedon , Perdiccas' brother Philip II took

3500-690: The Holy Roman Empire in the Italian Wars . Central saw the emergence of winged hussars that proved a decisive factor in the territorial gains of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and in its wars with Sweden , Muscovy , and the Ottoman Turks . The winged hussars developed in the second half of the 16th century and were inspired by very similar Hungarian armoured hussars, a lance-wielding and armoured offshoot of

3600-516: The Indo-Iranian languages (see Graeco-Aryan ), but little definitive evidence has been found. In addition, Albanian has also been considered somewhat related to Greek and Armenian, and it has been proposed that they all form a higher-order subgroup along with other extinct languages of the ancient Balkans; this higher-order subgroup is usually termed Palaeo-Balkan , and Greek has a central position in it. Linear B , attested as early as

3700-600: The Massagetae were believed to be the originator of the class of heavy cavalry known as cataphract . During the time of Achaemenid Persia cavalry was the elite arm of service (as was the case in most civilizations), and many Persian horsemen such as the bodyguard unit of Cyrus the Younger were rather heavily armoured by the standards of the era. By the time of Alexander's invasion cataphract units with both men and beasts being fully encased in armour were already in use by

3800-631: The Roman Empire being Cataphractarii ) and until the Middle Ages in Europe, continued to be used to designate armoured cavalry. However, as with other types of cavalry, heavy cavalry was not employed in any significant capacity in wars between the Greek city states until later, mainly due to the prevalence of hoplite warfare as well as the mountainous terrain of Central Greece . The lack of suitable grassland and excess grain supply necessary for

3900-567: The Tang dynasty (618–907) the importance of infantry and lighter-armed cavalry and infantry increased while that of the armoured cavalry decreased, with horse armour seldom used. However, armoured cavalry were again used by the Song dynasty (960–1279) and its enemies, including the Jin , Xi Xia , Mongols , and Khitans . In Korea, the earliest evidence of armoured cavalry is a mid-4th century AD mural of

4000-542: The United States in the late 18th century in Spanish Arizona . The last time cavalry of both belligerents wore cuirasses in battle was during the Franco-Prussian War . The Imperial German and Russian cuirassiers subsequently discarded this armour for all but parade purposes, but the twelve regiments of French heavy cavalry still in existence in 1914 wore their cuirasses on active service during

4100-492: The nominal and verbal systems. The major change in the nominal morphology since the classical stage was the disuse of the dative case (its functions being largely taken over by the genitive ). The verbal system has lost the infinitive , the synthetically -formed future, and perfect tenses and the optative mood . Many have been replaced by periphrastic ( analytical ) forms. Pronouns show distinctions in person (1st, 2nd, and 3rd), number (singular, dual , and plural in

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4200-453: The sarissa . All of the armor and weaponry a phalangite would carry totaled about 40 pounds, which was close to 10 pounds less than the weight of Greek hoplites' equipment. The phalanx consisted of a line-up of several battalion blocks called syntagmata , each of its 16 files ( lochoi ) numbering 16 men, for a total of 256 in each unit. Each syntagma was commanded by a syntagmatarch , who—together with his subordinate officers—would form

4300-470: The shock cavalry of the Middle East and North Africa, the heavy cavalry of Gaul and Celtiberia being widely regarded as some of the finest horsemen of the ancient world. The Gauls were known to be able to hurl their javelins while retreating, and to use a system whereby a cavalryman was supported by two other men with fresh horses who could resupply him with missiles. For close combat the main weapon

4400-470: The 3rd millennium BC, or possibly earlier. The earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the world's oldest recorded living language . Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now-extinct Anatolian languages . The Greek language is conventionally divided into

4500-600: The Celtiberi, widely employed by the Carthaginians, included men who may have ridden on mail-armoured horses. Known to the Romans as "Lanciarii" (not to be confused with the spear-armed infantry of the Eastern Roman Empire), they are represented in several Iberian carvings of the period. They may have carried the " soliferrum ", the all-iron javelin unique to Iberia, in addition to a spear and shield and

4600-649: The Companions was the first cavalry force that was known to represent archetypal heavy cavalry. The Companion cavalry, or Hetairoi , were the elite arm of the Macedonian army, and have been regarded as the best cavalry in the ancient world . In the aftermath of the Macedonian Empire , the Diadochi , successor states created by Alexander the Great's generals, continued the usage of heavy cavalry in their own forces. The Seleucids in particular introduced

4700-486: The Greek alphabet since approximately the 9th century BC. It was created by modifying the Phoenician alphabet , with the innovation of adopting certain letters to represent the vowels. The variant of the alphabet in use today is essentially the late Ionic variant, introduced for writing classical Attic in 403 BC. In classical Greek, as in classical Latin, only upper-case letters existed. The lower-case Greek letters were developed much later by medieval scribes to permit

4800-425: The Greek language are often emphasized. Although Greek has undergone morphological and phonological changes comparable to those seen in other languages, never since classical antiquity has its cultural, literary, and orthographic tradition been interrupted to the extent that one can speak of a new language emerging. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than

4900-495: The Greek language was the Cypriot syllabary (also a descendant of Linear A via the intermediate Cypro-Minoan syllabary ), which is closely related to Linear B but uses somewhat different syllabic conventions to represent phoneme sequences. The Cypriot syllabary is attested in Cyprus from the 11th century BC until its gradual abandonment in the late Classical period, in favor of the standard Greek alphabet. Greek has been written in

5000-629: The Greek verb have likewise remained largely the same over the course of the language's history but with significant changes in the number of distinctions within each category and their morphological expression. Greek verbs have synthetic inflectional forms for: Many aspects of the syntax of Greek have remained constant: verbs agree with their subject only, the use of the surviving cases is largely intact (nominative for subjects and predicates, accusative for objects of most verbs and many prepositions, genitive for possessors), articles precede nouns, adpositions are largely prepositional, relative clauses follow

5100-685: The Greek-Albanian border. A significant percentage of Albania's population has knowledge of the Greek language due in part to the Albanian wave of immigration to Greece in the 1980s and '90s and the Greek community in the country. Prior to the Greco-Turkish War and the resulting population exchange in 1923 a very large population of Greek-speakers also existed in Turkey , though very few remain today. A small Greek-speaking community

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5200-668: The Greeks to create their own cavalry arm, the Hippeis , composed mostly of upper-class citizens who could afford to maintain a horse. While cavalry played an increasingly greater part in Greek warfare, its roles were generally restricted to scouting, skirmishing and pursuit. However, by the end of the Peloponnesian War , heavy cavalry charges had started to play an increasingly important part in Ancient Greek warfare, with

5300-593: The Hungarian armoured hussars-lancers that inspired the winged hussars represented a central European counterpart to the demi-lancer, serving similar tactical roles on 16th and 17th century battlefields. Cuirassiers played a very large role in the Thirty Years' War and the related Eighty Years' War , particularly under the House of Orange and Duchy of Savoy . They represented the last gasp of full plate armour on

5400-403: The Persians. The Parthian Empire of Ancient Iran marks an early recorded utilization of armoured cavalry in warfare, and are specifically believed to have given rise to the tradition of very heavily armoured cataphract lancers. These had a distinct role from ordinary heavy cavalry and were primarily used as an elite assault force, to pummel infantry formations into submission, or even acted in

5500-461: The Thirty Year's War. Cuirassiers transitioned to using only a helmet and an enclosed cuirass. In the latter half of the 17th century, most European lancers abandoned the use of armor aside from a helmet, and occasionally a cuirass. European lancers from the 18th century onward were unarmoured light cavalry. Some of the 17th century heavy cavalry also wore a pauncer , a front-only cuirass without

5600-404: The acute during the late 20th century, and it has only been retained in typography . After the writing reform of 1982, most diacritics are no longer used. Since then, Greek has been written mostly in the simplified monotonic orthography (or monotonic system), which employs only the acute accent and the diaeresis. The traditional system, now called the polytonic orthography (or polytonic system),

5700-402: The ancient language; singular and plural alone in later stages), and gender (masculine, feminine, and neuter), and decline for case (from six cases in the earliest forms attested to four in the modern language). Nouns, articles, and adjectives show all the distinctions except for a person. Both attributive and predicative adjectives agree with the noun. The inflectional categories of

5800-533: The battle. The development of the saddle as well as increasingly larger horse breeds led to creation of the Macedonian Companion cavalry developed during the reign of Philip II of Macedon , likely based on the Theban model, as he had spent his youth in the house of Epaminondas as a hostage. This force was later used with great effect by his son, Alexander the Great . In both role and equipment,

5900-427: The battlefield. They would have worn very distinctive plate armour, which typically featured very long and wide tassets , articulated leg protectors which would extend all the way from the breastplate down to the knees. The head would typically have been protected by a fully enclosed burgonet , of which the "Savoyard" style was one notable type. This rounded helmet, frequently featuring a stylized or grotesque face mask,

6000-404: The early 19th century that was used for literary and official purposes in the newly formed Greek state. In 1976, Dimotiki was declared the official language of Greece, after having incorporated features of Katharevousa and thus giving birth to Standard Modern Greek , used today for all official purposes and in education . The historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of

6100-524: The early Middle Ages, the rank of knight was loosely defined. In late Carolingian France (10th century) persons occupying this role were known by the Latin term miles (plur. milites ). This term designated a professional fighting man in the emerging feudal system . Many were as poor as the peasant class. However, over time, as this class of fighter became more prominent in post-Carolingian France, they became wealthier and began to hold and inherit land. Eventually fighting on horseback became synonymous with

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6200-558: The early years of the Chosun dynasty (1392–1897) barding was no longer used, and the horseman's main weapon was the bow, with lances and other close-combat weapons seldom used. However, starting from at least the 17th century, the Korean cavalry began to carry two-handed flails along with bows. Armoured cavalry, in the form of the gendarme , was at its highest as a proportion of the total number of combatants in many Renaissance armies, especially in France . Other Western European states also used heavy cavalry very often, such as Spain and

6300-405: The elite warrior caste. From the 12th century onwards, the term became associated to cavalry and nobility in general, and thus to the earlier Roman equestrian class (see esquire ) as well as the Greek Hippei class. As the expense of equipping and maintaining a knight's equipment was beyond the ability of the primitive medieval state to support, the feudal system became more important as

6400-466: The emphasis that Celtic society placed on personal success and courage. At the Battle of Carrhae , Gallic auxiliary cavalry met with the completely armoured Parthian cataphracts. Despite being outmatched the Gauls fought fiercely and well before being annihilated in a protracted melee. The small size of Celtic horses meant that the Celtic heavy cavalry of north-western and central Europe appear to have been employed as heavy skirmisher cavalry, rather than

6500-448: The epics of Homer , ancient Greek literature includes many works of lasting importance in the European canon . Greek is also the language in which many of the foundational texts in science and philosophy were originally composed. The New Testament of the Christian Bible was also originally written in Greek. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world , the Greek texts and Greek societies of antiquity constitute

6600-449: The first row of each block. Each file was led and commanded by a dekadarch who were the most experienced Macedonian soldiers and received about triple pay. The leader was followed by another two experienced Macedonian soldiers, with a third positioned at the very end of the file, all three who received about double pay. The rest of the file was filled up by more inexperienced soldiers, often Persians during Alexander's campaign. The phalanx

6700-452: The following periods: In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia : the coexistence of vernacular and archaizing written forms of the language. What came to be known as the Greek language question was a polarization between two competing varieties of Modern Greek: Dimotiki , the vernacular form of Modern Greek proper, and Katharevousa , meaning 'purified', a compromise between Dimotiki and Ancient Greek developed in

6800-422: The gleam of moving bodies covered with closely fitting plates of iron dazzled the eyes of those who looked upon them, while the whole throng of horses was protected by coverings of leather. The Celts of western and central Europe are among the first peoples in the region known to have made use of heavy cavalry. It is generally accepted that the Celts were the originators of mail armour, the earliest find being from

6900-402: The horse-rearing plains of Anatolia after they lost the decisive Battle of Manzikert to lighter Turk cavalry, they slowly dropped out of use. But according to J. Birkenmeier in "The development of the Komnenian army: 1081–1180", units of 'Kataphraktoi' (cataphracts) were still being used during the 12th century. The Komnenian restoration of the Byzantine Empire during that century created

7000-436: The infantry and introduced regulations on military behaviour. During Alexander's campaign, the phalanx remained more or less the same, with the notable difference being more non-Macedonian soldiers among the ranks. Each phalangite carried as his primary weapon a sarissa , a double-pointed pike over 6 m (18 ft) in length, weighing about 6.6 kg (14.5 pounds). The sarissae were carried in two pieces before

7100-439: The infinitive entirely (employing a raft of new periphrastic constructions instead) and uses participles more restrictively. The loss of the dative led to a rise of prepositional indirect objects (and the use of the genitive to directly mark these as well). Ancient Greek tended to be verb-final, but neutral word order in the modern language is VSO or SVO. Modern Greek inherits most of its vocabulary from Ancient Greek, which in turn

7200-467: The late 15th century BC, was the first script used to write Greek. It is basically a syllabary , which was finally deciphered by Michael Ventris and John Chadwick in the 1950s (its precursor, Linear A , has not been deciphered and most likely encodes a non-Greek language). The language of the Linear B texts, Mycenaean Greek , is the earliest known form of Greek. Another similar system used to write

7300-640: The membership of Greece and Cyprus in the European Union, Greek is one of the organization's 24 official languages . Greek is recognized as a minority language in Albania, and used co-officially in some of its municipalities, in the districts of Gjirokastër and Sarandë . It is also an official minority language in the regions of Apulia and Calabria in Italy. In the framework of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages , Greek

7400-441: The modern period. The division into conventional periods is, as with all such periodizations, relatively arbitrary, especially because, in all periods, Ancient Greek has enjoyed high prestige, and the literate borrowed heavily from it. Across its history, the syllabic structure of Greek has varied little: Greek shows a mixed syllable structure, permitting complex syllabic onsets but very restricted codas. It has only oral vowels and

7500-594: The more typical, unarmoured, light cavalry hussars (which originated in Serbia and Hungary and eventually appeared in Poland as well by the early 16th century). Later, the cuirassier was the main form of heavy cavalry, beginning in 1484 with the 100-man strong regiments of Austrian kyrissers for the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian . In the early 16th century heavy cavalry in the European armies

7600-399: The noun they modify and relative pronouns are clause-initial. However, the morphological changes also have their counterparts in the syntax, and there are also significant differences between the syntax of the ancient and that of the modern form of the language . Ancient Greek made great use of participial constructions and of constructions involving the infinitive, and the modern variety lacks

7700-411: The number of French cuirassier regiments to fourteen by the end of his reign, although they gradually declined in importance as the firepower and accuracy of the muskets and rifles of the infantrymen increased. The cavalry still remained battle-deciders though, with Napoleon maintaining several reserve cavalry corps to be employed at the decisive moment in battle to finally break the enemy formations with

7800-536: The objects of study of the discipline of Classics . During antiquity , Greek was by far the most widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world . It eventually became the official language of the Byzantine Empire and developed into Medieval Greek . In its modern form , Greek is the official language of Greece and Cyprus and one of the 24 official languages of the European Union . It

7900-706: The older periods of Greek, loanwords into Greek acquired Greek inflections, thus leaving only a foreign root word. Modern borrowings (from the 20th century on), especially from French and English, are typically not inflected; other modern borrowings are derived from Albanian , South Slavic ( Macedonian / Bulgarian ) and Eastern Romance languages ( Aromanian and Megleno-Romanian ). Greek words have been widely borrowed into other languages, including English. Example words include: mathematics , physics , astronomy , democracy , philosophy , athletics , theatre, rhetoric , baptism , evangelist , etc. Moreover, Greek words and word elements continue to be productive as

8000-421: The phalanx as their arm of choice, but instead used it to hold the enemy in place while their heavy cavalry broke through their ranks. The Macedonian cavalry fought in wedge formation and was almost always stationed on the far right. The hypaspists , elite infantrymen who served as the king's bodyguard, were stationed on the immediate right of the phalanx wielding hoplite sized spears and shields. The left flank

8100-474: The production of good cavalry mounts was also crippling to the establishment of an effective cavalry force, the noted Greek mercenary and writer Xenophon once saying that a horse farm was the most expensive type of establishment to keep running. The exception was in Northern Greece , where large flat areas of grassland made cavalry much more practical. Eventually, encounters with Persian cavalry led

8200-451: The rider, which allowed the knight to use a sword more efficiently without falling, especially against infantry adversaries. The metal stirrup was invented in 4th century China, and spread to Europe by the late 6th or early 7th century, primarily due to invaders from Central Asia , such as the Avars and Cumans . By the 8th century the stirrup was in widespread European use, and

8300-518: The slower projectiles of previous centuries. From roughly 1650 to 1820, Spanish heavy cavalry fought Apache warriors in North America . Several small battles occurred; most of the time the Spanish lancers were outnumbered severely but still managed to defeat Apache armies, hundreds of men strong. The climax of these conflicts occurred in the region of present-day Tucson , Arizona , in

8400-472: The stiff joints conformed with those of their limbs; and forms of the human faces were so skillfully fitted to their heads, that since their entire bodies were covered with metal, arrows that fell upon them could lodge only where they could see a little through tiny openings opposite the pupil of the eye, or where through the tips of their noses they were able to get a little breath. The Persians opposed us serried bands of mail-clad horsemen in such close order that

8500-446: The stirrup is often called the third revolutionary step in equipment, after the chariot and the saddle . The basic tactics of mounted warfare were significantly altered by the stirrup. A rider supported by stirrups was less likely to fall off while fighting, and could deliver a blow with a weapon that more fully employed the weight and momentum of horse and rider. Among other advantages, stirrups provided greater balance and support to

8600-437: The stressed vowel; the so-called breathing marks ( rough and smooth breathing ), originally used to signal presence or absence of word-initial /h/; and the diaeresis , used to mark the full syllabic value of a vowel that would otherwise be read as part of a diphthong. These marks were introduced during the course of the Hellenistic period. Actual usage of the grave in handwriting saw a rapid decline in favor of uniform usage of

8700-420: The theme system, providing the Byzantine Empire with a motivated and professional force. An experimental type of cataphract was brought to the fore in the 10th and 11th centuries known as the klibanaphoros , "bearer of klibanion "—named after the clibanarius and a throwback to the very heavily armoured cavalry of earlier days. However, the traditional view is that after the loss of prestige, men and material and

8800-452: The throne. Philip II was a hostage in Thebes for much of his youth (367–360), where he witnessed the combat tactics of the general Epaminondas , which then influenced his restructuring of the 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 weapon, the sarissa . The first phalanx was

8900-429: The use of cataphracts into Western warfare, having learned the practice of completely armouring both man and horse from Iranian tribes encountered during the wars of Alexander the Great . The stirrup, which gives greater stability to a rider, has been described as one of the most significant inventions in the history of warfare , prior to the use of gunpowder . As a tool allowing expanded use of horses in warfare ,

9000-515: Was a distinct dialect of Greek itself. Aside from the Macedonian question, current consensus regards Phrygian as the closest relative of Greek, since they share a number of phonological, morphological and lexical isoglosses , with some being exclusive between them. Scholars have proposed a Graeco-Phrygian subgroup out of which Greek and Phrygian originated. Among living languages, some Indo-Europeanists suggest that Greek may be most closely related to Armenian (see Graeco-Armenian ) or

9100-568: Was also used as the official language of government and religion in the Christian Nubian kingdoms , for most of their history. Greek, in its modern form, is the official language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population. It is also the official language of Cyprus (nominally alongside Turkish ) and the British Overseas Territory of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (alongside English ). Because of

9200-494: Was also used in Ancient Greek. Greek has occasionally been written in the Latin script , especially in areas under Venetian rule or by Greek Catholics . The term Frankolevantinika / Φραγκολεβαντίνικα applies when the Latin script is used to write Greek in the cultural ambit of Catholicism (because Frankos / Φράγκος is an older Greek term for West-European dating to when most of (Roman Catholic Christian) West Europe

9300-569: Was developed during the Han dynasty (202 BC–220 AD), with armoured lancers becoming widespread during the Western Han era. Armoured cavalry, with both soldier and steed clad in complete armour, were employed in the late Han dynasty, and became widespread in the 4th century AD, where it was the main striking force of the armies of the Northern dynasties of China (4th century to 6th century.) During

9400-430: Was divided into taxis based on geographical recruitment differences. The phalanx used the "oblique line with reduced left" arrangement, designed to force enemies to engage with soldiers on the furthest right end, increasing the risk of opening a gap in their lines for the cavalry to break through. Due to the structure of the phalanx, it was weakest in the rear and on the right. Neither Philip nor Alexander actually used

9500-515: Was generally covered by allied cavalry supplied by the Thessalians , which fought in rhomboid formation and served mainly in a defensive role. Other forces— skirmishers , range troops, reserves of allied hoplites, archers , and artillery —were also employed. Greek language Greek ( Modern Greek : Ελληνικά , romanized :  Elliniká , [eliniˈka] ; Ancient Greek : Ἑλληνική , romanized :  Hellēnikḗ )

9600-470: Was nicknamed "Totenkopf" or "Death's Head" by the German soldiers who encountered cuirassiers so equipped. The reiters and cuirassiers of some central and eastern European countries also favoured the zischagge helmet in addition to or instead of the burgonet. The cuirassier's armour would have been exceptionally heavy and thick—sometimes up to thirty-six kilogrammes (eighty pounds)—and would be expected to stop

9700-628: Was principally remodeled after Albanian stratioti of the Venetian army, Hungarian hussars and German mercenary cavalry units. A 1551 Venetian document describes that part of the English cavalry was armed in the Albanian fashion . Two particular types of European heavy cavalry typical of the 16th century and the first half of the 17th century were (i) the Reiter - a form of early cuirassier in half or three-quarters plate armor, armed primarily with

9800-445: Was the spear, around 7 feet (2.1 m) in length with a leaf-bladed head, and a heavy wooden shield with an iron spindle-type boss. The most prestigious weapon was the sword, a blade ranging anywhere from 2 to 3 feet (0.61 to 0.91 m) in length. Celtic swords were typically of good quality, with some being of such quality that archeologists have classed them as being equal to modern, high-quality steel replicas. The heavy cavalry of

9900-580: Was under the control of the Frankish Empire ). Frankochiotika / Φραγκοχιώτικα (meaning 'Catholic Chiot') alludes to the significant presence of Catholic missionaries based on the island of Chios . Additionally, the term Greeklish is often used when the Greek language is written in a Latin script in online communications. The Latin script is nowadays used by the Greek-speaking communities of Southern Italy . The Yevanic dialect

10000-673: Was written by Romaniote and Constantinopolitan Karaite Jews using the Hebrew Alphabet . In a tradition, that in modern time, has come to be known as Greek Aljamiado , some Greek Muslims from Crete wrote their Cretan Greek in the Arabic alphabet . The same happened among Epirote Muslims in Ioannina . This also happened among Arabic-speaking Byzantine rite Christians in the Levant ( Lebanon , Palestine, and Syria ). This usage

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