Myke Cole - The Bronze Lie: Shattering the Myth of Spartan Warrior Supremacy

At this time, however, since the phalanx of Epaminondas bore down upon them alone and neglected the rest of their force, and since Pelopidas engaged them with incredible speed and boldness, their courage and skill were so confounded that there was a flight and slaughter of the Spartan Peers such as had never before been seen.

PLUTARCH, LIFE OF PELOPIDAS

Contents

PART I
The Myth of Sparta

PART II
The Reality of Sparta

PART III
Tangling Myth and Reality

To say Im both thrilled and surprised to be writing my second history book is an understatement. The truth is that I never expected to write my first one, much less to have it well received. What began as an obsession with wargaming and a desire to fill a gap I saw in the literature is now maturing into a desire to contribute to the field of military history a field that, despite its immense popularity, still has so many untold stories and unexamined questions.

As I mature as an historian, Im delighted to discover that so many of the skills I built as an intelligence and law enforcement officer, as a manhunter on TV, as a counterterrorism targeter and as a criminal investigator translate perfectly. History is, in the end, detective work sifting through facts, digging up evidence, trying to claw truth from tangled memory in witness accounts, battling your own biases in an effort to come up with cogent analysis that rests on the available data.

But while these skills translate, they do not make me a full-time professional. My only qualification is that I really, really like this stuff and I want to see the widest possible audience falling in love with the topic as much as I have.

I feel that one of the successes of Legion Versus Phalanx was its accessibility. I dont come from academia, so I never really learned to write in an academic style. Im not knocking those who do (I hungrily consume work coming out of academia) but writing Legion Versus Phalanx cemented my belief that its possible to write history that rests on a foundation of rock-solid scholarship and reads like a conversation in a bar with your nerdy friend.

Im writing for those nerdy barflies lovers of games like Rome: Total War II and Seven Wonders , fans of the shows Rome and Spartacus , tabletop wargamers, sword-and-sandal movie dorks, the wide world of folks whove never taken a graduate-level history class in their lives. Id be honored if the scholars out there would read me too, but I must beg their patience as I loosen my tie a bit, so to speak.

Keeping this in mind, youll notice that I sometimes use Greek words only once before switching to their rough English equivalents. Again, my goal here is to make this tent as big as possible, and I dont want to lose readers who dont read classical languages. Sometimes I will not define a word on first use, but only if I think the definition is clear from the context. Hang with me, a definition will surely be coming shortly. A glossary is included in the back of the book for your reference.

I will also try to stick to anglicized versions of Greek names. Lycurgus instead of Lykourgos. Lacedaemon instead of Lakedaimon. Herodotus instead of Herodotos. Again, my goal here is to use terms that are more likely to be recognized, and thus comfortable, for the uninitiated reader.

When I quote historical figures, I will put their words in italics when I am directly quoting from the sources and just in plain quotes when I am paraphrasing for purposes of clarity. Direct quotes from modern figures are also in italics.

While I bring a warfighters lens to this work, I dont want to exclude those who havent served. I have often said that nobody owns the military experience. All society is plagued by war at all times, and so military experience is a thing all people, service member and civilian alike, share. My experience having fought in Iraq is no more authentic than that of a civilian who has had to go through their life watching that same war unfold on TV, reading about it on Twitter, having it impact their pop culture, politics and interpersonal relationships. These are both genuine military experiences, only differing in perspective.