
Understanding violence
How the past can help explain the present
Following the assault of the Capitol Building in Washington DC last week, comparisons with past events have been made that are generally facile and fruitless. Instead, we should seek to explain how violence worked in the past to understand and change the present.

Hoplites riding dolphins
An Attic red-figure psykter
A red-figure vessel currently in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York depicts a line of spearmen riding dolphins. What is this object and how should we interpret the scene that decorates it?

The Spartans
A review of a book by Andrew J. Bayliss
Sparta’s perennial appeal to readers is shown by the sheer number of publications focused on this polis. Dr Andrew Bayliss has written the most recent monograph on the subject, offering an up-to-date introduction to the Spartan scholarship.

A Total War Saga: Troy
Thoughts on the game
The newest entry into the Total War series of strategy games is inspired by the Trojan War. While the game looks beautiful, it’s not something that I have enjoyed playing.

Sources of disinformation
Bad reconstructions of Aegean warriors
Playing through A Total War Saga: Troy, Josho is dismayed by the idea of thousands of players being exposed to terribly bad interpretations of what Mycenaean warriors looked like.

Mycenaean chariots
A video produced by Invicta History
The first in a series of videos on the Trojan War and the Aegean Bronze Age, this video produced by Invicta History and written by Josho Brouwers deals with Mycenaean chariots.

Blood, bronze, and balony
An Extra Credits video about battles in the Bronze Age
With the recent release of the strategy game A Total War Saga: Troy, there has been a flood of videos about the Trojan War. Sadly, many of them are not very good. The recent video by Extra Credits on “Battles in the Bronze Age” is an example.

Greek warfare and Homer
Last month, Josho Brouwers gave a lecture about the cultural signifcance of the Homeric epics to ancient Greek warfare, which was also recorded on video. Here you can read the text of this lecture.

A rogue general and the sack of Rome
Alaric, the commander who led the sack of Rome in AD 410, is often depicted as a wild barbarian. In truth, he had had a long and distinguished career as a general in the Roman army.

Misinterpreting the evidence?
A fragment of a fresco from Pylos
A fragmentary fresco from Pylos has been reconstructed as depicting a warrior with a round shield with armband and grip. A closer look reveals that this fresco most likely depicts something else.