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Me and my buddies like to reenact ancient battles as depicted in historical source material. I thought it be useful for like-minded people to get a thread growing about which books have been good sources.
We''ve run through battles deriving the source from the following books:


Herodotus - Histories
Thucydides - History of the Pelloponesian War
Julius Caesar -Gallic Wars
Julius Caesr - Civil Wars
Josephus - The Jewish War
The Hebrew Book of Kings

The Anabasis by Xenophon should provide some material.

I think Tacitus has a few bits and pieces too. Let me check my bookshelf and get back to you.

What about Procopius? Obviously, The Wars of Justinian, and not his Secret History.



I've never read him myself, so I'm not sure how good of a source it is. But it seems like it might have some potential.

What do we define as ancheint?

I believe that WRG defined it as ending at the fall of the western Roman Empire but history of course is continuous so any defined period is essentially arbitrary.

Xenophon also wrote a history that picks up where Thucydides leaves off, and another manual on cavalry tactics. (Also, the first home economics textbook for housewives...you know, typical fare for a seasoned mercenary commander.)

Herodotus has descriptions of the Persian Wars and such, and is also a good source for sex-with-goats, gold digging ants, flying snakes, and "penis puppets". Needless to say, the book is half over by the time he gets to the Persian Wars. He was also the first true western historian as he actually interviewed veterans of the war to try and get a real understanding of the conflict. Favorite understatement: "Other than the fact that they prostitute their daughters, they aren't all that different from us."

(Favorite understatement from Thucydides: "A collision at sea can ruin your whole day.")

For further reading on the Peloponnesian Wars from a modern author read A War Like None Other by Victor Davis Hanson. I would also suggest his The Western Way of War.

For heroic type gaming, nothing beats the Illiad.

Polybius wrote about the Punic Wars and has a lot of detailed info. I believe he devotes a chapter to a comparison between the Hellenistic Phalanx and the Roman Legion (Polybian era...obviously).

Plutarch was a biographer first and foremost and his intent was to compare Greek and Roman personalities in a moral light to show the similarities between the two cultures. In between you get some military details. I used him extensively in a paper on foreign cavalry in Roman service during the Late Republic. He was probably my second most used primary source after ole Gaius J. Caesar.

The OP already mentioned Caesar, to which I would add that there was another set of books about the wars in Africa, Spain, and Alexandria (Egypt). Authorship is in doubt but still useful info. They are usually grouped together in one volume, at least the one published by Loeb.

Other usually overlooked sources might be Cassius Dio and Dionysius of Halicarnassus. I don't really know how much info about the wars is in them, though. I tended to overlook them. Dionysius was kind of dry IIRC.

(Dethork, B.A., History Major, Antiquities focus, Russian Language Minor...go figure. M.A. Ancient History...dropped out because I need to work and screw $100k in debt.)

Livy actually covers a number of battles in his Histories of Rome. There is a lot of non battle stuff, but it sounds like war was pretty much the one constant for the early Romans. It covers common battle methodology (such as fortifying your position before engaging the enemy) for the Roman legions as well as some brief descriptions of battles.

Bibliotheca Historica by Diodorus Siculus has some good stuff, depicting battles with various degrees of detail including the Trojan War, the Persian Invasion of Greece, the Pellopeonnesian War, Phillip of Macedon and Alexander the Great, and the Punic Wars.

dethork wrote:
Victor Davis Hanson.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

You said today's secret word!

This site has alot of ancient source material for free download:

http://www.gutenberg.org/