The Tetsudo

[Guest Scanderbeg]

Im wondering. when this first used? I would imagine the drilling and discipline required to move in it would mean that the later Marius legions were really the only ones that could properly do it. But Goldsworthy mentions that the legion at the Siege of New Carthage was using it to get near the gate. The problem is when reading Polybius version. he says instead of Tetsudo "locking shields over their heads". So what im wondering is, was this one of the regular occurences wher a sieging army puts shields over their heads to enter the walls or was this *actually* the tetsudo. The whole "locked shields" seems to imply this but then again....

 

Damn you Polybius couldnt you have been more thorough.

This is just like the whole "naked Gauls" at the battle of Cannae. Does this really mean they were naked or just fighting shirtless? But thats a different topic.

 

BTW, here is what Goldsworthy says:

 

 

Holding their shields over their heads in the famous tetsudo formation, the soldiers aproached the gate and began to hack at its timber with axes."

 

 

And this is what Polybius says:

 

They locked their shields above their heads, forced a passage to the city gate, and strove to break their way through with axes and hatchets.

 

 

Shields over heads were a common and logical thing to do when sieging a city. But in this case I am emphasising "locked".

 

Edit: Damn I forgot there was another topic on this.

[Hamilcar Barca]

Goldsworthy refers many times to Polybius in his books as a key reference. I think that he simply interpretted:

locked their shields above their heads, forced a passage to the city gate

 

 

as the testudo, after all the testudo does indeed involve "locking shields over the head". Goldsworthy is probably just making an educated asumption.

 

As for the whole naked Gauls thing, it's easily possible. The Gaesatae Tribe who fought at the battle of Telamon only 9 years earlier stripped bare-ass naked, apparantly in an attempt to intimidate the Romans with their Manliness.

[Lost_Warrior]

haha or maybe they just thought the Romans would think them mad and not know what to do...certain tribes also painted themselves blue with woad.

 

I don't know when it was first used, but the tetsudo formation to me seems impractical. For short periods it would work, but one would think that the soldiers would a. wear out very quickly and b. not be able to see very well...

[Guest Scanderbeg]

As for the whole naked Gauls thing, it's easily possible. The Gaesatae Tribe

 

 

Yes but unlike those times, no special mentions were made of them. In that battle they would literally leap forward in the line and paid dearly for it.

[CenPrinCohILegVIVictPF]

The ancient Celts and Gauls belived that a naked man was protected by the gods for their bravery. Many of them fought bare naked. As for Woad, it is an interesting substance. It has both opiate and hallucinigenic properties that can be obtained through dermal absorption, especially on thin tissue areas such as the lips or genitalia. Blue painted men with turgid members would be scary indeed and the use of woad would make them belive the "Spearman's Invounerability" (sp?) thing even if they watched their buddies buy it.