Description
Of all the warships found in the ancient world, it is the trireme, or trieres, that remains the most famous and recognisable. Nearly all Hollywood 'sword and sandal' movies will include a trireme somewhere. The vessel was entirely designed for war. Its name came from the three rows of oars carried on each side, stacked above each other in staggered columns to give the rowers some room to work. The top row of oars pivoted on a rowlock, or oarlock, mounted on an outrigger projecting from the hull. This allowed the top oars to pitch down at a sharper angle to reach the sea without getting tangled in the lower ones. The trireme was a greyhound of a ship, capable of high-speed dashes with a well-trained crew and, contrary to popular belief, not all rowers were slaves. Aboard Greek vessels they were citizens, and were given respect, not the lash. They were also largely fair-weather ships, and unsuited to rough seas such as the Atlantic; the lowest level of oars were, at most, less than half a metre above the waterline. That, however, did not stop the trireme being a superb weapon against other ships: a high-speed ramming attack could rip a hole in the side of almost any target. The type was also large enough to be used in other ways, which lead to it carrying archers and assorted light artillery pieces.
Under the early Roman army’s Camillan system, if you were poor or low born then you might well have found yourself in battle with little more than a spear in your hand. Typically the poorest members of a Roman Legion, leves were attached to the hastati and faced the full enemy onslaught. They were used as a screen and to skirmish with the enemy’s front line. Un able to afford much armour, the leves used javelins in support of their richer compatriots. Historically, there were 300 leves alongside 900 hastati: 20 leves in front of each of the 60 maniples. They were replaced by velites, who were deployed across the three main lines of a maniple.
