Cuneus (military)
The term cuneus (wedge or wedge-shaped order of battle) denotes a formation to break through the enemy line, which - beginning narrow at its front - increased in width. Also some numbers of the Roman army, which were recruited from Frisian mercenaries in the third century and used in Britain, were not referred to as numeri but as cunei . The word is derived from the Latin word family cuneatus / cuneolus / cuneus .
Battle formation
Even the Greeks used the cuneus - there called ἔμβολος (émbolos) - such as the general Epaminondas in the battles of Leuktra and Mantineia . Gauls, Teutons and Hispanics also used this type of formation, which the Roman soldiers also called caput porcinum (boar's head). Such maneuvers were also trained for sea battles.
The cuneus was probably the preferred form of attack used by the infantry of late antiquity. It was probably taken over by the Germanic tribes in the Roman army. The formation is the Roman military chronicler Flavius Vegetius Renatus as
- " ... a mass of foot soldiers in close order, very tight, wide, the forward push in the front in the ranks steadily and crushed as the enemy ... ,
described. In the following centuries it was also used by the Vikings , who used the same name for it - svynfylking / pig position. A tradition from the early Middle Ages names the arrangement: two fighters for the top, three in the second and five in the third row.
Battle formation and tactics
A triangular formation offered the advantage of maintaining close projectile fire either in all directions or at a single point. The Scythians and other equestrian peoples armed with javelins also used this formation with their leader at the head, since such quick turning maneuvers were possible without prior drill. This led Vegetius to believe that a cuneus simply pierced the enemy line by focusing its projectile fire on a single point on the enemy line. The Germanic and Roman cuneus was probably not developed for these reasons alone. It was also used to strike a determined blow by hand-to-hand combat on the enemy's battle line in order to break through quickly. The defensive tactic of the enemy attacked by a cuneus usually consisted of forming a "V" with his line (forceps, pliers) in order to pick up and enclose the wedge in it when they meet.
shape
The triangular formation was supposed to prevent the enemy from eliminating champions of the first line right at the beginning of the fight, before they even reached the enemy lines (see also Lost Pile ). When they encountered the enemy, they naturally had to fight them all by themselves and were therefore certainly exposed to massive flank fire. Initially, they would receive little support from their own people, who had lagged behind them because of the wedge-shaped formation. If they didn't catch up quickly, the men on the front lines were soon lost. The question therefore arises, why shouldn't the line formation be chosen right from the start? Hans Delbrück summed up this problem in the following words:
- "No combat formation of a tactical body seems more silly than this kind of wedge formation! A group of men, no matter how firm their cohesion is in the end, remains a sum of individuals who, and there is no doubt, certainly proceed in one line, but they never can like a sharpened piece of iron, jerk your flanks into one point! "
The actual shape of a cuneus can be deduced from other ancient sources. Tacitus describes in his histories that this formation was tightly closed on all sides, that is, secured on the flanks, its rear and the front. The strategicon of Maurikios provides a further description. This says that the Teutons attacked in even and dense formations. From this it can be concluded that their attack pillar could also have formed a kind of triangle.
If one takes a Roman 400-man auxiliary unit as an example, it and its crew could form a 16-man deep and 25-man wide cuneus . As soon as the men in the back ranks shoot their first javelin volleys, the men in the front and in the center feel safer and therefore dare to advance faster against the enemy, so that their flanks automatically fall back a little. As a result, the cuneus could have assumed the shape of a triangle for a short time or until immediately before the impact on the enemy.
Vegetius and the author of the strategikon also recommend the use of reserve units for the cuneus . This makes perfect sense if it is used as a pure attack formation. If you have a narrow front, the attack column is much more maneuverable and the ranks in the depths then provide the necessary impact energy to break through the opposing battle line with their force or to take advantage of a briefly opening gap in it.
literature
- Hans Delbrück : History of the art of war in the context of political history. Volume 2: The Teutons. 3rd, revised and completed edition. de Gruyter, Berlin 1921.
- Simon Mac Dowall: Late Roman Infantryman. 236-565 AD. (= Warrior Series 9). Illustrated by Gery Embleton. Reprinted edition. Osprey Military, London 1997, ISBN 1-85532-419-9 .
- Flavios Tiberios Maurikios : Maurice's Strategikon. Handbook of Byzantine Military Strategy. Translated by George T. Dennis. University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia PA 1984, ISBN 0-8122-7899-2 (Reprint: ibid 2001, ISBN 0-8122-1772-1 ).
- Cornelius Tacitus : Germania / Histories. In: Gaius Iulius Caesar , Cornelius Tacitus: Reports on Teutons and Germania (= historians of German antiquity ). Published by Alexander Heine. Phaidon Verlag, Essen 1996, ISBN 3-88851-104-6 .