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> They find that 67% of Greek soldiers from 480 BCE are likely non-local, while 36% of Greek soldiers from 408 BC were non-local. The paper makes a weird menta
by utopcell 5y ago
> They find that 67% of Greek soldiers from 480 BCE are likely non-local, while 36% of Greek soldiers from 408 BC were non-local.
The paper makes a weird mental leap here, in that the relative percentages of dead soldiers corresponds to the relative percentages of soldiers that participated in the fights. One would expect that if Himera (in Italy) went through the trouble of procuring the services of Greek mercenaries from far-away mainland Greece, it did so because Greek mercenaries were good at their job, which essentially was: not dying.
- variable11 5y agoMaybe the other side hired even more mercenaries who were even better, we have no way of knowing. We don't even know if anyone was hired, could be some form of feudal obligation.
- tovej 5y agoI think it's a fair assumption that every soldier is equally likely to die. Zero bias is the easiest one to qualify here. If the greek were less likely to die, how much less likely would that be exactly? I don't see how that could ever be determined.
- utopcell 5y agoWell, that is the point: it cannot be determined.