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Dr Owen Rees Profile picture
Dr Owen Rees
@reeshistory
Ancient Historian: Global history, emotions and violence, veteran studies. Anything else that sounds interesting. Founder: @BadAncient
Jan 8, 2021 • 12 tweets • 4 min read
Watching the recent scenes in the U.S.A. we saw the Spartan iconography once again. So, if you are wondering what a Spartan may have made of such an event, let's take a look 1/10 molon labe flagSpartan-style helmet and cloak First things first, #molonlabe is not a thing. Leonidas did not say it, and Spartans did not agree with citizens or anyone else bearing arms around the city . . . what if the helots got hold of them! 2/10

badancient.com/claims/molon-l…
Sep 24, 2020 • 25 tweets • 7 min read
2,499 years ago, approximately #OTD, the straits between the Greek mainland and the island of Salamis became the site of one of the most famous naval battles in history.

Have you ever wondered what actually happened? Follow @Roelkonijn and I for yet another thread 1/lots Image As you know from previous threads, the Persian forces had taken Themopylai and their navy had survived the battle at Artemision.

Xerxes’ forces moved south, through Boiotia and into Attika. Here they burned Athens and prepared to deal with the fleet moored at Salamis.
2/ Image
Sep 3, 2020 • 6 tweets • 4 min read
If you enjoyed the 4 day tweet-a-thon with myself and @Roelkonijn then see all of them here in this thread of threads looking at the battles of Thermopylae and Artemisium, the Spartan mirage, and common myths about the Persians:
Sep 1, 2020 • 16 tweets • 7 min read
The myths around Thermopylai often rely on broader misconceptions about ancient Sparta.

Well, we can't have that can we?! Come along with @Roelkonijn and me, for another thread looking at 12 key myths about the Spartan culture, and their army 1/16 Myth #1: Spartans were professional soldiers.

The big one! This comes from Xenophon's description of Lykurgus banning Spartiates from having a job.

He doesn't actually say anything about them soldiering which, you know, is a job! Seem more like 'professional citizens'
2/ Image
Aug 31, 2020 • 18 tweets • 6 min read
2,499 years ago, approximately #OTD, a more interesting battle took place off the coast of Thermopylai - the naval battle of Artemision. Unlike Thermopylai, this one actually mattered.

It is not a well-known battle, so why not follow @Roelkonijn and I for yet another thread 1/18 Image Was this a united Greek fleet, in support of Leonidas' troops on land, standing against the Persian enemy: West vs East, good vs bad, freedom vs oppression?

No, not really
2/
Jul 27, 2020 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Interesting blog, Athenian armies don't often get this kind of attention! Although, the mass levy (pandemei) raises more questions. We cannot assume that they maintained the equal tribal sizes. If all men were called, then the deme of Archanae had 3,000 hoplites to join up If we assume they joined their tribe, so two other demes, we potentially have ca. 4,000 in one tribe which is almost 1/3 of Athens' hoplite strength at the beginning of Pelop. War. The pandemei was a system for emergency or quick planning, used to override the very slow
Jul 24, 2020 • 5 tweets • 3 min read
More #badancient Spartans. A review of new book by Dr Andrew Bayliss of @theBRIHC The reviewer seems to ignore Bayliss's opening section all about the Spartan mirage: dailymail.co.uk/home/books/art… /1 No, 300 Spartans did not fight at Thermopylae. Bayliss explicitly mentions helots and other greeks being there. Also: badancient.com/claims/did-300… /2
Jun 24, 2020 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
A Greek mantis is hard to pin down. They could be m/f, freelance or perm employed, used by individuals or a state. They read omens, purified homes, wrote curse tablets, made protective dolls, basically they were religious experts /1 What they could not do was communicate with the gods. That was the role of an oracle or a prophet. What made the mantis' job so hard was most of what they did was within the realm of anyone's capability./2
Jun 22, 2020 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
A solar eclipse is a classic omen, but while the Babylonians had a intricate system for reading them (e.g. different times of day meaning different things) - the classical Greeks did not. They knew they meant something, but did not codify what that might be Pindar discussing (guessing) the meaning of an eclipse (Paean 9): 'Are you bringing a portent of some war, or the failure of crops, or a mighty snowstorm beyond telling, or murderous civil war'
Jun 1, 2020 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
I was approached by the team behind @AncientWorldMag to turn my #badancient into a website project. So here it is! badancient.com

This is about examining modern public claims about the ancient world, and trying to untangle the history from them. Bad Ancient began as a teaching exercise to encourage students to see the use of the ancient world in everyday arenas: politics, advertising, TV, video games. By picking out incorrect uses, or bad examples, we began to discuss their purpose:
Apr 15, 2020 • 12 tweets • 2 min read
I do, I get it. The need to find historical lessons during this time - but this link between the plague of Athens in 430-427/6 B.C., the defeat in the FOLLOWING war in 404 B.C., and the dismantling of Athenian democracy is getting on my nerves 1/12 The plague came during the Archidamian War (431-421 B.C.). A war Athens dominated at sea, and in the wider Greek world, but allowed Sparta to do its one strategy - annual raids of Attica (lands around Athens) before returning home after a few weeks. 2/12