Raphaia Project part one

After being asked about the battle of Raphaia,  I decided that I would take a look at what was needed for the armies.  The first part will look at the composition of the armies.

There are a couple of different interpretations regarding troop strengths and who was armed with what.   I have tended to follow Bar Khocva;s interpretation in his book "The Seleucid Army".  Professor Phillip Sagin also has a similar interpretation in his book and game "Lost Battles" as does Duncan Head in "Armies of the Macedonian and Punic Wars"

Ptolemy's army totalled 5000 cavalry, 70,000 infantry and 73 African elephants.
The Seleucid army had 6000 cavalry, 60,000 infantry and 102 Indian elephants.

The elephants on both sides were accompanied by light infantry so each base would be 4 or 5 elephants.  This would be 15 to 18 units of elephants for Ptolemy and 21 to 25 for Antiochus

Ptolemy's infantry included:

6000 Galatian and Thracian peltasts
8000 Greek mercenaries armed as phalangites
20000 Egyptians armed as phalangites
25000 Macedonian settlers armed as phalangites
3000 Libyans armed as phalangites
3000 Agema armed as phalangites  (infantry guards)
2000 "Peltasts" armed as phalangites (this was another unit of guard infantry)
3000 Cretans and Neo-Cretans as elephant escorts

His cavalry included

700 Guards
2300 Settler horse
2000 Mercenaries  (possibly a mixture of light and heavy)

The infantry of the Seleucid army was a bit more diverse.
It included

10000 Argyraspides armed as phalangites (the infantry guard)
20000 Macedonian settlers armed as phalangites
5000 Greek Mercenaries (brigaded with 2000 phalangites so may also be phalangites)
10000 Arabs
5000  Medes, Cissians, Cadusians, and Carmanians
5000 Daae, Carmani, and Cilicians,
2500 Cretans and Neo-Cretans as elephant escorts
1000 Thracians
2000 Agrianes and Persians archers/slingers as elephant escorts
500 Lydians possibly also elephant escorts
1000 Cardaces

The Seleucid cavalry totaled 6000.
2000 were the guard cavalry (Agema and Companions)
the other 2000 on the right were settlers
The 2000 on the left flank may have included the mercenaries that deserted to the Seleucid army the year before and may have been a mix of settlers and mercenary heavy and light cavalry.

The armament of the Greek mercenaries is open to question.   Their position to the right of the 5000 light armed Asiatics would tend to indicate that they were probably Thureophoroi, but the inclusion of 2000 phalangites with them could also indicate that they were phalangites.  Bar Khocva and Phil Sabin consider them to be phalangites, while Duncan Head does not.

Scutarii now available from publishers web store

HR Games has released Scutarii.   It is now available on their web store at HR Games   A Yahoo Group has also been started.at  Domus Scutarii

 The first edition can be found on Amazon at
original version of the rules

A later color version of the original cover