New Wolfe Listing on Amazon

Pedro Pereira · 03 Sep 2008, 22:04 · from 2008-September.txt.gz

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From: domus_artemis at hotmail.com (Pedro Pereira)
Date: Thu, 4 Sep 2008 01:04:14 +0300
Subject: (urth) New Wolfe Listing on Amazon
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I remember reading some things that didn't strike me as probable. It was a long time ago that I read the books. 

One of the things is the imagery that Wolfe evokes for the legions to which Latro belonged. The most ancient evidence in terms of weapons and organization type that we have for the Republican Legions is from around the Punic Wars, if I'm not mistaken. We do have information on earlier campaigns but no info on organization, equipment, etc. Still Wolfe gives an imagery of eagle standards and legions on the march that evokes too much the perception of what the legions would later become. Of course, we can't say for sure that around 478 BC things were very different, but from the evidence we have there may have not been any "legions" at that time the way we usually use the term. I think that it would have been more useful to be a bit more vague in this mater. But again, its a minor thing that is not even "wrong" per si.

Another thing is the name of Latro's sword. Why is Latro's sword called "falcata"? Wolfe says that the word was written in the sword, as if it was her name. But since this term designates the type of sword, it makes as much sense as having a sword engraved with the word "sword" or "rapier" as her name. Not only that but the term "falcata" is not even of ancient origin (it was coined by Fernando Fulgosio in 1872 to describe this particular kind of Iberian sword).

Another thing is the translation of the word "hoplite". It doesn't mean "shield man" and in fact the word does not derive from "shield". This is a misuse of the term that has plagued the academia for a long time and is now beying droped from use. "Hoplon", "hopla", etc could mean any one part of the equipment (armor) of the hoplite or his equipment (armor) as a whole. A better translation of "hoplite" would simply be "heavily armored infantryman" instead of the term used in Wolfe (shieldman) which is a wrong interpretation of the ancient greek meaning of the word. But Wolfe ofcourse could not know that since the article that brought the academia's attention to this issue was published after the first books were published. 

This is just some stuff at the top of my head that I remember from reading the books a long time ago. There was some other stuff, but as I said, all this is pretty minor stuff and some of it is discussible and not really a "mistake". As I said, the Soldier series is highly recomended and my favorite books after the Solar Cycle.

> Date: Wed, 3 Sep 2008 14:40:49 -0400> From: brunians at brunians.org> To: urth at lists.urth.net> Subject: Re: (urth) New Wolfe Listing on Amazon> > > There's a few things in the Soldier books that I think may be a> > bit wrong from a historical point of view though. Not really wrong, but> > questionable at least, but it's minor stuff.> > > Like?> > > > .> > > > _______________________________________________> Urth Mailing List> To post, write urth at urth.net> Subscription/information: http://www.urth.net
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