Mediatori culturali dell’arte della guerra: i mercenari greci in epoca arcaica tra Oriente e Occidente

Abstract

The figure of the Greek mercenary during the archaic period appears to be shrouded in an aura
of indeterminacy, given the scarcity of sources on the matter. That’s one of the reasons why, according to the
common vulgate, the mercenary phenomenon has an elitist and an aristocratic character. Another group
of scholars, bringing to light a series of testimonies from the monarchies of the Ancient East monarchies,
rehabilitates the role of mercenaries within the climate of extreme mobility of the archaic age, in some cases
exalting the Greek ethnic origin as added value in the eyes of the commissioners. Still moving in the field of
hypotheses, the aim of this research is to try to glimpse the continuity, the connections between the Ancient
Eastern world and the Ancient Western world in the military field and whether the Greek mercenaries of the
archaic age could have been in some way cultural mediators of the art of warfare from the East to their homeland
(and/or their colonies) and vice versa.

Keywords: mercenaries, cultural mediation, East, warfare, tyrannies.