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Vikings vs Spartans

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  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: Vikings vs Spartans
    Posted: 28-Mar-2012 at 18:03
Two evenly-matched forces meet at the location of your choice. Who wins?

Vikings

Steel broadsword
Dane Axe
Wooden shield
Javelin
Iron helmet and leather armor (or chainmail for the richer Vikings)

Spartans

Long spear
Single-edged kopis sword
Thick bullhide shield
Bronze breastplate and helmet
Unarmored auxiliaries with slings
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  Quote Centrix Vigilis Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Mar-2012 at 18:33
Spartans. Better discipline. Better defensive equipment. Better tactics on closed terrain.

Edited by Centrix Vigilis - 28-Mar-2012 at 18:34
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  Quote Sidney Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Mar-2012 at 19:02
I go with CV. Also more agile.
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  Quote Don Quixote Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 28-Mar-2012 at 19:46
I'll go with the Spartans too, mostly because of the training the Spartans got in their individual lives, and the superb discipline they showed as a result of that personal education.
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  Quote Toltec Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 29-Mar-2012 at 06:58
Vikings, steel weapons vs bronze, better armour better agility due to lighter equipment (try being agile in bronze). More diversity of tactics boars head vs phalanx, able to keep  formation over broken ground, military tactics not specialist tactics designed only to fight other phalanx but to take on all comers, better selction of troops, as well as shieldwall, they have archers and long axe men.
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  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 30-Mar-2012 at 19:04
Originally posted by Don Quixote

I'll go with the Spartans too, mostly because of the training the Spartans got in their individual lives, and the superb discipline they showed as a result of that personal education.

The Vikings were also highly trained. Since childhood they learned to wrestle, handle weapons and lift weights. Sickly children were often thrown off cliffs to prevent food shortages. By the time a Viking was 12 years old he was ready to go on his first raid
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  Quote Centrix Vigilis Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 30-Mar-2012 at 20:00
Sounds like the Spartans. Wink
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  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 01-Apr-2012 at 19:21
Viking shields may have been less complex than those of the Spartans, but were capable of withstanding axe-blows
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  Quote Toltec Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 01-Apr-2012 at 21:47
Viking shields were much more hi-tech than Spartan one. You hit a Spartan shield with a Dane Axe you break the Spartan's arm. Viking shields were made from the lightest wood, and woven so they cushioned a blow and could stop a Dane Axe by disapating the energy. Also viking sheild's had bosses so were not strapped to the arm as a static defence but were held in the fist and used as an aggressive punching weapon.

Edited by Toltec - 01-Apr-2012 at 21:50
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  Quote Don Quixote Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 01-Apr-2012 at 23:02
Originally posted by Nick1986


The Vikings were also highly trained. Since childhood they learned to wrestle, handle weapons and lift weights. Sickly children were often thrown off cliffs to prevent food shortages. By the time a Viking was 12 years old he was ready to go on his first raid

I don't know much about the Viking education, but it wasn't organized, there were no public schools, whatever the kids learned was at home - I don't know if this can have the same results like state the organized Spartan education, and the rigorous physical part of it.
Are the skills utilize in raiding comparable the ones needed for with organized warfare? I don't know, military knowledge is not my strong side, most lamentably.
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  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 02-Apr-2012 at 19:06
Originally posted by Don Quixote

Originally posted by Nick1986


The Vikings were also highly trained. Since childhood they learned to wrestle, handle weapons and lift weights. Sickly children were often thrown off cliffs to prevent food shortages. By the time a Viking was 12 years old he was ready to go on his first raid

I don't know much about the Viking education, but it wasn't organized, there were no public schools, whatever the kids learned was at home - I don't know if this can have the same results like state the organized Spartan education, and the rigorous physical part of it.
Are the skills utilize in raiding comparable the ones needed for with organized warfare? I don't know, military knowledge is not my strong side, most lamentably.

Viking education was a hands-on experience. Few people could read (not even the king), but children learned to fight from an early age. Being strong-willed and quarrelsome were desirable attributes, giving young Vikings the self-confidence to fight (and kill) bigger and tougher opponents. Like the Spartans, the Vikings fought savagely as they believed death in battle would guarantee them a place in Valhalla
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  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08-Apr-2012 at 20:42
Spartan organisation and training might give them an advantage, but the Vikings had better weapons. The best swords and axes were made of Damascus steel, the same technique used to make Samurai swords
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  Quote Cryptic Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 08-Apr-2012 at 21:48
Originally posted by Toltec

Viking shields were much more hi-tech than Spartan one. You hit a Spartan shield with a Dane Axe you break the Spartan's arm.
 
Spartan shields were very well designed and also served as a smashing weapon.  The show Deadliest Warrior had an episode where an expert martial artist struck a Spartan shield using an extremely lethal Japanese war club. 
 
Impact sensors then demonstated how the force of the blow was transfered through out the the entire shield and that the force transmitted directly to the user's arm was not nearly enough to break it.  The shield's material (oak sheathed in bronze) and shape were a very efficient design. 
 
Originally posted by Nick1986

Spartan organisation and training might give them an advantage, but the Vikings had better weapons. The best swords and axes were made of Damascus steel, the same technique used to make Samurai swords
I think this would win the day.  The spartans fought as a team, Viking fought more as individuals.  In encounters like this, the individualists usually lose.  A good demosntration of this is Native American warriors verse European style military units.  A military unit that did not panic and break could usually survive against individualist warriors, even when outnumbered.  
 
 


Edited by Cryptic - 08-Apr-2012 at 21:53
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  Quote Leroy Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 09-Apr-2012 at 19:06
The Vikings (Wicingas or robbers) were pirates (abducting women and plundering monasteries) and slave traders (selling their Irish slaves to the Caliphate in North Africa), not soldiers. Yes, later they formed an army of pirates, sacking Orléans, but they were defeated by a Frankish army and retreated. The pirate chieftain Rollo was given Normandy, but he had to convert to Christianity and become a vassal of the King of France. Raiding problem solved.

When the Vikings settled in England they introduced eye-liner for men, shaving, and weekly baths (scandalizing the pious English). The Spartans on the other hand despised luxury and effeminacy and loved poverty and hardship (the Spartan men at least, the women, says Aristotle, lived in every sort of intemperance and luxury and they were utterly useless and caused more confusion than the enemy LOL).

I think that the organized Spartan army would destroy any Viking army ever fielded.

They fight individually and are collectively conquered. (Tacitus)

For the Spartans an honorable death is preferable to a dishonorable life. (Xenophon)
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  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10-Apr-2012 at 22:04
The Vikings were more than mere pirates and slavers. They were also professional mercenaries who hired themselves out as bodyguards for the Roman emperors, Irish chieftains and Russian Tsars
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  Quote Toltec Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 15-Apr-2012 at 03:00
Originally posted by Nick1986

Spartan organisation and training might give them an advantage, but the Vikings had better weapons. The best swords and axes were made of Damascus steel, the same technique used to make Samurai swords
 
Viking swords were made of pattern welded steel, a mixture of steel and iron, an extremely good quality weapon, slow and expensive to produce. Only wealthy nobles would have had them, most vikings had axes or spears. Axes and spears are also much more effective battlefield weapons than swords as well as a sword cannot penetrate armour.
 
Samurai swords were made by a older folding technique that was used until pattern welding was invented, both techniques were developed not far from each other in ancient China. The samurai too used spears and polearms on the battlefield as swords were pretty useless.
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  Quote AlphaS520 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12-Jul-2012 at 20:23
Originally posted by Toltec

[QUOTE=Nick1986]The samurai too used spears and polearms on the battlefield as swords were pretty useless.


Now why would you say that? The highest honor and the best samurais are the sword wielding samurais, with the katana.
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  Quote Nick1986 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12-Jul-2012 at 20:27
To the Samurai, the spear was the "king" of weapons. They developed a graceful martial art giving them greater reach and movement when facing similarly armed opponents
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  Quote AlphaS520 Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12-Jul-2012 at 20:39
I don't understand how is the Yari or the Naginata is the "king" of weapons, I for one understand that it is extremely good against cavalries. The Katana, wielded by a true swordsmen, is used for blocking, and can slash away any spears. The Samurai (trained extensively from childhood, his a samurai, not a peasant), wielding a katana, can close in in a respectable amount of time, rendering the long spear useless.

The best samurais in the dual of an opening battle (tradition), the best, wields the sword.
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  Quote Toltec Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 12-Jul-2012 at 22:36
Originally posted by AlphaS520


Originally posted by Toltec

[QUOTE=Nick1986]The samurai too used spears and polearms on the battlefield as swords were pretty useless.
Now why would you say that? The highest honor and the best samurais are the sword wielding samurais, with the katana.


The Katana was a peace time side arm, far to short for the battlefield and only devoped in the late 16th century after most of the warfare in Japan had finished. They had earlier battlefield swords such as the Nodachi and Odachi but they were by no mean common and there was little fuss made about using them.

Edited by Toltec - 12-Jul-2012 at 22:37
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