Oldest known army

Probably a gang of cavemen armed with tree branches and stones. Among the earliest weapons were probably spears made with branches and stones and axes made by tying larger pieces of rocks onto tree branches.

When society became more specialized (eg. farmers, governors, etc), armies became more organized. One of the earliest organized armies was the Sumerians'.

http://www.igwargminis.com/images/sumerians1.jpg

The picture's units look like they are modeled after the pictures in the standard of UR. So this army would be dated to around 2600 BC.


Edited by Imperator Invictus

The oldest known army was the Sumerian army,

The Sumerians were probably the first of the civilised nations of the Middle East. Their civilisation flourished around the area of Mesopotamia. By 3500 B.C. they had achieved a high level of culture and civilisation. This is reflected, to some extent, in their armed forces of the time. These forces were split into three main areas, There were the aristocracy riding chariots. These chariots were pulled by Onagers rather than horses. The second main area was the phalanx. These were spearmen who appear to have been organised into formal phalanxes. The third main area was a collection of skirmishers, made up from the poor and the Semitic peoples who populated the area before the Sumerians moved in and took control.

 

Originally posted by Ahmed The Fighter The oldest known army was the Sumerian army, The Sumerians were probably the first of the civilised nations of the Middle East. Their civilisation flourished around the area of Mesopotamia. By 3500 B.C. they had achieved a high level of culture and civilisation. This is reflected, to some extent, in their armed forces of the time. These forces were split into three main areas, There were the aristocracy riding chariots. These chariots were pulled by Onagers rather than horses. The second main area was the phalanx. These were spearmen who appear to have been organised into formal phalanxes. The third main area was a collection of skirmishers, made up from the poor and the Semitic peoples who populated the area before the Sumerians moved in and took control.

 

what are onagers?

'Onagros' in Greek means wild donkey (onos=donkey + agrios=wild).

The word 'onager' in Ahmed's text probably has to do with it.

What Subotai said is true, oldest recorded army belongs to the Akkadians, not Sumerians.

onager is a type of wild ass closely related to the donkey.  Summerian and Akkadian armies used large numbers of them.  They also used crossbreads between onagers and horses (referred to as 'equids' by moden historians).

The late Roman torsion powered catapult called an onager got its name because it kicked like a wild ass.

Originally posted by Emperor Barbarossa Onagers were catapults, not chariots. Therefore, I do not get what Ahmed is saying. How can you pull a wood thing with a catapult?

 

Onagers are sort of like donkeys. The Romans named some of their catapults "onagers" as a sort of pun, because they kicked. Kind of like how we call mechanized armour "tanks" in English because of an early and laughable attempt to disguise their purpose during construction as mobile water supplies for the trenchmen (seriously!). Some names just stick.

 

The Sumerians are the earliest known armies, but probably not the earliest appearance of massed fighting men. Even very primitive tribal groups throughout the world often massed up fighting forces to go raiding, so this phenomena probably goes back very far, perhaps to the appearance of the bow and arrow or even earlier. Sumeria probably lays claim to the first organized and disciplined armies, but the definition of army must be a bit broader, since this doesn't characterize the forces of Celtic or Germanic peoples who sometimes inflicted devastating defeats against the Romans, often it doesn't even characterize much later and highly succesful groups like the Vikings. Also, the Sumerians may have been able to raise organized fighting forces, but they didn't have professional, standing armies; these didn't appear until much later. In the West, perhaps this originated with the Spartans? I'm unclear as to whether they had actual standing units or not, though. A professional full-time warrior class is not the same thing as a standing army, if they are not consistently organized into units of some kind.

Edited by edgewaters