Cretan Archer hotsell Toxotae - A well known class of Warrior whose specialist Skills were extensively utilized in Warfare - Bronze

Condition: New, Made in Greece.
Material: Pure Bronze

Dimensions (approximately):
Height: 20 cm - 7,87 inches
Width: 12 cm - 4,72 inches
Length: 5,5 cm - 2,16 inches
Weight: 580 g

Since the era of the Minoitans, the Cretans were renowned archers; a fact that did not change even after the Achaeans and the Dorians' arrival at Crete. Cleinias attributes the development of archery to the island's topography, refering to the bow as «ideal» for Crete's setting.
The first Cretan archer known to us is referenced to in Iliad and he is Meriones, Idomeneus' partner.
The Dorians who invaded the island quickly adopted the Cretans' archery-related habits and mixed them with their military training. The Cretans spent most of their time fighting amongst themselves, thus they do not seem to have played any major role in greek matters until the 5th century B.C. Being professional archers, the Cretans would have had far faster reload times as well as being more accurate and possibly having slightly longer ranges due to a lifetime of increasing natural draw strength. The accuracy and speed of aiming would be essential in special situations such as sieges where opponents could be closing in from all angles.
One of the earliest tales of their effectiveness is found in the story of the ten thousand, the Greek mercenary army stranded deep in Persia after their employer fell in battle. Forming a hollow square the Greeks marched to the safety of the coast.
Continually harassed on their journey the Cretans put up a solid fight, even scavenging and reusing Persian arrows and gathering materials on the journey to make new bows as needed. Cretans were also used to great effect by Alexander the Great, who knew the importance of selecting the best possible troops for each area of his army, and within the framework of the combined weapons precept he had developed, hired 500 Cretans archers under Eyrybwta as elite skirmissers for the army he would pass to Asia. Eyrybwtas was killed in the capture of Thebes, but his archers remained in the troop of Alexander and played a decisive role with their arrow fire during the Battle of Granicus, their achievements are also mentioned in the battles of Issoy and Gaugamela.
Since the campaign of Alexander Cretans have gained even greater fame and in the following centuries became the most important and most infamous mercenaries of Mediterranean.The constant clashes between the Cretan cities intensified in the 3rd century, the result was that after the end of the Cretan wars where thousands of well-trained and battle hardened Cretans archers looking for work.The Hellenistic kingdoms, especially the hotsell Seleucids and the Ptolemies, became their best employers, since they hired in mass prudential as «best Archers of the time». The Antiochos Alexander in his «Anabasis» had 2,500 Cretans archers with him.
The Romans knew that though they had the best heavy infantry in the world, they lacked skilled skirmishers, with the role traditionally going to the youngest and least experienced Velites. Cretan archers were utilized during the Punic wars though they largely perished at the battles of Lake Trasimene and Cannae.Livy, in an abomination, makes a speech about the «storm of the Arrows» launched by the Cretans archers.
Julius Caesar knew the advantages of having elite troops thus he had Cretan archers in several of his legions (Sagitarii ex Creta, archers from Crete) and all the archers of the elite 10th legion were Cretans! He also utilized Cretan archers throughout his Gallic campaigns. They would have seen battle in Britain and fought in the unique battle of Alesia.
At the great siege of Constantinople the dwindling Byzantine Empire still had access to a small amount of Cretan archers. Though the Ottomans won the battle the defenders, particularly the archers, put up a fierce fight and forced Sultan Mehmet's troops to retreat from the breaches several times.

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