Bret Devereaux

Mind you, they didn't reconstruct the things nor did they compare to early modern pikes (if they had done the latter, they'd have found the length not unreasonable). Tarn just concludes the Macedonian cubit must have been really short and moves on. 13/xx

Picking up with our bits of iron, Markle follows Andronicos, puts them together, using the ancient measurements as stated producing two unworkably heavy weapons: cavalry 'sarisa' and infantry sarisa. The fact that they are unworkably heavy does not seem to bother him. 14/xx

Another scholar, P.A. Manti comes along and says, "Hey, these are unworkably heavy" and revives Tarn's idea of a short cubit to make a 15ft version. Problem: these literally cannot do the formation Polybius says they do. That Polybius *saw* them do. 15/xx

Peter Connolly is, I'd argue, the one who figures this out right beginning from the supposition that whatever else we know about the sarisa, we know it *worked* and so any reconstruction must actually function in the way described in our texts. Novel idea, I know. 16/xx

So he throws out Andronicos' identifications of what is what, which remember, were based on nothing but speculation in the first place. Instead he figures that (1) is a cavalry lance butt, (2) is a sarisa point, (3) is a sarisa butt, and (5) and (6) are lance tips. 17/xx

The socket for (3) is wider than the socket for (2) so he figures maybe the sarisa half tapered over its length - later European pikes do that too. He finds some evidence for tapering in artwork of the sarisa - it's not rock solid, but it's there. 18/xx

So Connolly reconstructs with the lengths as written in the sources, plus (2) and (3) and - SURPRISE - gets a functional weapon which balances exactly where it ought to for maximum usability. (to be clear, he's using manufactured replicas of the originals for this) 19/xx

Connolly then puts (1) and (5) together, matching their haft to the size of a cavalry lance shown on a tomb painting and - SURPRISE - gets a functional weapon which balances exactly where the cavalryman's hand is shown in the painting. 20/xx