#Confusing artwort

[jeannereames]

Greatly puzzled by this image. I assume this is supposed to somehow illustrate the Battle of Magnesia (190/89). Antiochus III’s guard of Silver Shields (Argyraspides) kinda give it away with stray Roman shields (of Scipio Asiaticus’s troops) thrown there in the middle as they come up against the Seleucid troops. At least, I assume that’s what this is supposed to be, but why are the Shields carrying sarissai? My understanding is that even reconstituted under the Seleucids, they were still the hypaspist-style royal guard: e.g., armed like a standard hoplite with a regular spear. Or maybe those are regular spears. They look sorta like sarissai to me.

(Also, if this is the Battle of Magnesia...where’s the rain? Famous example of where weather totally fucked up one side’s strategy. The rain softened the bowstrings and incapacitated the Seleucid archers.)