Talk:Xyston

Xyston length
I'm not completely sure about its length. Does anyone has a source confirming or contradicting my statement (3-4 meter long)? Nik Sage 10:51, 31 December 2006 (UTC)
 * Only source I have - this image, which I added. --MichałRadecki (talk) 14:15, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Xystophoroi and Sarissophoroi
Does anyone know the difference between Xystophoroi and Sarissophoroi. I have about 10 books about Greek and Hellenistic warfare and not even one of them have good information about the Xyston and its use Nik Sage * Nik Sage 13:05, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

Check the page for Sarissophoroi that you just linked to. It mentions some things that are not mentioned in this article.

Xyston was a general term that used to describe almost all lances. It became associated mainly with the cavalry lances and thus it was shorter than Sarissa which was only for use with infantry! Seleukosa (talk) 17:28, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

The Macedonian translation
My dear editors Kapnisma and Zakronian. It is vandalism to remove existing content in bad faith. There is linguistic similarity between osten, a pointed or sharpen wood stick in contemporary Macedonian and xyston, the spear of the ancient Macedonian cavalry. Keep all the views in Wikipedia and assume good faith. (Toci (talk) 23:52, 3 October 2008 (UTC))
 * Even if you presented a reliable source about the linguistic connection it's still irrelevant, so don't waste your time.--Zakronian (talk) 00:19, 4 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia is not about what one side thinks. It shows all the views. So please stop the vandalism. (Toci (talk) 17:23, 4 October 2008 (UTC))
 * Report us, if you consider reverting your edit vandalism. A Slavic Macedonian name has no place in an article about ancient Greece, like it or not. --Zakronian (talk) 22:25, 4 October 2008 (UTC)
 * No need to report you. Not my style. To explain, we are talking about ancient Macedonian word that exist in contemporary Macedonian. So it is there to stay. Xyston is not a contemporary Greek word for spear in any case and this is article about ancient Macedonia. It is questionable if ancient Macedonia was Greek or barbarian country. Therefore keep the both views in the article and assume good faith. (Toci (talk) 23:44, 5 October 2008 (UTC))
 * You don't seem to want to understand. Xyston is an ancient Greek word about an ancient Greek weapon mostly known from its use in the ancient Macedonian army, even if "osten" is a loan from Greek (something that's not obvious by the way) that's not an argument to be used. Nor the lack of conclusive evidence about the ultimate origin of the ancient Macedonians is a reason to add the Slavic Macedonian name. Your language, nation and state didn't exist in any form at the period in question. So where does a Slavic name fit in your "both views". Try to apply it here first, where more people (among them wiki admins) are watching. I quess your POV is based on theories developed in the RoM, which are not considered reliable or worth mentioning (apart from the articles that deal with the modern political dispute as an example of nationalist driven "scientific" research).--Zakronian (talk) 01:07, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Ost is Slavic or Gemanic root for sharp. In Macedonians we us ostar, -ra, -ro for sharp. You can see that the Slovak use ostep for spear as well. It has nothing with Greek and it is not import from Greek. Let me reveal to you that ancient Macedonian language is not surely a dialect of ancient Greek. The ancient Macedonian weapons are unique words who were written with the Greek alphabet. In any case, the linguistic similarity between xyston and osten is there. Dont worry about editing Macedon, the word Macedon was invented in the 90's, probably even in Wikipedia, with an idea to avoid the word Macedonia. Macedon is romantic term of Greek nationalism, same as the term Byzantium two hundred years ago. They never existed in reality. I am in all the talk pages and I am presenting all the new facts. For example they find a coin of Alexander the Great in an ancient Macedonian oltar on Skopje fortress in 2007. Sooner or later both views will be shown, even in Wikipedia. Wikipedia policy is NPOV and for now this article has only the Greek POV. My edit stays to give NPOV. Removing it is vandalism. For the hundred time assume good faith. (Toci (talk) 17:47, 7 October 2008 (UTC))
 * Not in a million years. Bye.--Zakronian (talk) 19:49, 7 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree 100% with Zakronian on this one. Inclusion of that Macedonian word is ridiculous, for a large number of reasons (which I'm just too bored to spell out right now.) Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:58, 8 October 2008 (UTC)

Unfocused added sections
I'm no expert and I don't have the required sources to hand, but to the untrained eye this article looks like it's had a rather rambling off-topic essay on all manner of other topics inserted into the middle of it, conflating that weapon with the sarissa, contradicting the existing material in a poorly integrated way, and opining rather freely. I'm not sure if one of the sources added (a rather clickbaity '10 Things You Should Know' page on www.realmofhistory.com) is especially usable. Is any of this of any value, or would it be better to simply revert to the version of a couple of months ago? 109.255.211.6 (talk) 21:41, 12 February 2021 (UTC)

Nonsensical/miscalculated density?
"The recorded weight, per cubic metre, of this extremely dense wood is 51.5 lbs (2.34 kg) and, per cubic inch, weighs 0.03 lb (0.014 kg)."

I'm almost sure the cubic-metre measurement is wrong, as it would be extremely light, not dense. At a minimum the values are inconsistent with each other. I don't have access to the original source, but if the cubic inch values are correct then the density is 854.33 kg/m3, not 2.34 kg/m3 --ChristopheBiocca (talk) 19:00, 25 January 2022 (UTC)


 * Agree. I just made the same observation and calculation as ChristopheBiocca and added the "Contradictory" template inline. The source document is behind a paywall -- perhaps the source printed the error or perhaps the WP editor miscopied it. —Blanchette (talk) 18:09, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks for catching this! The original source says: p. 324: "The weight of Cornus florida L., one of the heavier members of the family Cornaceae, with 15% moisture content (normal for wood dried in open air rather than by kiln) is 51.5 lbs. per cu. ft., or .03 lbs. per cu. inch, and I have been assured by a botanist that the weight of Cornus mas L. would be approximately the same" (cited to Wood Handbook (Forest Service, U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, 1955) 55). Are those figures consistent one with the other?
 * It looks like someone wrote "metre" for "foot"... Now, as someone who uses the metric system exclusively, I see absolutely no value in giving the metric values in this fashion. The weight in kg of a cubic foot/inch still means nothing to me. Rather, we should give the density in lb/ft3 and kg/m3 (and smaller units if that seems important). Furius (talk) 19:23, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Hold on! The IP above is also right! The cited article is entirely about the sarissa, not the xyston! It does say that javelins were also made out of cornel wood. Everything else is actually about sarissae. I'm going to delete irrelevant info now. Furius (talk) 19:29, 18 March 2023 (UTC)
 * Right, so the cited article discusses the "cavalry sarissa" at pp. 333-339. In the course of this, it notes on p. 338: "Asclepiodotus writes (Tact. 1.3): ". .. . cavalry ... which fights at close quarters . . . uses long spears, for which reason it is called ... xystophoron [xyston carrying] ..." The term xystophoroi replaced sarissophoroi for mounted lancers among the early Successors (Arr. 1.14.1 and 6; 2.9.2; 3.12.3; cf. Diod. 19.27.2, 29-3." As another IP notes above, xyston is a generic Greek word for "spear" (Eadie "The Development of Roman Mailed Cavalry" The Journal of Roman Studies, Vol. 57, No. 1/2 (1967), pp. 163 [ https://www.jstor.org/stable/299352] treats a xyston as "a short thrusting spear" akin to the hasta). My opinion is that the material on cavalry spears here should be transferred to sarissa and that this article should become either a redirect or a disambiguation page for various types of ancient Greek spear. Furius (talk) 19:50, 18 March 2023 (UTC)