Ancient Greek Sacrifice: The Effect of Pre-battle Sacrifice on Strategic Decision Making

Abstract

The main question which drives this paper is this: how did omens and sacrifices before battles truly affect decision making in Ancient Greek history. Did the results of religious rituals truly override possible strategic advantages?The first responsibility of the paper is to elucidate different factors that affected battle decisions: the sacrifices that preceded battles, the diviners themselves, and the generals who made the final decisions. The ancient histories are filled with examples of sacrifices and omens, diviners, and generals. In the end the general had the ultimate decision making power. For the first two variables, the assistance of secondary literature and other forms of primary history like art is required since the details of the sacrifices and diviners were not fully shown in the main primary sources: the ancient Greek histories.Multiple episodes were analyzed from each of the main Greek historians, Herodotus, Thucydides, and Xenophon. These episodes show a clear picture of the generals who made these decisions. The episodes also show the context of the battles, and whether the decisions made have a positive strategic affect or a negative one. This paper utilizes the main sources for Ancient Greek military history. These sources encompass the main military exploits in Ancient Greece: The Peloponnesian War, and the Persian War. Through these sources it analyzes the effects of Greek Religion on real life decision making in battle, and through that the true attitude of Greeks on their religious practice.