Spartan military influence on the rest of Greece is one of those topics that crops up in many discussions on Sparta. In general, the Greeks fought in a rather standard hoplite phalanx with little variation from sometime in the seventh century to the victory of Philip at Khaironeia. The Spartans may have been the first to develop the hoplite phalanx, possibly in the early years of the Second Messenian War, which had been going rather badly for them. According to Pausanias, the momentum of the war changed after the battle of the Great Trench, where the Spartans bribed the Messenians Arcadian allies to flee in disorder through the Messenian lines. My own personal theory is that this battle saw the first use of the phalanx and it routed the Arcadians. In any case, the phalanx had spread to the rest of Greece by the late sixth century and the beginning of more concrete records.

As I said, there weren’t a lot of changes. The Athenians used their trick of anchoring the wings and falling back at the center to beat the Persians at Marathon and Pausanias seems to have sent his troops hither and thither at Plataia, hoping to draw out the Persians, but the actual fighting was still the same. At Sphakteria, Kleon seems to have blundered into something new in his use of peltasts against hoplites, but he was greatly helped by the brushfires and afterwards peltasts and cavalry were still only used for flanking maneuvers, covering the wings, and hit and run raids.

The first major innovation, if it can be called that, came from Thebes when they massed their phalanges extra deep at Leuktra. The Spartans never really adapted to the deep phalanx and this was the beginning of the end of Spartan influence. Philip was the next innovator. He made changes to the standard weapon of the phalanx, making it longer. He also messed about with the formation of the phalanx, making it a bit more mobile, and he made the cavalry more effective. His victory at Khaironeia was partly the result of these innovations and partly the result of the lack of will and cohesiveness on the part of the rest of the Greeks. It took a lot to get the allies to fight Philip in the first place and many, notably Sparta, weren’t present at all.