Analyze this Siege of Numidia scene in Gladiator II

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

Everything, or most of things shown here. is / are off to me

1. Gladiator settings is placed in 2nd Century AD. Firmly mid- Imperial era, and Christianity was taking roots everywhere in Roman Empire.
Legion armor, shields and other wargear is more or less off. And Rome conquered Numidia well WITHIN the Republic era.
2. Galleys showing here are IRL too small to support twin castellations, let alone siege towers.
Why I say this?
Look at rowers compartment area, I shows that galleys shown here are either biremes or quadriremes or -- in the 2nd Century AD -- 'Heavy Liburnia', which are beefed up to be 'all rounders', but I don't think Liburnians at that time can support castellations like these.
In addition to this
2.1 galleys rolled up sails before joining a battle, if a galley comes with removable mast, it must be removed and lay flat first, and then fastened to its hull immediately)
2.2 galley slaves weren't commonly used by then - too risky and not really efficient, these were used only as desperate measures. Hired oarsmen are preferred, (and they aren't chained to rowing benches either) and were actually paid low (but otherwise supplied with a good number of food, that quite enough for them to replenish their enegy after so much of rowings)
And to fit siege towers for amphibious assault operations, two or three ships must first lashed together with a system of strong wooden beams. and after siege is done (and these 'siege rafts' survived), all siege works are dismantled to revert ships into original forms.
2.3 By this time, polyremes are largely multibanked -- i.e. one oar is worked by at least two men.
3. Siege engines are also off!
3.1 Counterpoised trebuchets did not become available by this time, the closest siege engine to this was traction trebuchet. but no one in Mediterranean at that time was using it, only Chinese empires located at a different corner of Eurasia landmass did.
3.2 While Onager did existed by this timeframe, it didn't have a really good attacking range, nor capabilities to break a stone wall, it can however break crenellations and top tier of towers, and above all, can penetrate warship's deck (of that time). the original meanings of 'Catapults' was actually means 'Armor piercer'.
And even if onager of that size really existed, it never fired with wheels still attached to, IRL wheels are disassembled from the frame when shooting this.

In conclusion. Ridley Scott really reassembled siegery from Kingdom of Heaven (his previous movie) for this movie project every siegery seen here except ballistae came from Crusades era. (There's indeed a cog, or many cogs fitted with siege towers used by Crusaders)

 

[Lexicus]

Opposed landings by and large simply don't happen in the premodern period.

Collections: Nitpicking Gladiator II, Part I

This week (and next), I want to talk a bit about the recent release of Gladiator II. Now I’ve written a review of the film for Foreign Policy, which you can find here (behind the paywall). I …

acoup.blog

This is a good piece that takes the battle apart and points out many of the same things OP did.

 

[Klaus Hergersheimer]

Until ground transport became faster than ships, it was easier to just land somewhere else. Who knew >_>

 

[Lexicus]

Until ground transport became faster than ships, it was easier to just land somewhere else. Who knew >_>

Opposed landings become much more common due to the dispersal of military force in the face of Second Industrial Revolution (ie, 1870-present) firepower. Nothing really to do with transportation technology.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Is there a list of known opposed landings?

 

[Lexicus]

Is there a list of known opposed landings?

Not that I know of, but they are extremely rare prior to the modern period and even then before the 20th century still pretty rare, because armies tended to move as a single mass and dispersing the whole army to guard a coastline just wasn't something you did. I have to amend my previous post to say transportation technology does have something to do with this - the reason you can't, e.g. disperse your army along a coast and then quickly concentrate it to fight an enemy wherever they're landing is that your soldiers are moving at marching speed (or at most horse speed for all-cavalry forces) which doesn't really help when the enemy fleet shows up. But it's the dispersal of armies - meaning they take up a lot more space - that makes something like defending the whole Atlantic coast of France feasible, thus necessitating an amphibious landing in the face of enemy defenses.

In Gladiator 2's period, the standard procedure would have been for the army to disembark a few days' march from the city, then the army would envelop the landward side while preparing for an assault by storm (the Romans would usually capture cities by building a dirt ramp up the side of the wall). The fleet's role was not to engage any defenses at all but simply to prevent the defenders from being reinforced or resupplied by sea.

2.3 By this time, polyremes are largely multibanked -- i.e. one oar is worked by at least two men.

One note here - this is mentioned in the link I posted, but by this time polyremes don't really exist as warships anymore.

The Roman fleet that performs the assault is several different stages of wrong. These are the wrong ships for quite a few different overlapping reasons. The first problem is that the ships we see are large, multiple-banked oared warships, ‘polyremes’ we might say. The Romans did use such large warships during the Republic. But by the second and third centuries, Rome has been the unquestioned, unchallenged master of the entire Mediterranean litoral for a long time and its fleet has changed to match. In 200 AD Rome no longer builds large warships of this type, but instead has a navy composed of smaller coastal patrol ships called liburnians, named the Dalmatian peoples who originally came up with the design.

 

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

One note here - this is mentioned in the link I posted, but by this time polyremes don't really exist as warships anymore.

Yet 2nd Century Romans did beef up Liburnia to be 'all rounders' (about the size, and nearly a capabilities of Spartan Triremes, but more focus is towards counter insurgency and anti piracy). And it is possible that Liburnia of this era is now a multibanked bireme.
yet it doesn't mean it can accept castellations as seen here. let alone siege towers. i'm not sure until @Boris Gudenuf shows up here.

Opposed landings by and large simply don't happen in the premodern period.

Collections: Nitpicking Gladiator II, Part I

This week (and next), I want to talk a bit about the recent release of Gladiator II. Now I’ve written a review of the film for Foreign Policy, which you can find here (behind the paywall). I …

acoup.blog

This is a good piece that takes the battle apart and points out many of the same things OP did.

Two polyremes can be lashed together to support siege towers for this purpose. Romans did this in the First Punic War in the Siege of Syracuse. and maybe Diadochi Kingdoms of the same time.

 

[Uberfrog]

In the very first scene of the film, where Paul Mescal is running his hands through some bird feed, the camera pans out to show him squatting in his… pumpkin patch.

I knew at this point the film was not going to be concerned with historical accuracy!

 

[Lonecat Nekophrodite]

In the very first scene of the film, where Paul Mescal is running his hands through some bird feed, the camera pans out to show him squatting in his… pumpkin patch.

I knew at this point the film was not going to be concerned with historical accuracy!

The classic 'Just for fun' excuse. with totally novel thing.