Link to This Definition Did you find this definition of MENISCUS helpful? You can share it by copying the code below and adding it to your blog or web page.
hoplite (plural hoplites) A heavily-armed infantry soldier of Ancient Greece, wielding a one-handed spear and an aspis. 1970, John Kinloch Anderson, Military Theory and Practice in the Age of Xenophon, page 141,
Hoplites also carried a sword, mostly a short sword called a xiphos, but later also longer and heavier types. The short sword was a secondary weapon, used if or when their spears were broken or lost, or if the phalanx broke rank.