– How did historical leaders speak to large crowd without amplification?

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All I can think of is the movie Life of Brian – blessed are the cheese makers!

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Anonymous 0 Comments

So there are some little tricks that can be used, which other comments have mentioned already. A key element though is just that leaders didn’t expect everyone to hear them in every situation. Who they need to head them will vary a lot:

If you’re a politician giving a speech in a political location, like a Roman Senate building or even the House of Commons, then you are benefitted by being inside. A loud voice carries better in a sealed building, with no wind to whip it away, and walls for it to potentially echo on. Buildings can be designed to amplify this. Part of the reason sermons in churches and cathedrals can be heard pretty effectively despite (or rather because of the) the large size of the room – church benefits too from the fact that no one will be trying to speak over you, unlike a political building.

If you’re delivering a speech in a public setting, say out in a forum, then you don’t really expect your words to be heard by everyone. What’s most important is the people close to you, who are likely to be members of the ruling elite, can hear you clearly. Second to that, you want the common people to be further away and if they can’t hear you, you want them to see you. So be stood up high and make grand gestures. You will probably set up people closer to you to either memorise or record your speech, so that it can be repeated back to a wider public later or even published. Those people who saw but didn’t hear you earlier get the chance to then learn what you said, and put it together with the big show you put on (sneaky tip, what you record and publish doesn’t even have to be 100% accurate to what you said).

If you’re delivering a speech or commands before a battle, then things are a bit different. You definitely can’t be heard by all your troops. You can’t gather them in one spot either, and you’re unlikely to be seen by them all, too. But that’s okay. You can give a good rousing speech (make sure a paige can record it for the history books) to just a few people, and have messengers run the commands and such along the line to everyone who needs it.

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