A review of the history of warfare up to the end of the nineteenth century shows that states and commanders, long before the advent of communication tools, resorted to various methods to influence the minds, perceptions, and behavior of their enemies, surrounding populations, and even their own forces. Despite the proliferation of cognitive warfare literature in contemporary studies, the link between this literature and the longer history of methods of influencing perception and decision-making in premodern societies has been less comparative. Despite civilizational differences, these methods, in their general logic, show remarkable consistency in tactics that were based on power, deception, rumor-mongering, spectacle, calculated mercy, the destruction of internal trust, the use of symbols and rituals, the use of religion and legitimization, and the possession of historical information. The present study, with a historical-analytical design and using thematic analysis, identifies and replicates historical examples related to influencing perception, decision-making, and behavior from historical sources. Drawing on examples from the Assyrian, Achaemenid, Greek, Roman, Chinese, Islamic, Byzantine, Mongol, Ottoman, and modern European worlds, the present paper shows how these methods have been employed in various forms. In this, the main difference between civilizations has been not in the methods, but in the political and primary language tools of implementation. From this perspective, the history of cognitive warfare up to the end of the nineteenth century can also be seen as a continuous history of influencing the mind and perception.