Guy Leven-Torres 2006

RomanitasA short collection of essays by Guy Leven-Torres MA(Hons),

F.SEFA looking at the Sociology of the Roman Army and Society

Introduction

Casualties of War

Rome and its empire stand as a beacon for law and order. Her sway stretched from Scotland in the north to Africa in the south and to the Persian Gulf in the East. Gibbon reckoned this the happiest time in the existence of Mankind.

Marx thought history cyclical and as much as he is probably right in this matter, one should perhaps qualify it with the caution, that it is not so much history itself that is cyclical as that themes and events appear to repeat themselves through the commonality of behaviour that is Mankind.

So, for example civilisations appear to rise and fall and from their beginning to ending, societies go through various phases common to all. Take the British Empire for example. She rose through her sea-power to world dominance, held it for a brief span then lost it as stronger powers replaced her.

1

Rome’s example however was truly exceptional. She not only rose to power over a longer period but maintained her position for centuries. Britain ruled her Empire for around two hundred and fifty years while the Romans ruled theirs for close on seven hundred years.

Like all empires and societies she became decadent and perished but she took a long time to wither upon the imperial branch. The British in comparison have slumped from Empire to advanced decadence in only two generations. The Romans took from twelve to twenty generations to collapse.

Looking back upon that time, it seems a well-ordered and peaceful one in comparison to ours. Yet in reality there never was a time when a Roman army somewhere or other was not engaged in a major conflict or police action to preserve the integrity of her frontiers.

The British Empire was also continually embroiled in border wars and police actions and it is remarkable that she did so with forces in many cases, a fraction in numbers of those available at any one time to Roman armies. It is a tribute to British diplomatic skill that she was able to do so.

Only in Africa Province was the Legio III Augusta alone in policing that northern coastal strip from the Atlantic to the borders of Egypt. From the available archaeological evidence a careful system of treaties establishing client kingdoms with the tribes and kings in the region was the way of things for centuries 2

before the final imposition of direct rule, possibly by the Severan Dynasty in the early Third Century after Christ. Until then however, it seems that III Augusta was the policeman of the area.

However, if one looks closer at the Empire we find this case is not so unusual as Rome employed only around 300,000 soldiers in all to police an area of around six million square miles. Only in provinces like Britain, Germany and those bordering its one great imperial rival, Parthia was Rome forced to station legions in sufficient numbers to deter aggression. On the northern frontier too she faced problematic tribal incursions from movements of peoples seeking better land or more likely her assistance in some petty dispute between one tribal faction and another. Even so the numbers of men she employed was minimal.

Edward Luttwak the famous United States advisor to Presidents from Nixon onwards called this system an ‘economy of force’1: those she ruled greatly outnumbered Roman citizens and therefore Rome’s military capacity. Yet they feared her and it was this psychological factor alone that appears to have allowed Rome to maintain the initiative for so long. How did she achieve this?

She achieved it by losing battles and winning wars. Time and again, her armies went

1 Edward Luttwak, The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire. Baltimore, John Hopkins Univeristy Press 1976.

3

down, either through weight of numbers as in the case of barbarians or superior generals, as in the case of those she came up against in the more advanced and civilised eastern empire. Her long struggle with Carthage especially helped foster this seeming invincibility. Take for example the dreadful battles of the Trebbia and Cannae in which the flower of her manhood was sacrificed to the superior generalship of Hannibal. She lost upwards of one hundred thousand men if some of the sources are to be believed.

Even, if these estimates are somewhat exaggerated, if Rome employed her usual republican military format of one Roman legion to one allied ala, both numbering around four thousand men each, Roman casualties alone would certainly be fifty percent of these: fifty thousand citizen soldiers is no small loss for a city state whose population is around the several thousands rather than millions. At the height of Imperial expansion, her city population only numbered around one million, and many academics think this too high an estimate.

Even with citizen colonies dotted around Italy, this would not really explain the effects of her losses adequately. It seemed to have been common practice at this period around 218BC to raise four legions annually. This would number 24,000 men. Together with the allied alae, from whence our own word ‘allied’ comes, a normal consular field army would be around

4

two Roman and two allied ‘ala legions’ of the same strength, that altogether, with cavalry along as well number just over 24,000 soldiers. Cannae was the ‘Big Push’ and over 80,000 men were present at the battle according to Polybius. This figure would therefore mean that at least eight citizen legions2 were present along with around ten allied legionary alae. Statistical evi4dence in ancient sources is not an exact one by any means. Polybius at best can be used as a very rough guide although he was unlike others, able to interview actual

2 Some sources state that seventeen legions were present but I choose to follow what appeared to be standard Roman methodology of raising four citizen and four allied legions annually. Even in war the Romans were notoriously conservative. The Roman legions in total spread around Italy and at Cannae were numbered up to the early twenties and 21 x 4 = 84,000 legionaries. If this figure is correct then the Romans would have had just over 160,000 citizens under arms. Of the seventeen legions stated to have been at the battle itself half would probably have been allied contingents, so we are talking of around eight to nine citizen legions at most, numbering 32,000 to 40,000 allowing for deliberate over-manning to replace casualties.

Livy (XXV. 6) states that 50,000 were exterminated but Polybius and others state 60-70,000 deaths. If we settle on 60,000, Rome still had 100,000 citizen solders under arms and probably an equal number of allied ‘legionaries’ so making 200,000 in total. But still one third of her battle ready strength was annihilated. What is more, wounded mostly outnumber deaths and given the state of ancient medicine and its inability to cope with post-wound infection the higher figures of 80,000 could be correct and over a longer period the figure would have grown as soldiers crippled and disabled were unfit for further duty. So perhaps anything up to 35 to 40 percent of Rome’s trained battle ready manpower was lost for good.

My own limited military experience allows one to understand how difficult it is to retain men even in peacetime. The British army at this time (2006) is woefully short of recruits and anything between 4,000 to 5,000 under strength. Even taking into account the unpopularity of the Iraq war, the problem of recruitment and retainment of trained personnel is dire. As Rome was at war for her very existence and already had over twenty citizen legions in the field the loss of nearly 40 percent of Roman and allied men under arms was no small matter. Any other power would have given way.4

5

survivors of the Second Punic War. He was also close to the Scipio family and therefore at the centre of politics in his day.

If we settle for a male population of Roman citizens, spread across Italy, able and willing to bear arms as perhaps in the region of around 250,000 total so that the annual legio3

perhaps took up ten percent of available men or 24-25,000, the loss of even 40,000 was a serious matter. Yet Rome did not give in and raised fresh armies from slaves and any other able bodied men she could muster and renewed the attack. She simply would not give in and it was this tenacious resistance that helped foster the psychological perception among those she ruled that she was invincible. Also when Rome decided to wage war she did so with a totality and determination not seen until the First World War in 20th century Europe. Roman wars were total wars.

Ancient battles were in many ways more catastrophic than modern ones simply because

3 Legio means the annual levy or dilectus of four legions. Even this figure is probably far too large. There is just no way of knowing true statistics of Roman citizens. The figure of 240,000 reserve of available manpower is pure guesswork except for the fact that by the Imperial period Rome numbered 1,000,000 city population. In the respublica the 6th Circus Maximus could seat 300,000 and the population was probably not much more. Even if we take this higher figure and split it equally among male and female, the resultant 100,000 to 150,000 males would not all have been eligible for military service based as it was on a man’s income and land ownership. The figures available should therefore be revised down if anything.

6

of the poor medical facilities of the time and lack of medicines capable of preventing infection. Yet the Romans never lacked manpower to overcome their foes. Men were hardier than now and therefore better suited to a harsher time.

This particular subject may seem strange one with which to start this collection of essays with but it lies at the base of the entire subject. Rome was about war and defence against further wars. As Flavius Josephus was fond of informing his readers, the Romans fought their practice battles like real wars and their real battles like well-drilled practices. These may not have been his exact words but they tell us much of the sentiment that lay behind the Roman attitude and ideology of war. She fought to win and survive at all costs in a hostile world.

The Legions and auxilia were her deterrent. Her early warning system was the forward position forts and signal stations, sometimes well beyond the frontier. She had learned her war-craft the hard way in the fire and baptism of battle. From Cannae to Zama she learned the awful truth of strategic international war, rather than simple local wars. From Numantia in Spain to Alesia and Pharsalus, she learned the need for professional armies honed and trained to a peak of discipline and dedication perhaps even unknown to Alexander the Great. From Actium to Trajan’s wars against the Dacians she

7

learned the necessity to maintain these forces at a sustained height of professionalism and never to let her guard drop.

However it is to the generals and other officers that we must perhaps turn to understand the way assimilation into the Roman citizen upper classes ensured that she secured the best minds in the empire to win her wars so ensuring this did not happen for a while at least. Even her later Emperors Trajan and Hadrian who were not even Romans of Rome, even Italy as both were either born or raised in Italica in Spain. When Hadrian first appeared at the Imperial Court of his cousin Trajan, who was certainly known to have been born in Spain, the courtiers laughed at his Spanish accent.

However it was from the same Roman Gallo-Hispanic background that one of the subjects of the collected essays below deal with, namely Gaius Julius Agricola, father-in-law to the Roman historian Publius Cornelius Tacitus and said to be the finest governor of Roman Britain ever to have ruled. He was of provincial stock himself and even his name is evidence that one of his Gallic forebears gained citizenship either through the Dictator or his adopted son Octavian, the first Emperor and subsequently renamed Augustus.

These were not the fine ancient Roman families of old but provincials who replaced them after the great losses of the Civil wars. Most were new men without pedigree of any 8

kind but service to the relatively new imperial regime. These were not the Scipiones, or the Fabii, the Cornelii, or Gracchi.

These were hard practical men schooled in professional careers as befitted an empire. Theirs was not the world of family faction and feud. Their families remained obscure in the sunlight of the imperial clan. Even the Flavians were Italian rather than Roman and of strong farming stock. This was a new Rome: a mature Rome where hard headed men realised that if the empire was to survive then provincials had to have a hand in it. The Antonines, the later imperial clan to take the tiller of state, were also largely provincial in stock, rather than Romans of Italy. Marcus Aurelius’ paternal great grandfather issued from Baetica the same province as Trajan.

These were the men who really made the empire work. Agricola spent much of his time in Britain and it was he who led Legions and bigger armies under his mentors Paulinus and Cerealis in order to subdue and pacify the province. It was he who took Roman Legions into the north of Scotland and defeated the Caledonii under Calgacus.

How different though were these Roman battles to Cannae three hundred years earlier? The casualties do not appear to have been anywhere near as great. At the battle of Mons Graupius, Agricola was said to have used only his auxiliaries while the Legionaries looked on half bored. And in a similar battle fought

9

twenty odd years before, Boudicca the Queen of the Iceni had been routed by only ten thousand hastily gathered troops somewhere in the Midlands of Britain with the loss of only a few hundred Roman soldiers. How truthful is this? Tacitus was after all writing for a political audience back in Rome who wished to keep well in with the Imperator and his palace faction at the top.

Boudicca had smashed the famous Legio IX Hispana. And estimates of between one third to three quarters of it perished on the battlefield. This was no Cannae, yet the warrior queen led an army five times the size of that at Cannae under the general Hannibal. Yet casualties were in their hundreds on the Roman side at the final showdown between the Roman Legions XIIII Gemina and XX Valeria, while thousands upon thousands of Britons perished. Had battles changed so much then or were the Romans putting their own spin of matters of military history? Thousands of Romano-Britons perished in the towns Boudicca sacked. However, one will leave it to the reader to decide for themselves.

The answer is bound up with the Roman insistence of Romanisation or Romanitas, which put simply is the abstracted ideal of being and acting Roman. In 212AD, Caracalla gave the freeborn inhabitants of the Empire the much-prized citizenship. There were two primary reasons for this. The first was the need to bind an empire to a relatively new militarist Severan

10

regime of African origin from Leptis Magna but also as this was the current social trend of the time anyway. Hadrian had travelled the Empire far and wide in order to bind the whole region more to his person as a fellow provincial. Italy was no longer the main area of political and strategic action. However, secondly and more importantly, the new citizens would provide loyal provincial Roman citizens for her legions. They were also liable for the famous five percent inheritance tax that fed the military treasury. This was a time of war and Septimius Severus had charged both his sons to put the army before all else, even awarding it the right to wear the equestrian gold ring.

However it is here that we come full circle and understand at last the reasons why Rome survived as long as she did and always seemed to come back from the brink of disaster. She had unlimited resources of manpower. From the early respublica she had assimilated those around her and by a careful system of graded rights had ensured the loyalty of those she defeated. She made them good Romans.

Agricola’s ancestors probably fought against the Romans while he at a later period embodied the very best of Roman aristocratic talent. Agricola was the embodiment of Romanitas at its best. This generosity of the Roman People though was no emotional whim but the determination to survive in a hostile world. Her answer was to assimilate it and make it part of Rome herself. This was practical

11

diplomacy and imperial strategy par excellence!

(1)

Rome and Assimilation

Roman Society and various social and civil institutions like the patron-client system were the basis of the whole subject of assimilation and with it a process still found in later centuries well into the modern era. Even today in Spain and elsewhere the Romans ruled or where their descendants emigrated, such as Central and South America, an almost identical system still exists. During the days of Empire however, it was the army that seems to have been the starting point of the whole process that led in many cases to rapid 'Romanisation'. There had been older systems of patronage, based upon traditions of tribal and group loyalty, often inherited from one generation to another before the Romans came but it was they who exploited the true potential of clientele through Imperial policy. The army was an attractive career and its history as one of the main instruments of 12

assimilation/Romanisation within the empire and without, is crucial to the central theme of argument in this book that assimilation was a positive thing and benefited all who partook of it.

The idea of Romanitas held the empire together like no other force then in existence. The basis of this Romanitas was the eventual award of the Roman citizenship to those who achieved over time the highest degree of assimilation into the ruling regime. There were degrees along the path to this final goal such as the Latin Rights jus latini. By the acquisition of this latter benefit and status, the Roman state recognised that an individual and indeed whole towns had achieved a degree of Romanitas that marked them out as something quite distinct from others in a subjugated area.

This award was usually acquired through the achievement of magisterial office within a town or settlement awarded a certain type of constitution by the Roman authorities. Since the only people who could stand for office were generally the rich or tribal leaders, this usually meant the gradual Latinisation and then Romanisation of the upper classes.

Empires, Nation States and institutions survive because people who make up the ruling classes believe in them. We have already seen in the earlier book I wrote 4that, our own liberal bien-pensant elites in Europe apparently

4 Leven-Torres, A Question of Balance? 1 to 3: lulu.com/guyleventorres New York 2006.

13

do not. The lower classes will mostly take their lead from their leaders and follow suit. However, in a democracy like ours and in the United States and elsewhere, this is vitally important. Ignore the enfranchised population and the results are those also discussed earlier, apathy, crime and the serious threat of civil unrest. Take away this belief and the institution will wither and fail like an organ starved of blood and oxygen. So the best way to preserve the institution is to ensure that the populations that make it up, have a strong personal interest in preserving it.

The British Empire ended in India because the peoples that it ruled there no longer felt it worth their while to support such an institution. This was especially so among the Indian upper classes, who felt strongly that it was time the foreign power that ruled them depart from their lands. In other words it was no longer in their interests. No government, no matter how strong can survive for long without the consent of the people it rules, especially that of the upper classes or those with influence. The British clung onto power, albeit reluctantly using armed force where necessary but to no avail; in Macmillan’s famous words ‘The winds of change were blowing!

If the British had been a little more forthcoming a little earlier than the latter part of Queen Victoria's reign and given the Indian and African elite a share of real political power not only in India and Africa itself but across the

14

empire, then the situation may well have been different today. It has taken many years to ensure that an Indian or an African had a seat in the House of Lords for example. The political establishment in the British Empire was largely white and male and thought solely in terms of British politics at home in England. Ideas of a common citizenship came late in British Imperial history. A different attitude to the American colonies may have preserved much that was good. Today America could have been a Dominion similar to Canada or Australia. Empires need to be liked and respected, even if occasionally force has to be used to remind those of the 'benefits' of such rule. World history would have been very different.

In contrast, from very early times, the Roman authorities encouraged, through the paternalistic system of patronisation, not only the chance to Romanise/Latinise but also to become part of the ruling elite by becoming a member of the equestrian class ordo equester and even a member of the elite Roman Senate itself. Even future emperors such as the Severans ruling in the early third century, came from origins far from Roman. The Severan dynasty came from North Africa and are rumoured to have spoken Punic among themselves. There was probably more than a touch of Moor and other races within its bloodline. Several of the later military emperors could claim descent from former barbarian chieftains. Some like Stilicho were

15

half-castes, yet commanded armies important enough to threaten the throne. The fact that Stilicho never became emperor is not the point but the fact is, the Romans encouraged such people to gain important positions like commanding armies despite being racially mixed. The fact was that despite his parentage, Stilicho felt himself to be a Roman.

Why should a man be despised because of his colour or his background? Why should a person be denied position on the grounds of gender or because of their ancestry? Such attitudes appear to have had no place within the Roman world. There was prejudice against the slave and barbarian, especially the Germans who became over time the Roman obsession that the Carthaginians had once been. However if a man or woman were willing to accept the laws and ways of Rome, that is assimilate into the culture itself, then the rewards were quite phenomenal, especially for one's descendants.

Rome was a paternalistic culture and there is no point in denying this fact. However as we shall see below, women unlike in other less tolerant ancient societies had a lot of freedom including the right to hold property. It is wrong however to judge a past civilisation from today's moral standpoint. There are however certain criteria that seem common to human behaviour. The first of these is the respect to be accorded to one's parents and elders or to those placed in authority over

16

others. Women too have usually been greatly respected as mothers and occasionally as heads of households, even queens of whole tribes.

The basis of Roman society, as in most cultures, was the family with the eldest male as pater familias at its head. In early republican times this individual had the right to kill unwanted infants or to put to death any within his family who breached the strict rules then in existence. Above him were more powerful males who held greater authority within his gens by being head of a senior part of the extended family structure. At the head of the whole would be the senior paterfamilias, an individual whose authority auctoritas by virtue of birth and social standing, outshone any other male within the extended family of which he was the head.

Above him would be the state of Rome itself, which would be the most senior paterfamilias of all. The Roman state would guarantee to protect the Roman family from outside threats such as enemy tribes and criminals and intercede on its behalf with the various Roman gods in its role as guardian of the state religion. Likewise, the more junior paterfamilias in his role as family head would also contract with his family to provide protection against outside influences, safeguard the family property and ancestral custom, and intercede with the family gods on the family's behalf in religious matters. In other words the Roman family was modelled on the

17

same organisation and obligations as the larger paterfamilias of the Roman state.

The Roman system was a series of interdependencies based upon family cells that all gave allegiance to the head family of the Roman state itself. This lead to the development of serious obligations on both sides of the contract between Roman family and the state often protected by religious sanction and custom, which if broken threatened the perpetrator with very unpleasant punishment from gods and state. In later times Augustus remonstrated with those of the Roman upper classes who fell well below the expected standard of obligations (Dio The Roman History, Augustus, Bk 56, 2-10).

One of those obligations was to supply men in time of war for the army and there are recorded examples of fathers being stripped of citizenship or even being reduced to slavery, for cutting off the thumbs of their sons so as not to send them to war. Augustus even put citizens to death who failed to rally to the state's defence in times of serious defeat (Dio, Bk56, 23). This obligation to have sons and provide soldiers was a prime requirement of the contract between state and paterfamilias. The need for the paterfamilias to provide land for his sons as citizen soldiers was also a prime obligation. In the earlier period nobody could serve in the Roman army unless he owned land. The lack of this led to great political turmoil during the second century and eventually led to

18

the civil wars and the establishment of the Principate.

Beyond those related by blood, there were the freed slaves who became citizens on emancipation and also adopted the family name of their former owner and benefactor who was usually the paterfamilias. This placed a series of obligations upon the freedman and his descendants. The Freedman was forever in the thrall of his old master and the penalties for breaking such obligations could even mean re-enslavement. Effectively the property of the freedman libertvs was for the use if necessary of the old master. There are recorded cases of freedmen hiding their fortunes from their former masters (Tacitus, Histories Bk 2, 92). In this latter case exiles returning from overseas were restored to their previous status.

The freedman was quite literally and legally adopted into the former master's family. His children of course would also be clients of the former master but could enrich themselves and even serve in the Roman army, the Senate, and even hold senior office within the state. The freedom of their freedman father to do such things was seriously curtailed within law and even here there were exceptions as both Julius Caesar and Augustus recognised (Suetonius, Aug. 74. Caesar B.G. III)

The patron-client system was the bedrock of Roman society. It was a system of reciprocity. The patron would look after the interests of his clients as paterfamilias of the

19

clan and his clients would support him politically and support him in other ways as well such as handling his banking and property interests. The paterfamilias himself may have been the client of a more senior patron to whom he and his own family owed allegiance. To renege upon these obligations from either side was a threat to the state itself since it disturbed the delicate balance between the gods and the state itself sanctioned by religious belief and superstition.

There were past examples where Romans ignored these ties to more senior families. Such men were Sertorius and Marius, who as novi homines or new men sought the political and finical support of the powerful Metelli clan, an aristocratic but plebeian ancient senatorial house in Rome itself. Both of these men raised great concern when they snubbed this ancient house in order to pursue the higher offices of the Roman state. These ancient obligations were enshrined in the ancient ways of Rome or the mos maiorum. Rome in effect was a series of miniature family states within a larger family state. This led to many problems during the later republic and especially during the days of the Principate. We may return to Augustus above who in 9AD lectured the more irresponsible sections of Roman upper class society on the responsibilities of marriage and children.

Cassius Dio has him corner the Roman equestrian class in the forum and even though

20

such speeches were a recognised literary device usually invented for the reason of putting across the essential arguments of historical characters where no actual speech survives, in its central message it was actually how Augustus felt in such matters. Dio obviously expressed some of his own ideas on the matter and used a supposed speech of Augustus as a convenient vehicle to disseminate these, since he was well aware of the similar problems of his own day.

Dio himself was a Consul twice and held several other offices of state. He had been born in Asia Minor in the province of Bithynia and although of Greek origins entered upon a senatorial career in the reign of Commodus. He subsequently served under future emperors such as the Severans and the later Macrinus. It is clear his career had spanned the more troubled times (Dio Bk 72, 23. 1-3, 5.) of an empire coming out of the peaceful Antonine period which Gibbon thought was the most blessed of mankind. In many ways Dio is the quintessential example of an upper class provincial whose family assimilated successfully enough to consider themselves suitable material for the highest offices of state.

But consider also the state, to which we owe many duties that may not come easily to us. How excellent, and how imperative it is, if peoples and cities are to exist, and if we are to rule others and the rest of the world is to obey

21

you, that there should be a flourishing race of ours; such a race as will in time of peace till the soil, sail the seas, practise the arts and pursue handicrafts, and in time of war protect what we hold with an ardour which is all the greater because of the ties of blood, and which will bring forth others to take the places of those who fall. You have chosen to disregard both the providence of the gods and the devotion of your forefathers; your purpose is to extinguish our entire race and make it literally mortal, to put an end to the existence of the whole Roman nation. Besides this, you are guilty of destroying the state by disobeying its laws, and betraying your country by making her barren and childless. For a city is made up of human beings, not of houses or porticoes or market-places with no people in them. Would it not enrage the Romans who were his followers, if they knew that after they had gone so far as to carry off foreign girls (rape of the Sabine brides, my insertion) you by contrast have no feeling even for those of your own race, and that after they had engendered children even by the women of an enemy country, you refuse to beget them even by women who are your fellow-citizens? From the earliest times, as soon as government was established, strict laws were laid down on these matters, and afterwards many decrees were voted both by the Senate and the people. You talk of this unconstrained and emancipated life you have chosen, without wives or children, but you are no different from outlaws or the most savage 22

wild beasts. Certainly it is not because you take pleasure in a solitary existence that you live without wives, for there is none among you who either eats or sleeps alone. What you want is complete liberty to lead an undisciplined and promiscuous life. You can see for yourselves how much more numerous you are than the married men. How can the state be preserved if we neither marry nor beget children?(Bk 56,3-7, Cassius Dio, The Reign of Augustus, Penguin Classics: Trans: Scott-Kilvert, London 1987).

Obviously, the major concern for Augustus and indeed any potential imperator in the Roman world was the need for troops in order to win wars of conquest and increasingly defensive campaigns. The failure of the Romans in Italy to enlist in the army is painfully clear from inscriptions found on gravestones and monuments found on archaeological sites around the former empire even today. Many of these give the origins of legionaries as being provincial and even the rather strange epithet for a bastard origo castris or son of the camp. In other words recruitment was increasingly among Romans and even provincials whose origins were anything but Italian let alone Roman. Most had never seen Rome at all and probably never would. This is the reality of the legions that entered Rome with Vitellius in 69AD (Tacitus, Histories, Bk 2, 88). This was the reality of assimilation- Rome had to do so, in order to survive!

23

Yann LeBohec, the French academic, in his book on the Roman Army cites various studies of the birthplaces or origins of Roman legionaries over longer periods of time. For example a 1914 study showed that of the recruits to Legion III Augusta in north Africa during the First century AD, 19 came from Italy, 23 from Senatorial provinces and 56 from Imperial provinces. By the 2nd Century, 1 man came from Italy, 54 from Senatorial provinces and 44 from Imperial provinces. By the 3rd

century none came from Italy, 62 came from Senatorial provinces and 37 from Imperial provinces. The distinction between Senatorial provinces and Imperial provinces is important for our purposes. The Senatorial provinces were technically ruled by the Senate, normally had few troops in them as they were supposed to be the most Romanised. Such a province was Baetica in Southern Spain. Imperial provinces were those within the imperial remit imperium of the Princeps and were those usually on the more dangerous frontiers and as a result contained the bulk of the Legions and Auxilia. They were therefore probably considered the less Romanised although archaeology has done much to change this view. But they were the provinces where Rome felt less secure (LeBohec, The Roman Imperial Army, Chap.3, p89, table 20. Batsford, trans from picard editeur 1989, London 1994).

The majority of these men in the second and third centuries came from the most

24

Romanised provinces, namely the senatorial. These men may have been descendants of Roman colonists but most would probably have held the citizenship not so much from colonisation by ancestors but through the gradual assimilation of Roman culture by their none Romanised ancestors. Perhaps a term such as latinisation is more appropriate. One would have thought the Imperial military provinces would have provided most recruits but this does not appear to have been the case except in the Ist Century. Le Bohec feels that the legionaries came from a higher social milieu than is generally accepted. Rostovtzeff believed that barbarians or at least sturdy peasants entered the army (Le Bohec 1989). This was probably more appropriate to his own time when armies were made up of largely peasant stock.

To live in a town usually meant that the inhabitant was highly Romanised. This after all was Rome's greatest contribution to western civilisation and at least in the western part of the empire such urbanisation would have been seen as the mainstay of Roman influence and occupation. Le Bohec cites the following numbers of legionary recruits provided by the cities and towns of the most highly Romanised area of Gaul, modern day Provence Gallia Narbonensis. Vienne 24, Narbonne 18, Frejus 13, Luc-en-Diois 12, Arles, Beziers, Nimes, 6 each, Alba 5, Valence 4, Aix 3, Riez 2, Carcassonne, Antibes Apt, Castelnau-de Leze

25

Cavaillon, Digne, Tarascon, Uzes, Vaison, 1 each. When one compares this to other areas of the empire the tally still favours the more Romanised parts of the whole. Other parts of Gaul, Lugdunensis (central France) 12, Aquitania (Bordeaux) 6 or Germania, Lower 27, Upper 2. Spain, Tarraconensis (near Taragona) 11, Baetica (Andalucia) 3 in Flavian-Trajanic period, but 13 latter Julio-Claudian period. Interestingly the same process happens around the same time in Narbonensis 31 early Julio-Claudian period, 58 latter Julio-Claudian period, then 34 Flavian-Trajanic period. In all cases recruitment drops off in the second century. One's own studies of Baetica at the site of ancient Italica would seem to confirm his findings. For example Lucius Rulius Alrius of the Sergian Tribe, was a soldier of the Tenth Legion (CIL V, 932). Another was L. Valerius Nepos of the Seventh Gemina who may have not only been the bearer of a famous name but an officer as well. There is also evidence of a former member of the Legion Third Gallica.

Italica itself was originally founded in the late third century BC by Scipio Africanus for his wounded veterans in the war against Hannibal. Its history as the original Roman municipal city municipium in Spain is interesting. This of all places would be primary recruiting ground for the legions. Pliny mentions it as one of the most Romanised towns in the province of Baetica (NH,III 4). Hardly anything is known about the original settlement in 206BC but that it was for

26

Scipio's veterans and their unofficial families. This very fact confuses the archaeological record as there is a clear fusing of cultures. Take for instance the stratigraphy of the site shows that early on in the city's existence there is a mixture of cultures and only later a more Italianate appearance. Lets look at this in more detail:- This is from the site of the Casa de Venus situated in the older part of what was Italica.(Guy Leven-Torres, Italica, From Vicus to Imperial Throne, UCL 1997, from EAE 1982 p13 fwd)

Level I. Approximately 4th century BC. Ceramica Iberica (globular form). Punic vases, local pottery of Final Bronze Age traditions.

Level II. 4th to 3rd century BC. Italo-Greek fish-plate pottery, ceramica Iberica, Campaniense B, 4th century pottery, Amphorae Punica Macareno B, C, and E. 4th - 3rd century Macareno pottery in great abundance.

Level III. 3rd to 2nd century (foundation period of Roman city). Increase in Romano-Italic material but also with quantities of native manufacture such as ceramica Iberica etc. Roman tiles tegulae, opus quadratum, Italo-Greek pottery corresponding to 3rd century type, Ceramic forms Lamb 23A, Campaniense A, Lamb 27, 29, 31, and 33, presigillata, ceramica Iberica. Amphorae, Dressel 1A and B . Macareno C, D, etc, Punic amphorae of 3rd century and localised pottery.

Level IV. 2nd to 1st century. Hardly any terra sigillata but presigillata, Campaniense A, Lamb

27

27/29, 30, 31, and 63, Campaniense B, ceramica Iberica. Amphorae, Dressel 1A, 1B, 1C, 18. Macareno 1, community pottery, Vegas 4, polychrome.

Level V. 1st century. Archaic Arretine Goud 5 and 6B. South Gallic and Hispanic, Ceramic presigillata. Campaniense A and B, Lamb 1A and 5A, ceramica Iberica in relative abundance. Amphorae, Dressel 1A, 1C, and 7/8, Pelchet 2 and Macareno C, Vegas 8, 14A, 31, 39, 42, and 44. Teracotta un rostro femenino or woman's face.

Level VI. 1st century AD. South Gallic terra sigillata, Drag 15/17, 18/31, Ritt 18, Arretine Goud, 16 and 27, Ritt 8, Drag 24/25, sigillata hispanica, Drag 8 and 35. Fine warse Mayet XXXII, XXXVIIB, and XIIIB Roman amphoras, Dressel 1b and 1c, Macareno D, Ceramica campaniense A and B.

Level VII. Late 1st century AD. Terra sigillata, conforming to Drag 15/17, 24, 27, 29B and 32. Arretine Drag 24/25, Ritt 5 and 5a, Goud 27, Drag and La hispanica Drag 18. Fine wares XLIII, XLIIIA, and XXXVIIIA and other types. Amphorea Dressel 1.

Level VIII. 1st to 2nd century AD. South Gallic terra sigillata, forms Drag 11, 18, 22, 24, 25, 27, and 37A. Also forms Ritt 13, Hermet 25. Arretine terra sigillata Haltern 7, Goud 18, Drag 36, Ritt 1, terra sigillata hispanica, Drag 29 and 37. Also abundant terra sigillata of Graufesenque origin. Fine wares Mayet II to III, X-C, XXXVII etc.28

At the beginning of the period, that is level 1 we observe a lot of native material and some Punic wares. Obviously the site was inhabited before the foundation of Italica itself in 206BC. We know that much of Spain at this period was under the Carthaginians or had strong trading links with them. By Level 2 the deposit includes or Italo-Greek remains. This would have come into inhabitants' possession through contact with Greek colonies further up the coasts of Spain who also traded with Italy. By Level III there is a veritable sea-change in the type of material found, still local but with a strong Italo-Roman theme. This seems to confirm the foundation of Italica by Scipio Africanus and the settlement of veterans there. Level IV contains mainly local material and this seems to indicate a rather impoverished period for the city, which is not surprising with the civil wars and piracy disturbing links with Italy. The veterans and their immediate descendants probably intermarried with Iberians and felt little loyalty to Rome so far away.

By Level V however, seems to indicate that by the later period of the 1st century BC Roman or at least Italian wares were again obtainable. We do know that many Italians defeated in the Social War of the 90s BC settled in Spain and in Italica to escape the turmoil in Italy itself. Levels VI and VIII seems a period of wealth came about in the Ist century AD. There is an increased amount of material from Roman and Italian origins but there is also material

29

imported from Gaul. We know there was economic growth with the establishment of the Principate in 27BC and Augustus campaigned her to secure the frontiers of the Spanish provinces. The Romano-Iberians profited greatly from this increased stability and more Italians settled attracted by the trading links with other parts of the Empire and the garum fish-sauce industry which supplied this rich condiment to the finest dining tables in Rome and the provinces. Level VIII shows that this imperialisation through contact with the rest of the Roman world continued unabated. Italica itself grew in importance but seems to have overreached itself by trying to emulate the metropolises of the Near East.

From the point of view of our discussion the archaeology of Italica is a revelation of the process of assimilation into the Roman imperial structure and into which the lives of the population of the empire were increasingly embedded and encouraged to become Romans. Some academics prefer the term imperilisation to Romanisation since they feel that Romanitas itself evolved in its meaning over time with direct contact and assimilation of other cultures and peoples and in particular hellenism that led to different forms of 'Romanisation' perhaps specific to the locality in question. However, this imperialisation-Romanisation was recognisably Roman. There was therefore no doubt of what it meant to be Roman, even though it may have evolved over

30

the centuries especially under the influence of the eastern Helleniic world. Greek was the language of the man-of-letters and despite early resistance to it in the earlier period of contact with Greece, its superiority in literature and as the language of a far older and civilised culture proved irresistible.

If one should doubt this process just examine the way the perception of our own nationality has changed over the centuries. Just what does it mean to be British today? One hundred or so years ago it meant England and Empire. Englishness was synonymous with Britishness despite the fact that the United Kingdom contained four different countries. Before the advent of empire an inhabitant of these islands would have looked no further than his local manorial landlord or his local parish for a clue to his identity which was strictly local in character.

The British Empire and in particular sea-power revolutionised the British national consciousness. Even in historical films made as late as the 1950s, England is regarded as the realm to be defended against the foreign foe. The Irish, Scottish and Welsh are seen as representatives of an English national supra identity in the broader epithet of British. It is England and Englishness that they must aspire to even if it means the British Empire. Nelson's signal at Trafalgar started with England expects despite the fact that there were three other nations that comprised Great Britain

31

under King George and he had Scots and other nationalities in his fleet. The British Empire imperialised the nation's perception of itself and its peoples. Our British identity today identity is a far different concept than the idea of Englishness and Britishness held in past times and will continue to evolve.

It is the same with all empires especially when they come into direct contact with exotic cultures like India. America is the new world super power and many of us have subtly assimilated American ways of speech, dress and attitudes. It is a natural human evolutionary process older even than Rome or ancient Greece. The Americans are highly successful in this process despite some misgivings from the older generation in places farther afield. However, 'Americana' is highly desired in general because of the benefits of that civilisation such as a higher standard of living, notions of democracy and a newness and openness often at odds with even the older European nations. In short it is exciting. Roman society with its sophistication and benefits in an improved way of life must have been very attractive to a 'barbarian' or even a 'civilised' Greek simply because it offered security as well, often from a subsistence level of life and free from war. That is why America is looked to today, because it provides security as well.

Italica is also interesting for the fact that in Trajan it supplied a Romano-Iberian emperor to the throne. Hadrian spent time here as a

32

boy. In fact a whole provincial elite entered the senate from this region and southern France. Ronald Syme is worth quoting, The new dynasty, which is Spanish with Trajan and Hadrian, emerges as Narbonensian with Antoninus Pius, and the strains are blended in the grandson of Annius Verus (otherwise Marcus Aurelius). Those rulers are the successive products of a group of families allied and interlocked long since, first in their countries of origin and then at Rome...The first object of matrimony among the gentry, whether Italian or provincial, was to link families of wealth and standing, to concentrate their resources, spread influence, and acquire predominance in a town or a region....Even when a family had risen from equestrian rank to senatorial, from local repute to metropolitan fame, its sons might still look for brides in their own country, so strong was the tie at home…Migrating to the capital, the elite of the western lands took station beside their predecessors from the Italian towns, whom they emulated in ousting the nobiles, and then went on to supplant. Wealth came with them, often ancestral, whereas many Italian fortunes were very recent, deriving from the civil war and proscriptions (Syme, Tacitus, Vol II, ix, p601-2, Oxford 1958, 1997).

This assimilation affected all levels of society. We have already seen the soldiers above, some from legions on the other side of the empire. One Sextus Julius from nearby

33

Hispalis (Sevilla), had quite an astonishing career. We shall quote his career in full. It has been dated to around 160AD.

Sex. IuIio Sex. F. Quir. Possessori, [Prae coh III Gallorum. Praeposito numer[ri Syror. Sagittarior, item alae primae Hispa[nor. Curatori civitas Romulensium. Arlvensium, tribuno, mi[I.leg] XII Fulminat(ae), [Curatori coloniae Arcensium, adlecto[in decurias ab optimus maximisque[imp Antonino et Vero augg, adiu[tor Ulpii Saturnini Praef annon [d oleum Afrum et Hispanim recen[ sendum item solamina transfe[renda item vecturas navicularis exsolvendas, proc augg ad [ripam Baetis, scapharii Hispalen[ses ob iurocentiam Iustitiam [que eius singularem (Dessau ILS 1403).

It appears the above began life as an equestrian narrow stripe military Tribune tribunus augustclavius. He then went on to Syria where he probably commanded a squad of the famous Syrian archers and then returned home to command a Spanish cavalry squadron. He seems then to have spent some time in a civilian curatorial post at Sevilla Hispalis, then joined the Twelth Fulminata legion wherever it was stationed in the empire at this period. His career then appears to have involved very senior posts of one kind or another as curator of the oil and grain supply in Africa and Spain, in particular imperial procuratorial responsibility for the transport of such materials up the river Baetis that flows through

34

the city of Hispalis, possibly with the direct patronage of the joint emperors Aurelius and Lucius Verus. In other words this confirms Syme's extensive studies on the subject and conclusion, that the assimilated Romanised/imperialised elite gradually supplanted the native senate at Rome and Italy but also in the more Romanised provinces as well. Sextus was probably descended from Romans and Italians but also numbered native Iberians in his ancestry.

Baetica and its wealth actually threatened the economic stability of Italy and in particular its wine production (Collumela 3, 1 3-4, Strabo 3. 2. 6). A shipwreck from the time of Claudius, found off the coast, known as Ponte Verdes II was carrying Haltern 70 amphorae from the province and Collumela owned a farm near modern day Jerez de la Frontera.

The region itself had to be highly Romanised in order to achieve this level of penetration at Rome itself. Italica supplied several senators (ILS 8970, CIL 1130) and so did its nearby rival Hispalis. Other inscriptions show how others from the cities served in lower capacities such as imperial procurators and agents in other areas of the empire (CIL 1115, 1116, 1117).

We have strayed a little from our main discussion but this is essential to demonstrate the level of assimilation that was very real in the Roman Empire, especially in a region so diverse as Spain. Many of these individuals

35

would have either been descended from Roman or Italian soldier settlers or even served in the legions themselves before going onto take up civil posts and offices. The only way they could achieve this was through patronage- a patronage that actively encouraged assimilation into the imperial Roman structures of the day. From high class aristocrat to low born peasant or townsman and slave, this system encouraged the individual to aspire to become Roman sooner rather than later. This is clearly shown by the inscriptions given above.

Augustus clearly was not the only emperor to face problems of recruitment among native Italians and Romans. The only available source was therefore the provincials themselves. These quickly displaced their Italian and Roman predecessors within the power structure at all levels of society, whether legionary, procurator, or senator. This was the secret of Romanitas and its success..

Rome founded colonies for the reason of not only defence but as a bastion of Roman ways and as an example to conquered peoples of the benefits of Roman life and civilisation. More than this it was a living claim to the land so subjugated. This was a tradition among less civilised peoples as well. Tribes often buried their warlike kings and aristocrats in burial mounds in order to lay claim to ancestral lands. However, there were several types of colonia and in the process of assimilation its meaning and function evolved in much the same way as

36

Romanitas itself. The original colonies were originally settlements of soldiers, often time-served veterans who could be called upon in time of peril to defend an area if they were not too old and fit enough or to breed future legionaries for Rome's armies. Originally colonies had been founded by transplanting whole sections of young Italians and Romans with their families in order to secure an area. This was in fact how Ostia the port of Rome had been founded in the early days of Rome. But as time progressed, these colonies would become established Roman towns, providing further recruits and colonies. This was probably the real reason why Italica was founded: Scipio had an eye upon the future of Spain and especially the potential wealth of a region such as the south.

Rome was ever conscious of the need to preserve the status-quo. For example once a land had been subjugated it was necessary to secure it in the name of Rome. To Rome this meant the establishment of her idea of urban life. This way the indigenous population, in particular the elite would observe first hand the benefits to be had from Roman life. This was the seed of Romanitas.

In the Roman west this was not too much of a problem. However in the more civilised and Hellenised Greek speaking East, this was not the case. We shall return to this later. In Spain and Gaul there already existed proto-urbanised settlements influenced by Greek and

37

Phoenecian traders and colonists. Some of these settlements reached a high standard of urbanisation as archaeological remains testify. This was especially so in Spain.

However, even in existing settlements Rome planted colonies of Roman citizens in order to secure the area. This was often done by confiscation procriptio of land from defeated foes. This had always been the Roman method of conquest. Sometimes whole peoples were ejected if the Romans were particularly uncertain of their hold on a place. Look for example at Colchester founded on such lands after the invasion of Britain in 43AD. Veteran legionaries of XX Valeria were planted here and the local tribes expelled. This eventually led to the Boudiccan rebellion of 61AD (Tacitus, Annals, XIV, 30) wherein the temple of Claudius, seen by the Britons as a symbol of their fate was completely raised to the ground.

Contrast the fate of St. Albans, a Roman Municipium, which was too a former native site of some importance but whose chiefs were favoured by Rome with the above status. This city although not a colony was allowed its own defensive walls in the 1st century, a sure sign of imperial favour. Such settlements usually started life as civitas, a Latin term meaning an urban settlement or area where it was intended to build a city as part of a long term programme to Romanise an area. Urbanisation of an area meant it was easier to control such a territory.

38

Each civitas had its own territory or civil boundary. Dependent upon its status, such foundations could ensure that the native ruling elite at least if not the town's inhabitants gained the Roman citizenship by becoming officials or magistrates on the town's senate or council ordo. Effectively, the town's constitution whether, simply civitas, municipium, or colonia, was based upon the constitution of the Roman state itself. Each was a little respublica headed by two or four magistrates termed either duoviri or quattuo-viri usually members of the local ordo each of whose members was termed decurionus. In a municipium the senior magistrates appear to have been two financial officers quaestor and two senior officers akin to the consuls in Rome itself. The citizens had Latin Rights, a half way stage to full Romanisation and the citizenship.

Obviously Verulamium was considered Roman enough, in sympathy at least to be granted walls and the Latin Right. Colonies were actually considered Roman territory per se, and enjoyed the same rights as Rome itself and was therefore free of taxation normally levied on lesser towns. The magistrates that headed these seen to have been only two in number and termed duum-viri . Romans like the British loved committees in order to decide upon public business.

Wacher in his book, The towns of Roman Britain (Batsford, London 1976) lists seven types of settlement recognised officially by the

39

Roman authorities (Leven-Torres, dissertation Italica, From Vicus to Imperial Throne, UCL 1997).

a) Civitas- citizenship of Roman or non-Roman community. It is also used by both to describe themselves (origo)

b) Colonia- used in early Empire to describe towns inhabited either by Roman or Latin citizens, many of whom would have been army veterans -governed by Charter based upon the laws of Rome itself.

c) Municipium- again in the early Empire to described towns, likewise governed by Charter. The inhabitants would have been of Roman municipium civium romanorum or of Latin status according to the grade of municipal charter awarded. Later however, a town with only Latin Rights might have received full Roman citizenship and subsequent promotion to Colonia was not unknown (Aulus Gellius, Attic Nights,.16, 13)

d) Oppidum- literally meaning a town or other native settlement. In Spain it meant any fortified urban settlement, although its use elsewhere in the Roman world, for example in Britain, might indicate a somewhat primitive nucleated settlement.

e) Urbs- normally translated as city, and it was used to describe a settlement of higher status than one which might be called an Oppidum.

f) Vicus- widest range of meanings of all. It could mean a city region, a civilian settlement

40

outside a fort cannabae, as at Vindolanda in England or Zugmantel in Germany. It also appears to have been used to describe simple villages, however, it was also used to describe central towns of some peregrine Civitates. It therefore had the lowest legal status applicable to something approaching an urbanised site. A pagus formed a country district.

g) Polis- Originally used to describe city-states in Greece, but also used by ancient sources to describe civitates or cities such as Italica mentioned above.

The elder Pliny, who in his Natural History describes the highly Romanised province of Baetica, actually gives the numbers of towns enjoying some form of Roman status within the region- Oppida omnia numero clxxv, In iis coloniae 1x, municipia xviii, latio antiquitus, xxix, libertate vi, foedere iii, stipendiaria cxx (NH, 3,4; Weisio 1841).

Returning to Italica, she produced nine Roman senators. In order to do this she must have been extremely Romanised, especially since she was originally only a vicus in the local territory (Elder Pliny NH, III, 4) conventus of nearby Hispalis. At sometime in the reign of Augustus, Italica suffered a confiscation of land deductio in order to settle a veteran legionary colony there (Strabo, History 3. 2. 1). However in the reign of Tiberius, Italica issued two series of semisses or small coins displaying the heads of the military commanders Germanicus and Drusus. The first was the nephew of

41

Tiberius and the second his brother of whom he was very fond. On the reverse of both these coins appear military insignia together with a legionary eagle standard surmounted by a vexillum (A.T. Fear, Rome and Baetica 50BC-150AD, Clarendon, London 1996). In particular the legend upon the coinage PER AUG. MUNIC. ITAL, seems to indicate that this was indeed so. There is still debate today among Spanish archaeologists whether it was Hispalis or Italica that suffered the imposition of the legionary colony. Italica would seem to be the preferred choice given the coins above.

From our point of view this is important. Italica was supposed to be the most Romanised of all towns in the region. Its history began with the settlement of soldiers in the 3rd

century BC and yet it received a second influx in the reign of Tiberius around 20-30AD. Italica had favoured Caesar's cause during the civil wars in the previous century (Caesar, BC, II. 20). Furthermore two of the conspirators who attempted the murder of an unpopular Caesarian governor came from Italica (Alexandrian War, 52. 2). The Caesarians or Octavian's party were obviously anxious to curry favour within a region notoriously sympathetic to Pompeius Magnus and his sons. The murder of an unpopular man may or may not have been most convenient to the Caesarian's cause. Either way, the imposition of a legionary colony would have ensured the continued loyalty of such a town and ensure its

42

loyalty to the newly established Principate which although founded around 27BC, was in Roman terms a very short while. The Republic was still a reality in most Roman minds, the man at the top or Princeps, was merely a first among equals. There was no right of hereditary succession and men still survived from the days of the Republic, men who still thought in terms of their own dominance within Rome itself. Tiberius was not a popular choice.

Either way the new regime needed support primarily among the provinces. It was among the inhabitants of these highly Romanised areas that the Principate sought support not just among the aristocracy at Rome. The new imperial system benefited most of all these peoples. They were for the first time governed by paid professional civil servants. These men were the employees of the emperor even though Baetica itself was a public province, the men who governed it would be conscious of the emperors eye upon them. This prevented them from lining their own pockets and stabilised the region and towns like Italica. We have seen above that archaeology clearly shows the huge growth in prosperity that came about after the establishment of the Principate.

The planting of soldiers would have reinvigorated the city and area. The move may not have been popular but it ensured the stability of the region and its loyalty to the new regime. The soldiers were Caesar's men to the core. Germanicus was a popular hero and so

43

was Drusus. Their influence upon the already heavily Romanised region ensured that the process deepened still further. Already by the time of Nero, the Gallo-Iberian elite were making serious inroads into the native Italo-Roman aristocracy. The Flavians another new dynasty with an insecure claim to the throne further encouraged the process (PIR2, C1425). One Spanish senator, L. Cornelius Pusio was Consul under Vespasian. other Consuls were Manlius Vopiscus (Statius, Silvae 1.3), his son or grandson in 114AD (ILS 1044), L. Minicius Natalis suffectus in 139AD, and M. Accenna Saturninus (CIL XIV, 3585). These men gained their positions through wealth in land and the patronage of the Imperial elite and the Princeps who by 100 AD would be of Spanish origins himself, often the direct descendant of Roman legionaries intermarried with local women.

It was to be these men and their descendants who joined the legions as citizen soldiers. The Italians recruited to the army seriously decreased in number. However it was in the interests of their colonial cousins to preserve the status quo and in particular the new imperial regime. Men like those settled at Italica, with more than just a patriotic interest in the survival of the Principate. The emperor to these men and their immediate descendants, was the patron or paterfamilias who gave them land and the opportunity over time to rise up through the Roman hierarchy, even to be a

44

town magistrate. Men like the Sextus Julius above, who became a Tribune in the XII Fulminata. He was not alone.

These Romanised provincial citizen legionaries were no country bumpkins and as Le Bohec and others have shown, these men had status, not only as soldiers but as Roman men of note in their own right. Junior officers in particular needed to be literate in order to rise to the Centurionate and beyond. Even to enter a legion, the crack troops of Rome, one needed to be of good character as the letters between Trajan and the Younger Pliny clearly show. Above all else, patronage was of utmost importance to any recruit to the military hierarchy (Pliny Bk.X, 106). Without a patron to vouchsafe a young aspirant to the colours, entry to office or the legions would be at the very least difficult without a letter to oil the way. This again is made clear by Pliny in his letters to his friends and Trajan. Suetonius, the author of the 'tabloid' Twelve Caesars, turned down such an invitation from his patron Pliny to take up a post as Tribune in the Army (Pliny Letters, Bk.X, 96).

Whether, legionary or procurator, these provincial Romans relied upon the intricate hierarchy of patron and client that led from the bottom of the social ladder to the Emperor himself. This was the very essence of Romanisation itself. Assimilation within the Roman world relied upon a system of reciprocity wherein the beneficiary of looked to

45

his patron to gain position and improve his lot. A whole nexus of inter-relational contacts ensured the stability of the Roman system. This system was actually one huge family based around several larger families whose wealth and prestige auctoritas protected and enshrined the idea of Romanitas itself.

The organism was based upon a hierarchy of reciprocal relationships sanctioned by law, custom and religion. Through it one gained the freedom if a slave, the Latin Right if free, the Roman citizenship itself and entry into the various offices high and low of the state itself. The emperor was the chief paterfamilias and he spent most of his reign dealing with petitions from Romans and provincials high and low. The army in particular looked to him for its survival and continued glory. It was through the army in particular that the aspiring provincial could raise himself higher up the social scale. Men like Sextus Julius above who saw a military career as a passport to important status and office in Spain itself. It was these type of men above all who gained most from the evolution of the idea of Romanitas. Trajan and Hadrian were both soldiers in their time but they were provincial Romans. This fact is important. Both were recognised as military men viri militares. And it was this fact alone above all others that gained for them and other provincials like them important posts, including the throne. Trajan was adopted by Nerva his patron and new father. Hadrian, an Italian by birth but also a

46

provincial and a cousin of Trajan was adopted by him in turn. This is a process that is often overlooked by academics.

The dynamic of assimilation works not only in the provinces but at the centre of things as well. Trajan and Hadrian took their provincial attitudes with them to the throne. Italy became less important but this was right at the time simply because the legions consisted in the main of men from the most Romanised provinces; men who recognised consciously or otherwise the necessity to preserve the idea of Rome and Romanitas. This was the true nature of Rome herself and Romanisation!

47

(2)

The Roman Legion

The Roman Legion was far more than just a ruthless killing machine. Its make up was truly cosmopolitan in origin. By the second Century AD it recruited from around the Empire. Its men, one and all had to speak and understand the Latin language. Most, if not all had to be Roman citizens, even though there is evidence in the East and West of the empire, that sometimes citizenship was awarded on entry. The usual term of engagement at this period was for twenty-five years, during which time the legionary was forbidden to marry, although unofficial relationships were tolerated probably to be legitimised on discharge.

The other major part of the Roman Army was the non-citizen Auxilia, made up of soldiers, many from the less civilised areas of the known world such as the frontiers and beyond. These were paid only a third of what the Legionary Roman citizen received but after twenty-five years under the colours, would on discharge receive a diploma awarding citizenship to the soldier and his unofficial family. The Legionary did not enjoy this prerequisite but his marital situation was legitimised either by going through a recognised form of marriage that at least gave the citizenship to his children or allowed to pass on his privileges by indulgent authorities. A clue is perhaps given by the fact that 48

discharge diplomas from this period often give the origin of the soldier as ‘Son of the Camp’ or origo castrense, meaning he was or had been a bastard. However Rome needed soldiers and those born of legionaries and ex-auxiliaries, born as they were into the frontier regions and familiar with the army already, were not going to be lightly dismissed as a potential source of recruits.

The potential soldier would therefore follow his father into the family trade. However to get anywhere, even into a Roman legion as a probatus or tiro, social connections were important. The fact that a boy born, even illegitimately to a legionary on the frontier was a good introduction. The recruiters, probably centurions and other more junior officers probably knew the father well and so the boy gained an easier introduction to the colours. If however, the new legionary wanted to rise up through the ranks he was going to have to cultivate some very important social connections among the officers under which he served. He also had to be able to read and write.

The legion itself was organised into ten cohorts, the First of which in our period was double in size to the numbers one to nine that comprised 480 men eah. In this First Cohort went the bravest men, the best officers and centurions named primi ordines, the most senior of which was the much respected primus pilus or First Spear who far from being like a

49

modern non-commissioned officer was actually equivalent to a Brigadier. These men and the rest of the corps of centurions known as the Centurionate were thorough professionals in the full sense of the word. These men led from the front and were the backbone of the Roman Legion.

Within the cohorts of 480 men were the maniples of 160 men, each divided into two centuries of eighty men. The century had at one time had consisted of 100 men but the smaller figure by the second Century AD, appears to have been a a tactical reform. There is the distinct possibility though that twenty of the century at this period were made up of civilian assistants, perhaps responsible for chores and duties not done by the military component of the unit. There is an echo of this in more recent times, when in the Duke of Marlborough’s Army in the early 1700s, the artillery and food supply was manned by and left to civilian contractors. Even the siege works in this period seem to have been left to civilian engineers and miners employed specifically for the purpose.

Underneath the century of eighty soldiers and civilian ancillaries, the century would be sub-divided into eight man sections or contuberniums. Interestingly enough we use a similar number of men in a modern infantry section. These would be led by a junior section leader of whose title we are not sure, although modern re-enactment groups have used the term Decanius to describe these. One’s

50

personal research has not found anything to substantiate this title in the sources. The closest one can find to a title for a section leader is in the cavalry, commanded by a decurion but he appears to be similar to a Centurion, commanding as he does up to thirty soldiers in a turmae. Like the infantry centurion, he had a deputy called an optio, from where our modern word option meaning choice. This understudy was probably a chosen man hence his full title optione ad spem.

The eight man sections served and slept together throughout their initial career. There has been a lot of discussion among academics about how the Roman army was recruited. One even suggests that, Roman legions only recruited every twenty five years by enlisting almost all the five thousand odd men needed, from the legion ﾴ s traditional recruiting grounds at once. This was then repeated every twenty-five years. This is errant nonsense. The author in question then goes on to say that legions never replaced their depleted manpower in the meantime and through these important facts, it is possible to track the movements of these professional bodies. So a legion recruited in its traditional grounds in Spain, such as the famous Tenth, would be full of fit young eighteen year olds, full of vigour in 25AD and discharge what remained of the Legion in 50AD, namely the forty-three years old middle aged men who had come to the end of their time.

51

A modern army, supported as it is by modern food and medicine needs to replenish itself every year, let alone very twenty-five years. Modern wastage rates, especially during basic training are around five to ten percent per annum, sometimes higher, especially during the first weeks of basic training. The modern British army at the time of writing is around five thousand men short of its full compliment. As there are around 100,000 men in this army, the five percent requirement seems about right to allowing for, injury, disease, and other problems that force soldiers into retirement. There is also the problems of rank and promotion that will create further gaps in the line.

In ancient times, the average life expectancy was only a third to one half of what it is now. For men it was around thirty-five to forty and for women around thirty-five. Soldiers ironically tended to live longer statistically speaking, simply because of a regular diet and good medical care.

However, even at an attrition rate of five to ten percent, a figure of quite conservative proportions, the loss of around one hundred or so men per annum through illness, injury, disease and death, especially in battle, factors that were far more common in the ancient world, the Tenth Legion would have numbered hundreds when it came round to discharge time. And men in their mid forties are nowhere, so fit as eighteen year olds. People aged faster

52

in those far off days too. Even though we have records of legionaries serving until their teeth fell out as is mentioned in Tacitus (Annals 1.16/17) or centurions still serving in the line aged nearly eighty! .These men were exceptions as the context mentioned in the famous Annals of Tacitus was about aged troops serving long after their discharge dates.

No, any army ancient or modern must have a ready supply of recruits to replenish its losses through battle and disease; especially a professional standing army like the Roman. Oneﾴ s own estimates show that around thirty legions of five thousand men each would require around 250 recruits per annum to train up and maintain its battle effectiveness. Most of these as we have seen came either from the legionﾴ s traditional recruiting grounds. Those of the Legions IX and X from Spain, certainly recruited from there until around the middle of the Ist Century. The famous IX Hispana, sent to Britain from Pannonia in 43AD was therefore better placed to receive these. Sea travel was far cheaper and faster than road.

Academics often fail to understand their subjects properly. The gentleman who one mentioned above failed to understand that any army to be battle effective must strike a healthy balance between youth and experience. What would be the point of having a middle-aged army? Such a force would not be effective. Older people suffer more injuries and one only has to return to the heady days of the Republic

53

to understand properly the Roman attitude to recruitment. Men had a duty to serve in at least ten campaigns and present themselves when requested for annual levies held every spring.

The tribunes responsible for this evolved quite an elaborate system to ensure a balance of physical fitness and experience. Roman military ages, started at around seventeen and ended at around forty-six, if the man were fit. There were men who served long after this age but from around the mid thirties, these senior experienced men, were placed in the rear as triarii and is probably the origin of our word ‘tried’. These men formed a stiffening rear echelon reserve, ready should the prnicipes and hastati front ranks face defeat. In other words the legion was designed very much to reflect the age and experience of its members. The younger ranks of the hastati and principes would do most of the fighting as the youngest and fittest and most importantly the keenest, anxious to prove their courage before their commander (Plutarch, Coriolanus 4).

So one has to agree, that assumptions that Roman legions raised in one year, discharged twenty-five years later, without levies in the meantime, are rather unacademic. There are records of Roman legions like the ones used by Lucullus in the conquest of Asia, whose mutinous behaviour nearly cost this excellent soldier and Senator his life were kept in the East for years after, as a punishment for their behaviour but even these would have had to

54

recruit and train annual levies to maintain fighting effectiveness.

This would not mean raising an entire legion every year but certainly enough men to replace casualties of battle and disease. We can also read of the similar Senatorial actions to the legions that were mauled so badly at Cannae. These were sent to Sicily and not allowed home until the end of the Second Carthaginian War after they had recovered their reputations by defeating Hannibal at Zama in 201BC. These too, in order to maintain their battlefield effectiveness would have had to take in recruits. It is unthinkable for a fighting formation to be allowed to dwindle and waste away in war. Even in peacetime, British Army recruits men and women from 18 to 35 years and these criteria are strictly enforced, unless one is a bandsman or qualified medical personnel. These latter though will not usually be required to face the job of frontline infantry. Also imagine the demoralising effect on men in such a unit, were it never to receive replacements. Basic military requirements rely upon a steady supply of fit replacements.

Certainly during the Empire, drafts or vexillations from other units were a common feature in this period. Hadrian apparently brought the Legio VI Victrix with him when he visited Britain to replace losses incurred during recent troubles in the province. Raising legions was no light matter. Again if we refer to the Younger Pliny’s letters to Trajan, on a number

55

of occasions he refers to army recruits and officers. Trajan is most anxious to maintain the dignity and fighting composition of the army, especially where slaves had tried to pass themselves off as free Roman citizens and gain entry into the legions. This was no annual levy either. Augustus had raised new troops, including freedmen, even slaves to replace losses after the great Varian disaster of 12AD in the German Teutoburgerwald (Annals 1.29-33). These clamoured for the release of time expired veterans and their own pay with demands for a lowering of the numbers of years required to serve down to sixteen years maximum rather than the thirty or forty some had actually been with the colours.

The point to be made is that the Roman army like any society must be a balance of age and experience. Imagine the effect, if all the world’s young were killed by some mystery virus leaving only people thirty-five years and older. This would wipe out at a stroke most of our ability to reproduce ourselves and mean that for years the human race would continue to decline as the fewer births to the women left aged 35 to 48 would hardly make up for the sharp reduction in young mothers available. The effect would be catastrophic. Likewise the world needs a balance in all matters. The result of sameness or a narrowing of diversity would be stagnation at worst or slowed development and evolution at the very least. This is not to excuse idiotic multiculturalism. We are here

56

talking about world diversity within ancient groupings called family and nation state: the difference between one family and another and between one nation and another. This is the type of traditional diversity that has allowed the human race to advance and evolve in time and space.

Likewise at the top end of the legion, only the best were able to command and these, as in most ancient societies came from the wealthy landowning aristocracy or plutocratic elements that increasingly influenced societies. We shall return to this later. The Legionary commanders were Roman Senators, members of a six hundred strong ruling elite and a narrow range of top families. Likewise the non- senatorial tribunes augusticlavii, of whom there were normally five to a legion as understudies for future command, came from the very same background. The one Senatorial tribune would be especially marked out for future command of legions and the more important governorships, including the much prized Consulate. The only difference between him was and his equestrian colleagues, was not so much wealth, as a deliberately chosen career path. T

he Senatorial Order was far less numerous than the Equestrian but that did not preclude a bright young man from aspiring to a political career, and many a Senator had an eques brother who perhaps preferred a mercantile career to a political one with all the extra

57

responsibilities and dangers it brought, especially the closer one came to the Imperator at the top. The system worked very well indeed. Modern generals have failed to understand the significance of this military setup. Indeed, one in particular, Field Marshal Montgomery was scathing in his critique of the Roman army and its command structure.

The Roman legionary commander was not solely a soldier; nor were his tribunes. The Roman hierarchy based as it was around the ancient mos maiorum, saw a close connection between military and civilian functions of office. There is strong evidence in archaeology that the local garrison commanders, whether in charge of a legion or just a small part of one were the local magistrates as well. These would be the local officials to whom, the local provincials would appeal for a decision in certain matters of legal or civil dispute. These local commanders, including legionary legates were not only soldiers but it seems district commissioners and as such representative of the ruling authority miles away. This power could of course be abused by heavy handed behaviour as that which stoked up the revolt in Britain in 61AD. (Annals, xiv.30).

We sometimes find letters, preserved in archaeological deposits referring to a centurion regionarius. These appear to have been territorial regional commissioners responsible for their particular area and whose activities included collecting information and dealing

58

with local security. His assistants, probably men from a nearby legion (speculators) acted as the local ﾴ beat bobby ﾴ . This man would either have reported back to the nearest local garrison commander or even to the governor in Londinium. The Romans were very fond of reporting on each other (Annals, xv.24.). The whole Roman system was one of checks and balances. Even the great Agricola suspected his staff had men reporting back to the administration in Rome.

All these men had imperium, originally awarded to them by the Senate and People of Rome but under the Empire, that is after Augustus, delegated to them through the representatives of the Emperor himself via his provincial governors and legionary commanders. That is why he was known as imperator. The word ‘province’ derives from provincia, actually means an area of responsibility for which a Roman official was given authority or imperium by the state. Every so often, the Roman Senate had to renew the powers of the Emperor by the award of a super provincia, normally all those frontier regions of the Empire in which legions were stationed and together with an award of greater imperium maius ensured that the more stable one man rule continued. By the time of Tiberius, the situation had stabilised enough to enable the Senate to award full powers for life. However Rome was still technically a respublica, and woe betide a usurper who trod roughshod over

59

the Senate’s ancient prerogatives to award these ancient powers as Hadrian and later incumbents on the throne found to their cost.

We have drifted somewhat from our discussion. Returning to the centurions above, these men played an extremely important role within the army and in local civilian life as we have seen. Many were ex-rankers but some, usually of very good family and often holding the lower equestrian status, were commissioned into the legions directly. These may have been the sons of the not so wealthy who, perhaps problems with land inheritance elected for a worthwhile military career instead. All the Centurions though were men of courage and character. They led from the front and one can read the horror, felt by Caesar at the numbers lost during campaigns in Gaul and his subsequent sorrow. He loved these men who he regarded as the backbone of his legions and worth twenty foppish tribunes and more.

The centurions were the professional officer corps of the army. Many had come up from the ranks to enjoy huge responsibility. These men were not simple non-commissioned officers but senior officers and company commanders. The lowest would rank as a major in our times with the top echelons of the Centurionate being the equivalents to todayﾴ s rank of Brigadier. Some would go onto become higher still as governors and procurators of the regime. Caesar even made the most worthy Senators.

60

The Roman system from top to bottom actively encouraged its members, Roman and otherwise to assimilate. It did not award the rights that went with it immediately. However, over time maybe years, even more it bred a system that stretched from Scotland to the Persian Gulf where even today one will find the ruins of vast ancient cities. This had been a common culture that in many ways still is the superior of our own. Of course it had its faults like all systems but that is no need to denigrate it.

It was the whole basis of our own, even modern Islam if some would care to look and examine more closely. As one who has studied to greater or lesser degree both Rome and Islam, I can vouchsafe the fact that both have much in common especially in the way they both had systems based upon social hierarchy and relational reciprocity.

A Roman legionary would have needed a letter of recommendation in order to enter any legion. There are letters between Trajan and Pliny on this very subject need the needs to maintain high standards in the ranks. After swearing an oath, the recruit entered a period of tough training and psychological toughening up that, as Josephus famously stated made Roman battle like training and training like battle. The recruit, should he successfully complete basic training then became the lowest rank of serving soldier or privatus/miles simplex.

61

Through hard work, courage and tenacity, and more importantly the carefully judged eye of a senior officer, the man could become a beneficarius and therefore exempted from some of the obligatory duties expected of an ordinary soldier. If he did not have a trade on entry he was now expected to gain one and this too could place him in a special category of service. These men were in fact the NCOs or sergeants and corporals of the Roman Legion. His rise through the ranks could take him into the lower Centurionate and if particularly gifted higher still, especially into civilian administration.

The non Roman auxiliaries served for around 25 years as well but enjoyed perhaps one third of the pay of their citizen counterparts. If however, they joined the elite cavalry they could earn as much, if not more than their auxiliary and legionary counterparts put together. This reflected the great importance placed upon the lack of cavalry in the Roman army from earlier times. In many ways this arm was the most important and effective. Its importance finally superseded the classic legionary infantry in the later empire, a position it held unchallenged right through the Middle-Ages.

On discharge, the auxiliary would be awarded the prized citizenship and his ‘marriage’ and children would be legally recognised. It was from these that future Roman soldier citizens came. Likewise in the case of a discharged

62

legionary any relationship would be legitimated and a bronze plaque stating that the man had served well given to the veteran, in order that he could gain his land and pension but more importantly an introduction to work in civilian life, where a military career and good conduct record opened up doors for the man and his family.

(3)

The Conqueror, Conquered

The Eastern half of the Roman Empire was a totally different world from the Western half. Greek and Semitic civilisations had existed for thousands of years before the advent of Rome into that world around 250 years before Christ. Rome had indeed sent delegations to the various religious shrines in Greece and knew of the Egyptians but she herself was largely ignored by the Greek and Phoenician city-states placed around the Mediterranean. She even had a treaty around 509BC with the City-state of Carthage banning her from the Western Mediterranean and giving her in return free access to the lands of Italy. However Rome was not a seagoing power at this early date.

63

As an aside this date given by Polybius is most interesting since it was during this year that Roman respublica had commenced. Did the Romans look to Carthage as an outside ally in the face of Etruscan attempts to retake the city after the expulsion of Tarquinius Superbus? The Carthaginians had already clashed with the Etruscans over their trading interests and annexation of territory in Sardinia and Corsica. So to have a friendly state to the Etruscans' south was in the interests of the Punic state. Carthage was also a republic ruled by two annually elected rulers entitled Suffetes. These also acted in unison with a Senate and an assembly of the People.

There is no real comparison with the Roman constitution, simply because from the start, Rome's elite was a genuine oligarchic aristocracy based upon ancient privilege rather than plutocratic wealth. Did Rome however adapt the idea of annually elected magistrates to her own peculiar needs through contact with Carthage and southern Greek city-states like Tarentum that had been founded as a colony by Sparta? This would be an early example of assimilation of other peoples' ideas.

Rome of course was not new to the influence of the Orient. Indeed there is a period around 700 to 600BC that is often refereed to as the orientalising period. Although this influence is also found in post dark age Greece, its transmission through Greek and Phoenician traders into Italy and further west is important,

64

since it is from this early date that Rome fell under the civilising power of many ideas and artistic influences of peoples she was later to overcome. The long evolution from primitive city-state into the queen of a sophisticated Romano-Hellenic civilisation had commenced.

Rome was actually to clash with Tarentum just before the Ist Punic War. She appealed to Pyrrhus, King of Epirus who tried at first to mediate between the Romans and the southern Greek State in the heel of Italy. Tarentum sank four Roman galleys and refused to pay for them. The original dispute had been between Rome and the Etruscans.

From Pyrrhus, Rome learned about the use of elephants and adapted its legionary tactics accordingly, after being beaten by the Greek general. So hard and costly though, did Pyrrhus find these battles against the Romans, that he eventually sailed away, unable to sustain such losses in men and equipment; hence our modern term a 'Pyrrhic victory' when describing a situation, wherein a competition may have cost the winning participant so much as to nullify any advantage to be gained.

We do not have the space within this work to narrate the history of Rome's involvement with the Greek world. She was gradually drawn into the troubles within Greece and Asia Minor by the continued internecine strife between factions, within and without the Greek city-states. Many of these problems had come about because of the King of Macedon's attempts to

65

ally himself with Rome's bitter enemy Carthage (Livy, War With Hannibal, Bk xxiii, 33-34.).

Philip saw Rome as a threat to his desire to control the eastern coattail region of Greece along the Adriatic down towards the Peloponnese. Rome suffered the effects of piracy from these areas that consisted of offshore islands as well as land-locked states of varying degrees of sophistication.

Queen Teuta was perhaps the most famous ruler within this area. Her ships were accused of looting Italian vessels (Polybius, The Rise of The Roman Empire, BkII, 8-9.) and this was used as a pretext to declare war, although many authors, ancient and modern, cast doubt upon the Romans' reasons for going to war with her and tend to see it as a Roman Consul's desire for military fame in the stiving for political clout at Rome itself.

There is much debate about why Rome intervened here and there. Some like to follow the idea that Rome did indeed fight defensively and there is no doubt she did not want to become embroiled in foreign politics to a large extent. Flamininus declared the Freedom of Greece in 196BC (Polybius, Bk xviii, 46, ibid) at the Isthmian Games. However lasting peace there was not to be. King Antiochus invaded Asia Minor and Thrace drawing Rome into another war. She was now well and truly embroiled within the Greek world, the city-states and alliances of which had become her clients. Despite efforts by the likes of 66

Flamininus to minimise the effects of Rome's rule within the heartland of Greece (Polybius, Bkxviii, 45-46, ibid), Rome was now the owner of an empire she was ill suited to rule without reorganising herself politically and institutionally from a city state to imperial mistress.

In many ways the Senate was wise realising her incapacity to rule a large empire and appears to have preferred a system of indirect rule, wherein she could decide foreign policy of her client states whilst leaving them to rule and organise themselves much as they had done in the past. One must be cautious however in this assessment.

Rome's entire political system was based upon a highly competitive system of patronage and political reward that saw victory in war as a basis for rising through the cursus honorem. Despite the protestations of those like Flamininus, who may have acted and talked as they did in order to win favour and gain clients to increase support for their own political standing back at the centre in Rome itself, Rome was in the main the aggressor. It really was a case of, Meanwhile back at the ranch….

T. Mommsen and his followers may have seen this as the defensive stance of Rome but most modern scholars now see this as naïve, seeing instead Rome's advance into the East and West as a continuation of a past tradition of war and conquest to enhance the power of Rome and her politicians. The so called

67

reluctance of Rome's Senate and People to annexe directly land and peoples may be due more to her inability to provide adequate resources in money and manpower than a genuine recalcitrance to control others in the name of Rome.

Her politicians still aspired to the highest offices of state and for that they needed money, clients and legions. War and conquest provided just these but they also placed a huge and increasingly unsustainable tension upon the ancient constitution of the Roman respublica and the mos maiorum best translated as ancient ways.

Add to this, the increased influence and assimilation of far more sophisticated ancient political ideas and systems of democracy to be found in the mainland of Greece, together with the highly cultivated philosophic ideational and artistic creations of that world and one finds a potential for revolution that threatened the very basis of the Roman respublica. Already in Rome important aristocratic Scipios were known for their appreciation of all things Hellenic. It is always the upper classes who lead. This is one reason why Rome like most successful empires sought to win over the upper classes of the conquered. Greek ideas of democracy were anathema to Rome.

Polybius was fortunate enough to become friends with the adopted son of the victor of Pydna. The Scipio's were an ancient family and heavily influenced by Hellenistic civilisation 68

and ideas that raised the suspicions of the more conservative elements within the Roman ruling classes. We may here quite Plutarch in his Life of Cato the Censor (elder)…Most of the Romans ………were well content to see their sons embrace Greek culture and frequent the company of such estimable men Carneades and Diogenes the Greek philosphers (author's insertion). But Cato from the moment this passion for discussion first entered Rome, was disturbed (Cato 22, Penguin Classics London 1965, Trans: Scott-Kilvert, Ed: B. Radice, R. Baldick). He feared that the younger generation might allow their ambitions to be diverted towards oratory at the expense of traditional Roman valour through feats of arms.

Cato was probably the most extreme in his attempts to censure all things Greek by various methods that included trying to expel all philosophers from Rome. Cato was eccentric but there is good cause to believe that his concerns for the undermining of Rome's traditional virtues through the importation of wealth and ideas from across the water. For example he attacked the so called Greek set in Rome by ejecting Lucius Scipio from the Equestrian Order, Lucius was the brother no less of the great Africanus. Cato also attempted to tax and control the growth of luxury items from Greece and elsewhere (Cato, 18, ibid). Although this made him unpopular with the wealthy it does to some degree show to us the speed of assimilation that was taking place

69

within the rather conservative Roman respublica of his day around 200-150BC.

In the same year of 146BC as Corinth was reduced to ashes by the Roman general Mummius on direct orders from the Senate, Rome finally finished the war with her old enemy Carthage. It had been Cato and his kind who had played upon the fears of the Punic state's revival. The cry of Hannibal ad Portas was deeply ingrained into every Roman's consciousness. Scipio Aemilanus the dear friend of Polybius is said to have cried at the destroyed city's fate. Was he shedding tears at the death of such a fine city, like the cultured hellenophile he was or seeing into the future and seeing his beloved Rome suffering the same terrible fate?

We are observing through these events the gradual assimilation of Hellenistic thought and culture among the elite at Rome itself. However the problems for the Roman State were far more complicated than questions of wealth and luxuries imported from a civilisation regarded as decadent and therefore soft. The problems caused to the Roman way of life were very real. Cato was a visionary and saw rightly the problems such influences would have upon the constitution and traditional way of life that had served Rome so well since her foundation, around 800BC.

The Romans had their version of class war stretching back into the remote past. This is not the beloved class war of Marxist philosophy 70

but a peple trying to find common cause. There were no means of production to control, no worker power but there was the need to find consensus between the plebeians on one hand and the aristocratic Patricians on the other. So the entire common people of Rome had on more than one occasion walked out of the city and demanded redress and possibly office from the ruling Patrician oligarchy. Many of these so called plebeians were actually quite wealthy in their own right. So between 494 and 449, three things of great political importance took place upon the first legendary secession of the Plebeian majority to a nearby hill and the installation of protectors of the people or Tribuneship of the Plebs. The Tribuneship tribunus plebis was a powerful plebeian office that was destined to play a major role in future city and imperial events. Only Plebeians though could hold it. The second event was the publication of the Tewlve Tables in stone of Roman Law. The third was the publication of a legal handbook by one Cnaeus Fulvius, the son of a freedman.

The date given for these, varies from 449 to around 304BC when Appius Claudius the Blind or Caecus, saw that the only way to protect Rome from a series of bloody defeats at the hands of the Samnites, a vicious mountain people, was to prevent a further plebeian secession by giving way to demands for legal redress and protection by the plebeians against rapacious magistrates. This is a recurrent

71

theme within the early Roman Empire and does not reach its full evolution until the Principate. One of the biggest problems was enslavement for debt or nexus.

This situation had a direct effect upon the recruitment of Roman soldiers for the annual military levies. One could not enrol an enslaved plebeian into these bodies and so critical was the situation at times that drastic solutions had to be found to resolve them. These problems were to continue to dog Rome for centuries after the foundation of the respublica in 509BC.

The important thing from our point of view, is that these problems were to be found across the Italo-Greek city-state world, as citizen fought citizen for various privileges, in what the Greeks themselves termed stasis. They were problematic enough in themselves, even at this early and localised level, wherein city republic fought other smaller city republics.

Visionary men such as Appius Claudius Caecus (Livy ix, 29, 6, Diodorus xx, 36,) could reorganise the courts, change political decisions and an individual's role in them, so that plebeian voting rights and ability to make law within the popular assembly concilium plebis would therefore be enhanced as it was in 287, when plebiscita or decisions passed by the plebeians in full assembly, became legally binding on all Romans, whether patrician, plutocrat or commoner through the lex Hortensia.72

Military problems had been at the basis of these reforms. The cost of hoplite armour was high and only the rich could afford it. The Patricians needed the support of the wealthy plebeians if they were to maintain the numbers necessary for the Greek phalanx. The system developed by Philip and utilised to such terrible effect by his son. The rich proletariat demanded access to the state magistracies. This was the real basis of the Roman so called struggle of the orders. Appius Claudius Caecus had to reorganise the Roman army in such a manner capable of defeating the savage Samnites. Rome at this stage was confined to Italy.

She was soon to be drawn into wars further afield. By the beginning of the second century, recruitment was a real problem despite various measures to alleviate the problems by lowering the property qualification. In 133BC, the famous tribune Tiberius Gracchus tried to improve recruitment by allotting the illegally held public lands within the hands of rich owners by a redistribution. This would have allowed propertyless plebs to re-enter the lists of able bodied men eligible for recruitment into the citizen legions. Many of these same, had been serving in Greece, Asia Minor and less popular areas such as Spain for years at a time and found themselves destitute upon their return and their lands sold off to speculators.

73

They either re-enlisted or drifted to Rome itself and joined the proletariat who could not serve in the legions. This seriously diminished the reserves of available manpower, a greater strain upon the allies who themselves were experiencing the same problems from the same cause in raising legions for Rome and her wars. Many with the Latin Right drifted to Rome and joined the plebeian mob. Although they became full citizens under ancient privileges granted to them by ancient treaties termed foedus aequam, they nevertheless became a burden to the Roman welfare system, or what passed for one. Most became clients to Roman patrons who used their vote to further his career. Attempts were made to expel these landless peasants from Rome. One M. Junius Pennus tried to do this in 126BC (Cicero, de off . 3.47; cf. Brutus 109, D. Stockton, The Gracchi, Chap V, p. 94. Oxford 1979).

During the tenure of Tiberius Gracchus, old King Attalus of Pergamum died leaving his kingdom to the People of Rome. Tiberius seized upon this windfall and demanded legislation through the concilium plebis that the riches from Pergamum be utilised to settle his landless clients upon the 500 jugera demanded by his famous law establishing a land commission to examine and action his reforms. One uses the term client deliberately here. This is how the patron-client system worked. By obtaining benefits such as land and money, a politician could gain to himself a whole class of

74

disaffected poor who in effect relied upon him, and he alone for their rescue from destitution. We shall see this same phenomenon appear under far more dangerous circumstances, when whole armies became clients of a general.

One thing though had become clear, the Struggle of the Orders was no longer confined to just the narrow interests of the City and respublica but had entered upon the Imperial stage and destiny of Rome. City solutions would not suffice.

What is more, Greek culture, thought and philosophy would have infected every strata of Roman society, especially Romans serving in Greece or Asia Minor. Some of those ideas apart from wanting the benefits and comfort of a higher ancient civilisation would have included Greek ideas of democracy and democratic representation. Benefactions and benefactors in the Greek world were in many ways more highly evolved than those at Rome itself.

The Roman soldier far away from the idealised Italian countryside would have seen Greek democracy in action. He would have stood in the agora of many a Greek city and seen for himself the benefits of Greek life, the libraries, magnificent public buildings, gymnasiums, theatres, all the benefits of public life to be had in that region: even public lighting but above all the very real political power of the Individual citizen within cities such as Athens. Contrast this to the sordid

75

squalor of Rome's Subura or the dilapidated farm that he knew very well existed after years of military service, is it any wonder that tensions at all levels of Roman society faced a revolution from within?

Elites in any society ancient or modern must keep in mind their responsibilities to those less fortunate than themselves. The Romans always supported the elite in any society they overcame, whether in civilised Greece or Iron Age Britain. It was to kings, queens and chiefs they appealed. These were the people with money and power. Rome did not trust Greek democracy. She trusted oligarchs; aristocrats and rulers whose preservation of power was equivalent to serving Rome's interests. Rome preserved these elites. However, should they have ever fallen short of Rome's expectations, she was quick to replace them.

She expected her puppets to ensure the collection of taxes and to keep the local underclass quiescent. The very execution of Jesus Christ makes this fact clear. Pilate found no fault in the man but he was fearful of a Jewish revolt, Jesus went to the cross for political expediency.

The Romans did have a conscience though. There was no point in butchering whole tribes if they could be made to settle down under Roman rule. There were cases of governors prosecuted for exceeding their authority. Suetonius Paulinus was reined in by 76

Nero for excess of this kind. Too many Roman citizens killed was another thing the Senate disapproved of. Death and destruction do not suit empires. If one wishes to lose a province quickly then ransack it, This is what happened in the respublica. The coming of the emperors meant that Roman governors had to be professional in their dealings with the local population. Several governors were prosecuted before the Senate under Tiberius. The likes of Mummius were a dying breed.

Assimilation of ideas and outlook takes time. It subtle effects are not always immediately apparent.. The Roman soldiers returning from the sack of Corinth by Mummius would have seen the wealth and richness of that city. They may not have carried away as much as their general, who was rumoured to have sent home galleys of the stuff but nevertheless their outlooks and attitudes would have been seriously challenged. These would in time, have communicated themselves to the populations to which they returned, namely Rome itself and the Italian mainland.

Corinth was one of the oldest Greek poleis. Its only real rival had been Athens and possibly Argos. Athens had a long history of democracy. This was not the Roman style democracy either. During the fifth century, her population had experimented with something akin to our own modern ideas in such matters. She had been fortunate to have a series of tyrants who reorganised her political system in

77

order to protect themselves from rival aristocratic factions.

One of them, Cleisthenes redistributed the Athenians into ten new tribes equally placed across the state so that these drew from all sections of available citizens irrespective of traditional territorial origins so breaking up the old oligarchic power base. In 487BC a new law was passed establishing a lottery system for the election of Archons the annually elected rulers of Athens. This finally broke the hold of the old aristocracy upon this high office. Eventually all offices of state were selected by lot. There was also the institution of Ostracism Ostrakophoria introduced by Cleisthenes wherein six thousand or more citizens could rid themselves of unpopular Athenians and others. Themistocles was one of their more famous victims.

This method of selection was carried out by inscribing names of undesirables on potsherds Ostrakon and drawing them out of a sealed container and counting them. Anyone with their name inscribed enough times upon these pieces of pottery was expelled from Athens.

Athens was far more of a true democracy than Rome ever was. An example mentioned Plutarch's Life of Themistocles shows this clearly. Athens was at war with the powerful island state of Aegina that possessed a powerful fleet. The Athenians were short of ships and Themistocles rose up and proposed that the silver from the rich mines of Laurium 78

be utilised for the purpose of building these. The Athenians had been in the habit of sharing this largesse among themselves. Themistocles carried the day. One could not imagine the same process happening within the Roman assemblies without a lot of unpleasantness and even death asa happened in the cases of the Gracchi when they proposed the sensible measures of redistributing land. The all powerful Senatorial oligarchy jealously fought for its perceived traditional privileges. What is more those who attended the various political assemblies in Athens were paid.

Athens was probably the only truly democratic society that ever existed. A citizen could meander around the city, debate philosophy, shade himself under the trees that sheltered Plato's Academy and socialise with men high and low. He could take himself off to the theatre and watch a play by Euripides that in itself may have had serious political comment to make. In short the Athenian had a very real political voice. He also had direct access to politicians through the assembled Demos or People of Athens, a far cry from the situation today in Britain or America. Roman soldiers and aristocrats living albeit temporarily in the city would have seen this living democracy first hand and assimilated those facts. In other times, aristocrats like Rabirius Postumus would choose exile in a Greek polis and amuse the locals with scurrilous cartoons of Roman politicians. The

79

future Emperor Tiberius chose to spend his exile in Rhodes around 6AD and there is no doubt that Greek ideas of republican democracy affected this sensitive and learned man sickened by the sycophancy of his own city under Augustus.

The plain fact is that individuals who travel for whatever reason can have their ideas changed forever. Soldiers away from home for long periods often drift into liaisons with local women and others. This softens the harshness of service away from home. This is actually the start of assimilation. Many British diplomats and officials went 'native' under the old Empire in India. Many could not bring themselves to leave upon independence in 1947. It had become their home. This author still regards the Mediterranean as his rightful home after living there for years as a boy.

So it was with Romans in these early days and later under the fully developed Roman Empire. The hostages taken at Carrhae in 54BC ran away from the Parthian authorities who tried to return them to Rome after the Eastern Settlement of the Emperor Augustus around 20BC when the captured eagles were returned. They had gone native.

Many years later, Tacitus describes the people of Rome being absolutely shocked by the appearance of troops from the Northern Frontier who appeared in Rome with the entry of Vitellius in 69AD. At the Second Battle of Cremona, the Third Legion based in Syria and a 80

long way from home greeted the rising sun in accordance with Syrian custom. (Tacitus, Histories, 3. 25).

Eastern legions had a reputation for being rather soft. Tacitus (Annals xiii, 34) informs us that Corbulo, the famous Roman general had to stiffen their resolve by making them camp out in the mountains in mid-winter snows. Apparently desertions were much reduced. The troops were not used to fighting and many had been softened by years of inactivity on the Parthian frontier where life in the towns was more than agreeable. Some had not even bothered to train or wear armour for years and even sold it.

All this evidence even if anecdotal points to the degree of assimilation to be found within the empire. In the western half, the degree of Romanisation depended largely upon the degree to which a Gaul or Britain took to Roman life and its benefits. In his Agricola, Tacitus is quite scathing of this fact. He feels that the noble Gaul and Briton have succumbed to the wiles of Roman life and even sees it as a form of enslavement.

We must be weary of reading too much into Tacitus' writings. He was part of the ruling elite and writing from his and his partisans' narrow point of view. He was living in somewhat easier times under the beneficent rule of Trajan and obviously wanted to show these as good and better ones than those under tyrants such as Domitian.

81

Talk of Roman soldiers succumbing to the luxuriant and decadent ways of the East are also probably no more than a common literary pose. The man was writing after all about his heroes Agricola and the great general Corbulo, both victims of unpleasant rulers. Tacitus and his fellows had to kep one eye on the throne and its occupant, even one like Trajan. Indeed his adoption by Marcus Cocceius Nerva was hardly peaceful with the Northern legions ready to move against the diffident Emperor should the adoption not go through. Despite the rhetoric, Trajan was no stranger to intrigue and neither was his successor and 'adopted' son Hadrian whose elevation to the purple was questioned until the day he died and who apparently put five of Trajan's marshals to death as they disagreed to his reorganisation of the previous reign's conquests. But hard times require hard men even if they are nice emperors.

Archaeology can assist us here to some extent. Excavations beyond the Rhine and within its hinterland have found an amazing degree of Romanisation among so called barbarians. The Rhine was no barrier to this form of assimilation. Further afield in Britain, we find sophisticated and very Roman ways of livinh even in so called barren frontier zones like Hadrian's Wall. This region, especially around Vindolanda appears to have even been growing grape vines.

82

At the deserted Roman fortress of Inchtuthil outside Aberdeen, the Twentieth Valeria left behind Samian wear, various types of pottery of local and imported manufacture. Mortaria used for grinding seed for corn etc, was of a standard type found on many military sites dating from the Flavian period. This type known simply as '85' was actually of local manufacture. Pitts and Joseph the original excavators of the fortress reported that, 'No, 85 is a typical widely made mortaria found in… (author's insertion) pre-Flavian at Usk, where it was one of the forms produced, and at Fishbourne (Cunliffe 1971), Camulodunum (Hawkes and Hill 1947, p. 53, No 23), Kingsholm and elsewhere. It was not made in the highly successful commercial potteries in the Verulamium region and Gaul…. There is the possibility that it was made primarily or solely by the Army. The Inchtuthil workshop which produced these mortaria along with other types of pottery would certainly be military, and the two features already mentioned, the unusual concentric scoring and profiles of No.s 84 and 85, suggest that it was working in a conservative tradition (Pitts and St. Joseph 1985).

Also found on this site and others were amphorae from Spain. In particular those found at various sites in obviously military contexts include the famous 'carrot type' amphorae Camulodunum 189 has also been found along with six of its kind there. Other types of

83

amhorae found at Inchtuthil included Dressel 20, Spanish, Dressel 2-4 and Dressel 30. As one archaeologist remarked the contents of these were probably of greater interest to the Roman officers than Britons. However, is this actually the case?

We have side tracked to some degree but the fact that armies took their ways of life and habit with them is important. By the late third Century AD, Britain in particular, enjoyed an economic boom and with it the most luxurious flowering of Romanitas. Sophisticated mosaics, luxurious furnishing in equally luxurious houses, rare end exotic foods and wines, indeed all the benefits of Empire.

One example is the Roman villa at Cock Farm near Abinger Hamer near Dorking, Surrey. It is a second to third century villa The 1995 field report by Mr Steve Dyer, Archeological Consultant to Surrey Archaeological Society reported finding in situ wall plaster, walls of opus cementicum and stone, roofing tiles and most interestingly a highly sophisticated tasteful mosaic….. The tesserae of the mosaic are from seven colours. The layout and style of the floor indicates that this room formed the triclinium, or dining room of the building. On stylistic evidence of the spirals and foot to the cantharus the mosaic can be dated to the early forth century, the nearest parallels to the workmanship and style being found at Keynsham, Avon, possibly

84

indicating work from a school of mosaicists in Bristol or Bath Area.

Mr Dyer's description of the mosaic states … The Centre of the floor consists of a cantharus, or two handled drinking cup, facing towards the south where a wide door, was partially indicated by square cut greensand blocks. The three corners that were revealed within the room, and presumably the fourth unexcavated one, consist of vine leaves within a circular guilloche. The panel to the top of the central cantharus and presumably the missing bottom panel consist of sixteen petalled flower bordered by a spiral band within the octagonal. The two panels to the side of the central cantharus are eight petalled flowers, again bordered by a spiral band. All these panels are bordered, as is the entire decorative section of the floor, with a guilloche.

Britain supposed by many to be a frontier province and unwelcoming to the Mediterranean Romans and others who came here appears to have been nothing of the sort. It was as receptive of Romano-hellenistic civilisation and life as much if not more than other areas. The inhabitants of the villa above were sophisticated owners and they were far from alone in this so called frontier province that has revealed in recent years an unexpected level of Roman sophistication and taste equal to anywhere in the Empire in the west at least.

85

In conclusion, we therefore appear to have a combined process in this so-called question of assimilation: Hellenised Romans and Italians in the East on the one hand and provincials in the Western empire hungrily adopting Roman hellenised ways from this powerful combined influence. This was why Rome survived so long beyond empires like the British because she new that in order to govern she needed to retain the loyalty and cooperation of those ruling elites she had conquered. They identified their cause with hers. Rome also insisted on all members of the empire becoming more or less Roman if they were to enjoy her gifts. We have much to learn from her in this day and age.

(4)

The Roman Army on Campaign

Agricola and the Invasion of the North: Tacitus and Historical Interpretation

It appears rather fashionable at present to downgrade the achievements of men from the past, especially if they were prominent and that eminence strikes a chord of insensitivity among modern day elites. For example, Napoleon would have been quite pleased with some of his later press many years after his death but recently several revisionist authors have 86

questioned his greatness as a military man. These same revisionist historians have also questioned the accepted version of events of not only Napoleon's era but also even the Second World War wherein many survivors are still in the full bloom of a very healthy old age. The most famous of course is Mr Irving whose appearance at a libel trial caused a sensation in the press.

We are not here to debate the rights and wrongs of Mr Irving's case. However it does raise a number of very important questions as to how we should review history, especially when it comes to interpreting Tacitus. Mr Irving had the courage to question certain perceptions of the Holocaust held by modern society. One does not have to agree with Mr Irving but there is no doubt he is an excellent researcher who is thorough in his investigations and has had unusually close contact with many of the families whose fathers, husbands, or grandfathers fought on the German side at General staff and party level. He came to his own conclusions no matter how far fetched they seem to the rest of Academia and the world at large in the post war era. The point being made here is that an academic in order to be a scholar must follow the truth even if that is sometimes unpalatable.

However, any conclusions so drawn must be justified by hard evidence. We cannot grow as human beings if everytime somebody prints a controversial piece, the media and

87

mainstream academia of the day attack such a person as Irving in paroxysms of outrage and hysteria. Free speech and debate is essential to a healthy democracy. People's opinions must be respected otherwise, truth and debate die and fear takes over. We are seeing this happen to a large degree already. This is one main reason why people today have such a distrust of politics and fail to vote. We should all take a leaf out of the great left-wing historian AJP Taylor who stated in his Foreword to Churchill's History of the English Speaking Peoples that if one 'ignored rubbish it generally went away'(1968). Those who pounced on Mr Irving might like to bear this in mind before they made him a martyr.

That does not mean one has to ignore Tacitus and his assessment of Agricola. But Tacitus belonged to the Roman Senate and therefore represented a very upper class view of his father in law. If we as historians are having difficulty concerning the veracity of events sixty or so years ago, how are we to cope with questions of history and campaigns from eighty years or so after Christ? Especially so when the only version of events is a testimony we possess in copies which are far more than third or fourth hand.

The Agricola itself must have been copied many hundreds of time down the ages, and it is well known that scribes make errors in their transliterate work, which is why debate among modern classicists is usually about philological

88

problems and often based upon the ending of one word or other which can literally alter an academic's view of his period. Tacitus, like Winston Churchill in our time was obviously anxious to have his version of events held to be the true version. In both politics played a huge role. Churchill claimed in his version of the Battle of Britain that Air Chief Marshal Dowding informed him that twenty-five squadrons was all that he needed to defend Britain against the Luftwaffe. Dowding denied this (C.Wilmot, Struggle for Europe 1951. Churchill History of Second World War Vol. II, p38 1948).

Tacitus in a similar vein says of his hero after Agricola had reached a point no Roman Army had before and thrashing the Caledonii, 'Fired with self-confidence and the glory of his victory, the army protested that no obstacle could bar its brave advance&. Even the conservative strategists of yesterday were forward and boastful enough after the victory (Agricola 27, Tacitus). Tacitus was like all senators a staunch Republican and only just tolerated 'good emperors' like Trajan. The truth is that Tacitus owed much to the Flavians and it was only after the death of Domitian that he dared write his eulogy to Agricola.

Agricola is above all a political pamphlet. The author goes at some length to compare the present good times with the bad old days of the former regime. Trajan had come to the throne under rather forced circumstances in that his

89

predecessor did not have much choice but to adopt him as his successor, otherwise there would have been civil war. An ailing and senile old man is an easy target for rebellion. So anything, which enhances the new Establishment, is welcome particularly from one whom had ingratiated himself with the old regime and had a little covering up to do and favour to win of the fellow at the top. However, we should not be blind to the informative material that is contained in the Agricola. It is to that we now turn.

The problems of trying to analyse Agricola's campaigns have been compounded by interpretations of modern historians and archaeologists. Many of them despite highly creditable work and investigations have consistently failed to agree the ultimate success or failure of Agricola in his military exploits. Ironically, it is writers such as Leonard Cottrell in the 1950s who give the most positive and interesting interpretations of Agricola's skills. Cottrell has been criticised as too unscholarly for modern academic tastes but from a modern soldier's analysis of campaign it is first rate, simply because it makes good military sense.

Choosing from today's scholars, the best seem to be Sheppard Frere and William Hanson. There are of course brief accounts by Peter Salway and Hugh Scullard but none approach the analytical qualities inherent in Hanson or the very fine logistical-historical

90

interpretation of Frere. The best of Frere is to be found in the twelfth edition of the Scottish Archaeological Forum published in 1981. William Hanson took part in this study of Agricola's campaigns as well.

From a purely military interpretation, the best version of events is that written by Frere in the publication cited above, entitled, 'The Flavian Frontier in Scotland.' Frere has made the basic assumptions that the 'glen blocking forts' are indeed Agricolan and supports this by reference to The Agricola, Chap 25, 3. This is the point in Tacitus' narrative where the Caledonii attacked a fort or forts and this led some Roman officers to counsel withdrawal behind the Forth-Clyde Isthmus. Frere states that it hardly made sense for the Romans to retreat behind the Isthmus if the fort was not further north.

If we examine Agricola 23, we find that the Isthmus had been fortified and territory to the south secured. This event probably took place in 81AD but it does not have to mean that outposts did not exist further north. They certainly existed in Hadrian's time and that of the Antonine Wall. From a logistical and strategic point of view it made good military sense to have forward observation posts manned in some strength. It would be necessary to provide early warning of enemy movement and therefore provide suitable accommodation for forward cavalry and infantry patrolling and reconnaissance. Besides

91

these forward posts would secure the area against surprise attack but more importantly for our purposes it is good military practice that still goes on today. Only a complacent commander would fail to secure not only his rear but frontal areas as well.

A good commander will always 'recce' an area himself rather than leave it to minions. Obviously intelligence is gathered from many sources, clandestine and otherwise. Modern operations are a lot more mobile and faster than Roman times with enemy troops advancing well into the rear of the defender. One role of the Special Services is to maintain ground observation posts in the captured areas in order to keep reporting vital information to their own side in preparation for a counter attack. But more than this these posts which have been bypassed by the enemy provide not only observation points but also centres of resistance against invading forces tying down valuable enemy troops, sometimes in large numbers. When the counter attack comes it means of course that one has men and equipment already to hand thereby maintaining a grip on territory and further confusing the enemy. These forward bases often serve as embarkation points for offensive operations in the enemy's rear. This was the lesson Orde Wingate taught the modern British Army in Burma. He took whole command and control headquarters with him, including field-hospitals, which gave him a series of huge

92

independent military commands able to fight the Japanese in their rear but with all the materiel and men necessary to wage war supplied from the air. He tied down thousands of enemy troops.

At Arnhem, dropping paratroops behind German lines made a forward thrust. By doing this Montgomery had hoped to secure a bridgehead well in the rear of the enemy. He dithered by failing to send in heavy armoured and infantry support and subsequently the British at Arnhem had to fight against heavy German attacks. But they were very well dug in. They took a lot of enemy with them. Finally an ordered withdrawal was made. But the lesson is clear- forward defence is vital supported by a good heavily defended rear. If Frere is right then we are beginning to see something of the type of commander Agricola was.

Military science demands forward planning and observation/ intelligence gathering in great detail. Only a very stupid commander would fail to do so. It is more than likely that the Roman line of forts on the Forth-Clyde line was a bridgehead to be used as a 'jump-off point' for future campaigns further up the Island towards John O'Groats and hence Tacitus' carping about the willingness of the Roman Army to go on (Agricola 27). But to the rear of this line also existed a line of glen-blocking forts that performed another vital function in that it secured conquered territory.

93

If Frere is in fact right in his assessment that they closed off the valleys or glens, then this is another move by Agricola to protect his left flank. This is nothing less than classical military containment of a perceived threat.

At Agricola 25, Tacitus tells us that 'He (Agricola) feared a general uprising of the northern nations and threatening movements by the enemy on land, he used his fleet too reconnoitre the harbours. It was first brought in by Agricola to bring up his forces to the requisite strength.' How else could he do this without a bridgehead into enemy lands? The Caledonii probably took to the hills as the Romans advanced. It sounds as though Agricola knew his Frontinus. His actions if they have been correctly interpreted are quite in keeping with modern military thinking. By this is meant the heavy build up of overwhelming force, intelligence gathering, the establishment of a bridgehead in secured territory, secure territory in the rear and on the flanks, forward observation posts. A general at the Ministry of Defence in London or the Pentagon would recognise all these activities. In fact a map of Frere's interpretation of Agricola's forts was shown to a former high ranking officer in Britain's armed services. He commented that Agricola acted and behaved like a modern strategist (comment by former RAF officer in conversation with G. Leven-Torres 1996).

Most archaeologists though are guarded about placing a precise date on these forts.

94

However, at least one scholar points to the truth of Frere's assumptions. Hanson states, 'While not disputing that the mountains themselves are unlikely to have proffered any major attractions to settlement, the straths and glens which divide them have much to offer. In particular recent detailed investigations of Loch Awe and Loch Tay suggest that our estimate of population density in the Highlands in prehistory needs to be drastically revised to take into account the number of crannogs or man-made islands (Dixon 1982;Morrison 1985). Moreover, contrary to Hind's assertion, the place name evidence that he quotes for the location of the Caledonii&&.would place them within the Highland massif not east of it (Agricola and the Conquest of the Northern States 1986).

Frere dates these forts along the Isthmus and those he sees as 'glen blocking forts' further south as Flavian. He names these as Drumquhassle, Menteith, Bochastle, Dalginross, Fendoch, and most importantly for our purposes, the main legionary fortress in the area Inchtuthil. This is because its position at the top of the map is important militarily and gives a strong clue to the type of commander Agricola was. One can only trust that Frere's hypothesis is right and that the forts are Flavian. One has been dated through planking removed from the side of a Roman well. The dendrochronological dating is the summer of 80AD.

95

There is nothing particularly special or brilliant in the way Agricola placed his forts. He had learnt and honed his military talents under Frontinus who wrote a treatise on military strategy and Petilius Cerealis, the former commander of the ill-fated Ninth Hispana. Actually more revealing is the political relationship between these latter Roman commanders and Rome itself. Cerealis had something of a chequered career, especially on the Flavian's side during the civil war of 69AD when he disguised himself as a peasant to escape from Vitellius' Rome. But Cerealis was a careful judge in the political sphere (Histories iv, 86) and despite the odd military fiasco such as the rout of the Ninth Hispana at the hands of Boudicca was a competent and inspirational soldier.

His time in Britain saw further consolidation of the North of England and the establishment of the Legionary fortress at York. This was common Roman practice to place a heavy force near at hand to hold a possible enemy in thrall by the threat of armed force. Brigantia had been a client kingdom under Cartimandua. The resultant problems led to the Romans annexing the rest of the territory and placing auxiliary forts around the region in order to patrol and observe. The placement of the fortress at York formed the same basis of military strategy that Agricola used in Scotland. Edward Luttwak who wrote the Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire (1976)

96

called this type of deployment 'an economy of force.'

Leonard Cottrell gives a vivid account of this annexation. The Romans according to his version advanced on the two flanks of the Pennines. Agricola commanded the western advance and Cerealis tested Agricola's mettle as a commander. He had been sent to Britain to take over the notorious XX Legion Valeria Victrix that had elected to fight for Vitellius and the governor at that time, one Vettius Bolanus was a Vitellian appointee. The young thirty year old Agricola apparently had been sent to bring the mutinous and surly Twentieth back to its sense of duty.

In relatively quick succession, Agricola 'cut his military commanders teeth' under two very able Governors. The last of them was dear old Frontinus who set about the destruction of the Welsh tribes in 74AD. He used similar methods of contaiment to those of Agricola in Scotland. There are glen blocking forts at Tomen y Mur and Caer Gai for example.This fact above all else would seem to prove the hypothesis of Frere that the forts in Scotland are Flavian, in that Agricola seeing this strategy in Wales, copied his former commander's activities in Scotland. Further evidence seems to support this as well.

There is epigraphical evidence of Agricola at Chester from around the time of Frontinus' period of rule in Britain. The fact that pottery from slightly earlier has been found at Carlisle

97

and Bowes strongly suggests the presence of Cerealis around the early seventies would seem to futher support Frere's idea that both governors had shown a keen interest in the Brigantian region. It seems that the historical key 'fits the lock.' The chronology of events wherein three Flavian men and 'experts' on warfare, especially in a region like Northern England would seem to indicate a consistent imperial policy. Agricola then spent time as governor of Aquitaine for four years. Vespasian thought highly enough of him to recall him and send him to Britain. Agricola was, like Petilius a Flavian man. He had raised troops in the region of hid birth in order to support the usurper Vespasian.

The actual dating is something of a problem. Agricola apparently arrived as governor in 77AD (Hanson 1986). Therefore taking the events as laid down by Tacitus, 77AD would be the first when he smashed the Ordovices late in the season (Agricola 18). He then established forts in Wales of the glen blocking type at Denbigh, Flint and Caernarvon, and used the Batavians to storm Anglesey. A legionary base already existed at Chester dated prior to Agricola's time as governor. AD 78 saw him fortifying and annexing more territory in Brigantia. He again advanced on both sides of the Pennines and eventually reached the Tyne. Corstopitum near corbridge appears to have been his jumping off point. In AD 79 he launched his main offensive

98

into Scotland. By 80AD he had reached and consolidated his position on the Forth-Clyde Isthmus and built a line of forts (Agricola 23). Domitian succeeded Titus in 81AD so it is probable that Agricola ' kicked his heels ' for a year awaiting new orders. The penalty for exceeding gubernatorial imperium was harsh. Domitian was known to be fickle. The new emperor ordered Agricola to supply vexillations to his campaigns in Germany and along the Danube, It appears these came from poor old Nine Hispana. But he did sail along the Scottish coast and campaign, probably to keep the Caledonii occupied and test their strength. In 82AD he opened his big offensive (Agricola 25).

We find evidence of marching camps and forts along his line of advance at Dunblane, Ardoch. There was also a line of signal stations along Gask Ridge, although they have been archaeologically dated as 'before 90AD.' For our purposes we shall assume them to be Agricolan. Dating is not an exact science. There is also a road from Sterling to Falkirk. He followed this through Strath Allen and across Strathearn, with the Ochill Hills at his back, the Firth of Tay gleaming on his right and away to the northeast the Grampians. It was now that Calgacus attacked Agricola in several columns (Agricola 25). In response Agricola divided his forces. The poor depleted IX Hispana was Calgacus' primary target no doubt hoping to exploit the weakest spot in the Agricolan plan.

99

Calgacus fell at the Mons Graupius in the following year 83AD (Agricola 29).

Inchtuthill was left unfinished. It was probably started around this time but its non-completion rather makes one feel that Domitian was less interested in Scotland and a wayward commander bent on his own glory since he was recalled to Rome in this same year (Agricola 39, 40).

Dating the forts above to Agricolan times has proved contentious; the best that can be said is that they are 'Flavian' (Hanson 1986). Hanson the archaeologist has taken the forts Barochan Hill, Cudder, Mollins, Castlecary, Camelon, Mumrills and Elgihaugh, measured the distance between them and deduced a 6-8 mile mean distance and feels this is strong archaeological evidence of the line of forts established by Agricola. Flavian dated artefacts have been found at all of them. Furthermore, Inchtuthill is not placed well strategically but tactically.

It would appear that all this evidence even allowing for the enthusiasm of archaeologists and historians, the whole system if it is 'Agricolan' seems to make good military sense in that it is consistent with what we know of Roman practice. Hadrian's Wall is good evidence and there are similar systems elsewhere in Europe dated to the same period. Looking at it from a soldier's point of view, it does make good sense. But what does it tell us about Tacitus' hero? He appears to be 100

competent Roman general typical of the type. There does not seem to be anything particularly outstanding about him.

His actions concerning the attack upon the auxiliary cohort by the Ordovices (Agricola 18) at the start of governorship, appears something of a planned reaction. Obviously the failure of previous governors such as Cerealis to 'finish the job' was well known to the new governor upon his arrival in 77AD. There is also evidence that Agricola made certain new dispositions as regards Brigantia. There certainly appears to have been a general policy decision about this time to consolidate the Roman hold on Brigantia. This would make sense in order to ensure no trouble broke out in the rear. Vespasian would have been well aware of Agricola's knowledge of Britain. The fact that he had served under no less than four previous governors made him something of a specialist on the subject. He must have been fully aware of previous failings and inadequacies of his previous commanders.

His whole governorship has the heavy feeling of trying to consolidate and finish off the conquest of Britain. It tied down three legions and strategically speaking it was not that important. Nero thought seriously about abandoning the province only to be dissuaded by Seneca and Burrus on the grounds it would reflect badly on the new regime's reputation with the Army. There is in all this a hint of Julius Caesar and Augustus who established the

101

Julio-Claudian dynasty. Octavian as he was then known set about apolicy of consolidation upon the frontiers.

Vespasian was to found a new dynasty. The army still remembered fondly the Julio-Claudians. He had an established military reputation though but being the far-sighted and practical man he was foresaw that Northern Britain would continue to be a drain on military manpower. This was especially so in the light of his experiences in Judea during the late 60s.

The Brigantian kingdom was no longer relevant to a secure Britain. Roman policy as regards Cartimandua had failed. But there is more than a hint of hesitation even though Cerealis placed the Ninth Hispana at York, he seems not to have consolidated this annexation fully. Hence Agricola's later work. Whatever the case obviously he felt that hostile parties could have caused a problem in his rear.

So it is fairly safe to assume that Flavian policy dictated the use of 'experts' like Agricola. Returning to Archaeology. Hanson and Frere (1986) both argue for the dating of the 'glen-blocking forts' as Agricolan. Furthermore bronze asses dated no later than 86AD have been found at Inchtuthill which was unfinished. These have also been found at Dalginross and Strathcaro. All provide a terminus post quem well in keeping with the departure of Agricola. From a military point of view they do seem remarkably too well placed to be the work of more than one commander. 102

Even if one were to raise the argument that they are the result of different commanders at consecutive periods, thess fall down by virtue of the fact that most commanders in history upon taking command in a new theatre have their own ideas. One only has to examine recent history to establish this fact and this is also the reason why commanders are changed in the hope they will bring fresh impetus and outlook to a military problem.

From the above it appears that Agricola may have been a good general but it must be clearly understood that the Emperor was the Commander in Chief. Coins with the head of Domitian as 'Imperator' appear around this time as well. Some archaeologists and numismatists have believed the issue of these was to commemorate Mons Graupius.

Military commanders if they are good also tend to become arrogant. One only has to examine the likes of Alexander, Caesar, Patton, McArthur and even to slight degree Montgomery and Churchill. There is evidence in The Agricola that he developed this sense of his own pre-eminence. This was not good for realations with Emperors like Domitian (Agricola 39, 40).

Summing up the man, it could be stated that Agricola was typical of his type. Better than average, popular with his troops, concerned for the welfare of his men, a good tactical commander but not so brilliant at strategy and a tendency to fall into

103

complacency in respect of his own talents. Domitian was in many ways right to recall the man. Such a one could pose a threat to the throne if allowed to grow to overconfidence. Besides war threatened from a far more dangerous people, namely Decebalus and the proto-state of Dacia, which left un-checked threatened the whole Northern Frontier.

Reading list:-

Caesar, Civil War.

Dio, The Roman History.

Livy, The War with Hannibal.

Polybius, The Roman History.

Plutarch, Lives.

Pliny, Letters,

Pliny, Natural History.

Tacitus, The Agricola,.

Tacitus, The Histories.

Tacitus, Annals.

Fear, Rome and Baetica 50BC –150AD, Clarendon 1986.

Frere, Britannia, Pimlico 1991and revised copies 1993 etc.

Hanson, Agricola and the Conquest of the Northern States etc 1986.

Churchill, History of Second World War Cassell1948.

Stockton, The Gracchi, Oxford 1979.

Wilmot, The Struggle for Europe 1951.

Luttwak, Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire, Hopkins University Press1976 and revised 1994.

Luttwak, The Logic of Peace and War, Harvard University Press 1987.

104

Leven-Torres. Italica: From Vicus to Imperial Throne. UCL 1997.

Leven-Torres, A Question of Balance? 1 to 3, Lulu.com/guyleventorres 2006.

Rostovtzeff, Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire, Oxford 1957.

Syme, Tacitus. Oxford 1957.

Wacher, The Towns of Roman Britain, Batsford 1974.

Wiseman, Roman Political Life 90BC –AD69, Dept of History and Archaeology, University of Exeter 1985.

Le Bohec, The Roman Imperial Army Batsford 1994.

105