Chapter 5

When We Were Soldiers

In This Chapter

What went to make up the Roman army

The equipment a Roman soldier fought with

How a Roman fort worked

If you ask someone to describe a Roman, the first thing that’ll come to mind is a Roman soldier, and most probably a Hollywood-style Roman soldier complete with extravagant breastplate, plumed helmet, red cloak, and waving an enormous sword. It’s not entirely inappropriate because in much of the world conquered by the Romans the first thing local populations saw was the Roman army.

The Roman army was the driving force of Roman power. In Chapter 4, I mention the Roman writer Cato who said that it was Roman farming stock that produced the best soldiers. These were men with staying power, and it’s certainly true that throughout the wars that won the Romans their Empire (see Parts III and IV of this book), it was the ability of the Roman army to cope with defeat, to be adaptable, and to keep coming back for more that wore the Romans’ enemies down. So this chapter is all about the Roman army: how it worked, who fought in it, and what a soldier’s life was like.

Mastering the Universe: The Fighting Men

There wasn’t really ‘a Roman army’ with a high command nerve centre in Rome and generals gathered round a map of the Roman world directing their troops. Roman armies were put together as the need arose for different campaigns, and they were under the local command of their individual generals. That went right back to Rome’s early days when citizens were classified according to what they could provide for military service.

In the days of the late Republic, armies could be official or unofficial, because they were created simply by the sheer force of circumstance. It all boiled down to the prestige and power of generals like Marius, Sulla, Pompey, and Caesar. Awarded imperium by the Senate to defend the state’s interests, these men, unlike earlier generals, created their own armies and also pursued their own political ambitions. Unlike the earlier armies, these armies were loyal to their generals first and Rome only second. After those days, the commander-in-chief was the emperor.

Army units were stationed all round the Roman Empire, mainly in the most troublesome places. Perhaps the most remarkable thing at all, however, is that in total the Roman army probably didn’t amount to more than 300,000–350,000 troops at its climax, which is an amazingly small total given the vast amount of territory the army controlled. To put it into perspective, consider this: At the outbreak of the First World War in 1914, Britain had 740,000 soldiers (including reservists and others), while France and Germany had armies of nearly 1 million troops each, making a combined total around nine times the entire Roman army. Yet most of these troops were fighting in a far smaller area than the Roman army controlled (though to be fair, the population of Europe in 1914 was much higher than in Roman times).

As a very rough estimate, around half the Roman soldiers were citizen infantry soldiers who fought in legiones (singular: legio, a legion made up of just under 5,500 soldiers). The rest were called the auxilia (‘assistant’ or ‘auxiliary troops’): hired provincials who were divided up into infantry, cavalry, and mixed units sometimes with specialised forms of warfare.

It took a long time for the Roman army to evolve into the system I describe in this section; see Chapter 14 for a little more detail about how the early army operated. From its relatively humble origins as a Roman citizen army, made up of men from Rome and Latium, the Roman army grew into a large force spread out across the Roman world. It was made up of men from every last province: citizens who entered the legions, and provincials who entered the auxiliary units. It also included men from beyond the frontiers, ‘barbarians’ by any other name, who played an increasingly important role in the Empire’s defence.

Legions and legionaries

The Roman historian Tacitus, writing around the end of the first century AD, listed 27 legions dispersed around the Roman Empire for the year AD 23. By Trajan’s reign (98–117), there were about 30 legions. At the beginning of the third century, there were only 19. The number of legions fluctuated as new ones were formed and others were lost, or cashiered. Legions were stationed where they were most needed. As a result the Rhine – one of the most dangerous frontiers – had eight legions, while the whole of North Africa and Egypt had only four between them. Britain, one of the smallest provinces but one of the most troublesome, never had less than three legions.

Legionaries had to be Roman citizens. In AD 92, a soldier in the III Legion Cyrenaica was accused of not being a citizen and faced instant dismissal. The man had to call three witnesses, two soldiers and a veteran, to testify that he was a citizen.

Organising a legion

Back in the Republic, around the time of the Third Punic War (151–146 BC), a legion varied in number from 4,200 to 5,000 infantry, depending on circumstances, with 300 cavalry. The legion was divided into maniples, each of which was made up from two centuries of troops. Maniples of young men made up the front line. Behind them came slightly older troops and at the back were the old, experienced soldiers.

A century used to mean what it sounds like, literally 100 soldiers. Over time, however, the term became less precise, and in practice a century had 80 soldiers. Those 80 soldiers were divided up into ten ‘tent parties’ (contubernia) of eight men each. Each tent party was garrisoned together in the permanent fort, and on campaign they marched together, bringing their tent and equipment on their allocated mule.

The legions went through a lot of changes, but by the late first century AD, they’d reached the form in which they existed for most of the great years of the Roman Empire: one legion totalling 5,120 infantry Roman citizen soldiers. The legion was made up like this:

That wasn’t all. Each century had a centurion to command it, and his assistant called an optio. There were about 128 of these, bringing the total to 5,248.

A legion in the days of the Empire had just 120 cavalrymen used as scouts and couriers, making the final total (not including officers) of 5,368. To that you can add other ad hoc staff like doctors.

Don’t imagine if you turned up to a legionary base you’d only see soldiers. Officers and some centurions could afford servants, freedmen, and slaves, and there were also sometimes officers’ families, and the unofficial families of soldiers (who lived outside the fortress in the civilian settlement). When the general in Germany called Quinctilius Varus set off to his doom in AD 9 (see Chapter 16), his three legions went out on campaign with women, children, and servants, who all helped slow him down.

Legionary emblems

Various standard-bearers carried emblems on parade and into battle:

Aquila: A gold eagle, only carried when the whole legion was on the march

Imago: An image of the emperor or a member of his family

Signa: A standard for an individual century

Vexilla: A flag on a pole naming the legion or a detachment (vexillatio)

The loss of standards was the worst thing that could happen to the Roman army. The general Crassus was killed and lost his at Carrhae in 53 BC (Chapter 14). Varus lost his in AD 9 (Chap-ter 16).

The command structure

A legion was usually commanded by legatus legionis (‘commander of the legion’), a man of senatorial rank who had served as a praetor (refer to Chapter 3). He had six military tribunes to assist him. The most senior (tribunus laticlavius, ‘tribune with a broad purple stripe’, meaning a man of senatorial rank) was one who would one day command a legion himself. The other five (tribuni angusticlavii, ‘tribunes with narrow purple stripes’) were equestrians and had usually already commanded auxiliaries and might go on to command auxiliary cavalry units.

Then there was the praefectus castrorum (‘prefect of the camp’) who was normally a former senior centurion who had risen through the ranks. Unlike the officers, he had a lifetime’s experience in the army. The senior centurion in each cohort commanded his cohort. The senior centurion in the first cohort was called primus pilus (probably meaning ‘the first spear’). He was the legion’s top centurion and had the position all the junior centurions hoped to reach one day. But the truth is no-one knows exactly how the centurions’ promotion system worked.

If this all sounds jolly neat and organised, you can forget it. For a start, we know that legions were often split into detachments called vexillationes (‘wings’). Centurions were frequently sent off to command auxiliary units. We also know that legions, like every other collection of human beings since the world began, were prone to sickness and desertion, quite apart from soldiers legitimately being away from base (see the section following this to find out what duties, military and otherwise, legionaries performed).

Jack-of-all-trades: Legionary duties

Legionaries were used by the Roman state for a whole variety of tasks from putting up fortresses, forts, and civilian public buildings to building bridges, mending roads, collecting taxes, and acting as policemen. In a new province, especially one in the West like Spain or Britain, Roman soldiers would be the only men with all the necessary skills to establish Roman civilization. Their architects, engineers, carpenters, masons, and blacksmiths were invaluable and played a huge part in developing these areas.

One of our sources is a duty roster for the III Legion Cyrenaica in Egypt in the late first century AD. The duties listed include being on guard duty at the local market, road patrol, road cleaning, latrine detail, and detachment to the harbour.

By imperial times, legionaries served for about 25 years, but plenty carried on for longer. They could hope for a grant of land from the emperor on discharge, perhaps in or around a Roman colony of other veterans, and run a business or farm. Augustus claimed that he personally settled 300,000 veterans. At an uncertain later date, a legionary called Vitalinius Felix served in the I Legion Minervia on the Rhine frontier. When retired, he moved to Lugdunum (Lyons) in Gaul where he sold pottery until he died at the age of 59 years, 5 months, and 10 days.

The auxiliaries

The idea of auxiliaries was to add muscle to the Roman army by using the provincials the Romans had once fought. By tapping into their fighting skills, the Romans formed units of Gauls, Spaniards, Thracian cavalry, Sarmatian archers (from an area north of the Black Sea), and a host of others. The auxiliaries were mostly divided into infantry, cavalry, or mixed units. Even if originally hired in one province, new soldiers were often later recruited from places where units were stationed, but the unit’s original ethnic title was kept. Here are some examples of auxiliaries:

The First Ala (cavalry) of Thracians (northern Greece).

The Third Ala of Arabians.

The Eighth Ala of Palmyrenes.

The First Thousand-strong Mounted Cohort of Vardullians (mixed infantry and cavalry). Vardullians came from Spain.

The Fourth Cohort of Gauls (infantry).

The First Cohort of Hamian (Syrian) Archers.

And that’s only a tiny fraction of them!

There’s no better description of the auxiliaries than that by a Roman military historian called Vegetius:

‘[Auxiliaries] are hired corps of foreigners assembled from different parts of the Empire, made up of different numbers, without knowledge of one another or any tie of affection. Each nation has its own peculiar discipline, customs and manner of fighting . . . it is almost impossible for men to act in concert under such varying and unsettled circumstances. They are, however, when properly trained and disciplined, of material service and are always joined as light troops with the legions in the line. And though the legions do not place their principal dependence on them, they still look on them as a very considerable addition to their strength.’

Organising auxiliaries

Auxiliaries didn’t serve in legions. They were arranged in much smaller units, based on the cohort. They were commanded by equestrian prefects or tribunes, or sometimes by legionary centurions on detachment. This is how they were divided up:

Infantry auxiliaries were organised into cohorts of 480 or 800, divided into centuries like the legions.

Cavalry auxiliaries were organised into wings (alae) of about 500 or 1000, divided up into turmae (squadrons) of 16 troopers each.

There were also mixed units where blocks of 128 or 256 cavalry were added to infantry units. These were called cohorts equitatae (‘mounted cohorts’).

Fighting fodder and frontline soldiers: Auxiliaries’ duties

Auxiliaries marched alongside the legionaries and even camped with them, but were paid less. Crucially, auxiliaries always bore the brunt of the fighting. The idea was that it was much better to lose provincials than Roman citizens. So in most set-piece battles, the auxiliaries would be thrown in first. Sometimes the legionaries just stood and watched.

The reason auxiliaries put up with such a raw deal was that they could earn citizenship that way, not just for themselves but for their families. Citizenship was awarded after 25 years’ service (in theory – often they were kept hanging on). Yet again, Rome had an advantage because other people wanted to be Roman, too. Of course, after AD 212 and the grant of universal citizenship under Caracalla (see Chapter 18), this distinction ceased to mean anything anyway.

The Romans also hired an unending series of more casual ad hoc auxiliaries, often from barbarian tribes on or near the frontier, who were even less well paid and who had no chance of citizenship. Handy for propping up the borders, these units were treated as totally disposable and were much more loosely organised and much more unreliable as a result. These units, sometimes generally referred to as foederati (federates), played an increasingly important and sometimes decisive part in Rome’s later history.

The Praetorian Guard: Rome’s garrison

The prefect of the Praetorian Guard constantly pops up in the history of the Roman Empire (see Chapters 16 through to 19). The Praetorians were the garrison of Rome, so they were right on hand to influence the imperial succession.

The origins of the Guard went back to the days of Publius Cornelius Scipio Aemilianus Africanus the Younger (c. 184–129 BC) who took a personal bodyguard of 500 troops to Spain with him in the Third Punic War (151–146 BC) because the soldiers in Spain were unreliable.

Under Augustus, the Praetorians were organised into nine cohorts of about 500 men, three of which were based in barracks outside Rome and the rest in various Italian cities. Praetorians were commanded by the equestrian praefectus praetorio (refer to Chapter 3), were paid more than legionaries, and served for much less time (16 years only). They occasionally took part in military campaigns, could be promoted to be centurions in legions, and in AD 61, a few were even sent to find the source of the Nile.

The fleet: Rome’s navy

Even though the Roman world was held together by lying around the Mediterranean, the Roman fleet (classis) or navy was really just an extension of the army. The Romans weren’t natural sailors and had no great skills in navigation or seamanship, despite Italy’s extensive coastline. When Julius Caesar invaded Britain in 55 and 54 BC, he lost ships on both occasions to storms and the tides, having no idea how extreme they could be.

The big naval successes for the Romans came earlier in the Punic Wars when Rome learned to sail ships in such a way that they could use them as platforms for landing soldiers (Chapters 12 and 13 explain the Punic Wars). Pompey’s destruction of the Cilician pirates was a major triumph, but of course the decisive event that ended the Republic was the naval battle between Antony and Octavian in 31 BC (see Chapter 15 for that tale).

The first permanent naval bases were built at Forum Julii (Fréjus) in Gaul, and in Italy at Misenum and Ravenna by Augustus’s time. They were designed to protect Italy and the grain fleets. Misenum became the main naval headquarters not far from where today the US Navy, the world’s most powerful, has a major base at Naples. Various other Roman fleets were installed around the Empire, for example in Alexandria, the Black Sea, Syria, Germany, and Britain, where they protected commerce or supported invasion forces by bringing up supplies, reconnoitring the land, building advance bases, and carrying marines (nauticus miles).

Fleets were generally commanded by equestrian prefects. Sailors, who came mostly from the east, turned up doing all sorts of other jobs from supplying recruits for new legions to building a granary on Hadrian’s Wall. The most notorious fleet event came in Britain in 286 when the commander of the British fleet, Carausius, used his naval power to rebel against the emperors Diocletian and Maximian (see Chapter 20).

The Roman siege of Syracuse between 213–211 BC in the Second Punic War (covered in Chapter 12) was a powerhouse of ingenuity. The Roman general Claudius Marcellus doubled up eight of his war galleys so they could carry siege ladders right up to the city walls. The idea was that attackers could launch themselves off the top onto the Syracusan defenders. Unfortunately, the Syracusans had the brilliant mathematician Archimedes (287–211 BC) on hand. Amongst the defensive weapons he devised was one that used a grappling iron to lift Roman ships up by the bows till they were vertical. The bottoms of the ships were then tied up and the grappling irons let go, causing the ships to fall back and sink. A far less reliable and much later source says Archimedes told the Syracusans to reflect sunlight with hexagonal mirrors onto the wooden ships. This supposedly set them on fire, but modern experiments have suggested this would have been extremely difficult if not impossible. Either way, Claudius Marcellus abandoned the assault by sea, but with a combination of land forces and a Syracusan traitor, he fought his way in and seized the city. Archimedes was killed in the battle, even though Marcellus had ordered his capture.

Having the Right Equipment

Regardless of how the Roman army was organised, none of that would have mattered a jot if soldiers hadn’t had the right gear. At its climax, the Roman army was the best equipped and best supplied force in the ancient world.

Uniforms and weapons

Until the mid-first century AD (around the reign of Claudius), the average legionary’s equipment consisted of the following:

Helmet (with cheek and neck guards) (galea).

Mail shirt (lorica hamata).

Dagger (pugio).

Sword (gladius).

Shield (scutum).

Spear (pilum).

Open leather boots with hobnails (caligae). (These are the boots the young Caligula, emperor AD 37–41, wore and were how he got his name.)

After the mid-first century AD, a legionary was more likely to have armour made of overlapping strips of iron (lorica segmentata) and a more elaborate helmet with deeper neck-guard and bigger cheek-pieces. But it’s plain from excavated examples that all this kit was liable to be handed down and used by many different soldiers over the years, so the likelihood is that any Roman army line-up would have looked distinctly ad hoc.

Not as ad hoc as the auxiliaries though, who used an almost unlimited array of weaponry and armour depending on their specialisations, where they came from, and what was available. The biggest show-offs were the auxiliary cavalry who loved fitting out their horses with decorative medallions on the harnesses. For special occasions, they had parade armour with face masks so that they could pose as mythical heroes in mock display battles.

The Roman army’s tradition was as an offensive, not a defensive force. Scipio Africanus the Younger once saw a soldier showing off his shield and told him, ‘It is a very fine one, my boy; but a Roman soldier must have more trust in his right arm than in his left’, meaning his sword arm, of course.

Artillery

The Romans were experts at artillery, though, of course, with no gunpowder, it was all done by sheer brute force and tensioned ropes. This is some of what they had, and it was especially suitable for siege warfare:

Ballista: Rather like a medieval crossbow, a ballista (or cheiroballista) fired iron darts.

Onager: A catapult sitting in a frame. A throwing arm, tensioned with ropes wrapped round the axle, was pulled back and let go, hurling rocks and other ammunition at the enemy.

Aries: The name means both a male sheep and a battering ram and is named because that’s what male sheep do. So like the Romans, we use the same word for both. The Romans used rams housed in vehicles with wheels. Inside, men pulled the ram back and forth on rollers. There was also a similar vehicle housing a drill, turned by a winch.

The best possible Roman battle in the movies is in the opening few minutes of Gladiator (2000). You get to see authentic-looking Roman soldiers caked in grime after years of campaigning on the German frontier, complete with artillery, archers, and an axe-wielding barbarian enemy. It’s amazingly realistic, though, in fact, it was filmed just outside London.

Holding the Fort

The Roman fort was like a miniature town. No matter where a Roman fort was built, or how big, it always conformed to the same basic design, though no two forts were identical. The biggest were legionary fortresses, accommodating more than 5,000 men, while the smallest full-sized forts housed auxiliary infantry cohorts of about 500 men. Even the fleet used coastal forts built to the same design. But smaller ones are known, right down to fortlets accommodating a dozen men.

The permanent fort was based on the marching camp, and the idea was to maintain discipline and organisation: Every Roman soldier should know exactly where he was supposed to be in the fort, whether the home base or an overnight marching camp. Permanent forts really came into being in the late first century AD and into the second century, once the Empire’s frontiers became fairly static.

Fort defences

Forts were generally planned in playing-card shapes with curved corners, and flush gateways (one in each side, opposite one another). Even the biggest fortresses were larger versions of the same basic layout (see Figure 5-1).

Turf and timber ramparts were about 4–5 metres in height and supported a walkway with a timber parapet. Planks were inserted in the turf to strengthen it. Stone walls could be as high as 4.5 metres (15 feet), with a 1.5 metre (5 foot) parapet above, and were often built as facings to existing turf ramparts. Beyond the walls a huge V-shaped ditch (fossa) was dug, and if the location was especially dangerous, extra ditches were added, sometimes with sharpened stakes dug into the sides.

Gateways were the weak link, but the Romans heavily protected them with flanking gate-towers. Interval towers around the walls added additional viewpoints. A grid of streets divided up the inside into various zones. The most important bit was the central zone (latera praetorii) where the administrative buildings were.

A Roman fort could be built in timber and turf, or in stone, or even a combination. Turf and timber was quick, easy to obtain, and extremely effective. The labour in the form of soldiers was available anyway, so it’s common for archaeologists to find several different builds of a fort, erected within a few years of each other on the same site, especially from the first century AD or earlier. After that date, forts were more usually built in stone because with settled frontiers, units were far less likely to move on from permanent bases.

Figure 5-1: A typical small Roman fort for housing about 480 auxiliary infantry troops and 128 cavalry.

Fort buildings

Forts had every facility necessary for daily life in the Roman army, including armouries and workshops to make and repair everything the soldier needed, from a humble buckle to a piece of artillery:

Barracks (contubernia): Filled out most of the fort area, with one block for each century (80 men).

Commander’s house (praetorium): Next door to the headquarters. Legionary fortresses had houses for the tribunes nearby, too.

Granaries (horrea): Usually built in pairs close to the headquarters building and heavily buttressed to withstand the pressure from settling grain.

Headquarters (principia): The nerve centre where standards, valuables, and admin records were stored.

Hospital (valetudinarium): Not always built.

Workshop (fabrica): Where all the fort’s needs like carpentry, blacksmithing, and clothing could be seen to (not always built).

A large gap always existed between buildings and the defences so that soldiers could rush to defend the fort walls and to protect the buildings. The only structures found around the edge were usually cooking ovens (kept away from the barracks because of the danger of fire) and latrines. Baths were such a fire risk they were often built outside the fort at some distance, but legionary fortresses usually had their baths within the walls.

Roman fort layouts are so similar that if an archaeologist finds a few key reference points by excavation, the rest of the plan can usually be worked out from that. Forts are at the heart of the Roman genius: It was all about system. Military architects could lay things out easily and quickly, and every soldier knew what he had to do and where he belonged once the fort was finished.

Sometimes legions built specialised works depots, which were industrial centres, especially useful when the legion was in a way-out place where pottery and other manufactured goods couldn’t be bought in. The XX legion at Chester in Britain had a works depot nearby at a place called Holt. Here the legion made its pottery, brick, and roof tiles, amongst other things, and then shipped them downriver to their fortress at Chester. But the army had vast needs for food and resources. It also bought in goods, or simply requisitioned them as tribute from conquered territories.

Marching camps

Marching camps were simply forts built on the move, though it’d probably be better to say that forts were permanent versions of marching camps. An army on campaign obviously needed an overnight stop. A suitable place on raised ground with access to water was chosen, and the fort systematically laid out, starting with the commanding officer’s tent (praetorium). Once the streets were laid out with all the places for the troops, the soldiers produced their spades and dug out a ditch around 1 metre deep and used the spoil to create a rampart. Each man carried wooden stakes so an instant palisade could be set up. Troops were then allocated various details like rampart guard duty or protecting supplies. In the morning, or as soon as the army moved on, the camp was packed up and the rampart flung back into the ditch.

Hadrian’s Wall

Hadrian’s most famous monument was his 76-mile-long frontier in Britain. A complex of stone wall, forts, fortlets spaced at 1-mile intervals with lookout towers at one-third-mile intervals between, together with forward and rearward defensive earthworks, it created a ribbon of Roman military life across northern Britain. One Roman historian said it was ‘to separate barbarians and Romans’, but it’s plain that crossing the Wall was allowed. Its real purpose was probably to control movement to prevent trouble and enforce taxation, rather than stop it altogether. Since Hadrian visited Britain around the time the Wall was begun, it’s almost certainly the case that he helped designed it. A bronze pan, inscribed with the names of several of the Wall’s forts, recently found in Britain also carries the words Val(l)i Aeli, which gives us the ancient name for the frontier: ‘The Aelian Frontier’, named after Hadrian (his full name was Publius Aelius Hadrianus). The Wall went through many repairs, restorations, and rethinks, but it remained a more or less permanent fixture until Britain was abandoned by the Empire in the early fifth century. Large stretches of the Wall can still be seen today. The Wall is studied by Roman military scholars from all over the world and visited by millions of tourists.

Keeping the enemy out: Frontier fortifications

Protecting the frontiers wasn’t strictly in the Roman tradition as the Romans had generally assumed they’d be forever expanding. But by Hadrian’s day (AD 117–138), the decision had been taken to stop conquering new territory (see Chapter 17). Frontiers were settled, and the Romans had to find ways of permanently protecting their troops and the borders. Wherever possible rivers, like the Rhine in Germany, or other natural boundaries were used. Watchtowers were built and acted like modern-day CCTV cameras, where troops could watch out for barbarians trying to sneak across. Warning could then be sent by beacon or mounted messenger to the nearest fort.

In some places, there just weren’t the natural boundaries so the ever-practical Romans had to make their own. The most extreme and the most famous is Hadrian’s Wall in Britain, but it wasn’t the only one. Other frontiers joined the Rhine and Danube, for example, and out in Egypt’s desert a chain of remote forts protected the Empire’s richest province.

The Late Army

From the reign of Marcus Aurelius (AD 161–180) on, the Empire was under attack on the borders. Not all the time, and not everywhere, but the assaults gradually increased and got much worse in the third century during the age of short-lived ‘soldier emperors’ (see Chapter 19). Cavalry became especially important. Gallienus (253–268) was the first to create an independent cavalry army under its own commander and put the legions under the command of equestrians rather than senators.

The really big changes started under Diocletian (284–305) and the Tetrarchy (Chapter 20). Diocletian increased the number of legions to about 60. They were installed in pairs along the frontiers, together with cavalry units, but a few were attached directly to the mobile imperial court (comitatus) along with the highest grade cavalry troops.

Dividing the army

Under Constantine (307–337), the emphasis on mobility became the first priority, though the change began under Gallienus (253–268). The army now became fully divided into the following:

Comitatenses (from comes meaning a member of the emperor’s retinue): The comitatenses fought the wars around the Empire, and were highly trained, well-paid, quality troops based on around a dozen 500-strong cavalry units which created the core of the emperor’s mobile army. These were the men who would race to confront any invading army of barbarians.

Limitanei (from limes, ‘frontier’): The mainly infantry static frontier garrisons, the limitanei held the restored frontier defences and were lower grade in every respect. In fact, they were frontier spear fodder, a hotch-potch of long-established auxiliary units, ad hoc bands of hired provincials, and even barbarians. As a result they were variable in their fighting ability and, even worse, in their loyalties.

Meanwhile, the legions were pulled back from the frontiers to create fortified strongholds and military centres within the Empire, which would protect civilians and military resources in the event of an invasion.

New forts for the late army

The frontier garrisons continued to occupy their old forts, but a new form of military architecture was developed that resembled medieval castles. With bigger walls and huge projecting towers and gates that supported defensive artillery, the new forts were really massive defensive compounds. The same features are often found on Roman city walls like those built by Aurelian for Rome (see Chapter 19).

The end of the Roman army in the West

The trouble is that with the army divided up into local frontier garrisons, it was easier for would-be emperors to cash in on local loyalty and rebel. There was also a huge setback in 378 when the emperor of the Eastern Empire Valens (364–378) was killed at Hadrianopolis trying to push back the Ostrogoths and Visigoths (explained in Chapter 21).

By the early fifth century, the West faced three key problems:

So much territory had been lost, the West couldn’t support or provide the army it needed.

A succession of rebellions inside the Roman Empire had taken troops away from frontiers and allowed forts and defences to become rundown.

The West became more and more dependent on hiring barbarian troops known as foederati, who were only loyal if they were being paid. They could turn against the Empire without warning.

Meanwhile, the East had suffered far less from invasions and was able to support the army it needed. In the end, what did it for the army in the West was simply that there weren’t enough resources or money to keep it going. The very last unit from the old days recorded was the Ninth Cohort of Batavians, which nearly 400 years earlier had been responsible for some of the writing tablets found at the fort of Vindolanda in northern Britain (see Chapter 17). Some of the unit’s soldiers tried to get back pay during the reign of Romulus Augustus (475–476). The troops were killed and thrown in the river. The Roman army in the West was no more.