Hazing in the Roman Legions

[Pisces Axxxxx]

I posted a topic yesterday.

 

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AiYHJoSeSc2p3fQJvuWN9_jsy6IX;_ylv=3?qid=20130213101824AATasNM

 

Now I know Roman soldiers would beat anyone who fell asleep on guard duty to death. In today's politically correct Western Militaries, that is considered hazing.

 

So I am curious more about specific Hazing that was typical among the Romans military.

[caldrail]

Legionaries caught sleeping on guard (and they engaged in this practice often as the common technique was to prop yourself up on a spear) weren't necessarily beaten. They would normally be given animal food to eat and told to sleep outside the camp.

 

'Hazing' in this instance appears to be another word for what the British call 'Beasting', which is communal bullying in order to force conformity and attitude. It's difficult to say to what extent the Romans carried this out since we don't have much in the way of writings left by common soldiers (please note the supposed level of literacy in the legions).

 

What we can say with some confidence is that money was an important factor. A letter from one soldier in Egypt tells his family that "nothing happens around here without money".and we already know that a certain of corruption persisted within the legions, with centurions often taking bribes from their men to avoid onerous duty.

 

During the post-Marian period the Romans instituted a system of 'Close Friends', in which they were quartered in eight man groups. Whilst this does not appear to have had any combat significance (because the group was too small for survival on the battlefield and because the Romans did not allocate contubernae to specific duties) it represented a manifestation of the 'extended family' concept that runs through Roman society like letters in a stick of rock. It provided a 'buddy' system among the men and some measure of low level control whilst the centurion was elsewhere in that their comnrades were likely to keep a close eye on what their less well behaved brethren were up to.

 

However, clearly the level of behaviour in the Roman legions wasn't brilliant and easily dropped to appalling levels. Theft from civilians wasn't unusual and note that the legions protected their men from what they considered interference from aggrieved citizens bearing complaints about their loss. The case was held by a senior legionary ("a judge in boots") and unless the legionary was unlucky, the case would be dismissed on some trivial grounds. Whatever the result, the plaintiff was at risk of retribution from the accused soldier and his mates. There is clearly a 'bully boy' attitude among legionaries.

 

This can lead us to all sorts of speculation about hazing/beasting. There's little evidence for it apart from a suggestion that recruits being escorted to their camp were quickly deprived of their expenses money by asll sorts of ruses from the veteran soldiers, and that sort of behaviour is conformal with our perceived pattern of the legions thus far. It isn't hard to imagine that bullies within the ranks 'stole the soldiers lunch money', but I don't see much evidence for that - none, if I were honest - although money was clearly changing hands to smooth things over on a daily basis..There was a certain level of fraternity within the legion derived from their 'buddy system' and the legions esprit-de-corps, and we know that legionaries were required to swear an oath not to steal from each other before a campaign (does that suggest they suffered a low level of theft in the camp ordinarily? That's not unusual for men billetted together - "If it isn't nailed down, it's mine" )

 

We do know that Roman soldiers lived in extremely cramped conditions. Not only were eight men billetted together in a small room, but their slaves (yes - soldiers sometimes owned slaves) must have lived with them. A feature of a men-only enviroment in restricted space is that the level of violence increases, especially when the prevailing culture is macho, and the legions qualify on both grounds. Although that would raise our expectation, we don't see mentions of this sort of thing in the sources. Either it was too low level for writers to notice or bother writing about, or that level of violence did not occur. The truth is probably between those viewpoints.

 

The reality as far as I can determine (you may disagree) is that the centurions regarded hazing/beasting as their preserve, as a means of enforcing the behaviour they wanted foom the men, and ensuring they were willing to perform assigned duties or compensate by cash if they couldn't. What might happen to those soldiers who did not perform a daily duty and didn't compensate their centurion is another matter.

[DecimusCaesar]

There does seem to be a strong bond between the men within their conturberium. Often when a soldier died his friends might help fund money for the 'funeral club'. But how often this happened is difficult to say. I suppose if you spend several years with other legionaries, you build up a friendship with them that becomes very strong, especially when you fight alongside them in battle, and thus your life is dependent on them.

 

As for 'hazing' or bullying, it almost certainly happened. In civilian life as Jerry Toner points out in Popular Culture in Ancient Rome, bullying was a normal everyday event, verbally (sometimes physically) for some Romans. Cursive tablets calling upon the gods to avenge a person's tormentors is proof of this. If it happened in Civilian life, it is bound to be even more common in the army, where aggression is admired.

[caldrail]

That's why the contubernium was important. In theory it provided for support if one of your lads was getting a lot of stick from someone else. The reasoning being that the centurion would intervene somewhat ruthlessly if things weren't settled quickly.