Diocletian's Imperial Guards

[Lucretia81]

I have a question (or a bunch of questions) that I'm desperately trying to find an answer to...it seems that everywhere I look I'm getting information that is either conflicting or vague. So hopefully someone here can straighten me out!

 

I know that when Diocletian set up the Tetrarchy, he didn't continue to use the Praetorian Guard as his own personal guard unit. If I'm understanding correctly, he created the Jovians and Herculians from two faithful legions to be the new imperial guards. Is that correct? Were the Jovians attached to him (who styled himself Jovianus) and the Herculians to Maximian in Rome? Or did Maximian still have the Praetorian Guard, and the Jovians and Herculians were both attached to Diocletian?

 

Also, I'm getting a bit hung up on the technical terms for the military divisions. Let's say the Jovians were in fact Diocletian's personal bodyguard. Would they have been considered a comitatus praesentales? Was the term "palatini" only used after Constantine?

 

As for their hierarchy, I think I had read that the Praetorian Guard was commanded at the highest level by a Tribune...was this also the case of Jovians? Does anyone know what the numbers and ranks in this elite group might have looked like? Would they have had centurions, etc? Also, I know that Constantine achieved the rank of "tribunus ordinis primi"...and I thought I had read from somewhere else that he was in Diocletian's personal guard. So basically I'm wondering, would Constantine have served in the Jovians, and is this "tribune of the first order" a possible rank in that group?

 

Any help would be SO appreciated...I'm getting dizzy trying to make sense of all of this. 

 

Thanks!

[caldrail]

Changes in the Praetorian Guard had happened before. They had been replaced wholesale with loyal soldiers by Severus when he marched into Rome for instance. Diocletian clearly didn't trust them. They were reduced in status and two loyal legions promoted to guard status, the Jovian and Herculians. The Praetorians persisted until Constantine eventually got rid of them altogether in favour of the Scholae Palatinae. As far as I'm aware, the term was only used after Constantine. Once the Scholae took the top slot, the Jovians and Herculians were no more than elite legions.

 

The Praetorian Guard had traditionally been commanded by a Prefect, a role with close political ties and much sought after.

 

Beware of Roman 'ranks'. I'm aware that most people routinely associate such titles with modern pyramidical organisation systems like our own armies, but there's evidence that the Romans used status a little bit differently from us. Constantine certainly served as a tribune - that's a senior military role classification, a sort of officer that could be assigned any major project within the legion - and in more than one office, but I don't see any mention of serving in the Praetorian Guard, although his father Constantius had been previously made a praetorian prefect by Maximius. I do however note that Constantine was serving in the court of Galerius as a military officer. The addition of 'First Order' had less to do with military promotion than acknowledging his status as a caesar's son and his record of military success.

 

What makes the situation worse is that 'personal guard' were not always the Praetorians (Nero for instance had a unit of German guards rather then untrustworthy Praetorians). For a long time the Equites Singulares Augusti, an elite cavalry unit, had in fact been closer to the Caesars than the Praetorians. They had emerged at the time of Trajan and were later disbanded along with the Praetorians.