The Late Roman Army

[caldrail]

He accelerated a process of decline rather than caused it in my view.

[Aphrodite]

Also, do you agree that the changes septimius Severus made were the start of the downfall of rome?

[Northern Neil]

According to Ammianus Marcellinus, 'Legions' were still very much in evidence in 360, and it seems quite clear that they took on the Persians as equals in a very protracted and bloody war. Although cavalry was starting to become the senior arm of the army by then, the legions he referred to were still masters of engineering and seige warfare - something German cavalry were not (and incidentally why they failed to exploit their victory at Adrianople in the following decade).

 

The legions referred to come from Gaul and Pannonia, places which had been Roman for nearly 400 years. No sign of 'Barbarisation' there. It was logistics and a backstab from an angry Christian which finally defeated Julian, not an inferiority in his troops.

[Neos Dionysos]

I have read arguments that the final changes constantine made, and the abandonment of the old tactics, and introducing large numbers of german troops, were the final nails in the coffin of the roman empire...

 

No, Constantine's changes were just additions, we don't know the exact time or date or emperor who changed the classical legions to the forms of the late empire employing field armies and frontier troops. Personally I think Diocletian had more toward the change of the legions than Constatine... tactics were not abandoned, they simply slowly adapted...

 

Also, do you agree that the changes septimius Severus made were the start of the downfall of rome?

 

No, I do not think that at all since at this time the legions were still the classical sense we know of them and his changes were needed... mind you the legions after his changes performed outstandingly, defeating not only Persians, but usurpers and throwing back new Germanic threats like the arrival of the Alemmani and the Goths...

 

According to Ammianus Marcellinus, 'Legions' were still very much in evidence in 360, and it seems quite clear that they took on the Persians as equals in a very protracted and bloody war. Although cavalry was starting to become the senior arm of the army by then, the legions he referred to were still masters of engineering and seige warfare - something German cavalry were not (and incidentally why they failed to exploit their victory at Adrianople in the following decade).

 

You mean the Goths... when speaking of Adrianople?

[Ovidius]

Perhaps all our answers are right, woudn't you say?

[Northern Neil]

You mean the Goths... when speaking of Adrianople?

 

Indeed, but the Goths simply followed a trend. The point I'm making is, when fighting an 'urbanised' rival such as Persia, the old legions were by far more useful troops than Barbarian foederatii, as the legions retained their skill in seigecraft and engineering. German troops - whether Goths at Adrianople or other groups within the Roman Army itself, were notoriously bad at taking walled settlements. This is why, I believe, there was an absence of them in Julian's campaign, and also why the Goths failed to exploit the Adrianople victory.

 

I am, by the way, referring to the 4th century. By the 5th, things had obviously moved on a pace.