Give Me Another!

[caldrail]

And so it would not be wrong to call their practice sessions bloodless battles and their battles bloody practice sessions

Josephus - A History of the Jewish War

 

This famous quote from Josephus sets the mood. These are men subjected to a fairly heartless regime where infractions of the rules can incur dire punishments. Life for the soldier is disciplined. Every change of activity is heralded by trumpet. They eat together, work together, and march together. Idleness is pounced on by senior men. The earlier volunteer armies had strict discipline, but the professional army of the late Republic and Principate was worse still.

 

We see that the Roman people have subjugated the whole world by no means other than training in the use of weapons, strict discipline in camps, and practise in warfare

Vegetius, A Book About Military Affairs

 

Vegetius also records much about the training of a recruit. Double-weight wickerwork shield, wooden swords, and shafts were used in practice against upright posts twice a day, morning and afternoon. Carrying sixty pounds of weight (43 modern pounds) they conduct route marches and camp building. They should regularly cut down trees, carry heavy loads, jump ditches, vault onto horses, swim, and even run in full kit. In this way the men were strengthened and toughened.

 

On route marches, every man was expected to assist the building of a camp, for mutual protection. Guards were poisted, and if caught sleeping on duty, then they would find themselves sleeping outside the camp at night, with only barley (an animal feed) to eat. For severe cases, a soldier might find himself clubbed to death for exposing his unit to danger.

 

The optio, the second in command to a centurion, would march behind the men, using a vine staff to make sure no-one spoke or fell out of line. Vine staffs were used for flogging men too, and famously one centurion was nicknamed 'Give Me Another' for his habit of breaking them during a punishment. Not suprisingly, that centurion was murdered during a mutiny.

 

It was a tough regime, and inevitably some recruits never made the grade, finding themselves dismissed during basic training. Deserters might expect to be thrown to animals if they persisted in this behaviour, although Corbulo ordered this sentence without hesitation. Tortured to death on a rack or crucifixion were alternatives.

 

The discipline did not let up even in battle. Modestinus writes that the first soldier to retreat is executed in front of his mates. A soldier who disobeys an officer in combat is executed even if his actions are heroic. Famously, a general might call for a decimation if the whole unit serves with dishonour. One man in ten is selected and beaten to death by his friends. One can only guess how they felt afterward.

 

It wasn't just the ordinary soldier who was subjected to this discipline. At the Siege of Jerusalem, Titus (the future emperor) was so angry at his officers negligence in guarding against jewish ambushes that he nearly executed the lot of them, stopped only by appeals from the soldiers themselves. Augustus is said to have disciplined centurions, requiring them to stand to attention outside his tent for long periods improperly dressed and holding clods of earth.

 

Given this harsh way of life it shouldn't be suprising that soldiers found ways to avoid onerous duties. Having artisan or clerical skills could get you immunes status, performing light duties. Paying bribes to a centurion might get you off the worst fatigues. Such corruption was widespread and although efforts were made to eradicate such behaviour, it continued unabated.

 

If there is a requisition and a soldier seizes your donkey, let it go. Don't resist and don't grumble. If you do, you will be beaten and you will still lose your donkey

Epictetus - Letters collected by Arrian

 

If he (a civilian) seeks redress, his case is heard by a judge in army boots and big, heavy jurors seated on heavy benches... The whole cohort is hostile and all the maniples agree to make sure that the punishment requires medical treatment and be worse than the original injury... So dry your eyes and don't bother your friends to serve as witnesses, since they will only offer excuses not to...

Juvenal - Satires

 

There's no doubt that soldiers got what they wanted. Bullying and stealing from civilians certainly went on despite laws to the contrary. From the descriptions given it was clear that officers took a dim view of civilians interfering with military business. Yet civilians made a good living out of legionary forts. Soldiers generally blew their pay on wine and loose women, no doubt getting drunk and violent in the hours of darkness. Although for much of the empire soldiers were forbidden to marry, many did on the quiet, and since their children were potential recruits in the future this transgression was normaly overlooked.

 

Military discipline in the Roman legions was severe. Nonetheless, the soldiers generally had a high degree of morale and pride. But legions did mutiny if pushed too far, and if badly led, it was often the case that roman soldiers were indifferent and bolshy.

Edited August 5, 2007 by caldrail

[Klingan]

Great post Caldrail. I've read 3 of those quotes before, the last one was new to me.

 

And "Give me another one" must have been a scary type. I think I've read about that one in my Roman Social History book. Is this where you found those quotes? (As the Romans Did, Second Edition: A Sourcebook in Roman Social History by Jo-Ann Shelton)

 

If not it's a very much recommended book, probably the one I enjoy most in my history collection!

[Ingsoc]

It's seem that after the civil war the army discipline decline and Augustus had to harden it again.

 

He made many changes and innovations in the army, besides reviving some usages of former times. He exacted the strictest discipline. It was with great reluctance that he allowed even his generals to visit their wives, and then only in the winter season. He sold a Roman knight and his property at public auction, because he had cut off the thumbs of two young sons, to make them unfit for military service; but when he saw that some tax-gatherers were intent upon buying him, he knocked him down to a freedmanº of his own, with the understanding that he should be banished to the country districts, but allowed to live in freedom. He dismissed the entire tenth legion in disgrace, because they were insubordinate, and others, too, that demanded their discharge in an insolent fashion, he disbanded without the rewards which would have been due for faithful service. If any cohorts gave way in battle, he decimated them, and fed the rest on barley. When centurions left their posts, he punished them with death, just as he did the rank and file; for faults of other kinds he imposed various ignominious penalties, such as ordering to stand all day long before the general's tent, sometimes in their tunics without their sword-belts, or again holding ten-foot poles or even a clod of earth.

 

After the civil wars he never called any of the troops "comrades," either in the assembly or in an edict, but always "soldiers";24 and he would not allow them to be addressed otherwise, even by those of his sons or stepsons who held military commands, thinking the former term too flattering for the requirements of discipline, the peaceful state of the times, and his own dignity and that of his household. (Suetonius, The Life of Augustus, 24-25)

[Nephele]

And so it would not be wrong to call their practice sessions bloodless battles and their battles bloody practice sessions

Josephus - A History of the Jewish War

 

I remember that quote from I, Claudius, where Drusus is complimenting his brother Tiberius, telling him how the men remembered Tiberius as a military leader: "They say your drills were bloodless battles, and your battles were bloody drills." To which Tiberius replies with some surprise (and pride): "Do they really say that?"

 

Great article, Caldrail.

 

-- Nephele

[Lost_Warrior]

Wow Caldrail, good post!! Of course, you beat me too it! I was seriously going to make a rather long winded post on this same subject. (no really I was)

[caldrail]

Its important to realise that the standard of discipline, esprit-de-corps, and training refers to the roman army at its peak effectiveness. It wasn't always so - long periods of peace reduce an armies effictiveness and the romans were not immune to that.

 

As the Romans Did, Second Edition: A Sourcebook in Roman Social History by Jo-Ann Shelton

 

A thoroughly brilliant book I found at the local library. I've since managed to get hold of a copy.

 

Lost Warrior, don't worry about not posting first, if you've something to add to the discussion go for it.

[Lost_Warrior]

Lost Warrior, don't worry about not posting first, if you've something to add to the discussion go for it.

 

I don't at the moment, unfortunately.

 

I do have a question though; Most of the pictures and writings I've seen reference the Optio carrying not a vine staff like the Centurion, but a staff with a knob on the end of it. Was this a different time period? Or simply a different depiction of the same thing?

[ASCLEPIADES]

It wasn't just the ordinary soldier who was subjected to this discipline. At the Siege of Jerusalem, Titus (the future emperor) was so angry at his officers negligence in guarding against jewish ambushes that he nearly executed the lot of them, stopped only by appeals from the soldiers themselves.

Salve, C. X-cellent post.

 

This might be the quote you were talking about; here comes "Titus Flavius" Josephus, the notorious Jewish-Roman version of Benedict Arnold:

(Jewish war, book 5, Ch VII, sec 4-5) :

 

"After this these Jews, without keeping any decorum, grew insolent upon their good fortune, and jested upon the Romans for being deluded by the trick they bad put upon them, and making a noise with beating their shields, leaped for gladness, and made joyful exclamations; while these soldiers were received with threatenings by their officers, and with indignation by Caesar himself, [who spake to them thus]: These Jews, who are only conducted by their madness, do every thing with care and circumspection; they contrive stratagems, and lay ambushes, and fortune gives success to their stratagems, because they are obedient, and preserve their goodwill and fidelity to one another; while the Romans, to whom fortune uses to be ever subservient, by reason of their good order, and ready submission to their commanders, have now had ill success by their contrary behavior, and by not being able to restrain their hands from action, they have been caught; and that which is the most to their reproach, they have gone on without their commanders, in the very presence of Caesar. "Truly," says Titus, "the laws of war cannot but groan heavily, as will my father also himself, when he shall be informed of this wound that hath been given us, since he who is grown old in wars did never make so great a mistake. Our laws of war do also ever inflict capital punishment on those that in the least break into good order, while at this time they have seen an entire army run into disorder. However, those that have been so insolent shall be made immediately sensible, that even they who conquer among the Romans without orders for fighting are to be under disgrace." When Titus had enlarged upon this matter before the commanders, it appeared evident that he would execute the law against all those that were concerned; so these soldiers' minds sunk down in despair, as expecting to be put to death, and that justly and quickly. However, the other legions came round about Titus, and entreated his favor to these their fellow soldiers, and made supplication to him, that he would pardon the rashness of a few, on account of the better obedience of all the rest; and promised for them that they should make amends for their present fault, by their more virtuous behavior for the time to come. So Caesar complied with their desires, and with what prudence dictated to him also; for he esteemed it fit to punish single persons by real executions, but that the punishment of great multitudes should proceed no further than reproofs; so he was reconciled to the soldiers, but gave them a special charge to act more wisely for the future; and he considered with himself how he might be even with the Jews for their stratagem."

 

"TF" Josephus was for Titus what V Paterculus was for Tiberius. Main difference would had been that the former was a far better writer.

[ScandinavianRoman]

Excellent post. That is probably why Roman recruits were hard to get in the later years of the Empire. They got fed up with all the strict disipline and wanted a lot of money to put up with that. Money was not something Rome had a lot in its later years.

[caldrail]

We're talking about a period of hundreds of years, dozens of generations. The roman people had 'stagnated' as a culture due to the long pax romana. Without the constant need to meet a standard, any army tends to get a bit lax, and the roman legions were no exception. Immigrants, less feeling of public duty, and in any case, the increasing size of the govermental bureaucracy had taken away recruits from the armies leadership pool. As we go through the empire, fewer and fewer soldiers are italian, until the in the late empire we even see press gangs roaming around to catch them, or edicts that two men without thumbs are as good as one man with.

[ASCLEPIADES]

... The roman people had 'stagnated' as a culture due to the long pax romana. Without the constant need to meet a standard, any army tends to get a bit lax, and the roman legions were no exception.,.

Salve, C!

 

I think this last post contradicts your opening one and Josephus' sapient words.

 

I don't consider a permanent war state a requirement for a well trained Army. In fact, it could have (and frequently has) an opposite effect, as in war your soldiers have the understandable tendency to die, and not in a Darwinian way.

 

For example: during WWII, Barbarossa was not a good training camp for the Wehrmacht; what the Allies faced the D-day was almost garbage.

[caldrail]

Incorrect. Although Augustus intended that the legions should remain battle ready (and indeed they were for a long tiime), part of an effective army is experience. You cannot get away from this, and the romans themselves in the consular legions reserved the experienced triarii at the rear to prevent too many casualties. Once lost, its gone, and can only be won again by more battles and casualties. Without battles, you have no experience.

 

Operation Barbarossa was not a training exercise - it was a full on invasion. Territory equal to twice that of germany was occupied in the first week by three million men advancing coast to coast. Many of them were raw recruits, who learned much during the campaign, but then much of that experience was lost again when the 6th army surrendered at Stalingrad. The luftwaffe for instance had been ordered to launch an air offensive to stop the allied advance in the ardennes in december 1944. They succeeded, but the luftwaffe lost too many experienced pilots and by that stage were not training new ones. Result? The luftwaffe was effectively spent. The americans were held up for three days. Thats the value of experience. You just can't beat it, and you can't get it without fighting.

[ASCLEPIADES]

Incorrect. Although Augustus intended that the legions should remain battle ready (and indeed they were for a long tiime), part of an effective army is experience. You cannot get away from this, and the romans themselves in the consular legions reserved the experienced triarii at the rear to prevent too many casualties. Once lost, its gone, and can only be won again by more battles and casualties. Without battles, you have no experience.

Salve, C!

 

Once again, I perceive some contradiction among your posts; I would agree more with the opening one.

 

Anyway, if you are right, one can only hope we shall never have to endure any extended period of peace.

[Carthago delenda est]

We're talking about a period of hundreds of years, dozens of generations. The roman people had 'stagnated' as a culture due to the long pax romana. Without the constant need to meet a standard, any army tends to get a bit lax, and the roman legions were no exception. Immigrants, less feeling of public duty, and in any case, the increasing size of the govermental bureaucracy had taken away recruits from the armies leadership pool. As we go through the empire, fewer and fewer soldiers are italian, until the in the late empire we even see press gangs roaming around to catch them, or edicts that two men without thumbs are as good as one man with.

 

Hmmmm....this reminds me of another country of my acquaintance. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it sounds so familiar....

 

Excellent post.