Roman Army Myths

[Ariovistus]

This will hopefully dispell some of the
myths that have been circulating around about
the Roman Army in the late Imperial stage:

Myth #1: "Barbarization" of the Roman army led to a decline in stadards.

Fact: the recruitment of barbarians in the Roman army did not occur in overwhelming numbers. Recent evidence shows that even the auxiliaries were not as heavily "barbarian" as once thought. In fact only a 5th of the soldiers were of barbarian origin. Compared to many of the units of the early imperial army, this was actually a decline of foreigners. The vast majority of the auxiliaries in the late Roman army were still of provincial origins.

myth #2: the armor of the late imperial era became lighter and did not offer as much protection to the soldier as in the early days of the empire.

Fact: While its true that the Lorica Segmentata was phased out of the Roman army in the 3rd century, the armor of the late imperial era was no worst off than in the Republican era since maille, scale, and lamellar continued to be widely used in the late empire. Greaves and arm guard were still used in the ranks of the heavy cavalry and oval shields pretty much remained the same as in the days of the Hastati and Triarii of the Republican roman army.

Myth # 3: The close order formatons and tactics of the Roman army changed in the late Empire as the Roman army adopted the tactics of the barbarians.

Fact: In terms of the Roman cavarly very few changes were made in the weapons and tactics and for the most part remained the same as they always had been in the Republican and early empire. The legion heavy infantry continued to use the pilum while the cavalry was armed with a ligher javelin for throwing and thrusting. While its true that longer swords by the second century had largely replaced the short Spanish sword known as the gladius, this was not in itself an indication of changing tactics since the longer swords were still used in close order formations for cutting and thrusting. In fact the longer blades increased the soldier's reach in close quarter combat. There was however a greater emphasis on longer range fire power which infact improved earlier tactics. The weighted throwing dart and the heavier emphasis on archery increased the effectiveness of Roman missiles over anything the Romans had in the Republican era. Despite some changes in weapons there was little change between the Army of the Republic and the army of the late empire.

Myth #4 The Roman army was invincible until the late imperial era.

Fact: The performance of the late imperial army was no worse off than the performance of the Republican and early imperial armies. Despite what the boob tube programmings on THC may tell you, the Roman army was far from invincible. Roman military disasters at Adrianoble was on the par with earlier disasters at Cannae, Carrhae, the fiasco at the Teutoberg. Even a poorly armed undisciplined Jewish rabble anihialated the XII Legion early in the Jewish wars, and the IX Legion was routed by the Iceni in the Boudiccan revolt.
The battle of Trasimene in 217 BC was just as devastating. 25,000 men,including Flaminius himself, almost the entire Roman army was massacred or drowned in Lake Trasimene trying to escape. A relief force of 4000 Roman equites was also destroyed trying to reach the battle.
Contrast this to the supposed Roman militay "decay" in the late empire, when the Roman army comprised mainly of highly mobile legionary cavalry and Praetorian horsemen under Gallienus, Aurelian, and the future emperor, Claudius II Gothicus, utterly crushed the largest Germanic invasion of 268 AD. A Gothic armada of 500 ships landed an army of 230,000 Goths on Moesia. I realize this estimate could be an exagerration by Roman sources, but the Romans were nevertheless vastly outnumbered by the Goths. An initial Roman counterattack at the bloody battle of Naisus was driven back by the Goths, but the Roman defenders managed to hold their ground until Aurelian routed the Gothic heavy cavalry. 50,000 Goths were slaughtered. The battle broke the Goths as a threat to Rome for a century. Gallienus could have followed through on his victory by finishing off the Gothic peril forever, but was compelled to break off the pursuit in order to supress an army rebellion by Aureolus in Italy.
The point is, Roman army standards and tactics did not decay in the late empire, but improved. Its hard to imagine a less mobile Republican army defeating such a large gothic invasion had it occured in the early days.