Mail and the Roman ascendency

[Imperial Dave]

he who has the mostest and all that....

[Cantabrigian]

Also, I think I would raise the issue of every one and his dog raising "Imitation legionaries" which did not enable them to conquer the world.  Could they not source the mail?
 

Ah, but they were all monarchies rather than a republic, so they would have had royal mail, and royal mail rarely delivers.

[Imperial Dave]

Boom tish

 

[Chilliarch]

The critical point Bret D makes (IMO) is that mail was a new technology to the Greek east and that the weapons used in Hellenistic warfare were not capable of piercing or cutting through a mail shirt. It's a window of opportunity that the Romans were well placed to take advantage of and would contribute much to understanding why the Romans crushed their 2nd C BC opponents so rapidly when their previous wars had taken many years.
Also, once a nation starts winning repeatedly, the reputation for invincibility grows for the beneficiary and their enemies start to believe it.
After all, we're all pretty settled on the idea of the Marian legionaries being standarised on mail armour, so why would it be so difficult to take the position that by 150 BC, Roman armies were increasingly armoured in mail to a degree where mail became the primary armour type.
It would also make sense as to why the scutum begins to shrink (at least by the time of Augustus or maybe Caesar).

Anyhow! 😊

[Ian61]

Good points all, just checking though...

It would also make sense as to why the scutum begins to shrink (at least by the time of Augustus or maybe Caesar).

That is such an incredibly logical point that at first reading I just thought 'Of course, that makes sense although that is some time after the introduction of mail why not simultaneously with the Marian reforms?'. On second thoughts though, whilst I am no expert is this really true? I know the scutum changed shape and form a number of times. It becomes rectangular about the time you suggest - Model Caesarean legionaries are always given the oval shields but EIR legionaries the rectangular ones - are these lighter? Looking at my models this could be true they do seem to be less tall against the figure. Of course construction might also have changed to make it lighter but still protect from missiles whilst maintaining the boss which protected the hand and as we are lead to believe allowed its use as a secondary weapon.

[tadamson]

I suspect that the 'mail is wonderful' angle is over streched.
Most armours are effectively cut proof for the areas they cover (eg 17thC 'buff coat').
The spread of mail in the Roman armies represents economic power. The same power that provided weapons, food, logistics etc. All of these are force multipliers that project onto battlefield prowess.

[lionheartrjc]

I don't believe there is any evidence for the introduction of mail in Roman armies being linked to the Marian reforms (if these are even a genuine thing anyway!).

Mail was extremely expensive to produce. It is the growing economic power of Rome (controlled by the senators who commanded Roman armies) that enables it to be produced in large quantities.

[Erpingham]

Mail was extremely expensive to produce.

Expensive but mass producible.  You can break it into processes and have slave labour working on at best semi-skilled processes until they drop, then replace them.  Perhaps the opposition were ground down by  Lurkio the Riveter?

[Jim Webster]

I think this is a fair point, mass producing mail rings would be comparatively easy. Whilst drawing wire and riveting small rings is tricky, when all you have to do is train people to those tasks, you don't need to train them as blacksmiths or armourers

[lionheartrjc]

Agreed. Mass production of mail is possible as Rome's economic power grows. I am not convinced it is easy - you have to have a whole supply chain of iron ore, charcoal, labour (free or slave), food, water, housing and factories/storage.  By the middle of the 1st century BC the republic must have been capable of producing thousands of mail shirts. This is in an age where land transport is very expensive, river transport vulnerable to floods and transport by sea subject to storms for 6 months of the year.  By the 1st century AD, the Roman military runs industrial enterprises like this, quarrying in the Medway valley for example.

[Erpingham]

I am not convinced it is easy - you have to have a whole supply chain

Good point.  Organising such a chain, though, is a Roman strength. It doesn't have to be all under one roof, either.  Clusters of workshops producing the basic materials for the more skilled process of assembling the mail shirts would work.  Another thing about mail is it is durable and repairable.  It can be refashioned into newer styles if needed.  So, growing your supply can be incremental over a number of years and veterans' kit can pass to tyros with probably fort-based refurbishment.

[DBS]

By the middle of the 1st century BC the republic must have been capable of producing thousands of mail shirts.

Yes and no.  My problem with this hypothesis is that I am not aware of much evidence of any sustained state enterprise before the principate.  Yes, roads, aqueducts, theatres, temples get built, but this is due to the leadership of individual magistrates initiating a project that will win them thanks, glory and votes. 

Is there a mechanism whereby Lurkio the Riveter is chained to his bench punching out mail day after day for the state?  Once you have an emperor, an established army, and imperial taxation not being milked by greedy governors too obviously for personal enrichment, such a construct becomes perfectly credible and we know that it existed.  Individual wealthy entrepreneurs may have had fabricae churning out kit, in the reasonable expectation that it will be needed by Sulla, Pompey or Caesar as they recruit to go and bash some foreigners, but that is supposition.

Also, I am very hesitant that mail was the secret armament that won Rome her empire in the second century BC.  There is the old question of exactly to when does Polybius' description of the armament of the legion date?  Yes, he places it before the Second Punic War, but arguments have been made that it may be more contemporary with when he was writing several decades later.  If true, that would suggest that the hastati, for example, were still less well protected than the senior classes, unless one assumes literary licence on P's part whereby he stereotypes each class to reflect average wealth and affordable kit, rather than a hodge podge depending on genuine wide variation in individuals' panoplies according to means.

[Keraunos]

Weapon and armour technology and productive capacity is interesting but even when put together do not, I think, provide sufficient explanation for Rome's rapid victory over the Hellenistic Kingdoms.  The different structure of Roman society with its ability to mobilise manpower and of the Senatorial class to maintain general unity of purpose contrast with the deep divisions between and within the Hellenistic states.  The armies that beat the Macedonian and Seleucid monarchies had some Romans in them but the Romans were backed up by large numbers of Greek allies.  Without that inside help, how far would a higher proportion of mail armour have taken the Romans? 

[DBS]

Indeed. There is also the argument that has been advanced a number of times that what distinguished the Romans from their Hellenistic peers was stubbornness and determination bordering on the irrational. What doomed Hannibal was not shirking a siege of Rome but that even after three Roman armies had been destroyed in three years, at which point anyone else would have sued for peace, the Romans kept on fighting.

[Imperial Dave]

Hannibal ad porta!