SoA Forums

General Category => Army Research => Topic started by: dwkay57 on October 14, 2020, 09:09:05 AM

Title: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on October 14, 2020, 09:09:05 AM
Can anyone recommend the next stage reading, beyond the DBM Army Lists (Vol 2 Nos 22 & 23) for some of the smaller states in the Near East at the time of the Early Imperial Romans?
I have some odd figures left in my dwindling 6mm unpainted pile and thought this might be a suitable use for them but apart from some odd pictures of Hatrans in the Osprey book on Herod's army I've not seen much detail.

I know Osprey publish Rome's Enemies (5): The Desert Frontier (or something similar) but am a bit dubious on investing in that given its cover.

Thanks for any guidance or photos of existing armies.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Tim on October 14, 2020, 07:52:17 PM
I can recommend the recent Osprey Roman Heavy Cavalry for a number of reasons, not just for the Hatrans...
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on October 14, 2020, 08:10:25 PM
Is this the RHC(1) Cataphractarii and Clibanarii and you are referring to the drawings on page 11? And does this suggest that the Hatrenes might have had some really heavy cavalry?

There is a drawing in the Osprey Army of Herod the Great book (plate D) which shows some Hatrenes but I'm not too convinced by them.

The wikipedia entry for Hatra does show some photographs of "military men" and rulers who appear to be wearing knee length tunics and trousers but potentially not armour, although this could be court dress.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Duncan Head on October 14, 2020, 09:30:11 PM
I posted a reply earlier today referring among other things to the Roman Cavalry book, and it's disappeared. Weird. I think sometimes it happens when replies cross too close together, so I may have posted at the exact same time as Tim?

Anyway, it is the Cataphracts book we were both talking about. There are three sketches described as "from Dura and Hatra"; the central one is definitely from Hatra, Nigel Tallis published a photo of the original in the groups.io dbmmlist a while back. (The other two I am not sure which site they are from.)

There are loads of Hatrene statues showing men with swords, and some holding standards, but not with armour or other weapons, and there seems to be little more in the way of military art except for some Parthian-looking horse-archers in hunting scenes.

Have a look at:

https://www.academia.edu/4434812/Winkelmann_2013_The_weapons_of_Hatra_as_reflection_of_interregional_contacts
https://archive.org/details/PictorialGraffitiInTheCityOfHatra

For standards:
https://www.ancient.eu/image/10853/temple-ritual-scene-from-hatra/
https://mythology.stackexchange.com/questions/5898/who-is-the-female-figure-in-the-nirgul-tablet
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on October 15, 2020, 01:38:46 PM
Yes I saw your first post Duncan as you recommended the Fergus Millar book and I pondering whether the £20 for that is a better investment than £12 for the Osprey book. Hopefully, the approaching sound of jingle bells might enable both to come down the chimney. Ho ho ho

https://www.deviantart.com/foojer/art/Mesopotamian-Warriors-10th-c-BC-to-16th-c-AD-807586954
Whilst searching around I did come up with the above (it is also available as a cartoon). The narrative in the cartoon describes the Hatran as a mix of Selucid / Persian influences which I suppose has some plausibility.

What I'm trying to get really is a more detailed feel for the different troop types (e.g. old WRG classifications) and whether they were still in the kilt / tunic / cloak type outfits as shown in some of the WRG A&E series or were moving towards Persian or later Arabian attire. It would also be good to have some sort of idea of the individual peculiarities of each state (e.g. how did Hatra differ from Edessa) in terms of army size and composition.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Duncan Head on October 15, 2020, 03:50:16 PM
Quote from: dwkay57 on October 15, 2020, 01:38:46 PM
Yes I saw your first post Duncan as you recommended the Fergus Millar book

And yet the post is not there now. How very odd.

QuoteWhat I'm trying to get really is a more detailed feel for the different troop types (e.g. old WRG classifications) and whether they were still in the kilt / tunic / cloak type outfits as shown in some of the WRG A&E series or were moving towards Persian or later Arabian attire. It would also be good to have some sort of idea of the individual peculiarities of each state (e.g. how did Hatra differ from Edessa) in terms of army size and composition.

Most of the art from Hatra and Edessa/Osrhoene shows Parthian-style costume by the 1st century BC or so, though it is hard to say how far down the social scale that fashion extended. I suspect that is true of all the "Arab-Aramean" states except for the Nabataeans, who seem to have been closer to their Arab roots and of course were less under Parthian influence. There is an article, though. that suggests that at Palmyra there were multiple distinct styles of dress: one the "Parthian" trousers/tunic/over-leggings/sleeved cloak that we associate with Palmyran soldiers, an "indigenous" style with "Arabian" waistcloth, and Hellenistic styles (found it: Susan Downey, "Arms and Armour as social coding in Palmyra, the Palmyrene, and Dura-Europos", in Mode (ed.) Arms and Armour as indicators of cultural transfer (https://amazon.co.uk/Arms-Armour-Indicators-Cultural-Transfer/dp/3895005290/)).

But you will probably have to put most of this information together yourself; I don't think there is much in the way of handy comparison sources. You could start with what Josephus says about the various alied contingents in the Roman army during the Jewish war, and the Roman accounts of Trajan's and Severus' sieges of Hatra.

Which reminds me, Commagene. See http://tabulaenovaeexercituum.pbworks.com/w/page/14246663/Commagene for Jim Webster on the Commagene army list, plus he had an earlier Slingshot article, and there are pictures of the Commagenan royal statuary all over the web.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Duncan Head on October 15, 2020, 04:11:31 PM
And of course the chap we discussed at http://soa.org.uk/sm/index.php?topic=3732 might be relevant to one or more of the armies you are looking at.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Jim Webster on October 15, 2020, 05:51:01 PM
Also you might want to think about Charcene. I've dug around a bit for that and there's a slingshot article with the editor :-)
I'm not suggesting major revisions to army lists, but there are interesting tweaks  ;)
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on October 18, 2020, 08:59:41 AM
Thanks. It looks like my Hatrenes will be tunic and trousers but my Nabataeans will stick to the kilt and cloak style, and if I do "Edessa" they'll probably be tunics and bare legs (to match the Herodian Jews to their south and my early Commagenes to their north). I'll investigate the opportunity for acquiring the Millar and probably the Osprey book too, but hold off putting paint to figures in the short term (possibly).
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: stevenneate on October 25, 2020, 06:19:39 AM
Reading Josephus is a must.
Fergus Millar's "The Roman Near East 31BC-AD337" is a bargain for the pocket money price of £20.

A few others sitting on my bookshelf that sheds light on Rome's Eastern chums:
Benjamin Isaac - "The Limits of Empire: The Roman Army in the East"
Warwick Bell - "Rome in the East: The Transformation of an Empire'
G.W. Bowersock - Roman Arabia
Martin Goodman - The Ruling Class of Judaea (after reading Josephus I had to read this, the backstabbing, the um... backstabbing and the err... backstabbing.  You just couldn't make this stuff up!)
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on October 26, 2020, 08:39:21 AM
Thanks Steve. The Millar book is on my list for Santa and I might investigate some of the others.

Tend to agree that life in Judea beat anything current soap operas or politics has to offer in terms of intrigue and plotting.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on February 07, 2021, 11:06:59 AM
The Fergus Millar book (The Roman Near East) did arrive for Christmas and has now been read. It was an interesting read in terms of explaining the cultures and geography of the region but apart from the occasional sentence there was not too much on the military aspect.

Given that this book and the Osprey Rome's Desert Frontier were both written in the 1990's, I assume there must have been some further publications since then.

Looking at reviews of the books on Steve's list Warwick Bell's book seemed to get a positive view and I also spotted Kevin Butcher's Roman Syria and the Near East as more "modern" publications, both of which seemed to put a focus on the existing states rather than from the Roman conquest perspective.

Has anyone (apart from Steve) read either of these and can advise whether they are worth reading, especially from a compiling possible army rosters perspective?
Thanks.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Dangun on February 09, 2021, 10:24:21 AM
Quote from: stevenneate on October 25, 2020, 06:19:39 AM
Reading Josephus is a must.

Agreed. It is one of the most detailed literary sources we have in terms of page count / years of history described.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: stevenneate on February 09, 2021, 12:57:31 PM
I am re-reading Benjamin Isaac's "The Limits of Empire: The Roman Army in the East" (I may have missed something first time around).  The various cities and kingdoms of the East are about as well covered as they can be but army information is sparse to say the least.  Sieges are more common but, again, details of who did what are spares other than "Hatra did not fall..... again".  Field armies rarely rate a mention unless it's Parthains, Romans, Persians or Armenians, i.e. the 'bigger players'  The smaller players , except Palmyra, most likely could not take the field against the 'big players'.  We know about Judaeans and Commagene because of the surviving details in Josephus.  The works of the "Josephus of Hatra, Emesa or Parthia' did not survive unfortunately.

If you were to say some heavy armoured cavalry, horse archers, infantry archers, then you're probably about right but more on inference as to what other Eastern state armies fielded.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on February 14, 2021, 09:16:55 AM
Thanks for the update Steve.

The nature and amount of the heavy cavalry is one query area to look into. The Osprey book on Rome's Desert Enemies seems to conflict itself with a plate of drawing of a Hatrene clibanarius, who looks like a standard HC (i.e. no horse armour, mail armour for the rider's torso) and the statement in the book about what the Romans meant by cataphractii and clibanarii. I was brought up to consider that the former were SHC and the latter EHC, but may be apparently not. The author also suggests that Palmyrene cavalry may have been a mix of the two.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: nikgaukroger on February 14, 2021, 09:30:37 AM
Ah, the ever-green question of catafracts and clibanarii  ;D

I'd suggest you leave the old WRG classifications of SHC and EHC as one or the other behind as no longer really useful, information has moved on a bit from then - there is no simple catafract = classification X really partly as different words appear to have been used for the same troops at different times. I'd also suggest that the Osprey refer to is dated, although there is really no up to date replacement.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Duncan Head on February 14, 2021, 11:37:02 AM
Quote from: dwkay57 on February 14, 2021, 09:16:55 AM... what the Romans meant by cataphractii and clibanarii. I was brought up to consider that the former were SHC and the latter EHC, but may be apparently not.
If anything, recent discussions suggest it is the other way round - "clibanarii" tends to mean complete armour and fully armoured horses, "cataphract" is much more flexible in meaning. I am reminded of the two Ptolemaic papyri Johnstono cites, with Ptolemaic cavalry troopers acquiring "kataphrakta" in the third quarter of the 3rd century BCE, probably the first mention of anything cataphract in the Hellenistic Near East (OK, except for ships), when the word just seems to mean heavy body-armour.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Jim Webster on February 14, 2021, 02:29:33 PM
Quote from: Duncan Head on February 14, 2021, 11:37:02 AM
Quote from: dwkay57 on February 14, 2021, 09:16:55 AM... what the Romans meant by cataphractii and clibanarii. I was brought up to consider that the former were SHC and the latter EHC, but may be apparently not.
If anything, recent discussions suggest it is the other way round - "clibanarii" tends to mean complete armour and fully armoured horses, "cataphract" is much more flexible in meaning. I am reminded of the two Ptolemaic papyri Johnstono cites, with Ptolemaic cavalry troopers acquiring "kataphrakta" in the third quarter of the 3rd century BCE, probably the first mention of anything cataphract in the Hellenistic Near East (OK, except for ships), when the word just seems to mean heavy body-armour.

I've been pondering the Ptolemaic cavalry
would they be worth upgrading in some way, but then would they have worn more armour than a Norman Kn(F)   :-[
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Duncan Head on February 14, 2021, 02:56:37 PM
In some rulesets, yes. In DB*, I don't see how you can.

Plus of course for all we know Seleucid and other cavalry may have been no different - we just don't have the same sort of  individual-level documentation.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: nikgaukroger on February 14, 2021, 03:32:45 PM
Quote from: Duncan Head on February 14, 2021, 02:56:37 PM
In some rulesets, yes. In DB*, I don't see how you can.

Plus of course for all we know Seleucid and other cavalry may have been no different - we just don't have the same sort of  individual-level documentation.

I think instinctively I'd feel that as the Seleukids appear to have been fighting more often that they may have been more likely to have it.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on February 15, 2021, 08:11:28 PM
Yes Nik, I thought the Osprey publication might have been dated, hence the trawl for more recent publications. Warwick Ball's book seems to have had a revision recently and Kevin Butcher's was printed not too long ago. Prices seem to be about £35-£45 each so I'm weighing up what to spend next month's pocket money on.

My guess is that neither will give that much detail but might provide some pointers that might enable me to build some small and unique armies, rather than the general purpose pre-Islamic Arab type, to support the bigger players.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on February 18, 2021, 05:54:31 PM
Whilst skimming through the Internet searching for information on Hatra, as one does especially when one's other half thinks you are doing some useful, I kept coming across references to the Battle of Shahrazoor (238AD). Unfortunately, all that seems to be known is that fixture took place, the names of the teams and the overall result.

Does anyone know anymore details, such as team captains, whether it was five-a-side or a full game, and who scored the goals?
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Duncan Head on February 18, 2021, 06:19:17 PM
The main source would appear to be Arabic tradition as retailed by Tabari (https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=p2UHIQ9WyJ4C&pg=PA31&lpg=PA31&dq=tabari+hatra&source=bl&ots=wPXy0ojYPx&sig=ACfU3U22yTOFya1FD2PAHLenGhhZ9FtpCg&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj_77CIg_TuAhWJUhUIHbtQAowQ6AEwAnoECAYQAw#v=onepage&q=tabari%20hatra&f=false), crediting the victory to a ruler of Hatra called Dayzan, regarded by some later Arab sources as an Arab, but possibly Syriac:

QuoteWe encountered them [in battle] with a host of the [Banu] Ilaf and with [a troop of] strong-hoofed stallions.
The Persians received at our hands exemplary punishment and we massacred the herbadhs of Shahrazur.
We advanced towards the Persians (al-A'ajim) from afar from afar with a host from al-Jazirah as in a blaze of fire.

I suspect that is all you are going to find.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on February 19, 2021, 08:47:17 AM
Thanks Duncan,

As you say not much of a battle report!
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on April 27, 2021, 09:32:55 AM
Now that I have a copy of the DBMM army lists (book 2) and read Robert Hoyland's "Arabia and the Arabs - from the Bronze Age to the coming of Islam" (pdf download from academia.thingy...) I understand and appreciate Jim's article on the Charcene a lot more.

The Hoyland book is quite useful in explaining the development of the states by geographical area. Again it is limited in precise wargamers information although there are descriptions of the tactics used in Arab raids and a description of a campaign (page 226) where the "Sabaean Royal Army" is mentioned along with the use of militia troops.

Most of the generic army lists covering these states seem to be dominated by irregulars. Depending on what your definition of "regular" is I might have assumed rulers would have had some form of permanent standing force rather than relying entirely on volunteer / pressed callouts. May be their troops weren't drilled as such but would have been full-time soldiers and so might warrant a slightly different classification.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Duncan Head on April 27, 2021, 10:06:28 AM
The Sabaeans and the other South Arabian kingdoms are a bit different from the more northerly Arab states. Have you read http://soa.org.uk/sm/index.php?topic=2151.0 on this Forum?
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: dwkay57 on April 28, 2021, 08:42:09 AM
I have now, thanks Duncan.
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: DBS on April 29, 2021, 02:14:45 PM
Quote from: dwkay57 on February 18, 2021, 05:54:31 PM
Whilst skimming through the Internet searching for information on Hatra, as one does especially when one's other half thinks you are doing some useful, I kept coming across references to the Battle of Shahrazoor (238AD). Unfortunately, all that seems to be known is that fixture took place, the names of the teams and the overall result.

Does anyone know anymore details, such as team captains, whether it was five-a-side or a full game, and who scored the goals?
Having been rereading Fergus Millar and Benjamin Isaac, a belated thought - apologies if the following is a statement of the obvious!

Anyway, the three Latin inscriptions found at Hatra are thought to indicate a Roman presence in 235 and 238/239/240 .  One inscription, the dedication of an altar, is very clearly 235 from the consular dating.  That does not of course necessarily equal a Roman military presence, but may do.  The other two inscriptions are both by a Roman officer, tribune of Legio I Parthica and tribune of Cohors IX Maurorum.  Since said auxiliary cohort has an honorific of Gordian, and Hatra was sacked by the Persians in either 239/240 or 240/241 according to the Cologne Mani Codex, that means the inscriptions must date between the accession of Gordian in 238 and the end of Hatra in early 241 at the latest.

Thus, if your battle really did happen and was not a figment of Tabari's imagination, there would seem to be the following options for Roman involvement:

1) None at all, if there was no presence between that apparently attested in 235, and that attested circa 239; in other words, maybe the Mauri cohort was only sent there as a reaction to a battle in 238, but was not enough to save the city from Ardashir a year or two later.

2) Said Cohort, plus perhaps other Romans on a limited scale: I Parthica after all was in garrison at Singara just over 100 kms away - too far if it was a Persian cavalry raid, but close enough just possibly if it was a more deliberate probe.

One wonders whether there are any parallels with events at Dura a decade later?  After all, the famous tribune commanding the XX Palmyrenes (he of the wall painting) was killed in battle according to the epitaph written by his widow, but the fact that she had time to get such an inscription in place suggests that he was killed in action some time before the siege that led to the city's fall.  Now, she does not say that he was killed by Persians, but they would seem the most probable culprits unless he was unlucky enough to cop it during a police action against naughty local nomads.  So do we also have here a probe or raid, followed by a full on siege?
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: Duncan Head on April 29, 2021, 02:49:17 PM
In the case of Dura, some scholars have been arguing for a while that the Persians took the city twice. If so, Terentius could have been killed in the first attack, leaving time for his widow to set up an inscription before the second and final siege four years later.

See for instance https://poj.peeters-leuven.be/secure/POJ/downloadpdf.php?ticket_id=6031246a8a874 p.19 of the pdf (paginated p.173).
Title: Re: Near East Armies 1st 2nd Century AD
Post by: DBS on April 29, 2021, 04:47:20 PM
Thank you for that, an interesting article.  He references James' report on Dura as the best summary of the debate about two possible conquests of the town - I have a copy of that and will look that bit up, as I have obviously missed it previously.