The army of the early Roman Republic

[Jim Webster]

I think it seems to be accepted that the initial Roman forces included a lot of Clan warbands who could do their own thing without involving the city and its militia too much.

But I'm reading Romans at War. Soldiers, citizens and society in the Roman Republic. Edited by Jeremy Armstrong and Michael P Fronda (It's a free download from Academia.edu  )

But I'm left wondering, we know there were probably warbands in 477 (The destruction of the Fabii)
But there is discussion as to whether Consuls were as early as they Romans thought, and whether Consular tributes and Praetors preceded them, perhaps as the title a 'clan leader' operated under. Various terms like Imperium seemed to mean different things as well.

To quote a footnote
"An inscription published by Cristofani (1986) suggests that Rome's chief magistrate was
the praetor in the early third century. The earliest known use of the title consul appears
on the surviving tombstone (CIL 12.7 = ILS 1) of Scipio Barbatus (cos. 298), but scholars
have suggested it was carved in the second half of the third century. See Coarelli (1972,
36–106); Van Sickle (1987, 42–43); Wachter (1987, 301–42 and n. 9); Flower (1996, 171–75);
Drogula (2015, 41–42). The first surviving unequivocal reference to a consul seems to be
the statues set up by M. Fulvius Flaccus sometime after his consulship in 264. See Torelli
(1968, 71–76)."


I'm left wondering if the army we describe as Tullian Roman with the five classes ever existed as such? Or whether there was a lot more Auxilia or Warband wearing 'hoplite panoply' supported by others less well armed
With perhaps those who were city levy as opposed to clan warband (but could you be both?) a more staid close order militia spearman type?

Just kicking ideas around here

[DBS]

I have always been suspicious of the Tullian Five Classes to put it mildly.  The early Republican political organisation is, as you say, much more murky than people usually recognise.  Maybe just one consul at times, maybe a praetor.  Other Italian peoples had a dictator as a regular, rather than an emergency, magistracy.  Maybe the consular tribunes are because only patricians can be consuls at first, so when plebeian elites are able to muscle in, the cos tribs are a compromise?

I also question whether the "first class" or whatever really were running around with aspides in the late sixth and early fifth centuries given the full classical hoplite was probably only just reaching maturity in Greece itself.  Certainly question the assumption that anyone so armed necessarily formed a nice tidy, trained phalanx.  After all, people such as the Illyrians seem to have quite happily embraced the hoplite panoply within the context of a more warband style of fighting.

I think there would be little difference between "clan" and city "levy/legion", as presumably the same chaps more or less, just a question of leadership.  If there is a difference, perhaps the Fabii, for example, when waging their private war, might have had a larger proportion of lighter troops, if they were calling out all their clients, proles included?

I suspect the early Republican army evolved quite rapidly, particularly in terms of "drill" and approximate uniformity of kit, but that it still was an evolution, not the reforming jumps so beloved of the later annalists.

[Jim Webster]

It did strike me that a legion was a good way of fitting together small clan forces, with them providing maniples or cohorts

[DBS]

Indeed, and the tribes seem to represent early geographic sections of Rome. Given it was originally a series of clumps of habitation, particularly on some of the hills, that edged towards each other, again that might be clan orientated if different clans had different hills in the early days...

[Cantabrigian]

But I'm left wondering, we know there were probably warbands in 477 (The destruction of the Fabii)

How confident are we that the destruction of the Fabii actually happened?  I thought there was some doubt as it sounded too like the co-opting of the Thermopylae story into Roman legend?

[Keraunos]

Given the many unwarranted assumptions with which the term 'warband' is freighted, the alternative 'small clan forces' seems safer to use.  The idea that these might have provided the maniples and cohorts for what became the legion of the Roman state is a nice one but is there any evidence for legions having any association at any time with particular clans or groups of clans?

[Jim Webster]

Given the many unwarranted assumptions with which the term 'warband' is freighted, the alternative 'small clan forces' seems safer to use.  The idea that these might have provided the maniples and cohorts for what became the legion of the Roman state is a nice one but is there any evidence for legions having any association at any time with particular clans or groups of clans?

I think the legion is a 'Roman' or 'Civic' thing. According to Polybius

The division and appointment of the tribunes having thus been so made
that each legion has the same number of officers, those of each legion
take their seats apart, and they draw lots for the tribes, and summon
them singly in the order of the lottery. From each tribe they first of all
select four lads of more or less the same age and physique. When these
are brought forward the officers of the first legion have first choice, those
of the second choice, those of the third, and those of the fourth last. Another
batch of four is now brought forward, and this time the officers of
the second legion have first choice and so on, those of the first choosing
last. A third batch having been brought forward the tribunes of the third
legion choose first, and those of the second last. By thus continuing to
give each legion first choice in turn, each gets men of the same standard.
When they have chosen the number determined on — that is when the
strength of each legion is brought up to four thousand two hundred,
or in times of exceptional danger to five thousand — the old system
was to choose the cavalry after the four thousand two hundred infantry,
but they now choose them first, the censor selecting them according

Which means that clan groups, or even bunches of friends, would get split up.

It has also been pointed out that during the Punic War period, two hundred thousand potential recruits didn't all cross Italy to go to Rome for Rome to pick 10% of them and send the others home

So there might have been an informal system, areas were told to send men. But even then if the system worked they'd be spread among all legions raised.
Now we know later than legions could be raised other than in Rome, Generals raised them from their clients elsewhere in Italy (or Asia Minor or wherever) but I'm not sure at what point that started

[DBS]

Certainly by the time of the mid second century, when Polybius is describing the levy system, no signs of any correlation. (I think the first time any of the annalists mention non "Roman" "legions", as opposed to alae, operating independently, is the Telamon campaign when there is an Etruscan force commanded by a Roman praetor.)

But the theory is that the early army was perhaps a single legion, representing the citizen levy.  When the city is small, with very few tribes, and perhaps greater clan identity within the city, then maybe, just maybe, there was some basis to Varro's idea that the original legion comprised 3,000 infantry, with 1,000 from each of the Titenses, Ramnes, and Luceres tribes; and Livy thought each of these tribes contributed a single century of horse.  Thus 3,000 infantry and 300 cavalry.  Dionysius had an alternative theory for the supposed 300 cavalry - each of the thirty curiae chose ten men to be Romulus' bodyguard.

As I said above, I am pretty sceptical about the annalists' accuracy so long after the events they attempt to record and rationalise.  But they do seem to assume an initial tribal organisation, rightly or wrongly.  Again, I suspect we are talking a lot of evolution, not set-piece reforms by mythical kings or dictators...

[Jim Webster]

I would recommend the volume

https://www.academia.edu/40691209/Romans_at_War_Soldiers_Citizens_and_Society_in_the_Roman_Republic

So far it hasn't looked that far back, and it's a collection of papers rather than one text, so who knows what I'll stumble on next

[Imperial Dave]

thanks Jim,

another excuse to dive into A.edu 

[Adrian Nayler]

Remember Dave,

You likely already have this e-book:

https://soa.org.uk/sm/index.php?topic=7636.msg101192#msg101192   

[Jim Webster]

thanks Jim,

another excuse to dive into A.edu 

you need an excuse 

[Imperial Dave]

 

[Monad]

But the theory is that the early army was perhaps a single legion, representing the citizen levy.  When the city is small, with very few tribes, and perhaps greater clan identity within the city, then maybe, just maybe, there was some basis to Varro's idea that the original legion comprised 3,000 infantry, with 1,000 from each of the Titenses, Ramnes, and Luceres tribes; and Livy thought each of these tribes contributed a single century of horse.  Thus 3,000 infantry and 300 cavalry.  Dionysius had an alternative theory for the supposed 300 cavalry - each of the thirty curiae chose ten men to be Romulus' bodyguard.

Paul Silentiarius (Military Matters 4 37), a palace official of Justinian I, the Byzantine emperor from 527 AD to 565 AD, writes that "from history, that in the Roman army, a 1,000 infantry were followed by sometimes a 100 cavalry, sometimes fewer."