Why did the roman army become so "strange" later o

[sonic]

It also makes it difficult for him if he changes his mind later, as questions regarding his 'firmness of belief' can then arise over his work: if he has changed his mind once, then can he change it again?

That's an interesting view of academic life but an inaccurate one. Any historian worth his/her salt can and should change his/her mind when new evidence or better arguments are presented and no one thinks them any worse for it. I've never heard of this 'firmness of belief' thing among academic historians.

I agree: with only a limited amount of time to write, I often make a firmer case than I mean to. :oops: In reality I was suggesting that the wargamers et al that you mention later are the ones that would question his integrity, not other 'academics'. They understand the difficulty of making specific claims.

There is, however, another possible reason: maybe they can't make their own minds up? Maybe the evidence is so fragmentary and contradictory that, unless somebody makes a major mental leap, scholars are unwilling and unable to make up their minds??

If there is insufficient evidence to permit a conclusive statement then it is not a question of making your mind up, is it? You can 'make up your mind' that a definite statement is impossible, and indeed acknowledging what it is not possible to state is part of the historian's job. Wargamers and the like tend to be exhasperated by academics for that because they like 'facts', but that's the way it is.

OK, so you're more eloquent than I am!! :lol: That is exactly the point I was trying to make. Too many people want 'facts' when it impossible to draw a definitive conclusion. I do it myself and I find it annoying when I do it, but all we can do is state that accuracy is impossible.

[Marcus_Ulpius_Trajanus]

Cool! I've been slapped down by Guy Halsall!

I'm sorry. I am clearly a bit naive in these matters but I really didn't think that there was any 'slapping down' in my message or its tone. If there was then I do sincerely apologise. It was unintentional.

Guy

I'm overstating the case. I'm happy to be engaged on the subject.

[Marcus_Ulpius_Trajanus]

I might agree if the scholar was the originator of the range. But when I read scholar after scholar parroting the same old range it starts to grate on me because it sounds like he's straddling the issue. He should give the range then state his opinion on where the figure is likeliest to be within the range.

A factor of two has enormous implications when considering how much of a burden the state had to endure to support the army.

You mean that? That Moors are in scale and scope as much of an issue as the Germans and the Goths? The Goths bagged Trajan Decius, and his army, and eventually forced the abandonment of Dacia. I confess I do not see the comparison.

In A.H.M. Jones' "The Later Roman Empire" (pg. 59) we get a better idea of how the Moors weakened Roman authority. He says that Maximian spent two whole years just fighting the Moors in North Africa with seven new legions plus eighteen vexillations. The Moors had a reach comparable to the Germanic raids.

Here's a good summary of Maximian's Moorish campaigns. The emperor prepared a massive expedition which advanced through Spain and crossed over into Tingitana.

To answer Tarbicus' original question, it doesn't sound likely the ethnicity of the Spanish legion (VII Gemina) remained unchanged based on the need for constant reinforcements from the time of M. Aurelius down to Maximian.

~Theo

Thanks for that link! But that makes me ask another question: Just how large are those legions and Vexillations now? (And yes, I fully understand that there may be no answer)

7 new legions--are they the 'old style' (for lack of a better term) of 5000 or so, or 'new style' of 1000 or so?

Assuming the vexillations are around 1000 or so (and correct me if there's any better estimates) that implies a expedition of from 25,000 (units of around 1000) to 50,000+ if those seven legions are full old style legions.

Now 50,000+ I agree is flipping huge. At the lower end of the scale, while I'd say that was definitely a substantial effort, is it in fact out of the ordinary for tetrarchic expeditionary forces?

And, does anyone know if the Moors that are raiding were actually supposed to be guarding the frontier down there, but maybe hadn't got paid (or paid off) and are taking it out on the Romans because they can?

I ask the last because I keep seeing references to 'indiginae' troops in the Notitia and am wondering how far back that goes.

[Theodosius the Great]

Trajanus,

I don't think there's any single answer to your questions about the Tetriarchic legions. It depends on which author you read and how recent the author's scholarship is or isn't.

But I would ask these questions on another thread that deals with the Tetriarchy where they would attract more attention. They're a bit OT for readers of this one.

Funny you mention "medieval" looking applied to Late Romans...

I see it as a long development in fashion and style of clothing from the 'Late Empire' which eventually became the fashion and style of the medieval era - hosen/tights can easily be seen as a development from the tightly fitting pants seen on Romans in the 400's, which had their origins from various 'native' cultures from the 1st century....

That's how I see it as well. Medieval fashions didn't come out of nowhere but from the evolving garb of the Romans AND Greeks who were both influenced by Northern Germanic and Persian fashsion respectively (with some overlap).

We can see this evolution very well in this book, the subject of which spans from the 4th to the 15th centuries (the true fall of the Roman Empire) :



It has over 30 large color plates from Constantine 'I' to Constantine 'XI'.

~Theo