traits of a Roman legionary

[Paullus Scipio]

Before this discussion of height requirements becomes too dichotomised, I recall that the male average height during the early Roman Empire was around 5ft 7 inches (1.675 m), to the best of our knowledge, so the height limit set was essentially 'average or over', not a hard requirement in peacetime. No doubt like other limits such as age, in times of war or other recruitment stress, this limit was relaxed, so we shouldn't be too pedantic about it........