07-17-2012, 05:27 PM
Quote:I should think it would be your high chance of being killed. It was also very unlikely that you would find yourself fighting 'true enemies' or 'barbarians. It is far more likely that you would end up fighting other Romans possibly from your own area of the empire. Civil wars were endemic throughout this period, almost every year someone would declare themselves Emperor and off you'd go either fighting for them or against them. In the earlier period of the Empire you could look forward to citizenship, but by this period almost everyone bar slaves were automatically 'citizens'. But the main reason has to be long protracted civil wars, brutal nasty affairs ! just not much fun !!
But what about the third century? It witnessed more than its share of civil wars; moreover there were terrible disasters around midcentury, but there doesn't seem to have been a shortage of troops, enabling Aurelian, Diocletian etc to bounce back.
I read in Goldsworthy's How Rome Fell that Anastasius, eastern emperor at the end of the fifth century, reformed military pay. Troops were again paid in coins instead of food, clothing and equipment. This is said to have made citizens more willing to serve, and reduced the need for barbarians. I wonder, if pay were the problem, why didn't the western Empire implement such reforms before the loss of Africa deprived it of the resources which may have made it possible?
