The Origins of the Limitanei

[Robert Vermaat]

My original point related to a note in another thread about the Deurne helmet - Evan commented that it may have belonged to a member of the limitanei. As the helmet has a deposit date of c.AD320, I questioned whether the term limitanei would have been in use, or indeed whether such a division of the army was in place at that point.

the dating is ciorrect but I would never ascribe it to a force of limitanei. For one it was not found near the border and more importantly, we know the stablesiani as a mobile force that accompanied the Emperor. The 38 coins found with the helmet possibly show that the owner(s) had been abroad shortly before (all coins were new) and that even speaks against a possibility that the stablesiana had been garrisoned there.

what's the earliest use of the term limitanei to indicate a distinct grade of soldier? It doesn't appear in Ammianus or Vegetius. In fact, aside from the Notitia Dignitatum, the only dated reference I can find is NTh 4.1, given in AD438. It could, therefore, be an entirely 5th century expression.

I'm not sure if a soldier was commonly referred to as 'a limitaneus'. I doubt that. Maybe this changed later, but even into the 5th c. the limitanei units could be 'upgraded' and the descriptions seem to be more of an administrative sort than something that would distinguish one soldier form another.

Of course, it could be a new(ish) word for an older system, but isn't that an assumption? Constantine's ruling of AD325 distinguishes riparienses from comitatenses, but this might not have been a strict usage: the troops of the sacro comitatu had been known under Diocletian, and perhaps before that too - there are suggestions of it under the Severans. Imperial retinue troops were an elite, and had special privileges - riparienses could just refer to the ordinary troops of the army, traditionally based on the borders.

That's entirely possible. It might have been a transitory state for all we know. It's not a common description for the old legions on the border anyway - we'd have to encounter it more often. However this IS the time that we expect to see the new division between statis border troops and mobile field armies. So it may also just be one of the early words to describe what would become the limitanei.