Project- Influences of Roman military on modern day riot control

[MonsGraupius]

I started responding to specific contributions but there are too many great contributions.

Having looks at many many riot videos, its been extremely useful both to get the view of someone involved as well as the critique. (Notably Densus and Bryan - but there were others). So thanks - extremely helpful.

However I must say I think some of the criticism are invalid. The Roman army fought it an entirely different way from any examples given above. This is because we have to go back before guns and then look for armies that fought in close quarters. There are very few examples of this form of army and as such I've concluded that the Modern police riots are in fact one of the closest examples of this form of battle we have.

However ... not all units were the same and e.g. the auxiliaries would have formed in different ways to the Legions (and possibly closer to above examples). And even the legions would almost certainly have changed tactics.

But even if we were to concentrate on a legion in one period - the tactics would change depending on the terrain and whether it was a defensive or offensive battle. So, rather than saying "they always fought this or that way" ... I am much more inclined to view all suggestions as possible at least some of the time in some forms of terrain. Indeed, the Romans would have experimented - so they probably tried everything that's been mentioned and far more. But no doubt they had some favoured tactics.

So, rather than dismissing ideas out of hand as "impossible" - I'd suggest a much more productive way is to put together the available evidence both modern and old and then try to work out the likelihood of each suggested formation or tactic.

But specifically on Centurions, my hunch is that a centurion would have led their troops into battle - but they would have been toward the back in a defensive battle - organising redirecting troops to where the battle was most fierce. Indeed, I suspect that having led the troops in a charge - they would then fall back to assess what was happening and decide the next move. However, again, it might depend on the experience of the troops. New soldiers might have to be led from the front. Seasoned troops may have been perfectly capable of fighting the frontline without any centurion - and so their role would be focussed on co-ordinating the whole body.

And there was a comment about ancient troops being more used to discipline. That's rubbish. Modern troops sit in regimented classes from an early age, they all have pretty much the same TV culture, they speak the same language, they learn from an early age to line up from teachers.

In contrast, even within Italy the culture would vary more from one town to another than it does across the whole of Britain today (where town centres have all the same shops and we all watch the same TV, play the same video games etc.). Likewise, many Romans probably did not attend formal classes, so, would never have lined up, never have sat in a formation. Modern kids are moulded from an early age to "fit in" ... ancient kids were almost wild in comparison.