12-11-2020, 03:16 PM
Hi Nathan,
Thanks for the reply.
Well, not necessarily. My understanding is that Diocletian raised the legions I Iovia and V Iovia and then extracted elements from one or both to create the unit known as the Ioviani Seniores. The Ioviani Iuniores may have been the result of a second, later draft on these same legions. In this case the name Ioviani would come from the parent legion and not from the Emperor responsible for the draft.
I think it was you who put forward in a previous thread the idea of successive drafts on a same parent unit to explain why different new units might have the same or similar names. This seems to me a very likely scenario.
Thanks for the reply.
(12-11-2020, 11:42 AM)Nathan Ross Wrote: There's also the problem that the Ioviani would appear, from the name alone, to have been raised by Diocletian...
Well, not necessarily. My understanding is that Diocletian raised the legions I Iovia and V Iovia and then extracted elements from one or both to create the unit known as the Ioviani Seniores. The Ioviani Iuniores may have been the result of a second, later draft on these same legions. In this case the name Ioviani would come from the parent legion and not from the Emperor responsible for the draft.
I think it was you who put forward in a previous thread the idea of successive drafts on a same parent unit to explain why different new units might have the same or similar names. This seems to me a very likely scenario.
