Tribigild's Revolt

[Robert Vermaat]

the Praesental army had been in the West as of 394 or thereabouts

Gainas was not then Magister Militum, and so the force he was leading was not a field army as such (whatever that might have comprised at the time!), and perhaps no more than a large force of the foederati that Theodosius had taken west for the Frigidus campaign.

So they disagree with Hoffmann who made hay of the issue between Constantinople and Stilicho, who (as it was claimed) had decided to keep the Eastern forces in the West. If Theodosius had only taken a temporary force of foederati to subdue the Western rebellion, why would you think that such a fuss was made over it? Maybe it was the 'praesental army' (avant la lettre) that only in a later redaction received that name?

I'm going to aquire that book for myself, but even when I've always been a big fan of a big Western Roman army c. 440, I've read quite a bit since my Rosemary Sutcliff days to somehow have big doubts about the possibility of such a large force around that time.