08-18-2009, 08:28 PM
Hey, Tom. Another interesting question to tease us!
The short answer is, in my opinion, yes -- the two posts are essentially the same.
My own theory, which I briefly wrote up for Jasper's Ancient Warfare magazine, is that the early praefecti equitum use that terminology because the first generation of cavalry units had no names. If an equestrian wished to record his military service, he could only specify that he had served as "prefect of horse".
I believe that these early units were identifiable only by their commander's name, so we get examples like ala Scaevae ("Scaeva's squadron"). In theory, when their commander moved on to his next posting, the regiment could take its new commander's name. Or it could nostalgically hark back to a previous commander (it's first ever?), so we get examples like ala Petriana ("the Petrian regiment", meaning "Petra's old regiment").
Once these names start to stick, future commanders can record their military service as prefect of a particular named ala. First as praef. equit. alae whatever, and gradually (as you said) dropping the equitum, which was now redundant. At the same time, with the increase in recruitment, we start to get a few regiments named after the nationality of their original recruits (e.g. ala Hispanorum) -- but it's remarkable how few there are (by contrast with the cohorts).
Anyway, that's my theory.
The short answer is, in my opinion, yes -- the two posts are essentially the same.
My own theory, which I briefly wrote up for Jasper's Ancient Warfare magazine, is that the early praefecti equitum use that terminology because the first generation of cavalry units had no names. If an equestrian wished to record his military service, he could only specify that he had served as "prefect of horse".
I believe that these early units were identifiable only by their commander's name, so we get examples like ala Scaevae ("Scaeva's squadron"). In theory, when their commander moved on to his next posting, the regiment could take its new commander's name. Or it could nostalgically hark back to a previous commander (it's first ever?), so we get examples like ala Petriana ("the Petrian regiment", meaning "Petra's old regiment").
Once these names start to stick, future commanders can record their military service as prefect of a particular named ala. First as praef. equit. alae whatever, and gradually (as you said) dropping the equitum, which was now redundant. At the same time, with the increase in recruitment, we start to get a few regiments named after the nationality of their original recruits (e.g. ala Hispanorum) -- but it's remarkable how few there are (by contrast with the cohorts).
Anyway, that's my theory.
