Evidence for legionary vs auxiliary helmet patterns

[Crispvs]

Just to stir the pot a little more, why do we assume that legionaries were always cremated and that only auxiliaries were interred? Many ancient peoples practiced cremation and I have always been led to believe that this applied to many Germanic peoples as well. Similarly, do we have any evidence to say categorically that citizens were always cremated? By the mid second century AD it seems to have been acceptable for citizens to opt for burial rather than cremation and by the end of the third century AD inhumation appears to have been quite normal. When did this start? Could inhumation burials have made their way into citizen society through practices adopted by soldiers serving on the frontiers? If so, what would that say about the Nijmegen burial (whose curving shield boss depends on the nature of the burial to be identified as part of an auxiliary shield and which is presently the sole piece of evidence which can be used to justify the use of curved shields by auxilia, but would not be surprising for a legionary) and Idria and Verdun burials?

Crispvs