02-09-2001, 07:51 AM
Salve,<br>
<br>
Currently I am in doubt regarding the auxiliary pay issue. It appears that 5/6th is securely attested, but on the other hand I think the case for equality in pay for both auxiliaries and legionaries has also been well argumented. That caused me to start thinking about reconciliating such conflicting ideas and one of the theories I entertained was to consider auxiliary pay being different at various times (at first less, later perhaps upped to the same level as legionaries), another to postulate differentiation according to legal status within the same units. Though some texts consider <i> militiae mutatio</i> to have been transfer to an inferior branch of the armed forces, it may have referred to a degradation from cavalry to infantry status incurring a loss of pay and status (based on the analoguy with late Roman officer titles: <i> magister equitum, magister peditum, magister utriusque militiae</i>).<br>
<br>
To support the latter cause one can refer to the will of Augustus in which the recently levied <i> cohortes</i> of Roman citizens (at that time probably still exclusively recruited from that source and not yet accepting <i> peregrini</i> as later on) were given a bequest just like the legionaries. On the other hand one can plead the first cause by referring to Hadrian's speach to the army at Lambaesis in which an auxiliary cohort is given a <i> donativum</i>, which in earlier sources appears to have been limited to citizen troops (praetorians and legionaries). A problem also arrises with the fact that use of the <i> tria nomina</i> can no longer be considered a fool proof method of distinguishing citizen from peregrine soldiers, for names of this kind were apparently also used by non citizens. Thus attributing those pay records which have no clues to unit type to particular branches of the army is a hazardous exercise.<br>
<br>
This is just a sideline of what I am interested in finding out about the Roman army, so I haven't given this issue as much time and thought as other subjects. This was posted to find out about other people's ideas and theories on the matter.<br>
<br>
Regards,<br>
<br>
Sander van Dorst <p></p><i></i>
<br>
Currently I am in doubt regarding the auxiliary pay issue. It appears that 5/6th is securely attested, but on the other hand I think the case for equality in pay for both auxiliaries and legionaries has also been well argumented. That caused me to start thinking about reconciliating such conflicting ideas and one of the theories I entertained was to consider auxiliary pay being different at various times (at first less, later perhaps upped to the same level as legionaries), another to postulate differentiation according to legal status within the same units. Though some texts consider <i> militiae mutatio</i> to have been transfer to an inferior branch of the armed forces, it may have referred to a degradation from cavalry to infantry status incurring a loss of pay and status (based on the analoguy with late Roman officer titles: <i> magister equitum, magister peditum, magister utriusque militiae</i>).<br>
<br>
To support the latter cause one can refer to the will of Augustus in which the recently levied <i> cohortes</i> of Roman citizens (at that time probably still exclusively recruited from that source and not yet accepting <i> peregrini</i> as later on) were given a bequest just like the legionaries. On the other hand one can plead the first cause by referring to Hadrian's speach to the army at Lambaesis in which an auxiliary cohort is given a <i> donativum</i>, which in earlier sources appears to have been limited to citizen troops (praetorians and legionaries). A problem also arrises with the fact that use of the <i> tria nomina</i> can no longer be considered a fool proof method of distinguishing citizen from peregrine soldiers, for names of this kind were apparently also used by non citizens. Thus attributing those pay records which have no clues to unit type to particular branches of the army is a hazardous exercise.<br>
<br>
This is just a sideline of what I am interested in finding out about the Roman army, so I haven't given this issue as much time and thought as other subjects. This was posted to find out about other people's ideas and theories on the matter.<br>
<br>
Regards,<br>
<br>
Sander van Dorst <p></p><i></i>
