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Nationalities in the late Roman (eastern) army

• Message 1.Μύ

  Posted by Colquhoun (U3935535) on Wednesday, 3rd December 2008

  Just a thought. Would the army that was defeated at Adrainople have been largely Greek (including from the wider Greek population in the eastern med) or Italian or other?
  Many talk of the use by German and other federati by the late Western Empire but what was the principle culture of the Eastern troops in the late 4th century?
  
  

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  Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Wednesday, 3rd December 2008

  A tough question if one wants it answered with accuracy. What we know is that the main part of the then still one Roman Empire was in the west and it basiclly consisted of Germanic (Goths and Vandals) mercenaries led by a semi-Vandal general, Stilicho (whose Roman affinities, other than the will for more power, were at least dubious, it is striking how Stilicho was not at all in a hurry to reach northern Thrace (modern day Bulgaria), as it was too obvious how he avoided to touch the rather few Goths that produced so much destruction in southern Greek lands.
  
  We know that the legions that fought in the Adrianoupoli's battle were raised in a haste and thus had many "local" soldiers. That means not necessarily local, from Thrace but also from all around the neighbourhood: Greeks from Macedonia and coastal Thrace, Konstantinoupolis and the subarbs and northern Minor Asia. Of course, this army, like all those Roman armies had also numerous mercenaries as it is shown by units such as "cornuti" (those carrying horns on their helmets). If anything the main language of the army would rather be Greek than Latin but mercenaries would stick to the latter as Roman military leaders stuck to latin for quite long, well into early Byzantine period. It is said that the whole community of Vlachs of the Balkans derives from such (mainly Gothic and Sarmatian) mercenaries, and it could be true taking for granted that Vlachs as a group are considerably "more blond" than other local populations till today, tended to come from the Danube (but no relation to latin-speakers Romanians, many make the mistake today) and had a blind faith in the Roman Empire, and of course stuck to Latin.
  
  Despite the fact that this army was assembled fast and from units that had either never fought or never fought together in that fashion, or even from units with dubious allegiances, it was not a bad army in itself, certainly not worse than what Goths and Alans and Sarmatians had to present there. It lost out of the complete incompetence of the military leaders and perhaps the dubious political games played behind, more visible a little bit later with the destruction of Greek lands in the south (an easily avoided destruction, it seemed as if it was orchestrated). A sign of that was that despite Goths, Alans and Sarmatians having taken the upper hand it took them considerably long time to kill the encircled and ill-fated Roman soldiers.

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  Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Wednesday, 3rd December 2008

  And since talking about political games I will give a hint: the cavalry! The one and only reason that the Roman army lost in Adrianopoli was the blatant fiasco of the Roman cavalry: a rather small detachment went ahead to trace the enemy movements and fell into a similar enemy detachement that was also there for recognition purposes. A fight started so more Roman cavalry came there to see what was going on, however at that point some Alan horsemen that saw the clash from far arrived. Roman cavalry men thought that it was all the army of the enemy ready to fall on them and turned to flee in a terribly chaotic way by-passing on the two sides of the Roman foot soldiers whose flanks they were supposed to protect!!! In this way they simply invited the enemy to encircle the bulk of the legions showing them the way! Almost as if taking the enemy by the hand to lead him to victory.
  
  I had never thought of it, but right now it all seems way too simple! Why? I can think of so many battles were the cavalry betrayed and condamned its side:
  
  1) Kynos Kephales (Macedonian noblemen cavalry watching the battle from a top the hill and leaving in the middle of the battle at the most critical point when it was to win all or to lose all, condamning the phalanxes - blatant treason
  2) Pydna (a repeat of the above Macedonian noblemen cavalry watching the battle and refusing to intervene when phalanxes were winning over Romans in the middle of the battle condamning the phalanxes that were left flanked a top a hill - blatant treason
  3) Zama - Numidian cavalry (noblemen here too?), a traditional ally of Carthagenians was then paid by Romans, one of the key factors of Roman victory (as it had been one of previous Roman defeats)
  4) Battle of Matzikert - actually contrary to what is believed, the battle was a land-slide victory of Byzantines against Seljuks, however, the cavalry comprising mainly of noblemen and led by a dux (duke) who was from a political party against the Emperor pretended retreat forcing units to back fast back, leaving alone the Emperor and his small personal guard: retreating Seljuks while having lost their battle and their fortress, they saw that small Byzantine detachment and just counter-attacked to clear it not even knowing that there was also the Emperor
  
  I do not know. I have the suspicion that there are other battles were the cavalry betrayed and condamned its side. As it is obvious from the above too often, the cavalry was comprising of noblemen way too close to the power-circles to be occupied with the actual battle! Not surprisingly, in the battle of Adrianopolis much of the Roman cavalry were nobilities' sons, fresh from their "military schools", each school there with its own flag and such (you know... Oxford, Cambridge, and the oar-race on Thames...)... If anything, these were not the best cavalry you could have, I would extend it more to include the possibility of treason. Who knows?

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• Message 4

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  Posted by englishvote (U5473482) on Wednesday, 3rd December 2008

  Hi Colquhoun
  
  Nationality of Roman troops during the late part of the 4th century is very hard to ascertain, but the Eastern Roman army that fought at Adrianople (or Harianopolis) in 378 was a well trained regular army from many regions of the Empire.
  
  The Notitia Dignitatum gives some clues as to the regions where the recruits may have come from, even though the lists for the Eastern Roman army probably date to 20-30 years after the battle.
  
  The eastern units have names such as Dalmatae, Gallicani, Parthi, Batavii, Armeni, Daci and Gemina. This does not of course mean that all of the men within these units came from the region used in the unit’s name but it does illustrate the regions where recruits were obtained.
  
  There was probably a high proportion of Germans and Gauls even in the eastern Roman army, but they would have been regular soldiers at this time. They would have been well trained and equipped and fought in the Roman style of the time. Foederati are not mentioned at Adrianople but it was this battle and other major defeats that led to greater use of tribal warriors fighting in their own style to replace regular troops that no longer existed.
  
  It is doubtful that the army would have contained many Greeks or Italians, certainly very few actual Romans from Rome itself. Just like today the main recruiting grounds were the poor regions rather than the affluent areas where wealth and power meant a much easier life away from the military.
  
  Even though the Roman army was defeated it appears that it fought well and did not break and run which probably demonstrates that it was of high quality and very well trained. Certainly some of the best Roman units were at the battle and accounts speak of the Lanciarii and Mattiarii Legions fighting a desperate rearguard action to enable the defeated army to withdraw.
  

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• Message 5

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  Posted by englishvote (U5473482) on Wednesday, 3rd December 2008

  Nik
  
  I don’t want to even start listing all the points where you are mistaken or just plain wrong but I would like to ask, where do you get your information?
  
  Do you just make it up or is there a great tomb of knowledge unknown to historians?
  

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  Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Thursday, 4th December 2008

  Englishvote, the only points you showed above different to my points is that you augment the numbers of mercenaries decreasing the local ones. I have no basic problem on that, however I underline again that this army was quickly raised as the bulk of ther Roman army was in the west lead by Stilicho - who, again I underline was not so pressed to come to help. If you think that there were almost no local ones at all, again it is alright by me, it is not irrational to think that the low wages of those times could only attract the desperate and not the middle, higher classes.
  
  However, from there one where is the mistake I did? Or did I describe a different battle? Wasn't the pathetic reaction of Roman cavalry that provoked all that chaos bringing the enemy by the hand to encircle the Roman infantry? Or was it any other detail I ignore?
  
  And why am I irrational to imply the possibility of treason when in so many other battles the cavalry betrayed? Do you havey any different view? Or you think that the examples I gave are wrong (well, I do not think so, you may say whatever, some facts are facts and will remain facts). The cavalry was traditionally the most treacherous part of any army, 1st because it was always more close to political circles, 2nd because its manoevres could easily cause chaos or its fleeing could leave the infantry unprotected in a crucial part of the battle. Numerous battle have shown that, I have only listed a few.

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  Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Thursday, 4th December 2008

  The information I got is bits and parts I remember from the analysis of the "military history", greek edition, I used to read in the army. It is a local edition in the sense that it does not just translate articles from foreign editions but it is edited by local historians, quite knowledgeable, or I would say extremely knowledgeable as these articles come in a complete package, not only of the battle but of the whole historic context before and after. I do not remember much of what they were saying on the national composition of the Roman army (though they mentioned a part of it was anyway the same nationalities as the enemy, Alans, Goths, Sarmatians etc.). But I remember more clearly the description of how the battle started and ended and the fact that the chaotic movement of the Roman cavalry that just fled the battle before it even had started passing on the sides of the legions that were in the process of preparations (as they thought the battle would be fought hours later or the next day)...
  
  The article was not mentioning anything about treasons and such... however, history is for that reason, to take example from past events isn't it?
  
  Where are exactly your remarks?

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  Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Thursday, 4th December 2008

  And just to give you some more hints of what was going on back then and how complex were things, one has to take into consideration that the Romans let a handfull of 20,000 poorly-clad Goths to raid the whole of the Thraecian and Greek countrysides and cities and destroy almost everything in their passage while Stilicho was just watching claiming he did not have enough army (not true), that Arcadius told him to go out (true) and when finally got there he let the Goths and old pal Alaric escape! It is striking that as ... war reparations to Goths the authorities ordered the... sacked cities to open
  their weapon wharehouses and provide Goths with weaponry showing that 1) cities had weapons that were kept locked in order not to permit to the citizens to fight the enemy, explaining the ease with which Goths roamed around and 2) Goths not only a relatively small army but were also badly armed. It was mentioned that the Roman citizens (Greeks and Thraecians in that case), became sick with the idea that there were there weapons and not only they would not be used against the ones that killed their relatives but they would be given to them!!! So yo get the idea...
  
  In the battle of Adrianopolis the western legions were really too slow to be considered as willing to participate in a battle. I am not saying that for Stilicho only, what could he do more when himself when willing to aid was not aided at all, at the end he was not the worst in comparison to what was circulating around those turbulent times that were of course the legacy of murderer and regressive emperor Theodocius, his love-affaire for christian barbarians and for his semi-retarded offsprings.
  
  There were going so many power games in that era that you cannot even imagine. Just to give one example, the first intense establishment of the christian religion in Greek lands was done right after the Gothic raids... who knows? Pagan citizens got the message clearly when they saw that even the last barbarian that became christian was passing better...

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  Posted by englishvote (U5473482) on Thursday, 4th December 2008

  Hi Nik
  
  Maybe I was being a bit harsh on your comments in message #2, and it could be that there is some confusion about which battle you are referring to. But let me address the point that I think you are mistaken about.
  
  
  What we know is that the main part of the then still one Roman Empire
  Μύ
  
  The battle of Adrianople, or Hadrianopolis if we are using Greek rather than latin, was fought in 378AD. At this time the Roman Empire was divided into Eastern and Western half’s and it was the main Eastern army under the Eastern Emperor Valens who fought the Gothic army at Adrianople.
  
  
  
  it basiclly consisted of Germanic (Goths and Vandals) mercenaries
  Μύ
  
  All evidence shows that the Roman army in the late 4th century was still a regular well trained army and very professional. There were certainly many Germans in the army but they trained and equipped as Roman troops as they had been for centuries.
  
  
  led by a semi-Vandal general, Stilicho
  Μύ
  
  
  I think you are getting confused with your dates, Stilicho came to prominence under the Emperor Theodosius long after the battle. Theodosiuos came to power only after the death of Valens in the battle.
  Stilicho’s father may have fought at the battle of Adrianople but he was not in command and Stilicho would only have been a child at the time..
  
  
  We know that the legions that fought in the Adrianoupoli's battle were raised in a haste and thus had many "local" soldiers
  Μύ
  
  There is no evidence to support this claim, the army at Adrianople was the main field army available to the Eastern Emperor and as such contained some of the best units in the Roman army. The Roman army had been humiliated in Persia in 363 AD but it had not been defeated in battle and would have regained any strength lost over the intervening 15 years.
  
  
  
  That means not necessarily local, from Thrace but also from all around the neighbourhood: Greeks from Macedonia and coastal Thrace, Konstantinoupolis and the subarbs and northern Minor Asia
  Μύ
  
  Again where is the evidence to support this claim? There would undoubtedly have been Greeks in the Roman army but it was not a major recruiting ground.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  Of course, this army, like all those Roman armies had also numerous mercenaries as it is shown by units such as "cornuti"
  Μύ
  
  The Roman army at the time of Adrianople did not recruit many mercenaries, if by that you mean Foederati or tribes fighting in their own style. Most troops at this time were Roman trained, Roman paid and Roman led, in fact Roman soldiers.
  
  Certainly the Auxilia Palatina Cornuti was not a mercenary unit but one of the top units in the Roman army as were all the Auxilia Palantina units. I would be interested to know why you assume that horned means horns on their helmets?
  
  I shall not continue to point out repeated use of the term β€œmercenary”, which I consider to be an incorrect description, as it would just get repetitive.
  
  The battle was indeed a disaster for the Roman army and Empire, it could also be argued that the fault lay with the Roman Emperors Valens and Gratian but to attribute the defeat to treason is unwarranted by any evidence.
  I know from previous debates that you like to blame cavalry for any defeat and put this down to treason but there is no evidence to support this claim, in this battle or any others that you have mentioned.
  

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