Vlad The Impaler
06-24-2003, 22:04
1.Confederation of dacians
In the times of Roman Empire , the big territory from Lower Danube , between Tisza and Dnister is known as Dacia.The people that lived there were called by the romans “dacians” and by the greek “getae”
“ I named them dacians “ , write Dio Cassius , ex-prefect of Pannonia , “ after the are calling themselves but I know that the greeks call them getae , good or bad.But after my knowledge , the getae are those who live over Hem , near Dnister”
Strabon : “the getae live near Pontus Euxinus ( Black Sea ) and the dacians rule the upper territories from Dnister to Germany” ( Strabon , Geogr[aphica] VII. 3.12 )
From ethnic point of view , the dacians and the getae were the same .Strabon says that the getae speaks the same language like the dacians. ( Strabon , Geogr[aphica] VII. 3.13 )
Herodot called the “the most righteous and the most courageous from the thracs” and the goth historian Iordanes ( sec IV AD )write ,in his “De Get [arum] orig[ine] , the the getae where so well known in the ancient times and this makes the other peoples to consider the Mars , the god of war , was born among them.
Ovidius Publius Naso , the well known poet the lived among the dacians know very well the warrior virtues of this people and he gives to the getae the nickname “indomiti” that means “undefeated” ( Ovidius , Pont[icele] lib[ri] II , 2. v. 3.4)
Esutathius ( in Comment[ariis] ad Dionys[ius] v.304 ) , the archbishop of Thesalonic were a nation that makes tremble his neighbours like Illyrians , Macedonians and Thracs .To revenge the pillage or to called as refferee between his neihbours , the dacians past Danube with their horses even in winter on ice and make even the Macedonians to show them the proper respect
At 184 BC , Filip III, king of Macedonia send a embassy to the dacians to offer an alliance against the romans .the plan was to defeat the popuplations the split the two kingdoms ( dardans ) and after that was accomplished an common military expediton against Rome and entire Italy ( Liviu , Historia Romanae , liber XLI Philippus in Macedoniam rediit , missis ad accolas Istri fluminis barbaros , ut in Italiam irrumperent , solicitandos “)
Diodor Siculus ( in Fragmentum ) reminds us that at 149 BC , a king name Basarban , who rulled the territories from left part of Lower Danube was so much powerful that he imposed on the Macedonian throne an king named Andriscus who pretend that was son of Perseu .
At 44-45 a real heroic figure appears : the king Boerebistas .He constitute an large empire .Strabon write about him that he start to inspire terror to romans .In short time he made an empire defeating the neighbouring populations , sacking Thracia till Macedonia and Illyria , completely defeated the tauriscians and the boi .In his times the military power of dacians rise to 200.000 men .From that times , the romans started to have an continiously preoccupation about this people.
After the defeat of Carthage and conquest of Galia , the dacians appear as the most fearful for the romans ( Horatiu , Odae III “Paene occupatam seditionibus Delevit urbem Dacus”
Caesar , after finished the gauls , wanted to start a campaign against them but his plans were cancelled by his assassination.
From 69 AD , after Tacit , the dacians rulled the both shores of Danube .After this initial success , the romans commanders from the northern borders start to think that the Empire will not resist to an common attack of dacians and germans .
Emperor August make peace with dacians .
In short time their military power started to inspire fear , again ,.
In 86 AD Decebal , one of the most known kings of dacians pass the Danube and beat Oppius Sabinus , the governor of Moesia .Some sources mentioned that this province come under his rule .
Emperor Domitianus called in hurry an big army and personally started an military campaign in Dacia. But after the roman armies approach the natura fortress of Transylvania , their commander , the emperor realised that a peace is urgent.a wholw legion vabquished and his troops were almost exhausted and decimated .
This peace was a disgrace for the Empire; the dacians practically got an tribute in money and engineers for theirs roads.
After the death of Emperor Nerva ( 98 AD ) , his son , the new emperor Traianus , raised at the school of wars , wanted to revenge the humiliation suffered by Diocletianus who bought the peace with money
The first war started in 101 AD and continued in 102 AD and in 103 the peace is signed again.Decebal , still the king of dacians , have to sign an shameful peace.All his war machines and his fortresses have to be destroyed.He also gave back Moesia .
But this peace doesn’t endure .in 104 AD the roman senate declare again Decebal as enemy of the Empire.The reasons were that he didn’t destroy the fortresses , that he gave asylum to Rome enemies and that he tried to make an alliance against romans with Germanic tribes from Lower Danube and in the Orient with the Parthians.
In 105 AD , the roman troops pass the Danube again .Traianus , from strategical reasons , choose to attack straight to the mountains and avoid in this way the powerful dacian cavalry.But it wasn’t such easy ; he was forced to build castra to protect his communications , burn the dacian cities and villages .He also tried an attack trough actual Dobrodgea ( the region between Danuebe and Black Sea ) but he was sttoped by the powerful dacian and Germanic cavalry.
This was ends in 106 AD when the central citadel of Sarmisegetusa fall to the roman armies after a very long siege.Dacia was made an roman province and were builded castra trough all Transylvania.The governor was an Legatus Augusti pro praetor.
The borders of the new province were from Tisa in west , Danube in east .In the north the frontier were undefined , with other words the stretch were the roman armies can go.One of the biggest castra were in Porollissum , near nowdays Cluj-Napoca , Romania.
Is hard to make an good description of this war because the main written documents about this ( Comentarii de bello dacicus by Traianus Emperor and Getica by Dio Chrisostomos ) were lost.
The best we have is the Traian Columna from Rome , sculptured in spirals, but this is an simple figurative history.There are some other stuff to other historians and this is the main source to describe the military power of dacians .This is an short introduction to the lobby I ‘ll make here for introducing the dacians as an playable faction in RTW.
2.Dacian Armies
a.Cavalry
the great general Tucidide write that the “the getae , wich live far over Haemus and the other peoples form that territories , that have the scythae as neibghours , have the same weapos as this ones .They are all cavalry archers”
Trough cavalry the getae found the name “idiomiti” ( undefited ).
At 339 BC , the dacian ( or scythic , not known for sure ) king Atheas wrote to the citizen of Byzantium :“Be aware , don’t make trouble to my fiscal revenues or my horses will drink your water”
Dacian cavalry consist in heavy cavalry and light cavalry.
The light cavalry was as far as it can , free of armour; they have bows , lances and short sword , no shields.They were ready for war at any time.The bows were very solid , made from animal bones .Ovidius in his Pontica wrote about that : “the most of this people doesn’t fear the roman weapons.they have complete trust in their weapons , the bows,and in their horses able to ride to long distance without food or water. There is nobody amongst dacians without an pouch of arrows with viper venom”.
They were also armed with lances that have the form of roman hastae .To the sarmatae cavalry was used a lance called contus and this was very likely as the Macedonian sarissa but not so long.The troops of cavalry that have lances also have round or oval shield with some figurative workings on them , mostly consisting in stylized representation of the sun.this shield was named pelta.
The heavy cavalry was composed by troops that wear lorica or small lamellar armors.
At some of this even the horses were covered with lorica.
The dacians were lorica made from bronze or iron that covered the chest and the back.the weapons of heavy dacian cavalry were a short sword called sicae ( not very long and curved ) , banes and bows.The best of the , the nobles and the elite troops carry falces ( huge straight sword ) .Some of them have war-trained falcons.
A significant part of dacian cavalry was sarmatian by origin ( roxolanae tribe ) and there are some differences.They covered their horses with lorica or small armour of iron or bronze.As an offensive weapon they used a long and straight sword , two-handed( gladius , praelongus , spata ) chained to the hand. Also they carried long lances ( conti ).
Both have , dacians and roxolane saramtians , have helm made by iron or animal bones.their horses were nuttered for not make sounds in case of an ambush.
b.Infantry
Mostly used in mountains war , this was also heavy and light.
The light infantry wear oval shield ( peltas ) bows and short lances ( hastae ) .Some of them have lorica but the most wear leather armour.Also thei have an long knife ( pungio)
This was the backbone of the dacian army
The heavy infantry have helmets and lorica made from iron , bows , sica ( the short curved sword ) , oval shields or round shields and lances.
c.Fortifications and war machines.
Looking at Traian Columna in Rome it is clear that the dacians have many fortifications .most of the battle scenes shows roman legions assaulting fortifications, big fortifications.is well known the “murus dacicus” , the dacian wall made by stones with no mortar on wood skeleton.that makes them proudy elastic when attacked with war-machines.In the same way were raised the old walls of Troja and Tirynt from Pelopones
In the southern part of Transylvania is localized a huge complex of fortifications that encircle a main citadel , Sarmizegetusa , the dacian capital;Impressive ruins are still up today , great solar calendars ( did u know that only the mayan calendar was better than the dacian one ? ) , huge foundantions of towers and walls.Also on all dacian territory can be found today ruins of dacian strongholds among roman castra ruins;
The geographian Ptolemeus wrote about a few cities like :
Docidava , Zusidava , Ziridava , Netidava , Singidava in western parts of Transylvania, Zargidava , Piroboridava in eastern parts of Moldavia , Dausdava and the huge Genucla near the Danube Delta and Acidava and Buridava in south-eastern part of Romania.thease are the most important but are hundreds of other fortresses.U noticed the termination “dava” wich means in dacian language “stronghold” or at least described with this meaning in greeks sources.
About war-machines is clear that tha dacians have some kind of this stuff; they were hegemons of the greek cities localized in the western part of Black Sea , cities like Histria , Tomis , Olbia.How the could impose such a hegemony if they weren’t able to conquer ?
Also the dacians sieged romans castra. Tacit in Historiae III wrote : “In the times of Vitelius , the people of dacians rise having no fear .At the start the do nothing , being just simple spectators but when Italy was in war they attacked the winter castra of cohors and take as masters the both sides of Danube and when they prepared to transform in dust the legions castra but Mucius opposed them the VI legion”
Also in Diocletianus times the dacians attacked and conquer some roman settlements ;
Iordanes wrote: “dacians destroyed o lot of castra and civitates ( strongholds? ) the were on empire territory”
Traianus Emperor impose to Decebal to destroy his war machines and fortifications .for this reason I think that those stuff were very important .
Dacian Element in Roman armies.
After the conquest of Dacia some of the contingents were repartized in military service trough the empire; Here is a list of the most wellknown :
Vexillatio Daciarum – cavalry
Vexillatio Dacorum Parthica
Ala I Ulpia Dacorum- formed by Traianus
All those are reminded in Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarium vol III
Ala I Dacorum – stationed in Noricum maybe identical with the previous one – Notitia Dignitatum
Cohors I Ulpia Dacorum – formed by Traianus
Cohors I Aelia Dacorum – formed by Hadrian and transferred in Britannia
Cohors II Augusta Dacorum Veterana Militaria
Cohors III Dacorum
Ala Mauret Tibiscensium in actual western extremity of Romania , maybe recruited form the ancient town of Tibiscus.
There are also sarmatian contingents like :
Ala Sarmatum / Cuneus Sarmatum or Ala VII Sarmatum known as recruited from Dacia province.
This post wants to be an start to a debate : should the dacians be in RTW as playable faction? I consider them the most civilized from the barbarian kingdoms and for this reason I think that should be in the game.Also they fit the timeframe of the game and they have major fights with romans , not speaking about the long conflicts with germans .Also it could be an spectacular and very challenging to play faction.But here is just the start of the debate and I would like to hear your opinions; please excuse the grammar and my English , I know inst the best
In the times of Roman Empire , the big territory from Lower Danube , between Tisza and Dnister is known as Dacia.The people that lived there were called by the romans “dacians” and by the greek “getae”
“ I named them dacians “ , write Dio Cassius , ex-prefect of Pannonia , “ after the are calling themselves but I know that the greeks call them getae , good or bad.But after my knowledge , the getae are those who live over Hem , near Dnister”
Strabon : “the getae live near Pontus Euxinus ( Black Sea ) and the dacians rule the upper territories from Dnister to Germany” ( Strabon , Geogr[aphica] VII. 3.12 )
From ethnic point of view , the dacians and the getae were the same .Strabon says that the getae speaks the same language like the dacians. ( Strabon , Geogr[aphica] VII. 3.13 )
Herodot called the “the most righteous and the most courageous from the thracs” and the goth historian Iordanes ( sec IV AD )write ,in his “De Get [arum] orig[ine] , the the getae where so well known in the ancient times and this makes the other peoples to consider the Mars , the god of war , was born among them.
Ovidius Publius Naso , the well known poet the lived among the dacians know very well the warrior virtues of this people and he gives to the getae the nickname “indomiti” that means “undefeated” ( Ovidius , Pont[icele] lib[ri] II , 2. v. 3.4)
Esutathius ( in Comment[ariis] ad Dionys[ius] v.304 ) , the archbishop of Thesalonic were a nation that makes tremble his neighbours like Illyrians , Macedonians and Thracs .To revenge the pillage or to called as refferee between his neihbours , the dacians past Danube with their horses even in winter on ice and make even the Macedonians to show them the proper respect
At 184 BC , Filip III, king of Macedonia send a embassy to the dacians to offer an alliance against the romans .the plan was to defeat the popuplations the split the two kingdoms ( dardans ) and after that was accomplished an common military expediton against Rome and entire Italy ( Liviu , Historia Romanae , liber XLI Philippus in Macedoniam rediit , missis ad accolas Istri fluminis barbaros , ut in Italiam irrumperent , solicitandos “)
Diodor Siculus ( in Fragmentum ) reminds us that at 149 BC , a king name Basarban , who rulled the territories from left part of Lower Danube was so much powerful that he imposed on the Macedonian throne an king named Andriscus who pretend that was son of Perseu .
At 44-45 a real heroic figure appears : the king Boerebistas .He constitute an large empire .Strabon write about him that he start to inspire terror to romans .In short time he made an empire defeating the neighbouring populations , sacking Thracia till Macedonia and Illyria , completely defeated the tauriscians and the boi .In his times the military power of dacians rise to 200.000 men .From that times , the romans started to have an continiously preoccupation about this people.
After the defeat of Carthage and conquest of Galia , the dacians appear as the most fearful for the romans ( Horatiu , Odae III “Paene occupatam seditionibus Delevit urbem Dacus”
Caesar , after finished the gauls , wanted to start a campaign against them but his plans were cancelled by his assassination.
From 69 AD , after Tacit , the dacians rulled the both shores of Danube .After this initial success , the romans commanders from the northern borders start to think that the Empire will not resist to an common attack of dacians and germans .
Emperor August make peace with dacians .
In short time their military power started to inspire fear , again ,.
In 86 AD Decebal , one of the most known kings of dacians pass the Danube and beat Oppius Sabinus , the governor of Moesia .Some sources mentioned that this province come under his rule .
Emperor Domitianus called in hurry an big army and personally started an military campaign in Dacia. But after the roman armies approach the natura fortress of Transylvania , their commander , the emperor realised that a peace is urgent.a wholw legion vabquished and his troops were almost exhausted and decimated .
This peace was a disgrace for the Empire; the dacians practically got an tribute in money and engineers for theirs roads.
After the death of Emperor Nerva ( 98 AD ) , his son , the new emperor Traianus , raised at the school of wars , wanted to revenge the humiliation suffered by Diocletianus who bought the peace with money
The first war started in 101 AD and continued in 102 AD and in 103 the peace is signed again.Decebal , still the king of dacians , have to sign an shameful peace.All his war machines and his fortresses have to be destroyed.He also gave back Moesia .
But this peace doesn’t endure .in 104 AD the roman senate declare again Decebal as enemy of the Empire.The reasons were that he didn’t destroy the fortresses , that he gave asylum to Rome enemies and that he tried to make an alliance against romans with Germanic tribes from Lower Danube and in the Orient with the Parthians.
In 105 AD , the roman troops pass the Danube again .Traianus , from strategical reasons , choose to attack straight to the mountains and avoid in this way the powerful dacian cavalry.But it wasn’t such easy ; he was forced to build castra to protect his communications , burn the dacian cities and villages .He also tried an attack trough actual Dobrodgea ( the region between Danuebe and Black Sea ) but he was sttoped by the powerful dacian and Germanic cavalry.
This was ends in 106 AD when the central citadel of Sarmisegetusa fall to the roman armies after a very long siege.Dacia was made an roman province and were builded castra trough all Transylvania.The governor was an Legatus Augusti pro praetor.
The borders of the new province were from Tisa in west , Danube in east .In the north the frontier were undefined , with other words the stretch were the roman armies can go.One of the biggest castra were in Porollissum , near nowdays Cluj-Napoca , Romania.
Is hard to make an good description of this war because the main written documents about this ( Comentarii de bello dacicus by Traianus Emperor and Getica by Dio Chrisostomos ) were lost.
The best we have is the Traian Columna from Rome , sculptured in spirals, but this is an simple figurative history.There are some other stuff to other historians and this is the main source to describe the military power of dacians .This is an short introduction to the lobby I ‘ll make here for introducing the dacians as an playable faction in RTW.
2.Dacian Armies
a.Cavalry
the great general Tucidide write that the “the getae , wich live far over Haemus and the other peoples form that territories , that have the scythae as neibghours , have the same weapos as this ones .They are all cavalry archers”
Trough cavalry the getae found the name “idiomiti” ( undefited ).
At 339 BC , the dacian ( or scythic , not known for sure ) king Atheas wrote to the citizen of Byzantium :“Be aware , don’t make trouble to my fiscal revenues or my horses will drink your water”
Dacian cavalry consist in heavy cavalry and light cavalry.
The light cavalry was as far as it can , free of armour; they have bows , lances and short sword , no shields.They were ready for war at any time.The bows were very solid , made from animal bones .Ovidius in his Pontica wrote about that : “the most of this people doesn’t fear the roman weapons.they have complete trust in their weapons , the bows,and in their horses able to ride to long distance without food or water. There is nobody amongst dacians without an pouch of arrows with viper venom”.
They were also armed with lances that have the form of roman hastae .To the sarmatae cavalry was used a lance called contus and this was very likely as the Macedonian sarissa but not so long.The troops of cavalry that have lances also have round or oval shield with some figurative workings on them , mostly consisting in stylized representation of the sun.this shield was named pelta.
The heavy cavalry was composed by troops that wear lorica or small lamellar armors.
At some of this even the horses were covered with lorica.
The dacians were lorica made from bronze or iron that covered the chest and the back.the weapons of heavy dacian cavalry were a short sword called sicae ( not very long and curved ) , banes and bows.The best of the , the nobles and the elite troops carry falces ( huge straight sword ) .Some of them have war-trained falcons.
A significant part of dacian cavalry was sarmatian by origin ( roxolanae tribe ) and there are some differences.They covered their horses with lorica or small armour of iron or bronze.As an offensive weapon they used a long and straight sword , two-handed( gladius , praelongus , spata ) chained to the hand. Also they carried long lances ( conti ).
Both have , dacians and roxolane saramtians , have helm made by iron or animal bones.their horses were nuttered for not make sounds in case of an ambush.
b.Infantry
Mostly used in mountains war , this was also heavy and light.
The light infantry wear oval shield ( peltas ) bows and short lances ( hastae ) .Some of them have lorica but the most wear leather armour.Also thei have an long knife ( pungio)
This was the backbone of the dacian army
The heavy infantry have helmets and lorica made from iron , bows , sica ( the short curved sword ) , oval shields or round shields and lances.
c.Fortifications and war machines.
Looking at Traian Columna in Rome it is clear that the dacians have many fortifications .most of the battle scenes shows roman legions assaulting fortifications, big fortifications.is well known the “murus dacicus” , the dacian wall made by stones with no mortar on wood skeleton.that makes them proudy elastic when attacked with war-machines.In the same way were raised the old walls of Troja and Tirynt from Pelopones
In the southern part of Transylvania is localized a huge complex of fortifications that encircle a main citadel , Sarmizegetusa , the dacian capital;Impressive ruins are still up today , great solar calendars ( did u know that only the mayan calendar was better than the dacian one ? ) , huge foundantions of towers and walls.Also on all dacian territory can be found today ruins of dacian strongholds among roman castra ruins;
The geographian Ptolemeus wrote about a few cities like :
Docidava , Zusidava , Ziridava , Netidava , Singidava in western parts of Transylvania, Zargidava , Piroboridava in eastern parts of Moldavia , Dausdava and the huge Genucla near the Danube Delta and Acidava and Buridava in south-eastern part of Romania.thease are the most important but are hundreds of other fortresses.U noticed the termination “dava” wich means in dacian language “stronghold” or at least described with this meaning in greeks sources.
About war-machines is clear that tha dacians have some kind of this stuff; they were hegemons of the greek cities localized in the western part of Black Sea , cities like Histria , Tomis , Olbia.How the could impose such a hegemony if they weren’t able to conquer ?
Also the dacians sieged romans castra. Tacit in Historiae III wrote : “In the times of Vitelius , the people of dacians rise having no fear .At the start the do nothing , being just simple spectators but when Italy was in war they attacked the winter castra of cohors and take as masters the both sides of Danube and when they prepared to transform in dust the legions castra but Mucius opposed them the VI legion”
Also in Diocletianus times the dacians attacked and conquer some roman settlements ;
Iordanes wrote: “dacians destroyed o lot of castra and civitates ( strongholds? ) the were on empire territory”
Traianus Emperor impose to Decebal to destroy his war machines and fortifications .for this reason I think that those stuff were very important .
Dacian Element in Roman armies.
After the conquest of Dacia some of the contingents were repartized in military service trough the empire; Here is a list of the most wellknown :
Vexillatio Daciarum – cavalry
Vexillatio Dacorum Parthica
Ala I Ulpia Dacorum- formed by Traianus
All those are reminded in Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarium vol III
Ala I Dacorum – stationed in Noricum maybe identical with the previous one – Notitia Dignitatum
Cohors I Ulpia Dacorum – formed by Traianus
Cohors I Aelia Dacorum – formed by Hadrian and transferred in Britannia
Cohors II Augusta Dacorum Veterana Militaria
Cohors III Dacorum
Ala Mauret Tibiscensium in actual western extremity of Romania , maybe recruited form the ancient town of Tibiscus.
There are also sarmatian contingents like :
Ala Sarmatum / Cuneus Sarmatum or Ala VII Sarmatum known as recruited from Dacia province.
This post wants to be an start to a debate : should the dacians be in RTW as playable faction? I consider them the most civilized from the barbarian kingdoms and for this reason I think that should be in the game.Also they fit the timeframe of the game and they have major fights with romans , not speaking about the long conflicts with germans .Also it could be an spectacular and very challenging to play faction.But here is just the start of the debate and I would like to hear your opinions; please excuse the grammar and my English , I know inst the best