Camillan armies

[chairman]

Hey about the Camillan Roman roster, for the light infantry there are Rorarii, Accensi and Leves, representing two categories of the period Roman census. From what I can tell this is based on Livy, mainly the link between the five census categories and the five lines of battle in the Roman army. However, according to Nick Sekunda in "Early Roman Armies" by Osprey, Livy's system may be an attempt to directly represent each class with a infantry type. Hence the baggage-handler Accensi have been included into the formation and given weapons that they did not in fact have. Also the way that EB portrays them, the Accensi are not even armed according to Livy, but are instead levy slingers. This fills a gap in the Roman combat system but neglects both the historical chronicles but also the modern analysis and critique of those chronicles. I understand the EB team have many more sources to draw from so I only want to point out where my sources show what seems like an inaccuracy.

Chairman

[Atilius]

...the Accensi are not even armed according to Livy, but are instead levy slingers. This fills a gap in the Roman combat system but neglects both the historical chronicles...

Livy tells us as much about the arms and equipment of the accensi as he does about the rorarii, which is to say nothing. Do you infer from this that the rorarii are similarly unarmed?



Hence the baggage-handler Accensi ...Where in classical literature do you find mention of the accensi as baggage handlers? This is a reasonable conjecture, but there is no clear evidence for it either.

I believe accensi are mentioned by Livy exactly once. In 8.8 he writes:


...the third [vexillum was followed] by the accensi who were least to be depended upon, and were therefore placed in the rearmost line.

Lacking any direct information about them, our Accensi are modeled on the 5th census class of the Servian system, assuming a degree of military and social continuity. Livy says that these men are armed with a sling, Dionysius claims that they were armed with sling or javelin.

The Romani team has discussed removing the accensi, and we may choose to do so at some point. But it's silly to accuse us of neglecting "both the historical chronicles but also the modern analysis and critique of those chronicles" over 20 words in the historical literature, and when you can cite only an Osprey book as "modern analysis and critique".

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

More importantly, if you don't like them you don't have to use them. Much of what is reconstructed is conjecture. This is true inside and outside EB. Many of the historical "facts" you have read are theories and almost all the "reconstructions" are actually only theoretical constructs.

History is a tricky buisness and if I had a denarius for every time I have writen "we don't really know" I'd be son rich I could retire before I finished this degree.

[chairman]

No where did I use the word "facts". What I said in the end also qualified my remarks because I said "I understand that the EB team have many more sources ... so I only wanted to point out where my sources seemed to show an inacurracy". So I wasn't saying I know for sure that the Accensi are wrong, I was just saying that from the little I know, their basis seems shaky. That's all I said.

[cmacq]

This fills a gap in the Roman combat system but neglects both the historical chronicles but also the modern analysis and critique of those chronicles.
Chairman

There may have been a better way of presenting this question?