Rome and its army

[Pindar]

Several of the posted answers to the question bring up good points, but those same answers appear to be aspects of the central explanation. I would submit that the answer to Roman success was not anything intrinsic to the mechanics of empire as much as a cultural phenomena. To cut to the quick, I believe there were two distinct features that combined to give Rome its dominance: discipline and pragmaticism.

A simple illustration of discipline: in 216 B.C. Rome suffered the worst defeat in its history. Cannae saw the Roman leadership decimated, some possible 60,000 dead on the field and Hannibal free to march on Rome (taken as a proportion of loss to available resources at the time, I can think of few possible worse disasters). The victorius Carthaginians sent envoys to Rome to ask for terms. The Roman response was basically how would Hannible like to surrender? The bravado behind that sentiment is stunning. I can think of no other nation or people who could have recovered. This is but one example of a sentiment that is illustarted over several Centuries.

Roman pragmaticism is evident in everything from road construction, to citizen mobilization, to adopting the gladius, to the construction of the corvus, to the development of a counter to the phalanx. Unlike the Greeks, Rome never produced an independant intellectual system. Their ability to focus on the task at hand and develope a proper response however, is stunning. This feature allowed Rome to create the longest sustained Empire in history.

These two cultural traits allowed Rome the wherewithal to overcome any opposition. It would be the dilution of these same traits that would sow the seed of Rome's decline.

[Copperhead]

Quote[/b] (ScubaSteveDave @ April 21 2004,21:16)]My apologies Copperhead, I had no intention to criticize or offend you, and I am sorry if I have done either. I thought that in a forum one posts their opinion and/or knowledge on the subject, which is what I attempted to do.
It may be that you know far more about the Napoleonic wars than I. All that I know about it I have learned from Advanced Placement European History (I have an excellent teacher, who I honor greatly), a few non-fiction books and a textbook, and a little from historical fiction. So I apologies if I have stepped on your toes, and I will try to avoid doing so again.
But this thread is about the Romans, and I shall endeavor to remain on the topic.

Okay, if you can explain to me how the French being able to fire 3 rounds a minute makes them more specialised with their muskets than the redcoats firing 4/5 rounds a minute then i will gladly accept that you have proved your point beyond all recognition. No matter what your teacher says, thinks or does, the fact that firing more rounds with a musket per minute makes the troopes better with their muskets than their opposition. Fact.

[bighairyman]

Napoleon's success didn't came from the rate of fire his soldats had. it wasn't that important. WHAT was important was of course he's tactics, the armies of Napoleon's enemies still used century old tactics which used infantry rows advancing under fire. Napoleon used the column, which was far more effective, And someone said massing artillery and fire, that was right, if you checked the numbers of soldiers and equipments Napoleon's army had, often he had more artillery than his enemies. If anyone studies him, Napoleon was first a artillery commander.

And Romans, at the beginning, romans lived in villages that will later form together and became Rome, they were farmers and simple artisans. But most important of all, they were hard working, but success polluted their minds and clouded their judgment; in other words, they became greedy. If you look at the years leading to the fall, the roman government was very corrupted, bribes, assassinations were very common. The romans forgot what their founding fathers fought and died for. The rich party all day and attempted to be emperor, while the poor grew poorer, and middle classes lived in the street.

The one important issue was their society, it broke apart, add that together with crumbling economy with cheap slave labor and importing goods, with weaker military, less standards. If a roman soldier near the end fought with a soldier from Caesar's legionary, i put my money on the legionnaire. disciplined broke down. Roman soldiers near the end were nothing more than poor farmers and slaves with little training.

So don't put all the blame on the invading cavalry, although it was the superior cavalry armies that defeated the romans. A strong Roman Empire could surly Incorporated the cavalry technology and win. But all the roman emperors wanted was wine and women.

Plus the romans were defending a area the size of Continental US with only 100,000 soldiers total, heck we got more troops in Iraq right now. plus it probably took more than several weeks to a couple months to march from one corner of the empire to the other.

that reminded me of a quote: one who defends all at the end, defends nothing

[Copperhead]

Quote[/b] (bighairyman @ April 21 2004,23:55)]Napoleon's success didn't came from the rate of fire his soldats had. it wasn't that important. WHAT was important was of course he's tactics, the armies of Napoleon's enemies still used century old tactics which used infantry rows advancing under fire. Napoleon used the column, which was far more effective, And someone said massing artillery and fire, that was right, if you checked the numbers of soldiers and equipments Napoleon's army had, often he had more artillery than his enemies. If anyone studies him, Napoleon was first a artillery commander.

I never said that the rate of fire was important when you look at the tactics he used. I was simply arguing against the idea someone put forward that the Grand Armee were musket specialists. I agree with you on everything you said except the marching in column being more effective when under fire. Sure the tight ranks gave confidence to the men but a roundshot going through a column killed far more than a roundshot going through two ranks. Not only was he an artillery commander, he was referred to as the Little Corporal, i think this was because he was a gunner corporal, i'm not sure however, please correct me if i'm wrong. I might go and find out for myself actually

[bighairyman]

No i meant the first military command he got was an artillery officer, He became famous in the military ranks after he thought out of a plan to put cannons on the battlements and blasted the British ships away from the city. I forgot the name of the city but it was in northwest of France.

I read somewhere that Napoleon's Column was more effective than the rows other armies used. Maybe it was more maneuverable, i will go check out the website i saw it on.

PS. my last post was directed at you, i was skimming through the thread.

Oh and here's some info on Napoleon and the military and the wars:
http://www.napoleonseries.org/faq/who.cfm

http://www.napoleon-series.org/milit.../c_guard1.html

http://www.napoleon-series.org/milit...renadiers.html

http://www.pbs.org/empires/napoleon/...on/page_2.html


and of course one of his most famous battles:
http://www.pbs.org/empires/napoleon/...gn/page_6.html

[Xecthilor]

I'm actually at the very end of a 300 level Roman history class this semester, so this is pretty fresh in my mind. Originally the army wasn't comprised of volunteers: service in the army was restricted to land owners. Certain measures were taken, (like splitting government land into small parcels and distributing those to the landless to increase the body of potential recruits), but this remained a part of the Roman system for quite a while. Eventually, I don't remember the exact date but its in the 130BC- onward range, pre-Julian, certain officials learned that the senate and the comitias, which made policy, could be bypassed by going to the plebian assembly, which was made up of the non-nobles. This allowed officials to bypass the senate, and someone who was popular with the people could get anything they want passed. An official, again can't remember his name, eventually got a series of laws passed removing the land ownership as a qualification of the army, and the military became a volunteer force. This vastly opened up the ranks, providing huge numbers of new men, but, being volunteers, it was expected they'd be compensated. This is where the drawback came in: those soldiers, once disbanded following a war, would look to their general to provide for them, i.e. get them land in exchange for their efforts. This was a life altering change for the Republic, as this meant the soldiers would be loyal to the general who provided for them, NOT the government. This made it possible for generals like Pompey, and later Caesar, to accomplish what they desired. Into AD, going up to Dioclatian and Constantine, this was so pronounced that it was the army which had all the power, and which chose who was emperor..

[meravelha]

The office you are describing is the Tribune of the Plebs who had the power to veto decisions of the elected Consuls.
A fairly radical power to have you might think, and you'd be right (the office had been extorted from the Senate in two previous confrontations between the plebs and the patricians).

But there was an unwritten 'gentlemen's agreement' within the Roman political elite that these tribunician powers would never be 'maxed-out'. That holders of the office would never challenge the authority of the Consuls (the elected executives of the Senate). That is until....

Tiberias Sempronius Gracchus, not short of native Roman political ambition, took the office of Tribune. On a campaign of land reform and debt reduction for the honest Roman farmer. Getting yourself famous on a policy like that would have been fine - it would have been within the bounds of acceptable behaviour (if abhorred by the patrician landlords).
But he used the powers of the Tribune to start blocking legislation by the Consuls and soon people (important people) were muttering that the man was a danger to the Roman State.
To cut a long story short, T.S. Gracchus was assassinated - but not before becoming obscenely wealthy.

The Romans loved this sort of competiton. Competition for political fame.
And in this competition the stakes kept rising as Rome became an increasingly dominant force in the mediterranean.

So the next Tribune you refer to is Marius ( whose praenomen and cognomen somehow escape me at the moment). And it was he, as you rightly point out, that reformed the republican legions.

Some would say that he simply standardised changes that were already occuring in the now never-ending series of overseas campaigns. But the upshot was to do away with the differently-armed components of the roman battle line (the hastati, the principes and the triarii) in favour of a standard legionary heavy infantry soldier with the scutum, the pilum armoured in chainmail. These are the troops that Jules Baby used in his own attempt to end the game of the Republic.

[meravelha]

(I wish I could edit these posts)

The point is that the reform of the legions was directly related to the land reform issue.
The endless overseas campaigns were keeping Roman smallholding farmers in the army for years at a time. At this time, roman soldiers were not paid - to fight was a civic duty according to your means and status.

Trouble was, that while the soldiers were away, the Patrician landlords would come in and buy up all the small farms, turn them into large farmers and run them with slaves.
Slaves that the farmer/soldiers were capturing
Large parts of Italy were being almost depopulated in this manner as the Roman elite sytematically ruined the peasantry they depended on.

Marius' solution was to remove the property restrictions on entry into the army (so he could recruit the poor urban masses) and to pay them directly from taxes.

As you can imagine, this made him very popular with the poor urban masses. That was the basis of his political support. His principal opponent in the ensuing civil war, Sulla had the backing of the rich landlords.

But you could say that the Marian faction won out. Julius Caeser was himself a part of the Marian faction and depended on the support of the urban poor and the army.

[Xecthilor]

Yeah, thanks for filling in the names, it would've been eating at my mind until I had to go dig through my notes from a month ago. This makes me want RTW even more now. Hail Caesar

[meravelha]

*grins*

You'll need to know that stuff at least to pass a 300-level paper on the republic :)

Ave

[ScubaSteveDave]

I vote for meravelha and Xecthilor to be the Official Roman Experts. Seriously.

[Gregoshi]

Welcome Scuba. Thanks for sharing your knowledge.

You are correct about membership & the edit/delete buttons meravelha. Those features will become available once you are promoted. Don't sweat the typos and double posts. We moderators will take care of the double posts - like I just did with Scuba's double post.

[Fanty]

Zitat[/b] ]What made the Roman military and political machines so effective?

I read a reconstruction.

Rome spend 80% of its total GDP for its Military.
Some economist-historians say, the real reason behind the fall of Rome was that Rome wasnt able to finance a military force like they had for unlimited time, without conquering more and more WEALTHY other empires. Wich again would have raised the need for more forces. The whole concept of Rome was doomed by the start.

Comparation to modern states:
USA: 3.5%
Germany: 1.2%

Thats for making oneself so much enemies. Hehehehe. ;)
Just imagine, the running cost of the borderfortifications at the Rhine towards Germania cost Rome 12% of its yearly GDP.

The Romans basicly gave up Britain because the costs of military occupition had been larger than the profit that the Isle gave.

The mainreason for not conquering germania was most likely that holding it would cost more money than the Romans have at all. and the land was pretty much useless.

[Leo]

Quote[/b] ]
So the next Tribune you refer to is Marius ( whose praenomen and cognomen somehow escape me at the moment). And it was he, as you rightly point out, that reformed the republican legions.

Some would say that he simply standardised changes that were already occuring in the now never-ending series of overseas campaigns.

Marius was consul, not tribune and his changes to the roman military where due to the invasion of the cimbri and teutons. He needed a standing army of disciplined soldiers, so instead of taking conscripts who where ill motivated to fight far off their homelands he created a new army of volunteers who got their motivation from the prospect of gaining some land after their time of service.
As has already been pointed out this lead to troops beeing absolutely loyal to their generals and to the marches on rome by sulla and caesar.

[ScubaSteveDave]

I love playing what-if games with history, trying to figure out what went wrong or what was not done. I have been thinking about the change from armies composed of property holders to professional standing armies, and how the loyalty of the troops change from the state to the generals. Obviously, this was an important factor in the fall of the Republican Senate and the creation of the Empire (the Emperors almost always took power with the backing of the armies, I believe), and the Empire may indeed be the cause of the final downfall of Rome, since the self aggrandizement of the emperors cause the romans to overextend their borders. But the opening of the military franchise to the non-property owners allowed more troops to be raised, allowed them to be equipped uniformly, and may well have made the armies far more effective since it was composed of full time professional soldiers. So the change was a force for good and ill.

So here is my question: what could have been done to retain the loyalty of the soldiers to the state (assuming their foresight was as good as our hindsight)?

[Pindar]

Quote[/b] ]Empire may indeed be the cause of the final downfall of Rome, since the self aggrandizement of the emperors cause the romans to overextend their borders.

This sentiment is problematic given the Empire lasted for over half a millennia.

Quote[/b] ]So here is my question: what could have been done to retain the loyalty of the soldiers to the state

Any polity must maintain control of its own military in order to survive. Centralized control (via pay and administration and loyalty instilling factors like court pagentry or equivalent mythos ) would have been necessary to prevent the rise of the Triumvirs.*

*Note: this was not a problem unique to Rome. The various Arab Calaphates suffered similarly as did Medieval Japan etc.

[ScubaSteveDave]

Yes, I know there are a lot of assumptions in the whole empire being the downfall of Rome thing, and that it is a stretch, which is why I try to include phrases like may indeed, although this is still to strong. But half a millennia is only 500 years, and Roman civilization lasted for two millennia (right?), so maybe it just took five centuries to them to finally extend too far, become committed in too many places, and have a serious threat arise far too close to home. But I don't really know, it was just a theory based on too little knowledge.

As for centralized control, pay, etc. of the armies, was not that already being done?

[Fanty]

Rome changed from their Legions to cheap and crap armies.

whats the reason for this?

Romes borders became protected by cheap Barbarian Mercs in the end.

Whats the reason for this?

Rome gave up Britain without beeng forced by an enemy. They disbanded it just for fun.

Whats the reason for this?

Who on earth forced Rome to exchange their superior Armies with crap?

Maybe their national depts? ;)

There is a need to expand.
Only unlimited expansion can garant survival of such system. (same with todays system. Only works with unlimited grow. A standstill kills the current system)

Rome would need to march into the middle east to survive. then India, then China.

Get riches, take more slaves. Waring and press the money for it out of the losers.

It cannot stand still. Rome was forced to stand still.
Desert in the south, Barbarians without wealth in the north.

nly chance to survive would have been further expansion to east. Wich they failed to do.

You only can suvive if your grow.
So faster you grow, so more fast you will need to grow.
One day, it colapses.

And a new small thing can grow again.

[Pindar]

Quote[/b] ]But half a millennia is only 500 years,

How many Empires can you name that lasted 500 years? The adjective seems misplaced.

Quote[/b] ]Roman civilization lasted for two millennia (right?),

Recognizing the name 'Roman Civilization' is inextricably tied to the polity itself: the tradition has Rome being founded in 753 B.C. The Republic lasted from 509 B.C. to 27 B.C. then followed the Empire. Determining the lengh of Roman Civilization depends on when you consider it to have been extinquished. The Empire is typically said to have fallen in 476 A.D. This is a fairly arbitrary date (particulary given the Goths still recognized the Emperor in Constantinople as titular lord of Italy, and a formal reconquest occured in the following century). If one takes the shift in title from Augustus to Basilius (the Greek for King) as the demarcation then the Empire lasted until the 7th Century. If one goes by self identification then the 'Romans' lasted until 1453. The later recognition entails seeing the empire to have lasted considerably longer than 500 years.

Quote[/b] ]As for centralized control, pay, etc. of the armies, was not that already being done?

No, it was not. During the Late Republic the financial fate of armies was tied to their leaders. There was little to no centralized control.

[Fanty]

Well, on paper the Western Roman Empire lasted until 1806 ;)

Under various names.

In the 10th century under the name Imperium (Empire)
In the 11th century under the name Imperium Romanorum (Roman Empire)
In the 12th century under the name Sacrum Imperium (Holy Empire)
From the 13th to 15th century under the name Sacrum Romanorum Imperium (Holy Roman Empire)

And from the 15th century to the 19th century under the name Holy Roman Empire of the German Nations

Official.... the anchestor in law, of West-Rome ;)

[Pindar]

Quote[/b] ]Well, on paper the Western Roman Empire lasted until 1806...And from the 15th century to the 19th century under the name Holy Roman Empire of the German Nations

I guess one has to quote Voltaire in this regared: The Holy Roman Empire was neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire.

[Fanty]

He was right. ;)

The Holy Roman Empire (1250-1806) was no empire anymore.
(Note that the term Holy Roman Empire did only came up AFTER the Empire fall (and it fall during the 13th century). It wasnt named like that during the time when the Empire was reality.)

different to the Empire (Otto the great invented the term),
the Roman Empire (Otto Secundus Imperator Augustus (Otto II) invented the term)
and the Holy Empire (namechange by Barbarossa) ;)

But yeah, they werent Holy, since a think like Holy does not exist.

In the times of Voltair, it doesnt exist at all.
He is complete right.

Is it Roman?
Well, the Pope invented the title.
The war destroid Europe. A new Rome was needed that establishes a Pax Romana. Who ever does the job doesnt matter. Well what matters was that the guy needed to be catholic. since the bycantine Emperor was Orthodox, he doesnt fit for the job. at least in the perspective of the pope. ;)

The Pope aspected Charlemagne to conquer all of Europe and establish a new peace. And of course protect the Roman-Catholic church.

The Pope can someone rightfully make the Emperor of Rome.
So juristic its Roman.

Also:

whats an Empire?
A state that controlles people of different ethnicies.
Like the Roman Empire and the brittish empire. And so on.

when it contolled Germany, the Lower countries, Burgundy, Czechia and Italy, it was an Empire.

When it only contained German speakers, it wasnt. that would be a national state and no empire. and at that time it wasnt even that. It was nonexisting in reality.

[Dunedin_dude]

Quote[/b] (ScubaSteveDave @ April 19 2004,14:58)]If you are really interested in military history, I can suggest no better source that A History of Warfare by John Keegan. It is an excellent book, and very engrossing (if you are interested). Again, really really good.

Can't agree enough - brilliant book.
Another good author is Donald Kagan, especially his books on the Peloponnesian War(s).

[Dunedin_dude]

Quote[/b] (bighairyman @ April 21 2004,19:36)]He became famous in the military ranks after he thought out of a plan to put cannons on the battlements and blasted the British ships away from the city. I forgot the name of the city but it was in northwest of France.

I read somewhere that Napoleon's Column was more effective than the rows other armies used. Maybe it was more maneuverable, i will go check out the website i saw it on.

I think the city was Toulouse, and it was a combined British/Neopolitan force, with not enough men or ships - they were always going to get beaten.

And the column was good for manuevering, and for morale, especially with the drummers inside beating out the pas de charge[I] but no good when against a disciplined line (the British) who could simple concentrate more fire against the column, which could only fire at the first two ranks, and on the flanks


And another thing - if all of us had been in charge of the Romans, no doubt we would all be typing in Latin, 'cause the Empire would still be going strong.

[ScubaSteveDave]

Quote[/b] ]I think the city was Toulouse

(dunedin_dude)

I thought the city was Toulon, in the provrince of Toulouse. And yeah, the British were almost always outnumered on land.

Donald Kagan huh? I'll look into it. (I'm glad someone knows what I was talking about.)

[bighairyman]

Quote[/b] (Fanty @ April 22 2004,17:50)]Rome changed from their Legions to cheap and crap armies.

whats the reason for this?

Romes borders became protected by cheap Barbarian Mercs in the end.

Whats the reason for this?

Rome gave up Britain without beeng forced by an enemy. They disbanded it just for fun.

Whats the reason for this?

Who on earth forced Rome to exchange their superior Armies with crap?

Maybe their national depts? ;)

There is a need to expand.
Only unlimited expansion can garant survival of such system. (same with todays system. Only works with unlimited grow. A standstill kills the current system)

Rome would need to march into the middle east to survive. then India, then China.

Get riches, take more slaves. Waring and press the money for it out of the losers.

It cannot stand still. Rome was forced to stand still.
Desert in the south, Barbarians without wealth in the north.

nly chance to survive would have been further expansion to east. Wich they failed to do.

You only can suvive if your grow.
So faster you grow, so more fast you will need to grow.
One day, it colapses.

And a new small thing can grow again.

1: the reason is that the roman government became poor, during their heyday, gold, loot and slaves pour into the empire, making it rich, during the later years, expansion slowed, so less gold, loot, slaves, plus the romans were trading with the Indians, which cost tons of gold every year. Also since all the Emperors only decide to amuse themselves using roman money, plus during the last years, there were lots of assassination, with emperor's changing every couple of years, and there wasn't a strong ruler. So discipline broke down, plus if i'm correct there was also a great plague that wipe out a lot of people.

2, since they were poor and can only train crappy units, they hired Germanic mercenaries to protect their border, cause they were better than the roman troops( not the crack troops of course, but there was only a few of them).

3 there were threats in England, the Scots from the north and other Germanic tribes from northern Europe was also threating the island, some of the famous ones are the Anglos and the Saxons . plus the Gaul(France) was threaten, the romans knew to cut their losses and return home. also the truth was England was also not that rich, and provide very little money for the state.

4, yup, and some other problems

most of what you said was right, but in my view, expanding into the middle east and china is not a good idea. first of all, the with romans moving to the east to attack the middle east, that will left an open gate for the north Germanic tribes, the romans already Had enough problems deafening them with the available legions. There was also an Strong empire in the middle east. the Parthian's and later the Persians. to be able to defeat them (if at all) it would require at least 70% of the all the roman forces, again the tribes in the north.

The only good way for them is to develop their economy, change it from a slave drivening agriculutrian economy to an industrial powerhouse(not the machine industrial of course), and change their corrupted government, maybe even change back to the good old republic. with the state controlling the armies.



There was a good chance that Napoleon would ahve won at Waterloo if his other generals did what he order them to do.

[meravelha]

Quote[/b] ]
Rome changed from their Legions to cheap and crap armies.

whats the reason for this?

Romes borders became protected by cheap Barbarian Mercs in the end.

Whats the reason for this?

Rome gave up Britain without beeng forced by an enemy. They disbanded it just for fun.

Whats the reason for this?

Who on earth forced Rome to exchange their superior Armies with crap?

Maybe their national depts? ;)

There is a need to expand.
Only unlimited expansion can garant survival of such system. (same with todays system. Only works with unlimited grow. A standstill kills the current system)

Rome would need to march into the middle east to survive. then India, then China.

Get riches, take more slaves. Waring and press the money for it out of the losers.

It cannot stand still. Rome was forced to stand still.
Desert in the south, Barbarians without wealth in the north.

nly chance to survive would have been further expansion to east. Wich they failed to do.

You only can suvive if your grow.
So faster you grow, so more fast you will need to grow.
One day, it colapses.

And a new small thing can grow again.

In essence I agree.
It survived the Principate on a very small military budget.
When that budget doubled, they were in trouble as the aristocracy were loathe to take a drop in living standards.

[Bayushi Togai]

I'm not sure this will go over well in a forum of people organized to play war games , but the big picture of Rome's success and waning probably his very little to do with the army, or military technology, or the battles we simulate in the games.

But considering we are here to play Total War, I can understand why those kinds of factors would be the focus of most people's interest. :)

The disposative reasons are probably cultural and economic, like being able to put together a bureaucracy complex enough to run such a huge geographic enterprise, and keeping so many soldiers fed and paid, and being able to entice foreign cultures to want to become more Roman.

But its the battles that make an interesting game, so no one can be faulted for having their heart in the right place.

[Impaler]

Don't forget the Roman Diplomacy. Their ability to utilize the inner conflicts of nations to their own ends and the power the Roman navy had in the times of the rise. After all the Carthage began to loose when the Romans build navy. Hannibal could not hope to get reinforcement from the sea and finally he could not stop Romans to invade Carthage.
Still how can one stop them when they could allied with half a nation, use it to conquer the other half and then find a reason to beat the rest.
Plus the fact that Roman army had strong leadership and willing men to fight for spoils and glory. Tactically the legionary had the right equipment for the job. The cavalry was crap yes, but there are mainly social reasons for these as the Romans that could afford horses preferred infantry.
The reasons for falling down, lets just say that everything that give power to the Empire, starting from the very spirit of Rome, was absent in the years after Marcus Aurelius.

[bighairyman]

Roman Armies were crap in the early years (years with Carthage), they won due to other town's loyalties, and their huge manpower, I read from a book, that during the second Punic war, Roman Italy has over 700,000 manpower for infantry, and over 30,000 manpower for cavalry. That's Huge for an ancient empire . plus the Romans lost over 700 warships during the first Punic war. The reason for early roman success is their ability to bounce back from disasters. At the end, they lost that ability and the empire felled.