Roman Auxillia question

[Centurion Crastinus]

That's real interesting. It's amazing what might be lurking underground in one's own back yard.

[Centurion Crastinus]

Were their actually sub-saharan africans serving in the ranks of the Roman Army. Those blogs said that some people had that opinion. I always assumed that anyone recruited from Africa was more likely to be someone with lighter skin. Kind of like the way someone from North Africa would look today.

[CaesarAugustus]

Maybe some mercenaries/auxilia were recruited from Meroe, or from sub-saharan immigrants to the empire. I'm sure at some point in the history of the empire there were at least a few sub-saharan africans in the legions. Maybe indians, too.

[russia almighty]

Maybe some mercenaries/auxilia were recruited from Meroe, or from sub-saharan immigrants to the empire. I'm sure at some point in the history of the empire there were at least a few sub-saharan africans in the legions. Maybe indians, too.

Indians ..... thats kinda weird imagining them in the legions . Iranians on the other hand I could easily see them being one of the bigger minorities in the army .

[cmacq]

Were their actually sub-saharan africans serving in the ranks of the Roman Army. Those blogs said that some people had that opinion. I always assumed that anyone recruited from Africa was more likely to be someone with lighter skin. Kind of like the way someone from North Africa would look today.

Your talking about the headless romans? right?

[L.C.Cinna]

axillia = mercenary/irregular/native/foreign forces; specialized troops organized along native lines. noncitizen, cavalry, archers, light infantry, and heavy assault infantry.

just to clear that: the auxilia are not mercenary or irregular troops. they are organized along roman lines and consist of light and heavy troops equipped mainly in "Roman" fashion, plus all specialized forces were grouped into the auxilia (like archers, cavalry,...). while citizenship was required to join a legion, many people with citizenship served in the auxiliaries as well (especially the cavalry).

[cmacq]

just to clear that: the auxilia are not mercenary or irregular troops. they are organized along roman lines and consist of light and heavy troops equipped mainly in "Roman" fashion, plus all specialized forces were grouped into the auxilia (like archers, cavalry,...). while citizenship was required to join a legion, many people with citizenship served in the auxiliaries as well (especially the cavalry).

point of order and a question?

during the 1st century Gallic War, do you consider the yearly levy of Gallic and later German horse designed to support the Roman army, auxilia or mercs?

[L.C.Cinna]

point of order and a question?

during the 1st century Gallic War, do you consider the yearly levy of Gallic and later German horse designed to support the Roman army, auxilia or mercs?

That's a good question. It's a matter of defining the word "auxilia". In general it stands for "support troops" in the same way as it is today.

The Roman way of organizing their army was to spilt it into "basic" which is to heavy infatry unit (in this case the legion; during the 3rd century CE when they regrouped the army to make it easier to group units they reduced the legion to around 1200 men.)

and into "supportive" like cavalry, archers, light troops. this is less a way to seperate people by citizenship but an easier way to construct the army because you now had the standard infantry which always built the core of the army and then you could look at your auxiliary pot and take out all the pieces you thought you'd need for a certain operation.

So this is the definition of "auxilia" in the imperial army and because of that it doesn't make too much difference if everyone has citizenship or not. This mattered in the beginning but later on many of the recruits were sons of soldiers, so in the 2nd and 3rd century already many of the auxilia probably had citizenship. So after the Constitutio Antoniniana the actual military defintion auf "basic" and "supportive" stayed the same.


Now to answer your question:

In the Republic we have no regular organized auxilia but only supportive troops provided by allies or hired as mercenaries. So in the original sense they are "auxilia" because they are "supportive troops" but they are not like the imperial auxilia which was a fixed branch of the army, organized and payed by the state.

It becomes a bit complicated during the Imperial era. For example when Vespasian went to supress the Jewish rebellion he had his legions, then he had auxiliary infantry and cavalry (like Archers, heavy infantry[they storm Iotapata and Ierusalem btw], and Alae) these would by then be called Auxilia because they were all official supportive troops. He also had Arabian archers and Cavalry provided by client kings (so they were kind of the same as your Gauls during the late Republic) and they fulfilled the roles of supportive troops but would of course not be part of the official auxilia.

Were their actually sub-saharan africans serving in the ranks of the Roman Army. Those blogs said that some people had that opinion. I always assumed that anyone recruited from Africa was more likely to be someone with lighter skin. Kind of like the way someone from North Africa would look today.

Here a quote from the Historia Augusta Vita Septimii Severi 22.4:

post murum apud Luguvallum visum73 in Britannia cum ad proximam mansionem rediret non solum victor sed etiam in aeternum pace fundata, volvens74 animo quid ominis sibi occurreret, Aethiops quidam e numero militari, clarae inter scurras famae et celebratorum semper iocorum, cum corona e cupressu facta eidem occurrit. 5 quem cum ille iratus removeri ab oculis praecepisset, et coloris eius tactus omine75 et coronae, dixisse ille dicitur ioci causa: "Totum fuisti,76 totum vicisti, iam deus esto victor".

transl:
On another occasion, when he was returning to his nearest quarters from an inspection of the wall at Luguvallum164 in Britain, at a time when he had not only proved victorious but had concluded a perpetual peace, just as he was wondering what omen would present itself, an Ethiopian soldier, who was famous among buffoons and always a notable jester, met him with a garland of cypress-boughs. 5 And when Severus in a rage ordered that the man be removed from his sight, troubled as he was by the man's ominous colour and the ominous nature of the garland, the Ethiopian by way of jest cried, it is said, "You have been all things,165 you have conquered all things, now, O conqueror, be a god."

about the "ominous colour":

this section is taken from the end of the biography were all kind of weird things are drawn together to have a series of "death omens" (most of them invented) it's rather less a negative comment on the persons black skin but the combination of the colour black (a sign of death) and the cypruss garland as a sign of divination (and death lol) which scares the emperor as it's predicts his death and happens right at the moment when he looks for a sign. But the quote shows that there probably were some black Africans among the ranks.

[Centurion Crastinus]

That definately redefines what I imagined the soldiers of the Empire looking like.