George H. Allen
The
Roman Army
"The
treatment of this subject will be confined to (I) a brief
description of the organization of the army, and (II) a
consideration of the allusions to the Roman military
establishment in the New Testament.
I. Organization.-- There were originally no standing forces,
but the citizens performed military service like any other
civic duty when summoned by the magistrates. The gradual
development of a military profession and standing army
culminated in the admission of the poorest class to the
ranks by Marius (about 107 BC). Henceforth the Roman army
was made up of a body of men whose character was essentially
that of mercenaries, and whose term of continuous service
varied in different divisions from 16 to 26 years.
The forces which composed the Roman army under the Empire
may be divided into the following five groups: (1) the
imperial guard and garrison of the capital, (2) the legions,
(3) the auxilia, (4) the numeri, (5) the fleet. We shall
discuss their organization in the order mentioned.
1. The Imperial Guard: The imperial guard consisted of the
cohortes praetoriae, which together with the cohortes
urbanae and vigiles made up the garrison of Rome. In the
military system as established by Augustus there were nine
cohorts of the praetorian guard, three of the urban troops,
and seven of the vigiles. Each cohort numbered 1,000 men,
and was commanded by a tribune of equestrian rank. The
praetorian prefects (praefecti praetorii), of whom there
were usually two, were commanders of the entire garrison of
the capital, and stood at the highest point of distinction
and authority in the equestrian career.
2. The Legions: There were 25 legions in 23 AD (Tacitus
Annals 4, 5), which had been increased to 30 at the time of
the reign of Marcus Aurelius, 160-180 AD (CIL, VI, 3492 a-b)
and to 33 under Septimius Severus (Dio Cassius, iv. 23-24).
Each legion was made up, ordinarily, of 6,000 men, who were
divided into 10 cohorts, each cohort containing 3 maniples,
and each maniple in turn 2 centuries.
The legatus Augustus pro praetore, or governor of each
imperial province, was chief commander of all the troops
within the province. An officer of senatorial rank known as
legatus Augusti legionis was intrusted with the command of
each legion, together with the bodies of auxilia which were
associated with it. Besides, there were six tribuni militum,
officers of equestrian rank (usually sons of senators who
had not yet held the quaestorship) in each legion. The
centurions who commanded the centuries belonged to the
plebeian class. Between the rank of common soldier and
centurion there were a large number of subalterns, called
principales, who correspond roughly to the non-commissioned
officers and men detailed from the ranks for special duties
in modern armies.
3. The "Auxilia": The auxilia were organized as infantry in
cohortes, as cavalry in alae, or as mixed bodies, cohortes
equitatae. Some of these divisions contained approximately
1,000 men (cohortes or alae miliariae), but the greater
number about 500 (cohortes or alae quingenariae). They were
commanded by tribuni and praefecti of equestrian rank. The
importance of the auxilia consisted originally in the
diversity of their equipment and manner of fighting, since
each group adhered to the customs of the nation in whose
midst it had been recruited. But with the gradual
Romanization of the Empire they were assimilated more and
more to the character of the legionaries.
4. The "Numeri": The numeri developed out of the provincial
militia and began to appear in the 2nd century AD. They
maintained their local manner of warfare. Some were bodies
of infantry, others of cavalry, and they varied in strength
from 300 to 90 (Mommsen, Hermes, XIX, 219 f, and XXII, 547
f). Their commanders were praepositi, praefecti or tribuni,
all men of equestrian rank.
5. The Fleet: The fleet was under the command of prefects (praefecti
classis), who took rank among the highest officials of the
equestrian class. The principal naval stations were at
Misenum and Ravenna.
6. Defensive Arrangements: Augustus established the northern
boundary of the Empire at the Rhine and at the Danube,
throughout the greater part of its course, and bequeathed to
his successors the advice that they should not extend their
sovereignty beyond the limits which he had set (Tacitus
Annals i. 11; Agricola 13); and although this policy was
departed from in many instances, such as the annexation of
Thrace, Cappadocia, Mauretania, Britain, and Dacia, not to
mention the more ephemeral acquisitions of Trajan, yet the
military system of the Empire was arranged primarily with
the view of providing for the defense of the provinces and
not for carrying on aggressive warfare on a large scale.
Nearly all the forces, with the exception of the imperial
guard, were distributed among the provinces on the border of
the Empire, and the essential feature of the disposition of
the troops in these provinces was the permanent fortress in
which each unit was stationed. The combination of large
camps for the legions with a series of smaller forts for the
alae, cohorts, and numeri is the characteristic arrangement
on all the frontiers. The immediate protection of the
frontier was regularly instrusted to the auxiliary troops,
while the legions were usually stationed some distance to
the rear of the actual boundary.
Thus the army as a whole was so scattered that it was a
difficult undertaking to assemble sufficient forces for
carrying out any considerable project of foreign conquest,
or even to cope at once with a serious invasion, yet the
system was generally satisfactory in view of the conditions
which prevailed, and secured for the millions of subjects of
the Roman Empire the longest period of undisturbed
tranquillity known to European history.
7. Recruiting System: In accordance with the arrangements of
Augustus, the cohortes praetoriae and cohortes urbanae were
recruited from Latium, Etruria, Umbria, and the older Roman
colonies (Tacitus Annals 4, 5), the legions from the
remaining portions of Italy, and the auxilia from the
subject communities of the Empire (Seeck, Rheinisches
Museum, XLVIII, 616).
But in course of time the natives of Italy disappeared,
first from the legions, and later from the garrison of the
capital. Antoninus Plus established the rule that each body
of troops should draw its recruits from the district where
it was stationed. Henceforth the previous possession of
Roman citizenship was no longer required for enlistment in
the legions. The legionary was granted the privilege of
citizenship upon entering the service, the auxiliary soldier
upon being discharged (Seeck, Untergang der antiken Welt, I,
250).
II. Allusions in the New Testament to the Roman Military
Establishment.-- Such references relate chiefly to the
bodies of troops which were stationed in Judaea. Agrippa I
left a military establishment of one ala and five cohorts at
his death in 44 AD (Jos, Ant, XIX, ix, 2; BJ, III, iv, 2),
which he had doubtless received from the earlier Roman
administration. These divisions were composed of local
recruits, chiefly Samaritans (Hirschfeld, Verwaltungsbeamte,
395; Mommsen, Hermes, XIX, 217, n. 1).
The Ala I gemina Sebastenorum was stationed at Caesarea (Jos,
Ant, XX, 122; BJ, II, xii, 5; Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum,
VIII, 9359).
1. Augustan Band: Julius, the centurion to whom Paul and
other prisoners were delivered to be escorted to Rome <Acts
27:1>, belonged to one of the five cohorts which was
stationed at or near Caesarea. This Speira Sebaste
(Westcott-Hort), "Augustus' Band" (the Revised Version
(British and American) "Augustan band"; the Revised Version,
margin "cohort"), was probably the same body of troops which
is mentioned in inscriptions as Cohors I Augusta (CIL, Supp,
6687) and Speira Augouste (Lebas-Waddington 2112). Its
official title may have been Cohors Augusta Sebastenorum (GVN).
It will be observed that all divisions of the Roman army
were divided into companies of about 100 men, each of which,
in the infantry, was commanded by a centurion, in the
cavalry, by a decurion.
2. Italian Band: There was another cohort in Caesarea, the
"Italian band" (Cohors Italica, Vulgate) of which Cornelius
was centurion (<Acts 10:1>: ek speires tes kaloumenes
Italikes). The cohortes Italicae (civium Romanorum) were
made up of Roman citizens (Marquardt, Romische
Staatsverwaltung, II, 467).
3. Praetorian Guard: One of the five cohorts was stationed
in Jerusalem <Mt 27:27; Mk 15:16>, the "chief captain" of
which was Claudius Lysias. His title, chiliarchos in the
Greek (<Acts 23:10,15. 17,19,22,26; 24:7> the King James
Version), meaning "leader of a thousand men" (tribunus,
Vulgate), indicates that this body of soldiers was a cohors
miliaria. Claudius Lysias sent Paul to Felix at Caesarea
under escort of 200 soldiers, 70 horsemen, and 200 spearmen
<Acts 23:23>. The latter (dexiolaboi, Westcott and Hort, The
New Testament in Greek) are thought to have been a party of
provincial militia.
Several centurions of the cohort at Jerusalem appear during
the riot and subsequent rescue and arrest of Paul <Acts
21:32; 22:25-26; 23:17,23>. The cohortes miliariae (of 1,000
men) contained ten centurions. A centurion, doubtless of the
same cohort, was in charge of the execution of the Saviour
<Mt 27:54; Mk 15:39,44-45; Lk 23:47>. It was customary for
centurions to be intrusted with the execution of capital
penalties (Tacitus Ann. i. 6; xvi. 9; xvi. 15; Hist. ii.
85).
The the King James Version contains the passage in <Acts
28:16>: "The centurion delivered the prisoners to the
captain of the guard" (stratopedarches), which the Revised
Version (British and American) omits. It has commonly been
held that the expression stratopedarches was equivalent to
praetorian prefect (praefectus praetorius), and that the
employment of the word in the singular was proof that Paul
arrived in Rome within the period 51-62 AD when Sex.
Afranius Burrus was sole praetorian prefect.
Mommsen (Sitzungsberichte der Berliner Akademie (1895),
491-503) believes that the sentence in question embodies an
ancient tradition, but that the term stratopedarches could
not mean praefectus praetorius, which is never rendered in
this way in Greek He suggests that it stands for princeps
castrorum peregrinorum, who was a centurion in command of
the frumentarii at Rome.
These were detachments of legionary soldiers who took rank
as principales. They served as military couriers between the
capital and provinces, political spies, and an imperial
police. It was probably customary, at least when the
tradition under discussion arose, for the frumentarii to
take charge of persons who were sent to Rome for trial
(Marquardt, Romische Staatsverwaltung, II, 491-94)."
GEORGE H.
ALLEN, Contributor "International Standard Bible
Encylopaedia" (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans 1939)
|