The Grand Strategy

of the Roman Empire

From the First Century C E
to the Third
R E V IS E D A N D U P D A T E D E D IT IO N

Edward N. Luttwak

|( >1111 ! I • 'i >( II! I imriMlx I ’l e s s

© 1976. ' 979 i 2016 Johns Hopkins University Press
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Names: Luttwak, Edward, author.

Title: The grand strategy of the Roman Empire : from the first century CE
to the third / Edward N. Luttwak.
Description: Revised and updated edition. I Baltimore .-Johns' Hopkins
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Identifiers: L C C N 2015030270I ISBN 9781421419442 (hardback) I
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Subjects: LCSII: Rome—Army. I Strategy. I Military history, Ancient. I
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 Contents

List of Maps, Figures, and Tables vii

Preface to the 2016 Edition ix
Preface to the First Edition xv
Acknowledgment xvii

Introduction 1

1 The Julio-Claudian System: Client States and Mobile Armies from

Augustus to Nero 6
The System in Outline 10 / The Client States 19 / The Management of the
Clients 28 / The Tactical Organization of the Armv 42 / T he Strategic
Deployment of Forces 50 / Conclusion 53

2 From the Flavians to the Sever!: “ Scientific” Frontiers and Preclusive

Defense from Vespasian to Marcus Aurelius 56
The System in Outline 60 / Border Defense: The Tactical Dimension 67 /
Border Defense: The Strategic Dimension 89 / The Decline of the Client
System 125 / The Army and the System 132 / Conclusion 144

3 Defense-in-Depth: The Great Crisis o f the Third Century and the

New Strategies 146
The System in Outline 149 / The Changing Threat 166 / T he New
Borders of the Empire 176 / Walled Towns and Hard-Point Defenses 182 /
Border Troops 195 / Provincial Forces 199 / Central Field Armies 207 /
Conclusion 216

Epilogue. The Three Systems: An Evaluation 219

Appendix. Power and F'orce: Definitions and Implications 223

Not es 229

Bibliography 251
Index A hj
 Maps, Figures, and Tables

MAPS
1.1 The Empire in 23 CK 12
1.2 The East under the Julio-Claudians 30
1.3 The German Problem, 6 -16 C E 36
2.1 The Frontiers in the Second Century 64
2.2 Strategic Mobility in the Roman Empire 92
2.3 The Wall Frontiers of Roman Britain 104
2.4 The Advancing Frontier in Germany 108
2.j The Second-Century Frontiers in Europe 112
2.6 The Dacian Conquest 116
2.7 The Strategic Importance of Armenia 120
2.8 The Parthian Empire and the Roman East 123
3.1 The Great Crisis of the Third Century 170
3.2 The Fontiers of the Tetrarchy and the New Provinces 180
3.3 The Defense-in-Depth of the German Frontier 186
3.4 Defense-in-Depth: Augusta Libanensis (Only Attested Units Shown) 208

FIGURES

1.1 Roman Unit Establishments in the First and Second Centuries C E 14

1.2 Two .Models of Empire 22
2.1 Models of Frontier Organization I 70
2.2 Models of Frontier Organization II 72
2.3 Hadrian’s Wall: The Barrier Elements 79
2.4 The Tactics of Forward Defense 86
3.1 Operational Methods of Border Defense: Elastic Defense 160
3.2 Operational Methods of Border Defense: Defense-in-Depth 762
3.3 Operational Methods of Border Defense: Forward Defense 164
3.4 The Changing Pattern of Roman Fortification 188

TABLES

2.1 Legionary Deployments, 23 C E to 192 C E 95

:.2 Auxiliary Troops in Lower Germany 97
Li 1) ist ri Iunion of Troops: Frontier and Field Armies in the East and West 217
 Preface to the 2016 Edition

When the first edition of this book was published— it w'as nothing more than
the text of a Johns Hopkins University dissertation, quickly written by a young
husband and father in a hurry— it immediately attracted inordinate, wholly
unexpected attention. A first wave of reviews wras followed by journal articles,
lengthy monographs, and then entire books, an unending flow' in several lan­
guages that soon exceeded my ability to keep up.
Oddly enough, from the start this book was both highly praised and harshly
condemned for exactly the same thing: my attribution of a “grand strategy” to
the Romans, indeed three of them in succession over as many centuries: the
first expansive, hegemonic, and reliant chiefly on diplomatic coercion; the second
meant to provide security even in the most exposed border areas, in part by
means of fortified lines whose remains are still visible from Britain to Mesopo­
tamia; and the third a defense-in-depth of layered frontier, regional, and central
reserve forces that kept the western empire going till the fifth century and the
eastern empire for much longer.
There was a definite pattern in the reviews that appeared originally and in
the articles and monographs that kept coming. The two most senior scholars
of highest reputation, holding chairs at Oxford and Harvard, respectively,
made light o f any errors and omissions to instead praise the book unreservedly
for uncovering the overall logic that explained a great many Roman doings
and undoings in wur and diplomacy, which previous scholarship had diligently
described but not explained. T h ey even predicted (accurately) that this book
would transform Roman frontier studies.1 But younger scholars still making
their w'ay w'ere more critical, some harshly so. T h ey started by pointing out
t he absence of any contemporary references to strategic planning, and the
absence of any documents describing imperial strategy at any point in time.
\nd they proceeded to argue that no such documents could possibly have
existed because Romans never had military or civilian planning staffs, which
m any case would have lacked such elementary tools as accurate maps.
These w ere not unreasonable objections (though I and others have argued
otherwise, as noted below), but the vehement manner in which they were
•nit anced st rough suggested that some scholars were offended hv the very idea
X Preface to the 2016 Edition

that Roman men could transcend the mindless pursuit of personal glory to think
rationally at all. One scholar started her critique with an account by Herodian
(1.6.5-6) in which we encounter a capricious Commodus and his spoiled friends
idly conversing about the merits o f continuing to fight the Quadi and Alarco-
manni on the Danube frontier.2 The implication is clear: Roman emperors
were just foolish boys striking poses— exemplars of the mindless men of any age.
In such depictions, one cannot recognize the emperors—yes, even Commodus—
officials, and soldiers who devised, built, and maintained the structures of im­
perial security that long enabled obedient, tax-paying subjects and their obedi­
ent wives to raise crops, livestock, and children in considerable safety from
marauders, raiders, and invaders even on the outer edges of the most exposed
frontier lands. One may wonder why that author did not start with Augustus,
the magisterially sly inventor of the principate, or with Tiberius at the Rhine
crossing, standing in the freezing dawn to personally inspect the soldiers pass­
ing by to ensure that they were not overloaded with gear and rations, or with the
indefatigable Hadrian, reviewing troop exercises in professional detail very far
from Rome, or for that matter with Gaius (“ Caligula”), when he decided that
crossing the channel was not a good idea after all. Actually it is far better to
simply leave aside our tenuous evidence on the proclivities of individual em­
perors, because the empire was an immeasurably larger reality than any of
them. It encompassed countless nameless administrators and officers efficient
and honest enough to recruit, train, equip, and supply hundreds o f thousands
of troops, including the shivering sentries who tenaciously guarded Hadrian’s
W all and the auxiliary cavalry that daily patrolled desert frontiers in the ex­
tremes of summer heat, all of them doing their duty day after day, week after
week, month after month, year after year, century after century. That was the
empire, not the reported or misreported musings of Commodus and his
friends.
Alore soberly, if still insistently, a work seemingly written in direct response
to mine maintained that the Romans -were incapable of strategic thinking and
could not even lay out frontier defenses coherently— which then forced the
author (and several others who followed him) to explain even conspicuously
systematic fortifications extending over vast distances as nothing more than
local improvisations.3 Another scholar pointed out that the Romans lacked any
formal training in statecraft, strategy, or foreign policy, and were thus inca­
pable of making strategic decisions in anv case. In sum, these critics berated
me for having interred comprehensive (“g r an d ” ) strategiex tb.il could not pox
 Preface to the 2016 Edition xi

sibly have existed because the Romans were intellectually incapable of any such
thing; hence, they argued, the archaeological, epigraphic, numismatic, and
narrative evidence that I assiduously cited was simply irrelevant.
Fittingly, scholars in a middle category, neither junior nor eminent, paid
the book the compliment of exceptionally extended attention, while being
critical o f its overall approach to a lesser or a greater extent.4 Thus one scholar
reviewed the book at very great length in the Journal of Roman Studies,5 identi­
fying a number of outright errors and challenging the entire notion that the
Romans could have planned and executed any “grand strategy,” lacking as they
did a planning staff or general headquarters. This objection I discuss below, but
another authority on the subject noted in response that “it would be anachronis­
tic to speak of think-tanks and formal strategic studies, but we should credit the
Romans with sufficient sophistication to develop a long-range strategy and the
institutions to execute it.” 6Eventually it was a classical military historian who
responded both to my thesis and to the critics most thoroughly, adding to my
own understanding of key issues.7
A general criticism was that my presentation of the three successive grand
strategies was excessively schematic, prompting the annotation of exceptions
even by those who accepted the overall thesis. Such criticism I can hardly con­
test because I myself noted exceptions as I went along— for such is the crooked
timber o f humanity.
Even before the book was translated into several foreign languages—including
Chinese and Hebrew— reviews from abroad started to come in, some o f mono­
graph length* Several foreign reviewers were seemingly convinced that the book
was really a coded justification of American imperialism. Naturally, I was grate­
ful to all reviewers, with the more unfriendly all the more useful because they
exposed additional errors, which I have finally been able to correct in this 40th
anniversary edition. But there were curious aspects to some of the criticisms.
First, national strategies, grand or not so grand, must altvays be inferred from
what is done or not done, and are never described in documents— or not, at any
rate, in documents that might see the light of day. Official documents that pur­
port to present “national strategies,” which are of course filled with fine senti­
ments and noble promises, are abundant, but what they contain is romance, not
policy guidance or military directives meant in earnest.
Second, thinking back on recent wars, on how they were started, on why
they were started, and with what quality of information (less than what many
.1 tourist collects belore vent uring to a foreign beach resort), the touching faith
xii Preface to the 2016 Edition

of some of my critics in the value of formal training in statecraft, strategy, and

foreign policy is almost moving in its innocence, suggestive of sheltered lives
far removed from the crimes and follies that propel human history. I was frankly
surprised that academics, of all people, would accept official descriptions of
“ strategy7” as a form of systematic group thinking, based on detailed informa­
tion and guided by rational choices. It is true that decisions are thus rational­
ized these days, but that is all. The decisions of war and peace are not made by
highly trained experts after systematic analyses, but by whoever happens to be
in charge, usually because of entirely unrelated political strengths, and informed
mostly by passing conceits. It happens very rarely that foreign countries that
are to be the scene of military ventures are actually studied, in their inevitably
complex and ambiguous reality. Instead they are imagined in order to fit what­
ever ambitions are projected upon them— and not even the possession of the
most perfect maps, nor any amount of specific intelligence can be a safeguard
against that recurrent and often irremediable error. Napoleon, for example,
imagined a Russia full of oppressed serfs ready to rebel to support his army— a
strange assumption after poor peasants in Spain had already fought strenuously
for their oppressors and against their French liberators. More recently7, an Iraq
ripe for democracy was disastrously7imagined.
Third, I have found that many o f the critics were writing in strict obedi­
ence to the obscurantist dogma that military history, ancient or modern, is
nothing more than “kings and battles,” nonsense unworthy o f academic study.
Certainly that is the prevalent attitude in contemporary American academia,
judging by the miserably small number of m ilitary historians employed in
university faculties. T h e eminent Byzantinist Walter E . Kaegi wrote of
“ scholars [who] have preconceived convictions or even prejudices that non­
military causes and dimensions o f . . . history are the only ones really worth
studying or understanding. . . . T hey can conceive of only social, economic,
religious, experiental, or socio-cultural explanations and are unsympathetic
to and sometimes even unforgiving of any inquiry into ‘narrow’ m ilitary
matters.” 9
But ultimately the entire dispute rests on how strategy7 itself is understood.
T h e critics— none of whom seem to have had any experience of military or
policy planning, let alone of war (which is hardly blameworthy in classicists
with no such pretensions, yet consequential), unlike the present writer —evident 1y
view “strategy” as an essentially modern, bureaucratic activity, based on explicit
 Preface to the 2016 Edition xiii

calculations and deliberate decisions, preceded by the gathering of all available

data. That much is confirmed by their insistence on the importance of geo­
graphic knowledge, which the Romans sorely lacked, according to them, not
least because they only had itineraries, not maps.10 That objection at any rate is
easily dealt with: ample uncontested evidence proves that the Romans habitu­
ally used large-scale surveying techniques to mark out their territories for fis­
cal purposes, could do so quite accurately, and even had distance-measuring
carts.11
Strategy, however, is not about moving armies over geography, as in board
games. It encompasses the entire struggle o f adversarial forces, which need not
have a spatial dimension at all, as in the case of the eternal competition be­
tween weapons and countermeasures. Indeed, the spatial dimension o f strat­
egy is rather marginal these days, and in some ways it always was.
It is the struggle of adversarial forces that generates the logic of strategy,
which is always and everywhere paradoxical, and as such is diametrically op­
posed to the coinmonsense, linear logic of everyday life. Thus, we have, for
example, the Roman si vis pacetn, para helium, if you want peace, prepare for
war, or tactically, the bad road is the good road in war, because its use is
unexpected— granting surprise and thus at least a brief exemption from the
entire predicament of a two-sided human struggle. Strategically, it is that same
paradoxical logic that transforms victories into defeats if they merely persist
long enough to pass their culminating point, whether by overextension or by
bringing others into the fray, or both. And there is much more of the same, at
every level of struggle, from the clash of weapons to the clash of empires, and
in peace as well as in w7ar. Always and everywhere it is the paradoxical logic of
strategy that determines outcomes, whether the protagonists know of its exis­
tence or not.12
Because strategy is neither straightforward nor transparent and never was,
it is more easily absorbed intuitively than consciously learned. As it happens,
the political culture of the Roman aristocracy was especially receptive to the
logic of strategy. Its able-bodied and able-minded men were educated from a
very young age in the realities of force, power, and influence and in the ruth­
less exercise of all three to advance themselves, their kin, and their empire in a
fiercely competitive fashion. T h ey were more than capable o f understand­
ing (he sharp choices that strategy invariably requires, and perfectly willing to
,ici accordingly, whether in the forum or on the battlefield. Their mentality
xiv Preface to the 2016 Edition

was especially well suited for strategic pursuits, because they were notably
unsentimental, distinctly unheroic, and relentlessly purposeful above all; it
would never have occurred to the Romans to invade territories that could not
yield commensurate revenues. Roman strategic culture would suit our own
times especially well.
 [Converted by
Preface to the First Edition

An investigation of the strategic statecraft of the Roman Empire scarcely re­

quires justification. In the record of our civilization, the Roman achievement
in the realm of grand strategy remains entirely unsurpassed, and even two
millennia of technological change have not invalidated its lessons. In any case,
the study of Roman history is its own reward.
To one accustomed to the chaotic duplication, scientistic language, and
narrow parochialism of the literature of international relations, the cumula­
tive discipline, austere elegance, and cosmopolitan character of Roman histo­
riography came as a revelation. And these virtues are especially marked in the
specialized literature on the Roman army and the military history of the empire.
Nevertheless, my own work was prompted by an acute dissatisfaction with this
very same literature: the archaeologists, epigraphists, numismatists, and textual
critics, whose devoted labors have uncovered the information on which our
knowledge rests, often applied grossly inappropriate strategic notions to their
reconstruction of the evidence. It is not that these scholars were ignorant of
the latest techniques of systems analysis or unaware of the content of modern
strategic thought; indeed, their shortcoming was not that they were old-
tashioned, but rather that they were far too modern.
From the beginning of the nineteenth century until Hiroshima, strategic-
thought was dominated by post-Napoleonic, Clausewitzian notions, and these
notions have pervaded the thinking of many whose primary interests are far
Irom removed from military matters. In their crude, popularized form, these
ideas stress a particular form of war, conflicts between nationalities; they stress
the primacy and desirability of offensive warfare in pursuit of decisive results
(thus inspiring an aversion to defensive strategies); and they imply a sharp dis-
tinction between the state of peace and the state of war. Finally, these ideas
accord primacy to the active use of military force, as opposed to the use of images
ill lorce, tor the purposes of diplomatic coercion.
( )nly since 1945 has the emergence of new technologies of mass destruction
invalidated the fundamental assumptions of the Clausewitzian approach to
grand strategy. We, like the Romans, face the prospect not of decisive conflict,
Inn of a permanent state ol war, albeit limited. We, like the Romans, must
xvi Preface to the First Edition

actively protect an advanced society against a variety of threats rather than

concentrate on destroying the forces of our enemies in battle. Above all, the
nature of modern weapons requires that we avoid their use while nevertheless
striving to exploit their full diplomatic potential. T he revolutionary implica­
tions o f these fundamental changes are as yet only dimly understood. It is not
surprising, therefore, that even contemporary research on Roman military
history is still pervaded by an anachronistic strategic outlook.
T he paradoxical effect of the revolutionary change in the nature of modern
war has been to bring the strategic predicament of the Romans much closer to
our own. Hence this reexamination of the historical evidence from the view­
point of modern strategic analysis.
 Acknowledgment

a pplied by registered version)!

When still an undergraduate but evidently destined for serious scholarship,
Nathan Aschenbrenner undertook the task of reviewing the original text to
identify passages that needed revision, or at least responses to critical appraisals.
He did that and more, offering many valid suggestions. As he progresses in his
chosen field of Byzantine studies, he has my enduring gratitude.
 s
J

IConverted by T IF F C om bine - (no stam ps

of the Roman Empire
The Grand Strategy
Introduction

In our own disordered times, it seems natural to look back lor comfort and
instruction to the experience of Roman imperial statecraft. N o analogies are
possible in the economic, social, or political spheres of life, but in the realm of
strategy there are instructive similarities. The fundamentals of Roman strategy
in the imperial age were rooted not in a technology now obsolete, but in a
predicament that we share. For the Romans, as for ourselves, the two essential
requirements of an evolving civilization were a sound material base and adequate
security. For the Romans, as for ourselves, the elusive goal of strategic statecraft
was to provide security for the civilization without prejudicing the vitality of its
economic base and without compromising the stability of an evolving political
order. The historic success of the Roman Empire, manifest in its unique endur­
ance, reflected the high degree to which these conflicting imperatives were rec­
onciled. It was certainly not battlefield achievements alone that ensured for so
long the tranquility of vast territories, lands which have been in turmoil ever
since.
Had the strength of the Roman Empire derived from a tactical superiority on
the battlefield, from superior generalship, or from a more advanced weapons
technology, there would be little to explain, though much to describe. But this
was not so. Roman tactics were almost invariably sound but not distinctly supe­
rior, and the Roman soldier of the imperial period was not noted for his élan. He
was not a wurrior intent on proving his manhood but a long-service profes­
sional pursuing a career; his goal and reward was not a hero’s death but a sever­
ance grant upon retirement. Roman weapons, far from being universally more
advanced, were frequently inferior to those used by the enemies whom the empire
defeated with such great regularity. N or could the secular survival of the empire
hav e been ensured by a fortunate succession of great feats of generalship: the
Roman army had a multitude of competent soldiers and a few famous generals,
Inn Us si rengt h de n \ is! I rom met hod, not I mm fortuitous talent.
2 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

T he superiority of the empire, and it was vast, was of an altogether more

subtle order: it derived from the whole complex o f ideas and traditions that
informed the organization of Roman military force and harnessed the armed
power of the empire to political purpose. The firm subordination of tactical
priorities, martial ideals, and warlike instincts to political as well as ideological
goals was the essential condition of the strategic success of the empire. W ith
rare exceptions, the misuse of force in pursuit of purely tactical goals, or for
the psychic rewards o f purposeless victories, was avoided by those who con­
trolled the destinies of Rome. In the imperial period at least, military force was
clearly recognized for what it is, an essentially limited instrument of power,
costly and brittle. Much better to conserve force and use military power indirectly,
as an instrument of political coercion.
Together with money and a manipulative diplomacy, forces visibly ready to
fight but held back from battle could serve to contrive disunity among those
who might jointly threaten the empire, to deter those who would otherwise
attack, and to control lands and peoples by intimidation— ideally to the point
where sufficient security or even an effective domination could be achieved
without any use of force at all. Having learned in the earlier republican period
how to defeat their neighbors in battle by sheer tactical strength, having later
mastered the strategic complexities of large-scale warfare in fighting the Cartha­
ginians, the Romans finally learned that the most desirable use of military power
was not m ilitary at all, but political; and indeed they conquered the entire
Hellenistic world with few' battles and much coercive diplomacy.
The same effort to conserve force w'as also evident in war, at the tactical level.
The ideal Roman general was not a figure in the heroic style, leading his troops
in a reckless charge to victory or death. He wrould rather advance in a slow and
carefully prepared inarch, building supply roads behind him and fortified
camps each night in order to avoid the unpredictable risks of rapid maneuver.
He preferred to let the enemy retreat into fortified positions rather than accept
the inevitable losses of open warfare, and he would wait to starve out the enemy
in a prolonged siege rather than suffer great casualties in taking the fortifica­
tions by storm. Overcoming the spirit o f a culture still infused with Greek
martial ideals (that most reckless of men, Alexander the Great, was actually an
object of worship in many Roman households), the great generals of Rome
were noted for their extreme caution.
It is precisely this aspect of Roman tactics (in addition to the heavy reliance
on combat engineering) that explains the relentless quality ol Roman armies
 gu!qu!o^j^^^^g^22l
Introduction 3

on the move, as well as their peculiar resilience in adversity: the Romans won
their victories slowly, but they were very hard to defeat.
Just as the Romans had apparently no need of a Clausewitz to subject their
military energies to the discipline of political goals, it seems that they had no
need of modern analytical techniques either. Innocent of the science of sys­
tems analysis, the Romans nevertheless designed and built large and complex
security systems that successfully integrated troop deployments, fixed defenses,
road networks, and signaling links in a coherent whole. In the more abstract
spheres of strategy it is evident that, whether bv intellect or just traditional
intuition, the Romans understood the subtleties o f deterrence, and also its
limitations. Above all, the Romans clearly realized that the dominant dimension
of power was not physical but psychological— the product of others’ perceptions
of Roman strength rather than the use of that strength. And this realization
alone can explain the sophistication of Roman strategy at its best.
T h e siege of Masada, which followed the fall of Jerusalem , reveals the
exceedingly subtle workings o f a long-range security policy based on deter­
rence. Faced with the resistance of a few hundred Jews on top of a mountain in
the remote Judean desert, a place of no strategic or economic importance, the
Romans could have isolated the rebels by posting a few hundred men to guard
them. Based at the nearby springs of Ein Gedi, a contingent of Roman cavalry
could have waited patiently for the Jews to exhaust their water supply. Alterna­
tively, the Romans could have stormed the mountain fortress. The Jewish War
had essentially been won, and only Masada was still holding out, but this spark
of resistance might rekindle at any time the fire o f revolt. The slopes of Masada
are steep, and the Jews were formidable fighters, but with several thousand
men pressing from all sides the defenders could not have held off the attackers
tor long, though they could have killed many.
The Romans did none o f these things. T h ey did not starve out the Jews,
and they did not storm the mountain. Instead, at a time w'hen the entire Roman
army had a total of only 29 legions to garrison the entire empire, an entire
legion was deployed to besiege Masada, there to reduce the fortress by great
works of engineering, including a huge ramp reaching the full height of the
mountain. 'The subordination of tactical priorities, martial ideals, and warlike
instincts to political as well as ideological goals was the essential condition of
Km nan strategic success. This was a vast and seemingly irrational commitment
• »I scarce militarv manpower— or was it? The entire three-year operation, and
1 lie \ cr\ msignilicancc ol its objective, must have made an ominous impression
4 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

on all those in the East who might otherwise have been tempted to contem­
plate revolt. T he lesson of Masada was that the Romans would pursue rebellion
even to mountaintops in remote deserts to destroy its last vestiges, regardless
of cost. The methodical nature of the siege demonstrates the fact that although
the goal was deterrence, this was no imprudent or irrational response. And as
if to ensure that the message was duly heard, and duly remembered, Josephus
was installed in Rome where he wrote a detailed account of the siege, which was
published in Greek, the acquired language of Josephus and of the Roman East.
T he suggestion that the Masada operation was a calculated act of psycho­
logical warfare is of course conjecture. But the alternative explanation is incred­
ible, for mere blind obstinacy in pursuing the siege would be utterly inconsistent
with all that we know of the protagonists, especially Vespasian— that most
practical of men, the emperor whose chief virtue was a shrewd common sense.
We need not rely upon conjecture to reconstruct in considerable detail the
basic features of Roman imperial statecraft from the first century C E to the
third, the subject of this inquiry. The narrative sources that could have revealed
at least declared motives and ostensible rationales are sadly incomplete and
sometimes suspect. But the labors of generations of scholars have yielded a mass
of detailed evidence on the physical elements of imperial strategy: the force
structure of the army, the design of border defenses, and the layout of individ­
ual fortifications. At the same time, enough is known of the salient moments
and general nature of Roman diplomacy to form a coherent picture of imperial
statecraft as a whole, both the hardware and the software so to speak.
Three distinct methods of imperial security can be identified over the
period. Each combined diplomacy military forces, road networks, and fortifi­
cations to serve a single objective, functioning therefore as a system up to a
point, albeit with local variations, interruptions, and exceptions. But each
addressed a distinct set of priorities, themselves the reflection of evolving con­
ceptions of empire: hegemonic expansionism for the first system; territorial
security for the second; and finally, in diminished circumstances, sheer survival
for the imperial power itself. Each system wras based on a different combination
of diplomacy, direct force, and fixed infrastructure, and each entailed different
operational methods, but more fundamentally, each system reflected a different
Roman world view' and self-image.
W ith brutal simplicity, it might be said that with the first system the Romans
of the republic conquered much to serve the interests of a few, those living in
the city— and in fact still fewer, those best placed to control policy. I h i r i n g t he
 Introduction

first century C E Roman ideas evolved toward a much broader and altogether
more benevolent conception of empire. Under the aegis of the second system,
men born in lands far from Rome could call themselves Romans and have their
claim fully allowed; and the frontiers were efficiently developed to defend the
growing prosperity of all, and not merely of the privileged. T h e result was the
empire o f the second century, which served the security interests of millions
rather than of thousands.
Under the third system, organized in the wuke of the great crisis of the third
century, the provision of security became an increasingly heavy charge on
society— and a charge very unevenly distributed, w'hich could enrich the wealthy
while certainly ruining the poor. The machinery of empire now became increas­
ingly self-serving, wdth its tax collectors, administrators, and soldiers of much
greater use to one another than to the society at large. Even then the empire
retained the loyalties of many, for the alternative w'as chaos. When this ceased
to be so, when organized barbarian states capable of providing a measure of law
and order began to emerge in lands that had once been Roman, then the last
system o f imperial security lost its last source o f support, men’s fear of the
unknown.
C H A P T E R ONE

T h e Ju lio-C lau d ian System

Client States and Mobile Armies from
Augustus to Nero

The first system of imperial security was essentially that of the late republic, though it
continued into the first century CE under that peculiar form of autocracy we know as
the principate. Created by the party of Octavian, himself a master of constitutional
ambiguity, the principate was republican inform but autocratic in content. The mag­
istracies were filled as before to supervise public life, and the Senate sat as before, seem­
ingly in charge of city and empire. But real control was now in the hands of the family
and personal associates of Octavian, a kinsman and heir of Julius Caesar and the ul­
timate victor of the civil war that had begun with Caesars murder and ended in yi
BCE with the final defeat of Antony and Cleopatra.
Julius Caesar the dictator had overthrown the weak institutions of the republic.
His heir, all-powerful after Actium, restored and immediately subverted the republic. In
27 BCE, Octavian adopted the name Augustus, redolent with semireligious authority;
Rotne had a new master. In theory, Augustus was only the first citizen (princeps), but
this was a citizen who controlled election to all the magistracies and the command of all
the armies.
Neither oriental despot nor living god, the princeps was in theory still bound by the
laws and subject to the will of the Senate. But the direct power controlled by Augustus,
the power of his legions, fa r outweighed the authority of the Senate, and the senators
gave this power its due in their eager obedience.
Under Augustus the vast but fragmented conquests of two centuries of republican
expansionism were rounded off and consolidated in a single generation. There has been
much scholarly debate on the ambitions and motives of the age. What is certain is that
Spain was fully occupied by 25 BCE, and three provinces were organized (Baetica,
Lusitania, and Tarraconensis), though the last native revolt was not suppressed until
ip BCE. The interior of Gaul, conquered by Caesar but not organized by him for tax
collection, was divided into three new provinces (Aquitania, Lugdunensis, and Rel-
gica). In southern Gaul, the old province of Gallia Transalpina, formed in 121 BCE,
 The Julio-Claudian System 7

was not reorganized but merely renamed Narbonensis; this was a land already heavily
Romanized and long since civilized.
Germany was another matter. It was not until circa 12 B C E that Roman incur­
sions reached the Elbe. Roman soldiers and traders were establishing a presence, but to
establish a German province it would be necessary to eliminate all independent powers
between the Rhine and the Elbe. This the Romans set out to do, beginning in the year
6 with a great pincer operation from the upper Rhine and the Danube, which was to
enclose what is now Bohemia and trap the Marcomanni, the most powerful nation in
southern Germany. In the meantime, P. Quinctilius Varus was in northwestern Ger­
many with three legions and auxiliary troops, not tofight but to organize tax collection
in lands already counted as conquered.
But the great offensive against the Marcomanni had to be called off just as it was
about to begin: lllyricum, in the rear of the southern pincer, had erupted in a great
revolt. In the year 9 the revolt was finally suppressed, but just then the three legions
and auxiliary troops o f Varus were ambushed and destroyed by the Germans of A r-
minius, a former auxiliary in Roman service and a chief of the Cherusci. The Varian
disaster brought the Augustan conquest of Germany to an end. The lands east of the
Rhine were evacuated, and two military commands, fo r Upper and Lower Germany,
were established instead to control the lands west of the Rhine.
To the south, Roman policy had greater success. The Alpine lands stretching from
the foothills in northern Italy to the upper course of the Danube were subdued by ty
BCE, partly to be incorporated into Italy and partly to be organized into two prov­
inces, Raetia and Noricum (roughly, Bavaria, Switzerland, and western Austria).
East of Noricum, the sub-Danubian lands already under Roman control encompassed
the coastal tracts of lllyricum, Macedonia, and the client kingdom of Thrace. Under
. lugustus, Roman power conquered all the remaining riparian lands of the Danube,
stretching from Croatia to Soviet Moldavia on the modern map. In the year 6, when
the encirclement of the Marcomanni was about to begin, Roman power was still too
new to pacify these lands, which are notfully tranquil even in our own day. When the
revolt came, it was on a grand scale; the so-called Pannonian revolt, which was actu­
ally centered in the roadless mountain country of lllyricum, was by fa r the most costly
of the wars of Augustus. It took three years of hardfighting with as many troops as the
empire could muster— even slaves and freedtnen were recruited— to subdue lllyricum.
/ he I artan disaster followed the end of the revolt in the year 9 almost immediately, and
ambitious schemes of conquest beyond the Danube could no longer be contemplated.
The coastal hinds of lllyricum were organized into the province of Dalmatia, and the
 I .in,/ '. h .i /mm "I i I'i' l\<»ntii> Empire

•>........ L ..1111, </■, juu.-iinf uf I’liimonia. The lower course of the Danube all the way
- ' h' <-,.n ./. In (fa ibcptui n jj) Russo-Romanian frontier) wasfronted by the vast
...... ./>/,/ ,7 We, i;,/, I'/n the client kingdom of Thrace occupied much of the hinter-
*./' -, l in 111,1,1,111 lilll[i,lllll.
In //■. I .ni. there were no Augustan conquests. The western half of Anatolia had
tune hi i u pi o,'in, ml territory (the province of Asia /southwestern Turkey] dated hack
in i ;; lit .'El. I he client kingdom of Galatia was annexed in 25 B C E and formed into
.1 i>n>eiii,c; beyond Galatia, kingdoms subject to Rome stretched from the Black Sea
.it m\i to the province of Syria, the largest being the kingdom, of Cappadocia. To the
e,t\( was vast, primitive, and mountainous Armenia, ahnost entirely useless but nev­
ertheless important, for beyond Annenia and south o f it was the civilized Parthia of
the . Irsaads— the only power on the horizon that could present a serious strategic
threat to the empire.
Augustus did not try to avenge the great defeat inflicted by the Parthians on the
Roman army of Crass us in 55 BCE at Carrhae. Instead, in 20 BCE he reached a
compromise settlement under which Armenia was to be ruled by a king of the Arsacid
family, who would receive his investiture from Rome. Behind the neatly balancedfo r­
mality there was strategy, for Parthian troops would thereby be kept out of a neutral­
ized Armenia and far from undefended Anatolia and valuable Syria. There was also
politics— domestic politics. The standards lost at Carrhae were returned to Rome and
received with great ceremony; Augustus had coins issued that falsely proclaimed the
“capture” of Annenia.
Adjoining the client kingdoms of eastern Anatolia to the south was Syria, orga­
nized as a tax-paying province in 6y BCE. Next was Judea, a client kingdom until
the year 6, and beyond the Sinai, Egypt. A province since 30 BCE, Egypt was most
directly controlled by Augustus through a prefect, who could not be of senatorial rank.
A senator might dream of becoming emperor, and control of the Egyptian grain supply
could be worth many legions to a rebel.
The rest of North Africa was provincial territory: Cyrenaica (eastern Libya) had
been organized since 74 BCE, and the province of Africa (western Libya and Tunisia)
was still older, dating from, the destruction of Carthage in 146 BCE. But the circle
was not complete, and Augustus did not seek to close it: beyond the province of Africa,
in the lands of modern Algeria and Morocco, Roman control was indirect, exercised
through the client kingdom of Mauretania.
By the year 9 the energies of Augustan expansionism, were spent, exhausted by the
travails of Illyricum and Germany. This fact could not be hidden, but necessity could
be presented as virtue. When Augustus died in the year 14, h/s sie/iwn libei nt\ 0/ the
 The Julio-Claudian System 9

Claudian family (Augustus counted himself o f the Julian) received a vast empire,
which he had done much to conquer.; as his inheritance, but he also received the admo­
nition that its boundaries were not to be expanded farther.
Tiberius was both able and, it is said, sinister; he ruled until the year 57. He had to
fight to subdue internal revolts, but fought no wars of conquest. Tiberius's acquisition
of power was simple: a cowed Senate eagerly and fearfully proclaimed him ruler, and
no army commander descended on Rome with his legions to contest the office. Another
followed Tiberius by the same means— Gains, nicknamed Caligula. Unbalanced, or
perhaps merely maligned in our sources, Gains was murdered in the year 41. There
was talk of restoring the republic. But Claudius, uncle of the murdered emperor, was
proclaimed emperor in turn, not by the Senate but by the Praetorian Guard, and not
disinterestedly: each o f the 4,300 Praetorians was paid 7,750 denarii as a cash bounty,
more than 16 years' worth of pay to a private serving in the legions.
A man of grotesque appearance, foolish in his dealings with women, Claudius presided
over a regime noted for its progressive benevolence to the provincials—and which soon
resumed the path of imperial conquest after an interval of 77 years. In the year 43 Brit­
ain was invaded, to be conquered only in part thereafter, in gradual stages: more than
160 years later, the emperor Septimius Severus was still campaigning in Scotland.
Senators might still try to restore the republic with their daggers, but Claudius was
killed, probably in the year 34, by poison, for pettier motives. His stepson Nero then
ascended to the principate, the last of the Claudians. Nero inaugurated his rule with
the first Parthian War of the principate. Tiridates, an Arsacid, had been made king of
. Innenia without benefit of a Roman investiture; and it was feared that Armenia
might be transformed from, buffer state to base of operations for Parthian armies ad­
vancing against undefended Anatolia and weakly held Syria.
Nero is known for extravagance and murder.; but there was wisdom in his regime:
1 he conduct of the Parthian War was moderate and successful, the outcome another
useful compromise. In the year 66, after 1 1 years of intermittent war and almost con-
un nous diplomacy, Tiridates was crowned king of Armenia once again, but this time
m Rome.
The settlement came just in time. In the year 66 the Jewish revolt began and soon
became a major war. It was to last until the year 77, i f the isolated resistance o f M a­
sala is counted. Nero did not live to see its end. The last o f the Julio-Claudians killed
1’imsell /// (),V; misfortune or excess had left him without the support of either Praeto-
/ /am or Senate when his office was contested.
C J11Ims I 'index, u new man, a Gaul, and a governor of Lugdimensis in Gaul,
.. ./> one of the many .shorn Nero's unsystematic terror had frightened but not fully
io The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

intimidated. He declared Nero unfit for the office and proposed as princeps S. Sulpicius
Galba, who was of venerable age and noble origin, a strict disciplinarian, and very
rich. Galba could count on the aristocratic sentiments of the Senate, but as governor of
Tarraconensis he had only one legion at his disposal. He began to raise another, but
could not save Vindex when the governor of Upper Germany descended on Gaul with
his legions.
It was one thing to destroy the Gallic levies of a Gallic upstart, but quite another to
defend actively the power of Nero against Galba, a great Roman aristocrat. Thus
Nero’s cause triumphed, but Nero was lost. He had no support in Rome, or so he thought,
possibly in petulance and panic. He did not appeal to the legions on the frontiers, where
Julio-Claudian prestige might have obscured his extreme personal shortcomings.
Instead, he planned an escape to Egypt, or so it is said. En route, he was deserted by his
escort of Praetorians and sought refuge in the koine of an ex-slave. There he heard
that the Senate had declared him a public enemy, to beflogged to death according to the
ancient custom. With help, he managed to commit suicide on Jun e 9 in the year 68.
Thus ended the ride of the Julio-Claudians.

The System in Outline

The most striking feature of the Julio-Claudian system of imperial security
was its economy of force. At the death of Augustus in the year 14, the territo­
ries subject to direct or indirect imperial control comprised the coastal lands
of the entire Mediterranean basin, the whole of the Iberian peninsula, conti­
nental Europe inland to the Rhine and Danube, Anatolia, and, more loosely,
the Bosporan kingdom on the northern shores of the Black Sea. Control over
this vast territory was effectively ensured by a small army, whose size was orig­
inally determined at the beginning of the principate and only slightly in­
creased thereafter.
Twenty-five legions remained after the destruction of Varus and his 3 legions
in the year 9 and throughout the rule of Tiberius (14-37).1 Eight new legions
were raised between the accession of Gaius/Caligula in 37 and the civil war of
69-70, but 4 were cashiered, so that under Vespasian there were 29 legions on
the establishment, only one more than the original number set by Augustus.2
T h e exact manpower strength of the legions inevitably varied with circum­
stances, but it is generally agreed that at full strength each had about 6,000
men, including 5,120 or 5,280 foot soldiers, a cavalry contingent of 720 men,
and sundry headquarters troops. It is normally assumed that the legions ol the
 The Julio-Claudian System ii

principate had an establishment o f nine standard cohorts o f six centuries with

So men in each and a first cohort with six double centuries, that is, 960 men
plus 120 mounted troops; but a revised reading of the surveyor’s manual De
Munitionibus Castrorinn yields 5,120 in nine standard cohorts and one first co­
hort o f five rather than six double centuries.3 On that basis, the upper limit on
the number of legionary troops would be about 168,000 men until the year 9,
and 150,000 thereafter, and no more than 174,000 after the year 70.
In addition to the legions of heavy infantry, then still composed mostly of
long-service citizen volunteers, there were the auxilia, who were in principle
noncitizens, though that was to change.4 Organized into cavalry “ wings” (nine),
light infantry cohorts, or mixed cavalry and infantry units {cohortes equitatae), the
auxilia did not merely add to the total number under arms but were tactically and
operationally complementary to the legionary forces of heavy infantry, provid-
1ng capabilities they lacked with a great variety of cavalry and light infantry units.
There is no satisfactory evidence on the total troop strength of the auxil-
iarv forces for the empire as a whole;5 hence one cannot quarrel with the pos­
sible fanciful near-equality with the total number in the legions that Tacitus
elegantly proposed (for the year 23) in Annuls (4.5): “at apud idoneu provindariim
mine triremes alaeque et auxilia cohortium, neque multo secus in Us virium.” (There
were besides, in suitable positions in the provinces, allied fleets, cavalry, and
light infantry only slightly inferior in strength). For us, it suffices to know that
1 lie total number of auxiliary troops did not greatly exceed that of the legion-
.irv forces— a possibility nowhere suggested in the primary sources. Accepting
I he near 1:1 ratio as a valid approximation, the total number of Roman troops
unuld thus be on the order of 300,000 for the year 23, with a theoretical maxi­
mum of roughly 350,000 for the balance of the period until the year 70.6
because Augustus claimed (Res Gestae, 3) to have personally paid o ff 300,000
men on their retirement with either lands or money (“E x quihus deduxi in colo­
nial ant remisi in municipia sua stipendis enteritis millia aliquanto plura quam trecenta,
, / ns omnibus agros adsignavi ant pecuniam pro praemiis militiae dedi” ), it might
eei 11 that the total number of men in the ground forces was not especially large
In contemporary standards. But the well-known difficulties of citizen recruit­
ment, a Iread v acute at this time, reflected a true demographic problem— Pliny’s
Inn tage 111 youths” (/iiventntis penurid). The total male population of military
II■e in It a Iv probably numbered less than a million— one estimate has 900,000
mm,ncs that is, the primarv group of citizens of military age. Unsurprisingly,
\l,lj) I. I. Till- 1' 11 Ц11 IС 111 J t, ( .1‘
 LEGEND
(q U Ä d T ] - U N S U B D U E D PEOPLES
A F R IC A - IM P E R IA L P R O V IN C E
CO N U M B E R O F L E S I O N S IN P R O V I N C E
C A P P A D O C IA - C LIE N T S T A TE S

[uojsjaÄ paisjsM
_ _ _ _ _ _ p o l it ic a l/ a d m in is t r a t iv e
B O U N D A R I E S OF E M P I R E
---------------------- A P P R O X I M A T E l i m i t s
of i m p e r i a l c o n t r o l
( J ) P R O VI N C E OF J U D E A - A N N E X E D 6 C.E.
T E T R A RCH Y OF A N T I P A S
T E T R A R C H Y OF P H I L I P
TETRARCHY OF A B I L E N E
E M E S A ( O T H E R S Y R I A N S T A T E L E T S NOT S H O W N )
K I N G D O M OF C O M M A G E N E
T A R C O N D IM O T ID K IN G D O M
TEUCRIO ETHNARCHY

C IL IC IA T R A C H E IA Q E T H N A R C H Y OF C O M A N A
©ALPES C O T T IA E
© A lpes m a r it im a e
 LEGION ( c . 6000 M E .K l)

n o MAN HEADQ UARTERS ARTILLERY

CAVALRY —
CO M M AND —
60?
u n it t e c h n ic ia n s
CATAPULT'S 4 BALLISTAC
m é d ic a l s t a f f

COHORTS JtL ( 5
) "Ä . J jL 1st ' c o h o r t

stam o ard
80 80 80 60 8o 1 80 I 160 l
COHORT C O M PR ISED FIRSTCOHORT
O f 4 5 0 M E N IN 6 ~8cT I D fdpl fêo l [6o 80 "So"
— I—
m ja n W ITHDOUftLt
C E N T U R IE S PLUS CENTURIES
STAFP
So' 8o 80 80 80 80 " 80 " 160

80 "] I 80 1 80 I I 80 1 I 60 I 1 80 1 I 801 I ftç I ( 160

80 1 I 80 1 I 60 1 1 Ô0 80
—
80
I—
80 80 80 LUpJ
c e n t u r y - 50 MEu-*j 66 I I 80 I I ôo I \ 60 I | 60 I I 80 I I 80 ) I 80 I 180 •Tëo"]

9 STANDARD COHORTS = 4 3 2 0 MEN

+ 1st COHORT = 5 1 2 0 / 5 2 8 0 FOOT SOLDIERS
fcOFFENSIVE P IL U M (THROWING S P E A R j , Ö L A O IU M (S H O R T J W O R o )
WEA.PONS
^ D E F E N S IV E - H E L M E T , B O D Y A R M O R , L A R G E S H IE L D

AUXILIA (A U K IU A R Y TROOPS)

C AVALR Y M IX E D INFANTRY

ALA Q U IN G E N A R 1A COHORS EQUITATA (QUINGENARIA)

(Quinruenary ala; (mixed cohort) ' COHORS (Q U IN G E N A pTÄ )
cohort
5 1 2 HORSEMEN 380 FOOT
C. 5 0 0 MEN
1 2 0 HORSEMEN

A LA M IL L IA R IA CO HO RS EQUITATA M IL L IA R IA 1
(MILLIARY ALA) (MIXEDCOHORT, MILLIARY) 1 COHORS M IL L I A R IA
(m i l l i a r y cohort)
C.JOOO HORSEMEN 760 FOOT I C. IOOO MEN
+HEADQUARTERS TROOPS 2 4 0 H O R SEM EN 1
1 + HEADQUARTERS TROOPS |
NUMERUS
( ir r e g u l a r u n it )
O F F E N S IV E W E A P O N S - BO WS , SLINGS , t h r o w i n g s p e a r s ,lo n g s w o r d s ,
t h r u s t in g S P E A R S AND C A V ALR Y h e a v y l a n c e 5. C. 3 0 0 MEN ?

‘ " ':,re f 1 , Roman Unit Establishments in the First and Second Centuries CE
16 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

conscription was very unpopular, and it was abolished by Tiberius; as early as

circa 50 C E one-third of the legionary manpower may have been of provincial
birth.7
It was easier to pay for the army than to find suitable recruits. Annual pay
and upkeep for a trained legionary soldier in the ranks came to 225 denarii per
year; the overall cost of retirement grants, set at 3,000 denarii in the year 5, was
a burden not much smaller than pay and upkeep, and there were also occa­
sional donatives.8 Nevertheless, it has been suggested that military spending
was roughly half of total expenditures under Augustus, with the proportion
declining as government revenues increased, though others calculate that it
was more like three-quarters.9
The reorganization of the army following the civil war, which replaced the
60 leftover legions of unknown actual strength (some must have been much
depleted) with 28 proper legions at full strength, certainly made sense from an
organizational point of view. It is less likely that it was motivated by financial
constraints, if only because the reorganization required vast expeditures for
the severance grants of veterans leaving the army.
In that famous passage already cited, Annals 4.5, Tacitus provides the only
comprehensive survey of the deployment of the legions that can be found in
the narrative sources. Its accuracy has long been accepted by scholars.10 Ac­
cording to Tacitus, in the year 23, the ninth year of the reign ofTiberius, there
were eight legions on the Rhine, three in Spain, two in the province of Africa,
two in Egypt, four in Syria, two in Moesia and two in Pannonia (for a total of
four along the Danube), and two in Dalmatia, for a total of twenty-five. And
then there were the auxilia, o f which Tacitus refrains from giving a detailed
breakdown. From this account one may gather the impression that the legion­
ary forces, and the auxiliary troops with them, wrere distributed to form a thin
perimeter. The consequent lack of a strategic reserve, held uncommitted in
the deep rear, has regularly been noted and criticized."
It is true that the forces in Italy, nine Praetorian cohorts and four urban
cohorts, did not amount to much; the latter were primarily a police force and
the former could provide no more than a strong escort for the rulers of Rome
when they set out to campaign in person. On the other hand, Tacitus describes
the two Dalmatian legions as a strategic reserve, which could cover in situ the
northeastern invasion axes into Italy while also being available for redeploy­
ment elsewhere, because Dalmatia was not a frontier province.
 The Julio-Claudian System 17

In fact, the impression of a perimeter deployment is misleading. For one thing,

as it has been pointed out, a key factor in the distribution of the legions was the
need to confront internal threats, with external security only relevant in some
sectors.12 That explains the three legions in Spain, which was not frontier terri­
tory but was in the final stages of a secular pacification effort, and the two legions
of Dalmatia, in the rear of the forces holding Pannonia. As Tacitus points out,
Dalmatia was a convenient location for a strategic reserve, but the province had
also been the scene of the dangerous Pannonian revolt in 6-9, “the most serious
of all our foreign wars since the Carthaginian ones,” according to Suetonius in
Tiberius 16 (“gravisshnum omnium externorum bellorum post Punica”).
Similarly, the two legions in Egypt were obviously not required to ward off
external threats, such as nomadic incursions. To counter or deter such elusive
enemies, auxiliary units, especially if mounted, were much more effective than
t he solid mass of the legions. T he latter, on the other hand, were very suitable
lor the task of maintaining internal security.
There was as yet no demarcated imperial frontier and no system of fixed
Irontier defenses, nor were the legions housed in permanent stone fortresses as
t hey would be in the future. Instead, the troops slept in leather tents or in
winter quarters (hiberna) built of wood, in camps whose perimeter defenses
were not always more elaborate than those of the camps that legionary forces
on the move would build each afternoon at the conclusion of the day’s march.
Nor were such legionary camps sited as tactical strong points, as Tacitus makes
clear in Histories (4.23) in describing the site of Vetera (Xanten), the camp in
which part of one legion and the remnants o f another came under attack dur­
ing the revolt of Civilis in 69-70. Indeed, they were not defensive positions at
ill (“ hide non loco neque nmnimentis labor additus: vis et arm a satis placebant”).
Deployed astride major routes leading both to unconquered lands ahead
.mil to the sometimes-unsettled provinces in the rear, the legions were not
1 lu re to defend the adjacent ground, but rather to serve as mobile striking
l<lives. For practical purposes, their deployment was that of a field army, distrib­
uted, it is true, in high-threat sectors, but not tied down to territorial defense.
I mm nixed in major wars of conquest between the years 6 and 43 (Britain), the
11111 \ ’s salient tunction was necessarily to defend what Rome already had rather
1 li.m to conquer more—until the policy changed.
\sule Iroiu the sporadic transborder incursions of Germans, Dacians, and,
l.iiri, Samial ians and Irom the rivalrv with Parthia over Armenia, Rome’s major
18 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

security problems were the result of native revolts within the empire. Charac­
teristically, a delay, sometimes o f generations, would intervene between the
initial conquest and the outbreak of revolt. W hile the native power structure
and the “ nativist atmosphere” were still largely intact (and with Rome itself
having introduced concepts of leadership and cohesion through the local re­
cruitment of auxiliary forces), the resistance to the full impact of imperial
taxation and conscription was often violent, sometimes more so than the resis­
tance to the initial conquest had been.13 Thus we see the revolt in Illyricum
of the years 6-9 and the intermittent revolt of Tacfarinas in Africa between 14
and 24 C E ; there were also more localized uprisings, such as that of Florus and
Sacrovir in Gaul in the year 21 and, as a borderline case, the Jewish War.
Because northwestern Germany had been counted as conquered, the scant
military experience of P. Quinctilius Varus— “a leading lawyer without any
military qualities”14— limited to a peaceful march through uncontested Sa­
maria with two legions, must have seemed sufficient. In any case, because
Varus was there to organize a province rather than conquer one, the “ Varian
disaster” of the year 9 must also be counted as an “ internal” war.15
Throughout this period, the control of internal insurgency presented a far
more difficult problem than the maintenance of external security vis-a-vis
Parthia—whose power was a serious threat certainly, but only in the East,
hence a regional rather than a systemic threat. The Parthians certainly had no
aspirations to conquer the entire Roman empire; accordingly, Tacitus (Annals,
13.6-7) makes it clear that the Romans considered them a regional rival, which
was more than any other enemy anywhere near the empire was at the time.
The colonies were a second instrument o f strategic control. Julius Caesar
had routinely settled his veterans outside Italy, and Augustus founded 28 colo­
nies for the veterans discharged from the legions. N ot primarily intended as
agencies o f Romanization,16 the colonies were islands o f direct Roman control
in an empire still in part hegemonic; as such, they were especially important in
areas such as Anatolia, where legions were not ordinarily deployed. Whether
located in provincial or client-state territory, the colonies provided secure ob­
servation and control bases. Their citizens were, in effect, a ready-made m ili­
tia of ex-soldiers and soldiers’ sons, who could defend their hometowns in the
event of attack and hold out until imperial forces could arrive on the scene.
They also provided a local base for operations in otherwise unpacified regions.
Neither the legions and auxilia deployed in their widely spaced bases nor
the colonies outside Italy, scattered as they were, could ponide an\ thing re
 The Julio-Claudian System

sembling an all-round perimeter defense. There were no guards and patrols to

prevent infiltration of the 4,000 miles of the imperial perimeter on land; there
were no contingents of widely distributed mobile forces ready to intercept
raiding parties or contend with localized attacks; there was no perimeter defense.
In other words, there was no limes, in its later and conventional meaning o f a
fortified and guarded border.1. At this time the word limes still retained its
lorrner (but not, apparently, original) meaning of an access road perpendicular
10 the border of secured imperial territory. Limes thus described a route of
penetration cut through hostile territory rather than a “ horizontal” frontier,
and certainly not a fortified defensive perimeter.
It is the absence of a perimeter defense that is the key to the entire system of
Roman imperial security of this period. There were neither border defenses
nor local forces to guard imperial territories against the low-intensity threats
. >1 petty infiltration, transborder incursion, or localized attacks. As we shall
see, such protection was provided, but only by indirect and nonm ilitary
means. By avoiding the burden of maintaining continuous frontier defenses,
that is, the dispersal of imperial forces over very long perimeters, the deployable
military power that could be generated by the imperial forces was maximized.
I lence, the total military power that others could perceive as being available to
Rome for offensive use— and that could therefore be put to political advantage
l>\ diplomatic means—was also maximized. Thus the empire’s potential mili-
n ry power could be converted into actual political control at a high rate of
exchange.
The diplomatic instruments that achieved this conversion were the client
■ latcs and client tribes, whose obedience reflected both their perceptions of
Roman military power and their fear of retaliation. Since clients would take
care to prevent attacks against provincial territory, their obedience lessened
1 lie need to provide local security at the periphery of the empire against low-
miensity threats, thus increasing the empire’s net disposable military power—
.md so completing the cycle.

The Client States

In 1 lie year 14, when 'Tiberius succeeded Augustus to the principate, a substan-
1 cil pari ol imperial territory was constituted by client states, which were defi-
imd\ of the empire even if perhaps not fully within it, as Strabo (6.4.2) duly
1 1 . , ip ni/ed. I .egallv, I he constituted client states c ame under the jus postl i mi-
ui i , c\ ( i i 1 1inn id 1 lor 1110s 1 purposes 1 licv were t realed as de facto extensions of
20 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

imperial territory.18 In the West primitive Mauretania was ruled by Juba II, a
Roman creature originally established on his throne in 25 B C E . In the Levant,
Judea was now a province, but in parts of Herod’s former kingdom the tetrar-
chies of Philip and of Antipas remained autonomous. In Syria, the small kingdom
ofEm esa and the tetrarchy of Abilene were comparatively well-defined entities
in an area that included a welter of lesser client cities and client tribes— Pliny’s
17 “ tetrarchies with barbarous names” (fpraeter tetrarchias in regna descriptas
bitrharis nominibus”-,."Natural History, 5.81).
East of Judea was the merchant state of Nabatean Arabia. Its sparse popula­
tion lived in small cities or roamed the desert, and its ill-defined territories
stretched across Sinai and northern Arabia. Western Anatolia was organized
into provinces, except for the “free league” o f Lycia, but farther east there
were still two large client states, Cappadocia and Pontus, as well as the smaller
Teucrid principality, the Tarcondimotid kingdom, Comana, and the impor­
tant Armenian kingdom of Commagene— its once famous capital, Samosata,
is now flooded, lost to a Turkish dam—whose territory included the southern
access routes to contested Armenia, the crucial strategic back door to Parthia.
Across the Black Sea the Bosporan kingdom that extended on either side of
the straits of Kerch (Pantikapaion in the Greek of Roman times) included
eastern Crimea and the western part of the Taman peninsula. It had no conti­
guity with imperial territory but was subject to substantial Roman control
nonetheless, in spite of its chronic turbulence. This upheaval did not prevent it
from being the most long-lasting of Roman client states, whose rulers were
periodically removed, only to be reinstated; when it reached as far as the Don
estuary, then a great trade market, its shortcomings were offset in Roman eyes
by its commercial value. In the Balkans, Thrace remained a client state until
the year 46. Even in the northern extremities of the Italian peninsula the
important transit point of the Cottian Alps was ruled by a local chief, albeit
one who was no more than an appointed official in the Romans’ view.
These constituted client states of the still partially hegemonic empire did
not exhaust the full scope of the client system. Roman diplomacy, especially
during the principate of Tiberius, also established an “invisible frontier” of
client relationships with the more primitive peoples beyond the Rhine and
Danube.19 Lacking the cultural base that a more advanced material culture and
Greek ideas provided in the East, these clients were not as satisfactory as those
of Anatolia or the Levant. Specifically, diplomatic relationships were less stable,
partly because the (rower of those who dealt with Rome was itself less stable
 The Julio-Claudim i System 21

(it was client rulers who made client states). Aloreover, these clients, who were
migratory if not nomadic, had a last resort that the territorial client states of
the East never had— migration beyond the reach of Roman power.
Conditions were thus unfavorable, but the Romans were persistent. In 16
C E Tiberius called off the series of reprisal offensives against the Germans
beyond the Rhine, which had followed the destruction of the three legions
under Varus. As soon as the Roman threat was removed, the two strongest
powers remaining in Germany, the Cherusci of Arminius and the Marcoman-
nic kingdom o f Maroboduus, naturally began to fight one another, which, we
are told by Tacitus, was Tiberius’s intention, and the way was opened for a
Roman diplomatic offensive.'0 During the remainder of Tiberius’s principate
i his resulted in the creation of a chain of clients from Lower Germany to the
middle Danube. The Frisii, Batavi, Herntunduri, Alarcomanni, Quadi, and
Sarmatian Tazyges (whose settlement between the Tisza and the Danube had
been procured by Rome) all became client tribes.21
This wholesale diplomatic subjugation was the product of a rational strategic
policy on the part of Tiberius {plum comilio quam vi perfecisse), which generated
i he greatest security with the lowest level of applied force. Even in Britain, client
relationships had been established in the wake of Julius Caesar’s reconnaissance
i n force,12 though Strabo’s description (4.5.3) of an “ intimate union” was no doubt
.111 exercise in Augustan public relations: Britain remained unconquered and
1 >nl\ marginally subjected to Roman desires.
These important diplomatic instruments were maintained by the succès-
.1 its of Tiberius, as some had been developed before him. The territories of
1 licsc tribal clients could not be thought of as being within the perimeter of
imperial security, nor were they destined for ultimate annexation, as the east-
mu client states were. Sometimes dependent and therefore obedient, and
■' 01 let imes hostile, client tribes and tribal kingdoms required constant manage-
Mi' in with the full range of Roman diplomatic techniques, from subsidies to
I>111111 i\ c warfare.
Roman notions of foreign client polities and the Roman view of the rela-
iiinship between empire and client were rooted in the traditional pattern of
II iiiom client relationships in Roman municipal life.2’ The essential transac-
ii"u "I these unequal relationships was the exchange of rewards (bénéficia)
nlrd In the patron lor sen ices {officia) performed by the client. Discrete
1 1. I n 1. >1a. "I the mequaht \ bet w een empire and client w ere recognized, though
a h tin 1 1 nit iiiiiinc iin re.r.r in Rinnan power a divergence oltcn developed
 HEGEMONIC EMPIRE

LEGEND
>F 1 * F L Ü -------- PR O V IN C IA L TER RITO R Y

<c- A/ ------ ------ C LIE N T STATE B O U N D A R IE S

C
-------- C L IE N T TR IBE BOUNDARIES
O .y
£g C O M B IN E D TASK FO R C E S OF LESION
\ - \ 9 l o m a 7v c / AND A U X IL IA .

D IS P O S A B L E A N D C O N C E N T R A T E D
C L IE N T S R E S P O N S IB L E \ IM P E R IA L FO R C E S A V A IL A B L E F O R
FOR LO CAL D E F E N S E W A R S OF C ON Q U E S T A U D IN T IM ID A T IO N
A N D IN T E R N A L S E C U R IT Y OF C L IE N T S

LE G E N D
S U A R D E D OR FORTIFIED FRONTIER
P E R IM E T E R

PROVINCIAL BOUNDARY

•6 * * L e g i o n s a n d a u x il ia r y u n it s
D IS TR IB U TE D FOR FRONTIER DEFENSE

All c l ie n t s an n exed or abandoned .

A L L IM P E R IA L FORCES DEPLOYED FOR FRONTIER
D ETERREN C E A N D D E F E N S E . NO "DISPOSABLE
FORCES F O R O F F E N S E OR D E F E N S E ,

I M P E R I A L F O R C E S D IR E C T L Y R E S P O N S IB L E
F O R P E R I M E T E R D E F E N S E A N D IN T E R N A L
SECURITY.

iu n i.z. Two .Models of Empire

2Q2E£Z!iEI5 I^Sö<
24 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Etnpire

between the formal and the actual relationship. By the later stages o f the pro­
cess, a client king whose formal status was that of a “ friend of the Roman people”
(/amicus populi Romani)— a title suggesting recognition for services rendered
“with a lively sense of favours still to come,” but with no connotation of
subservience24—was generally no more than a vehicle of Roman control. T h is
applied not only to foreign and security policies but also to dynastic and domes­
tic matters. In fact, no clear areas o f authority were left as the client ruler’s
prerogative.2’
The conventional characterization of the client kingdoms as “ buffer states”
does not correctly define their complex role in the system of imperial security.
Only Armenia was a true buffer state, serving as a physical neutral zone between
the greater powers of Rome and Parthia, and providing them with a device
that would help them to avoid conflict as long as they desired to avoid conflict.
But Armenia was sui generis, acting as a true client state only intermittently.26
The security officia provided by the client states amounted to much more than
the passivity of a true buffer state.
There were positive acts (including the provision of local troops to serve as
auxiliaries for the Roman army and for purely Roman purposes),27 but the
most important function of the client states in the system of imperial security
was not formally recognized as an officium at all. By virtue of their very exis­
tence, the client states absorbed the burden of providing peripheral security
against border infiltration and other low-intensity threats, and they also pro­
vided the added geographic depth o f their own territory to counter medium-
and high-intensity threats.
At this time there was no truly empire-wide threat, though some lesser
threats may have been seen as such: for example, in the year 6 there was mo­
mentary fear of a Germ anic invasion of Gaul and even of Italy in the aftermath
of the Varian disaster. As usual, Suetonius (Augustus, 23) captured the dra­
matic moment: “Hac nuntiata excubias per urbem indixit, ne quit tumultus exsis-
teret, et praesidibus provinciarmn propagavit imperium, ut a peritis et asstietis socii
continerentur.” And (Tiberius, 17) “nemine dubitante quin victores Germani iunc-
turi se Pannoniis fuerint, nisi debellatwn prills lllyricum esset,” in regard to the
sinister if most unlikely danger that the fierce Pannonians and Germans might
combine against Rome. Misplaced fears aside, the only power that counted
was Parthia. It was still recognized as a potentially formidable rival, but under
the later Arsacids, who lasted till 244, Parthia was chronically weakened by
internal struggles and does not appear to have been viewed as ,1 gieai menace.
 The Julio-Claudian System 25

In Tacitus’s later view, at any rate, the freedom of the Germans was deemed a
more formidable threat than the Arsacid despots: “<7uippe regno Arsacis acrior est
Germanorum liberties’’ (Germania, 37).
Partly because o f the nature of the threats faced by Rome, the value of the
client states in the security system as a whole far exceeded any effort required
to maintain them, because their contribution was not merely additive to R o­
man military power, but complementary. Effective client states could provide
lor their own internal security and for their own perimeter defense against
low-intensity threats, absolving the empire from that responsibility. For ex­
ample, after Herod’s death the turbulent land of the Jews required the pres­
ence o f at least one legion (X Fretensis) and sometimes more: three legions (V
Macedonica, X Fretensis, X V Apollinaris) from the year 67 until the Jewish
revolt was finally suppressed three years later, and the X Fretensis alone
t hereafter; then two legions around the time of the outbreak of Bar Kokhba’s
revolt of the year 132, V I Ferrata and X Fretensis, which remained in place
thereafter.28
The provision of internal security was the most obvious function of client
states, and it is the one most commonly recognized.29 In addition, however,
efficient client states could also shield adjacent provincial territories from low-
mtensity threats emanating from their own territory or from the far side of
the client state’s periphery. For example, in Tacitus (Annals, 4.24), we read of
Tacfarinas fought by client-state troops. Often approximated but not always
achieved even by the most successful client states, this level of efficiency re­
quired a very delicate balance between strength and weakness, such as that
supposedly achieved by Deiotarus, the client king of Galatia (d. 40 BC E), who
was described in Cicero’s special pleading (Deiotarus, 22) as strong enough to
guard his borders but not strong enough to threaten Roman interests:
"\umquam eas capias rex Deiotarus habuit quibus inferre helium populo Romano
posset, sed quibus finis suos ab excursionibus et latrociniis tueretur et imperatoribus
iimtris auxilia neitteret.”
More commonly perhaps, the client states could not ensure high standards
"I miernal and perimeter security comparable to those o f provincial territory.
Sometimes there were major disorders that threatened adjacent provincial
lands or important strategic routes and therefore required the direct interven­
tion ol imperial forces. In King Juba’s Mauretania, for example, 30 years of
11 in 1 inn tent war la re were needed to subdue the Caetuli; the fighting continued
mild the \ ear ft. Soon l bet e.il lei, I he revolt ol 1ai lari nas broke out m nort hern
i6 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

Africa, not to be finally suppressed until the year 24, with the eventual com­
mitment of two legions, III Augusta and IX Hispana.30 (The revolt was cen­
tered in the province of Africa, but Mauretania and its chronically unruly
tribes were also involved.) Another client state with severe internal and exter­
nal security problems was Thrace, whose ruler, Rhoemetalces I, and his quar­
reling successors had to be repeatedly assisted against the Bessi.31 But even in
such cases, the status of the territories involved made an important difference.
I f direct Roman intervention did become necessary, its goal could be limited
to the essential minimum of protecting local Roman assets and keeping the
client ruler in control of his people, in contrast to the much greater military
effort ordinarily required for suppressing insurgencies fully and bringing the
affected areas up to provincial standards of tranquility. In other words, the
direct intervention of Rome in the affairs of a client state would not mean that
every rebel band would have to be pursued into deep forest or remote desert,
as the Roman system of deterrence and Roman prestige required in provincial
territory, with the siege of Masada in the barren Judean desert as the extreme
case.32 There, the entire tenth legion was commited to besiege fanatics holding
out on top of an inconsequential mountain.
When client forces were inadequate, the locals could at least absorb the re­
sultant insecurity, and the Romans were content to let them do so.33 To censure
Rome for this, as Mommsen did in commenting that the client states enjoyed
neither “peace nor independence,” reveals a lack of historical perspective and
imposes anachronistic values on a premodern political relationship.34 As we
shall see, it was only much later that the systemic goals of the empire changed,
requiring a modification in the fundamental strategy toward provision of high
standards of security even at the peripheries of empire.
Against high-intensity threats, such as invasions on a provincial or even a
regional scale, client states and client tribes could contribute both their own
organic forces and their territorial capacity to absorb the threat— in other
words, they could provide geographic depth. Any system of troop deployment
that achieves high levels of economy of force does so by avoiding the diffusion
of strength entailed by the distribution of forces along the full length of a de­
fensive perimeter. Consequently, if high-intensity threats do materialize, they
can usually be dealt with only after the fact. In the event of an invasion, enemy
penetrations can only be countered and reversed after additional forces have
been redeployed to the scene, and given the Roman rates ol strategic mobility.
 The Julio-Claudian System 27

this was likely to happen, if at all, long after the damage had been done.3’ N ot­
withstanding a justly renowned road system, movements on land were of
course very slow— 3 miles per hour for marching troops, then as now, or 24-30
miles a day at most. Inter-sector journeys (e.g., Pannonia to eastern Anatolia)
would accordingly take up much o f a campaigning season. Movements at sea
could be much faster, and often were much more direct.
Given the relationship between the system’s economy of force and its inabil­
ity to defend all frontier sectors all of the time or to campaign simultaneously
on a serious scale on separate fronts (though nobody who can avoid doing so
would ever do that), it was essential for the success of the system to limit the
damage that high-intensity threats could inflict rapidly. I f the damage were
great, the costs of such penetrations could exceed the benefits achieved by the
centralized deployment of forces. T he client states were critically important in
reducing these costs: even if their own forces could not maintain a defense until
imperial troops arrived on the scene, the resultant damage would be inflicted
not on Rome, but on what was not yet Roman territory in the full sense. This
would considerably reduce the loss of prestige and the domestic political costs
of enemy invasions to the rulers of Rome. Thus, during this period no Roman
lorces were ordinarily deployed to guard the entire Anatolian sector (from
Zeugma in northeastern Syria to the Black Sea), which faced Armenia and the
major invasion axes from Parthia. Instead, at the time of Tiberius’s accession to
1 lie principate in the year 14, it was the client rulers of Pontus, Cappadocia, and
( aimmagene who guarded the entire sector with their own forces, and it was
1 heir territories that would have absorbed the first impact of an invasion.
In a typical failure to appreciate the strategic significance of the Augustan
.HTangement, whose very essence was the avoidance o f perimeter deployment,
the absence o f permanent Roman garrisons has been described as a “grave
military defect.” 36 By 72 C E , in the principate ofVespasian, all three states had
been annexed, and annexation required the deployment of a costly permanent
garrison of two legions on the Anatolian-Armenian border; both were sta-
1 a ined in the reorganized province of Cappadocia.3' Thus, instead of an “invis­
ible" border guarded by others at no direct cost to Rome, a new defended sector
b.id to be created, and a supporting road infrastructure had to be built. When
1 In supposed “defect” was duly corrected, the defense o f eastern Anatolia per­
manent Iv reduced the empire’s disposable military power, and therefore reduced
1 be system's economy ol force.
28 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

Another obvious contribution of client states and client tribes to Roman

security was the supply o f local forces to augment Roman field armies on
campaign. Naturally, these troops would fall into the Roman category of
auxilia, that is, cavalry and light infantry, rather than legionary forces of heavy
infantry. (Though one legion, the X X II Deiotariana, originated, as its cogno­
men indicates, in a formation raised by Deiotarus of Galatia, which had been
trained and equipped as heavy infantry in the legionary manner).38 In fact,
many of the auxilia organic to the imperial army started out as tribal levies,
which were then absorbed into the regular establishment, or as client-state
troops, which were incorporated into the Roman army when their home states
were absorbed.39 Auxiliary troops contributed by clients had played an impor­
tant part in the campaigns of the republic, not least because they could provide
military specialties missing from the regular Roman arsenal, such as archers
and, especially, mounted archers.
T h e complementarity between auxilia and legionary forces was an impor­
tant feature of the Roman m ilitary establishment; moreover, the forces
maintained by the client states were substantial. Even in the year 67, when the
clients of the East had been much reduced by annexation, the three legions
deployed under Vespasian to subdue the Jewish revolt were augmented, ac­
cording to Josephus, by is,000 men contributed by Antiochus IV of Comma-
gene, Agrippa II, Sohaemus of Emesa, and the Arab ruler Malchus.40 Forces
supplied by client kings or tribal leaders relieved the pressure on the available
pool of citizen manpower (as did the regular noncitizen auxilia) and reduced
I lie financial burden on the Roman military treasury (aerarium mHitare). Even
II (hey received pay and upkeep (as the tribal levies must have done), the auxil­
iaries would not have to be paid the very generous retirement grants due to
legionary troops.
Weighed against these benefits, however, was the corresponding loss of
Ir.c a I revenue that the client system entailed: once duly annexed as provinces,
■ Inm suites would of course bear the full burden o f imperial taxation. Tribal
. In in s Imm which it was not easy to extract tribute, one imagines— seem to
line contributed fighting manpower to the empire in lieu of tribute, as the
I'. irn 1 certainly did.41

I lit- Management of the Clients

I In value ol state and tribal clients in the system ol imperial sec u n i t was a
1 1 n nmi m pi a re 1 il Ro ma n si at eera 11 (Tacit us, ( ieru/auia. { () I n 11 e. sn t \ r\ <il t lie
 The Julio-Claudian System 29

distribution of imperial forces, Tacitus added the client kingdoms of Maureta­

nia and Thrace and the Iberian, Albanian, and other kings of the Caucasus to
his listing o f the legions, obviously viewing the clients as forces to be added
up, even if they could never be the equivalent of Roman legionary forces (as
opposed to the more comparable auxilia).42 In the same passage in Germania,
Tacitus carefully distinguished the status rankings of the various clients he
mentioned: Mauretania was described as “ a gift from the Roman people”
to Juba II, while the Caucasian clients were viewed more or less as protector­
ates, “ to whom our greatness was a protection against any foreign powrer.”
Thrace, ruled as it was by native clients (Rhoemetalces at the time) and sub­
jected but not created by Rome, was said to be “held” by the Romans (Tacitus,
Annals, 4.5).
W hat contemporary observers like Tacitus may not have fully realized was
that the clients were not merely additive but complementary to Roman m ili­
tary power— that is, they provided a different and synergistic form of power,
not just more force; and this complementarity was crucial to the preservation
of Rome’s economy of military force. In fact, the system presupposed a hege­
monic rather than a territorial structure o f empire, as the republican empire
clearly had been and as the principate also was at first, but eventually ceased
to lie.43
( Ictavian had clearly appreciated the value of the system,44 so much so that
alter his victory at Actium he had no compunction about confirming the rule
ot s i x of the major clients who had faithfully served his rival Antony, because
I hcv «ere essential to the proto-empire as it existed.4’ It was only with minor
clients that Octavian allowed himself the luxury o f punishing his enemy’s
II lends and rewarding his own; for example, he removed the Tarcondimotid
uilcrs of Hierapolis-Castabala (in Cilicia) who had been faithful to Antony
mini the end. Even there, however, he eventually reversed himself and rein-
■t.iied the Tarcondimotid Philopator a decade after Actium, a battle in wdrich
I'hilopator’s father had lost his life on Antony’s side.40 Octavian evidently dis-
ii ncrcd (and Augustus remembered) that efficient and reliable client rulers
" in - verv valuable instruments, and that not every associate deserving of re-
mod could master the exacting techniques o f client statecraft.
Iidicrcntlx dynamic and unstable, client rulers, both royal and tribal, re-
quiicd 1 lie constant management of a specialized diplomacy: Roman control
uni '.in \ c 111a 11cc had to be continuous. In the East, the dynasts who operated
1 In <bent s\sicni were Mil licienl l\ aware ol their own weakness (ami of the
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32 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

inevitability of Roman retribution) to remain loyal. Even so, internal dynastic

rivalries and the complications of interdynastic family relations could threaten
the stability of the system. Thus Herod’s troubles with his sons— or his senile
paranoia— upset the internal equilibrium of his important client state. Worse,
these factors had repercussions on Cappadocia, since Glaphyra, a daughter of
Archelaus, ruler of Cappadocia, was married to Alexander, one of Herod’s ex­
ecuted sons.47
T h e vagaries of individual character, inevitable in dynastic arrangements,
were all-important. For example, Eurycles, who inherited the small state of
Sparta from his canny father, turned out to be an inveterate and dangerous
intriguer; having left his own mean lands, Eurycles sowed discord between
Cappadocia and Judea for his own personal advantage, and also seemingly
caused unrest in Achea. W hile the important rulers of important states, such
as Herod and Archelaus, were guided with great tact and patience by Augus­
tus, Eurycles, a petty ruler o f a village-state o f no strategic importance, was
simply removed from office.48
Augustus was personally well suited for the task of controlling the clients,
and his firm but gentle paternalism was very much in evidence. But Roman
dealings with client states had long since coalesced into a tradition and a set of
rules, which no doubt served to guide policy. For example, it was well under­
stood that no client could aggrandize himself at the expense of a fellow' client
wdthout explicit sanction from Rome.49 When Herod broke this cardinal rule
by sending his forces into the adjacent client state of Nabatean Arabia, then in
turmoil, Augustus promptly ordered him to stop. Byw ay of punishment, Au­
gustus wrote to Herod that henceforth he could no longer regard him as a
friend and wrould have to treat him as a subject; given Augustus’s style, this was
equivalent to a harsh reprimand.’0 In order to contend with the inevitable
countercharges that attackers could level at their victims in order to justify
their own aggression (a common phenomenon in the Levant till now), the rule
established by Rome under the republic specified that a client could only re­
spond to attacks with strictly defensive measures until a Roman ruling could
settle the issue.’ 1
It was understood that Roman interests were best served by maintaining
local balances of power between nearby clients, so that the system could keep
itself in equilibrium wdthout recourse to direct Roman intervention. Unfortu­
nately, as rulers and circumstances changed over time, so did the power bal­
ances at the local level. Client rulers had their own militai v loo < then own
 The Julio-Cltm dian System 33

ambitions, and their own temptations. Those in the East, moreover, could at
times have invoked the countervailing power of Parthia, as Archelaus of Cap­
padocia (in 17 CE) and Antiochus IV o f Commagene (in 72 CE) were accused
of having done (Tacitus, Annals, 2.42).'2
Loyal and efficient client rulers were rewarded with personal honors, ordi­
narily receiving Roman citizenship (which Augustus’s highly restrictive citi­
zenship policy made an important privilege); but no honor or title could confer
genuine equality in a world where none could equal Roman power.'5 More
tangible rewards were also given, primarily territorial. The model client king,
Polerno I of Pontus, received Lesser Armenia from Antony, and when Augustus
detached that territory from Pontus, Polemo received instead the important
(but, as it turned out, ungovernable) Bosporan state.54 Similarly, when Herod— a
very efficient client ruler indeed—was still in Augustus’s good graces, he was
granted in 24-23 B C E part of the plateau country of Ituraea (Golan-Hauran),
at the expense of another client, Zenodorus, who had failed to control the
nomadic raiding of his subjects.”
Relationships with the client tribes and barbarian principalities of conti­
nental Europe were of a different order. For one thing, these peoples were at
least potentially migratory, even if not nomadic. They could flee into the re­
mote interior, as Maroboduus did by taking his Marcomanni to Bohemia to
escape the pressure of Roman military power on the upper Rhine.'6 This op­
ium had its costs: the abandonment of good lands for the uncertain prospect of
i >1 hers, possibly inferior, that might have to be fought for, and also perhaps the
loss of valued commercial contacts with Roman merchants. Peoples migrating
.may from Roman power could still hope to remain within the sphere of R o­
man commerce, whose reach was much greater, but they could no longer play
.1 profitable middleman role.’ 7
The major difference between these two groups was cultural. T h e client
iidcrs of the East and their subjects were, generally, sufficiently politically
sophisticated to understand the full potential o f Roman military power in the
ibsiract, while the more backward peoples of continental Europe often were
not. The rulers of eastern client states and their subjects did not actually have
to wr Roman legions marching toward their cities in order to respond to Rome’s
commands, for they could imagine what the consequences of disobedience
w1 mid be. That would have been a good reason to provide schools for the edu-
' ....... of the sons of European tribal chiefs, as the Romans did, according to
I m it us (. Iyjiadn, 1 1), “him rent jirincijmm films libcralibus artibns er itdire.” There
34 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

was also of course a simpler, geographic difference: the overland frontiers of

Europe were much longer than those of the Levant.
Legionary deployments may have reflected other considerations as well—
local considerations, that is— but it seems likely that the difference in how the
populations responded to deterrence played some role, if only subconscious, in
determining how legions were distributed. Further, the client rulers of the
East normally enjoyed secure political control over their subjects. Only this
security could ensure that their own perceptions of Roman power— and the
restraints that this perception imposed— would be shared by their subjects. By
contrast, in the less structured polities of Europe, the prudence of the well-
informed (e.g., Maroboduus in the year 9) would not necessarily restrain all
those capable of acting against Roman interests.'’8
Because the forceful suasion of Roman military power could only function
through the medium of others’ perceptions (and through the internal processes
of decision and control of other polities), the primitive political character of
the peoples of continental Europe could negate such suasion, or at least weaken
its impact.59 To the extent that the processes of suasion were negated by the
inability or refusal of its objects to give Roman power its due, the actual political
control generated by the military strength of the empire was correspondingly
reduced. As a heroic generalization— for there were numerous exceptions— one
can therefore say that while Roman military power was freely converted into
political power vis-a-vis the sophisticated polities of the East, when employed
against the primitive peoples of Europe its main use was the direct application
of force. The distinction is, of course, quite basic, for power born of potential
force is not expended when used, nor is it a finite quantity. Force, on the other
hand, is just that: if directed to one purpose, it cannot simultaneously be
directed at another, and if used, it is ipso facto consumed.
To be sure, Roman reprisals would soon educate their victims, making it
more likely that the same group would in future respond to Roman orders. But
as a practical matter, such induced propensities to react appropriately to poten­
tial force would apply only to direct threats. Further, they could be counter­
acted by tribal relocations; and their impact could still be attenuated by loose
structures of internal control. In the strategic ambush by the German Cher-
usci against the three unfortunate legions serving beyond the Rhine under
Varus, these three negative factors were all in evidence.60 Nevertheless, Roman
diplomacy persisted in trying to transform the northern bol de r tribes into
 lonverted by TIFF Combine^
The Julio-Claudian System 35

clients and not without success. Direct political ties between the empire and
selected chiefs were fostered by systematic policy.fiI As already noted, citizen­
ship was almost a standard reward for chiefs; some further received the eques­
trian rank. W here sanctions were ineffective, positive incentives of a more
tangible sort could take their place. T he payment of subsidies to the border
peoples, often popularly associated with the era of Roman decline, was already
an established policy even before the principate, and continued to be a pillar of
diplomacy throughout all three of the imperial systems described in this
book.62
But in the disordered, barbaric world, even relationships cemented with both
money and honors wrere unstable. Arminius, the betrayer and destroyer of
Varus, had been given Roman citizenship and had served as the commander of
an auxiliary force of Cherusci. His father-in-law, Segestes, and his brother,
f lavus, both remained loyal to Rome (Segestes reportedly tried to warn Varus
i>l the ambush), or so the sources claim.62 These affiliations did not suffice to
save Varus and his men. The incident makes clear that the patterns of author­
ise in this native society disintegrating under Roman pressure were too weak
10 support a satisfactory client relationship. Segestes was evidently a chief in
Ins own right, but he lacked the degree of control over his Cherusci that any self-
1 especting dynast of the East would have had.
In spite of the terrible experience of the clacles Variana, the Romans did not
' Icspair of the policy, nor even of the family. Tacitus (Annals, 11.16 ) tells us that
during the principate of Claudius, the Cherusci asked that a king be appointed
I' a them, and they received as their ruler a son of Flavus and nephew of Armin­
ius, a Roman citizen educated in Rome, whose name wras Italicus: “Eodem anno
< hcrusarrian gens regem Roma petivit, an/issisper interna hella nobilibus et into reli-
.in" stirpis regiae, qui apiul urbem habebatur nomine Italicus. Paternum huic genus e
Haro frat re Anninii. mater ex Actum ero principe Chattorum erat.” By then the
■ Ilent system had taken hold, after a full generation of ceaseless effort. When
I ilienus decided to withdraw Germanicus and his forces from beyond the
f lime in 16 C E , thus suspending the reprisal operations that had followed the
• 1 isis 1 >1 t he year y, the new diplomatic policy was launched. Even if these lands
11 not to he conquered, the Romans could not simply ignore the peoples
nine hcvnnd the Rhine and Danube. These peoples, both great and little,
u |in senieil inn pcmcrlul a force to be left uncontrolled and unobserved on
ih. I■ iiiv ,11u1 vulnerable perimeter of the empire, which still had no border
Г 1 1 |.1 Ы Ы ,« .Ы Ь Ч П Я » Ч !» Д Ш !П 1 !И 1 * |.|1 1 Ь Ь И !> тмд ш оЭ -j- щ Ад psjJSAUOpl
38 The Grand Strategy o f the Rotnan Empire

defenses. By the year 16, then, a coherent policy of diplomatic control was
emerging for the first time, hinted at by Tacitus (Annals, 2.26) in speech attrib­
uted to Tiberius, which recalled the superiority of policy over arms, “'plura
consilio qiiam vi perfecis.se,” although most of its elements had long been
present.
T he first instrument of this policy was a manipulative and divisive diplo­
macy, intended to keep the Germanic peoples separated and, if possible, oc­
cupied in fighting one another. Although not a nice thing to do, all was fair
north of the border.64 But the Romans needed to do more than that. Once they
became aware of the magnitude o f the threat that the Germans represented,
they could not be satisfied with attempts to weaken them by diplomatic in­
trigues. Much as they enjoyed the thought of barbarians killing one another
(Tacitus, Germania, 33), the Romans clearly realized that it was far more prac­
tical to make positive use of German energies through the creation of a chain
of client tribes, w'hich would form an active barrier between the perimeters of
the empire and the possibly still more dangerous barbarians deeper inland.
T h e control mechanism was complex. It was necessary to manipulate
the tribes through their chiefs, while controlling the chiefs by means of per­
sonal threats and personal inducements; always there was the latent threat of
force against the tribe as a whole. By channeling money and favors through
chosen client chiefs, the Romans helped the latter gain power over their sub­
jects, while the Romans gained power over them.65 Some of the chiefs were
appointed by Rome, while others rose on their own; but in either case the task
o f diplomacy was to maintain the two lines of control, internal and external, in
working order. T h is must have required a good deal of petty border diplo­
macy, of which we know little. W hat is certain is that the policy wras successful
over a prolonged period: speaking o f the once formidable Alarcontanni and
Quadi, Tacitus {Germania, 42) described both as ruled by client rulers main­
tained in power— and controlled— by a combination o f occasional armed
assistance and financial support: llsed vis etpotentia regibns ex auctorhate Romana.
Raro armis nostris, saepius pecunia itivantur, nee minus valent'.'
The major active instrument of client management among the primitive
peoples of continental Europe was a systematic policy of subsidization.66 The
primary passive instrument, on the other hand, was the latent threat o f Roman
reprisals. The satisfactory state of affairs recorded by Tacitus in Germania,
published in 98 C E , was the final product of this integrated policy. The sequence
of events leading to the situation Tacitus described can be reconstructed as
 The Julio-Claiidian System 39

follows: first, when the outbreak of the Pannonian revolt in the year 6 forced
the Romans to cancel the planned invasion of Bohemia, an accommodation
was reached with Maroboduus and his Marcomanni; whether they were sim­
ply bought off or conciliated by treaty, it is certain that they remained peace-
lully passive during the three years o f the revolt. In 9 C E , after the Varian
disaster, Maroboduus refused to cooperate with Arminius in a concerted attack
on the empire (Tacitus, Annals, 2.45, 46). Following the Roman withdrawal,
m the year 17 war broke out between the two greatest chiefs of Germany.
Maroboduus was the loser, and though he asked for help under a claim of alliance
reciprocity, his appeal was refused by the Romans {Annals, 2.46). Overthrown
.nul driven out in 18 C E , Maroboduus merely received refuge in the empire,
living out the last 18 years of his life in comfortable exile in Ravenna {Annals,
'.62). Shortly afterward, the Hermunduri fought and defeated Catualda, who
bad succeeded Maroboduus through Roman intrigue. Tiberius finally stepped
m to appoint Vannius, chief of the Quadi, as ruler over the M arcomanni as
well (Suevi is the generic name for both peoples), thus creating a full-fledged
<bent state on the middle Danube, as Tacitus {Annals, 2.63) wrote: “Barbari
atntmque comirati, ne quietas provincias immixti tnrbarent, Danuvium ultra inter
ilnmina Marum et Cusum locantur, dato rege Vannio gentis Quadorum.” Vannius
naturally received a regular subsidy but, again, no guarantee o f protection,67
.1 deft policy that kept client rulers keenly aware of their precipitous positions.
11ms, he was left to his fate when attacked by the Hermunduri, though he, like
Maroboduus, was given personal refuge (Tacitus, Annals, 12.29).
Tiberius’s successor, Gaius (Caligula), may have intended to renew the
at tempt to conquer Germany in his own erratic way, and in the year 39 forces
u ere seemingly assembled on the Rhine for the purpose. Suetonius’s diverting
H,mint of the episode {Gains 43-46) is amusing but not credible; in any case
in 1 move was made. When Claudius succeeded Gaius, he clearly reverted to
1 In' policy o f Tiberius: in 47 C E the great general Cn. Domitius Corbulo (who
u as to win fame under Nero) was ordered to stop his attack on the Chauci in
in a 1 hern Germany. In the typical, indeed eternal pattern of imperial expan­
si l e, that attack had originated in a cowwferoffensive against the sea-raiding
< .mninelatcs, but it was apparently developing into a general invasion o f north-
1 m < .etmany. ( hi orders from Claudius, the legions were withdrawn from the
11 1'ht hank ol the Rhine, according to Tacitus {Annals, 11.19), “/igitur Claudius
■ id, ,1 nor,nn in <ienii/inias run prohibnit ut referri praesidia as Rhenum iuberct.”
1111 \ n.11 >1\, m line pel 1 v hot 1let war Ia re persisted (e.g., in the year 30 against the
40 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

Chatti), but this was dearly of a defensive nature— punitive responses to trans-
border raiding.
Evidently, Roman strategy in Germany under Claudius and Nero, as under
Tiberius, was to rely on dients, unstable as these clients might be (Tacitus,
Annals, 12.27, 28). T he preference for using clients rather than imperial forces
to maintain border security and even regional stability was definitely a deliber­
ate strategy, even if it was not passed from emperor to emperor in some codi­
fied form, or written down in a document. I f so preferred, it might be ascribed
to mere instinct— if only because some contemporary scholars are offended by
the notion that Roman men could think and strategically too. T h ey invoke
elemental cravings for personal renown, and booty of course, to explain all the
actions of the emperors.
Much more is known of Roman client management in the East. In 17 C E
Tiberius made drastic changes in the client-state structure o f eastern Anatolia:
Archelaus of Cappadocia (whose son-in-law Herod had executed) was tried and
removed from office on the grounds of treasonable relations with Parthia; at
about the same time, both Antiochus III o f Commagene and Philopator of
Hierapolis-Castabala died.6* Tiberius decided to annex the three states. Cap­
padocia was by far the largest, but Commagene was also of particular strategic
importance since its territory included one of the three crossings of the middle
course of the Euphrates leading to Parthian lands.69 Tiberius organized Cap­
padocia into a new province and attached Commagene to Syria, assigning the
detached territory of Cilicia Tracheia and Lycaonia to Archelaus II, son o f the
deposed ruler of Cappadocia. (These moves have been explained as a strategic
response to the breakdown of the Armenian settlement in the year 16, when
the Roman client king Vonones was expelled from Armenia.)'6
Gaius substantially reversed Tiberius’s annexationist policy. Antiochus IV
was restored to Commagene, which became a client state once more with the
addition o f Cilicia Tracheia. The sons of Cotys II, the murdered king of
Thrace, who had been brought up in Rome as Gaius’s playmates, all received
kingdoms: Polemo II was given Pontus and— in theory— the Bosporan state
(whose de facto ruler was Mithridates); Cotys III was given Lesser Armenia;
and Rhoemetalces was given half o f Thrace (the other half being under the
rule of another Rhoemetalces, son of Rhescuporis, the killer of Cotys IT). A
further creation was Sohaemus, appointed to a tetrarchy in Ituraea (Hainan). 1
A more important beneficiary of Gaius’s generosity was ( ’. .Julius Agrippa I,
“ an oriental adventurer” and grandson ol I lerod the ( hc.il. \r.i ippa, u 1m had
 The Julio-Claudian System 41

r^ ^ .'llt-'m i'iiM B
been imprisoned by Tiberius, was freed and amply rewarded by Gaius. In 37
( IE he was given a small principality east of the Jordan; a year later he was
granted further parts of Ituraea, lands actually detached from the provincial
territory of Syria; in the year 40 he received Abilene and finally Galilee and
Pcraea, thus virtually reconstituting the northern half of Herod’s kingdom
under his rule, as described by Josephus in Jewish Antiquities (18.7.2).2
Both ancient and modern historians attribute Gaius’s generosity to his per­
sonal emotions and to his madness. Which is also how they account for his
deposition and execution of Ptolemy, king of Mauretania, in the year 40, which
was followed by the annexation of that country.'3 Yet Gaius’s successor, Claudius,
who was neither mad nor improvident with the empire’s resources, did not
undo what Gaius had done. On the contrary, his policy was clearly intended to
stabilize the settlement left by Gaius: Mithridates was recognized as ruler of the
llosporan state that Polemo II had been unable to control, and the latter was
1 (mipensated in Cilicia; Antiochus IV, whom Gaius had removed in the year 40,
1 eversing himself, was restored to his throne in Commagene; and Agrippa I
i( .aius’s favorite) received Judea and Samaria as further additions to his kingdom.
1 hose lands, it should be noted, had been under direct imperial rule since the
1 cnioval o f Archelaus, son of Herod, in 6 C E .;+ W hile it was the right thing to
do strategically, in order to strengthen the client-ruler regime in the East, the
i' i .nit to Agrippa I was also in part a reward for his role in securing Claudius’s
succession to Gaius.
The client states needed constant and responsive management: unsatisfactory
I ulets had to be replaced (as in the case o f the Spartan Eurycles), and succes-
'■oi s had to be found for rulers who died. But the system of indirect rule endured.
I I is true that there were further annexations (Judea again, in 44 C E ; Thrace
in 16 C E ; and, under Nero, Pontus in the year 64), but there were also retro-
■ cssions, such as those which gradually enlarged the territories of C. Julius
\ g 1 ippa IT, a worthy follower of his father and namesake.73 (There is some evi­
dence indicating that Claudius actually appointed a special diplomatic agent
■ h.ugcd with the management of client relations in situ.)'6 Those annexations
hi mid not therefore be misinterpreted as expansionist: they reflected the
■ mis 1.mi maneuvering required to maintain a hegemonic empire in changing
. i n urns! antes.
In 1 lie absence of an organized foreign office, the work must have placed a
. ..n'.iilcr.ihic burden on the oifiee of the emperor; but this was a burden that
1 hi I11I111 ( I.Indian emperors were obviously willing to accept, together with all
42 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

the ambiguities and complexities of the client system. Everything ultimately

depended on whom the client rulers were. Men like Poleino I of Pontus and
Agrippa II (who remained in power until 93 CE) were obviously specialists in
the techniques needed on their part to make indirect rule both reliable and
effective.
In the simpler lands to the west, the reality o f imperial service was not con­
cealed behind the screen of a false independence. A British chieftain men­
tioned by Tacitus, Cogidubnus, described himself as “ K ing and Legate of the
Emperor in Britain” (Rex et Legatus Augusti in Britannia), according to an epi-
graphical reconstruction.77 Cottius, son of Donnus, was also in this position—
he was prefect of the Cottian Alps to the Romans and a king to the locals.78 It
has been suggested that such dual status was a Claudian invention;79 if so, it
would confirm the impression that Claudius or his policy makers understood
the virtues of indirect rule particularly well.

T he Tactical Organization of the Army

The legions of the second century B C E described by Polybius were remark­
ably complex formations with a carefully balanced structure:80 in addition to
the core o f heavy infantry, they included a significant contingent of cavalry
and a substantial proportion of light infantry.81 Legions contained three classes
of heavy infantry: hastati, principes, and triariv, the first two classes, each con­
sisting of 1,200 men, were armed with composite oval shields, swords, and the
pilum, a heavy throwing spear 9 feet long, which was to emerge as the charac­
teristic missile weapon of the legionary infantry.82 The 600 or so triarii were
also armed with the hasta, a long thrusting spear. W hat made these legions
“ balanced,” as opposed to the legions of the principate, was their contingent of
1,200 light infantry (velites), armed with swords, small shields (parmae), and the
hasta velitaris (a short, light javelin), and their 10 small squadrons of cavalry,
amounting to 300 horse in all.82
It is true that with neither archers nor slingers these legions were obviously
weak in missile weapons, while the organic cavalry contingent was rather small
as well— too small to be employed independently as an offensive arm, as op­
posed to being a pool of horsemen for patrolling, scouting, and liaison. But
when Gaius Marius (157-86 BC E) reformed the legions, he did not add missile
troops nor more horsemen. To the contrary, he made the legions even more
unbalanced than before. The velites were abolished, and the cavalry contingent
 The Julio-Clauditm System 43

was apparently withdrawn gradually: there is no mention o f organic legionary

cavalry in the wars of Julius Caesar.84 Also, the triarii were eliminated (though
not their weapon) in the shift to a new tactical organization based on the 480-
man standard cohort, whose troops were armed with the two-foot-long,
double-edged “ Spanish” sword, the gladius, as well as pilaT
The legions of the principate were essentially similar in structure, except that
a small (120-horse) cavalry contingent was apparently reintroduced.86 These
changes meant that the legions became narrowly specialized forces of heavy
infantry. In fact, as has been pointed out, legionary troops were dual-purpose
mlantry and combat engineers.8. Each legion had engineering specialists in its
headquarters, men who could survey a canal, design a circus, plan roads, and,
above all, build or demolish walls and fortifications. When Claudius ordered
Cm Domitius Corbulo to disengage from his reprisal operations against the
< hand, Corbulo put his men to work digging a canal between the Maas and
1 Ik- Rhine, according to Tacitus (Annals, 11.20). After the battle of Bedriacum
mi the civil war 0(69 C E , Vitellius sent the legion X III Gemina to build am­
phitheaters at Cremona and Bononia (Histories, 11.67). All the roads were of
' Miirse built by the legions, which included mensores (surveyors) in their head-
quarters. The troops must have been trained as skilled or semiskilled workers,
mil their personal kits included basic construction tools, notably a carefully
f signed, multipurpose pickaxe, the dolabra. Corbulo, the leading Roman gen-
' ml o f the Claudian period, was fond of saying that victory was to be won by
r a n g the dolabra, according to Frontinus (Strategemata, 4.7.2): “ Domitius Corbulo
■i••Libra hasten; vincendum esse dicebat” The legions of the principate also included
|a In 1 heavy elements: organic artillery in the shape of stone-throwing ballistae
md catapults that shot arrows or bolts. These weapons feature prominently in I
1
I In 1 ccorded accounts of sieges, but they were also used for fire support in the
m Id.
1 iidcr the right conditions, this unbalanced structure produced the highest ?
!■ 'ir r n! tactical effectiveness in the most reliable element of the Roman
II mi, the legions. The “right conditions,” however, were those of high-intensity
111.1 re: close combat to hold ground under attack or to seize ground against
iiu i m rated enemv forces, including forces manning elaborate fortifications.
I'- 1 In- ' „ i m e token, the re la tiv e lv s lo w - m o v in g le g io n a r y in f a n t r y w as u n s u ite d

i 1 " i n 11 i l l . 1 ( o r c o u n t e r - g u e r r i l l a ) w a r f a r e , a n d i n d e e d f o r a l l m o b i l e w a r f a r e

.......... a 1 I i i m \ r c m i m e s , p a r t i c u l a r l v t h e c a v a l r v a r m i e s o f w e s t e r n a n d c e n t r a l

i
44 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

Asia. Purely legionary forces would perform rather poorly in such low-
intensity warfare, which required small units, dispersal, much more missile
power than shock capability, and as much cavalry as possible, except in dense
forest or high mountain terrain. Such warfare, moreover, did not ordinarily
require the engineering skills so highly developed in the legions.
T h e legion was trained to fight as a solid mass, in concentration; it had very
little missile power, since there were few pila, and the range of a hand-thrown
pilum would not normally exceed too feet.88 Moreover, the legionary cavalry
could only provide scouts and pickets; it was inadequate for proper screening
against hostile cavalry and utterly inadequate for independent use as heavy
“shock” cavalry or for harassing tactics against enemy infantry, in the manner
of the mounted bowmen of the East. W hile lighter or otherwise more mobile
forces could mount hit-and-run attacks against them, legionary forces could
only advance slowly, if relentlessly, toward the centers of the enemy’s power to
reduce them by siege or assault. Given the degree of specialization of the le­
gionary forces and their tactical limitations, it is clear that the auxilia were not
merely additive but complementary to the legions, as it was long ago pointed
out.89 Thanks to the auxilia, the Romans could avoid a dilution o f their citizen
manpower in the kinds of forces for which it was unsuited, such as the cav­
alry90 and missile troops, archers, and slingers, which were of especial value in
wet weather when bows could not remain long exposed.91
At the same time, the particular capabilities of the legionary forces gave
them escalation dominance over both enemies and allies— for in the last analy­
sis they could always prevail over the auxilia in high-intensity warfare. L e ­
gionary forces could not prevent auxilia from running away, but they could be
fairly certain of defeating them in open battle or siege warfare unless condi­
tions were exceedingly unfavorable. Unfavorable conditions did prevail during
the revolt of Civilis (in 69-70 CE), when two legions, V Alaudae and X Y Primi-
genia, depleted and .short of food, were besieged and massacred by dissident
Batavian auxiliaries in the ill-situated camp of Vetera in Lower Germany. Four
legions, I Germanica, X V I Gallica, IV Macedoniea, and X V Primigenia, were
later forced to surrender or went over to the rebels, according to Tacitus (Histo­
ries, 4.12-80, 5.14-26).
The revolt of Civilis had the general character of a war between legions and
auxilar. eight Batavian auxiliary cohorts revolted, and Civilis him self while an
of beer of the auxilia, was also a tribal chief (as two <it her Ia mot is rebel',, \r111111111s
 The Julio-Claudian System 45

nl stress was not a unique episode, even though the subsequent treason of
Koman legions certainly was. In the narrative sources, the inherent unreliabil­
ity of auxiliaries emerges repeatedly under both empire and republic: Sulla was
concerned with preserving their loyalty, according to Frontinus (Stmtegemata,
i'
.■ .7.4—5), and Plutarch (Crassus, 27.6, 7) recorded the unreliable conduct of
< Irassus’s auxiliary cavalry at Carrhae. And in the year 70, when Q. Petilius
( vrialis reached the zone of operations during the suppression of C ivilis’s
1 cvolt, he thought it prudent to send his Gallic auxiliaries back to their homes
In'lore entering the fight, with the message that the legions alone were adequate
111 restore order.1'2
In the twro-level structure of the Roman army, the citizen forces of the
legions, ordinarily highly disciplined and reliable, tacitly served to keep the
auxilia under control if necessary, by means of their tactical superiority in
lugh-intensity warfare. This was only a latent function of the legions, but one
el obvious importance. Once the reliability of the auxilia was secured— and
filer reforms were to ensure it more fully— the combination of the legionary
hr.ivy infantry/combat engineers with varying mixes of the cavalry, light in-
1 .mi rv, and missile units of the auxilia yielded task forces that could be tailored
io 1 lie need. This gave the Romans tactical superiority in most terrains and
i".mist most enemies, as well as strategic— if not necessarily very prompt—
■ i .ilotion dominance against virtually everyone, because the Romans could
■'Mi r e i n f o r c e a l l c o m e r s .

I jeitus recorded that when Germanicus crossed the Rhine to search for the
1' m.mis of the lost legions ofVarus and, more important, to reestablish Roman
pit siigc by reprisal operations meant to redeem the deterrent capability of
f ' im.m arms, he did so with two legions, eight alae of auxiliary cavalry, and no
i' » it than 26 cohorts of auxiliary infantry (Annals, 1.49): “Sequitur ardorem
■ xluitiii Caesar iunctoque ponte tramittit duodecim wilia e kgimibus, sex et viginti
■ u\i ii/Mirtis, octo equitum alas, quartern easeclitione intemerata modestia fnit.” Appar-
mi h , 1 here was no standard allotment o f auxilia: Varus had brought only three
. <il cavalry anil six cohorts of auxiliary infantrv with his three legions,
" ' . >1 ilmg to the former soldier Velleius Paterculus (2.117), “ex Germania epistu-
■ ■ ',7////mu i/ii/ile/r eaesi l ari trucidatarunique legionum trium totidemque alarum
1 , uhurtium."
I In incisi obvious dehcicncv of Roman arms was in the cavalry. As early as
IK I 1 In lb mi ans had re Iled on mercenary Numidian cavalry to help light
111 ■ it ill 1 .11 lines ol I I .m ml si I, .mil .ill lioiieji a Roma 11 ell i/en e.n aIrv did cxisl
I'. / he ( Ira mi Strategy o f the Roman Umpire

i.i'. <11«1 i lit' cavalry of the Italian socii until the “ social war”), the pattern of reli-
.mi i' mi a noncitizen cavalry was consistently kept up. In the army o f the prin-
i ip a t e , the auxiliary cavalry appeared in two guises, as the alae of cavalry proper
ami as the cohortes equitatae, mixed units of infantry and cavalry. Both, like the
normal infantry auxiliary cohorts, came in two classes of formation: the ala
ijiiuigenaria with 512 men and the ala milliaria w'ith roughly twice as many.
The cohors equitata apparently had 380 or 760 infantry for the two classes of unit
and 120 or 240 cavalry.93 M illiary units, however, are not attested before the
Flavian period: it is uncertain when they were first organized, and they did not
become significant until the Flavian era.
Because the cavalry of antiquity, including the Romans of this period, had
110 stirrups (which the later Romans of the East would acquire from the Avars),
it has sometimes been assumed that all Roman mounted troops w'ere “ light”
cavalry, that is, horsemen trained and armed to attack from a distance with bow
or javelin, or else to harass the enemy in close quarters with spear or sword— as
opposed to “ heavy,” but not necessarily armored, cavalry, who were armed with
the long lance and trained to fight as a shock force, intended to press home the
charge.94 Without stirrups, it has been argued, the cavalry could not charge
solid infantry, for no horseman could keep his balance once contact took place
(but, as every horseman knows, one stays in the saddle because of pressed-in
knees, with or without stirrups). It is certainly true that the development of
closed-rank infantry tactics from Sparta onward made the simple cavalry charge
virtually obsolete against disciplined foot soldiers, because even the best shock
cavalry would be defeated by infantrymen in close order who presented a wall
o f shields and spears in the direction of the attack. In fact, the Romans used
heavy (though unarmored) cavalry as well as light, because the cavalry charge
could still be very effective against undisciplined infantry.93 Moreover, the lack
of stirrups would not prevent cavalry charges against enemy cavalry, especially I
unarmored light horsemen.
In addition, it is virtually certain that a cavalry tactic that could defeat even
disciplined infantry had been devised: this was the combined use of heavy cavalry
armed with lances and mounted bowmen (i.e., light cavalry). This technique
was used by the Parthian cavalry army that annihilated the seven legions
Crassus took to the field of Carrhae in 53 BCF,.96 A classic combination of fire
and shock, this tactic employed high volumes of arrow lire trom mounted
bowmen to attack the ranks ol th e Romans, w hile the laneeo, lorced th em to

11 i n . i m i n r l o s e i l r a n k s I n the threat ol a c h a r i n ' , 01 an a. 1 11 a I 1 h a r i ' c thus

 amqTuop ddIJ. Acl pai-O Aiioj]
The Julio-Cltm dian System 47

■ nsuring their vulnerability to arrow fire. In this situation, the infantry could
leither come to grips with the bowmen nor march away to shelter— even if
.nitable terrain were close at hand. Once it is realized that even without stirrups,
inrsemen could and did press the charge, the value of the auxiliary cavalry of
lie aide can be seen in proper perspective: they added not only a scouting, coun-
erscouting, and pursuit force to the legions, but also a shock element— very
iseful in breaking concentrations of light cavalry and quite lethal against undis-
11dined warriors on foot.
In relying on auxiliary cavalry, the Romans were merely compensating for
lie poor quality of their citizen horsemen (and horses?). On the other hand,
'u'ir reliance on auxiliary missile infantry (archers, slingers, and javelin-throwers)
■ rved a positive purpose: it preserved the comparative advantage the Romans
njoyed in the superior arm of the heavy infantry. Given the Romans’ chronic
empower shortage, it would have been inefficient to dilute scarce citizen man-
mi er by deploying it as light infantry, a commodity easily obtained outside
al\. Here, too, there were very old precedents. L ivy (22.37) recorded the re-
mtment of a thousand archers and slingers from Syracuse in 217 B C E ,9, and
Iring Caesar’s wars in Gaul, the “classic trio”— Cretan archers, Balearic sling-
and Numidian infantry (spearmen?)— already appeared, and they remained
II \ 111 re of the auxiliaries of the principate (Caesar, Bello Galileo, 11.7.1).
W ording to a nineteenth-century experiment sponsored by Napoleon III,
■ maximum practical range of the Roman throwing spear (pilimt) in the hands
1 st mng and trained man was about 100 feet. According to the same experi-
1ait, the maximum effective range of the composite bow made of a wooden
11- u ith sinew on the outside and bone keratin on the inside was between 175
d 100 yards.9* (Much longer ranges have been cited, but these probably refer
special bows, special bowmen, and special “ fly” arrows not useful in war.)
h maximum accurate and effective range of the composite bow of antiquity
mu more than 65 yards or so, but still nearly double that of thepilttm. The
■si important advantage of the bow over the pilum was thus its greater vol-
s <>! lire rather than its superior range: soldiers on the march could carry
h ., Icu pita (two being the probable standard), while bowmen would have
in .11 m u s.
'’lingers and bowmen performed the same function— giving cover and sup-
1 " nli then missile lire to advancing (or retreating) infantry. In siege war-
iinl m mobile warfare as well il conditions allowed, light missile fire was
I’l. 1mailed 11\ 11 le a i 111le I \ live.wise well built loll tlie.lt lolls x\ oitld u it list and
48 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

the shot of all but the very largest stone-throwers (hallistae), the more common
mission of the artillery in siege warfare must have been to give covering fire
for the advance of battering rams and other shock engines. The artillery was
sufficiently mobile for field use, too, at least on firm and level ground: in 14 C E
Germanicus used arrow-firers (tormenta) to drive the Chatti from the opposite
bank while his troops made a contested river crossing. In another episode two
years later, he used artillery to cover the assault o f Roman troops against an
earthwork manned by Cherusci warriors— forcing the Cherusci to keep their
heads down and suspend their missile fire, according to Tacitus (Annals, 1.56,
11.20; cf. Suetonius, Gains, 46).
We do not know' the standard number of artillery weapons organic to the
legions, but a decent guess is probably 6 pieces per cohort (i.e., 60 per legion)—
mostly arrow-shooting catapults and the rest heavier, stone-throwing hallistae.
It appears that the auxilia ordinarily had no artillery or siege engines. Although
there is no conclusive evidence either way, it is evident that allowdng them such
weapons would have contradicted the principle of escalation dominance; the
presence of artillery among the often primitive troops of the auxilia would
need explanation. (When Civilis and his auxiliary troops besieged the Roman
camp at Vetera, they used siege engines built by Roman prisoners and desert­
ers, i.e., legionary troops, according to Tacitus, Histories, 4-23." A more recent
parallel: one of the precautions taken by the British in India in the aftermath
of the 1857 mutiny? w?as to deny artillery to most Indian regiments.)
Although the skills of the auxilia complemented those of the legions, so that
mixed legionary-auxiliary task forces were “ balanced” multipurpose field
armies, the overall comparative advantage of the Roman army was still in
high-intensity warfare: the slow but relentless strategic penetration of enemy
territory in depth, secured by road construction and en route fortifications;
full-scale battles against dense troop concentrations; and, above all, offensive
and defensive siege warfare.,HHAs the degree of force concentration and com­
bat intensity increased, so did the tactical superiority of the Romans.’01
This tactical-structural factor had strategic implications of great significance:
the Roman army was clearly best equipped to serve as an instrument o f war­
fare against enemies fixed assets to protect— prim arily cities, but also
such things as arable lands or even irrigation systems. Conversely, Roman
capabilities were less useful in fighting enemies whose assets and sources ol
strength were not fixed, or at any rate, not concentrated. It was pointless lor
 У|дцю^^1^Ярэ1-|эл1|0Э|
The Julio-Chm dian System 49

the Romans to cut a path through forest and swamp to reach the primitive
townships of the Germans, because the real sources of German strength were
rural and diffuse: even the loss of all their towns would not be a serious blow.
Nor were Roman capabilities all that well suited to fight the Parthians or, later,
1 lie Sassanids in the East. Although both had some important cities, their major
Miurce of combat strength— the cavalry— originated in the small and semino-
madic settlements of the Iranian plateau, vast in size, most arid, torridly hot in
summer and freezing in winter, altogether not a suitable environment for
Homan soldiers. Even when the Romans did conquer and sack Parthian cities,
including Ctesiphon, the Arsacid capital, their power remained unbroken.
So it was wdth Dacians, Sarmatians, and the nomads of Arabia and North
\lrica as w'ell: none could resist the relentless advance of Roman invasion col­
umns, but neither could the Romans apply their strength effectively against
1 lie widely dispersed rural bases of warrior nations whose life and strength did
not depend on the survival of a city-based economic and social structure. C on­
sequently, if the Romans persisted in their efforts, their only real alternative
4,1s to attack the population base itself in a war of extermination. In the ab­
sence of a settled pattern of life that the army could control and reorganize
under Roman rule, peace required that first a desert be made. Thus at the
' 1 inclusion of Domitian’s campaign against the Nasamones of North Africa,
he reported to the Senate that the war had been w'on, and that the Nasamones
Iей I ceased to exist.102
II this analysis of Roman military capacities is correct, a technico-military
1 e,1si in for the geographic limits of imperial expansion is suggested. A function
mi a ol sheer space, distance, or even demography, these limits w'ere of a quali-
' u i\ c nature and— most important— they applied to coercive diplomacy as well as
■ " war. Environmental factors that conditioned the effectiveness of the Roman
и mv as an instrument of wrar also determined its utility as an instrument of
diplomatic control. The armed suasion generated by Roman military powrer
" !'■ most effective against polities with fixed assets to protect, for these were
Ии \ .dues that Roman pow'er threatened, if only implicitly. Because the Romans
'■■'/,/1 lest toy or appropriate these assets, they could also subjugate their owners
' и Ik mm doing either, thus converting them into clients. The conditions for
' lin It the training, weaponry, and techniques o f the Roman army w'ere most
П11 nvc, whether for war or for diplomatic coercion in the absence of w-ar,
' im .I m the North ЛIncan setnideserf, in the uncleared forestlands of central
5° The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

Europe, in the plains of what is now Ukraine, in the arid plateau of Iran, and
in the deserts of Arabia. Roman power could assure control of adjacent arable
lands, but to penetrate beyond them was risky.

T he Strategic Deployment of Forces

Until Domitian forbade the practice, according to Suetonius,U)i the large-unit
structure of the Roman army, organized as it was around legions of roughly
6,000 men, was accentuated still further by the habit of deploying the forces in
multilegion camps like Mogontiacum (Mainz), Vetera (Xanten), and Oppidum
Obiorum (Cologne) on the Rhine frontier. Because the auxilia were with the
legions, the forces o f the Roman army were concentrated on a few points
around the periphery o f the empire, leaving little or nothing for the interior
and with a very uneven distribution on the perimeter itself. T'hus, in 6 C E ,
twenty-eight legions were distributed this way: four were in Spain, five on the
Rhine or beyond, two in Raetia, five in Illyricum, three in Moesia, and nine in
the whole of North Africa, Egypt, and Syria.l04After the ambush of Varus’s
legion in the year 9, the Spanish garrison was reduced to three legions, the G er­
man increased to eight, the Raetian eliminated, the Illyrian left unchanged,
and the iMoesian reduced to twro. One legion remained in North Africa, two in
Egypt, and four in Syria. This distribution was maintained until the invasion
of Britain in 43 C E , according to Tacitus (Annals, 4.5).10’'
Clearly, the uneven development of client states in the East and West had
military implications. In the East, W'here client states were highly developed
(and where the Armenian settlement of 20 B C E left a deep buffer zone be­
tween Rome and Parthia), Roman security was ensured by a few mediocre le­
gions, powerfully supplemented by the obedience of clients aware of the much
greater potential of Roman forces elsewhere. In the Wrest, on the other hand,
the day-to-day security of the imperial periphery could only be ensured by an
immediate and visible legionary presence. W hat the sophisticated populations
and leaders of the civilized East could readily visualize, Germans and Dacians
had to see with their own eyes.
By absorbing the burden of providing internal and perimeter security, the
client states of the East allowed the Romans to keep their striking power
concentrated— and it was, of course, this same concentrated strength that gen­
erated the powerful armed suasion that kept the client states in subjection in
the first place. Small though it was, the four-legion garrison in S\ na had tins
cjiial it v ol concent rated st rengt h that, paradox ieall \, u ould lin e Inert d issi pal 0 1
 The Julio-Claudian System 51

I>v an attempt at military control of the vast territories of Asia Minor. Moreover,
w ith Parthia to the east still the only great power on Rome’s horizon, a disper­
sion of strength would have entailed grave dangers. It is in this light that the
deployment policy of the period must be seen. Both the lack of central reserves
.md the chosen deployment of the legions on the perimeter must be viewed

[uoisja/^aJsJsM
Imm the perspective of a security structure that was still anchored in the com­
plex, fragile, but supremely efficient client system. There was a strategic re­
serve, but it was deployed on the line. Located near zones of expected threat or
opportunity (i.e., opportunity for conquest), the legions at this time were not
id uallv committed to the territorial defense of their segment of the perimeter,
is was later the case. I f a threat materialized in any one sector, forces could
ordinarily be withdrawn from the others; there was no real danger that G er­
mans, Dacians, and Parthians would coordinate their attacks on the empire.11’6
( liven these political circumstances, the defensive component of the empire’s
ir.uegv had to cope with two kinds of threats: endemic threats, which were
II a ire or less stable in intensity over prolonged periods of time (such as the
• icrman threat between 9 C E and the crisis of 69-70), and sporadic threats,
"Inch were inherently unpredictable (such as native revolts). It would there-
i"i c have been w asteful to retain substantial forces in a central strategic reserve,
‘'mil a reserve is preferable to the use of ad hoc forces drawn from the line
■ ■111\ d it can be redeployed in time to reinforce sectors under attack, and quick
1' ' Ivplovment could rarely be accomplished in the Roman Empire. W here the
ifiiw.u was endemic and stable, it was not the availability of a reserve that was
m>(ded, but permanently deployed forces; w-here the threat was sporadic and
unpredictable, reserves could hardly ever hope to arrive on the scene in good
omv, and the damage was likely to be inflicted very early, in any case. It was
mm li more efficient to keep all forces on or near the perimeter, where their
pi '"•cnee was continuously useful either militarily or diplomatically, and not in
in interior reserve.
I he peculiar geography of the empire— a hollow' ring around the Medi-
I I I .mean —deprived the Romans of the defender’s usual advantage, shorter in-
"■ 1 Inn s (>1 communication, except when sea transport wras feasible. In the
■I...... ... 11I early warning of emerging threats, Roman forces could only march
ii ; miles an hour (to cover approximately' 20 miles a day) toward an enemy whose
0. reave was .dread' under way. This limitation meant that a strategic reserve
raid in it make a gn at deal nl dil Icrcnce, for it would not matter much if enemv
"■ msline, m 1mpe11.il lei 111111 x lasted one month rather than two; with or
52 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

without a centralized reserve, the Roman response could rarely he rapid

enough to reinforce a sector while it was still successfully containing enemy
attacks.
The system also entailed additional risks. For one thing, there was always
the possibility that major threats— even if uncoordinated— would materialize
simultaneously on different segments of the perimeter. Moreover, there was
one danger that was more than a contingency: when legions were withdrawn
from one sector to meet a threat in another, or to gather offensive forces for a
campaign of conquest, unsubdued provincial populations and enemies beyond
the border were liable to seize the opportunity to rebel against Roman rule or
to raid imperial territory. This was more than a contingency since there was
obviously a causal relationship between the removal of Roman troops from a
given sector and the emergence of threats previously latent. And there was the
further risk of a chain reaction, such as that which materialized in 6 C E . In
that year, the Pannonian revolt broke out when Illyricum was stripped of its
legions to augment the forces being concentrated for the two-pronged offensive
against Maroboduus and for the strategic encirclement of Bohemia. Tiberius,
in charge of five legions, had actually crossed the Danube on his northwest
line of advance from Carnuntum, some 50 kilometers east of today’s Vienna.
This wus to be the southern pincer of the operation; a second pincer was to
advance eastward from Alainz (on the Rhine), and the two armies were to meet
on the Elbe. As many as 150,000 troops were involved in this vast operation if
Tacitus (Annals, 2.46, 11.16 ) and Velleius Paterculus (2.109) do not mislead. It
was then that the revolt broke out.10'
The small Roman force left at the base of Siscia (now Sisak in Croatia) was
besieged by the rebels, who seem to have gained control of most of the prov­
ince. The provincial legate of Moesia, A. Caecina Severus, who wus bringing
his forces north to join Tiberius for the planned offensive against Maroboduus,
instead set out to quell the revolt. But the Danubian frontier of his own prov­
ince had now been stripped of its two legions, and Dacian raiders crossed the
river and penetrated Moesia. Just as Tiberius was forced to cancel the invasion
of Bohemia in order to return to fight in Illyricum, so Severus w as forced to
cut short his own rescue effort in order to return to Moesia. In the end, it took
three vears and all the forces the Romans could muster to subdue Illyricum. In
the year 8 there mav have been more than 100,000 troops engaged in sup­
pressing the revolt: 10 legions, 70 cohorts of auxiliary t o o l , u >c av al r y alav, and
 The Ju lio - Claudian System 53

large forces of irregulars, primarily Thracian cavalry supplied by Rhoemet-

aices I, client king of Thrace.108
Viewed in the context of the sporadic and widely separated threats the R o­
mans had to face, the chain reaction brought about by the planned offensive
against Maroboduus was an exception, even if an important one. The normal
experience of the early principate was the successful maintenance of imperial
security on a very narrow and very economical base of military power.

Conclusion
1 nder the republic, the Romans generally solved the security problems of
i heir growing empire by further expansion, but this expansion was mostly he-
I’.emonic rather than territorial. The usual outcome of Roman wars and R o­
man victories was a minimum of territorial aggrandizement and an altogether
more far-reaching extension of Rome’s diplomatic control by means of the cli­
ent system. In the late republic, however, new policies were formed by new
I'lives in Roman political life, and the rhythm of territorial expansion acceler­
at'd perceptibly, reaching a climax under Augustus.
\ugustus obviously did not practice in his own lifetime what he preached in
In . famous posthumous injunction against further conquest, as recorded by
I .ifii us (and to which Tacitus strongly objected).100 Under Augustus’s direction,
".ns ol conquest were fought in every direction, resulting in the annexation of
- i i territories: the future provinces ofMoesia, Pannonia, Noricum, Raetia, and
\l|n s Cottiae and Maritimae. These last annexations were long-overdue secu-
i iii measures against the depredations of the Salassi upon transalpine traffic,
l"ii i lie security motive was less compelling elsewhere. The annexation of man-
i i 11ilc‘ and efficient client states was not, however, Augustan policy, except as a
' i a u sort: Judea was annexed in the year 6, but only because no adequate suc-
i a to 1 lerod was to be found in his family— and Judea was not a province to
1- In’la U entrusted to one of the entrepreneurial client princes of’Asia Minor,
i lie amiv economical])' downsized by Octavian from 6o legions or fragments
i I' " a ms alter his final victory in 31 BCF. remained largely unchanged during
'■ luliu ( laudian era. The emperors of this period could have used conscrip-
..... in increase 1 he size of the arm}' but declined to do so, confirming their
" ■ ■ planer nl ilns self-imposed strategic limitation. That is what drove the
"I 'ii. in e<mt mne Io exploit tile llexible tool of diplomatic control so well known
■ mill' 1 <■11nI' 111 an era: 11 le cl lenl s\ stem.
54 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

Due to the system’s economy of force, the Augustan military establishment

w as sufficient not only to defend the empire but also to enable some attempts
at hegemonic, as opposed to territorial, expansion; at any moment, large troop
concentrations could be assembled for wars of conquest by drawing down the
forces ordinarily deployed on the line, albeit at some risk. In 6 C E , for example,
out of a total legionary establishment of only 28 legions, no fewer than 12 were
concentrated for the offensive into Bohemia that was to take Roman power to
the Elbe, according to Tacitus in Annals (2.46).11(1 .Admittedly, this 12:28 pro­
portion proved to be too high and entailed grave risks, but the system was
undoubtedly highly elastic.
'The accepted view is that Augustus’s goal, even before the great crises of
the years 6-9 in Illvricum and Germany, was limited to the establishment of a
“scientific” frontier on the Elbe, which has even been labeled a “ Hamburg-
Prague-Vienna” line— the sort of anachronism that gives bad historians a bad
name.111 Some scholars have suggested that Augustus set himself no such limit,
being still in full pursuit of the Alexandrian— and Roman— dream of world
conquest. Perhaps that was so at one point: having set out to conquer the R o­
man world at age 18, Augustus was not lacking in ambition. But the civil war
lasted long enough to dull any warlike spirit, and above all his deliberate deci­
sion to maintain a relatively small army was simply inconsistent with any
dreams of world conquest— no matter how badly he might have misjudged the
distance from Rome to the end of the world. It is true but therefore irrelevant
that Roman geographic knowledge was so undeveloped that even the conquest
of China could seem feasible: it has been shown convincingly that the distance
from the Rhine to the Vistula was believed to be less than the distance from
the Pyrenees to the Rhine (656 or 686 Roman miles versus 920), the latter two
being thought to be parallel. Similarly, the distance from the Vistula to the
ocean on the far side of China w as thought to be less than three times the dis­
tance from the Pyrenees to the Rhine (i.e., 2,560 or 2,660 miles). Because
Julius Caesar had conquered Gaul in 10 years with a force that nev er exceeded
10 legions, the conquest of all of Germany must have seemed a perfectly feasi­
ble proposition— if it were indeed a matter of geographic depth and not of the
intensity of resistance, a question answ ered in 9 C E .112
The Augustan system was certainly well suited to support limited ollcnsivc
action on a particular irotit while concurrently ensuring the xccuntv nl the
i m peri a I pen meter as a w hole, and this lle\ ibi lit \ was so emphn rd I >\ ( 'laud 11 is
111 the conquest 0! Britain. V. lone as the empire was In п о pe, ,p|, ■. nnl i id
 fjq S o ^ jilA q p s ijs A u o g ]
The Julio-Claudian Systetn 55

lures that were susceptible to the armed suasion that radiated from Rome’s
power as a whole, and that therefore remained dependable clients that would
ihemselves absorb much of the security burden resulting from past expansion,
Iurther expansion remained possible— but only on one front at a time, and not
a very wide one. There was only so much that could be conquered with the
downsized army of Augustus.
 C H A P T E R TWO

From the Flavians to the Severi

“ Scientific” Frontiers and Preclusive Defense
from Vespasian to Marcus Aurelius

When Nero died in 68 CE, another had already claimed his place. But the new em­
peror, Galba, did not arrive in Rome until October and did not live beyond Ja n u ­
ary 6(j. M. Salvius Otho, an ex-governor of Lusitania, though in Rome as Galba's
follower, procured his murder at the hands of the Praetorians and was acclaimed em­
peror in turn. By then yet another had risen to claim the office, Aldus Vitellius, gov­
ernor of Lower Germany and master of its four legions. So far, contention had been
resolved through suicide and murder; now there was to he civil war also.
In the two Germanics there were seven legions in all: 40,000 men and at least as
many auxiliaries. Vitellius could count on most o f them, enough to seize Rome and the
imperial power. Otho did not command such power in his own right; no legion was
bound to his person, for his former province of Lusitania had none. In Rome there
were the Praetorians, 4,500 men at most; a legion of ex-marines newly raised by Nero
(I Adiutrix); some detachments from the frontier annies of the Danube; and some
auxiliaries. These were not enough; Otho also paid 2,000 gladiators to serve him.
His real hope was the five legions of the Danubian armies and the two legions close
at hand in Dalmatia. The men were willing. I f the legions on the Rhine had a candi­
date in Vitellius, the legions on the Danube would have Otho. The cause of Vitellius
was denuding the German frontiers, as soldiers were removed to Italy to fight for the
imperial power; now the cause o f Otho would expose the Danubian frontiers as well.
But Otho’s plans, and Otho’s men, were slow. At Bedriacum near Cremona in north­
ern Italy the two gathering armies met; the more numerous Vitellians won. By
A pril 6g, Rome had its third emperor of the year, gross and bloodthirsty, according to
the sources, but successful— or so it seemed.
Vitellius had defeated Otho by bold and rapid maneuvers. He was to be defeated in
turn by cautious and wide-ranging preparation. When Vitellius entered Rome in
Ju ly 69, the two legions in Egypt, at the instigation of the prefect-governor, had al­
ready proclaimed another emperor, T. Flavius Vespasianus.
 Fro?;/ the Flavians to the Seven 57

Vespasian had been successfully fighting the Jewish War with an army of three le­
gions, supported by auxiliaries and the troops of client states. He had the support of Egypt,
Syria, and all the eastern client princes— and their ntoney was as useful as their
troops. There was no danger that his rear would be subverted the way his own agents
were subverting the West. His son Titus remained in command in Judea, which was
still the scene of operations and the power base o f the Flavian cause: the fighting legions
in Judea could always overawe both Syria and Egypt to keep allegiances firm .
Vespasian remained in Egypt and left the bloody business of civil war to others. His
agentsfomented unrest among the Batavian auxiliaries on the Rhine to draw and pin
down Vitellian legionary troops, and the grain supply from Egypt was cut off—
perhaps this alone would force Vitellius to capitulate. In the meantime, 20,000 troops
o'i out from Syria on the long road to Rome. By October 69, Vitellians and Flavians
were fighting once again at Bedriacum. The Syrian troops had not yet reached Italy,
and Vespasian was still in Egypt, but the Damdnan armies, who had lost their Otho,
, mild expect no favors from Vitellius, and they had rallied to the Flavian cause. It was
1mops from Pannonia who won the second battle of Bedriacum. Horror followed. Those
who fought in the name of Vespasian were not controlled by him. Cremona, near the
cue of battle, was sacked as i f it were a foreign city, and as the wild men front wild
I'.mnonia marched on Rome, disorderfollowed in their wake. In December 69, Vitellius
.. as killed in Rome, and the Senate voted the imperial powers to Vespasian. He did not
. uier the city until October 70.
I he civil war was to exact one more penalty. To occupy the Vitellian troops in
I never Germany, theformidable Batavians, led by their chief Civilis, had been instigated
i<> revolt in the name o f the Flavian cause. Civilis, client chief of a client tribe, could
.<<11111 on eight auxiliary cohorts manned by his tribesmen in the Roman service, and
augmented their strength with free Germans. By the end of 69 CE, Vitellius was
/- ad, and Romans no longer needed help to fight other Romans. But Civilis continued
II fight in his own cause and rallied some Gauls to his side: the rebels spoke o f creating
■ <i.ilhc empire.
I fair legions on the Rhine, depleted, starved, and demoralized, were overcome by
:<m or subversion. Civilis had won control of the lower Rhine. But the provincial Gauls
■<■• ”//c side of the river did not abandon their Roman allegiance, and thefree Germans
■ the other did not invade the defenseless empire en masse. Both were wise in their
• <n,mu. \in e sound legions under sound Flavian commanders moved against the
• oegade legions and the auxiliaries, leaving their own auxiliaries prudently aside.
■ ■ oh fore could not be resisted. The revolt of Civilis was suppressed, but the Rhine
5« The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

frontier had disintegrated: its troops evacuated or lost, its -winter camps burned, and
Roman prestige— and Roman deterrence— severely damaged.
Vespasian's dynastic ambition was overt. He had two sons, and he tints determined
that the empire would be ruled by a Flavian or not at all. His first, Titus, duly fol­
lowed him in the office after Vespasian died in 79, but Titus died in Si. The younger
son, Domitian, succeeded his brother. The sources are kind to the first two Flavians,
but not to the third. His power threatened, Domitian reacted with repression. The
ancient autocrat lacked the bureaucratic machinery and surveillance technology of the
modern dictator, so that repression, while provocative, was not very reliable. In i)6 CE,
Domitian was murdered.
Between the end of civil war in the year 70 and Domitian's death 26 years later,
there had been no spectacular wars of conquest. In Britain, the area of Roman control
had been pushed to the north, but the island had not been fully conquered, nor had a
settled frontier beeti established across the narrow neck of land below savage Scotland.
I11 Germany, a Rhine frontier had been systematically reestablished and equally sys­
tematically abandoned as Roman control advanced and left the river behind. In a long
series o f frontier rectification campaigns, roads, camps, and forts were built east of the
Rhine and north of the Danube to drive back hostile peoples and to enclose the fertile
salient between the rivers. Not recognizable as wars of conquest in the grand manner,
the engineering campaigns of the Flavians failed to generate enthusiasm among the
sedentary martial spirits in Rome. Domitian's very useful frontier war with the Ger­
man Chatti in 8y C F was ridiculed by contemporary commentators.
In 8y the well-organized Dacians of the jniddle Danube, ruled by Decebalus, a
formidable figure in our sources, crossed the frontier to attack Moesia. Domitian's
subsequent war against the Dacians ended neither in victory and triumph nor in dis­
grace. There were tactical defeats and tactical victories, but the combination of inva­
sion threats from Germans and Sarmatians upstream from Dacia and the attempted
usurpation of I.. Antonins Saturnimis, governor of Upper Germany, in 8y, distracted
Domitian from a decisive war against Decebalus, i f indeed one had been planned.
Domitian's murder in (j6 C F left the office vacant, but no civil war ensued. Equi­
librium between the power of the Praetorians and that of legions (which zee may infer
but cannot prove), or possibly the bitter memories of civil war, left the Senate free to
choose the next emperor. Its choice set a pattern. M. Cocceius Nerva was old, inmtili-
tary, respected, and noble, but chiefly old. In the future, whenever rare circumstances
left this choice to the Senate, old aristocrats would be chosen, us if the senators wanted
to ensure that the privilege of choice could soon be exercised again.
 From the Flavians to the Sever/ 59

Elderly nobles without military experience or affiliation were generally defenseless

against active army commanders with legions at their call, and the Senate’s subse­
quent nominees soon lost their offices and their lives. Bat Netva or his advisers were
seise. After news of mutiny reached Rome, after unruly Praetorians had publicly hu­
miliated the new emperor. Xerva chose to adopt M. Ulpias Trajan us, a distinguished

l^jSJSA p J }SM
39
'ohlier and popular governor of Upper Germany, as his son and successor. Even before
\ervii died in p8, Trajan was the new ruler of the empire. The adoption created the
useful fiction of a family succession, an orderly transfer o f power that simple soldiers
and dynasty-minded provincials could readily accept: the deliberate act was safer than
//■;1genetic gamble of natural succession, and the result could be acceptable to the Senate.
Trajan was a soldier, and a good one; wars of conquest were feverishly anticipated,
uud this time there was no disappointment. A limited war against the Dacians in
iM -102 CE resulted in a compromise settlement, but one which marked a victory:
I hicia was to be a client state with Decebalus as the client king. But the protagonist did
uni fit the part. In 105-106 war had to be renewed, for Decebalus was disobedient and
I ra/an's patience was exhausted. Hard fighting and a great victory followed. A large
new Dacian province across the Danube was added to the empire.
Bat the natural arena for a Roman conqueror was the East. The Armenian settle-
•"cut had broken clown once more: once again an Arsacid occupied the throne of Arme­
nia without the sanction of Rome. Anatolia now had an organized frontier, but with
ui\ iwo legions in Cappadocia and only three in Syria itself and without the geo-
i.ij’hic depth provided by clients, it could not be a safe frontier. I f Parthian forces
'"Id assemble freely in Armenia they might strike with greater force either due west
i due south at their choosing, and to the south was Syria, a core province of the em-
■■■1 e. Both strategic necessity and personal ambition required war. Between up.
■ vd u p Trajan’s army conquered not merely Armenia but much of Mesopotamia
i-wu to the Parthian capital of Ctesipbon. Trajan conquered more than any ruler of
It me since Augustus. Then came disaster. Insurrection in the rear and a Parthian
I"tc nffeusive from the hinterland of Iran forced the rapid evacuation of all the
■ .jiieral lands. Trajan did not outlive his ultimate defeat. In 1 1 7 he fell ill and died
< ihcin, on his way hack to Rome.
/' I,-Iins I lad ruin us, Trajan’s adopted successor, followed a policy of consolidation, not
/"Mi. Darin was retained, bat all the eastern conquests were abandoned. Hadrian
Mined ihe chain <f adoptions with Antoninus Pius (/: 158-161), who in turn adopted
mi ' ,/> cii emperors. Lucius I eras (/: i 6 i - i 6<j ) and Marcus Aurelius (r. 161-180).
hifomi/e era. ,/> /7 bcunne known, was a period of stability and consolidation, of

i
 /'•. i . ,*»//,//«•!* v "/ //’<’ Homan Empire

, .///,/ \xslaiiatized defenses; it was the climax o f imperial success, the

■. i.i . . / v. .//it a, c ,ij food and long-lived emperors andfavorable circumstances. Having
. .nlo i , d the cj cat crisis of 69— when it had seemed on the verge of dissolution— the
i ■ ■ :pu, „1 the l iaviiiiis, Trajan, Hadrian, and the Antonines had seemingly achieved a
i a, m aj everlasting security, a pax Roman and eternal. By the later years of the
vnai anii emperor Marcus Aurelius, however, wears, invasions, and the plague would
duucr the Autonine peace. From then until the end, with only relatively brief intervals
oj respite, the survival of the empire was to be a bitter struggle.

I he System in Outline
The most characteristic device of the Roman art of war under the republic and
early principate was the marching camp. At the conclusion of each day’s march,
legionary troops on the move were assembled at a site, which had been care­
fully selected in advance, where they were put to work for three hours or more
to dig a perimeter obstacle ditch, erect a rampart, assemble a palisade with
prefabricated elements (pila muraliajf and pitch tents. Although archaeological
evidence shows a wide variety of perimeters in the surviving sites,- the internal
layout apparently followed a standard scheme: tent sites were neatly grouped
by units around a broad T-shaped roadway at the center of the camp, which
faced the headquarters area, and a broad gap was left between the inner edge
of the rampart and the first line of tents.’
Afodern commentators often point out that the strength o f the camp de­
fenses was not commensurate with the elaborate effort needed to build them
after a day on the march.4 The strategic mobility o f Roman forces was un­
doubtedly reduced by this tiring and time-consuming camp-building routine,
because Roman troops seemingly marched from a “ very early breakfast” to
midday, with the remainder of the day given over to camp building and rest.’
However, though the flimsy palisade made of portable two-pointed stakes, the
shallow ditch three Roman feet deep, and the rampart only six feet high would
not do much to stem a major assault, it would be a mistake to underestimate
the tactical utility of standard marching camp defenses. According to the
highly technical, and highly credible rather than aspirational, fortification
manual Liber de miinitionibus castrortmr.

In a more secure place, the ditch is used for the sake of discipline, and the types
are V-shaped or Punic. It is called V-shaped when the sides, sloping in Iroin the
top at the same angle and becoming narrower, reac h the bottom. \ <lu< b is I’u
 From the Flavians to the Severi 61

nic when the outer side is laid out vertical; the other side is inclined as in the
V-shaped. They should be at least five feet wide and three feet deep. A similar
ditch should be dug sixty feet in front of the gateway, and the same width as the
gate. Because of its shortness, it is known as a titulum. . . . In less secure places a
rampart of turf, stone, rocks, or rubble should be thrown up. Eight feet wide and
six feet wide will suffice, and a little parapet. There should also be a rampart
before the gates along the titulum as along the ditches; because of the construc­
tion it is known as sanctum.6

Fossa loco securiori causa disciplinae, emus species est fasigata velpunica. Fastigata clicitur,
quae a summa latitudine lateribus devexis in angustiam ad solum coniuncta pervenit.
Punica dicitur; quae latere exteriori ad perpendiculwm dirigitur; contrarium devexmn
/it, quomodo in fastigata. Quilms latitudo dari debeat ad minimum pedum quinque;
altum pedes tres. Regressis pedilnis exterius sexaginta per latitudinem portarmn similiter
fossa fiet, quod propter brevitatem titulum cognominatum est. Vallum loco suspectiori
extrtti debet cespite aut lapide, saxo sive caemento. Sufficit latum pedes VIII, altum pedes
17; et lorica pawn fit similiter ante portas, ut titulum ad fossam, ad vallum. Causa
mstructionis sanctum est cognominatum.

Even modest earthworks (especially with pointed stakes) would be sufficient

in break the impetus of a cavalry charge; indeed, no cavalry would normally
ain-mpt to charge against such obstacles. Furthermore, the margin of 60 Ro­
man feet of the Liber de munitianibiis castrorum, 50 between the outer perimeter
md the first line of tents on the inside, would afford considerable protection
i".mist arrows or throwing spears. Moreover, the broad roadways would
■ nsure that if the camp came under attack, the troops could be mustered in
m orderly manner, avoiding the certain confusion and possible panic easily
aused by men rushing about in a small space strewn with impedimenta.
W \ ertheless, modern commentators are undoubtedly right in stressing the
| 11 111 a] shortcomings of the camp defenses. It was certainly no part of Roman
Ia a nee to man a beleaguered camp in the manner of a fortress: once assem­
ble .1, 1 he troops would march out to fight the enemy in the open, where the
bm I. lorce ol disciplined infantry could be brought to bear with full effect.
1 'nil auxiliaries armed with missile weapons could fight at all usefully from
" loud ilu- c a mp fence.) But it was the nontactical functions that made the
I' ' m m ma roll mg ca mp much more than a mere defensive perimeter andthat
1 - 11 "a deioee <>1 mi| hn i a nee wilhoiil parallel in modern warfare.” I lie
■ | in Im I", i amp was, 111 • lb • l i pc uvei lid ps \ clw >1»>;\u a I dc\ ice.'
62 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

For troops venturing into hostile territory and possibly exotic surround­
ings, the familiar context of the camp defenses would provide a welcome sense
of security. With stray natives and w ild beasts firmly separated front the sol­
diers’ immediate vicinity by ditch, rampart, and palisade, the troops could
wash, care for their equipment, converse, and play in a relaxed atmosphere.
This same sense of security would allow them to sleep soundly and so be fit for
march or battle on the next day. Thus, the physical brutalization and cumula­
tive exhaustion of troops living in field conditions would be mitigated by a
nightly opportunity for recuperation.
T he marching camp was also a labor-saving device. It is true that much
labor was needed to build it, but once the camp was ready for the night, the
protected perimeter would allow a proper watch with a minimum of men.
A standard objective of night operations is to deny sleep to the enemy; even if
little damage is inflicted, noisy hit-and-run attacks night after night can cause
a progressive deterioration in the physical and mental condition of the troops
under attack, partly by forcing more and more men to be assigned to guard
duties at the expense of sleep. Here again the marching camp w as of great
value in preserving the energies of the troops, since, if our source is reliable,
only 16 men in each 8o-man legionary century were posted to guard and
picket duties for the night watch at any one time.4 (Only those who have been
in combat can truly appreciate the military value of sleep.)
It is sometimes claimed that the marching camp also provided an element of
tactical insurance, because if Roman troops were defeated in the field they
could take refuge in the camp and prepare to fight another day.1'1 But this could
onl\r be so if the defeated troops had an intact marching camp within easy
reach, which was unlikely, it was standard practice to slight the defenses once
the site was left. In a more subtle sense, however, the observation has merit.
Xothing is more difficult than canalizing defeat into an orderly retreat to avoid
a rout. The campsite could provide a natural rallying point and a ready-made
framework for redeployment. The Roman marching camp thus combined the
tactical advantages o f a bivouac with the convenience of billets,11 and had the
added benefit of a guarded perimeter that could alw ays be turned into a heavily
fortified earthwork, given more time and labor. The characteristically Roman
institution of the marching camp was a crucial factor in the strength ol an anus
whose significant quality was an exceptional resilience under stress.

The security policies of Vespasian and his successors, winch i eaclusl a fro
cal culmination under I ladrian and lus successors, m.u fi. <I1 ,m .u u nijU
 I<ro?n the Flavians to the Severi 63

to transform the empire into a marching camp writ large. The metaphor is
perfectly applicable: the border defenses created under their policies, just like
1 hose of the marching camp, were intended to serve not as total barriers but
rather as the one fixed element in a mobile strategy o f imperial defense.

uolsj3Apai3js!i
The first step was the demarcation of imperial frontiers. Although major
natural barriers had in some cases provided reasonably clear borders for the
lulio-Claudian empire, in many places its borders would have been difficult to
determine with any precision. One modern scholar noted the lack of identified
boundary stones and went on to infer that the very notion of an imperial fron-
1 icr did not exist— an extreme case of positivist historiographical discipline.12
YYrhile it is certainly true that the Roman borders were different from today’s,
1 bat is ultimately so only because our borders presume an accepted political
entity on the far side, a status that sets rigid limits on each side’s sphere of corv-
1 ml if not influence. The Romans often faced no symmetrical power or admin-
iMrative presence on the far side of their own border, and could freely project
(heir influence beyond it. Hence beyond provincial territory under direct rnili-
1.1 ry control, there was a further zone of political control, and the latter in turn
rave way to areas of greater, and then lesser, influence. One modern historian
deems this much too subtle for mere Romans, but then that same historian
insists that they were (all?) simple-minded glory hounds and looters, conceding
1mi king to the evidence of large-scale thinking.13
W here no ocean or broad desert gave visible definition to the limits of em­
pire. only an exercise in subjective political judgment could determine just
"here the sphere of imperial control finally came to an end. An understand-
d'le psychic satisfaction could be derived from claiming some vague form of
u/crainty over remote peoples whom Rome did not really control, and these
■ mpty claims are not always easy to distinguish from the genuine client rela-
ii'inships that broadened the real scope o f imperial power so considerably.
V'Min, some modern historians view the Romans as sufficiently delusional to
' Innk that the entire world was already theirs.14 But that inflates the scope of
'In о boastings, even if Augustan bombast did claim the allegiance of India
' !'•' <lesiac, 31). But false claims of suzerainty were paired with very similar
1 "ms ihai were altogether more valid, as in the case of Juba’s .Mauretania or
I I о >d’s |udea.
\ll i Ins had changed l>\ the rime H ad rian was done with his frontier f o r d ­
's u юн-,. I lw lim ns ui empire were demarcated on the ground, so that all could
' II e\aei l\ what was lb un an ami w lu I was not, even 11 l here w ere no houmlai \
■ ■ я ».в т я п я я а я гг в | и ь и .| | д
66 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

stones as such.11 Almost all the client states had been absorbed, and with
several significant exceptions that illuminate the purpose of the rest, the land
borders of the empire were secured by perimeter infrastructures that comple­
mented the natural barriers of rivers and ocean.
The invisible borders of imperial power had given way in many places to
physical frontier defenses: in Britain, the complex of fortifications known as
Hadrian’s Wall (it was much more than a wall) defined Roman territory from
sea to sea on the Tyne-Solway line. In Germany, a less elaborate trench-and-
palisade construction, or fence barrier, cut across the base of the salient formed
by the converging upstream courses of the Rhine and Danube, with the frontier
running along the inner bank of each. In N orth Africa, segments of a trench-
and-wall system, the Fossatuin Africae, have been identified over a distance of
750 kilometers along the edge ol the Sahara in modern Algeria. In the Dobruja
o f modern Romania, a continuous wall of less certain attribution formed a
short perimeter from Axiopolis (Rasova) on the Danube to the sea at Tomis
(near Constanta). T h is is a typical “scientific” frontier and may have been the
first continuous perimeter of imperial times— if it was indeed built under
Domitian.16
N o such continuous wall systems have been identified on the long eastern
borders of the empire in Asia, from the Black Sea to the Red, with one inter­
esting exception: a 15-mile double ditch and wall in northern Mesopotamia
that closes a gap between the natural defenses of the Khabur River to the west
and the high ground of the Jebel Sinjar to the east, thus blocking off an other­
wise easy access route to the key city of Nisibis from the south.1. But no evidence
has come to light indicating an eastward extension of the Fossatutn Africae of
Numidia into Tripolitania, Cyrenaica, or Egypt (or westward to Mauretania).
As we shall see, the sections of the limes (here in the meaning of a defended
border) that remained “open” illuminate the true military purpose of those
that zrere provided with an unbroken perimeter barrier. For the absence of such
barriers does not mean that there was no limes (in the sense of a linear perim­
eter): the essential element of the limes was not the wall, palisade, or fence, but
rather the network of roads linking the frontier garrisons with one another
and the frontier zone as a whole with the interior.111 One modern scholar made
a name for himself bv rejecting the entire notion that the limes w as a defended
tronlier,1'' as opposed to its original meaning as a road network, and a mere
demarcation d that; bill in addition to lontr stretches ol claborateh delcndcd
 From the Flavians to the Severi 67

The transition to the second system of perimeter defenses was neither abrupt
nor universal!} applied. Under successive emperors from Vespasian onward,
tlie Romans reacted to local conditions by reinforcing particular segments of the
perimeter that happened to concern them at the time. Under Vespasian they

^lOjSjgApaJSjSM
dismantled the last client states in the East; under Domitian they enclosed
what is now the Wetterau ot Germany, a salient beyond the Rhine; under Trajan
they annexed Dacia and campaigned against the Parthians; and under Hadrian
! hey consolidated provinces and built his famous wall across the narrow' neck
o( northernmost England. These emperors did not decide to abandon the client
system as a tool of diplomatic control, but it is clear that they saw it as much
100 fragile to defend imperial security reliably.
We can discern a definite pattern in Roman strategic behavior under suc­
cessive emperors, different as it was: an increasing reliance on military forces
and military infrastructure for territorial security. It would be on them, rather
1 Ivan (an client rulers, that the Romans would increasingly rely to defend their
empire.

Border Defense; T he Tactical Dimension

1 lie growing reliance on a perimeter defense under the Flavians required an
imestment of colossal proportions that continued over the next three centu-
1 ics. On every segment of the limes, whether provided with a continuous barrier
m not, road networks, forts large and small, and towers for observation and
signaling were built and repeatedly rebuilt according to changing schemes of
dclcnse and changes in regional priorities, and in response to variations in the
nature of the threat. Thanks to the devoted labors of generations of archaeolo-
"isis. the physical elements of Roman frontier policy have been uncovered in a
■ ■ 'luTcnt, if incomplete, manner (there are many known sites not yet excavated).
Km while the archaeological, epigraphic, numismatic, and literary evidence
In been augmented and assiduously collated by these labors, the meaning and
pm pose of Roman frontier defense during this phase of imperial strategy remain
■ 'ini n iversial.
I h e Romans are not otherwise held to have been irrational or timid, yet the
i' e d defenses built by them are often said to have been both useless and
■I. пи иali/ingv’1 ow ing to the supposedly fatal “Maginot Line mentality” that
;U m r ie p re se n ce ol th ese lived defenses allegedly engendered.” These judg­
in' n e , r e l l e e i not n u ll .111 a w a r e n e s s o l t h e eventual third-eenturv breakdown
■I 1 lie s\ '.Inn, bnl also 1 i r i i m i e h ineradicable pre|niliee against d el e ns nc
 . '■ ■/'/,/// i.injure

.. i .... h i,, \ /..min .ii ions—;i prejudice as common among histori-

...... i i I,.h i m ж .I Ins policies as among contemporary military ana-
i............ i...| n 4 ballistic missile defenses. To that purpose, Clansewitz
....... I "i t 11 pi i .< ill eel.
i i ......... i .........и>n lallaey contained in such analyses is to evaluate defen-
i. mi . in absolute terms. I f a defense can be penetrated anywhere, at any
....... и i ..ml m lie “ useless,” and only an impenetrable defense is conceded to
l.. ..I \ alne. This appraisal is highly misleading: its equivalent for the offense
m i .i i M Ik in regard as useless any offensive system that cannot prevail against
ill Ini ms of resistance, under all circumstances. Defensive systems, as with
.mi i lung else except love perhaps, must be evaluated in relative terms: their
cost in resources should be compared to their military “output,” which is more
varied than just preclusion or penetration. Further, the value of any defensive
system must be assessed in terms of the type o f threat it is intended to counter.
One system may be most effective against low-intensity threats (infiltration,
hit-and-run raids, etc.), another against the maximal threat of invasion. Each
should be evaluated accordingly, for defensive systems are normally intended
to provide a finite barrier only against a particular kind of threat, while other­
wise absorbing, or deflecting, or at least filtering threats of greater or lesser in
intensity than those against which the system is designed.
Roman frontier defenses in sectors provided with linear barriers, whether
in the form of walls, palisades, fences, or earthworks, were mostly designed to
provide security against low-intensity threats— primarily transborder infiltra­
tion and limited incursions. These barriers were certainly not intended to provide
a total defense against large-scale attacks. Instead, both types of limes, whether
“open” or “closed” (i.e., provided with continuous barriers), served as baselines
for mobile striking forces, which were to repel or pursue and chase out any
large-scale attacks by fighting in a tactically offensive manner, albeit within
the framework of a defensive strategy. W hile minor, endemic threats were
countered by the small guard forces that manned the fixed defenses, more seri­
ous threats were met by concentrated mobile forces held in the nearby rear but
ready to move forward to intercept invaders or to launch spoiling attacks across
the border against enemies gathering to invade.
During this phase of the empire, the operational method of border defense
against high-intensity threats was therefore mobile and offensive, not static
and defensive: combat was to take place beyond the border rat Iht i ban within n.
In other words, the complex of fixed defenses built along ilic 1i i i i c \ Mixed only
 From the Flavians to the Severi 69

as a supporting infrastructure for offensive operations in the event o f major at­

tacks, and it should be evaluated as such. There was no question, at that time,
of using the frontier defense infrastructures to shelter the garrisons serving on
the sector. To validate these statements, we must first set the barrier elements:
walls, palisades, fences, and earthworks, in the context of the other compo­

[uoisjeA p s js js ii
nents of the overall defense systems which were present in every tract o f the
Irontier, whether open or closed.24
Watchtowers and outpost forts. Their function was to provide surveillance
against infiltration and early warning of impending large-scale attacks. Watch-
towers were usually built directly into the barrier element, if there w as one, as
m the case of the turrets spaced at intervals of 540 feet along Hadrian’s Wall in
Britain. These provided dense surveillance coverage, but little in the way of
early warning.2'
Outpost forts, on the other hand, w^ere located well beyond the border.
Such forts have been identified on the major routes north of Hadrian’s Wall,
.1 ml three of them (Birrens, Netherby, and Bewcastle) have been given a securely
I ladrianic dating.26 In the case of the Fossatum Africae in modern Algeria, the
dating of the elements in the system is less certain, but an outer zone of surveil­
lance and active defense has been identified with reasonable certainty to a depth
<>1 60-80 kilometers beyond the borderline.2,
('jrmmimiaitions. This second functional element, partly based on the same
physical structures, was a two-way signaling system that connected the out­
posts and surveillance towers with the auxiliary forts in the rear and with the
legionary fortresses of the sector, the latter sometimes located deep in the rear.
< omniunications, by fire and smoke signals, required that perimeter forts or
1■ >uers have a clear view to the rear, though not necessarily to either side.24 (It
Ims been observed that on the Antonine Wall in Scotland, where the irregu-
I 1111 ics of the ground sometimes preclude a line-of-sight alignment, semicir-
■ nl.it extensions of the wall appear to have served as the bases of signaling
| " « i t s .) 2 ' A communication network is present even where there is no trace
"l 1 perimeter barrier: a scene on Trajan’s column shows a regular pattern of
mauling stations along the Danube, where there was no wall or other bar­
ic 1 " In Britain, where the two legionary fortresses York-Eburacum and
1 hrsiiT Dcva remained over 100 and 140 miles, respectively, behind Hadrian’s
\\ all, a vertical axis ot signaling rowers has been identified linking the C a r­
le.f acini <>l 1ladnan's Wall with the fortress of the legion VI Victrix at
\ .a f 1
1
 LEGEMD
LEGI ON

0 CAVALRY ala

~C~ INFANTRY COHORT

cT~ MIKED COHORT

"T" NUMERUS
PATROL
BOAT

legend
[L]| LEGION

0 CAVALRY ALA
l~L| INFANTRY COHORT
MIKED COHORT
EUROPEAN LAND FRONTIER B HUMERUS
(E.G., BRITAIN,UPPER GERMANY, RAETIA, DACIA)

^Iodels of Frontier Organization II

Hr
n ii.iH b i,«.fciB H H H K B »ii3 iiiB ia a m iiiiL n .ii»№ iii.iiii.iiP H i»,M .fcH b M ii.y
74 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

Garrisons and operational reserves. The third indispensable element in the sys­
tem was the guards, patrol units, auxiliary forces, and—though not always—
legions, which were housed in an ascending hierarchy of guardposts, auxiliary
forts, and legionary fortresses. T he latter term is used conventionally to de­
scribe legionary bases, but during this phase of empire no elaborate defenses
were built around the complex o f barracks and service buildings that made up
each legionary “ fortress.”
Roads. They were the essential elements of the system-, each defended sector
was served by a network of “ horizontal” and “vertical” roads, the latter provid­
ing axes o f penetration beyond the border as well as rearward routes for com­
munication, reinforcement, troop circulation, and supply. Where the limes
was not guarded by linear barriers as, most importantly, on the Syrian frontier,
horizontal perimeter roads also served as patrol routes against infiltration and
small-scale incursions.'2
When the outer lines of the perimeter were shorter than the inner ones, as
w-as the case wdth the trans-Danubian limes o f Raetia, the horizontal frontier
roads also served as interprovincial highways. Based as it w-as on the rapid con­
centration of mobile forces, the frontier defense of this phase of empire was
critically dependent on the density and quality of the road netw-ork. Charac­
teristically, the first step in the Flavian reorganization of the frontiers of east­
ern Anatolia was the construction of west-east vertical highways, linking the
approaches to the frontier zone with western Anatolia."
However impressive they are in their conceptualized totality, however im­
pressive are their visible survivals (destined to grow as excavation continues),’4
the physical elements of Roman limites w-ere only the skeleton of the system.
They did not delimit its scope, which comprised “ the w-hole moving complex
o f patrolling, trafficking, and diplomacy which grew-- up around these struc­
tural lines and . . . extended far beyond the areas covered by them.” 5'
Their layout makes it quite clear that the walls, palisades, fences, or earth­
works that formed the linear barriers in Europe and Numidia during this phase
of the empire were not intended to provide fighting platforms in the manner o!
medieval castle walls. For one thing, their physical design would have pre­
cluded such use. In the case of Hadrian’s Wall, for example, the rampart walk
was no more than 6 feet wide, too narrow- to be a satisfactory fighting platform.
T he thickness of the wall (and therefore the rampart walk minus the parapet)
varied from as little as 5 feet 6 inches to a maximum <>l w>lerv “ Mom>vcr, in
t lie case of the ualisades. fences, and walls of 1 unci ( ,Vi m.m\ and K a r l la. as
 Frmn the Flavians to the Severi 75

well as in the “curtain” element of the Fossatum Africae, there was no rampart
or parapet at all. Therefore, while these structures were useful elements of the
security apparatus against infiltration, they were not meant to defend against
serious threats— those threats were to be defeated by attacking, not by
defending.

'UQtSJSA. pSJS^Sl.t
The obvious unsuitability of the linear barriers as fighting platforms against
large-scale attacks has sometimes resulted in description of them as merely
"s\ mbolic.” , If that were so, it would diminish their function to mere bound­
ary markers, making their entire construction hugely wasteful and wildly ir-
I a! ional, given the vast and prolonged efforts needed to build them. But that is
not a possible reality. Roman linear barriers, by no means the first known to
antiquity,-™ had at least two separate tactical functions.
First, they enhanced the reliability of surveillance and decreased the quan­
tity of manpower needed for protection against low-intensity threats, notably
infiltration. By presenting an obstacle that could be crossed, hut not effortlessly
■ a quickly, the walls, palisades, or fences increased the effectiveness o f surveil-
I Iin e, especially at night when the visual observation range of the sentries in
1heir turrets or watchtowers would be drastically reduced. The barriers also
I'K« ided security for small patrols bv posing an effective obstacle to ambush;
1 In« meant that the sice of patrol units could safely be kept very small.
11 has been argued that even such elaborate militarv fortifications as those
"inprising Hadrian’s Wall served primarily an economic rather than a secu-
i i I unction. 1 hat view focuses narrowlv on the frontier zones solelv as areas
-'I intense commercial activity, as then undoubtedly were. But that narrow view
I1"-wins anv proper understanding of the role of such frontier defenses. To
i" 'U- ihat the purpose of Hadrian's Wall was “to control movement, not to pre-
m h" means nothing at all,40 because it is impossible to control movements
ii Ik mi an ability to restrict them, or simply stop them and then repel an attack
1 ' .■ «vssnrv. The Roman frontier structures of this period must he seen w ithin
" ••. i.lcr context of the security apparatus as a whole (as should he obv ious to
: i' i ippai atus designed to he both relatively permeable for innocent trans-
• nd- 1 11 at fie when the threat level was low and highly impermeable to infil-
1(i11 .iml raiders when the threat level was higher.
I !k m-ciiik) laciieal function of the linear harriers was aimed at much more
1 •• 1 -ne. (It 1 earn. Mieh news 1nentsii ip', b\ mounted raiders or C\ CI1 outright
k -i i I I a 1 .n .111 \ I' k 1 i ■ , I Ik 11.11 1 iei e u ere <v n ,1 m Iv formidable: I Iad na n'x
' ill v a- limited In .1 \ 11 1111 ■ I d 111 11 e > In I wide and .11 lea ‘.I 11 lee I deep,
ii
76 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

beyond the ditch and past a berm from 6 to 20 feet wide stood the wall, 20 feet
high including the parapet.41 The palisades and fences of Upper Germany and
Raetia were generally lower (12 -13 feet), while the reconstructed segments of
the Fossatum Africae show a wide degree of variance: the obstacle ditch ranged
from 4 to 6 meters wide and 2.3 to 3.4 meters deep, and the wall from 2 to 2.5
meters high.42
It might appear that the low wall of the Fossatum Africae, not much higher
than a reasonably tall man, would not present much of an obstacle to marauders—
and some of the reductionists, who see no strategy at all in Roman doings and
undoings, of course deny that it had any military function at all,41 even deny­
ing the need for it. But as one notable expert explained, there was indeed a
need to keep out nomads: “drought, cattle disease or pressure of other tribes
from behind often formed a vital compulsion to transgress from desert and
semi-desert into the town. This implies the need for a permanent guard.” 44
Actually, as any horseman well knows, no wall or ditch is lightly jumped over
in a gallop— let alone a wall plus ditch combination such as the fossatum was,
reminiscent of the hedge and ha-ha combinations that make British-style fox
hunting, however fox-less, an excellent preparation for dangerous combat. And
contemporary narrative sources concur that even a relatively shallow ditch and j
I
a low wall could discourage mounted raiders, by taking awav their ability to j
swiftly storm defenses.4’ Instead of being able to ride into settled areas at will, I
relying on surprise and the resulting shock effect to defeat resistance quickly, |
raiders would be forced to dismount in order to breach the wall and fill in the 3
-3
ditch, so that their mounts could pass. And once inside the barrier, the raiders |
could not be certain of a rapid exit— unless they returned to the original entry |
point. Bv posting a detachment to close the original breach and sending pa- j
trols to locate the raiding party, the defenders could trap the raiders inside the j
perimeter, counting on the barrier to slow down their escape. The principal
tactical problem in countering such threats was always the elusiveness of the j
enemy, and even if wall systems could not keep them out, they could certainly
help to keep them in.46
An interesting case in point is the vallum (the Venerable Bede's misnomer;
Hiytoriu, 1.12) on the inner side of the Hadrian Wall complex, which consisted
of a flat-bottomed trench 20 feet wide at the top, 8 feet wide at the bottom,
and 10 feet deep, the whole set between 6-toot-high ramparts iormed In the
upcast. T o g e th er with the berms, the width ol t lie \ a I Inn 1 .e. .........1 iplrl e e.i 1 1 It
w o r k a m o u n te d to 1n ■ l e d , a R o m a n act u v 1 S o f me .1 . 11 » r. b. b c t n l t li.it
 From the Flavians to the Severi 77

1 his uniquely elaborate barrier had preceded the wall, it could be explained as
a wall substitute, if a poor one. But once archaeological evidence proved that the
digging of the vallum was concurrent with the erection o f the wall, or came
alter it,4S there was much explaining to do.
Obviously it was useless as a second line o f defense: troops forced off the

[uoIsjaApaiaisii
wall would only make themselves more vulnerable if they descended into the
\ nllum. One old speculation that fits the modern reductionist fashion explained
the vallum as the limit of civil jurisdiction, just ahead of the military zone of
I ladrian’s Wall, with the further embellishment of identifying it as a customs
barrier under procuratorial control. But because the vallum is generally located
so that it can be observed from the wall turrets, such a large construction effort
is simply too implausible for that minor jurisdictional purpose.
Attempts have been made to relate the linear elements o f frontier systems to
uctics of border defense against high-intensity threats also, but these have not
been very convincing. All linear defenses necessarily work best against low-
mtensity threats; they could not be of much use in fighting enemy concentra-
i a ms, which were to be intercepted not by guards or patrols but by substantial
l<lives, and well beyond the curtain whenever possible. Against a large-scale
.a lack, the walls, palisades, fences, or perimeter roads (e.g., on the Syrian limes)
\\ ere not the first line of defense, but rather the last.
\ctually the structures of Hadrian’s Wall as originally built are eloquent
ssiim on v to the underlying tactical scheme: the forts built along the wall
" ere provided with three twin portal gates, the last opening on the far side of
i lie curtain, and it is obvious that those gates were to serve as sally ports for a
mobile and offensive defense. It is also evident that the outpost forts were to
I'luvide early warning before, and a secure baseline during, such interception
illics. The result was a highly successful combination of the strategic defensive
e a b offensive tactics and operational methods, which made the system active
mil resilient, with an inherent capacity to outconcentrate attackers, which
" i , i lie essential point of course. In other words, the Hadrian’s Wall complex
■■/. (,/ like a fixed and static response to the fluid, dynamic threat of incursions,
bm most of its actual forces were mobile and poised to attack, and thus inher-
- in It capable of gathering into field forces to engage the enemy offensively.
h v m ild appear, h o w ev er, th a t h is to r ia n s u n f a m ilia r w it h m ilit a r y o p e r a tio n s

■ in n i i i r c l v m iss th e p o in t. H e n c e th e v c r it ic iz e R o m a n f r o n t ie r p o lic y d u r in g

111r phase o l t lie c i 11pi re lo r l be I in c u r d c p lo v m c n t o f R o m a n fo rc e s a lo n g th e

l ii t i i i c . , « I n c h .illu m in e d i<> .iii in e la s t ic “ c o r d o n , ” b o u n d In be p e n d ra ted .

78 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

according' to them, and the}- quote Napoleon (“le systeme de cordons est des plus
nuisihlcs”) and Clausewitz as their witnesses. But the essence of cordon deploy­
ments is the even distribution of available defensive forces all along the line of
interception, in order to cover the full frontage equally.
It is certainlv true that the attackers of a cordon have the full advantage of
concentration against a dispersed defense, as do all mobile columns against all
tactically static lines: even if the offense is numerically inferior overall, and
perhaps grossly so, it can still attain crushing local superiority at the chosen
points of penetration. It is for this reason that all capable practitioners of war
and all progressive theoreticians have always regarded evenly distributed cor­
don deployments as inherently inferior in large-scale warfare against mobile
forces. Indeed, in such warfare it is only rational to choose a cordon deployment
if the defense suffers from inferiorities that cannot be overcome. For example,
an army composed solely of infantry, when opposed by cavalry forces, can have
no hope of successful maneuver in any case, so the only feasible defense may be
the formation of a continuous interception line. Similarly, the cordon may
be the best form of deployment for defensive forces that are grossly inferior to
the attackers in command and control (or in their means of communication);
again, such forces would be outmaneuvered in mobile warfare in any case, and
by adopting cordon tactics they can at least hope to delay the enemy. When
such deficiencies are not present, the voluntary adoption of a cordon, with its
resultant dispersal of strength, can only signify a failure of generalship— or so
goes the argument.
None of these organic inferiorities affected the Roman army during this
phase of the empire. There was no inferiority in the overall level of mobility:
although the core of the army was still very much the heavy infantry of the
legions, it also contained large cavalry forces. In the second half of the second
century, the Roman army included at least 10 milliary and 90 quingenary altn\
a total of some 55,000 horsemen at full establishment.49 There was, moreover,
the light cavalry of the mixed cohortes equitatae, at the rate of 240 horsemen for
each milliary and 120 for each quingenary cohort. There are no precise data
on the number of cohortes equitatae out of the total of 40-50 milliary cohorts
and 270 quingenary cohorts estimated for the second half of the second century,
but the proportion may have been quite large. In Britain, for example, 5 of t h e
7 attested milliary cohorts and 31 of the 46 quingenary cohorts were cqnitu
t a e f] though Britain was probably atypical. In Lower (Irrm a m tlu -iv w e re <>
attested cohortes ajintatae and as many inlantrv co h o rts a ll q u m e e n a t \

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82 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

T h is breakdown reveals the true nature of the deployment. O f a grand total

o f almost 30,000 troops deployed on the sector, to percent at most were com­
mitted to static defense/’2 which is by no means a large proportion. In fact, it is
comparable to the proportion of manpower that a mobile field army would al­
locate for security duties in the rear.
On other segments of the imperial perimeter there was a similar distribu­
tion of forces: many mobile, few static. On the trans-Danubian limes in Rae­
tia, for example, the late second-century structure of forces consisted of five
elements in an ascending hierarchy of concentration: on or very near the pali­
sade or fence, small towers (Wachposten or Blockhäuser) were strung out, each
housing a handful of men. Also on the line, larger guardposts (Feldwache) were
spaced at less frequent intervals. Then there were still larger fortlets (Zwischen­
kastelle) at longer intervals; and finally, entire alae and cohorts were deployed
in standard auxiliary castella, located mostly on the line but sometimes well
behind the curtain/’3 In addition, as of 179 -180 C E , the sector was backstopped
by the legion III Italica deployed at Castra Regina (Regensburg), constituting
the only striking force of major proportions.
T he structure of forces described above was not that of the original (i.e.,
Flavian) scheme o f border defense in Britain, Upper Germany, or Raetia. In
that scheme, the auxiliary forts had frequently been located well behind the
perimeter, itself only marked by watchtowers and outpost forts, since there
were no linear barriers as yet. In both cases, the post-Flavian trend was to
move the forts right up to the perimeter itself, usually abandoning the older
forts behind the line. The change was once associated specifically with Iladri-
anic frontier policy, and much was made of it: the defense had supposedly been
made inelastic by being deprived of the second line formed by the chain of
auxiliary forts. But recent archaeological evidence suggests that this change
was only one of degree.64
In any case, the tactical criticism is not valid, for at that time it was no part
of Roman tactics to allow penetrations of the line in the manner o f a defense-
in-depth, where the enemy is to be trapped between outer and inner lines in a
combat zone within the perimeter. Instead, the scheme called for a forward
defense: the aim was to intercept the enemy beyond the perimeter. Hence the
“ Hadrianic” reorganization merely meant that auxiliary interception forces
were already based at jurnping-off positions, instead of having to march lor
ward to them from forts several hours awav.
 From the Flavians to the Severi 83

It is now possible to reconstruct the outlines of the operational method of

border defense. Instead of playing the role o f the passiv e line to the dynamic
mobile column of the offense (which could thus attain crushing numerical su­
periority at the chosen points of penetration), the forces deployed on each sec-
inr were obviously intended to sally out o f their forts to intercept major bands

TfojsjaA paisjSji
'>f attackers, that is, intermediate-level threats. For threats below and above
1 his threshold, tactics differed: against small-scale incursions and solitary at-
icmpts at infiltration, the guards in the fortlets (milecastles or their equiva­
lents) would suffice; in the case of large-scale invasions, the tiuxilia would sally
Inrth to contain the threat while legionary forces marched forward to back-
lop their defense.
The only troops not normally available for massed mobile deployments
were that small proportion assigned to guard duty on the line. And these pro-
' uled a rear-area security function, which mobile forces in the field would
1iced in any case. One cannot therefore speak of an “ inelastic frontier cordon” *'—
not, at any rate, at the tactical or operational level. For the essence of a cordon
defense is the low degree of concentration imposed by an extended linear de-
I>!■ ament, while at this time Roman frontier forces were still essentially mobile
1ud could mass as quickly as any field army. The Romans, whose forces still
■ mined their core of legionary heavy infantry, would benefit from maximal
b.ui Afield concentration on both sides: all else being equal, concentration would
- icmatically (avor the Romans, because their forces fought most efficiently
a 1 lie higher levels of combat intensity.6*
I lie great difference between the post-Flavian system of frontier defense
mb that of the Julio-Claudian era was in the greater provision of day-to-day
' untv against low-intensity threats in areas unprotected by client troops,
b'h Roman forces fully retained their ability to fight large-scale wars,
l- - misc their capacity for mobility and concentration remained high (though
1 tmw were no longer deployed in multiple camps, according to Suetonius,
1 ■ '/,///. 7), they now had another type of military capability: they could pro-
I .1 preclusive defense against low-intensity threats. Both force structures
-111 I i nsure ultimate superiority in the field, the sine qua non of the empire’s
n ■ n il But only the second could also ensure a high level of civil security,
n m In >iit ic r /ones.
I b. s,- two dimensions of security vvere, and are, functionally very different
'■1 ■mail 1 1 mi rad wh an 1 c-qu 1n-mcnis. Isolated m bit rat or s and small bands of
84 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Etnpire

raiders cannot be reliably intercepted by large striking forces marching or rid­

ing across the countryside. On the other hand, a thinly distributed intercep­
tion line that provides a preclusive defense over the full length of the frontier
cannot stop large-scale attacks. T he conflicting demands of battlefield superi­
ority, which requires concentration, and preclusive security, which requires
linear dispersion, cannot be resolved unless a third element is introduced into
the equation. That was the role of the limes frontier infrastructure, with its
roads, watchtowers, guardposts, walls, palisades, and fences systematically built
on the frontiers. These infrastructures resolved the contradiction between
concentration and dispersion by serving as highly effective labor-saving devices.
They enabled the army to provide preclusive security against low-intensity
threats with a small fraction of its total force, while preserving the army’s ability
to fight in large-scale combat with the bulk of its forces.
Battlefield superiority is indispensable for strategic survival; any power that
survives in a hostile environment does so by defeating the highest-intensity
threats with which it is confronted. But strategic superiority does not automati­
cally entail preclusive security. A state mav retain control over its territory even
if it does not repel each and every small-scale penetration.
Under the Julio-Claudians, there was no linear defense infrastructure, so
high levels of day-to-day security for exposed frontier areas could not have
been attained without fragmenting the Roman army into a very large number
of small guard detachments. Actuallv, the legions and the mixilia were deployed
in compact masses, often in multilegion camps. Between the widely separated
legionary bases there was often no active defense at all. Instead, it was the cli­
ent states and client tribes beyond the frontier that provided security within it,
bv themselves suppressing transborder infiltration at the source. Given the
level of political organization and control in these states and tribes, which were
kept in awe bv the legions, a fully effective preclusive defense was out of the
question. Few clients could be expected to control every would-be infiltrator
and warrior-raider among their populations.
Notwithstanding the endemic insecurity of its unguarded frontiers, the
Julio-Claudian system was highly efficient— efficient, that is, in terms ol tin-
goals of the empire at that time. But much evidence supports the inference t lv.il
by the second centurv the goals had changed. Ultimate strategic seeuriu
remained essential, but now there was a further requirement: providing e o n

tiimotis security for civilian life and properlv bv insulating provincials trom
hostilc barbarians c\ cn 111 peripheral arc.is. \ 1<>iv pa 11 ic 11 la 1 h 1 1n |hi i [» i-.r 1 >1 1 In­
 Front the Flavians to the Severi 85

linear barriers was to divide the barbarians beyond from the barbarians within,
who were in the process of becoming Romans.6, Economic development, urban­
ization, and political integration, that is, Romanization— the ultimate goal—
.ill required high levels of day-to-day security and also the separation of newly
made provincials from their kin living beyond the nearby borders in freedom
and savagery.
How, then, does one explain the “open” limites of eastern Anatolia, Syria,
Palestine, Arabia, Egypt, Cvrenaica, Tripolitania, and Mauretania, where
1 here were neither walls nor palisades? W hy was the goal of preclusive security
lo r civilian life pursued so consistently in Numidia and the West and seem­
ingly not at all in the rest of the empire? In answer, we must first note that in
Ihi rope the river frontiers of the Rhine and Danube were not protected by
linear barriers. Instead, watchtowers and signal stations were complemented
l>\ riverine patrol fleets (Chassis Cermanica, Chassis Pannonica, and Chassis
Moesica). The Danube’s winter freeze, when the river fleets could not operate,
".is therefore the time of greatest danger, because the land-based surveillance
\ stem was much less effective without their support.68
A similar adaptation to circumstances is found in the case of the desert
liuntiers of Asia and Africa. There, too, no continuous barrier was needed
ii'.imst low-intensity threats. There were, of course, numerous nomadic tribes
if .11 would raid the frontier zones, given the opportunity (into the twentieth
■ mu 11 ry, the predatory razzia was the major cottage industry of the desert). But
1 Ins did not mean that linear defenses were needed, since there were no broad
■ ultivated zones to be protected. In the Syrian, Arabian, Palestinian, and Sa­
il .11 in frontier zones there were only isolated towns and small islands of oasis
'■ 'i icuIture, and it was much more efficient to protect those localities individu-
>h\ than to protect the whole area. Hence one could say that along the desert
n mges of the empire there was no real frontier, nor any political border de-
in suing zones of greater and lesser political control.69
I lie only places over which the Romans truly exercised firm control, because
I" \ prov ided for their security, were the individual settlements. In the Negev
1 '• in ot Israel, for example, towns like Nitzana, Haluza, Rehovot, and Shivta
■ ■ o lori i fled islands in a sea of desert, a barren landscape that needed no pro-
...... mi because it held nothing of value for Romans, natives, or raiding nomads.70
' 'n 1 lie oilier peripherv of these settlements, houses were built very close to one
...... . h e r , t u n n i n g m etleet an all-round perimeter that mounted raiders would
■ "a • .1■.1K \ enl 11 le lo pi ■ 1id 1.11 r; he me , these low 11s did not need walls. I o v e r s
/ I I. )
 / !>; Hi'Miiii Umpire i:
i . ..i in ....... i impending attack, communications to summon mobile
i |.................1 m lunik sufficed to ensure security for the desert towns.
m, ,, ,, , xi .ii m ,• proves that the towns mere secure, for no settled life can
....... . a 11111 i aiding range of desert nomads unless provided with a reliable

\\ 11 it'I\ spaced sources of water dictated an agriculture scattered across the

. nine desert belt from Mauretania to Syria; thus all these areas could be pro-
ici led In point defenses, echeloned in depth. On the Syrian limes, this meant
1 ii i t her that the system could be effective against the high-intensity Parthian
threat; defense against the Parthians required good roads and a substantial
body of troops, but not a linear barrier. 1
The security problems of modern Israel during its vulnerable first decades
provided an exact parallel: it faced a high-intensity invasion threat from Egypt
on the Suez Canal-Sinai sector, but only a low-intensity infiltration threat on
the Jordan River border with the Hashemite kingdom. Accordingly, the Israe­
lis had to establish two very different defensive systems: a large mobile force
deep in the Sinai with only a picket line of small and widely separated observa­
tion strongholds (the Bar Lev Line) on the canal itself; and on the Jordanian
frontier, against the much less significant threat posed by the Palestinian
guerrillas, an uninterrupted barrier of fences, surveillance devices, and mined
strips to prevent infiltrators from penetrating the settled areas of the West
Bank, which are within walking range of the river Jordan. By contrast there was
no need to preclude infiltration on the canal front, because inside it there
was no Israeli civilian life, only the desert.
Given that the southern edge of Numidia also faced the desert, why was the
linear barrier of the Fossatum Africae built? This, the longest of all Roman
barriers, is a huge exception to the pattern of localized or point defenses found
on other desert frontiers. But here again, the military factor was conditioned
by the hydraulic: the fossatum coexisted with linear water-management
schemes that allowed the development of agriculture not only in scattered oa­
ses but also across long stretches of what would otherwise have been desert . ’
Both the linear defenses and the extensive water-management infrastructure
of Numidia were based on the same scheme o f frontier settlement and defense,':
then as now, the two indispensable requirements of desert survival arc wain
and security. Since the establishment of the settlements was concurrent with
that of their defenses, the system as a whole must have had a purpose bvsond
the creation of a closed loop ol irrigation and defense in the l io u u c r /one il
 From the Flavians to the Severi 89

self. T h is purpose, which had to be external to both aspects of the.fossat.mn if it

were to be rational, was surely to provide high levels of security for the terri­
tory behind, the frontier zone, that is, between the frontier and the Mediterra­
nean coast, an area that would otherwise have been vulnerable to seasonal
nomadic raiding.
Without dependable security for civilian life and property, there could be
no economic development to generate surpluses and thus sustain towns. W ith­
out the fossatum to contain the chronic threat o f nomadic raiding, Numidia
uould have remained undeveloped; there would have been neither extensive
urbanization nor its political concomitant, Romanization. Here more than
elsewhere the purpose of continuous frontier barriers is apparent: they wrere
designed not to shelter an army afflicted by a Maginot Line mentality, but
rather to allow civilian life to develop in ways calculated to facilitate the long­
term survival of the empire, by creating a social environment receptive to
Unman ideals and responsive to imperial authority. In addition, the fossatum
eould also serve as a customs barrier, providing the opportunity to levy tariffs
■ 'it nomads’ animals being brought into the empire for sale and also possibly on
die transhumant traffic of nomads seeking pastures on the Roman side or,
)',n en the aridity, post-harvest gleanings for their animals and themselves. *
But such levies were not collected by customs clerks. T h ey were collected
In soldiers in a policing or, more precisely, a gendarmerie role, who concur-
i>-utlv had an important security function, that is, the monitoring of nomad
o.msborder traffic and the denial of passage to nomad groups that were too
lu ge, or too belligerent, or too well armed.'4 Transhuntance across settled ar-
i is, especially if there are ethnic tensions, can be devastating. That is how, for
■ Munple, the Armenian towns of eastern Anatolia were ruined by Turcoman
uul later Kurdish nomads, who bullied and pillaged their way through the
m i ls in the course of their annual migration: each time, crops were lost to
di' ir animal herds until there was nothing left but ruins.

1’»order Defense; T h e Strategic Dimension

I n u t bough frontier tactics wrere offensive, there is no doubt that at the empire-
" idr strategic level, the pattern of deployment was a thin linear perimeter, and
I'" 11 ic s military strength -tons fragmented into regional armies. By the time of
II nli 1.m, these armies were already ac qui ri ng separate identities ( Exercitus
1" o n . imru.s, Raei ieus, N'nrici, Dalmatictis, Mocsicus, Dacicus, Britannicus,
ço The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

organized around the core of legions stationed permanently in each region and
provided with fleets where appropriate to give waterborne support to the land
forces (there was almost no naval warfare),'6 was deployed in response to cen­
tralized assessments o f the regional threat. Given hindsight of the concentrated
threat that was to materialize in the second half of the second century on the j
Rhine and Danube, which was to threaten the very survival of the empire two j
generations later, critics have censured this deployment on the grounds that it
was inelastic and inherently fragile. But at the time of Hadrian there was no
systemic threat, and thus no reason to sacrifice the long-term political priority
of a preclusive frontier defense for the sake of a more elastic deployment di­
rected at nonexistent regional or systemic threats.
The only alternative to the regional distribution of the army would have
been a centralized deployment, with large troop concentrations based at key
transit points on the inner lines of communication rather than deployed on
the outer perimeters of the frontiers. There was, of course, no possibility of
adopting a fully centralized deployment strategy, using only a thin deployment
of border guards on the frontier and keeping all other forces in a single, undi­
vided strategic reserve. Such a deployment can only be as effective as the avail­
able means of transport are rapid. Even today, certain precautionary deployments |
in situ are deemed to be necessary to contend with threats that are liable, if
they do emerge, to do so very rapidly. For example, even though possessing
airborne mobility at speeds of 600 mph, the U S Department of Defense consid­
ers South Korea too remote to permit the efficient device of allocating to it
centrally7 located “ earmarked” forces. The US troops must be stationed in the
theater itself, with the resultant diseconomy of force, because of the obvious
political functions that the deployment also serves.
It is only7 when the total defended area is small (in relation to the speed ol J
transport) that the problem of troop deployment does not arise, since the timely |
inter-sector redeployments needed to match enemy concentrations against any f
one sector of the perimeter will not present any difficulty. Indeed, redeployments
within the perimeter may then actually anticipate the emergence of the threat.
For example, troops holding a small fort under siege will ordinarily he able to
redeploy from rampart to rampart by moving on shorter internal littes, even
before the offense can complete its concentration of forces by moving around
the longer exterior lines.
But the R o m a n empire was not a small fort under siege. It cannot be visual
ized as 11 tort at all, however Ia rye, because a m tort will alu .n s lu\ 1 1 lie ,nh an

I
 From the Flavians to the Sever/ 9l

tage of shorter inner lines of communication. In fact, the geographic shape of

i he empire was most unfavorable: its center was the hollow oblong of the M edi­
terranean, and the Mediterranean could be as much a barrier as a highway. (The
more the perimeter approximates a circle, the greater is the advantage; the
more the perimeter approximates a thin rectangle, in which long-axis inter-

listered version]
sector distances on the inside will be virtually the same as those on the outside,
i he smaller the advantage.)
Seaborne transport on straight transits could, of course, he faster than
i ransport overland, but it was subject to the vagaries of the weather. From No-
\ ember to March navigation was virtually suspended; even the largest vessels
n ailable to the Romans, the Alexandrine grain ships, waited until April to set
• ait on their first voyage of the season. Two-day voyages between Ostia and
i lie nearest point in North Africa (Cape Bon), six-dav voyages between Sicily
i Messina) and Alexandria, and seven-day voyages between Ostia and the Strait
ol Gibraltar are recorded; but those speeds, averaging 6, 5.8, and 5.6 knots,
1 espectively, are all exceptional— which is, no doubt, why they were recorded. 8
h has been calculated that normal speeds for fleets, with favorable winds,
were of the order of 2-3 knots, slowing to only 1-1.5 knots with unfavorable
v mds.
But compared to the speed of troops marching on land, even those speeds
ire high: with a normal kit, over level ground— or on paved roads— Roman
1 mops could march for roughly 15 Roman miles (or 13.8 statute miles) per clay
■ n cr long distances, while ships could carry them over a distance of 27 miles
m 24 hours for each knot of speed. Moreover, distances were often shorter bv sea
dun on land, and sometimes much shorter. For example, the voyage between
i lie naval base of Puteoli (near Naples) and Alexandria would take less than 42
I u s at sea, even at the minimal speed of 1 knot. On land, however, the journey
" 1 mid take roughly 180 days of uninterrupted marching plus 2 days at sea; and
dm lull overland route by way of Aquileia (near Trieste) at the head of the
\driatic would require no less than 210 days. But this is a comparison of ex-
nemes. a straight-line journey by sea against a half-circuit of the Mediterra-
■ e in. On the Rome-Antioch route, for example, a distance of 1,860 miles on
I mil plus 2 days at sea (between Brindisi and the landfall on the Via Egnatia),
dn mu voyage would take roughly 55 days at 1 knot plus 2 days on land (Seleuceia-
\ in a n il), u bile the land march would take roughly 124 (lavs on land plus 2 days
II 1 .1, .1 1.11111 ol 1:2.2 .is ( ippi>\cd to t he 1:4.3 ratio bet\\ecu land and sea journeys
■a die Rome Me\,md 1 1.1 iniilr
\Lij> ■ • Sn. i i cj Mi Мо 1 ч 1 п \ m li n l\<Hii.ui I i i i mi i
iimLEIA-DYRRHACHIUM
94 The Grund Strategy o f the Roman Empire

As soon as the ratio narrowed any further, the sea voyage often became the
less desirable alternative. Ancient sailors could not contend at all easily with
rough weather, and ships might be delayed unpredictably even in the sailing
season, having to wait for weeks in order to sail. Moreover, long sea journeys
were liable to impair the health of the troops.8<> Nevertheless, troops were
frequently transported at sea, and special transports were also available for
horses.81
Unlike the ancient empires centered on Mesopotamia or the Iranian pla­
teau, the Roman empire had no real inner lines. W ith Cologne roughly 67
days’ march from Rome, and Antioch, gateway to the critical Parthian sector,
still more remote, the delay between the emergence of a new threat on the
frontier and the response of a fully centralized system would have been unac­
ceptably long. Had the Romans deployed their forces in a single centralized
strategic reserve in the modern manner, their enemies would have been able to
invade and ravage the provinces at will for months at a time and then retreat
before relief forces could arrive on the scene.8-’ There is thus little point in
criticizing the deployment policy associated with Hadrian— which actually
spanned the entire Flavio-Antonine era. T he great inter-sector distances and
the severe limitations on Roman strategic mobility made the choice of a regional
deployment policy inevitable. Since, as we have seen, it mattered little whether
the troops were actually on the frontier or echeloned in depth, the only question
that remains is whether the chosen distribution of forces was fortunate in the
light of the threats that unpredictably emerged.
The outlines of the Roman deployment strategy during the second century,
corresponding more or less to the second phase of empire under the present
analysis, may be discerned in the distribution of the legions.87’ These outlines
must be deduced cautiously, however, because no exact correlation can be as­
sumed between legionary and auxiliary deployments— the latter equally
important, if not more so, at least numerically. As table 2.1 indicates, the varia­
tion in legionary deployments during the second century was very small, in
spite of the upheavals of Trajan’s wars and the still greater turbulence of the
wars of Marcus Aurelius two generations later. T h e original number of Angus
tan legions, 28 prior to the A’arian disaster, grew only to 30 byr the end of the
period, and the changes in regional distribution reflected the resilience ol
the system more than the dramatic vicissitudes of the second century. Ihn
the doubling of the number of legions in the hast, from 4 to 8, show s t he rouse
quences of giving up on the client-state solution: the R o ma n s needed 4 том
 From the Flavians to the Severi 95

Table 2.1 Legionary Deployments, 23 C E to 192 CE

23 ca. 106 ca. 138 ca. 161 ca. 192

Britain 0 3 3 3 3
Northern Front 8 4 4 4 6
Lower Germany 4 2 2 2 2
Upper Germany 4 2 2 2 2
Raetia/Noricum 0 0 0 0 2
Central Front 7 12-13 10 10 10
Upper Pannonia 3 3 3 3 3
Lower Pannonia 0 1 1 1 1
Dalmatia 2 0 0 0 0
Upper Moesia 0 3-4 2 2 2
Dacia 2 2 1 1 2
Lower Moesia 0 3 3 3 2
Kastern Front 4 6 8 8 8
Cappadocia 0 2 2 2 2
Syria 4 3 3 3 3
Judea 0 1 2 2 2
Arabia 0 0 1 1 1
( .arrisons 6 4 3 3 3
Egypt 2 2 1 1 1
Africa 1 1 1 1 1
Spain 3 1 1 1 1
<h her 0 1-0 0 -T

I'nt al 25 30 28-29 28 30
I'he IX Hispana, whose location, if the legion was still in existence, is unknown.

legions to provide the security previously provided by Herod and his

ul leagues.
In Britain, there was no change at all, even though during this period the
lontier moved forward from Hadrian’s Wall to the Antonine Wall, the latter
• < lie abandoned again by the end of the century.1**4 The northern front re­
named static at 4 legions until after the Marcomannic wars, when the legions
I It a lira and III Italiea raised in 165 C E were posted to Noricum and Raetia,
.peel i\elyT On the central front, the reorganization of sector defenses in
n u .ike ot Trajan’s conquest of Dacia (and the establishment of what was per-
ips 1 he most seieni the nl all “scientific” frontiers) resulted in the consolidation
1 1 In I )a mil ie .11 m 1c. .11 1 h r li \ e| ul u deg 11 ins, af tel I he prior si nailer'in c re a s e
96 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

and the surge of Trajan’s second Dacian war.86 On the eastern front, the 2-unit
increase in the legionary deployment reflected the annexation in 106 ( T of
Nabatean Arabia, which, as a province, received a legionary garrison, the III
Cyrenaica, brought from Egypt and stationed at Bostra, where it remained.8.
The other additional legion (V I Ferrata) was deployed in Judea by the 120s,
possibly already under Trajan although the exact date remains uncertain.88 But
it was there before the Jewish rebellions, the last of which was finally suppressed
in t35, but not before the destruction of one (or possibly two) legions.89 The
legionary garrison was thus doubled, since the X Fretensis (stationed in Judea
since the time o f Nero) also remained there permanent!}'.
T he obvious change from the well-known legionary dispositions o f the year
23 recorded by Tacitus in Annals (4.5) is the transfer of legions from the con­
solidated inner zones of the empire, where their function had been to maintain
internal security, to the periphery, where they faced a primarily external
threat. Dalmatia, a difficult country bisected by mountains crossed by very
few roads, had its garrison reduced to one legion during the rule o f N ero;90
and the IV Flavia Felix, the last Dalmatian legion, was withdrawn by Donti-
tian (ca. 86) to serve in the Dacian war. The scene of the great rebellion of 6-9,
Dalmatia appears to have been thoroughly pacified thereafter. Similarly, the
legionary establishments of Egypt and Spain were reduced drastically from a
total o f ten legions at the beginning of the principate to only three by the end
of the Julio-Claudian era, until the further involuntary reduction brought
about by the failure to replace the X X II Deiotariana, which was probably de­
stroyed or cashiered during the Jewish revolt of 132—135-91
One scholar sees evidence in the table of legionary deployments over time
that the second system of perimeter security was a mere mirage, because the
legions were already mostly deployed on the frontier by the time of Tacitus’s
roll call. That is a misunderstanding. It is not changes in the location of the
legions that distinguish the second system, but rather a change in the strategic
purpose of the legions and the addition of a vast frontier infrastructure to limit
transborder traffic and to provide provincial security all the way up to the
border, that is, preclusive security to keep enemies out, and not just defeat them
after they had penetrated into imperial territory. Most legions stayed in the
same place under both systems, but under the second of the Flavians and the
Severi, they were increasingly tasked not just with threat interdiction, hut with
guard and patrol duties to provide preclusive security.
 From the Flavians to the Severi 97

Table 2.2 Auxiliary Troops in Lower Germany

70-83 C E 104-120 CE Third century
Alae 6 6 7
.Milliary cohorts 2 1 1
Milliary cohorts (equitatae) 0 0
Quingenary cohorts (equitatae) n 6 5
Quingenary cohorts 8 6 7-8
Sumeri 0 0 4

W hile the core provinces of the empire were now securely held by a hand­
ful of legions, the periphery needed stronger forces. As we shall see, this re­
flected a change in the instruments of Roman security policy, from the client
system to a seemingly more secure but ultimately more fragile reliance on di­
rect military7force.
Because Britain had needed four legions from the inception o f the Roman
conquest in the year 43 until Domitian, and three thereafter,1'2 neither the four-
unit increase in the legionary establishment achieved under the Flavians,1'3 nor
redeployments from Egypt, Spain, and Dalmatia sufficed to provide the addi-
nonal forces required on the Danube frontier and for the reorganized eastern
front. Accordingly7, the armies deployed on the Rhine were substantially
reduced— and also possibly because the Germans across the river had become
weaker.94 In the case of Lower Germany', for example, the number of legions
was halved to two, and the auxiliary forces were reduced also, as table 2.2
illustrates.93
Thus the legionary garrison of Lower Germany decreased from about
• ’ . o o o combat troops to about 11,000, while the auxiliary establishment de-
■ n-ased from about 15,500 to about 10,000 (increasing again only slightly, to
>1><nit 10,500 men, in the third century7). Notice the absence o f any milliary
■i/ne throughout this period, the reduction in the milliary cohorts, and the
withdrawal of the only milliary cohors equitata on the sector. It is a plausible
•peculation that milliary alae were premium forces allocated to high-threat
' tors and deployed at key points within them.96 Obviously, Lower Germany
was not one of these points— unlike Upper Germany, which had the milliary
Vi a II Fla via, or Britain, which had the Ala Petriana.
( >n all I routs, the changes in the pattern o f l egionary depl oyment reflected
" "I mcrclv the course of local events hut also the advent of a new strategy of
98 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

preclusive frontier defense. The security policy initiated by the Flavians had
clearly matured. Its major feature was the deliberate selection of optimal regional
perimeters, chosen not merely for their tactical and topographic convenience
but also for strategic reasons in the broadest sense— in other words, “scientific”
frontiers.
It is important to acknowledge at this point the very poor geographic knowl­
edge o f the Romans, which a number of contemporary historians insistently
cite to argue that they could not possibly have had any sort of rational strategy.
Yes and no: the Romans did not have real maps that we know of, let alone ac­
curate ones— they relied on itineraries. One is the famous Tabula Peutingeri-
inw, which shows the trans-imperial routes of the cursus publicus, the official
horse-relay messaging service; the very long (6.75-meter) thirteenth-century
parchment scroll is a copy of a fourth- or fifth-century document, itself prob­
ably derived from Marcus Vipsanius A-grippa’s map, which was carved in stone
in or just after tz B C E , according to G . Bowersock armed with strong evi­
dence.97 Useful to plan journeys, such an itinerary is useless to plan frontiers
or their military garrisons. On that basis some have denied that the Romans
could think strategically at all. But the lack of accurate maps was no great ob­
stacle: it is undisputed that the Romans had all the necessary skills and equip­
ment for large-scale territorial surveys,which they did all the time for fiscal
purposes, and even had distance-measuring machines.98
When it came to the frontiers specifically, maps or no maps, Hadrian’s
Wall, for example, did bisect Britain at just about the narrowest point that did
not require venturing into savage Scottish lands, so the Romans were not just
blundering in the dark. In the case of the northern front, the Rhine and Dan­
ube provided very obvious borders that did not have to be visualized on a map;
in arid zones it was the rainfall (enough to sustain barley at least if not wheat)
that defined the borders, again without need of maps; and in Syria/Mesopota-
mia and eastern Anatolia, it was the resistance o f the Parthian enemy that set
the borderlines, again w ithout need of maps.
As for the much larger question of the concept of strategy in Roman times,
the argument rests on how “strategy” is defined. I hold that strategy is not
about moving armies on maps, as in board games, but rather strategy compre
hends the entire struggle o f adversarial forces— the phenomenology of conflict
which need not have a spatial dimension at all, as with the eternal compel it 10n
between weapons and countermeasures. Indeed the spatial dimension ol sir.11
ey\ is rather marginal these days, and 111 some u at s 11 aht at \ u .r.
 From the Flavians to the Severi 99

It is the struggle of adversarial forces that generates the paradoxical logic

of strategy, which is diametrically opposed to the commonsense, linear logic of
everyday life. In strategy, the seemingly contradictory is the rule: had roads
are good in war because their use is unexpected, generating surprise that yields
a temporarily nonresistant enemy, thereby suspending the entire predicament
of conflict; victories are transformed into defeats if they merely persist long
enough to pass their culminating point. And much more of the same: si vis
para helium, if you want peace, prepare tor war, is no oddity hut rather
the (paradoxical) rule. Hence strategy is not transparent and never was, but it
always determines outcomes, whether men know of its existence or not. That
some understand it and others do not is a historical fact literally inexplicable in
ns persistence, for the paradoxical logic of strategy is more often absorbed in-
i uitively than understood explicitly.w
Nonpractitioners by contrast, notably scholars who have never participated
m real-life military planning or decision making, in headquarter meetings or
m combat, seem to believe that strategy is a form of systematic group thinking
guided by rational choices, whose results are then itemized in official docu­
ments. It is true that decisions driven by the logic of strategy itself, or (more
■ >1ten) brutishly motivated by the conflicting urges of power seeking or retreat,
iiv rationalized in that way, but that is all. N or is strategic practice the mere ap­
plication of techniques that could be applied anywhere and by anyone. It is
alu ays the expression of a particular culture, in this case the unsentimental,
mi heroic, rigorously materialistic Roman imperial culture, with its vast ac-
• imuilated experience of fighting and pacifying many tribes, nations, and
p<>i entâtes. If one compares the borders of the Roman Empire under Hadrian
» u h those of the short-lived empire of Alexander the Great— or, for that matter,
" n h Napoleon’s empire at its height— the first immediately reveals the workings
■ >1 si rategic calculations and sober administrative priorities (not for the Romans
■' 1v wars without profit), while the second and third display the consequences
■ a indiscriminate, merely egotistical, expansionism.
I u Britain, with anv idea of total conquest abandoned, the frontier was fixed
■ 'ii i lie Solway-Tyne line o f Hadrian’s Wall. Earlier, under Cn. Julius Agricola,
II nor of Britain from 79 to 84 C E , the Romans had penetrated much far-
1 hi 1 10 the north, beyond the Clyde-Forth line.KKI This expansion not only
ii Inscil much more territory than the Solway-Tyne line hut the border was
dsn m u c h shorter. 1I o u c m t , scientific frontiers were designed not 10 eneom-
p 1 a s mi l l ' l l I i l l 11 « >1 i r, p. i v, 1 1 i l e, bi l l l o e n e o i np. i s s 1 lie up! m i n i . m i n i m i 1 if
IOO The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

territory— in other words, the area that it was profitable to enclose on political,
economic, or strategic grounds, net of garrisoning costs. Therefore, the short­
est line was not necessarily the best frontier, if it happened to enclose difficult
terrain inhabited by difficult peoples— as the Clyde-Forth line certainly did.
Hence the Romans chose the very sensible withdrawal that Tacitus (Histories,
1.2) most bitterly, most memorably, and most unfairly criticized with much
exaggeration in his “perdomita Britannia et statim omissa”— Britain wholly con­
quered and immediately abandoned.
Two decades after the building of Hadrian’s Wall and its infrastructures
was completed, the Clvde-Forth line was reoccupied, and in 142 the Antonine
Wall was built to demarcate and secure the new' frontier. On the basis of the
fragmentary evidence available, it has been argued that the advance was pre­
cipitated bv the breakdown of the tribal dientelae that had constituted the dip­
lomatic glacis of Hadrian’s W all.101 The new fortification was much simpler
and, in a wav, more functional. Closely spaced forts at intervals of roughly 2
miles made the milecastles and turrets of Hadrian’s Wail unnecessary; there
was, instead, a simple wall roughly io feet high wdth a 6-foot patrol track
screened by a timber breastwork. N o equivalent to the vallum was built in its
rear, but there was the indispensable obstacle ditch (here roughly 40 feet wide
and 12 feet deep), as well as a perimeter road running behind the wall.10'’
Seen as lines on a map, and especially on a small-scale map that does not
show the topography but only the geography, the Antonine Wall seems much
more “ scientific” than the Hadrianic; for one thing, it was much shorter, only
37 miles in length as opposed to 73 V3 miles. T he Antonine Wall, however,
had a significant disadvantage: Roman methods’ of pacification in frontier
zones required that the inhabitants and the terrain be suitable for settlement
and development, so that “ self-Roinanization” could emerge as the voluntary
response to Roman rule, Roman ideas, and Roman material culture. Diplo­
macy, on the other hand, required that those w'ho lived beyond the frontier he
responsive to threats and inducements. The people and terrain on both sides
of the Clyde-Forth line fulfilled none of those conditions. As a result, the rear of
the Antonine Wall was never fully pacified, and its front remained unsecured,
for no glacis of dependent clients was formed.
By 158 C E restoration work was under way on Hadrian’s W all,10’ and ilu-
Clyde-Forth line collapsed then or shortly thereafter, when the peoples di
vided by the barrier rose up in revolt.104 The forces in Britain were already
badly overextended. Bv one calculation, the added m anpow n lu-ccssarv to
 From the Flavians to the Severi ioi

advance the frontier to the Antonine Wall, increasing the number of occupied
forts to 114 , was supplied by risky expedients: the evacuation of some forts (e.g.,
in Wales), the short-manning of others, possibly the recruitment o f lower-
grade numeri (poorly attested and possibly nonexistent as a separate category),

^Jojsjg/vpajajsn
the resort to legionary vexillationes, and rapid redeployments on a circulating
basis.105 But by 162, the onset of the Parthian War made reinforcement of the
British garrisons impossible.
Although the Antonine Wall was briefly reoccupied and restored in an exu­
berant but not at all cost-effective advance into lowland Scotland in 208 -211
under Septimius Severus,106 Hadrian’s original scheme of frontier defense was
v indicated by the end of the century when his wall became the frontier once
again, as it would remain until the last phases of Roman rule.
In Germany, the original goal of conquest beyond the Rhine was aban­
doned in the aftermath of the Varian disaster, but the post-16 withdrawal did
not lead to retreat to a scientific frontier, for the Rhine was certainly not that.
It is true that in places where the banks were steep and high, the Rhine was
topographically convenient for surveillance and defense. Moreover, the Rhine
river fleet (Classis Germanica) could give useful waterborne support to the forces
on land, being particularly efficient for frontier patrols against low-intensity
1 lireats.10.
One scholar argued that rivers were not effective as frontiers,10* and another
noted that Roman authors did not depict rivers as “military fronts.” 100 Such
comments reveal a plain lack of military expertise (hardly a sin in classicists
u ith no such pretensions): of course, rivers in themselves defend nothing. But
1 hey do form a ready-made line of delimitation; they did allow' effective patrol­
ling in pre-GPS days without straying over or too deeply within the intended
perimeter (a danger even with modern maps); they allowed supplies to be de­
livered to riverine outposts and forts with boats (inherently more economical
1 lun carts or pack mules); and they made it possible to send replacements and
u mforcements (with their full kits) to riverine forts and observation tow'ers,
h< vond the capacity of pack animals or backs. Furthermore, by keeping reserve
t lives upstream of each segment of the river frontier line, the arrival of rein-
h iivcments could be accelerated by the current.
\n inscription found near the Danube recorded that Commodus placed
'imposts to intercept infiltrators;110 its author clearly viewed the riverine forti-
ln .11 i o n s as useful prim.ii ilv against low-intensity threats, transbordcr thievery,
md brief ineiir.ii mi s \inilhei 1 nsi 1 i p l u >11, noting llie ai 1
e< >r 11 [) I i s 1 m e i n s u l
102 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

Tiberius Plautius Silvanus Aelianus, governor of Moesia during N ero’s reign,

described how he brought to the riverbank “ kings” previously unknown to the
Romans to pay homage.
But as a strategic frontier, the river had a grave defect: the L-shaped Rhine-
Danube line that hinged on Yindonissa (Windisch) formed a wedge roughly 180
miles long at the base (Mainz-Regensburg) and 170 miles to the apex, cutting
a deep salient into imperial territory. As a result, the imperial perimeter between
Castra Regina (Regensburg) and Mogontiacum (Mainz) was lengthened by
more than 250 miles, not counting the twists and turns of the two rivers. This
added 10 days or so to the time needed for strategic redeployments between
the German and Pannoman frontiers on the shortest route by way of Augusta
Vindelicorum (Augsburg). Morse, the deep wedge of the Neckar valley and
the Black Forest formed a ready-made invasion axis, which endangered lateral
communications north of the Alps and was only a week’s march away from the
northern edge of Italy.
Even without maps, the Romans were evidently able to visualize big-enough
segments of their borders to guide the successive frontier rectification cam­
paigns that gradually transformed the Rhine-Danube perimeter. On this sec­
tor, at any rate, it is quite clear from the map of archaeological investigations
that the emperors’ individual differences of temperament and orientation, so
strongly stressed in the narrative sources, did not affect the general continuity
of imperial policy.111 There was also continuity in methods. Roads and forts
were built in sets, by means of characteristically Roman “engineering offen­
sives” focused on three critical hinge points: the legionary bases at M ainz
(I Adiutrix and X IV Gemina under Vespasian), Strasbourg (V i II Augusta), and
Windisch (XI Claudia).
First, under Vespasian, and indeed as soon as order was reestablished in
Germany after the revolt of Civills (ca. 70 CE), old fort sites in the Wettenui
bridgehead (Wiesbaden and Hofheim) on the right bank of the Rhine opposite
Mainz were rebuilt and reoccupied. Other forts were established on the right
bank of the Rhine as far south as Heidelberg/Neuenheim; at the same time,
the old forts on the left bank of the Rhine may have been evacuated, as Rite
ingonheim certainlv was."'1 Such moves could have been consistent with a lim
ited bridgehead strategy (compare the outpost forts beyond Hadrian’s Wall) or
with a more ambitious attempt to open a M ainz-Augsburg axis, across 1 In-
apex of the Rhine-Danube salient. Around 74, however, a huilier line o! pen
etration was opened on the W indiscb-Roti ueil axis. Ii bisei led 1 be salicni and
 From the Flavians to the Severi 103

would have made possible an improved— if still indirect— connection from the
Rhine to the Danube on the Strasbourg-Tuttlingen axis. It would also have
provided flank security for the more drastic surgery7of a M ainz-Augsburg axis
(together with the Vespasianic forts built, or rebuilt, along the Danube from
Linz to Oberstimm and farther wust to Emerkingen).114
Domitian’s German campaign of 83-85, on which Frontinus {Strategen/ata,
1.3.10), provides some precise data,11' penetrated 120 miles to establish a fron­
tier on the crest of the Taunus Mountains, which dominate— and could now
protect— the fertile Wetterau. This was Domitian’s war against the Chatti,
ridiculed by Tacitus (Agricola, 39),116 who claimed that fake prisoners were pro­
duced for a sham triumph. That relentless if slow-moving offensive made ideal
use of the combat-engineer capability of the legions, but could hardly capture
many prisoners. It was indeed an engineering campaign, aimed at the con­
struction of forts, roads, and watchtowers from the confluence of the Lahn and
Rhine rivers along the crest of the Taunus and southeast to the M ain, which
reveals both coherent planning and systematic, detailed preparations. It left
behind an organized frontier manned by patrols and secured by a series of
small road forts, watchtowers, and auxiliary’ forts.11' One benefit of the new
limes was the ability to control access to the Neuwied basin and Wetterau.
I he latter was the territory of the Alattiaci, a people already under Roman diplo­
matic influence but until then vulnerable to harassment by the Chatti, according
in l acitus (Germania, 29).
After a break imposed by the Dacian troubles on the Danube and the
a tempted usurpation of the legate of Upper Germany, L. Antonius Saturninus,
I >mnitian’s frontier rectification offensive resumed on a large scale circa 90. It
u as at this stage that the salient was finally cut and the agri decumatcs enclosed.
\cw forts were built on the Alain from Seligenstadt to Obernburg and to the
A irkar River; along the edge of the Odenwald, a chain of small forts and
u .inlitovers secured a connecting limes road. On the approaches to the river
1 lx larger cohort forts began to appear again, from Oberscheidental to W imp-
t n mi the Neckar, continuing with a series o f cohort forts to Köngen. T he
n il m e of the connection between the Neckar line at Köngen and the Danube
linx s is unclear; it is certain, however, that a much shorter route from Panno-
mm in ( iemvany was now available bv way of Köngen; a Heidenheim-Faimingen
'Mir m the Danube seems probable.11''
I lie (mal pen me ln bei v een 1 be Rhine anil t he 1 )anube u as nol established
"m il 1 lie \ nil h i 1m M.i, u lien 1 lie Ime In 1111 \ 1ill cut lei 1; ( )sl. Wel/lieim, .1 mI
uojSJaA p a la is;
io6 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

Schirenhof to Eining was established and fortified in the “ Hadrianic” manner,

with a palisade screening the patrol track and linking watchtowers, small forts,
and auxiliary bases. (The straight-line limes from Miltenberg-Ost to Welzheim
is thought to be Antonine, but the Schirenhof-Bohming line may have been
Hadrianic).119
Because of the cumulative nature of this vast enterprise, the new frontier in
its final form was actually laid out in depth, with forts and roads behind the
rough triangle of the limes between the Rhine and Danube, which had its apex
at Schirenhof. There the Raetian segment of the perimeter joined the Upper
German segment, at a point roughly 31 miles north of the Danube and 64
miles due east from the Rhine. This ultimate perimeter line was systematically
consolidated over a period of more than a century by the addition o f obstacle
ditches, walls, and improved surveillance towers; stone walls eventually re­
placed the palisades on the Raetian segment of the limes.120
The Eining-Taunus frontier was a great improvement militarily over the
old Rhine-Danube line, but the logic of its design is not evident on the map.
Domitian’s limes on the Taunus Mountains was anything but the shortest line
between points; rather, it formed an awkward bulge that came to a narrow
point in the area of Arnsburg. Yet while the southern segment of this limes,
below the M ain, was eventually left behind when the Antonine perimeter
(hinged on Lorch farther to the east) was established, the curious hook-shaped
line north of the Main was not replaced, but retained instead as the permanent
frontier. Dom itian’s limes on the Taunus reveals the higher priority o f the
strategic over the tactical and the clear precedence given to the goal of Ronvan-
ization through economic development over the attractions of a straight perim­
eter line.
At the strategic level, the Taunus frontier had the effect of blocking the natural
invasion routes between northern Germany west of the Elbe and the upper
Rhine region.121 At the same time, as an outward salient rather than an inward
wedge, the line did not prolong the strategic redeployment route across the
sector. At the operational level, the Taunus frontier, though itself costly to man
owing to the dense network of forts, roads, and watchtowers, had the effect o!
simplifying the problem of frontier defense for the whole of Upper German)1,
because it pushed back the Chatti— apparently the most dangerous neighbors
o f the empire in the entire region— from the Rhine valley and the VVetterau.
This, in turn, allowed an eventual reduction in the provincial garrison. Tlu-
 From the Flavians to the Severi toy

legionary forces in Mainz (consisting of two legions until 89 CE) and the aux­
iliary forces distributed within the salient could concentrate to fight off the
Chatti whether the invaders advanced due south toward the Neckar or due west
toward the Rhine. In order to concentrate in the right places, the Romans
needed early warning of impending attacks, and the new frontier seems intended

’uojsjsApajaisu
to provide such advance warning, as well as to canalize major attacks and contain
minor ones.
The role of the political-economic goal o f Romanization in determining
the shape of the frontier can only be hypothesized by inference: the area en­
closed by the Taunus-M ain frontier, the Wetterau, is highly productive, ara­
ble land. T h e forests had been cleared and the land opened for fanning long
before the Romans arrived. There a productive agriculture could generate
prosperity, //’there was day-to-day security against infiltrators and marauders.
When that was duly assured, agriculture could in turn provide the material
basis of urbanization, which would then facilitate the processes o f Romaniza-
iion. Precisely because it slights the obvious military advantages of straight
lines, this particular segment of the limes suggests other motivations in the
lornvation of frontier policy. It was Appian’s opinion (The Foreign Wars, 7) that
1 lie Romans “aimed to preserve their empire by the exercise of prudence, rather
1 Ivan to extend their sway indefinitely over poverty-stricken and profitless
1 ribes of barbarians.” Decisions about where to establish “optimal” frontiers were
v,aided by rational considerations— but divergent ones.
There is, therefore, a consistent pattern in Roman frontier policy, including
.1 hierarchy of priorities: first, the frontier should facilitate strategic transit
lie! ween the continental regions of the empire; second, it should not include
areas inherently difficult to settle, urbanize, and Romanize (such as Scotland);
1 Imvl, vc should include lands suited for settlement— lands that would enhance
1 Iw strength of the empire in men and resources, as Appian observed. Finally,
v,.) distinctly lower priority, the frontier should be as short as possible in order
i" reduce the manpower required for outposts and patrols. (Because the Ro-
Mi.ms at this time would fight against large-scale threats with mobile troop con-
■ I'm rations, the length of the perimeter was not important vis-a-vis those
1 In cai s . ) Another major consideration, which may have been important in the
■ e 1 >( the Taunus-M ain frontier, was more or less the reverse of the str-ategic-
ii iiimi requirement: where the Romans faced several particularly powerful
■ m imes across the limes, ii was useful to separate these enemies from one
ЕЕИЕШИВН
ii' I he ( ir,iii,l Siratepy o f the Roman Empire

,iii> ii In i l>v Iuniting a salient between them. This salient would also provide an
added la\ei uf security for the roads and populations at its base. In this situa-
i a m, too, the mere length of the frontier became a secondary priority.
What Domitian’s limes on the Taunus achieved tactically, Trajan’s limes in
I )acia would achieve on a strategic scale. Until Trajan’s conquest of Dacia, the
imperial perimeter followed the course of the Danube all the way to the delta
on the Black Sea.1-2 A series of legionary bases stretched from Raetia to what is
now Bulgaria, and the intervals between the bases were covered by a somewhat
denser network of auxiliary forts that reached into modern Dobruja in Roma­
nia. T he two Danube fleets, the Chassis Pannonica, which operated upstream
from the Iron Gates, and the Classis Moesica below, complemented the watch-
towers, signal stations, and patrols on the left bank of the river.
The most important single threat to this long frontier, which spanned the
territories of six important provinces, came front the Dacians. Their power
was centered in the high ground of Transylvania, and they had already formed
a centralized stare under a ruler named Burebista in the lirst century B C E .
T heir expansionism had put them in violent contact with Roman armies even
earlier.122 This propensity for centralization, rare among the peoples of Europe
except for the Romans, made them dangerous enemies for any pow er whose
lands reached the Danube: Dacian raids were directed at the entire vast are
from what is now Yhenna to the Black Sea. Under Augustus, the Dacian prob­
lem was alleviated, hut not solved, by punitive expeditions and reprisal opera­
tions.124 Under Tiberius diplomacy was tried, but the Dacians could not be
turned into reliable clients, perhaps because they had gold of their own.1- The
Romans therefore used the Sarmatian lazvges, installed between the Tisza
(Theiss) and the Danube, to keep Dacian power away from that stretch of the
river.126
By the time of the Flavians, the Roxolani, another horse-riding Sarmatian
nation, occupied the plains along the lower course of the Danube. T adius
recorded (Histories, 1.79) their ill-fated raid of 69 across the Danube and into
Moesia, in which 9,000 mounted warriors were intercepted bv the legion III
Gallica and cut to pieces as they were retreating, laden with booty.
In 85-86, under Domitian, the Romans again had to fight the Dacians, w lm
had recentralized under the rule of Decebalus. After driving the Dacians had,
across the Danube following yet another incursion into Moesia, the Romaic,
pursued them, but suffered a serious defeat; in 88 this was aw ngrd l>\ a sm
cesstul strategic offensive, which culminated in a great \ ten >1 \ 11 I ap.ic, in 1 In
 From the Flavians to the Seven in

plain beyond Turnu Severin.12' Perhaps Domitian intended to follow up this

victory in the field with an advance on Sarmizegethusa, the seat of Decebalus
and his court, but the revolt of Antonius Saturninus, legate of Upper Germany,
intervened in January 89. By then, the client system on the Danube sector was
crumbling, and this drastically restricted the strategic options open to the
Romans.
T he Romans faced three major tribal agglomerations in the region, which
had been under a loose but effective form of diplomatic control since the time
of Tiberius: the Marcomanni, the Quadi (centered in the general area opposite
\ henna), and the lazyges. There is no evidence that any of the three helped
Domitian’s forces in the campaigns o f 85 and 88 C E against Decebalus. But
neither had they hindered, which was good enough for the Romans, who could
not have mounted simultaneous offensives across the 600 miles of the Danube
border from Dacia to the Marcomannic territory west of the Elbe. The acqui­
escence of these powerful neighbors was essential for any strategic offensive
against Dacia, just as the acquiescence of the Dacians was essential for any
••1 rategic offensive against the Marcomanni, Quadi, or lazyges. Thus, when
1 lie Marcomanni, Quadi, and lazyges all threatened war,12s Domitian was
l'n eed to make peace with Decebalus on the basis of the status quo ante and a
in hnical aid program.120 For the next several years, there was inconclusive war
I '.iinst Germans and Sarmatians upstream from Dacian territory, which itself
1 itimined at peace.150
It is in this context that Trajan’s wars with Decebalus and his ultimate
■ "iiquest o f Dacia must be seen. It was once de rigueur for scholars to con-
o .im Trajan’s heedless adventurism with Hadrian’s peaceful disposition.
\> kiss the Danube, as across the Euphrates, Trajan supposedly left deep sa­
ls nis that marked his grandiose conquests but lengthened the imperial pe-
1 MMcter needlessly. Trajan’s annexation of Dacia has also been explained as a
1 Iik whack to the days of predatory— indeed gold-craving— imperialism and
mm!miited expansionism.131
\ ilclcnsive interpretation is more sensible:132 the strength of Trajan’s army,
m1 ■ 1 >1 m legions in both wars, shows how powerful a state Decebalus had or-
im/ctl. \'o economical frontier strategy on that sector was compatible with
-li' in v iva! of so strong a neighbor. It is noteworthy that loyal Pliny (Paiiegy-
1 16) claimed greatness for his employer for his moderation, not for heroic
"iii|in",i: “ he ncil her liars nor provokes wars” (“ .\ 7>// limes bellih ncc provoats.
' I i: ; iiii 1 1 /, h n j n i . i t i ’i I;/i’ll \ s lev. b e e n pom lcil m i l " I 1a|.m c o n c l u d e d
M iip i.). I h e S (.ч•(>п<1 ( \ f ' I »>f»j к ) •• m J* n i I *|>г
r LEGEND
f ill ITA.LICA1 L E S IO N

радами
II 4 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

his first Dacian war of 10 1-10 2 with another attempt to convert Dacia into a
client state, refraining from conquest. It was Decebalus who provoked the
second war of 105-106 by breaking the terms of the treaty of 102; and even that
second war was not followed by total conquest, because only Transylvania was
provincialized, while the lands on either side wyere left to the Sarmatians.
It is certainly true that once Dacia was conquered, after Trajan’s second war
against Decebalus in 106, the frontiers of the new province of Dacia formed a
deep wyedge centered on the Sarmizegethusa-Apulum axis, eventually adding
more than 370 miles to the length of the imperial perimeter.154 On the map,
the new province presents a classic profile of vulnerability. This impression is
strengthened by the nature of the military deployment left in place once the
campaigns were over. The salient’s center of gravity wras not at its base, but
toward the apex, because the legionary base at Apulum in the Maros valley was
nearer to the northern edge of the Carpathians than to the Danube. Neither
then nor later u'as the Dacian limes as a wyhole enclosed with a wall system; it
remained organized as a network of independent strong points astride the
main invasion routes, guarding the major lines of communication.l:b
This new frontier, w'hich makes so little sense in the light of the superficial
strategy of small-scale maps, becomes highly rational in the light o f the actual
priorities of Roman policy: the elimination of Dacia’s independent power pro­
vided the necessary conditions for a restoration of Roman diplomatic control
over the Germans and Sarmatians of the entire region. Both deterrence and
positive inducements (i.e., subsidies) would be needed to keep the Marcomanni,
Iazyges, and Roxolani from raiding the Danube lands; and as long as Deceba­
lus remained in defiant independence, the deterrent arm of the policy would
be fatally w eakened. As a province, Dacia would satisfy the strategic priorities
of the day by providing valuable access to other regions, while also yielding
some material wealth to the empire.153’ But it was as a strategic shield for the
region as a w hole that Dacia was most valuable.
Following the Sarmatian attacks of 116 -119 , the flanks of the Dacian salient
were narrowed through the evacuation of the western Banat to the north and
Muntenia to the south. By 124 -126 Dacia had been divided into three prov­
inces (Malvensis, Porolissensis, and Apulensis), and at least 65 separate out­
posts were built to provide a defense-in-depth of Dacia Porolissensis. Plus
Limes Porolissensis formed the outer shield of the entire system o f Damihisn
defense, with rear support provided by the legion X III Gemma, stationed m
Apuluin. On either side of the Dacia n salient were the plains un iipual In the
 From the Flavians to the Severi ib-

subsidized Sarmatians: Iazyges to the west and Roxolani to the east. Had
Rome been weak and the Sarmatians strong, the Dacian provinces would have
been vulnerable to encirclement (across the neck of the peninsula of Roman
territory on the Danube); but with Rome as strong as it then was, the Dacian
frontier effectively separated the Sarmatians on either side and weakened their
combined power. Though subsidies might still be required, the strong auxil­
iary garrisons of Dacia Malvensis (on the Danube) and Dacia Porolissensis (on
the Carpathian) as well as the legion in Dacia Apulensis would suffice to com­
plement the inducements with the threat of retaliation for any transborder
raiding.15
The elimination of the Dacian threat provided security for the Dobruja and
all the sub-Danubian lands. With security there came first agricultural pros­
perity and then urbanization. The coastal Greek cities of the Dobruja recovered
swiftly from the effects of insecurity, while new cities emerged in the entire
region, from Thrace to modern lower Austria, where Carnuntum, head city of
bannonia Superior, attained some 50,000 inhabitants. (Its remains halfway
between Vienna and Bratislava extend over an area of 10 square kilometers.)
The legionary bases at Ratiaria and Oescus on the lower Danube were left
m the deep rear by the conquest o f Dacia, and the legions were w ithdrawn
because the sector was no longer of military significance. But the two localities
did not wither away. Instead, they became civilian settlements, with the high
status of cokmiae}w Once the scene of raid and counter-raid, after Trajan’s con­
quest, the Danube valley could contribute to the human and material resources
ul the empire, augmenting its fundamental strength.
The only priority of Roman frontier policy that the Dacian frontier did not
..it isfy was the lowest military priority, because the overall imperial perimeter
u as lengthened rather than shortened. This did not, of course, affect imperial
1 iiiumunications, which could now follow interior routes just as short but
much more secure. N or is the impression of vulnerability given by the map of
1 lie Dacian frontier justified. Aside from its obvious topographic advantage,
1 In- Limes Porolissensis was a salient only in purely military terms: its flanks
■ a\i and west were not open invasion axes, for they were occupied by peoples
under Roman diplomatic control.159
I hough the conquest of Dacia thus reinforced Rome’s strategic and diplo-
m me control of the entire Danube frontier, the Limes Porolissensis was still
"iiu'tliing ol an nulpnst, nr rat her a whole series of outposts centered on the
\ I I I < 1 run 11 a at \pu In 1 o , 1 be on i\ Icq ion Id 1 in place n n i r tin- I mn 1 n r was
 u m m
D - A U X I L I A R Y FORTS ( i n D A C I A O n l y )
-a---HIGHWAY
|cA R pi|- 6A B B A R I A M S
m m ~ < - - OPEN LAND FRO N T IER

FLAVIAl- L E G IO N A R Y BASE

i'iifHt.

- Yi- 1 he Dacian Conquest

n8 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

organized.140 As is true of any outpost, as long as the sector as a whole was

securely held, the Dacian salient added to this security. Far from being vulner­
able to encirclement, the salient itself could be used as a base to encircle the
Ia/.yges to the west or the Roxolani to the east: Roman forces could advance on
the Drobeta-Apulum highway and then turn to attack the Sarmatians in the
rear. The salient was used in this way when the forces of C. Velius Rufus seem­
ingly attacked the lazvges in the rear after an advance north of the Danube
and west across the river Tisza (Theiss), circa 89. But the military worth of an
outpost declines and finally becomes a liability as the security of the baseline
diminishes. Thus, in the great crisis of the third century, when Rome lost con­
trol of the Sarmatians on either side o f the salient, the Limes Porolissensis did
become a vulnerable salient liable to be cut off, as well as a drain on the resources
of the sector as a whole. It was finally abandoned during (or just after) the reign
of Aurelian (270-275). Numismatic evidence proves that Roman power per­
sisted in Dacia Malvensis (Transylvania west of the river Olt) until then.141
The Dacian limes was indeed cost-effective in ensuring Roman military and
diplomatic control over the entire region until external factors compelled its
abandonment.
On the eastern front, from eastern Anatolia through Syria to the Red Sea,
the Julio-Claudian system of imperial security had been based on three elements:
the chain of client states, which absorbed the burdens of day-to-day security
against internal disorder and low-intensity external threats; the buffer of
Armenia; and the army of Syria, four legions strong until the Armenian crisis
of 55.142 O f these three elements, only Armenia’s status as a buffer state was not
wdiolly in Roman control. From the time of the Augustan settlement until the
Flavian era, the Armenian question required constant management, for Arm e­
nia was crucial to Roman security in the sector and equally crucial for the se­
curity of the Arsacid state of Parthia. I f Armenia were under some form of
Roman suzerainty, or even a condominium such as that established under the
Neronian compromise (“Arsacid secondgeniture and Roman investiture”),141
then Syria’s army could defend Cappadocia and Pontus as well as Syria from
Parthian attack. If, on the other hand, the Arsacids wrere free to station armies
in Armenia, then each of the two sectors would require a frontier army of ils
own, independently capable of containing Parthian attacks until the arriv al <>l
strategic reinforcements. Without an advanced base, Parthian forces advancing
toward Pontus and Cappadocia by way of the difficult routes across Anncnt.t
could move no faster than t he legions of Svria advancing to intercept t hem up
 From the Flavians to the Severi ng

i he Euphrates. Hence the Parthians could not hope to surprise or outmaneu-

ver the Romans in launching an attack against either sector.
This was the precise meaning of Armenia’s status as a buffer zone, and it is
i his factor that explains the rationality of N ero’s diplomatic and military offen­
sives of 55-66 C E . The Parthian ruler Vologases I had driven Radamistus, a
usurper, from the throne of Armenia, giving his throne to his fellow Arsacid,
I iridates.144 This act suggested the possibility that Arsacid armies would now
have free use of Armenian territory, and therefore that Cappadocia and Pontus
could no longer be secure without armies of their own.№ In 55 N ero’s great
general Cn. Domitius Corbulo was appointed legate to Cappadocia and provided
\\ ith powerful expeditionary forces, including III Gallica and AT Ferrata from
1 he army o f Syria, 1V Scythica from Moesia, and a complement of auxiliary
lorces.146
Corbulo engaged in diplomacy while working up (with retraining) a fighting
army out of garrison troops, and then successfully launched a difficult campaign
m the difficult terrain of Armenia, conquering the two major centers in the
ci uintry, Artaxata and Tigranocerta. The status quo ante having been restored,
1 reliable client prince, Tigranes, was duly appointed king of Armenia and
provided with a small 2,000-man guard force.147 But following an Armenian
1 aid into Arsacid territory, Vologases resumed the war, after the terms he offered
iutc rejected by Rome.148
Earlier, the Romans had offered to recognize the Arsacid Tiridates as king
' ’I Vrmenia, provided he accepted a Roman investiture, but according to Tacitus
1 h/nals, 8.37-39) this offer was rejected by Vologases. After Corbulo’s victory,
Ihe balance of power shifted, and this naturally curtailed the scope of diplo-
iii n \. It may also have induced the Romans to contemplate annexation.149 It
U"ik the defeat of L. Caesennius Paetus, sent to take charge in Cappadocia
II hen Corbulo left to take over the Syrian sector, to restore a balance of power.
M ura successful show-of-force invasion by Corbulo, now in supreme command
1inI provided w'ith a high-grade legion drawn from Pannonia (X V Apollinaris),bH
1 diplomatic settlement was finally reached (Tacitus, Annals, 15.27-30). In the
" n 66 Tiridates was crowned in Rome as king of Armenia in a lavish ceremony
" hi i\c cost scandalized Suetonius (Nero, 13).
11 was no great victory that Rome won in the Armenian settlement; indeed,
a in.n have seemed that after five years of desultory war, the situation had merely
'■ 'i iled to the position ol v| CIA when Vologases had originallv placed his
1 11 lai
I a ■ 'I l i e 1 o i l | l i e A 1 m t i n i n 1 11 <1111 ' . ' It l l s s e e n n d t o li I lit .11 a n 11 l i r a s \ I i.i l.i n e e
 From the Flavians to the Severi 121

when Corbulo acknowledged that Vologases had fled Armenia but that his
own legions must return to defend Syria. Yet this was a case of strategic gain
that did not result from a grandiose victory. The nominal condominium suf­
ficed to ensure the security of the Pontic-Cappadocian sector, thus obviating
ihe very great cost of deploying a counterpart to the Syrian army along the
upper Euphrates.1,2
As we shall see, the Flavians eventually abolished what was left of the client-
state system on the eastern front, and this naturally required for the first time
the deployment of permanent legionary garrisons in eastern Anatolia. T he le­
gion X II Fulminata was permanently stationed at Melitene in Cappadocia, on
the central route between Armenia and Cappadocia, and the legion X V I Fla-
\ ia Firma was probably in Satala (near a more northerly crossing of the E u ­
phrates) in the territory of the former client state of Lesser Armenia.11’
The eastern frontier that Trajan inherited, though neater than the confused
Ipatchwork of client states of the Julio-Claudian era, was still highly unsatisfac­
tory.'14 From the ill-defined borders of the Nabatean client state stretching from
cast of Judea south into northwestern Arabia, the frontier cut across the desert
In way of Damascus and Palmyra to the Euphrates, probably reaching the
m er above Sura. From there it followed the river through Zeugma to the
nor t h until its eastward turn into Armenia, then overland to the Black Sea to a
point east of Trapezus (currently Trabzon). As drawn on a map of the empire
.pi i he accession of Trajan, this frontier was scarcely tenable. Largely as a result
■ >l i he distribution of rainfall, Roman territory in the Levant was confined for
poetical purposes to a narrow strip (mostly less than 6o miles wide) almost
, ■ >miles long from Petra to Zeugma. Though theoretically in Roman hands,
i In- lands to the east of this fertile crescent were mostly desert, which required
pi" security force for border defense against low-intensity threats (point de-
icnses would suffice) but which, on the other hand, could not support the sub­
mit ial forces that would be needed to meet any high-intensity threats. The
I'huuiiis were in the uncomfortable position of holding a long, narrow, and
•lc arable strip with the sea to the west and a vulnerable flank to the east. Op-
p>cate Antioch, the greatest city of the region, the depth of the territory con-
ilulled l>v Rome was scarcely more than ioo miles—not enough to contain a
r a ilnan invasion until forces more numerous and better than the Syrian legions
■m ill a r r i v e l i o n ) E u r o p e .
I bese grog r'a| ill i< l.irii pi u it b \\ b it'll every power in the Levant luo bad to
' i 'i 111 ■ i i 11, n u d e l l i r I iipln He. li ciniHT 111 adri p i.it e; li.i|.m\ I’.utlii.iii " "
i //-, <i,,nhl Strategy o f tbe Roman Empire

( i i | i i ) li.is been explained as an attempt to establish a “scientific” frontier

Ь. waul i lie river.1' 1 T he only possible perimeter that would satisfy the concur-
i mi i i-ipiirements of strategic depth, rear-area security, and economy of force
m .1 postwar frontier deployment had to follow the course of the river Khabur
in the western edge of Jebel Sinjar, then continue east along the high ground
toward the Tigris and north again into Armenia.1-115
Though by no means straight, this frontier would have had advantages far
greater than mere geographic simplicity. I f strongly manned, the Khabur-
Jebel Sinjar-Tigris line could provide a reliable defense-in-depth for both the
Antioch region to the west and Armenia to the north astride the major east-
west invasion axes from Parthia leading to northern Syria and into southern
Cappadocia. Moreover, this double L-shaped frontier could also interdict the
advance of armies moving westward, whether above or below the Euphrates,
and it would itself outflank any westward advance into southern Armenia.
Finally, there was enough rainfall (8 inches or more per year) to supply the
troops with food extracted from local agriculturists if imperial taxation could
become as efficient as it was elsewhere at the time, especially once the consolida­
tion of the frontier encouraged the growth of civilian settlements. The only real
alternative to this line would have been a frontier running along the edge of
the Armenian plateau, but this would have left Roman forces too far from
Ctesiphon, the Arsacid capital, to intimidate its rulers.
Trajan’s Parthian War was not, however, a limited border rectification of­
fensive, nor is it usually considered a purely strategic enterprise; wars chosen
rather than imposed rarely are. Its origins conform to the stereotyped pattern
of Ronian-Parthian relations: the Arsacid Osroes (king of Parthia since no)
replaced a fellow Arsacid, Axidares, king of Armenia by Roman approval, with
another, Parthamasiris, who had not been approved by Rome as required h\
the terms of the agreement.11 By the end of 113, Trajan was in Antioch “ to
review the situation.” 1
Between 113 and 117, diplomacy failed. It is uncertain to what extent each
side seriously attempted to resolve the crisis peacefully, though Osroes sent .111
ambassador to Athens to meet Trajan on his way east, and Trajan also seems to
have offered an opening to a peaceful settlement by making himself available
at Satala to an invited gathering of client kings from the Caucasus. Part ham.i
siris could have come to this meeting, but did not. We can read in the fragmrii
tary sources that Trajan’s forces adv anced and conquered, event uallv eaptui 1111•
Ctesiphon and the golden throne o! the Parthian kings t< К me-, h.n ini', lied),
 From the Flavians to the Severi 123

L f.GE.ND
V J A - i m p e r i a l , p r o v i n c e s
== - WiGMW&Y
___________ — TRACK
! 1 i\j GEOGRAPHI C N A M E S - /Tf] - m&M GROUND
■ ftQSSIW <3S O F & U P W R A T E -3 G O R G E ............ - FRONTIER BEFO REiM D A ^ T E R T R A JA N
wAllED TOWNS «(imimn - P O S S l& L E "c l o s e d " U M E S

'fy :.S . T h e Parthian Empire and the Roma n East

■ 1 ""ed the way to the Persian Gulf; and advanced across the Tigris into remote
Lli.ilienc, which seems to have become the short-lived province of Assyria.
< >iu- chronology that is more plausible than proven begins in 114 with the
"lupu si nt A n n in i. i .1 ml nnrt hern .M c s o p o i amia n o n h ot the )ebcl Sinjat line;
'"'ill UlTI .lltllrC'll lll i I I UI l ! ' ill.|| Ihr n i C . I MI I ' 1 1 1 )" Ol l l III | C I I I I < I | \ ti l l IlM.ll
124 77 ;r Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

purposes was imminent. In 115, southern Mesopotamia and Adiabene were

also conquered and annexed; that winter, Roman troops entered Ctesiphon,
the seat of the Arsacid empire that in the Iranic manner had no real capital,
given that instead of a unitary state there was a federation of satrapies with
many capitals and none. In 116 there came the scouting descent to the Persian
G u lf and the outbreak of local (nativist?) revolts in the newly conquered lands
and also by the Jew s across the Levant to Cyrenaica, with catastrophic results
in Gyrene, Egypt, and Cyprus. In 117 the revolts were suppressed with much
damage, but the Romans started to withdraw (facing a counteroffensive?),
and 117 is also the (certain) date of Trajan’s death.
Provinces were being organized, client kings were being enrolled into alle­
giance to Rome in place o f older Parthian loyalties, and a fiscal administration
for the India trade was apparently being organized—when disaster struck.
Since 114 , Trajan had advanced farther and conquered more than any emperor
since Augustus, but by the late summer of 1 17 he was dead in Cilicia, and little
remained of his conquests. Parthamaspates, placed in Ctesiphon as the Roman
client king of a diminished and dependent Parthia, was losing control, and the
lesser client kings were losing either their thrones or their imposed Roman
allegiance,
Hadrian, the new ruler of Rome and Trajan’s former lieutenant in the East,
completed the strategic withdrawal that Trajan had begun. The new provinces
were abandoned, and by the end of 1 r j what remained of Trajan’s vast con­
quests was a confirmed claim o f suzerainty over Armenia and Osrhoene— not
a bad haul actually, for a war that did no lasting damage.1W) Dio’s accusations
(68.29.r) that Trajan’s Parthian W ar was a pointless quest for glory and that lie
was chagrined by his inability to emulate Alexander have been given too much
credence.IA! Another explanation is the rational but nonmilitary goal of con
trolling the trade route to India. But a strategic purpose, the establishment ol
a more secure Khabur-Jebel Sinjar-Tigris frontier, has also been adduced, and

to this writer it seems the most plausible.

W hat is certain is that until his further conquests across the Tigris, down
to Ctesiphon, and beyond, Trajan’s policy in the East had been consistent with
that of the Flavians. Like them, he continued the process o f political consult
dation, with the annexation of Nabatean Arabia in 106. Like them, lie deployed
a legion to secure the new province (based at Bostra, renamed Nova Trataual,
and like them, he extended the road infrastructure, building a major tint
highway across eastern Stria and down to the Red Sea by way ni Mostia and
 From the Flavians to the Seven' 125

I’etra.162 T h e establishment o f a defended salient down the Euphrates, up the

Khabur River, and across the ridge of the Jebel Sinjar would not have been
inconsistent with the established methods of frontier reorganization— if, that
is, Armenia north of the N isibis-Zeugm a axis was left as a client kingdom.
For an empire whose resources of trained military manpower had hardly
increased since the days of Augustus, the conquests of Trajan were too exten­
sive to be successfully consolidated. N or did the entrenched cultures of the
region offer much scope for long-term Roman policies of cultural-political in­
tegration (with the exception of the most Hellenized cities). Above all, the fur-
1 her conquests of Trajan could not be efficient1, the vast investment of effort—
\\ hich would inevitably result in diminished security elsewhere— could only be
compensated by added security against Parthia or by the acquisition o f added
resources in place. Parthia was not strong enough to merit such a vast military
cl fort, but it was resilient enough to prevent the profitable incorporation of the
new provinces.

The Decline of the Client System

V hen Vespasian concentrated his forces at Ptolemais in the winter of 67 while
preparing to advance into Judea, then in full revolt, four client rulers, Antio-
clms IV of Comtnagene, M. Julius Agrippa II in the Galilee, Sohaemus of
t mesa, and the Arab chieftain Malchus, contributed a total of 15,000 men to
ho army, according to Josephus {The Jewish War.; u 1.4.2). Aside from Vespa-
■1.i d ’s three legions (X V Apollinaris, VM acedonica, and X Fretensis),164 which
u ere to be fully engaged in the sieges and guerrilla warfare of the Jewish War,
ilu re were only four legions for the entire Levant. One of these (III Gallica)
was redeployed to Moesia in 68 C E , so that only the three Syrian legions re­
in.lined to cover the vast eastern sector from the Red Sea to the Black, and one
' 'I 1 hese (X II Fulminata) w as also committed to the Jewish War for a time.164
With the new legion I Italica, N ero’s army comprised twenty-eight legions,
" ilv.it counting the four legions in Syria, no less than one-quarter of Rome’s
na.d legionary strength was already engaged in that one sector. It is doubtful
" h< 1 her any additional legionary forces could have been brought in, for ex-
miplc, to counter Parthian pressure, without dangerously unbalancing the
I' "Hmart-auxiliary ratio elsewhere, risking internal civil disorder in less con-
• In I.iied areas, or exposing frontiers to attack. T he system was still highly
11 ' n e , (nit w i t h 1 be provision of the three legions for the Jewish War, this
H. m I11 lit v w as pi eai l\ dr|>l( iis 1,
i 1<i / /’i (, i j / / , ! ' < ! i ,/ f < \‘ ) “ I i /'< l \ i >///,/ n l m i ' i > <

A 11lie mnil I luiv w as peace bet u cell koine a nd I‘ai Ili u ;K I Ik ' I mu' (as .1 1vs 1111
of Nero’s compromise over Armenia) ami although there were some aiixilia
free from the Judean commitment in the region, the concentration o! forces
against the Jews was rendered possible only by the glacis of client states and
client tribes that shielded the eastern borders of the empire. Without this sup
port, it would have been highly imprudent to commit very nearly the full dis­
posable legionary reserve o f the empire to the Jewish War (three legions out of
twenty-eight), with no security for the long exposed flanks other than thal
provided by three Syrian legions of indifferent quality, a concern made explicit
by Tacitus (Annals, 13.35): “Sed Corbuloni plus molis adversus ignavium militum
quam contra perfidiam hostium erat: quippe Syria transmotae legiones, pace longa
segues, munia castrorum aegerrime tolerabant.” 16‘’
Indeed, the client system of the East was then revealed at its most effective.
To the south in Sinai and on the eastern borders of Judea, the Nabatean king­
dom of Arabia absorbed and contained the endemic marauding of the nomads,16'1
and several minor client states remained in Syria. On the Euphrates, Osrhoene
was a neutral buffer state: essentially Parthian in orientation but unlikely to
cooperate in hostility toward Rome. Across the river, Osrhoene faced not R o ­
man territory but the key client state of Commagene, whose loyalty was as yet
unquestioned. Farther north, near the Black Sea, was Lesser Armenia under
Aristobolus; it, too, was paired across the Euphrates with another client state,
Sophene, ruled by another Sohaemus, according to Tacitus (Annals, 13.7): “et
minorem Armeniam Aristobulo, regionem Sophenen Sobaemo aim insignibus regiis
mandat.” In practice, this meant that both the chronically sensitive borders
with Parthia and the avenues of nomadic raiding were shielded by powers be­
holden to the empire, but not of it in a full sense. The client states deployed
their own forces to contain minor attacks, and their resistance even to major
attacks, whether successful or not, would allow time for an eventual disen­
gagement from Judea to free the army of Vespasian for action elsewhere.
By 69 Nero was dead, Vespasian had been proclaimed emperor, and a civil
war was under way. Again the client states stood Vespasian in good stead: Taci­
tus recorded that Sohaemus of Sophene, Antiochus IV of Commagene (who
had great wealth to contribute), and other client rulers extended their support
to the Flavian cause; there is no record of any client state’s opposition or even
of unfriendly neutrality, in line with Tacitus (.Histories, 2.81). In 70 C E , when
Titus set out for the final campaign of the Jewish War, Tacitus once again re­
corded the troop contributions of the client rulers; the list included a large
 lim n ihi I L i l -i , i n ' , i n i b f S f i ' e m 127

mi ml hi nl Ai.il>-., 11K111\ .ik'd by neigh Iloll y hatred: “et solito inter accolas odio in­
ti Hi,1 liidiias . Udlutm iiiiiiiin" (Histories, 5.1).
Acl 11 w as none other than Vespasian, the direct beneficiary o f the client-
a.iie system, who presided over its substantial dismantlement. Although Pon-
iii ,, ruled by Polemo II, had already been annexed under Nero in 64,167 the
M-gional structure of indirect control was still essentially intact. But within
l<«in- t ears of Vespasian’s accession, Lesser Armenia, Sophene, and Comma-
I’liie had all been annexed.168 The fate of the lesser client rulers and their states
r. unknown, and the only survivals of any importance that can be documented
nr the Galilean statelet of Agrippa II and Nabatean Arabia (which were not
uincxed until after 92 and 106, respectively),166 the petty kingdoms of the
< .mcasus, Palmyra, and the Bosporan state centered on Crim ea.170
Scholars have explained Vespasian’s annexationist policy as one facet of his
mure general policy of centralization.1,1 That is supported by Suetonius (Ves-
j',minus, 8), who noted the annexation of Commagene and Cilicia Trachea
together with the provincial reorganization of Achea, Lycia, Rhodes, Byzan-
1 mm, and Samos.
In Vespasian’s overall attempt to restructure the empire on a new basis,
administrative centralization and the territorialization of what was still in part
.1 hegemonic empire were mutually complementary. Hence the strategic goals
■ >1 the Flavians and the survival of the client-state system were mutually exclu-
■ uve. It is true that there were still some minor client states in the East when
Trajan came to hold court at Satala in i t 4: the Arsacid ruler ot Armenia did
not present himself, but the petty7 kings of the Albani, Iberi, and Colchi,
among others, did.1 2 Moreover, in the wake of the retreat that followed Tra-
1.m’s Parthian War, Osrhoene was left behind as a new client state, under Par-
1 hamaspates, who had been Trajan’s candidate for the Parthian throne.1 3 But
ilt hough the terminology was unchanged, the client states that survived an­
nexation into the second century7were not like the old. Though difficult to define
m specific, legalistic terms, the change in the relationship between Rome and
1 he client states had important strategic implications.1,4
The annexation of the major clients of Anatolia and Syria had replaced
1 he “ leisurely processes of diplomacy”1' ’ from the Black Sea to the Red with
1 he presence of Roman legions. W ith the deployment of direct military force
u here before there had been only a perception of Rome’s potential for ultimate
\ ictorv, there came the need to provide new administrative and communication
infrastructures. Under the Flavians, a network of highways was constructed in
128 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

Anatolia; also, very likely, a frontier-delimiting road from Palmyra to Sura on

the Euphrates was built (under the supervision of M arcus Ulpius Traianus,
father of the future emperor).1 6 Behind the highways a chain of legionary
bases spanned the entire sector from Bostra in the new province of Arabia to
Satala, only 70 miles south of the Black Sea.
Under Vespasian, the territories of Galatia, Pontus, Cappadocia, and Lesser
Armenia were at first amalgamated into an enormously enlarged Galatian
province of 112,000 square miles. Cilicia Aspera, formerly7 part of Antiochus
I V ’s possessions, was combined with Cilicia Campestris (until then part of
Syria) to form a new province o f Cilicia. When in 106 Rabbel II, last of the
Nabatean rulers, was deposed, Arabia too became a very large province, stretch­
ing from modern Daraa in southern Syria to Medain Salih, deep in the Hejaz,
and including the Sinai Peninsula. Trajan must have found the greater Galatia
of Vespasian too unwieldy7: by 113 at the latest, it had been divided into its ma­
jor constituent elements, Galatia and Cappadocia.1
The reorganization of the eastern sector of the empire required a sharp in­
crease in legionary deployments: the number rose from the Julio-Claudian
norm of four legions, all in Syria, to an eventual total of eight by the time ol
Hadrian.1 8 It has been argued that because the legionary buildup was pre-
Flavian (there were six full legions in the Near East by 67), then the entire ar­
gument that the Flavian reorganization with its reduction of the client states
required additional legionary support is wrong. But this objection fails to rec­
ognize that the additional legions were expeditionary, sent to fight campaigns in
Armenia and to suppress rebellion in Judea, rather than garrison troops,
whereas the static security needs of the frontier in terms of guard, patrol, and
reaction forces had doubled by the time of Hadrian, as compared to the troop
requirements under Augustus. Three of the additional four legions (two in
Cappadocia and one in Arabia) were deployed in territories that had been man
aged by clients under the Julio-Claudians, but had become provinces in need
of forces sufficient for a preclusive defense. It is evident that it was their stains
as provinces, which directly resulted from the dissolution o f the preexisting
clients, that necessitated an increase in the number of legions.
Thus the needs of the eastern front had doubled, while the total number ol
legions in the Roman army7 had increased, at most, by only one. The built in
reserve afforded by the previous pattern of legionary deployments was then
fore virtually exhausted: when entire legions were removed lor short term te
deployments, the lorees that remained were msnllieient. It is tins, nimii iimn-
 From the Flavians to the Seven' 129

t Ivan the tactical reorganization o f frontier defenses (which had no inherent

effect on elasticity), which deprived the imperial army of its inherent flexibil­
ity. In the absence of client-state forces ready to suppress low-intensity threats
and of client-state territories able to absorb high-intensity attacks, it was the
central forces of the empire itself that had to meet both kinds of threat. Vespa­
sian himself already had to deal with “ frequent barbarian raids” in Cappadocia
(i.e., greater Galatia), and in 75 the king of Iberia (in the Caucasus) had to be
helped to fortify the approaches to the Dariel Pass, the Caucasian Gates, as
noted by Suetonius (Vespasianus, 8): “ Cappadociae propter adsidiws harharonrm
nictirsus legiones addidit, consularemque rectorem imposuitpro etj. R.”
The processes of client-state diplomacy may have been too leisurely, and per­
haps disturbingly intangible, for a soldier who had risen to become emperor
1 h rough the highly tangible power o f his legions, but the ultimate consequence
ol annexation was the substitution of an enfeebling dispersion of forces for the
virtually costless projection of Rome’s remote but dynamic military power.
I ventually, some Roman troops— a detachment of the legion X II Fulminata—
v ere even stationed in the remote mountains of the Caucasus. (It must be rec­
ognized, however, that the “costless” projection of power could have an op­
portunity cost nonetheless, and in some cases a substantial opportunity cost:
u hen Cappadocia was annexed, in the year 17 C E , its revenues allowed Tiberius
10 reduce the auction tax by 50 percent, as recorded by Tacitus in Annals, 2.42:
"Regnum in provincialn redactum est, fructihusque eius levari posse centesimae verti­
cal professns Caesar ducentesimam in postern?» statuit”)
It is clear that a client state such as Hadrian’s Osrhoene was outside the
empire, just as the old-style client states had been of it, even if not in a legal
sense. The difference was intangible but all-important— a matter of expecta-
1 ions. The old-style clients understood that their status could be revoked at
m\ time to assert direct imperial control. But with the new-style client states,
1 heir status was a permanent substitute for that control. The ultimate intention—
uni capacity for annexation—was visibly gone, and with it went the principal
incentive to obedience on the part of client rulers intent on delaying the evil
■ I■1\. A critic of this specific argument rejected it on the grounds that there is
no evidence that emperors ever appointed client rulers as an “explicitly short
n 1 m measure” and that the institution’s longevity shows that client states were
not pisi a stopgap measure prior to annexation in due course.179 That may be
o, lull 1 here is n o need 10 view earlier clients as just temporary in order to argue
ill.II I lie s\ si ei n u.e. d<'loaded once surviving client rulers could see that the
130 The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire

empire was less capable of annexation. Th at surely allowed them a much

greater freedom of action— too much so for imperial security, especially if
there was a powerful Iranian state at the time.
Under the Julio-Claudians, the stronger a client state was, the better it could
fulfill its diverse security functions. An empire that was perceived as capable of
further expansion was also an empire that could keep even powerful clients in
subjection. Not so under the new system, in which the only satisfactory clients
were those weak enough to be kept in awe by the forces deployed in direct
proximity to them. In the absence o f the ultimate threat o f annexation, only
weak clients were safe clients. But their very weakness rendered them less sat­
isfactory as providers of free military services. Strong client states, on the
other hand, had now' become dangerous, since the bonds of dependence were
greatly weakened. Under the earlier system, when different imperial priorities
prevailed, and when there was a much greater disposable military strength ready
to be sent into action, even Decebalus, the powerful ruler of Dacia, could have
been transformed into a highly useful client in the wake o f Trajan’s first and
victorious Dacian war (101-102).'*°
Once defeated but still powerful, a Dacian client state could have assumed
responsibility for preventing infiltration and raids on the Daco-Roman fron­
tier and for interdicting Sarmatian attacks. The relationship between the cli­
ent ruler Decebalus and Rome under the earlier system of empire would have
been shaped by the plain realities of power: Decebalus, kept in subjection by
the ultimate threat of total war and deposition, could have complied overtly
with Roman security desiderata without fear of domestic opposition. C on­
fronted with the worse alternative of direct imperial rule, the Dacians would
have had a powerful incentive to obey a ruler who himself obeyed Rome.
It was not so in the new strategic environment. Faced with an empire that
could concentrate superior forces on the Dacian sector only with visible diffi
cultv,1*1 and, more important, that was obviously reluctant to expand (shown to
all by the failure to annex Dacia in the wake of Trajan’s first war), Decebalus
was insufficiently intimidated to act as a satisfactory client. And even if he per
sonallv had been willing to obey Rome, it is likely that others in Dacia would
have demanded a more independent policy. Thus Dacia had to he annexed,
paradoxically because the empire had become visibly less expansionist and mot c
reluctant to annex. In other words, Trajan had to destroy Dacian indepen
dence because the option of indirect rule was no longer available.,f- I his is just
one more mam lest at ion ol tile parade i\ iea 1 logic oi si 1 at eg \ : .11 n<>111 ■ |>n >1.1 _■><>
 From the Flavians to the Seven D1

nists who are cognizant (i.e., not in the position of, say, primitive peoples un­
aware of firearms), every specific act of force is perceived as a symptom of
overall weakness, for otherwise it would be unnecessary.
Although client tribes and client states did not everywhere disappear, as the
empire evolved toward a preclusive defense, they became either redundant (if №
weak) or inherently unstable (if strong). In Britain, the breakdown of the client l
i
a0
relationship with the Brigantians of Cartimandua may have been the prime
cause of the campaigns of Agricola and later of the establishment of the Solway-
Tyne frontier.183 In Low'er Germany, a client structure of sorts did survive,
based on the repentant Batavi and the Frisii, Tencteri, and Usipetes.184 But
there, too, the relationship between empire and client had changed: in place
of the unpaid tribal militias, which provided for local defense at no direct cost to
i he empire, as recorded by Tacitus (Histories, 1.67)— “castelli quod olim Helvetii
mis militibus ac stipendiis tuehantur”— regular formations of auxiliary troops
had to be deployed to guard the frontiers. As for the vulnerable sector of the
lower Danube, the Roxolani had already acquired the dangerous status of
neighbors who were both fully independent and subsidized.185
Foreshadowing the ironic reversal o f the client system that w as to take place
.1 century later, the nature of the subsidy relationship between clients and em­
pire began to change in character. From its beginnings as a reward to deserv­
ing chieftains, the subsidy became a short-term rental of good behavior, wrhich
could not be suspended without undermining the security of the border zone.
I he ultimate ability of the empire to crush the peoples it chose to subsidize
was not yet in question, but without a credible threat of annexation, the posi-
1 ive incentives to good behavior had to be augmented in order to maintain the
i-quilibrium between threats and incentives on which any such system of power
must necessarily be based.188 (As of this w'riting in 2015, Vladim ir Putin’s Rus­
sian Federation, a multinational empire and already the largest state of the
unrid, is striving hard to enlarge its pow’er by making client states of all its
lesser neighbors. As it was with Parthamaspates, it is by recruiting client rul-
<i s, especially in a succession crisis, that client states are made.)
1n the new system o f the Roman Empire, neighbors w'ere no longer auto-
111.11 ically classified either as targets of conquest or as clients. Instead, they tended
in Iunction in the manner of “ buffer states,” of which Armenia had long been
1 In prototype. The buffer state performs only one military function: it serves
1. .1 physical 1h i ti 101 /one between greater powers, providing them with a
means nl a\ on 111 m . >u111 u 1 which is use! 111 lor as Inn 1: as 1 h< \ want In amid
cnnlbrt. \ billin' si,He i .hiihi I In' powcrlul enough lo an ivch resist lugli
i nlensit v l h reals (i it Iutw isc, U u ould it sell he a pou er instead ol a Ihi I ler), nor
will it normally assume responsibility lor containing low-intensity threats, as
client states must to deserve protection. Finally, the government ol the bullet
state cannot be freely manipulated by one side or the other w ithout provoking
the intervention o f the rival greater power.
Although the Parthian sector of the empire was sui generis, because Parthia
was the only civilized state adjacent to Roman territory, Armenia was not
unique in being a buffer state. Osrhoene, just east of the Euphrates, also played
this role through many vicissitudes, until the interventions of Romans and
Parthians finally destroyed its usefulness as an instrument of conflict avoid­
ance and made it instead one more arena of conflict, featuring, as usual, the
installation and deposition of rival candidates to the kingship. In 12} Hadrian
replaced the Parthian appointee, Pacorus II, with one of his own, the Parthamas-
pates whom Trajan had earlier left at Ctesiphon in precarious control ol a
short-lived Parthian client state. With this, Osrhoene became a new-stvle cli­
ent state until a Parthian intervention removed the Roman appointee. In 164,
under Marcus Aurelius, Rome intervened once more and continued to do so in
rivalry with Parthia until Osrhoene vvas finally annexed under Septimius
Severus in 195.Is
We have seen how the multiple security, even military, services provided by
the old-style clients had served most usefully to preserve the flexibility of the
Roman army. But the system was by no means costless: lands that could have
been brought within the sphere of the cultural and commercial processes ol
Romanization were not; peoples that could have been subjected to the full
weight of imperial taxation were not. Those opportunity costs were worth
paying as long as the disposable military strength so generated was being put
to use, however infrequently, to secure further expansion. But once “ scientific”
borders were everywhere set in final form, encompassing the territory deemed
optima] for the empire, the dynamic combination of hegemonic control anti
offensive military power became redundant, and with it the entire system ol
client-state peripheries, even if some lingered for centuries.

The Army and the System

“For their nation does not wait for the outbreak of war to give men their first
lesson in arms; they do not sit with folded hands in peacetime only to put them
in motion in the hour of need. . . . they never have a truce from training, never
 I 'n»// the I'hii'ians to the Severi 133

".ni Ini ci 1u-i :■( in ic, in anse. .Moreover, their peace maneuvers are no less
.in iiiiiins 1 han veritable warfare; each soldier daily throws all his energy into
In-, drill, as though he were in action. . . . Indeed, it would not be wrong to
describe their maneuvers as bloodless combats and their combats as sangui­
nary maneuvers” (The Jeivish War, 1.11.5). hhus wrote Josephus on the pre­
paredness of the Roman army— in theory; his fellow Jews by then needed no
instruction in the matter of Roman efficacy in combat.
( )nce the empire was mobilized to fight, with first-class leaders in charge of
I 11 mpe-based first-class legions, it was invincible. The solid infantry of the
legions would move into action, complemented bv the variegated panoply of
auxiliary light infantry, cavalry, and missile troops. Then, even if the enemv
■ mild not he drawn out to fight in close combat, or outmaneuvered in field
1 iperations, it would still be defeated bv the relentless methods of Roman engi­
neering warfare. To fight the Chatti in the Taunus Mountains of Germane,
assault roads leading to their fortified high places were cut into the forest; and
m light the last handful of Jewish w arriors in the remote desert fortress of
Masada, the Romans built an assault embankment 675 feet long and 275 feet
high, surmounted by a stone platform another 75 feet high and equally wide.
I lie ability to bring large numbers of carefully trained, cleverly equipped men
in the scene of combat, to construct the required infrastructures, to deliver a
lead} supply of food and equipment to remote and sometimes desolate
places— all this reflected the high standards of Roman military organization.m
But once the overall strategy of the empire was transformed from hege­
monic expansionism to territorial defense, and a preclusive defense at that, the
qualities needed by the Roman army changed also. The empire and its armies
.(ill needed the ability to deploy large forces under good generals to fight large-
vale wars, but nowr this surge capability was not enough. Under the new- sys-
11-111, the army also needed sustained, indeed permanent, defensive capabilities
mer the full length of a land perimeter that was 9,600 kilometers (5,965 stat­
ute miles) without Dacia and 10,200 kilometers (6,338 statute miles) with Da-
1 ta; it also had 4,509 kilometers (2,802 statute miles) of coastline, including the
\ lediterranean’s— famously peaceful for two centuries, but an open front once
c.i raiders arrived in the third century.
The physical requirement was to have forces capable of both guarding the
Iii it ders against petty infiltration in peacetime and executing mobile operations
m wartime. T he psychological requirement was to preserve the fighting skills
ind élan of troops assigned to routine guard and patrol duties, or merely residing
I(| I /■ ( ( , / . ! / } . ! '</ / , l h i’ 3 I f'< U < " t t ,1 H / m j<! I t

i n ic i <>11 a r \ I n i l r c s s i ' s , 111 <i n 111 a 11c■ i m onth, w a r a 11i-r \ c .i i , mil 1

i n 1 (a 111 <a 1 11\
in dreary places t a r Im m ( l i e a n i m a l i o n <>l cities, culler Inn n llr n mill mill
wet, or too often hot and dry. These troops had no ready prospect ol e n j o y

ing the excitement of war and the joy of taking booty, and little chance ol

exposure to the leadership of fighting generals or to the natural discipline nl

battle.
For the Roman army as for any other, it was much easier to elicit a short-term
surge response for battle than to maintain adequate standards of training (hard
to do and never done, for it must be forever redone) and overall preparedness
on a permanent basis. Where troops remained long inactive or in a hospitable
environment, as in Syrian cities most famously, but any cities really, they
would cease to be soldiers. Tacitus (Annals, 13.35, recounted the harsh
expedients used by Cn. Domitius Corbulo in 55-58 C E to turn the men of his
two Syrian legions, III Gallica and V I Ferrata, into fighting soldiers for N ero’s
Parthian War After weeding out the old and unfit who had been kept on the
rolls— men who had never been on guard, who knew nothing of the simplesi
drills, and wrho lacked even helmets and breastplates— Corbulo kept the rest
under canvas for their training in the bitter wunter weather of the Anatolian
Mountains. Even so, there were reverses in the first engagements of the fol­
lowing spring, according to Tacitus. Aside from whatever delays may have
been caused by the continued attempts to reach a diplomatic settlement, it
seems that Corbulo’s army was in training for three years before the start ol
the victorious campaign in Armenia.
Once appointed governor of Syria, Corbulo must have employed all his
famous severity on and set a personal example of self-discipline for the two
remaining Syrian legions, X Fretensis and X II Fulininata. And yet, in 66 C E ,
when C. Cestius Callus, the next governor of Syria, marched into Judea to
quell what was still a small uprising, he was soundly defeated. Built around the
X II Fulminata and comprising 2,000-man detachments from two other Syrian
legions, the expeditionary force also included six cohorts of auxiliary infantry,
four cavalry alae, almost 14,000 client-state troops, and large numbers of ir­
regulars w'ho had volunteered to join in w'hat must have seemed w'ould be a
quick fight with certain victory.1*9
T he Jews (or rather, the Zealots and their followers) could only muster un­
trained enthusiasts: men armed wdth spears and bow's. Callus soon reached
Jerusalem, but failed to take the Temple Mount by storm; he then felt threat-
 a u jq Tu o^ j^ ^ qp at-^ A U Q gl
I'ni/// i/jf I'hi,'h/iis to I In' S r c t r i 135

■ 1ii «I .uni u.is iii.iiicmcieil min, or chose, retreat. He was neither a coward nor
I tool (Josephus, 7 he Jrd'ish War.; n .19 .5, 7), so it may be conjectured that
I" e. 1use 1 he legionary troops had proved unsteady, the auxiliaries were af-
l. i led, and the irregulars melted away. Callus’s army suffered heavy losses as it
« nhdrew, and the X II Fulminata lost its eagle standard, according to Sueto­
nius (I espasianus, 4): “praedictum ludaei ad se trahentes, rebellarunt, caesoque prae-
jui'.iio Icffutmn insuper Syriae consularem suppetias ferentem, rapta aquila, fngttver-
:nn"—an ignominy sufficiently rare to warrant disbandment in most cases. It
II>1wars that the imperial forces only made good their escape by abandoning
1 lieir personal baggage, artillery, and siege engines, and they suffered 5,780
lulled or missing (not counting client-state troops lost), according to Josephus
1 / hcjeu'is'b War, 11.19.7). T b is shocking defeat of Callus— and by mere enthu­
siasts too— turned the uprising into a much more serious affair. Eventually it
...... a full-scale war to defeat the Jews, a war fought with an army that in-
1 luded two legions brought from Europe and fit for serious warfare, unlike
1 heir Syrian counterparts.
1 he circumstances that undermined the strength of the Syrian legions had
been peculiar to the East during the Julio-Claudian era: a pattern of local re-
■ mitment from a population not especially warlike, excessively infrequent
1 umbat, and prolonged stationing in city barracks rather than rural camps, a
practice always frowned upon.190 One critic of my overall thesis of strategic
j 1.11 uinality,191 and of my depiction of the three systems (as systems to boot),
; deduced from the same scant evidence that the legions were primarily de-
S ployed to suppress lower-intensity civil unrest rather than to defend the ern-
j pu e, part of his larger denial that there was any imperial strategy, rather than
lust day-to-day policing (which can be “ mindless,” unlike the scholars who so
. uiiiment on empire builders).
Hut such circumstances were no longer found only in the excessively civi-
h/ed East in the post-Flavian era. They were found to an increasing extent
i li roughout the empire, with the proviso that in colder areas, where warfare was
ure in winter, the legions had always been stationed in cities in the winter
f months,192 T h e danger was obvious: all the legions might deteriorate as the
S\ rian legions had. Large-scale offensive warfare would everywhere cease
"iice scientific frontiers were attained, and local recruitment was rapidly becom­
ing the norm. Meanwhile the supposedly bracing rural camps gave way to
•nine fortresses, which rapidly acquired an urban atmosphere, as vietnailers,
 / ht ( 1 1 ,1 / I , ! '*/ / ,//i i’ ) ' < ’/ I h i l\ i >///,//1 I n / j ’i/1

laundry w om en, assorted t r a d e s m e n , ; i i ul e n t e r t a i n e r s n u n c In l i r e a r o u n d

them .1'”
In theJulio-Claudian era there had already been town-like legionary cnni|>s
offering many comforts, and war was scarcely a daily occupation. But because
the troops were not in cities nor engaged in routine patrols and guard duties,
and were instead engaged in their famously strenuous training and famously
realistic unit exercises (“ bloodless battles”), there had been no softening up ol
the Syrian sort, no loss of the combat edge. That, after all, is the universal
experience of armies: their combat readiness is highly unstable; it is either
increasing with hard training or decreasing with inaction. Guarding and patrol
ling was scarcely inaction, but it did not suffice to maintain combat readiness,
because guarding is passive, and patrolling can be a mere stroll if the absence
of bracing incidents is too prolonged. It is against this background, as well as
that of the civil war, that the army policies of Vespasian and his successors
must be seen.
First, in the wake of Civilis’s revolt, Vespasian restored order to the legion­
ary forces: four legions (I Germanica, IV iMacedonica, X V Primigenia, and
X V I Gallica) were disbanded for having surrendered or lost their eagles. At
the same time, two legions manned by transferred sailors from the fleets (I and
II Adiutrix) and a legion raised by the short-lived emperor Galba (VTI Gemina
ex Galbiana) were placed on the regular establishment, together with two
newly created legions (IV Flavia Felix and X V I Flavia Firma).194 Vespasian’s
accession had divulged a secret of the empire: troops could make an emperor,
even if far from Rome, so the problem of political security wras added to the
eternal problem of maintaining ordinary discipline.
Both the successes and the shortcomings of Flavian army policy in the
wake of the civil wrar are illustrated by the attempted putsch of L. Antonins
Saturninus, legate of Upper Germany, against Domitian in 88-89 (Suetonius,
Domitianus, 6, 7).191 W hile Saturninus was able to persuade the two legions
under his command (X IV Gemina and X X I Rapax) to support his cause by
appropriating the treasure chests of their savings bank, the legate and army of
Lowrer Germany remained loyal to Domitian, and the putsch collapsed. This
episode incidentally showed that diplomatic penetration could be a two-wray
street: Saturninus had apparently purchased the support of the German Chatti
from across the Rhine. But the Rhine thawed prematurely, the Chatti could
not cross over the ice, and this attempt to use a client relationship for private
aims failed.
 l-int/i li'c i l i i r h i m In t h e S t \ ' c n 1 ^7

Wlu'ii i In i i'll miK-iI Ii i' ii ins u i re reestablished on the Rhine in the wake of
iln i nil uni, then f.uilv rudimentary earth and wood hiberna winter camps
m m - wav to liases built ol stone; subsequently, permanent bases were built for

i In- legions in Britain and throughout the empire.146 This is perhaps the clear-
' a expression of the gradual emergence of the new strategy: having attained
i u ntilic frontiers, no further movement was expected— not, at any rate, be­
lt mil the reach of fixed base points. Thus when the British frontier was ad-
' .meed, first to Hadrian’s line and then to the still more northerly Clyde-Forth
line, the legions remained at York and Chester, deeper in the rear. Legions also
n mained in Strasbourg, almost 87 miles behind the Antonine German limes
11 its nearest point, Welzheim.14
That the official ideology proclaimed in speeches and slogans remained
as triumphalist and as expansionist as ever is scarcely surprising. There was a
11 adv-made heroic phraseology for unending conquest without limits, and
in me for the prudent optimization of military resources to maximize provincial
•ecurity, prosperity (and thus tax revenues), and empire-wide stability. It was a
1 nne to live well rather than risk it all for yet more territory.
Though attempts were made to prohibit unseemly entertainments for the
Hoops,14*1 the spacious and well-equipped legionary fortresses provided stan­
dards of comfort and hygiene that soldiers— or, for that matter, most civilians—
uere not to experience again until the nineteenth century, if then. Even in the
torrid and bleak North African desert, the fortress of the legion III Augusta at
( icinellae, built in 12 6 -133, was provided with baths fully equipped in the R o­
man manner, built on an area of more than 6,700 square feet.144 Elaborate
procedures supplied the baths with fuel in the desert— tamarisk trees— and
abundant water.
Integral to the design of legionary fortresses and auxiliary forts was a hospi-
lal. An exemplary7one, but very likely a standard design, had five-cot rooms for
bedridden patients and separate lavatories for each pair of rooms, apparently to
contain infections (even though standard medical practice would not recog­
nize the phenomenon until the nineteenth century).2(10 The legions and some
auxiliary' units had doctors (media) on the regular establishment, as well as or­
derlies and surgeons (medici chintgi).2m The narrative sources suggest that the
military doctors were highly regarded in the medical profession. The authori-
1 ics certainly had to make special efforts to ensure the health of troops in fixed
Imses; the liberties that men can take in the field, so long as they7change camp-
Mtes frequently, would have resulted in chronic illnesses in permanent sites.
 More subtle measures u r i c needed In cope with tile more set inns problem
of preserving the lighting skills and el.m ol t n><»ps w ho bleed the prospect ol .1
lifetime in the army without ever seeing action. Alter all, from the conclusion
of Trajan’s Parthian War in 117 to the wars of Marcus Aurelius in the 160s,
there was almost half a century of tranquility, with only sporadic and localized
warfare in the remote northern frontiers of Britain and in Mauretania in 141
152. T h e answer was an increased emphasis on troop selection (already rigor­
ous though it was),202 on training (of which the same could be said),205 and on
professional specialization, which is a highly effective way to cultivate exper­
tise if done with serious intent. More than 154 different functional posts have
been counted in the second-century legionary establishment, excluding the
junior centurions in the centuries.204 Epigraphic evidence of unique value gives
us a glimpse of army exercises under Hadrian. Although this was an official
speech, the professionalism evident in Hadrian’s remarks to the troops in Africa
gives authenticity to the evidence.20’
Only constant training could preserve the combat capabilities of an army
that had settled down to an indefinite term of peacetime soldiering. M ore­
over, as the savage mutinies of the year 14 had shown, and as the sack of
Cremona during the civil war was to show again, the concentration o f large
numbers of men into legions fully conscious of their inherent power as the
empire’s major fighting force entailed grave risks for civil society. It is not
surprising, therefore, that the major emphasis in Roman army policy was not
innovation but rather the maintenance of discipline. Even Hadrian, a man of
broad conceptions and great expertise in m ilitary matters, was no innova­
tor.206 Instead, it seems that his major concern w as the restoration of routine
and discipline in the wake of the disruptions caused by Trajan’s wars. Under
Hadrian the legions were deployed at fixed bases which, in most cases, they
were never to leave again; and soldiers soon acquired unofficial families in
the settlements (vici) that grew' spontaneously around the legionary bases. It
is sometimes simply assumed— and asserted— that this domestication di­
minished the arm y’s combat capabilities by infecting its fighting spirit w'ith
familial prudence.20.
Had the Roman army built its combat capabilities on the basis of the raw
courage of its troops, that observation would have plausibility at least. But
there is ample evidence that a very definite preference for methodical and cau­
tious warfare had been the hallmark of the Roman army long before Hadrian.
 l i m n t h e l l , i , i , m \ In / h r S r , - e l l
HO

\> i <>i. Imi; in I n mi inns {Str,iia>fwtiia, 4.7.4), Sc/ipio Alricanus once replied to a
I 1 me i>I his prudence 1>\ saying that his mother had given birth to a general,

iiE»F,TramnraiTrEiiii,.n.m
n.ii .1 u arriiit: “////peratorein me mater; non bellatorem, peperit.” So, also, were the
II mies ol 1 ladrian and his successors. As in the past, the Roman army would
iiglii and win by relying on sound tactics, strategic methods, and superior
1'ii'istics. It did not need to emulate the savage spirit of barbarian warriors
in order to prevail. These were soldiers who received regular pay (increased
in g>o denarii by Domitian),208 retirement benefits, and occasional donatives in
Inn of the uncertain prospect of booty, and they could be kept in fighting trim
In administrative means: regulation, inspection, and the detailed execution of
l>/escribed exercises.
In the course of the second century there were only minor changes in the
1 ipiipment of the legions: a tendency toward heavier and shorter throw'ing
pears (the characteristic Roman pild)\ the replacement of the shorter gladius,
once the legionary weapon par excellence, with the longer spatha, which had
always been issued to auxiliaries (it was not especially Germanic but rather
( .reek: anaOr] spdthe)', and the replacement of the classic heavy and semi-
1 \ lindrical shields with smaller and flatter shields. These changes clearly indi-
1 ale a shift in priorities from equipment optimized for battles of attrition to
1 ipiipment more suited for fluid operations against bands rather than armies.
Ao hint of decadence can be derived from these changes.
There was also a major innovation: the introduction as standard issue o f the
. nrroballista, a powerful arrow- or bolt-shooting machine as mobile as any
1 art.209 Already present in Trajan’s army and shown on Trajan’s column,210 the
enrroballista appears to have become the most important type of artillery in the
legionary establishment, used alongside a small number of heavier and alto­
gether less mobile stone-throwing machines. The introduction of the carrobal-
hsta must have increased even further the Roman advantage in the high-intensity
v arfare at which the legions were already so adept.
But the maintenance of frontier security against low-intensity threats, the
major business of the Roman army during much o f the second century, called
lor lighter forces trained and equipped for guard, patrol, and escort duties as
well as highly mobile but small-scale warfare. It is not surprising, therefore,
that the proportion of auxiliary troops in the army seems to have increased
during the second century.211 There wTas, moreover, a trend toward increased
diversification in both the structure and function of the auxilia. For example,
'I l hi ( i / , i / / J ' ' I / , / 1 < im "/ //'i l\om ,m I ////'// <

ill 111 i;ir\ tiliic nm l o >li<>rt s were eil her i ill r< mIiu cc I or <>iv;il Iy 11 kivum /i I in mi 11 il >ers
during' tire post-Flavian period: the lirsl aut bent icated appearanee <
>1a indIlai \
ala oc c u rre d in 85 C E . 212 T h e new form ations were clearly useful in bridging
the gap between the legions and the q u in g e n a ry auxilia , less than a tenth as
large in m anpower: given the inevitable friction that the briga d in g o f different
units would cause, the m illia ry units should have resulted in a sounder overall
force structure.
It is possible that there was also an innovation in the opposite direction: the
introduction of a new kind of smaller unit, the numeri, commonly associated
with Hadrian but possibly older. The numcri are poorly documented as com­
pared to the auxiliary alae and cohorts; indeed they have to be discerned from
the nature of their unit names: an ethnic designation followed in most cases by
a functional one.213 It is possible that the numeri did not exist in any stable form,211
and there is no evidence at all for the oft-repeated speculation that they were
smaller units than the quingenary t/rt-r/Y/tf, let alone that they had an establish­
ment of 300 men. All one can opine is that if they were indeed newly raised
ethnic units, they would have retained a more pronounced national character,
which most of the auxilia had lost long before.2b T he one detail that comes
from a credible source (Arrian, Tactica, 44) is that they were allowed to retain
their native war cries, leading to the further speculation that the numeri were
introduced to replenish the fighting spirit of the mw-staid auxilia.216 That they
were also cheap, because their men came from barbarian poverty and could be
paid less, is plausible but undocumented.21.
Finally, the numeri wure supposedly different in a more fundamental way
because their manpower was self-renewing instead of being self-extinguishing:
since the time of Claudius, troops of the auxilia were given citizenship upon
discharge; hence their sons could aspire to legionary careers.216 Under Antoni­
nus Pius, however, sons born to auxiliaries prior to the grant of citizenship no
longer received it wdth their fathers, and thus had to serve in the auxilia them­
selves in order to qualify.219 But those who served in the numeri did not become
citizens, and their sons were thus available for service in the auxiliaries.22"
T h is was important: while recruitment w'as a chronic problem for all Roman
forces, it must have been less intractable for the better-paid and more presti­
gious legions.
I f indeed smaller, the numeri were better suited for the fragmented deploy­
ments required on the “closed” frontiers— as in Germany, where the western
Taunus and Odenwald segments of the Hadrianic frontier were guarded by
 I ' i n i i i t h e I h i e m i i i In I h e S e r e r i
14 1

u n i mii.ill Iml'. in.inin 11 11\ hhmen. 1,1 It is also possible that the troops that
ii.iiiiii-d i lie milee.isiks ol Hadrian’s Wall in Britain belonged to numeri. In
■"ill eases, t be undesirable alternative to the use of numeri would have been to
pin iil,ie or cohorts into many small subunits. The numeri thus contributed to
lie I imctional diversification of the Roman army; they cannot simply be writ-
' ii oil as "low-category” troops.
I lie first requirement of tactical diversification was to provide more cav-
di more light infantry (spearmen especially), and more bowmen and slingers
" balance the heavy legionary infantry. Irregular North African horsemen
I /,turi gentiles) were prominent among the troops who fought in Trajan’s wars,
uid so were oriental archers armed with powerful tendon-and-horn compound
"iws; both kinds of troops were considered irregulars (symmuchiurii) at the
ime, and would appear as numeri later.” 2
\\ hile it seems improbable that the Romans looked to the numeri to infuse
In troops with barbarian energy, mounted archery was very much an eastern
penalty, and it was natural to find numeri of mounted archers from Palmyra
mil Sura side by side with regular auxiliaries, such as spearmen of Ituraea.
Mounted missile troops were obviously suitable as border forces, since they
" ii Id best deal with elusive infiltrators and with skirmishers; it is not surpris­
in' that they were prominent in the garrison of the Dacian Limes Porolissen-
i on the Carpathians, which had no continuous wall barrier.222
( hitsidc the numeri there was some specialization of a more recondite sort:
mder Trajan, for example, both a milliary ala of lancers, Ala I Ulpia Contari-
'i 11in, and one of dromedary troops, Ala I Ulpia Dromadariorum, were
used .224The first may have been something of an experimental unit of heavy
Ik ick cavalry; the second was obviously a case of terrain specialization. Clearly,
" ianise the Roman army was no longer an undifferentiated force apt to fight
mi where, regional patterns of deployment had become useful: dromedary
i"ops for the desert; mounted archers for “open” frontiers, such as those of
fin ia and above all the Euphrates; light spearmen (Raeti Gaesati?) for mountain
' 'imtry; and so on.
Most frontiers required a combination of static troops, to man forts, watch-
"uers, and guardposts, and mobile troops, that is, cavalrymen for patrol and
" "i t duties. At the provincial level, the force mix could easily be obtained by
<'ii)llining' cavalry alae with auxiliary, or even legionary, infantry; but at the
ii Ht ly local level, the frictions of brigading different units (cap-badge bar fights
' nc long enlivened British army life) could be avoided by the deployment of
>I ' / h, < './/,//, r I >7 l ! ‘> I nil'll i

the, o l m r l f s ii/it 11 til iic. Tin.' ini lei appear In have had i 2<i cavalry I n ^ S ’d ill lam r\
ifquingenary, and 240 cavalry u> Soo inlantry if millinry.22' Sometimes dis
missed as low-grade mounted infantry, the traditional bane of true cavalry
men,” 6 it seems that the cohortes equitatae were, on the contrary, organic com
binations o f normal infantry with light cavalry, that is, cavalry that relies on
harassment (as opposed to shock) tactics. In the event of large-scale warfare,
the cavalry and infantry would fight with their respective branches, and not in
combination.2"'
It has been argued that the horsemen of the cohortes equitatae were “true"
cavalry and not mounted infantry, and certainly not low-grade mounted troops.
But that conflates light cavalry, suitable for scouting, screening patrols, and so
on, and the heavy cavalry trained and equipped for high-intensity warfare -
that is, to charge en masse against enemy concentrations mounted or on fool.
The cavalry of the alae was in fact dual purpose, trained to fight both with
missile and shock weapons (the lance, contus)\ but the cavalry of the cohorts
equitatae was only mounted and equipped for close contact and missile attack.
As such it was a limited-purpose light cavalry. It is likely that the cavalry-infantry
mix o f the cohortes equitatae could be employed for normal frontier securit y
duties, with its infantrymen holding fixed observation points while its cavalry
patrols covered the intervening zones.
The territorialization of the legions, arising from their deployment in per
manent bases, raises the basic question of flexibility for large-scale warfare. II
the legions could no longer leave their bases to campaign outside their tern
tory, where did the troops of expeditionary forces come from?
At a middle level of combat intensity, an expeditionary corps could In­
formed out of mixilia units alone, as in the operations in Mauretania under
Antoninus Pius in the mid-second century, when the only legion in Africa (111
Augusta) was reinforced by auxiliary cavalry forces sent into the coastal stag
mg bases of Portus Magnus, Cartennae, and Tipasa.228 (In Tipasa, a circuit nl
walls 2,400 meters long has been excavated. This would have provided a secure
I' i',c for forces shipped in from Europe: the Ala Flavia Brittanica, a milliaiy
■ i' 1I1 \ unit; the Ala I Ituraeorum Sagittariorum, a unit of mounted archers,
M 1 I 1 Ipia Contariorum, lancers and heavy cavalry; and the Ala I Canancla
1 Men and horses would have to be rested and acclimatized prior in
" i w m serious warfare, and the provision of a secure base at the landing
■> r. • >1>\ iouslv a sound move.
 From the Flavians to the Severi M3

But the Roman army could not dispense with the heavy mass of legionary
lorces when it came to large-scale warfare. Three entire legions appear to have
been sent to the East for the Parthian War of Marcus Aurelius: I Minervia from
Bonna (Bonn) in Lower Germany; the II Adiutrix from Aquincum (Budapest)
m Pannonia; and the V Macedonica from Troesmis (near Galap) in lower
Moesia.’ 50
Much more frequent was the deploym ent of vexillattones, detachments
drawn from the legions, ranging in size from a handful of men under the com­
mand of a centurion to the large formations commanded bv legionary legates.-’ 51
I nng an established practice, the use of vexillationes increased considerably in
die post-Trajanic era. The legions as a whole developed local attachments and
' mild not be easily moved— for soldiers were not likely to countenance indefi-
mie separation from their (as yet unofficial) families. It was still feasible, how-
■ o r, to find 1,000-2,000 troops in each legion freely available for large-scale
" .irlare far from their bases. But there was a much stronger disincentive and a
much stronger reason for not redeploying entire legions than the reluctance of
die troops to leave their homes. W ith frontier security now reliant on the sta-
11*ming of forces in situ and the security apparatus they supported with patrols
md such (rather than on others’ perceptions of their remote power), the re­
moval of legions was liable to cause an immediate breakdown in the diplomatic
11 iicture of transborder control at the local level, which happened when Lucius
A ms’s Parthian campaigns took away legions from the Rhine and Danube,
II eyrering a revolt by the Marcomanni.25-
duch outbreaks in turn could precipitate other attacks against imperial
l mds. It is true that on a day-to-day basis, peoples across the borders dealt
mm.ily with the auxiliary forces in their perimeter forts, but the integrity of
mi|MTial territory was ultimately secured by the deterrent suasion emanating
1‘ "in the concentrated power of the legions. Their removal was bound to upset
id, dual balance of power and weaken or even neutralize deterrence, leaving
mb die actual war-fighting capabilities of the forces left in place. If thev had
- 1 m- used and consumed in combat, security had to be bought at full price,
> o hi nl coming cheaply from deterrence alone.
A hen three entire legions (as well as several vexillationes) were sent to fight
iir-i Part Ilia under .Marcus Aurelius, the governors of the affected provinces
i, odd to compensate lor their transfer In “diplomacy." ” Not Mirpnsinyh,
k Iii mi a deleiTi-itt dir -a i net uri - o! diplomat ic coni ro! In i ike dou it, |ireei| >it at me.

i
111 / /’. t >I ,11:, i ' ' / > \ [ \ of I hi ' 1\<>n 1,111 / m j ' U (•

(in- miiihiTn w;iis <>l Marcus Aurelius immediately after the victorious con-
cltision ol the Parthian War. During the winter o f 166-167 the northern
irontiers were defended by mobile vexillationes in anticipation of the return of
the forces previously sent to the East. But major penetrations nevertheless
took place.-34
T h e deployment of vexillationes on a strategic scale was more effective, as
had already been shown in 83-85 under Domitian, when C. Velius Rufus in
Germ any had a force drawn from nine separate legions under his command.231
The support elements and headquarters of the legions could then be left in
place, together with older, married soldiers. These were precisely the troops
that were less likely to be useful on remote fronts and more likely to do their
very best on the defensive, and for the same reason: the frontier had become
their home and it was where their families were.
Centurions expert in dealing with the locals across the border would also
remain in place, and so would the psychological presence of the legion as a
deterrent, which would most likely diminish less than proportionally with the
departure of vexillationes of moderate size. Further, with the development of
the empire’s civil and military infrastructures of roads and supply depots, the
support and logistic elements of the legions had become redundant for expedi­
tionary purposes: local support elements and base infrastructures already in
the combat zone could no doubt be stretched to accommodate vexillationes
consisting only of legionary combat echelons, that is, the cohorts. This would
also alleviate the transportation problem.
Finally, there was the element o f troop selection. Unless extruded by their
home units, rather than picked by detachment commanders, the men of the
vexillationes were liable to be younger and fitter than the average legionary.
They were also likely to be unattached— as suitable for mobile and offensive
warfare as the older family men left behind would be resilient on the defensive.

( Conclusion
li <.lunot be pretended that expeditionary units extracted from an army which
1 m <ry where deployed in static frontier positions could have as much of a
■ "wli a edge as the strategically mobile armies of the early principate. A strut
"I'inm/ed for preclusive defense— even though by no means a cordon
.......... 11 mid not enjoy the very high ratio of net disposable military power
"hi 1 w siem of hegemonic control and mobile armies. W hile undci
!" - I..... ms could be deployed to Judea in 66 with no apparent strain on
 From the Flavians to the Severi H5

i he system, Trajan’s army was obviously stretched nearly to the breaking point
by 1 16, and that of Marcus Aurelius even more so by 166.
Ultimately, the decreased elasticity o f the system had to be compensated
lor by the recruitment of two new legions (II and III Italica).-’36 The margin
upon which the safety o f the system depended had become dangerously
thin.
< 11 \ P I K K T H R E E

D efense-in-D epth
T he Great Crisis of the Third Century
and the New Strategies

The outstanding virtue of the principate, the constitutional device invented by Augus­
tus, -was its reconciliation of republican forms and traditions with autocratic efficiency.
Its outstanding defect was that the succession was dynastic, but without any mechanism
to secure it as such, or to replace an unfit dynast. When a tolerable emperor chose a
capable successor and made him a son by adoption, all was well. Adoption satisfied the
dynastic sentiments of the army and the common people without offending the anti-
dynastic prejudice of the Senate. But i f there were no adequate son and none were
adopted, he became emperor who could make himself emperor; usually by force.
During the fortunate second century, Trajan (r. 9 8 -117 ) was adopted by Nervu
and himself adopted Hadrian, who lived till the year 138. Hadrian, in turn, adopted
Antoninus Pius (r. 138-61), who adopted two sons: Lucius Verus, who died in 169, and
Marcus Aurelius, who ruled the empire until 180. Then the chain of successful adoptions
was fatally broken.
Marcus Aurelius did not adopt a son, for one was born to him, Commodus, wholly
unfit for the office he inherited. Commodus was murdered in 192. Three months later,
his successor by proclamation, the elderly Pertinax, was murdered also. The Praetorian
Guards, as the strongest military force actually in Rome, was the immediate arbiter of
the succession, and they chose to sell the office. The buyer, Didius Julianas, did not last
the year. Septimius Severus, legate ofPamwnia, brought the superiorforce of the Danube
frontier legions to bear by marching on Rome and claimed the throne. But if one legale
could make himself emperor, so might another. For five years Severus had tofight tie
structive interned wars: other legates with other legions contested the office, just a\
Severus himself had done.
Having defeated his rivals, Severus engaged in successful external war until hr
death on campaign at York in 2 11. His two natural sons. Caraadla and Gela, then
jointly inherited the imperial power, as Commodus had done and with equal incut
Having murdered his brother in 2 12, Curuailln was murdered in 2/7. Smrcw/tin by
murder and civil war now became the norm.
 Defense-iiJ-Depth H7

Between the natural death of Septimius Severus in 2 1 1 and the accession of Diocle­
tian in 284, there -were 24 more or less legitimate emperors and many more usurpers,
that is, rulers who could not control Rome. Most reigns were short-lived, hut some
usurpers ruled substantial parts of the empire for several years. In fact, the longest
ic/gn of the period was that of a usurper, Postunms, who controlled Gaul for nine
years. The average reign of the “legitimate” emperors was only three years. One
emperor.; Decius (r. 249-251), died in battle fighting the Goths; another, Valerian
(/. 2$3-260), was captured by the Persians and died in captivity; Claudius I I (r. 268—
■ pu) died of the plague. A ll the other emperors and most usurpers were murdered or
1 Ivy perished in civil war.
Sanguinary turmoil at the very core of the imperial system was bound to invite
aggression from without. But there is also reason to believe that the magnitude of the
asternal threat had increased independently. O11 the Rhine and upper Danube, the old
■uni f ragmented neighbors of the empire had begun federating into much larger and
nmre dangerous agglomerations during the second century, even before Rome’s domes­
tic upheavals began. Instead of the many peoples recorded in the first and second
■ anturies— Frisii, Bructeri, Tencteri, Usipi, Chatti, Hermunduri, and so on— the
• injure now confronted the larger federations of the Franks and the Alamanni, who
•atild concentrate much more manpower in attacking the frontiers. Having for so long
•anf routed a single adversary whose culture had infiltrated all their separate lives, dif-
jerent barbarian groupsfound a common basisfor action against the empire. It became
"inch harder for Roman diplomacy to contrive divisions among men who now had
"inch in common.
In the East, the weak Arsacid regime of Parthia was overthrown circa 224 by the
rsiau dynasty of the Sassanids, and the new enemy immediately proved to be alto-
i;i iher more formidable than the old. For the empire this change had catastrophic
•'usequences,for its entire strategy of containment was thereby unbalanced. Septimius
'•everus had fought Parthia more successfully than any Roman before him, and his
a 1 \.f had been consolidated by the establishment of a “scientific” frontier in northern
' Ic'iijuitamia, on the Khabur River-Jebel Sinjar line. But this did not suffice to con-
■■ mi the Persian attack of a generation later.
I huuestic strife and foreign aggression were not merely parallel; they interacted
■•' versely with one another. It was fortunate for Rome that the territorialization of
■ - army (which most modern historians like to deplore) was already fa r advanced: it
■ ■ mi have acted as a brake on eager pretenders, for soldiers were less likely to be enticed
■ leaving the jnaitici s I n jiofil internal wars if their own families and /bar own
■ nd 1 w o u ld the I ch\ h , 1 />,»,,/ to ja ie ie u invaders A c v c r t l 'e / a s tn m jn w ere a l l ton
I |S Ih I < T/,///,/ '»//,//1 r 1 !'/ //-! tVun.tn t m j'n ,

Im/iii'iifly rrttmvil from frnutnTS it/rcitily /tinier at tack to /gbl in />/•/. v//r v// \ Ac
tween emperors and usurpers. There veils also a more subtle connection between evict
mil attack and domestic instability: regional usurpations were in part a reaction to the
failure of the central government to provide security for the border regions.
This interaction between internal disorder and foreign invasion had disastrous
results: the history of the third century is largely a history of invasions, many made
possible by domestic strife, and some so deep that Rome itself had to be provided with
walls. Much that had been built and achieved since Augustus was irreparably destroyed.
Destroyed as well was an entire conception of empire.
Much of the time, the emperor of the hour had to devote his attention to the threat
from within even when attacks were under way from without: it was more important
to protect the office than to ensure the tranquility of remote frontiers. Sometimes
external security was sacrificed directlyfor internal: Philip the Arab (r. 244-249) abau
dotted the Persian campaign of his predecessor and victim, Gordian III (r. 238- 244),
and sought a prompt and unfavorable peace treaty in order to return to Rome to claim
the imperial power before another could do so in his place.
That the ideal of a unitary empire was still dominant, that a form of cultural pa
triotism had become prevalent, and that an anxious longing for order remained uni
versal, are all proven by the rapid success of Diocletian's efforts to restore the political
stability and territorial security of the empire. Diocletian (r. 284-qoy) rose from
peasant to emperor through the ranks of the army, but he was neither a peasant nor a
simple-minded soldier by the time he attained the purple. Schooled in the chaos and
insecurity of half a century, Diocletian relentlessly pursued a policy of internal regt
mentation and systematicfrontier consolidation— the one exemplified by his celebrated
edict on prices, the other by stout forts built all around the imperial perimeter.
Although he was the benefeiary of a "wholly unregulated system of succession, Dio
cletian invented, or at least applied, a scheme of great constitutional ingenuity that
was to abolish the danger of civil war. The tetrarchy, the joint rule of four, was to
produce f uture r ulers for the empire with the assured regularity of a machine. There
were to be two equal co-emperors, an Augustus fo r the West and one fo r the East, and
in 286 Diocletian made Maximum the Augustus for the West, himself retaining the
East. Then came a refinement: each Augustus would have a junior emperor; -with the
title of Caesar, in 293 Diocletian tnade Galerius his own Caesar and chose Constan­
tins I Chlorus to be Maximian's. Each Caesar would marry the daughter of his A u ­
gustus, and eventually succeed him, then choosing a Caesar in turn as his own junior
associate. The four rulers, the tetrarchs, could campaign simultaneously in as many
sectors, and no vast areas of the empire would ever again be left unattended to breed
 amqTuop j j l l Aq pa^jaAuoj]
/ )i 'In i sc- in - 1Depth 14 9

/mi/ins. Iii ;»•, / )nu leu,in (,/nil Maxnuian, his fellow Augustus) abdicated, and he
• in cl iii n splendid jailncc in Dahnntid, the only emperor ever to retire voluntarily.
/•i ;i><j the machine of the tetrarchy had already broken down. No predictable and
. ihmmtic succession ensued, for six Augusta disputed the title. Nevertheless, the iiisti-
'di/iui oj dual control endured until the very end of the western empire, and the chaotic
■i111 ision struggles of the third century did not recur.
I magnificent palace falling into ruin, the empire was restored under the tetrur-
• I'M but it was restored as a solid and austere fortress. The agency of this transformation
■n a perfected system of taxation in kind, which ruthlessly extracted the food, fodder,
ic ih in g , arms, and money needed for imperial defense from an empire that had be-
'me one vast logistic base. In the military realm, the reforms of the tetrarchy marked
i c uical stage in the secular transformation of the assured territorial defense of the
• mud century into the defense-in-depth of the late declining empire. The age of the
- in/rchy was a time of grim and painful innovation, presided over by a man whose
ma/itics even the most hostile sources cannot fully obscure. In the stern rule of Diocle­
tian lay the key to a difficult salvation for the empire and its civilization, while in the
a ciningly happier age of Constantine were the beginnings of the final disaster.

The System in Outline

I .iced with an enemy sufficiently mobile and sufficiently strong to pierce a
d( tensive perimeter on any selected vector of penetration, the defense has, in
principle, two alternatives: the first, usually described as an “elastic defense,”
nukes no attempt to defend the original frontal perimeter with its fortifica-
i nms and associated infrastructures, if any. Instead, the defense relies exclusively
mi mobile forces, which must be at least as mobile as those of the enemy. The
mo sides then fight on an equal footing: the defense can be as concentrated as
die offense, because it need not assign troops to hold any fixed positions, nor
detach forces to protect towns, cities, or specific sectors. On the other hand,
die defense thereby sacrifices all the tactical advantages of being on the
delcnsive— except its presumably better knowledge of the terrain1— because
neither side can choose its ground, let alone fortify it in advance. As a strategy,
hi elastic defense is normally a last resort, the result of being unable to defend
die perimeter as it was before. Indeed the very term is euphemistic: as one
I liolar noted, a really elastic defense is virtually no defense at all.2
The second operational method is a defense-in-depth, based on some coin-
in nation of self-contained strongholds with mobile forces deployed between,
diead, or behind them. Under this method, which has many variants both
 / hi ( , ! , ! n, l ''{/ ,ih r | of //'( i\orti.in / ////'//,

ancient and model'll, warlarc is no longer a s\ nill HI 111 a I mules! Iielueen

structurally similar forces. While 1 lie ollense has the advantage ol living able
to concentrate its forces against any chosen sector of the entire front, thus
maximizing its local superiority, the defense has the advantages of mutual sup
port between its self-contained strongholds and of its mobile forces in iIn­
field. I f the strongholds are sufficiently resilient to survive attack zvithoul in­
quiring the direct support of the mobile elements, if the mobile elements in
turn can resist or evade concentrated attacks in the field without needing the
shelter of the strongholds, and finally, if the offense must defeat the strong
holds one by one in order to prevail, then the conditions are present for a sue
cessful defense-in-depth, because the offense will eventually be faced by tlie-
superior strength of the fixed and mobile elements acting in combination. Be­
fore that, indeed all along, the strongholds can resupply the mobile forces and
afford them temporary shelter if needed, while the mobile forces can gather to
counterattack the enemy forces attempting to defeat any given stronghold.
The terms used above are modern, but defense-in-depth is a strategy wit It
an ancient pedigree. Some reviewers of the first edition of this book did not
seem to be aware of this; one even noted in alarmed tones that defense-in
depth was the “ usual designation of current N A T O doctrine” and that such a
strategy “would make no sense without the possibility of rapid and massive
reinforcement from overseas, and the threat of nuclear retaliation.” 5 O f that
there was little danger in the third century C E . In any case, fortresses, their
garrisons, and cavalry forces formed defense-in-depth combinations long be
fore then, though not on the strategic scale o f the Romans.
Neither o f the two methods available to cope with strategic penetrations
that perimeter defenses can no longer reliably contain— that is, a defense-in­
depth or an elastic defense— can offer the preclusive security of a perimeter
defense, but both are more resilient. At the tactical level, the two methods lead
to very different patterns of deployment. But at the strategic level, the qualita­
tive difference between the two methods is less significant than the scale of their
application, because both can be applied across all of the defended territory or
just locally. As the scale of application increases, so does the short-term resil­
ience of the system, hut the depth o f the territory that is fought over must
increase also, with all the resulting costs to society.
Having acquired a comprehensive system of preclusive defense in the sec­
ond century, and having enjoyed the security it provided for agriculture and
for towns and cities right up to the frontier lines, and the resulting prosperity,
 Dt'/riiM- w Depth •5 '

111' K< ii ii ;ii i ivs |»in sc in i lie 111 si serious |>cnet nu ions of the imperial perimeter,
lut Ii look place under Marcus .Aurelius (ca. j 6 6 ), was naturally localized, in-
■ n■ menial, and remedial rather than systemic. Instead of adopting either an
■ I i an defense or a defense-in-depth, border fortifications were strengthened
mil garrisons were augmented on the most vulnerable tracts of the perimeter.
In addition, two new legions, II Italica and III Italica, wrere raised and de-
I ' l o t v d in Noricum and Raetia, respectively, w'hich till then wrere provinces
nilgai risoned by legions.4 The perimeter defense strategy was not abandoned
■ o n when the first nucleus of a central strategic reserve was formed a genera-
1 Km later, under Septimius Severus. Instead, further attempts were made to
0 11indy local inadequacies in frontier defenses hy constructing additional for-
nlieaiions and augmenting garrisons.
It was only after the chaotic breakdown of imperial defenses in the great
■ i ims of the mid-third century that a new strategy began to emerge, in a pro-
■ n-.s that remained incremental, subtle in places, and unheralded in any case.
1 Not finding explicit documentation, and perhaps unaware of its absence in
| "iitcmporary conditions also— for what is documented is not intended, and
' ice versa— one scholar simply denied that there was any change in strategy.)1
W lien and where frontier defenses were totally overrun, remedial strategies
i «mid only take the form of an elastic defense, but to the extent that deliberate
i Imices were still possible, the strategy that emerged had the character of a
-Ii lense-in-depth based on a combination o f static frontier forces and mobile
in Id armies.
I he adoption of a defense-in-depth strategy in the later third century was
uni, however, either total or definitive. Indeed, whenever that strategy showed
'tens of enduring success, it was promptly abandoned. In other words, when Roman
u inies did succeed in forcing the enemy to revert to the defensive, every at-
ii nipt was made to restore the former perimeter of preclusive security in the
vetor in question. Or better yet, if Roman armies could induce rebellious
neighbors to revert to client status, there was a prompt reversion to the hege-
iminic mode. That striving to progress from emergency responses to the re-
i 'institution of stable frontier defenses wms the essence of Diocletian’s military
I»>1 icy at the end of the third century and that of the more fortunate of his
■.accessors until Valentinian I, under wrhom the last sustained attempt to as-
.11 rc a preclusive defense of the imperial territory was made.
This pattern o f attempted reversions to earlier and better times on the Ro­
man frontier was seemingly overlooked by some critics of the first edition’s
i, ' / / ’( ( i / . / / / . / ' * / / . / / 1 1 ’ ) of // ’i A’i'///,/// / ///!>i/ 1

dcsci l|)l ion (>i defense m deplh ;is .1 si 1.11il ; \ I 1u \ assn ted lli.il the Ivnliuns
ot the third and fourth cr-ntulies never adopted a purelv defensive siraiegy
and never abandoned hegemonic ambitions or methods, both things are in
deed true, yet happier intervals of reversion were not more than that, and 11
was the principal strategy of defense-in-depth that ensured the empire’s stir
vival, even if its peripheries were afflicted by infiltrations and penetrations that
could not be precluded and had to be intercepted and destroyed, or at least
driven back to prevent further damage.
Long-term reliance on the defense-in-depth strategy entailed the mainte
nance of a stable equilibrium between the incursions of the enemy and the even
tual imperial counteroffensives. Incursions would inevitably take place and,
unless very feeble, could no longer be prevented by interception on the frontier
line itself, for its garrisons were thinned out. M eeting only static guardposls
and weak patrol forces on the frontier, the enemy could frequently cross the
line virtually unopposed, but in the context of defense-in-depth, this no longer
meant that the defense system had been pierced, “ turned,” or overrun. Instead,
the enemy would find itself in a peripheral combat zone of varying depth,
within which strongholds large and small as well as walled cities, fortified farm­
houses, fortified granaries, and fortified refuges would remain, each capable of
some sustained period of resistance, at least against enemies unequipped with
siege machines. W ithin and beyond this zone, enemies would encounter the
mobile forces of the defense, deployed to fight in the open but with the support
of the fortified places, as with the cities on the Near Eastern frontier.
Such support could take several distinct forms.7 First, as mentioned above,
the fortified islands could serve as supply depots. Under the later empire, the
most important remaining advantage of Roman forces over their enemies was
their vast logistic superiority: Roman victories were frequently the outcome of
fights between well-fed Roman troops and starving invaders who had failed to
find undefended food stores in the areas they had overrun.8Tacitus {Germania,
33) remarked that the Chatti were exceptional among the Germans, and more
dangerous, because they went to war supplied with provisions.
Food and fodder stores in fortified strongholds were at once denied to the
enemy and readily available to the forces of the defense, when the latter ad­
vanced to recover territory temporarily overrun. The location of frontier-line
lood storehouses was ideal from a logistic point of view, because resupply was
available where it was needed most, at the troops’ destination. Cavalry troops
u nli good horses in good health can move across country as fast as 50 miles
 I >i ft'i/w m Dcjith ■53

i ■ L i lcii iii'ic i s) pci i l;i\, Inn in 11< inn (if t hi ns port available to the Romans could
I i . p up with them. .Mules, horses, anti camels can, of course, move as fast or
I i n r (ban men, but the logistic load was heavy, and economical supply would

M a M m m B ia g r m iiii,n .iu i
i. 1111ire the use of carts pulled by oxen. It has been calculated that a legion at
lull establishment needed 170 metric tons o f wheat per month, and a quinge-
11.11 v iila needed just under 53 tons of barley for its horses.9 Even in the case of
ml.miry marching on good roads, terminal resupply would be vastly superior
in baseline supply, because men could march at 3 miles per hour (5 kph) on
human roads, but heavy carts pulled by oxen are much slower and cannot
n Ineve more than a bit over 1 mph (1.5 kph). Oxen can pull heavyweights and
in drag carts through muddy passages, but they do need 16 hours to eat, rest,
mil digest, leaving only 8 productive hours in 24.
\ second function of fortified positions is tactical. Fixed defenses on the
IIuntier could usefully serve as obstacles even where the perimeter as a whole
ii. is not manned in sufficient strength to deny passage absolutely, since an
I iirmy bypassing, rather than attacking, a fortified stronghold ran the risk that
dm Romans would sally out and attack them from the rear once the enemy had
chanced farther into Roman territory. Under the later empire, both old-style
bases rebuilt as hard fortifications for sustained resistance and entirely new
Im ts served to deny passage at accessible river crossings and preferred moun­
tain passes. In a rational scheme of selective fortification in depth, the goal is
III equalize the barrier effects of terrain across the sector as a whole, by denying
IIce use of the easier passage points. This was the rationale of the river forts
along the Rhine and Danube under the later empire.
A third function of self-contained fortifications in a scheme of defense-in-
depth is to provide rear-area security and rear-area intelligence. Imperial
I<trees had to move as quickly as possible to achieve the rapid concentration of
lurces required by the new strategy, so they could not afford to interdict their
nu n communications in order to slow enemy incursions.10 Road forts were
built at intervals along the highways to secure safe passage for gathering con-
1 entrations of imperial troops and their supply trains, as wrell as for civilian traf­
fic, while denying unimpeded use of the roads to enemy bands. It is true that
1 hey were not horizontal to the frontiers, as some early critics kept stressing.11
I hey were not frontier forts therefore, but they were still very much part of
1 lie frontier system; that they could also serve against banditry and internal
unrest does not mean that they were built solely for internal security (as
claimed by those who see the entire limes phenomenon as a retroactive
 < »> '>//,//< r )
f
* >i I I't ,m ,l ,<l I h i I in j> i

construct llr.ll im putes .1 false iniprli.il ilrlrn sr s lijlrto r I a I li ill :| l r lor «li.il
w e r e — a c c o rd in g to th e m n o t h i n g m o r e l i m n lor;ili/.ril m e a s u r e s in r e p ir s'.

subjected populations).
Road forts manned by small detachments could not effectively oppose the
passage of large enemy forces, but they could at least intercept stray groups
and foraging parties or impose time-consuming detours. And delay was the
object, in anticipation of the relief columns that would be on their way to help
sectors under attack. During the third-century invasions, prior to the con
struction of road forts, quite small barbarian bands had been able to penetrate
rapidly into the interior, sometimes for hundreds of miles, using the highwavs
built precisely to facilitate movements within the empire.
A fourth function o f self-contained strongholds was only of importance
when effective mobile troops remained in their garrisons. Such troops could
sally7out to attack an invading enemy7 on the flanks or from the rear, and then
return to the safety of their walls once the enemy responded in strength. Such
hit-and-run attacks not only would wear down enemy forces, but also would
induce their leaders to keep their men together in larger-than-preferred force
concentrations for safety’s sake, instead of the dispersal that was better lor
looting and disruption. This benefit could be critical, because the principal
tactical problem facing the mobile field forces of the Romans was coming to
grips writh elusive and dispersed invasion forces.
A fifth function of self-contained strongholds was to conserve the strength
of mobile forces under stress bv offering them temporary refuge. Under a pure
elastic defense strategy, overwhelmed defensive forces faced a stark choice:
escape or destruction. But with strongholds available, outnumbered or defeated
contingents did not have to disperse in flight or face destruction, and could
instead find shelter to rest, reconstitute, and prepare to return to the fight.
For the empire it was always essential to conserve the scarce supply of trained
military7 manpower, and the strongholds did so doubly: by maximizing tin-
defensive strength of garrisons within their walls and by7 offering temporary
shelter for mobile forces that would otherwise have been destroyed or driven
from the field. These strongholds did have a potential drawback: stout walls
and high ramparts could eventually erode the offensive spirit of the troops
they contained by7increasing the difference between the dangers of open com
bat and the safety offered by the stronghold. But that universal and eternal
problem had a universal and eternal solution in the constant tactical exercises
of Roman units (not just parade ground drills), which are so well attested in

i
 / V / r i e a w I )i’plh >5 S

' In Mum <■j>i;• i.ij>1111 .is ui ll iis narrative. In sum, “ Magi not Line syndromes”
in avoidable: less n a me d troops that do succumb are even more likely to be
li n o i Irnm the field il they luck fortifications.
I li.ne assumed throughout that fortified strongholds would normally be ca­
l’ ilile ol sustained resistance against direct attack, given proper manning and
Ia m isioning. This was not the case with the Roman forts of the first and sec-
"iid centuries, however. The legionary “ fortresses” and auxiliary “ forts” were
i In n n o more than residential complexes, with none of the features of fortified
i mugholds. They had stone walls, but they were there to separate physically
Hid psychologically the military installations from the often untidy civilian
fill- ihat grew around them with its huts, booths, and market stands; to convey
i i ( assuring message of enduring solidity; and to keep out petty thieves. They
hi ic not real fortifications.12 This was entirely consistent with their opera-
i a uial role, which was to serve as bases for tactically offensive operations, albeit
wa bin the framework o f a strategy of territorial defense.
With their spacious grounds protected only by thin, low walls, and their
narrow perimeter ditches designed to do no more than keep out infiltrators (or
a most to break the impetus of a sudden onslaught), these fortresses and forts
un c incapable o f withstanding determined attacks. Even the most primitive
■ nrmies could contrive simple battering rams to breach thin walls.12 The le-
"i"nary fortress of Eburacum (York), for example, built circa 107-108 C E
under Trajan and rebuilt under Septimius Severus, had walls only 18 feet high
and only some 3 feet wide.14 The walls of later, post-third century fortifica-
111 ms by contrast, were generally 10 feet thick.1'
T or were the troop bases on the frontiers well situated for tactical defense;
II icv were not on high ground to better hold out against the enemy but instead
.i t astride lines of communications, lor logistic and residential convenience.
Moreover, wall circuits were long in proportion to garrison strengths, because
ol spacious internal layouts and the prderred perimeter shapes (typically rect­
angles, instead of minimum-perimeter circular or oval circuits).16 Further, the
walls commonly lacked topside fighting positions, ram parts, and projecting
lowers, from which intervening wall segments could be Lcpt under enfilading
Inc. And if there were towers, they were commonly den hat ive, that is nonpro-
teeting, as in the Trajanic fortress at Eburacum, where lowers ;u square leet at
1 lie base projected only 2 feet from the circuit.1
Finally, the wall circuits of first- and second-century bases l.u Led w ide berms
and ditches (to keep siege machines at a distance), solid suhlloors (to dcleat
l,(. l hi ' , 1,1 ii.I i.it , ,■ i ,./ //■ , A’, m/. n: I nil’ll ,

ill Im iil; .111f 1111 >Is), d e l c i i s i h l e y.Hcs, .mil s.i 1Iv pc ii Is. All <>1 I l i e s e dc\ ices Iici Mini1
c ommon In Roman Ion i lical ions I m m ihc t hu d ccnlui \ onward, uwi.ilh line

grated in set designs that would remain models ol military arch ileel m e lor lull
a millennium and more.
It is sometimes suggested that this transformation of Roman military eon
struction was prompted by a hypothesized (and sudden) improvement in the
siege technology of the Goths, which came about because of the capture ol
Greek cities in Greece and Asia Minor, But those cities had been at peace lot
centuries, and there is no reason to believe that they contained siege equip
ment or men trained in siege warfare.18 Technology is not an independent van
able but rather a reflection of the cultural and economic base of a society— and
barbarian society had not changed significantly. It is true that there are relcr
ences to the use of “engines” by the Goths at the third siege of Philippopolis
(in Macedonia) in 267 and at the siege of Side (in Lycia) in 269, but it is un
likely that those machines were anything more elaborate than simple battering
rams or scaling towers.19 In fact, the evidence indicates that the improvement
in barbarian siege technology between the first century and the sixth was mar
ginal.20 (Sassanid-Persian siege technology was much more advanced.)
W hile technical (new machines) or tactical explanations for the revolu
tion in Roman military architecture are implausible, there is a straightforward
strategic explanation, inherent in any strategy of defense-in-depth. Roman
bases were rebuilt as fortified strongholds not because the barbarians had learned
how to breach simple walls—which they must always have been capable ol
doing— but because the enemy had not acquired significant siege capabilities.
Unless the strongholds could resist close investment and sieges, the defense-in
depth would quickly collapse into an elastic defense of the worst kind. On the
other hand, facing barbarians unequipped to breach serious defenses adequately
manned, and incapable of starving out the well-fed defenders, the strongholds
could resist while relief was on the way, while performing their several support­
ing functions.21
T he general character of any defense-in-depth strategy is rearward defense,
as opposed to the forward defense of the earlier Roman strategy. Any concept
of defense requires the enemy to be intercepted, but while forward defense
demands that he be intercepted in advance of the frontier so that peaceful life
can continue unmolested behind it, rearward defense can only provide for his
eventual interception inside imperial territory, his ravages being meanwhile
contained only by the point defenses of forts, towns, cities, and even individual
 auiqTuo^jjTTAqpsjJSAUQgl
I )til a isc-1 n-I )eptb 157

I umliiiiM s. I lu- earlier syst em ni preclusive security had been obviously su-
I■>11111 ni ns licnetiis lo society, but it was impossibly costly to maintain against
■ ih inn s that bad become capable of concentrating overwhelming forces on
111 \ narrow segment of the frontier.
I n perfect accordance with the paradoxical logic of strategy, it was the very
in c e s s of the earlier strategy in keeping out the barbarians over long stretches
"l frontier that had stabilized neighboring clans and tribes, inducing them to
■ 1 >1111line in ever-stronger gatherings, which long and thin perimeter defenses
' "ii Id no longer keep out. Moreover, the system had not been resilient, because
II u i c was nothing behind the linear defense of the frontier. A defense-in-depth,
m contrast, could survive even serious and prolonged penetrations without
■ i >1lapsing. And this resilience added to the flexibility of imperial strategy as a
"hole: in the presence of multiple threats on different sectors, field armies
'' mid be redeployed from one to the next to fight different enemies seriatim, for
no irreparable damage would be suffered in the meantime.
Hut the new strategy offered much more security via resilience for the cen-
n.d authorities of the empire, rather than for the provincial elites that were
I-iced with incursions and penetrations— and this disparity would eventually
have grave political consequences. The nexus between the multiple invasions
' >1 1 he third century and the succession of would-be usurpers in Britain, Gaul,
I gypt, and North Africa was quite direct. Provincial security had been sacrificed
11' better assure the survival of the empire as a whole, and the provincials could
be excused for their failure to applaud the sound logic of the new system.
The equilibrium of a successful defense-in-depth strategy could not last
l"iig. There was a built-in tendency for a successful defense-in-depth to give
way to a temporary restoration of the earlier strategy of forward defense. And
II ihe strategy proved unsuccessful, it would degenerate into an elastic defense.
I lie goal of a successful defense-in-depth, ensuring the ultimate possession of
imperial territory, was upgraded to the Antonine goal o f preclusive protection
lur all imperial territory against threats at all levels of intensity. T he goal of an
unsuccessful defense-in-depth was of necessity downgraded to the minimum
1 il ensuring the survival of the mobile forces in the field, which were frequently
beaded by the emperor himself. Sometimes, for all the tactical flexibility of an
1-fistic defense (in wTich safety could always be sought in retreat), imperial
imiies could not even ensure that minimum goal: thus we find the emperor
I )ecius killed by the Goths in 251 while campaigning in the modern Dobruja;
Valerian captured in 260 by the Sassanid ruler of Persia, Shapur l, before the
 im ,■/ / / ' i l m j'ii.

walls i>l 1’ ilrss.i; .mil, in I h r j;rnu'si dcleai oi all, \ a lens killed with the dele.it
of his field a r my by the Visigoths at AdrianopJe in the great disaster of yjX.
Kven when there was neither a complete reversion to a preclusive defense
nor a decline into a deep elastic defense, the dynamics of the strategy were
inherently unstable, primarily because the defended area that became a com
bat zone was simultaneously part of the empire-wide logistic base. The Romans
did not face a single enemy, or even a fixed group of enemies, whose ultimate
defeat would ensure permanent security. Regardless of the magnitude of Roman
victories, the frontiers of the empire would always remain under attack, because
they lay in the path of secular migration flow's from north to south and from
east to west. Hence Roman strategy could not usefully aim for total victory at
any cost, for the threat was not temporary, but endless. The only feasible and
rational goal at any point in time was the maintenance of a minimally adequate
level of security at the lowest cost to society.
Under a successful strategy of preclusive defense, the total expense of impe­
rial security consisted of money spent on troop maintenance and the hidden
costs of compulsory purchase and compulsory service. A defense-in-depth
strategy, on the other hand, inflicted additional costs on society, w’hich were
paid by the population directly and not through the medium o f the tax col­
lector or recruiting sergeant— that is, the losses inflicted by enemy incur­
sions. In the short run, those societal costs had no direct impact on the army,
which would be fighting with men already in the ranks, fed by food already
harvested. In the long run, on the other hand, the level o f damage (or, more
precisely, the level of the damage that was cumulative rather than just tempo­
rary) would determine popular and elite attitudes toward the very idea of a
unitary empire, it would decisively affect the morale of autochthonous troops,
and it would ultimately determine the value of the imperial structure to its
inhabitants. (And of course the degree to which the costs of enemy incursions
and invasions wrere cumulative rather than just temporary also depended—
perhaps greatly— on the quality of governance in each place, in each time
period.) In the medium term, say the span o f two or three years, the longest
likely to be relevant to the imperial leadership, there was a direct relationship
between the logistic support available to the army (and therefore its capabili-
t u s) and the geographic depth o f the defense-in-depth combat zones.
11 the peripheral zone that became a war zone in a sequence of enemy incur-
■iciis and successful counteroffensives was kept thin, the damage inflicted to
■ Ik .mny’s logistic base W'ould be correspondingly limited. But this zone could
 Defense-in-Depth J59

'inly remain thin if the reaction of the defenders was prompt, and speed in re­
action conflicted with the need for time in which to assemble the strongest
possible force for the counteroffensive. Conversely, the greater the degree of
i mop concentration— other things being equal— the longer the time needed
i" deploy forces prior to interception, and the deeper the enemy penetration.
1 here was, in other words, a proportional relationship between the resilience
"I the system and the degree of damage sustained by the empire’s logistic base
Itetore the enemy was repelled. It was this conflict of priorities between the soci-
cial and logistic costs o f delayed interception, on the one hand, and the combat
.chantage of the greatest feasible preliminary concentration offerees, on the
"t her, that generated the cyclical nature of imperial strategy.
If successful in the first instance in reacting to attacks, imperial armies
would suppress major threats and then go on to defeat successive incursions
v ith shorter and shorter interception delays. At each stage, the damage done to
i lie logistic base by each incursion would be less and less, and the imperial armies
supported by the affected areas would be gradually strengthened. This in turn
would tend to ensure, other things being equal, that the interception delays
would he shorter still— and so on, in a virtuous circle.
On the other hand, if the imperial armies were not successful in the first
instance, incursions would become deeper and deeper, the damage done to the
logistic base would be greater and greater, and the imperial forces supported
In the sector in question would be correspondingly weakened. The mobile
im ces gathered to drive out the enemy would then have to come from farther
mil farther afield, thus delaying interception to a greater and greater extent,
■ m respondingly increasing the damage inflicted on the logistic base— and so
■ in, in a vicious circle.
Mile leaders and good fortune in battle could and did reverse the downward
' tele of a deteriorating defense-in-depth time and again. In the West there were
>i end major reversals of fortune to good effect from the third century to the
l ne fourth century, each time culminating in a temporary return to a preclu-
m e border defense. In the eastern half of the empire, even the great crisis of
die fifth century precipitated by the extraordinary threat of Attila’s Huns was
neeessfully overcome,22 as were many crises thereafter. But the downward
■ vi le that began in the West after the reign of Valentinian ($64-375) 'V;ls onh'
I ■ 11 1 i a l l v a m i b l i e l l \ r e v e r s e d t h e r e a f t e r . F o l l o w i n g th e d eal h of T h e o d o s i u s I

on i O s f t h e e \ v i e b e e a m e 11 1 e w r s i b l e . . W u e l i o f t h e w e s t e n i e m p i i e I l i e n h e i . l i n e

die seelie ol eombal In I w 1 on Ion 11,11 i . m .11 l i n e s I ii.it 1 av ared 1 '

 T I F F Com bine
o i
--------12
{-------1 3I.-------41--------1
- 5
DEFENSE FORCE MILES
a v a l r V ) E A S E D
■ IN T E R IO R

Figure j . i . Operational Methods of Border Defense: Elastic Defense

 sm quioj j j l j A q pa;jaAU0 3 |
Figure 3.2. Operational Methods of Border Defense: Defense-in-Depth
Figure 3.3. Operational Methods of Border Defense: Forward Defense
 I hi < t > , / i / J K' t i , / h i'i nflh, l\<>/n,inl nifn i i

ol eil her ;in i neTea singly si in(low \ imperial am h<nil \ , <ir simply I lien i nvn. I lie
goal of a defense-in-depth strategy— that is, tile ultimate restoration ol lull
territorial security— had deteriorated into the goal of maintaining an elastn
defense, which became increasingly elastic and was only of value to the imlividu
als thereby protected and made powerful. The losses of logistic base areas now
acquired a permanent character, because imperial authority was devolving to
warrior nations that no longer raided, but rather occupied, what had once been
part o f the empire.

T he Changing Threat
The Antonine system o f preclusive security had always been vulnerable to
simultaneous attacks from different directions. M ost notably, the Parthian
invasion of Armenia in 162 initiated a whole series of conflicts that were to
last, with short intervals, until the death of Marcus Aurelius in t8o.2’ The
threat on the Danubian and (to a lesser extent) the Rhine sectors was permanent.
The Parthian threat, on the other hand, was sporadic: Rome’s eastern wars were
fought with an organized state, and thus had a beginning and an end. Parthia
and Rome remained strategic adversaries, but there was no warfare between
them from 117 to 162.
When the eastern front became active in 162, vexillationes drawn from the
legions, auxiliaries, and even complete legions were sent east, and the European
frontiers were correspondingly weakened. It appears that even earlier there
had been incursions by the Chatti against the Taunus limes, resulting in the
attested destruction of frontier forts (e.g., Altenstadt).24 At the same time, trou­
ble was expected on the Danubian frontiers.2’ The Romans constantly watched
the barbarians, but the barbarians also watched the Romans: with the frontier
garrisons visibly depleted, they naturally saw new opportunities for profitable
raiding.
By 166 the armies of Marcus Aurelius had repeated Trajan’s feat: they had
defeated the Parthians, taken Ctesiphon, and overrun the intervening lands,
but no new frontier was established.26 Victory in the east was followed by incon­
clusive war in the west. As the expeditionary forces were returning from the
east, bringing a devastating plague with them, Quadi, Marcomanni, and
(Sarmatian) Iazyges crossed the Danube over lengthy tracts, evaded or de­
feated the badly outnumbered frontier garrisons, and advanced in bands large
and small deep into the empire.2. In the foreover dubious yet too often indis­
pensable Scriptures Historiae Augustae, it was a barbarian “conspiracy” {Vita
 I Kjfllt,' III I >t jul' 167

M.11,1, : -M: “ i>i7//o tiHnirs til' Illyria li/itii,- mt/iic in CmIlium amspiraverant"), but
■ \ ( 11 \\ 11 hum ;mv coordination, 1 lie opportunity offered by the absence of Roman
l' >1 it s , and then bv their return badly diminished by plague, must have been
n m i l l a n e o u s l v v i s i b l e tea a l l .

In spile of a severe fiscal crisis and in spite of the chronic shortage of man-
IHiu er aggravated by plague, two new legions, the II and III Italica, were raised,
1 ui a 1650s By 167 Quadi and Marcomanni were at Aquileia, the northeastern
I'.new av to Italy.:v It w'as the empire’s gravest military crisis since the inception
1 >1 1 he principate.30 Desperate expedients were employed to find recruits, start-
nig with the enrollment of freedmen and even slaves. In addition, strong forces
■ il auxiliaries as well as vexillationes detached from the frontier legions (of much
mi leased importance in the total force mix) were deployed as field forces to
I 1 a 1liter the new threat.31
With an undefended interior, enemy penetrations could and did reach far
uul wide, but the threat was not normally especially intense. T he damage in­
dicted bv fleeting barbarian incursions was in most places superficial, because
hungry invaders would not long persist in trying to breach closed wall circuits;
II was readily available food and loot that they were seeking. Aquileia, though
devoid of troops and without a proper wall circuit, was hurriedly provided with
improvised defenses, and it did not fall. T he Quadi and Marcomanni were not
equipped or organized for siege operations; their attack was only a large-scale
1 aid, and it seems unlikely that their aim was conquest rather than booty.
Because the raiders could not seriously damage the empire’s logistic base,
Home’s eventual victory was only a question of time. By 172 the Marcomanni
had been driven out of the empire, and a peace was imposed on them; two
\ cars later the Quadi were suppressed, and in 175 it was the turn of the Sarma-
1 ians.3: W hen the Quadi and Marcomanni renewed hostilities in 177, the out­
come was a great Roman victory on the Danube in 179.’3 Marcus Aurelius may
well have planned a trans-Danubian operation to conquer the homeland of the
Marcomanni, and much else besides, but this project, if still envisaged by then,
was abandoned by his son Commodus upon the emperor’s death in 180.
It is impossible to quantify in any way, however approximative, the magni-
i ndc: of the endemic threat on the Danube that became manifest after 166. In
1 he fragmentary sources describing the period, there is, for example, a reference
10 6,000 Langobardi and Obii who broke into Pannonia, having breached the
Danubian limes.34 A legion with its auxiliaries could easily defeat such a force,
11 only the enemy could be located and constrained to battle. But the significance
 I -V/v/ngy of the Roman Empire

■I ili. 11111111h■r is unclear: was 6,000 a large number, the survivors of a larger
mi .r.iiui, or an average invading force?
fortunately, there is no need to quantify the change in order to establish
1 hat the overall threat faced by the empire during and after the third century
was much greater than that of the two preceding centuries. T he narrative
sources provide enough evidence to show that the Goths, whose westward at­
tacks had reached Tyras on the Dniester by 238 and who crossed the Danube
delta four years later, were a much more formidable enemy than the Carpi and
Sarmatians, who had been until then the major enemies in lower Moesia.55 Simi­
larly, the tribal confederation known as the Alamanni, whose attacks forced
the evacuation of the Antonine limes beyond the Rhine and Danube by 260,50
and the confederation known as the Franks on the lower Rhine, who broke
through the frontier en masse following the collapse of the Gallic empire in
275,’ ' were clearly more menacing than their predecessors on those same
sectors. Rome also faced the new seaborne threat of Saxon raiders against
southern England and the Gallic coasts, whose depredations, based on the evi­
dence o f coin hoards, seem to have become intense over the years 268-282.54
Sea raids were not unknown in the first and second centuries, but they had
been both small and localized. The new seaborne incursions of the Franks anti
Saxons in the channel and of the Goths, Heruli, and associated peoples in the
Black Sea and the eastern ^Mediterranean were qualitatively different: from
about 253 until about 269, Goths and Heruli ravaged first the Black Sea coasts
and later the Aegean cities in a crescendo of raiding expeditions, often leaving
their boats and penetrating deep inland.59 In the process, productive lands
were devastated, and important cities were attacked, sacked, and sometimes
destroyed: Pityus in the first wave of sea raids in 253; Trapezus and other Pon­
tic cities in 254 or 255; and Chalcedon, Nicomedia, and other Bithynian cities
in 256, when the raiders sailed through the Hellespont into the Aegean.40
After almost a decade of lesser attacks in 266 and 267, the Goths, Heruli,
and their allies again raided Thrace, Macedonia, Greece, and Asia M inor in
large combined expeditions by sea, while attacks also continued on land."
Among many cities large and small, Athens, still a place of importance but like-
other cities virtually undefended, fell to Heruli sea raiders in 267. In one of tin-
famous episodes of both history and historiography, Dexippus rallied 2,01111
Athenians to fight the Heruli, but the city had already fallen;42 it was nm in
recover until the fifth century.45
 Defense-in-Depth 169

From the strategic point of view, the security problem presented by the new
seaborne threat was immense. The incremental cost to the empire o f provid­
ing a land-based defense of 3,000 miles of coastline (not counting peninsular
and insular shores) against sea raids was wholly disproportionate to the magni-
I ude and degree of persistence of the threat, which was both very sporadic and
'.cry localized. Moreover, while in the Black Sea and in the Mediterranean
naval supremacy could ensure security on land, this was not true of the open sea
north of the channel. A few thousand sea raiders could inflict more damage,
and cause more costly countermeasures to be adopted, than could twice or sev­
eral times their number on land. An entirely new coastal defense organization
bad to be created for the “ Saxon shore” in Britain and northwestern Gaul.
( \ “Coffies Litoris Saxonici per Britanniani" is found in charge of sector defenses
in the Notitia Dignitatum, that most precious late listing of Roman civil offices
and military formations.)44
Notoriously, the narrative sources give inordinately high figures for the
size of the raiding armadas and warrior armies of the Goths and their allies;
notably, in the Scriptores Historiae Augustas {Vita Claudii, 6.3-4) we find 2,000
■ ■ hips participating in the Goth expedition of 267, and 320,000 warriors ad­
vancing on land across the modern Dobruja. Naturally, modern historiogra­
phy does not accept such estimates even as very rough approximations, though
a may be surmised that the dimensions o f the threat were unusually large—
indeed the largest that faced Rome in the third century.4" Only statistics that
uc do not have could prove that the threat had become stronger, and not the
empire weaker. After all, acute political disarray is evident in the multiple and
ifironic usurpations that repeatedly disrupted the central power between the
death of Severus Alexander in 235 and the accession of Diocletian in 284. There
is also incontrovertible evidence of economic weakness and fiscal inadequacy,
bin the fundamental change in the external environment of the empire took
place in the East, and its crucial significance is unequivocal. In 224-226 the
IIan hian state of the Arsacids was overthrown by the Sassanids, who founded
1 lie new empire of Persia, destined to be a far more formidable foe for centu-
iiis in come.46
In a sense, the entire system o f preclusive defense of the second century had
been based on the implicit assumption that an essentially weak Parthia would
i' mam the nnlv major lb real in ihe Fast, for otherwise emperors could not
have loensed on l.eepmp mil mlillrators and mere marauders as opposed to
 4

Map p i. The Great Crisis of the Third Century

ЗЭШЕЯЗЭ
I I I'l' ( ,Iitllj hi / nf i h i HrnhlH I nil'll <

cut ire a ii mes. Part li la was apt to ec in test Roman i out rol ol Armenia, Init ot Iter
wise the threat it presented was only sporadic: Tra j an fought his Parthian
War, and so did Marcus Aurelius almost half a century later. Septimius Secerns
fought Parthia in 195 and again in 197—199; like his predecessors, he won.
Once Roman expeditionary forces were properly mustered out of E urope a n
garrisons and properly deployed in sufficient concentrations, the Parthians
invariably lost. Severus had, in fact, concluded his campaigns with the organi
zation of a permanent limes on the line of the Khabur River, Jebel Sinjar, and
east to the Tigris, garrisoned by his new legions, I and III Parthica.4
In addition to being sporadic, the Parthian threat had also been limited in its
geographic scope; there is no sign of an Arsacid program of conquest extending
to Syria or Cappadocia, both core areas of the empire. The strategic weakness
of the Parthian state was organic: organized as an assemblage of semiautono-
mous vassal states under Arsacid suzerainty, Parthia was inherently vulnerable
to the divisive manipulations of Roman diplomacy and incapable of fully
mobilizing the considerable military resources of the Iranian plateau and the
adjacent lands.48 All this changed with the rise of the Sassanids. First, the new
state was much more centralized than the old, having both administrative and
ideological instrumentalities o f control that the Arsacids had lacked— most
important, a state religion.49 Second, almost from the start, Sassanid expan­
sionism transcended the scope of Arsacid ambitions, which had been limited
to Armenia.
The first of the Sassanid emperors, Ardashir I, like the more vigorous of his
successors, starting with his son, Shapur I (r. 241-272), was already aiming at
the conquest of northern Mesopotamia and much else beyond.'0 Herodian
(6.2.7) reported that Ardashir, after having killed Artabanus of Parthia and
conquered his neighbors,’ 1 turned his ambition to Rome. Indeed until the final
defeat of the Sassanid power in the seventh century, the Romans frequently
had to defend Syria and any Mesopotamian territories they held from the
“ Kings of Kings of Iran and non-Iran,’” 2 as the rulers styled themselves from
Shapur I (the conqueror) onward.
A third difference between the Arsacid and Sassanid threats was tactical.
Under the Sassanids, the combined light and heavy cavalry tactics of the Arsac-
ids (threaten with the heavy, so that the light could launch its arrows into the
resulting concentration) were generally improved, but the real difference was
that the Sassanids, unlike the Arsacids, developed an adequate siege-warfare
technology.’ ’ Given the overall character of war in the East, which essentially
 I /// Depth 17;

.... m u t e d in c.n.iln T 111111 si 11 ii” and l a i c cavalry battles followed by siege

• ■ in-Miii>ns, 1 he lieu siege capabilities ol the Sassanid armies were of obvious
11111 m11 1.1 nee.
\ bare chronology suffices to illustrate the persistence of the Sassanid
ilne.u. In 230 Ardashir attacked imperial territory in northern Mesopotamia
1
1 ter an unsuccessful offensive against Armenia (then ruled by an Arsacid cli-
■ in king of the empire). Severus Alexander responded by personally taking an
nim 10 the East; he won some battles and lost more, but succeeded neverthe-
k v. m restoring the status quo ante by 233.'4 In 241 the Sassanids were much
..... .. successful, overrunning northern Mesopotamia, including both Ndsibis
uni Garrhae, and conquering territory as far west as Antioch.'0 The Romans
launched a counteroffensive (nominally under the command of Gordian ITT)
m 242—243, but this did not succeed in restoring the status quo ante. In the
peace treaty of 244, concluded by Gordian’s successor, Philip the Arab, F.dessa
mil the entire client state of Osrhoene around it were lost; its vassal king,
\hgar XI, took refuge in Rome. In 252, a time of especial weakess for the Roman
empire, as he must have known, Shapur I launched the first of his great offen­
ces. Warfare was thereafter intermittent for three decades. Roman fortunes
1 cached their nadir in 260, when Valerian was captured at Edessa, to remain in
Persian captivity until his death.'6
Ultimately, however, the third-century Sassanid attempt to drive the frontier
1 il 1 he empire back into Syria failed. The campaigns of the great soldier-emperors
\11relian, Carus, and, later, Galerius reestablished Roman predominance in
northern .Mesopotamia and the region by the end of the century, and did so
i cry decisively. The peace agreement o f 298 confirmed Roman suzerainty over
\nnenia and set the northern Mesopotamian border on the Khabur R iver-
Smgara-Lake Van line. There the frontier was to remain in peace and in war
until Jovian’s treaty with Shapur II in 363, whereby northern Mesopotamia,
IDeluding Nisibis, was finally ceded to the Persians.’ '
The total effect of Sassanid pressure on the empire was altogether more
disastrous than these territorial changes would suggest. Once the heightened
ihreat in the East became manifest, the entire system o f preclusive defense
became unbalanced. Because of the system’s limited supply of disposable mobile
lorces— that is, forces that could safely be borrowed from provincial garrisons—
II was essential that threats on any given sector be successfully dealt with be-
lore new' ones emerged elsewhere. Legionary vexillationes and auxiliary troops
concentrated on the Rhine could be redeployed on the middle Danube in a
 I I ’t ( i I i l 111 1 ' > / / , / / ( ; ' ) of ! h, l \ 11 ///, / // / / / / { > / / <
!
mallei' ol weeks; assuming an S hum marchi ng 1 1
a \ al ; inpli, iinliin dined in
hintry could march Irom the channel coast to the Black Sea in less than yi
days. This meant that during the summer and autumn months, when orga

nized tribal raiding was most likely, the same units could fight at opposite ends
o f the empire’s European frontiers during the same campaign season. (1 can
cite no example when it happened, but that it could happen was itself reassur
ing.) Not so for troops committed to northern Mesopotamia, regardless ol

how successful their campaigning might be. Due to the greater distance, the
systemic costs o f warfare against Persia were disproportionately greater than
the size of the forces required, large though they were.
The threat on the Rhine and Danube was endemic, but it was not until the
emergence of an equally endemic threat in the East that the overall burden on
the disposable forces of the empire became overwhelming. From then on, si
multaneous pressures on distant sectors ceased to be a rare contingency and
became a chronic predicament. Thus, major Alammanic attacks on the Upper
Germ an-Raetian frontiers in 233, with the attested destruction of several
frontier forts,3S and a more persistent weakness coincided with the conclusion
of the Roman counteroffensive against Ardashir I of the Sassanids. Similarly',
the collapse of the overland frontier between the Rhine and the Danube took
place (by 260) at a time of maximal pressure in the East:39 Shapur’s forces had
taken Antioch itself in 256, while the sea raids of the Goths and Heruli were al
their height in Asia Minor.
There was a perceptible two-way interaction, intentional or otherwise,
between the rhythm of the Goths’ attacks on land and at sea and the intensifi­
cation of Persian pressures in the East. In 250 the emperor Decius set out to
reestablish the lower Danubian frontier, and after driving the Carpi from Dacia
Malvensis, his forces engaged the Goths, who had penetrated into Thrace,
forcing them to raise the siege of Nicopolis.60 A w ar of strategic maneuver
followed, in which the Goths were eventually forced to withdraw northward
into the Dobruja.
It seems (the sources are especially poor) that a catastrophic tactical defeat
then reversed an apparent strategic victory: the Roman field army under Decius
was destroyed at Abrittus (in the central Dobruja) in 251.61 As already noted, in
252 Shapur opened a major offensive in the East. In the next four years came
the deluge: Dacia was submerged by invaders, the Goths reached Salonika, sea
raiders ravaged the coasts, and Shapur’s armies conquered territory as far west
as Antioch, while in the West, the Franks and Alamanni were subjecting the
 /V /(7 /\f III l)f[ll/.’ '75

hi lie K lime Imill hi and i hr upper I Filmin' to ill most constant pressure. The
lucks in i In- Wcsi culminatcil in 260— the year of Valerian’s disaster, when
■lupin's advance threatened even Cilicia and Cappadocia.6’

riE ir,i^F m n m rg i;iiiM d .iiH

W u federations of old neighbors of the empire, such as the Franks and
\ l.mianni, on top of the relatively new arrivals in the immediate vicinity of the
mules, the Gepids, Goths, Heruli, and Vandals (the Asdings opposite Pan-
ionia, the Silings on the .Main), necessarily constituted a threat greater than
liat of their older, established predecessors. But in addition to that and the
MicnsiHcation of the eastern threat, a qualitative deterioration in the integrity
>l the imperial leadership is also apparent. W hile some usurpations reflected
nvakdowns in security and did not cause them— they were the acts of men
ompeting as security providers (or else affirmations of regional security
nierests)— other usurpations demonstrably caused the weakening of the fron-
hts , when border forces were depleted or just removed wholesale to fight in
li imestic struggles for power. So it was w hen the Rhine defenses were stripped
n 253, once Trebonianus Gallus sent troops to fight Aemilianus; then for the
impaign o f Gallienus against Ingenuus in 258; and in the redeployment of
11 mtier troops to Italy by Postumus, the Gallic emperor, in 269/”
Ow ing to the repeated removal of vexillationes, legionary bases by the later
11 iI'd century probably contained for the most part old soldiers and those men
a herwise unfit for duty in the field. It was not the Iladrianic system o f preclu-
nc security through a forward defense that was tested in the crisis of the third
entury, but only the empty shell of that system, stripped of its indispensable
lenient of tactical mobility and deprived of its limited but still extant strategic
■ lasticitv, which derived from well-manned legions from which vexillationes
mild be borrowed for specific campaigns without crippling their strength.
I lie Alamanni who broke through the Neckar valley and overran the overland
limes of Upper Germany and Raetia by 260 were probably stronger than the
( .hatti whom Domitian had successfully driven beyond the Taunus, but it is
ertain that the imperial frontiers they attacked had become much weaker.
In addition to the diminution of the troops and the general lowering of
1 heir quality, there was now a functional dissonance between the infrastruc-
1 ure of fortifications, the strategy, and the nature of the troops left to implement
a . Static troops personally attached to their sectors by virtue of their own local
interests could have been very useful if they had been deployed in a system of
Inirder defense organized to take advantage of their peculiar qualities. The
Irontiers, however, were still organized to support primarily offensive tactics,
 / /'< < , / ./ / ; , / '■>!>.//< i m <■/ / /'i !\ <>///,/// i iu j'ii,

lor w i n c h t litir n o w sett k 'd -in d e f e n d e r s were no longer suited. Ihe reorgam
/.at i o n of frontier defenses during and after the third century was therefore .1

realistic adaptation of the system to the available resources. Static and increas
ingly militia-like troops could not be expected to serve effectively in mobile
striking forces, but if provided with stout walls and high towers, they could
hold out just as long as the finest mobile troops. At the same time, of course,
the quality of the border troops was a function of overall imperial strategy,
which now tended to allocate the better fighting men to the mobile field
armies. Once that strategic change was accomplished, frontier defense tactics
had to be changed also: third-century border troops could not successfully
execute second-century forward defense tactics, but they could be perfectly
satisfactory in manning the fixed elements of a defense-in-depth.
There was no need for a general headquarters manned by skilled staff olfi
cers and well provided with equally nonexistent maps to calculate all these
factors and to then deliberately correlate tactical changes with the change in
the overall strategy: the adaptation happened because it had to happen. In
creasingly localized and married militia-like troops were equally unwilling
and unable either to attack strongly or to run away, leaving their families behind.

The New Borders of the Empire

In the year 298, the great victory of Galerius (Diocletian’s junior emperor, 01
Caesar) enabled Diocletian to make a peace agreement with Persia that was to
endure for 30 years. Its terms were advantageous: the Roman frontier was ad
vanced beyond Singara, running due northeast along the Tigris and then west
again, just south of Lake Van.64 This was a line both more advanced and more
easily defensible than the old frontier, which had been under Sassanid pressure
ever since 230 and which had repeatedly been overrun in the troubled years
thereafter.
In the East, and only there, the empire emerged from the tempest of the
third century with an enhanced strategic position and even some territon.il
gains. The entire coastal strip running from Egypt to Anatolia was once again
protected by a broad wedge of imperial territory to its east that was hinged on
the Khabur River-Jebel Sinjar-Tigris line in northern Mesopotamia. As be
fore, the Syrian desert to the south and the Armenian highlands to the non It
were outside the frontier: if held in strength, the northern Mesopotamian sa
lient alone could protect the eastern provinces from Persian attack and would
 Defense-in-Deptb 177

■11so ensure the subjection of the thinly scattered Arabs to the south and the
\nnenian mountain folk to the north/'5
Elsewhere, the reorganization of imperial defenses under Diocletian and
1 he tetrarchy saw the formalization of losses rather than of gains. The Dacian
provinces beyond the Danube had been lost in stages; with the abandonment
"I the Severan Limes Transalutanus under Aurelian (r. 270-275), the frontier
j 1 everted to the pre-Trajanic line of the river.66 This was true in Germ any as
I »ell, where the lands east of the Rhine and north o f the Danube in Upper
1 <.ermany and western Raetia had been abandoned and the frontier brought
h.n k to the Rhine-Iller-Danube line by 260/ At the extremities of the empire,
; 1 Minilar retreat had taken place in Mauretania Tingitana, which was reduced to
.1 semicircular bridgehead south of Tingis (Tangier) through the abandonment
■ 1 he southern limes of Volubilis and of the wedge of territory due east; the
In let may have served to connect T ingitana with Mauretania Caesariensis and
1 lu- rest of Roman North Africa.6” In Egypt, the southern glacis of the
I >udekaschoinos (in lower Nubia, from the first cataract to Hiera Sycaminos)
» as abandoned, and the Roman frontier was brought back to Elephantine on the
in si cataract.66
Uthough these territorial losses reflected in large measure the force of cir-
• »instances, the tetrarchic reorganization of the frontiers also presents the
unmistakable signs of a deliberate policy of consolidation and rationalization.
I \ eii without the maps and geographic expertise deemed essential by modern
lnsiorians, the Romans obviously acted in a coherent manner by giving up
their more exposed territories to obtain more defensible frontiers, shorter and
II .lighter than hitherto. It may wadi be that the Alamanni, Burgundi, and Iut-
himgi were simply too strong to be dislodged from the agri decimates and the
■ mire Rhine-Danube salient, but it is also evident that given a strategy of
■ Ivlcnse-in-depth, the Romans no longer found it advantageous to hold the
fun mine limes that had cut across the base of the salient. The Taunus ridge, if
• 1 in ch' held, could provide a strategic base for southward attacks on enemies
I»'w ing into the agri decumates, but it would no longer be verv useful if the
11 .itcgy was to meet major attacks ivithin imperial territory.
I he same conditions prevailed in Dacia. There, with Carpi and Visigoths
■ i.ibhshed in the T r a ns y l va ni an highl ands and in Wal l achi a, the T a i f a l i in
1Minna, and the Sar ma t i a ns still in the Banat (but under pressure from
ilv \s d i ng Vandals esl uhlishcd in what is now eastern I l ungarv ), " il would
 I I'l < i I , 111, 1 \ f / , l / l [ ’ \ <'///'( l \ •>// / . / >/ l fttf'tt <

u n d o u b t e d l y h ave been v e r y dilltcult lo reestablish R o m a n co n tro l u u t I ).tc i . i

(i.e., Transvlvania anti tile Oltcnia land bridge). Hut in a n y e a s e t h e let r a n 11 it

form of defense-in-depth was, as we shall see, shallow, and it did not requite

advanced salients. The legions and cavalry units of each province, reinforced il
need be by expeditionary forces, were to defend imperial territory on a pror/ii
rial scale. In contrast, the earlier forward defense system hinged on Dacia hail
been regional in scale, with the Dacian provinces forming a defended salient
from which lateral counteroffensives into the Banat to the west and Wallachi.i
to the east were possible. Whether or not the new strategy was the right one
from a conceptual standpoint, it is clear that its adoption would considerably
reduce the military value of the Dacian salient. It was only when Constantine
resumed an aggressive strategy o f forward defense that a bridge across the
Danube was built in 328 to provide access into the Olt valley. This trails
Danubian bridgehead was used, as Dacia as a whole had been used, as a base for
lateral attacks.'1 In 332, for example, the Visigoths, then attacking the client
Sarmatians in the Banat, were taken in the flank by a Roman force coming from
the Olt valley and suffered a shattering defeat.
Such strategic conjecture can be validated with conclusive evidence in the
case of the retreat in Tingitana. In North Africa, the recurrent raids of the
Mauri and the attacks of the Baquates in 240-245 evolved into a general attack by
nomads and highlanders in 253-262, which affected Mauretania Caesarensis,
Sitifensis, and Numidia— and perhaps Africa Proconsularis (modern Tunisia)
as w ell.'2 Local punitive campaigns reestablished Roman control each time, Inn
in 288, when there was another outbreak affecting the region as a whole, the
empire could finally respond on a very large scale.
Landing in Tingitana, directly across the narrow strait from Spain, Diode
tian’s junior Augustus, Maximian, brought an expeditionary army to North
Africa composed of Praetorian cohorts, vexillation.es of the X I Claudia (from
Aquileia), II Herculia (from lower Moesia), and II Traiana (from Egypt), as well
as German and Gallic numeri, Thracian recruits, and perhaps recalled veter
ans.'1 Operating in the grand manner of old, Maximian advanced across the
full width of North Africa from Tingis to Carthage. There on Alarch 10, 298,
Maximian made a triumphal entry, after having defeated the Baquates, Bavares,
and Quinquegentiani; pursued the Berbers of the Rif, Aures, and Kabylie into
their mountains;'4 and driven the nomad tribesmen back into the Sahara.'5
M aximian’s pacification offensive had been very successful, yet it was then
that W lubilis and its limes were evacuated.'6 In that, as in other sectors, there
 I V/r/nr m I >eplb ' 7 ')

" .r. lngic in i Ik- sec.....igl\ contradictory sequence of victory and retreat: local
<i. lory had created the right conditions for the frontier reorganization dic-
i ii e d li\ empire-wide strategic considerations. Defeated, the barbarians could
in i doubt be reduced to dependence, and a buffer zone controlled by clients
■ i >ii Id lie reestablished in front o f the new limites. W ith so many tribesmen
■ li-.id or maimed, the Romans might hope that the rest would respect the invio­
lability o f Roman lands, at least for a time.
The retreat from the southern extremity of Egypt further substantiates the
• inilecture. In that sector, there is evidence that the new frontier line (hinged
■ hi the Elephantine) was protected by a client structure: the sedentary Nobades
"ere established on the N ile in order to contain the pressure of the nomadic
I'.lcinmyes.'' A sound frontier was one strong enough to ensure the subjection
"I strong-enough clients beyond it— clients who could relieve Roman troops
-I the burden o f day-to-day border policing against low-intensity threats but
not so strong that they could threaten the Romans as well. T he new strategy
no longer aimed at providing a forward defense and did not even require a
vl.tcis of reliable clients; it certainly no longer required forward positions and
"I tensive salients. In the language of modern commerce, the frontiers of the
impire that emerged from the near ship-wreck of the third century had been
"rationalized”: exposed salients, necessary for the earlier tactically offensive
i omponent of the preclusive defense strategy, had given way to simpler river
lines in Europe and shorter desert frontiers in North Africa.
It was only in the East that a forward defense frontier system was reestab­
lished, once again with obvious deliberation. After a poor start, Galerius had
"litmaneuvered and thoroughly defeated the Sassanid army in 297. In the en­
suing negotiations, Diocletian contented himself with the old frontier estab­
lished by Septimius Severus, except for the addition of minor satrapies across
1 lie Tigris (for which the pro-Roman king of Armenia, Tiridates III, was
i "inpensated at Persian expense, with Media Atropatene).'8 It is noteworthy
1 hat Diocletian refrained from claiming land due east o f Singara across the
I igris and south of the Jebel Sinjar line, lands that Rome had briefly held in
1 lie wake of Trajan’s conquests after 115 and that were the very embodiment
"I that fateful overextension. Here, too, the frontier was complemented by
1 Ilent relationships: with Armenia, of course, and with the Iberian kingdom
m the Caucasus, which was already strategically important and was destined
in he still more so, as the threat emanating from Transcaucasia became more
' l.i ngerous.
с А5 р|д
I
1 82 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

Walled Towns and Hard-Point Defenses

Rationalization was a necessary but insufficient condition for the implementa­
tion of the new strategy. Once Diocletian and his colleagues had restored the
strength of the empire to the point that a shallow defense-in-depth on a pro­
vincial scale could be substituted for the deep elastic defense of the later third
century, the fortifications of the frontier zones had to be changed. It was not
enough to repair the fortresses, forts, and watchtowers of the principate; mere
bases for offensive forces were no longer adequate. Now it became necessary
to build forts capable o f sustained resistance, and these fortifications had to be
built in depth in order to protect internal lines of communication.79 Instead of
a thin perimeter line on the edges of provincial territory, broad zones o f mili­
tary control had to be created to protect the territory within which civilians
could live in security, as civilians.
An extreme example of this pattern was the province of Palaestina III (Salu-
taris), which included the Negev and the southern half of the former province
of Arabia and which was organized essentially as a military zone. There, the
limes did not exist to protect a province, but rather the province existed to

sustain the limes, which served a broad regional function in protecting the
southern Levant from nomad attacks. Articulated in depth on the inner line
(Gaza-Beersheba-Arava) and the outer perimeter (Nitzana-Petra) and ex
tending south from Petra to the Red Sea, the defenses of Palaestina Salutans
were “ studded with fortifications,” all defensible hard points built in the new
style. At Mesad Boqeq, for example, a typical Diocletianic quadriburgium has
been found: it is small (22 by 22 meters) and has four massive square towers
projecting outward.80 Water sources and signal stations were also fortified m
the province-wide defended zone, and the few roads were carefully protected.
For example, the critical Scorpion Pass, which provided the main westerly ItitL
between Aila (now Elat) on the Red Sea (where elements of the legion X fir
tensis were stationed ca. 300) and the North, was guarded by road forts at eit h e i
end, a halfway station in the middle, lookout towers at the approaches, and >1
control point at the highest elevation. One scholar, whose overall thesis was
that no systematic limes or defensive strategy existed at all, specifically rcjcrird
the notion that there was a double line of defense “marked by Dioclct i.iiim
castella.’,m He also saw' no evidence of any nomad pressure nor of the a g g r e s s o r

transhumance that destroyed towns near deserts whenever and wherever tin \
w'ere undefended. This author found some support lor his reductionist thesis,"
 Defense-hi-Depth 183

I>nt not from the scholar who specialized in Negev archaeology for the pe-
1 iod,83 who quite reasonably interpreted serious fortifications as evidence that
1 here was a serious threat.
At the opposite end of the imperial perimeter, in northwestern Europe,
e q u al care was taken to fortify important highways leading from the frontiers
in the interior. Under the principate, important highways had been lightly
warded by soldiers detached from their legions for police duties (betieficiarii
•'ii/y/tlaris).M But from the second half of the third century onward, both nor-
m.11 torts and small road forts (burgi) began to be built on the highways in the
1 <'.ir of the frontiers, as for example in the case of the Cologne-Tongres-Bavay
mad (which continued to the channel coast at Boulogne),81 and the highways
I mm Trier to Cologne and from Reims to Strasbourg.86 In the wake of the
av.it Alammanic invasion of Italy in 259-260, which the emperor Gallienus
II nally defeated at Milan, and the invasion of the luthungi a decade later, which
\ 111 clian crushed in the Po valley, the defense of the transalpine roads became
m important priority. T h e goal was the erection of multiple barriers across
1 In- invasion corridors leading to northern Italy.
1 his effort, which may have begun in a systematic manner under the tet-
1 in In, was continued thereafter whenever there was sufficient stability for
1'-Ilit-term investments to be made, and this happened as late as the latter half
■I 1 lie fourth century.8 Those barriers were designed to impede the very deep
i" in 1 rations that had characterized the third-century raids— though some are
in 1 n r thought of as offensives— such as those of the Alamanni in 259, which
' 1 .11 lied as far as southern France and Spain and into northern Italy.88 Bands of
I'dl.iging Alamanni had then penetrated into Lyon and even Clermont-Ferrand
w I 1.nice, down the Rhone valley and across into Spain; coin hoards of the
i" 1 mil have been found in northeastern Spain.86
\i 1 licit initial breaching points, the barbarians would have been concen-
’ 1 iii-il and therefore formidable, but in the course of the subsequent forays,
'In \ must have dispersed to find their loot. We can thus see the logic of the
m ill mail forts and small civilian refuges that were then built, which would
m been o( little use in resisting any concentrated mass of barbarians, like
' I" ' me 1 hat was defeated by Gallienus near Milan in 260 (100,000 of them in
-In improbable narrative, but many no doubt).611 Road forts and refuges also
1"' 11 idnl si ime seen rit v from .1 new internal threat: bands of brigands (btiga/idae),
lie j 111HIu1 1 ill a sneieiv that remained oppressive and exploitative even in a
lie 11I ne . 11 1 i il l a p w e ' 1
IS j / /'( 1 , / ,1 U. I ' ' ! ! , H I V \ <'/ //’< K otn.in /

At lilt1 tactical level, there is a striking till Icrcucc between the Io ns and
fortresses of ilie principale anti the strongholds of the later empire. The lattn
are far from homogeneous, and over the period from Diocletian to the fifth
century there are major differences in design (though the inadequacy of dal ing
methods makes chronological distinctions difficult). For our purposes, him
ever, the entire period of late Roman fortification, from the second half of the
third century to the last sustained effort under Valentinian a century lain,
may be treated as a whole.
First, there is a difference in siting. W hile some fortifications were si ill
built for residential and logistic convenience, that is, in close proximity in
highways and on flat ground, most late Roman fortifications were positioned,
whenever possible, for tactical dominance. The most likely reason for the change
was that the concentrated forces of the principate could deal with their cue
mies by going over to the offensive, while the smaller frontier garrisons of the
late empire would often be obliged to resist in place, awaiting the arrival of
provincial, regional, or even empire-wide reinforcements. Accordingly, natu
rally strong positions were of prime importance. Examples of this siting uniy
be found in Basel, Zurzach, Burg near Stein am Rhein, Arbon, Kostan#,
Kempten, and Isny on the upper Rhine and in Raetia. On the lower Rhine,
where the ground is mostly flat, forts were built on the few available hills

even if their locations were not otherwise suitable— as at Qualburg and Nijme
gen.92 This evident preference for easily defensible (if less convenient) ten aitt
is further manifest in the siting o f the fortifications of the tetrarchic road toil
and patrol system on the Syrian sector, based on the forward line of the Sti.iU
Diocletiana, running from Palmyra all the way south toward the G u lf of Mu!
on the Red Sea.93
A second clear-cut difference between the forts and fortresses o f the prim I
pate and the strongholds of the later empire is their ground plan. Old stvll
rectangles with rounded ditch defenses naturally persisted, because in many
cases old fortifications remained in use, but the square layout became pi»,
dominant, together with irregular quadrilaterals (Yverdon), rough cm I»#
(Jiinkerath), and bell shapes— where the broader side rested along a nw i of
the sea (Koblenz, Altenburg, Solothurn, Altrip).94 The advantage of proMimii#
circles and proximate squares over the older rectangular pattern is, as niiiwl
above, the shorter length of the wall circuit for any given internal area, i hi
perfect circle— theoretically optimal—was normally avoided because it mm
 Defense-in-Depth 185

difficult to build. The irregular wall circuits that were to become characteris-
1 u of medieval structures began to appear in places where the walls followed
1 lie irregularities o f the ground— high, defensible ground, that is (as in Vemania-
I iiy, Pevensey, and Pilismarot on the Danube, among others).95 T h is pattern
iKo occurred where irregular river lines were used as part of the circuit.96
\nother important difference between the forts and fortresses of the prin-
■ ip.tte and the strongholds of the later empire is their outer defense structure:
die perimeter ditches and berms. Instead o f the narrow, V-shaped ditches with
1ucrow berms— only 7 or 8 feet wide— characteristic of first- and second-
- cnuiry structures, we find much wider berms, from 25 to as much as 90 feet
"idc, while the ditches, single or double and often flat-bottomed, were also
niucli wider, ranging from 25 to 45 feet or more.9' Wide ditches were evidently
mic.mt to keep the rams and siege engines of the attackers away from the wall.
I he Sassanid armies, unlike those of the Arsacids, were equipped with siege
■ urines, and the expert Ammianus Marcellinus reported (20.6.5) an “aries ro-
c nsshmis,” a very powerful ram, at the siege of Singara in 359 C E . Earlier,
m" ii, lad towers serving as firing platforms for artillery, had been unsuccess-
udh used by the forces of Shapur II at the siege of Amida.
I ven the northern barbarians were not devoid of technical inventiveness,98
1I1 In nigh they had no systematic siege technology. But the more important
II in gic change was on the Roman side: small garrisons were now to hold out
■hi 1 heir own, and that required added protection because even the common
■ mm' ii barbarians who had never mastered sophisticated siege techniques were
>lcildc- of using improvised rams. The wide ditches, then, were intended to
'M'l'cilc rhe close approach of battering devices to the walls. These walls were also
■" "lc 1 bicker: instead of the standard 5 feet, late Roman fort walls were com-
....>>l\ 10 feet thick or more, as in the legionary fortresses at Strasbourg and
in 1 1 mstantinian fortress at Divitia (Deutz) opposite Cologne.99 When older
mm o. 1 cm-ained in use, the walls were simply thickened,1011 as in the ease of the
1 icnc auxiliary fort at Remagen, where the existing structure dating from
|mmcipate was reconditioned in 275.101 In some cases, archaeological study
■ hi ealed a telling progression of wall-thickening efforts over time, as in the
‘ 1 " la lort near the (now-flooded) Danubian gates.102 (In Britain, however,
■ "i mic other parts of the empire, thin-walled structures remained in service,
I' milt because ol local considerations, Irom threat levels to the availability
■ 1 ■ ■. mi c e s . ) 1" ’
/ABANDONED LANDS OF THE FRISII
 Defense-bi-Deptb 187

Wide berms certainly reflected a significant tactical change. Research has

shown that in the fortifications that Aurelian built around Rome and in the
late Roman walls of Roman towns in Britain, Gaul, and elsewhere in the em­
pire, the fire power of the defenders was augmented with static artillery, both
.nine-throwers and arrow- (or bolt-) shooters. It has been calculated that the
lull complement of artillery for Rome’s Aurelian wall would have amounted to
;f)2 pieces for the 381 towers.104 But by the fourth century, the legions had lost
I heir organic complement of artillery. Aside from the separate artillery legions
mentioned in the Notitia Dignitatum, the artillery seems to have been used in
large numbers only for fixed defenses (tormenta muralia).ub Because artillery
u capons positioned on towers and ramparts could not be sharply angled down-
unrd, their fire could not be directed against attackers close to the walls. The
IIroad berms were accordingly designed to hold the attackers in an outer zone
111.1t could be covered by overlapping missile fire.106 Under favorable conditions,
1 lie artillery could compensate for a lack o f sufficient manpower, and this was
.m important reason to invest in artillery at a time when there was a chronic
■liortage o f trained m ilitary manpower; a late reformer who advanced that
argument went on to offer labor-saving weapons o f his own design, including
1 lie lormidably named ballista fulminalis}^
A rather sophisticated form of passive defense was to elevate the floor levels
inside forts well above the level of the surrounding ground, in order to counter
Iloth ground-level battering rams and mining (or rather, undermining)— a
leclmique that attackers were apt to use when they lacked siege engines and
" lien the defense lacked the fire power needed to keep them away from the
".ills. Found in forts at Bavay, Alzey, and Altrip, among others,108 this tech­
nique suggests combat conditions akin to those of medieval sieges: an offense
incapable of breaching walls and a defense equally incapable of striking at the
I" siegers, even -when they closely invested the walls. For all its antiquity, this
" i'. also a technique applied in twentieth-century British colonial police forts—
in Israel some of these Tegart forts have become tourist attractions.
From the third century to the fifth, the deployment of forces evolved
iluuugh several distinct phases, but it is clear that the large and strategically
■ .mi cut rated frontier garrisons typical of the linear strategy of the principate
"cic ihinned out, even though the overall size of the Roman army was increas­
in',' There were more troops than before, but they were no longer deployed
■ o IiimvcIv on the I r o n t i c r lini' itself, lienee late Roman forts and fortresses
I'itr/irc The Changing Pattern of Roman Fortification

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IlequenlIv housed lar lewer men l han their first and sec<>nd-century predr
cessors (the outpost torts on 1 hulrian’s Wall being a notable exception).
What is certain is that when Roman fortifications came to serve as defensible
hard points rather than as bases for counterattacks or larger-scale offensives,
the lengths o f the wall circuits and thus the internal areas within them were
greatly reduced, often to a minimum. For example, Vindonissa, a first-centurv
base of the legion X I Claudia, was abandoned circa ioo and subsequently
dwindled into a village; circa 260 an attempt was apparently made to recondi
tion the walls of the spacious legionary fortress, but they were much too long,
and the attempt was abandoned. Finally, circa 300 a new fort, small and strong,
surrounded by a broad triple ditch, was built within the old perimeter. At
Abusina (now Eining) on the Danube, near the eastern terminus of the Anto
nine artificial limes, a small fort (37 by 48 meters) was built within the spacious
perimeter o f an old fort. And the evolution— or rather, shrinking— of the fort
of Drobeta is an even more striking example of this secular transformation.111''
Fighting towers, built high to enhance missile fire, located not on the wall
line itself but projecting outward, are typical of fortifications meant to resist
investment and siege (i.e., hard-point defenses), as opposed to lightly fortified
bases for offensive forces. Accordingly, the surveillance and decorative towers
of first- and second-century structures gave way in late Roman times to towers
that took various shapes but almost invariably projected out from the wall, in
order to allow lateral (enfilading) arrow-launching to cover the intervening
wall segments.110 Fan-shaped towers, like those at Intercisa (Dunapentele) on
the Danube, and polygonal projecting towers, like those at Eburacum (York),
were also built, though round and square towers were more common.111 The
Diocletianic quadribiirgium had four square towers in a pattern that varied little
from province to province,112 which is further evidence o f systematic strategic
planning on an empire-wide scale.
Under the principate, the gates of towns and fortresses were only meant to
impress; in late Roman conditions, however, gates became weak points that
required special protection.111 Forts manned by small garrisons that must ol
ten have failed to patrol aggressively w'ere inherently vulnerable to surprise
attacks, especially sudden seizure attempts in places where barbarians wen-
allowed to congregate at markets in times of apparent peace. That threat geu
erated innovations in the design of gates: double sets of guard towers (e.g., at
Divitia, opposite Cologne); reentrant courtyards, where access to the fort proper
w-as by way of a guarded internal yard (e.g., Burgle, near Gundremmingen),
 h t /cn w m D c j u b 191

in.r.Led ('..lies, (mu i ;ilc<I In 1111 11 Li 1 ramparts (e.g., near Kellmunz); and finally
I" c.ti-i ns, iliat is, narrow sins ai the bases of towers or walls, designed to allow
I In defenders lo sally out unobserved. Because those slits wrere very narrow (one
man wide), lbey could easily be blocked when needed (Icorigium-Jiinkerath).114
In comparing the ground plans of Roman and medieval fortifications, one
IIuiIs the most obvious difference in the siting of the internal buildings. The
1 umlard Roman practice (well into the fourth century, it appears) was to sepa-
1 ale the living quarters from the outer walls with a broad roadway (via sagnla-
i/'l. As in the classic marching-camp layout, the purpose was to protect the
men inside from missiles launched from beyond the perimeter ditch. Although
le.iving room for a via sagularis would make the fort, and the all-important
wall circuit, that much larger, this practice continued until the reign of Con-
1 untine, if not beyond it. (The fort at Divitia, mentioned above, features a via
./{•j/laris.) But from the mid-fourth century onward, barracks began to be built
■ m the inner face of the walls, for added protection to both. This made for less
well-lighted and less comfortable quarters, but it was an economical way of
1 hickening the walls. Thus we find the fort of Alzey, spacious but with built-up
w ills; the late Valentinian fort at Altrip, which was more compact; and the fort
ii Burgle near Gundremmingen, which already had the internal layout, exter-
m1! circuit, and hilltop siting typical of medieval castles.115
The cramped quarters and irregular shapes of the new structures suggest
111.11 it was not only the tactics but the entire lifestyle of the soldiers within that
li.ul undergone a vast transformation— or regression rather— since the happier
d.i\s of the principate. This did not, however, necessarily imply a decline in
1 11 lical effectiveness, because under the new strategic system the functions of
aatic and mobile troops were quite different. Thus, some static elements of
Ilie system survived in isolation long after the collapse of the whole: St. Severi­
nus encountered forts still manned and operated at Kiinzing and Passau when
In 1 raveled across Raetia in 450.116 (One cannot help but try to imagine life in
■mb forts at such a time, with drills, ceremonies, and hierarchies persisting
"iilv because of hallowed habits and fears of the unknown, and with supplies
I>iiivided by locals grateful for protection in an anarchical world, or else ex-
II acted from them under duress, in either case providing a stepping-stone to a
lui ure of decentralized “ feudal” despotism.)
( )nce the frontiers were no longer defended preclusively, it became neces-
arv to defend assets of value in situ, on a local scale and with local efforts. Just
r. 1 be roads were secured by constructing road forts, everything else of value
<<) ' I I ’■ 1 ,1,111,1 ',//,(/ V :‘l ihi l\t>/rj,l i: I m\'ll I

had In he secured also, nr else ll w ould lie.- exposed to ;itl;icL, depred;it ton, .ind
even destruction during the inevitable interval between hostile penetrations
and successful interceptions of the defense-in-depth sequence. The result 111p.
conditions called for the formation of volunteer home guards and local milt
tias; in some cases, former imperial troops may have declined into explicitl\
recognized part-time militias (though none are attested), and there were cases
when organized groups of young volunteers (Collegia Iuventutis) seem to have
manned road forts.11. But for obvious political reasons, the imperial authorities
were consistently opposed to the formation of volunteer militias for any pur
pose, even to serx-e only as fire brigades— an attitude recorded in the famous
letter from Trajan to Pliny, and persisting thereafter.1111 Thus no volunteet
civilian militias were organized, and local defense essentially meant local for
tification, which often sufficed. Roving barbarian bands and home-grown
marauders (bagaudae), unskilled and unequipped for siege warfare, could be
kept at bay by stout walls manned by whatever stray soldiers were at hand, or
by the citizenry armed with improvised weapons.119
Along with undefended cities, whose lack of wall circuits until the third
century was evidence o f both prosperity and security (for example, the ancient
wulls of Aquileia were demolished in the second century to accommodate the
growth of the city),120 there had always been walled cities in the empire. In
deed in the East, wall defenses were the norm, because the frontiers were
open, unsecured by manned barriers. Even in the West, some cities had walls
long before any were needed. In Gaul, for example, the walls of Autun were
Augustan; Cologne received a wall circuit circa 50 C E , and Xanten (Vetera)
circa n o , in the secure days of Trajan’s principate.121 But all those were walls
built either for decorative purposes, for the sake of civic dignity, or, at mosi,
for police purposes, to keep out thieves and robbers. T h ey were certainly noi
built for military purposes, and could not cope with determined attacks.1’2
Given their purposes, wall circuits naturally enclosed entire cities and noi
merely their more defensible parts; they were therefore long relative to their
populations and correspondingly difficult to defend. Walls were generally
thin, 5 feet or so in width; towers wrere primarily decorative; and berms and
ditches, if any, were narrow.121
After the catastrophic invasions of the mid-third century, all this changed
drastically and rapidly in many places. In northwestern Europe, in the wake ol
the breakdown o f the Rhine defenses in 254 (when both the Alamanni and the
Franks broke through the frontier), and especially after the great Alamannie
 I >!■ /<■ //w in Dt j>ib >9 $

mi ■ iii-sion nl .■ I'm 1' 1 llu' cities ol 1 lie ( lermanies, Raetia, and Gaul hur-
i n (IK acquired walls. These delensive walls were very different from the pre-
' inns enceintes. In many cases, the enclosed areas were drastically reduced in
.m effort to enclose an area deemed defensible with the available m ilitary man­
power: in Gaul, both Paris and Perigueux acquired walls that enclosed less
than 20 acres.12’ (Some fairly large cities were walled, however, for example,
11 mlouse, whose 3,000 meters of walls enclosed 90 hectares.)126 In addition, the
walls became functional: thick and heavily protected. Any and all available
masonry was used: in the 40-acre wall circuit of Athens, built in the wake of
1 be Heruli attack of 267, a thickness of more than 10 feet was achieved by filling
in two wall facings with broken pieces of statues, inscribed slabs, and blocks
I(-moved from former public buildings.12'
The civic structures built in former times of prosperity and security were
■1 imetimes incorporated into the new' wall perimeters as complete units: a temple
it Beauvais and an amphitheater in Paris were used as part of the circuit; a forum
.11 Bagacum (Bava) wTas fortified as a defensive redoubt, as were the main public
baths at Sens.12* But in some cases even the cannibalization of the city infra-
■1 ructure did not suffice to protect its core. At Augst (Augusta Raurica), which
bad developed as an open city with “fine public buildings— forum, basilica,
icmple ofjupiter, theatre, baths, industrial quarters, [and] public-water-supply,” 129
an attempt was made at first to protect the entire city. But after 260, in the
wake of the Alamannic incursions, the city wTas largely abandoned. A further
II tempt was made to defend the highest part o f the plateau on w'hich the city
» as built by cutting it off with ditches from the lower slopes and turning ter-
i.ices into walls with cannibalized blocks, but this failed also. By the end of the
1 bird century Augst no longer existed, and only a small river fort on the Rhine
remained.
Elsewhere, relocation was more successful, but it still entailed the abandon­
ment of large fixed investments; sometimes it reduced the civilian population
in a much earlier, primitive state. Fortified hilltop villages (oppida) had housed
1 lie barbarians before Roman power had arrived on the scene, and similar
.1 ructures now' housed the Romanized provincials who had lost the amenity of
1 heir cities. In the case of Horn (near Wittnau) in Raetia, rather poignantly, a
prehistoric rampart across a narrow neck of high ground w'as refortified in the
Lite third century as a refuge,1311 and numerous examples of private refuges can
be found in Gaul, the Germanies, Raetia, Noricum, Pannonia, and Dalmatia.131
W here the lack of time or of suitable defensible ground precluded the relocation
!<;.( / hi ( ih /n J .S//<//i t< y <>{ I hi l\om ,u ! / mj>n r

ot even a diminished city, extinction lollovved. 1 his was |);ul icnhuiy (nie in
the case of port cities such as Leptis Magna, whose seafaring inhahitants could
not leave the coast to seek refuge inland. In some cases, cities were so reduced
in size, and defenses became so elaborate, that they gradually became forts
or at least became indistinguishable from forts. In the East, garrisons had long
been housed in cities— or rather, in specific areas of cities. N ow the pattern
became more general, extending from London to Chersonesus on the Black
Sea, and from Regensburg on the Rhine to Tiaret in the Sahara.132
Because some troops were simultaneously becoming part-time urban mili
tiamen or static farmer-soldiers, there was a regressive convergence between
civilian and military life. Cities were becoming forts, and their inhabitants,
involuntary soldiers on occasion; and forts were becoming towns inhabited hy
artisan-soldiers, merchant-soldiers, and farmer-soldiers— all of these involuntary
changes were concrete expressions of the normally vacuous term “decadence."
In the case of the Lim es Tripolitanus in Libya with its centenaria— small fort
like farmhouses (or agriculturally self-supporting fortlets?)— the mixing <>l
roles appears to be complete.133
In arid areas, concentration was imposed on rural life by the water supply,
so the conversion of rural settlements into defensible, fortified hard points pro
sented no real difficulty. On the other hand, where water was easily available,
as was the case in most of Europe, rural life was not naturally concentrated,
but rather widely diffused to best use the available agricultural land, and indeed
to create it, by clearing woods and forests and by removing stones. Local protec
tion therefore presented a problem that could not be solved economically. The
emperor might have a wall built to enclose an estate 220 kilometers square,1"
but the ordinary farmer could not hope to enclose his fields with walls; and il
he did, he would not be able to defend them. Private landlords were in a middle
position. I f rich enough, they could afford to build w'atchtowers to provide early
warning of attack, and they could fortify farmhouses and granaries; if they had
enough field hands, they could even organize private armies.13'
The empire was primarily a supplier of security. Circumstances forced it to
exact a higher price for this commodity after the second century, but the price
would not have exceeded the empire’s worth to its subjects had it been able 10
continue to provide standards o f security as high as its cost. T he walled cities
and the defended farmhouses of the late empire illustrate the diminished seen
rity that was provided by a defense-in-depth, even a successful one. But in ordei
to measure the true societal costs of the system, we would have to count the
 Di-jnisc-m Depth '9 5

unknown number ol small holdings in the open countryside that had to be

.ib.unioned. Cities, though walled and diminished, could survive, and so could
i In- farmhouses and villas of determined men of substance; it was the indepen-
dcni small farmer and the small estate that the invasions swept away over vast
11 acts of the empire.

Border Troops
l 'nder the principate, the primary frontier defense forces were the alae of aux­
iliary cavalry and the cohorts of infantry of the auxilia, later possibly supple­
mented by numeri, if they did indeed exist as a new and different kind of military
unit (with a supposedly more ethnic character), as opposed to being merely a
new designation for units of the auxilia.
Lower in status than the legionary infantry, and less well paid, the auxilia-
i ies were the principal forces in the system o f frontier defense. The legions
could not have played a major role in the forward interceptions and minor
skirmishing that characterized border warfare, since they were not agile
enough for such tasks. T h ey were designed to be relentlessly powerful, not
quick on their feet. The sort o f mobility that border fighting required would
have been a most inefficient attribute in the legions, whose chief functions
were to stabilize the borders politically, by virtue of their commanding presence,
and to guarantee the security of their sectors against the rare contingency of
large-scale enemy offensives (as well as to function as combat or even civil
engineers).
Units described as legions continued to serve in the imperial army until the
lilth century and even later, but from the third century onward their impor-
i anee in the army as a whole steadily declined. At the same time, the alae, cohortes,
and the more shadowy numeri either underwent a gradual transformation into
antic forces, which came to be described as “ frontier men” (ilimitanei), or else
disappeared altogether in places where the frontiers were utterly overrun.
I here is much controversy over the timing and the nature of this transforma-
i inn. Denis van Berchem held that the limitanei were generally the former alae
and cohortes in a new and more localized guise but otherwise qualitatively
unchanged.136 It was only much later, that is, in the late fourth century that they
di generated into a very part-time local militia of farmers. In so arguing,
I’.iTchem reflected the traditional view.137
Another specialist of the period defined the farmer-soldiers noted by the
l' mrth-century sources not as alares and cohortales transformed and degenerated,
i(/> t h e ( i h i m l S h tt/ i'y y o/ l l ’f Uoiihiu I '. in y u c

but rather as barbarians ( gentiles) enrolled for local, part-time military s e r v i c e .1

A leading American scholar instead embraced the degeneration thesis, that is,
the transformation of increasingly static, decreasingly trained troops into
increasingly full-time farmers.139 T he author of the most comprehrensive Ins
tory of the later empire concurred with Berchem’s rejection of the early (third
century) dating for the disappearance of the alae and cohorts but stressed the
evidence from N orth Africa, where the militia were getitiles, while the static
troops, that is, the limitanei proper (former alares and cohortales), remained fti 11
time garrison troops. He saw the limitanei as remaining very much full-time
soldiers (as opposed to the barbarian farmer-soldiers) and presumably efficient;
he noted that by law they were to receive full rations in kind until 364, and
even thereafter for nine months per year, which proves, he argued, that they did
not grow their own food (and drilled instead?).140
In the same vein, an Italian scholar who focused on North Africa argued
that only in that part of the empire did the limitanei become peasants by the
end of the third century.141 A British specialist on Hadrian’s Wall argued thai
the permission given to soldiers to cultivate the legionary lands and their other
privileges (higher pay, gold rings, permission to form clubs, etc.) were all in
tended to improve recruitment and to raise morale, not evidence of decadence
(or of any need to bribe the army to support the dynasty).142 It remained for a
critic of the first edition of this book to baldly and boldly deny that there ever
was any transformation (let alone decadence, a prohibited term in contempo
rary historiography, in which “progress-challenged” might at most be tolerated).
He argued that limitanei -were merely soldiers (of alae and cohorts presumably)
that happened to be stationed in a frontier district and thus were under the
command of a dux limitis,w rejecting the entire notion of qualitatively differeni
limitanei.
W hat is certain is that the full-time troops that had guarded the borders
using mobile and offensive tactics gave way to forces that were more defensive,
perhaps because they had informally become part-time peasant-soldiers who
farmed their own lands and were more fit for a purely local and static defense
than for offensive operations, or perhaps because of a more generic decline in
combat readiness. Because the thin line of auxiliary forts and legionary fortresses
along the perimeter had gradually been replaced by a much broader network of
small forts in order to support an evolving strategy of defense-in-depth, the
fact that mobile alae and cohortes had given way to scattered groups of less mo­
bile, more localized troops—whether they were qualitatively different limita-
 Aq psjJ3AUo5|
Dr/riiM’ in -D e p th 197

ii o r no t n r o l not have resulted in a decline in the effectiveness of the troops

- s m q iu o j
lemselves. This is because the new strategy required, above all, soldiers who
on Id hold out in their positions: only if those positions were held right
■ trough an enemy offensive could a collapse o f the system into an elastic defense
e avoided. And men who had their own families and possessions to protect in
it 11 should have made capable defenders.
In modern times, military-agricultural colonies have proved to be useful
nd economical for border defense in places and times as diverse as the Tran-
vlvania of the eighteenth century, the Volga steppe into the nineteenth (against
vazakh slaving raids), and the Israeli Negev during the decades o f war and
uerrilla fighting that ended in 1974. In each case, self-reliant farmer-soldiers
1 mid be counted on to respond to localized infiltrations and other low-intensity
h teats by acting on their own, while being ready to provide points d ’appui
or mobile field armies of regular full-tim e troops in the event of large-scale
1 ar. In principle, therefore, there is no reason to assume that the emergence
n the Roman Empire of frontier forces consisting of farmer-soldiers reflected
ither local degeneration, official neglect, or a politically motivated relaxation
>1 discipline that went so far as to require of soldiers neither discipline nor
raining.
Much necessarily depended on the general state of society and on the overall
■ ccurity situation. Much would also have depended on the quality of the super-
ision exercised over these farmer-soldiers, the limitanei. It is possible that under
he tetrarchy, provincial troops (as opposed to the central field armies) came
mder a system of dual control, with the limitanei under the supervision of the
irovincial governor (praeses) and the mobile elements of each frontier province
legions and cavalry units) under the control of the dux, the senior military
ilficial— though both posts were sometimes filled by one man. This structure
supposedly facilitated the localized supervision of frontier security and freed
he dux from the burden of supervising immobile forces that could not, in any
use, play a useful role in mobile warfare.144 The state of the evidence is such
1hat controversy persists over the entire notion of dual command. A priori, it
Mould seem that separating the administration of the limitanei from that of the
mobile cavalry equites and legions would be calculated to encourage the local­
ization of the limitanei and the further degeneration of their military role.
As a general principle, in order to maintain the efficiency of small groups of
isolated farmer-soldiers, a system of regular and detailed inspection, as well as
1 lie frequent supervision o f elementary training, is essential. Soldiers must
 / he < i h i n d S i m h v y »/ I he l\m n,ni l-.injni <■

regularly repeal lighting drills, not because they are apt to lorget them, Inn
because otherwise they will not instinctively use them in actual combat. But it
seems unlikely that the officials in charge, whether civilian praesides or ini Iit at y
duces (or even a post-Constantinian dux limitis, whose duties concerned front ict
defenses exclusively),14' were numerically adequate to inspect the scattered
outposts of the limitanei regularly.
The quality of the limitanei was also likely to have been influenced by the
quality of the full-time troops stationed in their sectors. I f these were well
regarded mobile forces which were always apt to be called away on campaign
and were capable of fighting effectively, it is likely that some of their skills and
even some of their spirit would have been transmitted to the part-time farmer
soldiers in the sector. If, on the other hand, even the nominally full-time units
had deteriorated into a territorial militia or simply into a static mass of pension
ers unfit for serious campaigning, then the degeneration of the limitanei would
probably have been accelerated. It is impossible to assess the quality of static-
border troops at different times and in different parts of the empire. Some
limitanei may indeed have “spent most of their time on their little estates . . .
and fought.. . like amateurs,”146 and yet the particular limitanei so characterized
successfully ensured the defense of a broad sector o f Tripolitania (where no
other forces were deployed) until the year 363 at least, on their own.147
To say that the limitanei were useless implies a fortiori that the fixed defenses
they manned must have been useless as well; this would apply particularly to
the great complex of trenches, walls, towers, and irrigation works of the Fossa
turn Africae. Yet the records of imperial legislation testify to the great concern
of the central authorities for the maintenance o f thefossatum as late as 40914x—
and only powerful memories of its effectiveness can explain the fact that in
534, following the reconquest of N orth Africa, Justinian ordered that the
ancient fossatum be rehabilitated and that limitanei be recruited and deployed
once again to man the system.149
I f one compares the part-time limitanei of the fourth century with the le­
gionary infantry of the best days o f the principate, the former may indeed ap­
pear grossly inferior and almost useless. But such a comparison overlooks the
fundamental change in the overall strategy of the empire, which now required
that troops be static in order to hold fixed points in support of the mobile
forces that were to maneuver between them. Training, discipline, and mobility
were certainly required of the latter, while only stubborn resilience was re­
quired of the former. Their endurance obviously impressed Justinian, and it
 D i p ■//.\f tn D e p t h '99

■InmId impress ns: renin.mis of -.i local defense network survived, even in
much-ravaged kactia, into tlie fifth century.1’0

I C T M tH F I C B I in i.H .llll
Provincial Forces
l aider the principate, all the forces of the army but for the 7,000 men o f the
Praetorian and Urban cohorts were “provincial” in the sense that they were
ordinarily deployed for the defense of particular provinces. Those forces con­
sisted exclusively of full-time units: the legions, alae of cavalry, cohortes of in­
fantry, and mixed cohortes equitatae. There was neither a part-time border force
o! limitanei nor a regular mobile reserve, either regional or empire-wide.
By the time of Constantine in the fourth century the pattern of provincial
1 roop deployments had been transformed: troops stationed fixedly along the
borders, whether distinctive limitanei or not, had appeared, and the auxiliary
alae and cohortes had disappeared. Units described as legions remained, but
1 hese were evidently much smaller; they were no longer deployed in single vast
bases but were fragmented into permanent detachments. For example, the V
Alacedonica and X III Gemina along the Danube in Dacia Ripensis and upper
\loesia were divided into five and four detachments, respectively, and the divi­
sion had a permanent character, each detachment coming under the command
of a separate praefectus legionis.hl
New types of units, cavalry cunei and infantry azixilia, had also made their
appearance, both perhaps 500 strong, it has been suggested (with no hard evi­
dence).1’2 Like the border troops, the limitanei of whatever kind, all the other
provincial forces that could be defined as ripenses (riversiders?), a new catchall
term, came under the sector commander, the dux limitis, but they remained full-
1 ime regular soldiers with an intermediate status between the limitanei and the
elite empire-wide field forces, the comitatenses.b? This evolution, which was to
result during the fourth century in a further stratification of the Roman armed
forces, began with a series of transformations originating in the third century.
Until the deluge of the third-century invasions, the legions had been the
backbone of the Roman army, and their deployment had hardly changed since
1 he Hadrianic era. At the beginning of the third century, the II Traiana was still
in Egypt; the X Fretensis and V I Ferrata still in Palestine; the III Cyrenaica
was in Arabia; the old III Gallica in the new Syrian province of Phoenice; the
IV Scythica and X V I Flavia Firma remained in Syria proper; the new Severan
legions, I and III Parthica (and possibly I V Italica), were on the new Severan
frontier in Mesopotamia; and the X V Apollinaris and X II Fulminata were in
 / he ( i i u i i j \ l i ( / / Try <'/ (he !\u/11,m l ni j i .

Cappadocia. On the Danube, the I Italica ami XI Claudia held lower M oesi.i,
the IV' Flavia and V II Claudia were based in upper Moesia; the V Macedoine .1
and X III Gemina were in Dacia; the I and II Adiutrix w'ere in lower Pannonia,
the X Gemina and X IV Gemina held upper Pannonia, while the two legions
raised by Alarcus Aurelius held the rest of the Danubian frontier: the 11 It a lira
in Noricum and III Italica in Raetia. T he I M inervia and X X X Ulpia were in
Upper Germany, and the V III Augusta and X X II Primigenia were in Lowei
Germany. Britain, now divided into two provinces, had the II Augusta in supe
rior and the X X Valeria V ictrix and V I Victrix in inferior. The V II Gemina
was still in Spain, and the III Augusta remained the only legion in North Africa,
deployed in Numidia.
The deployment of the legions had thus changed remarkably little from the
time of Hadrian: the II and III Italica had been sent after 165 to Noricum and
Raetia, respectively, and the three Severan legions— I, II, and III Parthica
had been added. These additions brought the number of legions to 33, or pos
sibly 34, if the unattested IA^ Italica supposedly raised by Severus Alexander in
231 is counted. One of the new legions, the II Parthica, was deployed in Rome,
of which more below, and the rest w'ere, logically enough, deployed in the newly
conquered province of Mesopotamia. Under Severus at least, there were new
legions for new frontiers.
This, then, wras the structure that was submerged by the invasions of the
mid-third century. Given the multiple military disasters that ensued after the
defeat and death of Decius in 251, we may presume that by then the legions
had lost at least some of their legendary effectiveness. But in spite of confideni
verdicts,’54 there can only be tentative presumptions because there is no definite
evidence on the magnitude of the threat—which may wrell have been greater
than it wras in the second century. As w'e have seen, the qualitative change in the
threat had certainly been most adverse.
O f the legions of the Severan army, only the V I Ferrata of Palestine and
possibly the III Parthica of Mesopotamia seem to have utterly disappeared
during the half century of travails between the death of Severus Alexander in
235 and the accession of Diocletian in 284.135 The last mention of V I Ferrata is
in Dio (55.23).'56 T h e III Parthica is not listed in the Notitia, but this does not
mean that it too disappeared; internal evidence suggests that its absence may
have been due to a clerical error. The Notitia lists for the Rhine have been
lost, but only one of the Rhine legions, the X X II Primigenia, is unattested in the
 Aq p ajjartuojj
I V /<aw 111 I) f pi b 201

ones, unlike 1 M inervia (listed under Mii/ervii in the

ii ml iiii>,rii(', i it i lie lie U I

- a u tq u io j
V li nn/ , 01.1x.t7), V \ X L'lpia ( I'niihc/isii/i/mi, 0cc.vii.108), and V III Augusta
1<h inriiiiii, occ.vn.28). As For the X X II Primigenia, which is also absent from
1 lie Xotitii/, it is mentioned in the coins of Carausius in the tetrarchic period,13'
1long with another legion not recorded in the Notitia, the X X Valeria Victrix.
I he III Augusta had a particularly agitated existence: disbanded after 238, it
u as reconstituted in 253 and was to endure into the fifth century.
Forty-four legions are listed in the Notitia as limitanei, that is, territorial forces,
of which 29 were in the East (on the Libya-Dacia circuit) and 15 in the West;
1 his excludes 4 detachments of legions also listed elsewhere and 4 detachments
of Egyptian legions listed twice. In the eastern field army (the comitatus)
1 ccorded in the Notitia, there were 13 higher-grade “palatine” legions, 38 regu­
lar field legions (comitateases), and 20 transferred ex-border legions (psetidocomi-
hitenses)-, in the western field army, there were 12 palatine legions, 33 regular
legions, and 28pseudomnitatenses.hHThe grand total comes to 188 legions, which
would be equivalent to 1,128,000 men under the old level of legionary unit
manpower, an impossibly high number.
That is sufficient evidence to determine that the formations listed in the Noti-
na Dignitatum (and not only the legions) could not have been the large combat
units of the principate, but were necessarily much diminished, though it is not
known by how much. With scant evidence, it is the prevailing scholarly opinion
1 hat the “legions” of the late empire may have had perhaps 1,000 men in the
mobile field legions and 3,000 or so in the territorial legions, but possibly even
Icwer.130 Moreover, these men were not the select and highly trained heavy infan-
1it that the original legionnaires had been, and they did not have the equipment,
1 raining, or discipline to function as combat engineers— by far the most success­
ful role of the legions of the principate.160 Nor was artillery any longer organic.
I here were instead separate legions, it seems. (The implication of Ammianus
Marcellinus, 19.5.2, commenting on the siege of Amida, is that normal legions
were no longer trained to handle artillery.)161 In other words, sans heavy infan-
1 rv, sans combat engineering, sans artillery, those “ legions” were not legions.
Instead, they were essentially light infantry formations, equipped as the auxilia
had been, with spears, bows, slings, darts, and, above all, the spatha, the barbar­
ian long sword unsuited for fightingin well-drilled, close-packed formations but
u ell suited for open-order fighting.162 Clearly, such formations were not the qual-
natively superior troops that the legionary forces o f the principate had been.
 / hi ( ,1 .m J .'■ >//,//( r i n j l h t l \ , >///,/// l m j > n ,

I h is decline did nut ()trur sue Men Iv 1 111 ii ny the Lite luu it h cent u i \ , l huui’ h
most of our evidence dates from that time. T h e legions that survived the deluge
of the third century must have done so more in form than in content. Depleted
through the successive withdrawals of vexillationes that never returned to (hen
parent units, weakened by breakdowns in supply and command, repeatedly
overrun along with adjacent tracts of the limes (and sometimes destroyed in
the process), the legions must have been drastically diminished and great It
weakened by the time of Diocletian. Additionally, many of the auxiliary units,
both alue and cohortes, either disappeared or survived only as limitan ei, that is,
as purely territorial forces unsuitable for and perhaps incapable of mobile held
operations.
As a result of these changes, until Diocletian reformed the legions, the
strategy based on a forward defense could no longer be implemented (for it
required a net tactical superiority at the local level), while a proper defense-in
depth strategy could not be implemented either, because the latter required a
deep, secure network of fortified outposts, self-contained strongholds, and
road forts. Inevitably, the only kind of defense that could be provided during
the crisis years (ca. 250-ca. 284) was an elastic defense. W hile it would allow
the enemy to penetrate, sometimes deeply, it would at least ensure the ultimate-
security of the imperial power (though not of imperial territory) if sufficiently
powerful field armies could eventually be assembled to defeat the enemy, how
ever deep he had reached. This could entail fighting Alamanni before Milan
and luthungi after they had threatened even Rome. Powerful field armies, in
eluding much cavalry, were indeed assembled, and the imperial power thereby
survived, but it survived only at the cost of abandoning civilian life and prop
erty to the prolonged ravages of the invaders.
Diocletian was evidently not content with this: his goal was to reestablish a
territorial defense.u,i T h is defense was certainly not meant to be preclusive
that would have been far too ambitious— but it was to be at least a shalloir defense
in-depth, in w-hich only the outer frontier zones would be ordinarily exposed
to the ebbs and flows of w-arfare. In his attempt to attain this end, Diocletian
tried to curtail the dynamics of incursion and post facto interception within
imperial territory by maintaining fortified bridgeheads on the far side of tin-
frontier; they wrere obviously intended to support the early interception ol
enemy attacks.164
As already noted, there were tw-o preconditions for a successful defense-in
depth strategy, first, the organization of a resilient network of fortifications
 I h /t //w m I hplh 2o(

l.ml out in 11c]>i 11; mill m rmiiI, 1 lie deployment of sectoral or “provincial” forces
.iiMuiciuly p o w e rfu l to deal effectively with local threats. Diocletian’s vast
liirtification-huililing efforts spanned the continents. “ Quid ego alarum et cohor-

t.-mr,vrHn:r.r*n*T.rnrnxmi
niiiii castra percemeant toto Rheni et Histri et Eufratae limite restituita”— he re­
stored the Rhine, Danube, and Euphrates borders, cried the panegyrist—while
i lie chronicler Malalas in the sixth century retained a memory o f Diocletian’s
lortification-building effort in the East, a line of forts from “ E gypt” (Arabia?)
to the Persian frontier.165 Modern archaeology has substantiated the claims
i hat the ancients made on Diocletian’s behalf—or else to accuse him of extrava­
gance. On three sectors, the resulting structures are of particular interest.
The fortified Strata Diocletiana, built after the Persian war, between 293
and 305 C E , reached the Euphrates from the southwest byway o f Palmyra and
provided a patrolled frontier between the Bostra-Damascus axis and the des­
ert.166 Along this road frontier, the positions of three infantry cohorts (out of
live) and of two alae (out of seven) have been identified.167 Because this frontier
had always been an open one, with no continuous barrier whether wall or
ditch, the difference between the tetrarchic scheme of frontier defense and
1 hat o f the principate is not readily apparent. There was, however, a basic dif-
lerence, and it concerned the relationship between the provincial forces and
1 he limes. On the Danube, old forts and fortresses were generally rehabilitated
and converted into hard-point fortifications, but in the wake of Diocletian’s
victories over the Sarmatians— now the main enemy on that sector— a chain
id bridgehead positions was also established on the far side of the river, in Ripa
Sarinatica,168 to facilitate anticipatory attacks.
In Egypt, the scene of a major revolt circa 295 and a serious attempted usur­
pation circa 296, the reorganized fortifications of the N ile valley and delta
provided the storehouses for the food and fodder collected by tetrarchic taxa-
1 ion in kind; they were protected by alae and cohorts.169 Egypt retained a spe­
cial role in the empire, and it also had a most peculiar long, thin geography,
which meant that there could be no normal provincial perimeter, given flanks
much too long to be protected. It is nevertheless significant that alae and co­
horts were assigned to the defense of food and fodder: it was absolutely essen-
nal that supplies be denied to penetrating enemy raiders and assured for the
mobile forces of the defense. Ultimately, the entire strategy of defense-in-
depth rested on this logistic factor.
T he second characteristic of the tetrarchic system of defense-in-depth was
1 lie new structure o f forces. Aside from the border troops, frontier provinces
’ 1' ) I hr f i / .in,} .S//,//< im "/ /A< A’('///,/// / ff.'j'i/ 1

were defended l>v legions and by cavalry mills styled vexillattones, which oli\i
ously were not the original legionary detachments and seemingly had roughly
500 men each.1'0 Both were permanently deployed in their assigned sector,,
but as in the past, they could also be temporarily redeployed elsewhere in whole
or in part to serve in ad hoc field armies,
Diocletian, who subordinated his entire policy to the pressing needs of im
perial defense and who turned the entire empire into a regimented logistic base,1 1
used much of the wealth extracted by ruthless taxation in kind to rehabilitate
and maintain the legionary forces. A century earlier, Septimius Severus had
already done much to ease the conditions of service in order to improve recruil
ment and raise morale. He had granted troops the right to marry (surely a cast-
of ex post facto recognition), raised pay for the first time since Domitian (from
300 to 450 denarii per year), allowed the formation of social clubs, and facili
tated promotions.1,2 Diocletian followed the same policy, and organized his
fiscal system in order to supply? the legions through payments in kind— though
not without also attempting to preserve the much-diminished worth of money
salaries: “ Sometimes the single purchase of a soldier deprives him of his bonus
and salary” read the preamble o f his celebrated if futile edict on prices.1,3
O f the 34 legions deployed until circa 231,1,4 most managed to survive the
disasters of the mid-third century. As many as 35 new legions might have been
added by the time of Diocletian’s abdication in 305, for a total of up to 67 or AM
legions. T he minimum estimate is 56 (33 Severan legions, 6 more attested
legions by 284, 14 attested legions under Diocletian, and 3 more that are con
jectural).1'’ T he growth in the legionary forces was thus very? great, for the
legions of Diocletian were not in most cases the diminished 1,000-man bat
talions of the late empire, because some at least continued to send detachments
to the comitatus. Whether the legionary soldier remained a heavy infantry
man and combat engineer is unclear, though the great amount of military con
struction under Diocletian suggests that he did.
The role of the legions was central to Diocletian’s defense-in-depth strut
egy7. W hile the new cavalry vexillationes were deployed primarily? in the inte
rior, astride important roads, the legions— as before— remained concentrated
in major localities. In front of and next to them there were the alae and cohorts,
by now probably indistinguishable from one another, and neither capable ol
executing offensive, forward defense tactics. It is therefore apparent that the
intention was to meet the enemy inside the defended zone, with mobile intci
ceptions by the cavalry vexillationes and with blocking positions formed bv the
 Dc/cnsc m D e p t h 205

I. I'lons, which were still mobile enough to move astride the axes o f nearby
incursions.
In Augusta Libanensis, for example, the defenders of the sector fronted by

iiEir.CTirmrm rgummj.iin
i he Strata Diocletiana included, in addition to 7 alae and 5 cohortes along the
mad itself, 2 legions and 12 vexillationes of cavalry (described as equites in the
\niiiiii). The frontage held by the static border troops could obviously be pen-
11 rated by mobile enemies, hence the equites deployed on important routes
vm re there to intercept the intruders in the interior, with the legions (at Pal-
iu\ ra and Danaba) serving as pivots and support points of the system.176 In
II. destine, 5 vexillationes of high-grade cavalry (equites illyriciani) and 4 o f local
. .nalry (equites indigenae) were in similar sector-control positions, obviously
. 1 instituting a mobile deployment. Here, too, the single legion held a hinge posi-
I a in, at Aila (near Elat), wrhile 17 alae and cohortes in the Arava valley formed a
■ Inin of static defended points across this major theater o f migration and
in imadic incursion.1"
1 his, then, was the basic defensive scheme under Diocletian, as it can be
■ ledneed from the Notitia. It is accepted that the alae and cohortes, now immo­
bile, manned a chain of self-contained strongholds;1 s that the equites served as
mobile forces for ready intervention; and that the legions were still concen-
II .ited to form the backbone of the defense and provide its ultimate guarantee.
I Ins defense-in-depth on a provincial scale was therefore quite shallow: the
inditing was to be confined within a narrow strip of the frontier sectors, and
lHnetrations were to be dealt with by the local forces, because no large (empire-
« ule) field armies were ordinarily available. By containing the fighting to the
11.ivrowest band of frontier territory, the defenders would limit its ravages, and
1 In- empire would be spared the highly damaging deep incursions entailed by
1 Ik- earlier (and later) strategy of elastic defense.
It was seemingly under Constantine (r. 306-337) that this system gave way
in another, in which powerful mobile field forces were concentrated for empire-
u ide service, and the provincial forces were correspondingly reduced. This
1 1mstantinian deployment has been reconstructed from the Notitia lists for the
Inn er Danube sectors of Scythia, Dacia Ripensis, and the two Moesias.1'9 In
'•i \ thia, for example, we find two legions, a Roman and an indigenous river
if >t ilia, and neither alae nor cohortes. Legions now provided part of the border
i- uard; they were divided into permanent detachments, each assigned to a spec-
1lied stretch of the river under a local security officer, the praefectus ripae.m
• l<ise to the food storehouses, the centerpieces of all late Roman deployments,
 I hi 1 i /,///,/ V t ,ih i; \ <>} (h, Uo/n.m I ////>// r

w o I n n I s o v o n c a v a l r y u n i t s l i s t o i l as a t/in afitiH ati, a n d e ig h t m l a n t r y u n it s do

s c r i b e d as auxilia, b o th n e w ty p e s o f c o m b a t fo r m a tio n s .1*1

The cavalry vexillationes were no more, evidently having been transferred in
the central field forces (or reorganized into cunei), and the legions were no
longer deployed as concentrated striking forces. Their status had changed lot
the worse: in the hierarchy of forces of the mid-third century, the provincial
legions were qualified as ripenses, holding an intermediate position between
the low-status alae and cohortes and the first-class field forces, the comitateuses.w>
T he dux limitis was no longer the commander of his sectoral slice of the impr
rial forces but only a territorial commander.183 Because there was no increase
in the overall resources of the empire, Constantine’s creation of the field
armies could only have resulted in a weakening of the provincial forces. Their
was both an attested qualitative decline (indicated by the relaxed physical Man
dards of recruitment)184 and most probably a numerical decline as well. Although
Constantine did not strip the frontiers of their defenders, as the accusation
would have it,18' it is obvious that the provincial forces had to be diminished it
the field armies were to have food, money, and, above all, men.
There was thus a transition from the shallow defense-in-depth o f Diode
tian’s time to a deeper system based on strong field armies and rather smallet
if not necessarily inferior frontier forces. In the Notitia we find legions dcsig
nated as pseudocomitatenses under the control o f field commanders: these iiniii
had quite obviously been transferred from the territorial to the mobile forces,
the comitatenses, without, however, attaining the full status of field units.
T h e process continued after Constantine. In the Notitia lists for uppci
Moesia we find, it seems, the depiction o f a post-Constantinian state of <lc
ployment: three legionary detachments were listed (drawn from IV I'T.n i*
and V II Claudia), but there were also five units of milites exploratores (milium I*
a generic term, like “ unit”), all commanded by prefects. It seems that all eight
units were remnants of the old legionary garrison.186 Having broken all lies
with their ancient mother units, the milites, like the “legions,” were mere sm
veillance and scouting forces (exploratores), presumably acting in support of i l»>
eight cunei o f cavalry and eight auxilia o f infantry.187 The cunei at least nnty
have retained their cohesiveness (and therefore, their mobility) into the lit ill
century,188 while the auxilia may have assumed the backstop role of the legion
ary infantry, though of necessity in a much diminished form.
A still further stage of disintegration was recorded in the Notitia lists for I lie
much-ravaged middle Rhine sector,189 where under the command o f the ,1m
 Defense-in-Depth 207

’••~>v«iiihicnisis, \\c line! it praefecti in charge of units that were mostly undif-
ii 1 rni lated viilites. One unit retained the mere memory of a legionary associa-
11. m (Prnefectus Militum Secundae Flaviae); another unit’s name recalled a
luiu'tion most probably defunct (Praefectus Alilitum Balistariorum). In the
I1.1 11 is clear that all were to be identified primarily by the place names appended
I.. 1 heir titles— a symbol o f the final localization of what had once been a fully
deployable army.

( Central Field Armies

II 11 were possible to create totally mobile military forces— that is, forces with
1 i opacity for instant movement from place to place— then no troops would
. 1 is have to be deployed for-ward at all. Instead, the entire force could be kept
I. .1 central reserve, without concern for ready availability and without regard
i"i considerations of access or transit. On the other hand, if military forces are
■ tit irely immobile, the deployment scheme must make the best of individual
nun locations in order to equalize the utility— tactical or political— of each
ini ward deployment; and no forces should be kept in reserve at all, since im­
mobile reserves can serve no purpose.
Mot surprisingly, the strategy of imperial security that reached its culmina-
II. >n under Hadrian approximated the second of these two theoretical extremes.
I veil if their heavy equipment were carried by pack animals or in carts, the
1.1'ions could not move any faster than a man could walk; in terms of the daily
m ile a ge o f the Roman infantry, therefore, distances within the empire were
immense. Because the frontiers did require the continuous presence of Roman
i.Mn s to deter or defeat attacks, and because the enemies of the empire could not
' >iilmarily coordinate their attacks, the deployment of a central reserve would
line been a wasteful form of insurance: long delays would have intervened
1" m cen the emergence of a threat and the arrival of redeployed forces. Better
. keep all units on the line and augment the defense o f one sector by taking
i"ii cs from another. Forces kept in reserve would serve no purpose and would
■ I as much as or more to maintain than forces in place and on duty. It is all
1 \ well to say that the Antonine deployment pattern was that of a thinly
' 11ached line and to say7that there was no mobile reserve “prete a voter au secours
■ points menaces.” 19l)
\i the tactical level, auxiliary units and even legions could generally reach
mi ihreatened point of a provincial frontier in a matter of days, hut a central
" 1 t\e could hardly “ fly”; it would have to march will) agonizing slimness
Map 3.4. Defense-in-Depth: Augusta
Libanensis (Only Attested Units Shown)
 I ht ( i /,/f/J Sf ),/ft ) oj thr l\ oiiitiu i .mjut

over ] , o o o miles or more to arrive at, say, the central Rhine sector t r o m a ecu
tral deployment point like Rome. There is, nevertheless, one possible moim
for the deployment o f a centralized reserve even in a very low mobility cm i
ronment: the protection of the central power itself. W hat might have been
inefficient from the empire-wide point of view could have been very function.il
indeed for its ruler. Under the principate there was no central field force; tlu-ii'
were only palace guards, private bodyguards, officer cadets in the retinue, and
the like: Augustus had his picked men (evocati) and his Batavian slave guards.1''1
Later, speculatores (selected centurions) also appeared in the emperor’s retinue,
and around the time of Domitian we find the equites singuläres, a mounted force
of perhaps 1,000 men.192 By the later third century the retinue came to include
the protectores, seemingly a combined elite guard force and officer nursery.1'"
By 330 we find the scholae, an elite mounted force commanded, significantly, by
the emperor him self rather than by the senior field officers (magistri militiun),
who controlled all the other central forces. T h ey came under the master of ol
fices, but he was only their administrator, not their operational commander.1''1
In the Notitia, five units of scholae are listed in the West and seven in the Easy
generally held to be of 500 men each, based on no evidence to speak of.19’
In regard to such guards there was a recurrent phenomenon: privale
bodyguards— tough and rough goons— tended to evolve into well-dressed
palace guards with official status, and they in turn tended to degenerate into
ornamental palace guards unfit for any form of combat, or even bodvguarding.
Another familiar pattern of evolution— from palace guard to elite force to
enlarged field formation— never developed in Rome, even though the Praelo
rian cohorts were front the beginning a much more substantial force than any
bodyguard unit could be. Formed in 27 B C E at the very beginning of the
principate,196 the Praetorians were a privileged force receiving double the legion
ary salary, or 450 denarii per year.19 In his survey of the imperial forces,
Tacitus {Annals, 4.5) listed 9 Praetorian cohorts (“novem praetoriae cohortes” ),
but their number had increased to 12 by 47 C E .198 One of the unsuccessful
contenders of 69 C E — the year of the four emperors—Vitellius further in
creased the number of Praetorian cohorts to 16, but Vespasian reduced it again
to 9. Finally, by 101 C E their number was increased once more to 10, resulting
in a force of some 5,000 troops, elite at least in status.199
In addition to the Praetorian cohorts there were also the Urban cohorts,
always four in number and each 500 strong, and the vigiles, 3,500 strong by the
end of the second century. But the latter were freedmen who served as firemen
 / -><■/( / / w- u i D e p t h i 1i

im I ',i i ici |>i 11Kriiii ii, .mil t hc\ cannot lie counted as soldiers.-200 Excluding the
/>;//(•», t lu-iv uere t Inis a maximum ol 8,000 men in organized units available as
I 1 i-niral lorce. This was more than adequate to serve as a retinue to the em-
I» 1 (a , luit it certainly did not amount to a significant field force.
Even though there was a good deal of elasticity in the second-century system,
II (< hi Id not provide field armies for demanding campaigns. Hence, new legions
li.ul to he raised for major wars. Domitian raised the I M inervia for his war
u uh the Chatti in 83, and Trajan had to raise the II Traiana and X X X Ulpia
im his conquests. Antoninus Pius managed his not inconsiderable wars with
■ xpeditionary corps o f auxiliary forces, but Marcus Aurelius was forced to
ii hin new legions (the II and III Italica) to fight his northern wars.201 Beginning
in 193, Septimius Severus fought a civil war of major proportions, and then
dmost immediately afterward, he began his Parthian War. Like his predeces-
1 its, he did so with an ad hoc field army of legionary vexillationes and auxiliaries,
Inn he found, as his predecessors had, that this was not enough: by 196 C E
1 luce new legions, the I, II, and III Parthica, were raised.202 N o emperor since
\ngustus had raised as many.
Then came the major innovation: although the I and III Parthica were duly
|insted on the newly conquered Mesopotamian frontier, in line with previous
practice, the II Parthica was not. Instead, it was installed near Rome at Alba-
1mm, becoming the first legion to be regularly stationed anywhere in Italy
nice the inception of the principate. This, and the fact that all three Severan
legions were placed under commanders of the equestrian class (praefecti) rather
1h a n of the senatorial class (legati), has suggested to both ancient and modern
historians that the motive for the deployment of the II Parthica was internal
.uni political rather than external and military.203 This may have been so, but it
is equally evident that the II Parthica could also have served as the nucleus of
.1 central field army. The new legion on its own was already a substantial force,
mure so than the total establishment of pre-Severan Praetorians, Urban cohorts,
.mil equites singuläres. But Severus increased substantially these forces: each
IVaetorian cohort was doubled in size to 1,000 men, for a total of 10,000; the
l 'than cohorts w-ere tripled to 1,500 men each, for a total of 6,000; and even the
1111 mber of vigiles was doubled to 7,000. Only the number of the equites singula-
I ei failed to increase.204 There were, in addition, some troops, especially cavalry,
attached to the obscure Castra Peregrina, a place where centurions sent on
missions to Rome from all parts o f the empire would lodge, and presumably
II here is no evidence) exchange tactical and threat information— a facility still
21 2 The Grand Strategy o f the Roman Empire

a very long way from an imperial general headquarters, but not useless as an
expertise exchange.20'1
It is unfortunate that no coherent picture o f the subsequent employment of
these forces can be gleaned from the inadequate sources, but it is certain that
out o f the 30,000 men now permanently available in Rome and free o f frontier
defense duties, a substantial central reserve could be extracted for actual cam­
paigning, perhaps as many as 23,000 men— the equivalent of almost four le­
gions, and thus something of a “ halfway house” or at least an intermediate stop
on the way to the large field armies of Diocletian and Constantine.206 T h is was
certainly an operationally significant force: Marcus Aurelius took three le­
gions with him to fight Parthia, and their absence from the frontiers may have
triggered the dangerous northern wars of his reign.
It is in the most difficult years of the third century, under Gallienus (r. 253
268), that we hear of a new central reserve, or rather, regional held reserves.
These were cavalry forces deployed on major road axes, such as Aquileia (most
important, because it controlled the major eastern gateway into Italy); Sirmium
for the mid-Danube sector; Poetovio in the Drava valley; and Lychnidus on tlu-
major highway into Greece from the north.207 On the basis of the scattered c\ 1
dence, some have seen the emergence of a new strategic variant: a defense
in-depth so deep that it was virtually an elastic defense, in w'hich nothing Imii
the Italian core was securely held.208 But others disagree.200
The wholly mobile cavalry army which appears in our sources, constituted
by Gallienus or at least increased by him, was a drastic innovation, or an enna
gency response that could only have been prompted by severe insecurity: a vast
empire cannot be so defended, nor can an entire army of cavalry be assembled
without depleting the entire military apparatus of horses everywhere. An m i
lus served for 10 years as its commander, fighting loyally against both inu-i mil
and external enemies before finally turning against Gallienus in 268; the usm

patiott failed, but Gallienus was assassinated while besieging Milan, where 1 hr
defeated Aureolus was seeking refuge. Significantly, his designated surer-.mu
w'as another cavalry commander, Claudius, who was to rule for two \ >■.11 >■
(268-270), supposedly winning great victories. Claudius was succeeded In .»
much more successful cavalry commander, Aurelian, who ruled u n t i l b i t
murder in 275. Clearly, the existence of a mobile corps ol cava Ii t uuai 1 ached n>
anv fixed position had great political significance: if its commander u.r, mu
already the emperor, he could become t lie emperor, because t lu av «a-, uni mu
parable force that could el ieet iv cl\ at 1 nr I, a l a r g e , cent 1 ali/ts I <a\ alt \ n >1 p-.
 Defense-in-Depth 2x3

Very little is known of the composition of this cavalry. It included units of

promoti (which may have been a survival of the old 120-horse legionary cavalry
contingents),210 as well as units of native cavalry (équités Dalmatae and équités
Mauri) and possibly some heavy cavalry (scutarii).21] It is also possible that

^UOISJSApSMSjSM
under Gallienus the legions were given new cavalry contingents of 726 men in
place of the original 120.212 It was at this time that the term vexillatio under­
went a change of meaning: it appeared in 269 with its original meaning of a
legionary infantry detachment, but by 293 it implied a cavalry unit.211 T h e term
must have initially connoted a mobile field unit par excellence, and it is easy to
■-ce the transformation taking place as the importance of the cavalry increased.
I n the celebrations of the tenth year of Gallienus’s rule the new importance of
1 he cavalry was given formal recognition: in the ritual hierarchy o f the pro-
- cssion, it was given the same status as the Praetorian Guard.214
The cavalry could double the strategic mobility of Roman expeditionary
ii uves when moving overland (as much as 50 miles per day against 10-15), but
:liis strategic advantage entailed a tactical disadvantage: when the Roman sol­
dier became a cavalryman he could retain no trace of his former tactical supe-
1 unity. Roman cavalry fought the barbarians without the inherent advantage
- M|oyed by even a decadent legionary force. Perhaps it is for this reason that the
u 1 nings of the nostalgic Vegetius were hostile to the cavalry, arguing that
1 In infantry was cheaper, more versatile, and more appropriate as a vehicle
■■I 1 lie legionary traditions.211
! he history of the Roman cavalry records the consistent success of large
1"nl ics of light cavalry armed with missile weapons and the equally consistent
1 11 Inre of the heavy cavalry equipped with shock weapons— the contus or hm-
. .1 heavy thrusting lance meant for the charge. Nevertheless, under Trajan a
""Ih.irv unit of heavy lancers (Ala I Ulpia Contariorum Miliaria) had already
r i " nvd; and even earlier, Josephus had described (The Jeivish War., u 1.5.5)
■ '■ .ipnn oi Vespasian's cavalry in Judea (ca. 68) as a kontos.'M' T h is cavalry,
in cr, had no body armor— it was deemed “ heavy” because it could serve as
Ii n g m g shock iorce, as opposed to the light cavalry. But a first unit o i armored
' >h\ appeared in Hadrian’s time as the Ala I Gallorum et Pannoniorum
1 a 1I1.ict.ua, a désignai ion that describes cavalry protected with chain mail,
11' I Irai Ih t , and some rigid arm or .21 Such heavy cavalry had been the leading
■ ' ' -I tlic I’a n 111 a ns, a ml II was a Iso I he lea< Ii ng Iorce oi the Sassanid a nines.
1 r 1I1, \ .1 Im 1 h.u I -.<une lic.n \ ea \ a I it I bal u as 111 Hi prut erl ci I w it h n y u l a m u 11,
■ ■ , l i ni n' . « 1 ic 11.11 t l\ .11 mu i i d a-, we l l , m 1 I n • 111.1111 u t m a d e t .11111 1 1.11 In
 i
: i .j /l u ( i /,///,/ S f / . / f c v \ <>l tl' i R o m .n i / / / / j> n 1

depictions ol late medieval knights engaged in tournaments or even m com

bat— a risky proposition with heavy armor, which precluded remounting. Roman
troops nicknamed such fully armored cavalrymen clibanarii (bread-ovennerv ),
and they certainly could not have had an easy time of it in the heat of the Sy ri.m
desert.
Late in 271, Aurelian sailed east to destroy the power of Palmyra with a
force of legionary detachments, Praetorian cohorts, and above all, light cava h y
of Moorish and Dalmatian origin.218 First by the Orontes River and then at
Emesa, Aurelian soundly defeated the Palmyran forces, using the same tact u
on both occasions: the light and unencumbered native horse retreated and the
enemy clibanarii pursued— until they were exhausted. Then the real fighting
began. Later, when Persian forces intervened to take the Romans besieging
Palmyra in the flank, they were defeated in turn with the same tactics. In spite
of this ample demonstration of the superiority o f light cavalry over armored
horsemen— so long as the light horsemen were properly supported by sturdy
infantry— units of clibanarii began to appear in the Roman army: nine were
listed in the Notifia Dignitatum, including a unit described as équités sagittarii
clibanarii (i.e., armored mounted archers)— most likely a decorative but ineffer
tual combination o f light weaponry and heavy armor. The combat record ol
this armored cavalry was dismal.219
There was no room for an unattached cavalry corps in Diocletian’s scheme
of a shallow defense-in-depth. Strategically, it had been the natural instru
ment of an elastic defense, while on the political level its very existence was
destabilizing. But Diocletian did not need to dissolve the cavalry7 corps, for it
had probably already disappeared.220 It remains uncertain whether the Moor
ish and Dalmatian équités were disbanded by Aurelian after his victory over
Palmyra in order to garrison the disorganized eastern frontiers instead— or
whether Diocletian himself disbanded them. There were certainly7many équités
in the Notifia for Palestine, indeed 12 équités, while the much vaster Arabia
had 8, Phoenice also had 12, Syria 10, Osrhoene 9, and Mesopotamia also 9.-’21
In addition, the promoti may have been attached to the legions once again,
though the link may have been only administrative.222 It is noteworthy that in
the Notifia lists for the eastern frontiers there was no numerical correlation
between the number of legions and the number of équités promoti,223
The question of the deployment of the cavalry under Diocletian is directly
connected to a broader, more important, and much more controversial issue:
 / V/rz/w' in f )cj>lh ' i

iln ilc|)lu\ 11 u■111 ill ,i held иг111\ iis such. The orthodox view has been that
I 'и к lot ion anil his colleagues created or expanded the sneer comitatus (the field
, i a i ol t he emperors), replacing the improvised field forces of their predeces-

иит,тддтпггтак|пьы.|1п
■ a s u ith standing field armies, and creating the dual structure of static border
i и nips (limitnnei) anti mobile field forces (comitateuses) that characterized the
n 111 v of the late empire. According to this interpretation of the evidence, Con-
.1.inline merely perfected the change a generation later by adding a command
и ucture.224 The sacer comitatus would thus have amounted to a major field
I' иге, even a field army, certainly much more than a bodyguard, because of its
.Iirer size; also it was not uniform in composition, as the old Praetorian co­
horts had been. It included the latter, whose number was, however, reduced,22’
ind also lanciarii, which were elite infantry selected from the legions, a much-
debated category of forces. Some have argued that the lanciarii were assigned
in frontier sectors under Diocletian, and thus were not part of the comitatus at
ill. Tan Berchem held that they were,226 but also that they were few in number.
1n t he Notitia, however, there were several legions of lanciarii; on that basis, some
■ vholars view them as an important part of the comitatus.22 Finally, there
u ere the cavalry units (comites); the prestigious Moorish light cavalry; select new
legions (Ioviani and Herculiani); and possibly cavalry promoti.22*
In the other, less traditional view, which was advanced earlier and then
injected,2’ 9 the argument was that the sacer comitatus was nothing more than
i lie traditional escort of the emperors and not a field army or even the nucleus
"I one. It was held that Diocletian had expanded the army, doubling it in size,
bin it was Constantine who had removed large numbers of troops from the
111 mtier sectors to form his central field force of comitatenses. Restated in a mono-
"I aph of considerable authority by Denis van Berchem, which has been criti-
i i/ed but also authoritatively accepted, at least in great part, this view now
veins persuasive. The controversy over the authorship of the reform is still un-
i vxolved, however, for subordinate but important questions remain.220 There is
mi doubt, however, that it was Constantine who created the new7commands of
i lie standing field army, the magister peditum of the infantry and the magister
чjuitimt of the cavalry.2,1
in any event, by the first decades of the fourth century the dual army struc-
i ure was in existence, with limitnnei and provincial troops on the border under
i lie control of sector commanders (duces), and centralized field forces under the
emperor and his magistri. T h e subsequent evolution of the dual army structure
 I hi (, /j / t J S i i ,//i v y >>/ //v l \ o I ml'H r

was predictable. In the \< ////./. there were 4S legions listed as [vc//Joiv////l,/lc/tu
indicating that they were transferred into the field army after having served .r.
provincial forces.232
W hen Constantine formed, or at least enlarged, his field army, he did raise
some new units, including the auxilia,233 but he must also have considerably
weakened the provincial forces in order to augment his field forces. T h is trails

fer of troops from the frontiers to the cities was criticized by the fifth-cent m y
historian Zosimus (Historic! Nova, 2.34), no doubt because of his vehement
anti-Christian sentiments. It is probable that during the late fourth centmy
the comitatenses grew steadily in size at the expense of the provincial forces (now
all called Imritanei), whose relative status and privileges continued to decline. "

Conclusion
When the provincial forces that guarded the frontiers were reduced lo
strengthen the central field armies, the result was to provide added political
and military security for the imperial power— and thus for the empire itself
but inevitably this improvement came at the expense of the day-to-day secunt y
of the common people living in provincial territories exposed to incursions,
and not just border areas. As the relative strength of the imperial system
declined (either because of a rising total threat, or because of its own weak
nesses, or any combination thereof) in the very late stage of this devolution, .it
least in the western half of the empire, the frontiers could be stripped wholes,dc
of their remaining garrisons in order to augment the central field forces; tlm
happened in 406 under Stilicho, who was engaged in internal warfare.21' In
such cases, the frontier wras seemingly left to be “defended” by barbarian alii
ances,236 hollow and reversed versions of the client relationships of the lust
century. Such alliances were rented, not bought; nor could inducements pm
vide much security once the indispensable element of deterrence was gone.
The lists of the Notitia Dignitatum, whatever their exact date, give some
notion of the distribution of forces between the frontier sectors and the field
armies, and several attempts have been made to quantify the distribution mi
the basis of varying estimates of unit sizes.23' (See table 3.1.) It follows thai
timates for the total size of the Roman armed forces at the time of the N0/111,4
also vary widely, from under 400,000 to 650,000, although the mobile livid
army is consistently estimated at around 200,000.
Those estimates, which also reflect, inter alia, different datings of ihc Son
tin, have one thing in common: in each case the percentage of Uimiain i w.n
 Defense-hi-Depth 2 I J

i Distribution of Troops: Frontiers and Field Armies in the East and West
Number of troops

(1) R) (3) (4) (5)

i romitatus — 111,000 113,000 123,800 94,000

^ôîsjâîTpaiaisu
i-rnnit-atus — 94,500 104,000 96,300 79,000
<oniitatenses 194,500 205,500 217,000 220,100 173,000
\ lunitanei - - 200,000 135,000 138,000 122,000 / 130,000
lunitanei — 332,000 248,000 165,700 201,500
lunitanei 360,000 532,000 383,000 303,700 323,500/ 331,500
'tern — 311,000 248,000 261,800 226,000 / 224,000
'■ te rn — 426,500 352,000 262,000 280,500
irc of lim it aneiin West — 64 % 54% 47 % 56- 58%
we of lim itanei in East — 78% 70% 63% 72%
imips, East and West 554,500 737,500 600,000 523,800 496 , 500/504,500
irc of lim itanei in total 65 % 72% 64 % 58% 65%

11) Mommsen, “ Das romisc'he Militarwesen seit Diocletian,” Hernies 24 (1880): i6 x , cited in
ir, "Xotitia D i^n ita tn m L p. i 56, n. 7t; (2) Nischer, “Army Reforms of Diocletiar1 and Constantine,”
) (ones, L ater Rom an E m p ir e, pp. 3:370--80, table 15; (4) Vâradv, “New Evidence on Some
p. 360; (5) Szilagyi, “l.e s Variations ties centres tie prépondérance militaire,” p. 217.

nbstantially higher in the East, which not coincidentally survived the fifth-
■ • iitury crisis, than in the West, which did not. The implication is obvious, and
■ ndorses the argument here advanced as to the limited strategic value of cen-
o.i I reserve forces in a low-mobility environment. The fact that the enemies
<a i lie empire could not have been significantly more mobile is irrelevant. Because
II u external threat was uncoordinated, relative mobility was unimportant. W hat
ih.ii icred was the absolute mobility of Roman forces deployed in the rear, which
" in much too low to justify the dual system militarily; it was only as a political
in-.! rumcnt for the emperor that it was certainly advantageous.
Septimius Severus commanded his armies against both internal and exter-
u d enemies in both the East and West once he became emperor, even though
In had no experience of active duty until he came to power. Again the implica-
iii hi is clear: “The example of Severus became a rule to which there could be
ini exceptions. The emperor must command his armies in the field, whatever
In , age or his personal inclinations— and if he was unsuccessful, a better gen-
i.d would take his place.”-™ The field armies of the later empire were much
1 ii gcr than those n! the prineipate, but even when distributed in regional reserves
I IIe iiim ihiteir.r* emild not hope to have adequate strategic mobdi l v lo cleleud
 I h r < S l n h r i " i lh , K ,i!ii,in / m i n i

imperial territory preclusively: enemies could l>e intercepted and nlti-n dr

feated, but only after they had penetrated imperial territory and done thru
worst. On the other hand, the centralized held armies could ensure the power
of the soldier-emperors who controlled them, and this was the one task t li.it
central held armies continued to perform effectively until the very end.
But the damage inflicted upon imperial territories, private lives, and private
property was cumulative. It relentlessly eroded the logistic base of the einpnr
and relentlessly diminished the net value of the imperial structure to its lax
paying subjects.
Iépilogue
I lie Three Systems: An Evaluation

I nim the Constantinian version of defense-in-depth, with its dual structure of

border troops and central field units, the stratification of the imperial army
predictably evolved further. By the later fourth century, we find new units, styled
is palatini (palace troops), serving as the core of the central field forces, under
die direct command of the emperors of the East and W est.1 The comitatenses
lud become lower-status regional field armies, while the limitanei had sunk still
lower in relative status. It may safely be assumed that this evolution caused a
lurther reduction in the quality and quantity of the human and material re­
sources available for territorial defense, both local and regional. Other things
being equal, it must have entailed a further decline in territorial security, for
rural populations and the rural economy especially, with all the logistic and
societal consequences, manifest in the increasing weakness of the empire.
A triple deployment in depth would of course have been much more resilient
ihan any linear deployment, but this “resilience” could merely mean that the
t cntral power could thereby survive for another season of tax gathering from a
population now constantly exposed to the violence of endemic warfare and the
i .wages of unopposed barbarian incursions. Finally, the situation so deteriorated
i hat in the fifth century an ordinary citizen of the empire, a merchant from
\ iminacium, preferred life outside the empire, finding a desirable new home
among a people no gentler than the Huns, in the very camp of Attila.2
Three systems of imperial security were described above. First was the system
here called Julio-Claudian, but more properly perhaps thought of as the system
■ >1 the republican empire. Around its core areas the empire was hegemonic in
nature, with client states autonomously responsible for implementing Roman
desiderata and providing out of their own resources, and through their obedi-
' nee, for the territorial security of the core areas. No Roman troops were ordi­
narily deployed in the client states or with client tribes, but the stability of the
■ astern required a constant diplomatic effort, both to ensure that each client
 / f ' l ' ( i I i t /1,1 S f / )' uf fl>,' l \ О/ / / , / / / / . / / / / » / / ('

ruler was continually aware of the totality of Roman power (in contrast t o Ins

own political isolation) and to maintain both the internal dynastic and regional
(i.e., interclient) equilibrium of the overall structure of client relationships.
Client states great and small were thus kept in subjection by their own perccp
tions o f Roman power, and this deterrent force was complemented by positive
inducements, including Roman payments, titles, and honors.
Under this system, the armed forces that the clients perceived as an undi
vided force of overwhelming strength were actually distributed in a vast perimeter
around Rome. Because they were concentrated in multilegion armies, and not
committed to territorial defense, they were inherently mobile and freely rede
ployable. The flexibility of the force structure was such that almost half the
army could be sent to a single rebellious province (e.g., Illyricum in 6 -9 CF).
O f course, the full exercise of this flexibility could be dangerous: the revolt in
Illyricum was most likely triggered by the removal of forces for the invasion
of Germany, which the revolt aborted. In any case, in the absence of such rebel -
lions, this flexibility generated vast disposable military strength, which could
be used for further expansion where the front remained open, as in Germany
before the year 9 or for the conquest o f Britain under Claudius.
Owing to its hegemonic nature, the sphere o f imperial control had no fixed
boundaries and was limited only by the range at which others perceived Roman
power as still powerful enough to compel obedience. The reach of Roman power
therefore did not require proportional expenditures. N or did further extensions
of the empire in that hegemonic mode require increases in its total military
force. New clients added to the empire would respond to the same compulsion
as all the clients brought within the sphere of imperial control before them.
That was the key to the economy of force of the Julio-Claudian system and the
secret of its efficiency. This system, however, could only assure Roman control;
it could not provide day-to-day security for the entirety of the imperial territory
and its populations, least o f all in peripheral areas.
T h e Antonine system, in use in one form or another from the Flavian era
after the year 69 to the crisis of the mid-third century—with leads and lags of
course— reflected the territorialization o f the empire and a drastic reorientation
of imperial priorities. Armed forces were everywhere deployed to secure the
tranquility and, therefore, the prosperity of all imperial territory, including its
most contested border lands. W ith that, the effective power of the empire
became strictly proportional to its military strength, because this strength was
largely used directly to provide security, and not as a tool of political persuasion.
 i'.juhnuit' :: i

I lien- u r i c still clients, lull they were much less useful than in the past, because
i he task o f maintaining territorial security was shifted from them to widely
ihst ributed frontier forces. Meanwhile strong clients could no longer be toler­

riaT,T^FmrmrrBiniau.iin
ated at all, because their strength could dangerously exceed that of the adjacent
imperial forces.
Nevertheless, the empire remained strong, and not the least of its strength
was political. Increasing prosperity and voluntary Romanization were elimi­
nating the last vestiges of nativistic disaffection and creating a strong base of
support for the imperial regime, which offered security and stability. Facing
enemies widely separated from one another at the periphery, the empire could
st ill send overwhelmingly powerful forces against them, because the tranquil-
ii v of the provinces— and, in places, elaborate border defense infrastructures—
allowed peace to be temporarily maintained even with much-depleted frontier
forces. T h is residual offensive capability was primarily useful as a diplomatic
instrument, its latent threat serving to keep the neighbors o f the empire
divided— if not necessarily obedient.
But there was a dangerous process at work-, the cultural and economic influ­
ence of the empire on the lives of all its neighbors was itself creating a political
basis for joint action against it. Enemies of Rome who before had nothing in
common came to acquire elements of the same Roman frontier culture that
was shared by all precisely because it belonged to none: the culture o f self-
Romanization. That in turn increased the ability of different tribal or other
groups to communicate with one another, opening opportunities for coopera-
lion, even fusion. Beyond the Rhine, the confederation of border peoples that
would turn them into formidable multitribal agglomerations was under way.
( Ipposed by the relentless force o f cultural transformation, Roman diplomacy
became less and less effective in keeping the enemies of the empire divided.
\nd the system of perimeter defense, keyed to low-intensity threats, could not
adequately' contend with their unity.
The third system of imperial security arose in response to this intractable
combination of diplomatic and military threats, whose consequences became
manifest in the great crisis of the third century. Under Diocletian, a still shal­
low and structured defense-in-depth replaced the emergency response of the
clastic defense of Gallienus and of the previous generation, in w hich ad hoc
lield armies had fought agglomerations of barbarians deep within imperial ter­
ritory. The new system provided no disposable surplus of military power either
lor offensive use or for diplomatic coercion, whether deterrent or compellent.
 / hr ( I ) . / / / , / S h ,U rr I' »/ thr I . ////>// r

That had been true of the preclusive detense strategy also, hut the dittiTcncc
was that the third system no longer had a surge capability either, because the
enemies o f the empire were no longer kept on the defensive by offensive,
forward defense operations; instead, they were only contained. Anti when
containment forces were reduced to muster ad hoc field forces, penetrations
occurred, and the previous capacity to generate images o f power for the purpose
of political persuasion was much reduced. It follows that diplomatic relation
ships with external powers increasingly reflected local balances of forces—which
did not always favor the empire on every sector of the perimeter.
W ith that, the level of security that the empire could provide became direct ly
proportional to the human and material resources supplied to the army, or
made available to construct frontier fortifications and defensive infrastructures,
notably fortified granaries. T he economy of force that had made the Julio
Claudian empire such an efficient provider of security was therefore lost. From
then on, the empire merely enjoyed modest economies-of-scale advantages,
which were not large enough to compensate for much administrative ineffi­
ciency, internal strife, and bureaucratic venality. And because inefficiency, stri Ic,
and venality could not be sufficiently contained, the empire was losing its value
to its subjects: it still demanded large tax payments but offered less and less
security. In the end, as the empire’s ability to extract taxes persistently exceeded
its ability to protect its subjects and their property, the arrival of the barbarians
could even become some sort of solution.
Once the empire was no longer sustained by the logic of collective security,
it could only endure because of the unsustainable will of its rulers, and by men’s
waning fear of the unknown.
 Appendix
Power and Force: Definitions and Implications

Military power is normally defined, in functional terms, more or less as “ the

ilnlitv of states to affect the wall and behavior of other states by armed coercion
-ii i he threat of armed coercion.” 1 Such a definition clearly does not allow' for any
meaningful differentiation between power and force; indeed the quoted author
immediately adds, “ It [military power] is equivalent to ‘force,’ broadly defined.”2
11 is apparent that the “power” manifest in the Roman security systems under
' misideration, as indeed in almost all other conceivable security systems, is a
phenomenon much broader than force, even if force is “broadly defined.”
Power itself, power tout court (but always as a relation rather than a unit of
measurement), has been the subject of countless definitions,5 including some
.<i general as to define very little indeed (e.g., “man’s control over the minds and
mlions of other men,” in a popular textbook).4 One modern definition analyzes
die power relation in its components, treating power in action as a dynamic,
manipulative relationship, of w'hich power tout court is an instrumentality that
iin ludes diverse elements in a continuum from positive incentives to coercion.’
Int his fuller definition, voluntary compliance is attributed to “authority,” while
die absence of coercion or the threat thereof in nonvoluntary compliance is
nd to reveal the working of “ influence.” 6
Other modern definitions deliberately combine the notions of power and
inlluence, treating both as actor-directed relationships,' whose nature can be
(ic wed in terms of “ intuitive notions very similar to those on w hich the idea of
force rests in mechanics” 8— Newtonian mechanics, that is. Not surprisingly,
I.--.s formal definitions obscure entirely any distinction between power and
mice,1' beginning (and sometimes ending) with a phrase such as “ power is the
iluiity to force.”
Now these definitions may’ be adequate for a variety of analytical purposes,
Inn not for our own. In seeking to evaluate the efficiency’ of the three systems
"I imperial security7, it should be noted first that in these, as in all comparable
\ ci cuts of security both ancient and modern, “power” as an aggregate of ex-
i■■imil action capabilities is the overall “output” of the system. (The output is
l><vwer rather than security because the latter depends also on the level of the
i In cat, a variable external to the system.) Next, we observe that the efficiency
■'I

of such systems is defined by the relationship between the power gcncraicd

(output) and the costs to society of operating the system (input).111 T h e s e air
both the direct costs of force deployments, military infrastructures, and siiIim
dization, and the hidden costs that may be imputed to methods o f discreiion
ary defense (i.e., defense-in-depth and elastic defense), in which damage e,
inflicted on the society by enemy action that goes temporarily unopposed lm
strategic (i.e., systemic) reasons.
All else being equal, the efficiency of such systems must be inversely pro
portional to the degree o f reliance on force, since the force generated w ill
require a proportional input o f human and material resources. In fact, 1 In­
efficiency of the systems will reflect their “economy of force.”
It follows that while in a static perspective, force is indeed a constituent of
power, in dynamic terms force and power are not analogous at all, but they are
rather, in a sense, opposites. One is an input and the other an output, and clfi
ciency requires the minimization of the former and the maximization of the
latter. Evidently we cannot rely on definitions that nullify the difference (in dy
namic terms) between force and power, and must provide our own definitions
instead.
O f course, the definition of force is by far the simpler. We know how force
is constituted: in direct proportion to the quantity and quality of the inputs,
whether these are legionary troops or armored divisions, auxiliary cavalry or
helicopter squadrons— or, at a different level of analysis, men and foodstuffs, or
equipment and fuel. We know how force works: by direct application on the field
of battle, or in active (noncombat) deployments. It is true that force also works
indirectly (i.e., politically) since its mere presence— if recognized— may deter or
compel. But the indirect suasion of force,11 though undoubtedly a political rather
than a physical phenomenon, occurs only in the narrowest tactical dimension.
Accordingly, while bearing in mind this qualification, we may treat force in
operation as essentially analogous to a physical phenomenon, genuinely compa
rable to the concept of force in Newtonian mechanics. Both are consumed in
application; both wane over distance to a degree that is dependent on the means
of conveyance or the medium of transmission; both are characterized by per
feet proportionality between qualitatively equal units. In other words, military
force is indeed governed by constraints on accumulation, use, transmission,
and dispersion akin to the physical laws that condition mechanical force.
How does power work? Very differently. First, it works not by causing cl
fects directly, but by eliciting responses— if all goes well, the desired responses.
 Aq pajja/tuo;
I'ncci ,m,l Ini if ?i s

I In- pnwri lul issur . i n i n t i l-i , mill those subject to their power obev. But in

- a in q m o j
obeying, i be hitter are not the passive objects of the power relation (as are the
i il >|ccts of force). They are the actors, since those who obey carry out the required
u i ions themselves.
The powerful, who merely issue the order, only have a static attribute, that
i-., “ power”; it is the actor-objects of this power who supply the dynamic en­
ergy through their obedience.12 It follows immediately that the physical con­
straints, which impose a proportional relationship between the amount of
Inree applied (and consumed in the process) and the results obtained, does not
apply to the power relation. One, two, or a thousand prisoners of war who w'alk
to their place of internment in response to an order that they choose to obey
11<) not consume the power to wrhich their obedience is a response. In contrast, the
physical removal o f 50 demonstrators requires much less force than the removal
of 50,000. In the latter case there is a rigid proportionality between the force
inputs and the output; in the former there is no such proportionality.
All this merely describes the power relation without explaining it. Next we
must ask why some men obey others, or, in other words, what the processes are
whereby desired responses can be elicited in the minds of men, causing them
to act in the manner required of them. Clearly, the actor-objects of the power
relation decide to obey; if we assume that they are rational,12 their obedience or
lack of it must reflect a comparison between the costs and benefits of obedience
versus those of defiance. (This comparison may have been internalized into a
mental habit, with obedience reflexive rather than deliberate. Such apparently
instinctual processes merely reflect the ingrained results of prior comparisons
of costs and benefits.) At this point it would seem that power is easily defined
as the ability to control the flows of costs and benefits to others, with force being
merely a subordinate ability to impose a particular kind of cost through coercion
or destruction. If this were indeed so, then our analysis would have fruitlessly
returned to its starting point,14 and the differentiation here being pursued be­
tween power and force would have to be abandoned. For it would appear that
the ability to control costs and benefits must be subject to the same limiting
proportionality between inputs and outputs as the ability to apply force (or force
tout court).
But this is not so. The ability to elicit desired responses through the deci­
sions of the actor-objects of the power relation is plainly not a function of the
ability to control costs and benefits, but rather a function of the perceived ability
to do so. In other words, the first stage of the power process is perceptual, and
:.•(> l/'/'i'/./n

power is therefore initially a subjective phenomenon; it can only limcimii

through the medium of others’ perceptions.
I f power is in the first instance a perceptual process, then distance will nut
diminish it unless the means of perception are correspondingly degraded o v ri

the distance. A remote eastern client kingdom would normally be much closet

to Roman realities in perceptual terms than would the peoples beyond the
Elbe, for in the East a Hellenistic civilization predisposed men to understand
the meaning of imperial power, while no such cultural basis was to be found
beyond the Elbe. It is true that repeated punitive actions (as well as positive
inducements) could teach even the most primitive of men the meaning of Ko

man power, but in that case the “power” so validated would be a different soi l
of phenomenon: crucially, there would be a proportionality between inputs and
outputs, at least as long as the process of education continued.
Perceived power does not diminish with distance, for it is not a physical (ot
quasi-physical) phenomenon. For the same reason, perceived power is not con
sumed by use. One client king or ten can perceive the same undivided power
in the empire and can be influenced by it. N or is the quantum of this pown
diminished when the obedience of a further dozen client kings is secured— by
their own perception of this same power. Indeed, perception is one of a very
few human activities (pace the romantics, love is another) that does not con
sume its objects, even imperceptibly. By contrast, force applied on one sector
to impose tranquility on one restless tribe is unavailable for simultaneous use
against another, and any increase in the number of targets diminishes the amoti nt
of force that can be used against each. It is for this reason that the efficiency ol
systems of imperial security must depend on their economy of force. Or, to put
it differently, their efficiency depends on the degree to which force is main
tained as an inactive component of perceived power rather than used directly.
I f one excludes for the moment consideration of all other components ol
pow'er— that is, static, perceived power— it may seem that once again the
difference between the workings of power and those of force is inconsequen
rial, for it is clear that in virtually all conceivable circumstances deployed mili
tary force will be the central ingredient of the overall power o f states. Accord
ingly, it would appear that it hardly matters wdtether security is obtained by t lie-
static deployment of force as perceived power or by its direct use. N ot so. Even
if one does not take into account the actual wear and tear that force must suffet
when actually used (casualties and matériel losses), force as power is inherently
 I' d ,: r / iii/tl /' H /i r ’ ’ 7

m u m li n m>rc economical than force used directly, since it does not require pro-
111 ii l ionate inputs.

r iE iT .T ^ g m r r r r a iim i^ H .iiii
fo r example, a given perimeter may be secured by means of an active de­
fense (in which case the forces deployed must suffice to defeat all threats on
i v e r y segment o f the perimeter) or else it may be secured by deterrence, for
»Inch one need only deploy a punitive striking force capable of inflicting
itreater damage on the potential attackers than the gains the latter may hope
io make by attacking in the first place. Inevitably, an active defense requires
altogether greater force than does deterrence, for which credible retaliatory
i apabilities will suffice— assuming that one’s opponents are rational and make
predictable relative-value judgments.1’ In the first instance, security requires
i lie protection o f every single asset vulnerable to attack; in the second, it re­
quires merely the recognized ability to destroy selected enemy assets and inflict
unacceptable levels o f damage. Still, it must be pointed out that there is a qual­
itative difference between the security provided by deterrence and that pro­
vided by an active defense. T h e former, being the result of suasion, is subject
io all the vagaries inherent in human perceptions and human decisions; the
latter, being physical, is definitive. Prudent men may well choose to pay the
■ treater costs of an active defense for the sake of its reliability, which is indepen­
dent of the decisions of other men.
This raises the entire broad question of error, beyond the specific case of
cognitive time lags. I f power can only be manifest through the medium of
others’ perceptions, then the translation of the “objective” (and, by the same
token, theoretical) ability to control costs and benefits into the perceived abil­
ity of doing so is subject to multiple errors: errors of physical perception, of the
medium o f communication, o f cognitive processes, and of communication
between perceivers. A blind man will not be intimidated by the display of a gun,
nor a bank clerk by a gun too well concealed, while men ignorant of the chem­
istry of gunpowder may regard rifles as ineffectual clubs, and even those who
understand it may fail to convey word of guns’ lethality to other men who have
never seen them. In such cases, it may suffice to kill one savage, blind man, or
bank clerk to educate the rest, but the exercise of suasion will have been invali­
dated, since force had to be used instead. N or will symbolic force suffice in
every case.
Is power then merely a perceptual phenomenon, and politics nothing more
i ban a particular psychological phenomenon— and a narrow one at that? Surely
not. So far, we have implicitly treated the power relation as bilateral, with .1
single controller of costs and benefits facing— and being perceived by— a single
actor-object of his power; even when groups were hypothesized, they w en­
treated as entirely monolithic, thus identical to individuals. But even if all poll
tics could be treated as a sum of power relations, these relations would be for t In­
most part not bilateral, but multilateral.
Returning to the example o f the client kings who individually perceived
Roman power and individually obeyed imperial commands, there was an im
plicit assumption that the client kings did not also perceive the power of thcii
fellow clients as being potentially additive and did not compare their total power
to the power of Rome. Had such a comparison been made, the power of the
empire would no longer have been seen as so totally superior. It follows that
the pow-er relation between the empire and the single client king was only
procedurally bilateral. In fact it depended on a variety o f phenomena, most of
them multilateral: the client’s perception and calculation of his own power, ol
the power of other clients, of the possibilities of concerted action, of the risks,
costs, and benefits of joint defiance (versus the costs and benefits of obedience),
and so on.
All these factors are conditioned by the perceptions of individuals and tIn­
decisions of (and between) groups— in other words, by all the processes of pol
itics in their full diversity and inherent complexity. Politics in the round ulti
mately determines the relationship between client states and empires; most
significantly, it determines the balance of power, which is a function not only
of the perceived pow-er of the individual units in the system but also of the
degree of cohesion between the clients and within the empire. In spite of the
importance of these complex relations, perception and the problems thereol
remain central, and w-ith them remains the distinction betw-een power and force.
 - sujqmoj -yij. At^äsiüsAuo^
Notes

Preface to the 2016 Edition

1. Brunt, then the Camden professor (“ It is a long time since I have read so important a
I ontribution to Roman history”), in “Power and Pax Romana”; and Badian (“ He had done
scholarship an immense service”), in “ In Defense of Empire.”
2. Mattern, Rome and the Enemy.
3. Isaac, Lim its o f Empire-, and in much cruder form, Whittaker, Frontiers o f the Roman
Empire.
4. Among others, see Millar, “Emperors, Frontiers, and Foreign Relations.”
5. Mann, “ Power, Force and the Frontiers of the Empire.”
6. Dyson, Creation o f the Roman Frontier.
7. Wheeler, “ Methodological Limits and the Mirage of Roman Strategy,” parts 1 and 2.
8. E.g., among hundreds: Loreto, Per La Storia Militate del Mondo Antico: “ La Storia
della grand strategy un dibattito Luttwak?” (pp. 67-81) and “ II paradosso Luttwakiano
power projection, low intensity e funzione del limes” (pp. 84-92); Mickaël Guichaoua, “ Lec-
111 re critique de Luttwak, La Grande stratégie de l’Empire romain,” in Enquêtes et Documents,
Reçue du C R IIIA 30 (2004); and Karl-Wilhelm Welwei, “Probleme römischer Grenzsicher-
img am Beispiel der Germanienpolitik des Augustus,” in Welwei, Res publica und Imperium:
Kleine Schriften zur römischen Geschichte I Iistoria Einzelschriften, 177 (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner
\ erlag, 2004), p. 675.
9. Byzantium and the Early Islamic Conquests, p. 17.
10. But see Lee, Information and Frontiers, p. 87 and n. 29.
i t . Cantor, Die römischen Agrimensoren.

12. See Luttwak, Strategy.

c h a p t e r o n e : TheJulio-Claudian System
1. Syme, “ Some Notes on the Legions under Augustus.” Also H. Parker, The Roman
Legions, pp. 72-92; Ritterling’s “Legio,” in the PaulyWissowa Real-Encyclopaedie der klassischen
Altertumswissenschaft.
2. Passerini, “Legio,” pp. 555—57.
3. Davies, “A Note on a Recently Discovered Inscription,” pp. 1 10 - 11. On headquarters’
troops, see Breeze, “The Organization of the Legion.”
4. Holder, Studies in the A uxiha. The classic study is Cheesman, A u x ilia o f the Roman
Im perial A rm y, see also Saddington, “ Development of Roman Auxiliary Forces.”
5. E.g., Stevenson, Cambridge Ancient History (hereafter, C A H ) 10:229; and Cheesman,
A uxilia o f the Roman Im perial A rm y, p. 53.
6. MacMullen, “Howr Big Was the Roman Imperial Army?” In MacMullen, “The Roman
Emperors’ Army Costs,” the estimate is 375,000 prior to Severus’s new legions. Cf. Szilâgyi,
“ Les Variations des centres de prépondérance militaire,” pp. 133, 147, 156, with estimates
of 325,000-356,000 men for the year 6; 318,000-348,000 men for the year 20 and 369,000-
375,000 men for the year 46.
■ v> \l!/t's It) I'tHU ) 1 f)

7. Pliny, Nut lirai History , 7.149; Brunt, Italian Manpower , p. 512; re provincial recru 11 mrni
Form, 11 Reclutamento, pp. 65-76, and appendix B, pp. 159-68. Also see Forni, “ Fstin/iom
etnica e sociale,” p. 344.
8. Watson, The Roman Soldier , p. 92, for legionary pay; on retirement grants sec iIml ,
pp. 147-53; on donatives, see ibid., pp. 108-14. For the pay of the auxilia, see Watson, “ I In-
Pay of the Roman Army.”
9. MacMullen, “The Roman Emperors’ Army Costs,” p. 572. Duncan-Jones, Money tin,I
Governm ent in the Roman Em pire, pp. 33-46, estimates up to 77 percent of the total budget m
the second century. Also Pekâry, “ Studien zur römischen Währungs,” pp. 472-73.
10. Ritterling, “ Legio .”
11. E.g., Pflaum, “ Forces et faiblesses,” p. 94. Also see Bereitem, L ’A rm ée de Dioclétien,
pp. 103-4, concerning the late principate hence a fortiori applicable to the Julio-Claudian
period.
12. Wblls, G erm an Policy o f Augustus, pp. 237-46.
13. Dyson, “ Native Revolts in the Roman Empire,” esp. pp. 264-67.
14. Webster, The Roman Im perial A rm y, p. 52.
15. Wrells, G erm an Policy o f Augustus, p. 239. See also Chevallier, “Rome et la Germanic,"
p. 269.
16. Bowersock, Augustus and the Greek World, p. 66.
17. Forni, “Limes,” pp. 1076-83, esp. type g (p. 1080). For the meanings of limes, 1VI
ham, Essays, p. 168; and the discussion by Piganiol, “ La Notion de limes.”
18. Sands, Client Princes, p. 115.
19. From Kornemann’s lecture “Die unsichtbaren Grenzen.”
20. For supposed motives, see Tacitus, Annals, 11.26. For the relations of the Cheruso
based confederation and the Marcomannic state of Marohoduus, see ibid., 11.44. Cf. Hat
mand, L ’Occident romain, pp. 106-8. See also Dobiâs, “ King Maroboduus,” p. 163.
21. Cf. Syme, C A H 10:781-83; and Demougeot, L a Formation de l ’Europe, pp. 114 -2 ;
On Germanic policy. Thompson, The Early Germans, pp. 72-108. On the Sarmatian lazyges,
see Harmatta, “The Sarmatians in Hungary,” in his Studies in the History o f the Sartnatiam ,
pp. 45-46.
22. Stevens, “Britain between the Invasions.”
23. Badian, Foreign Clientelae, pp. 1-14 .
24. Winspcar and Geweke, Augustus and the Reconstruction o f Roman Governm ent, p. 244.
25. See Sands, Client Princes, for a functional study of the spheres of Roman control; see
p. 77 on dynastic policy, pp. 88-89 on foreign policy.
26. Magie, Roman Rule, pp. 1:437, 476, 553-61.
27. Cheesman, A u x ilia o f the Roman Im perial A rm y, pp. 15-16; and Sands, Client Princes,
pp. 103-6.
28. Parker, The Roman Legions, pp. 139-40, 162-63.
29. See, e.g., Stevenson, Roman Provincial Adm inistration, pp. 47-50.
30. Cagnat, L ’A rm ée romaine d ’A friqu e, pp. 7-24.
31. Syme, C A H 10:356.
32. Richmond, “Roman Siege-Works of Masada.” Much more fully, M asada: The Yigael
Yadin Excavations 1965-1965. Successive volumes have been issued by the Israel Exploration
Society, notably: Netzer, vol. 3 (1991); and Bar-Nathan, vol. 7 (2006).
33. See Sands, Client Princes, p. 155, n. 2; and Tacitus, Annals, 12.29.
34. .Mommsen (Hist., pp. 3:234-36), cited by Stevenson, Roman Provincial Adm inistra
tion, p. 37.
35. Casson, Ships and Seamanship.
 \ t i h s In /'illM'v O' .f I

;(Y I I r n d r l v m, h i . i R o m a n I ' 11/ 11<’ l n i l , jl. I'll i-

;7- Sec Parker, / hi' luii/iti/i Legions, [i. 148.
;K. ] I>1,1., |)|i. K</, 27 1.

rCT.fiHHniBngnasmi,nai«,ii
59. ( ihcesman, A u xilia o f the Roman Im perial A rm y, p. 59.
40. Sands, ('.In-nt Princes, p. 103.
41. The Jew ish War, 111.4.2. Cf. ibid., 11.18.9.
42. See, e.g., Badian, Roman Im perialism , pp. 29-43.
43. Jo n e s , History o f Rome, 2:148-49.
44. Badian, Roman Im perialism , p. 4.
45. Tarn, C A H 10:113-15.
46. Bowersock, Augustus and the Greek World, pp. 42-61.
47. Josephus, The Jew ish War, 1.23.1, 1.27.6.
48. On Eurycles: Bowersock, Augustus and the Greek World, pp. 59-60; Josephus, The
jcwish War, 1.26.1-4.
49. Sands, Client Princes, p. 93.
50. Bowersock, Augustus and the Greek World, p. 56.
51. Sands, Client Princes, p. 93.
52. Syme, C A H 11:139, dismisses the accusation against Antiochus as a “ flimsy pretext.”
53. Badian, Foreign Clientelae, p. 12.
54. Bowersock, Augustus and the Greek World, pp. 51, 53.
55. Josephus, The Jew ish War; 1.20.4.
56. Dobias, “ King .Maroboduus,” p. 156.
57. See Wheeler, Rome beyond the Im perial Frontiers, pp. 91-94, on the relationship be-
1 ween trade and migration routes.
58. Dobias, “ King Maroboduus,” p. 161.
59. For the armed “suasion” concept (=the political application of military force), see
I .uttwak, Political Uses o f Sea Power, ch. 1.
60. Holmes, Architect o f the Roman Em pire, 2 :116 -21. Also Dyson, “ Native Revolts in
1 he Roman Empire,” pp. 253-258, and the reconstruction in Harmand, L ’Occident romain,
PP- 86-93.
61. Chevallier, “ Rome et la Germanie,” pp. 271-73.
62. Gordon, “ Subsidization of Border Peoples.”
63. Harmand, V Occident romain, pp. 86-93.
64. Cf. Alfoldi, “Moral Barrier on the Rhine and Danube,” pp. 1-16.
65. Thompson, The Early Germans, pp. 93-99; and Dobias, “King Maroboduus,”
p p .163-165
66. Gordon, “ Subsidization of Border Peoples,” pp. 11-34.
67. Ibid., p. 23.
68. Anderson, C A H 10:744-45.
69. Isoghli (near Aielitene), where there was a bridge on the road to Nisibis, was in Cap­
padocia, but the crossing at Samosata, astride the road into Mesopotamia, was in Comma-
gene. Zeugma (Balkis) in northeastern Syria w-as the key node, linked to the .Mediterranean
l>v way of the Orontes valley. See Scramuzza, Em peror Claudius, pp. 193-95; and Cary, Geo­
graphic Background, pp. 181-82.
70. Anderson, C A H 10:744-45.
71. Ibid., p. 750 (for Antiochus IV) and p. 751 (for Sohaeinus and the sons of Cotys); see
also Charlesworth, C A H 10:660-61.
72. Josephus, The Jew ish War, 11.9.6; Garzetti, L'lmpero da Tiberio, pp. 98-100. The char­
acterization is Garzetti’s (“avventuriero orientale” ). Cf. Charlesworth, Five M en, pp. 3-30.
232 Notes to Pages 41-50

73. Fishwick, “Annexation of Mauretania,” pp. 467-68

74. Anderson, C A H 10:752; Magie, Roman R ale , pp. 540-53.
75. Anderson, C A H 10:752.
76. Scramuzza, Em peror Claudius, p. 185. Cf. Tacitus, Annals, 12.21.
77. Dudlev and Webster, Roman Conquest o f Britain, p. 184.
78. Berchem, “Conquête et organisation par Rome,” p. 231.
79. Charlesworth, C A H 10:682.
80. Parker, The Roman Legions, pp. 9-20; and Webster, The Roman Im perial A rm y ,
pp. 27-30, both based on the sixth book of Polybius.
81. Harmand, L ’A rm ée et le soldat, p. 39.
82. Coussin, Les A rm es romaines.
83. Re the post-Marian legionary cavalry: Harmand, LA rm ee et le soldat, p. 46. Also
Marin y Pena, Institucmies m ilitates romanas, p. 74, par. 137.
84. Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 43.
85. But the hasta did not disappear; see Coussin, Les Arm es romaines, pp. 359-60.
86. The sole evidence for the number is Josephus, T h e jeirish War, i n . 6.2.
87. Marsden, Creek and Roman A rtillery, p. 1:183. The enthusiasm of Vegetius (Epitoma
rei m ilitant, 2.11) is unpersuasive.
88. Harmand, L A rm ée et le soldat, p. 62, citing a nineteenth-century French army
experiment.
89. Marquardt, De l'Organisation militaire, pp. 156, 192.
90. Vigneron, Le Cheval dans l'antiquité, pp. 1:261-64.
91. Harmand, L'Arm ée et le soldat, p. 77. On range comparability, see McLeod, “ Range ni
the Ancient Bow,” p. 14. Davies, “The Romans at Burnswark,” pp. 105-6, argued that sling
ers were never a regular element in the Roman army.
92. Tacitus, Histories, 4.71: “ Dilectus p e r Qalliam habitas in Evitâtes rem ittit ac nuntiare in
bet sufficerc imperio legiones: socii ad m unia pads redirent seeuri velnt covjecto hello quod Ronumar
manus excepissent."
93. Davies, “A Note on a Recently Discovered Inscription.” Davies suggests that their
were 480 and 800 foot soldiers in the cohort qmngenaria and m illiaria, respectively'.
94. Vigneron, Le Cheval dans l ’a ntiquité, p. 235.
95. See, e.g., Josephus, The Jew ish War, 1 1 1.5.5. Josephus’s komm is clearly a shod,
weapon, and the cavalry equipped with it is dearly that of the regular au.xiiia as opposed m
client-state or irregular troops.
96. Vigneron, Le Cheval dans l'antiquité, pp. 297-99.
97. Cited in Cheesman, A u x ilia o f the Roman Im perial A rm y, p. 8.
98. Marsden, Greek and Roman A rtillery, pp. 9, 10; McLeod, “ Range of the Am urn
Bow,” p. 8.
99. Cf. Marsden, Greek and Roman A rtillery, p. 184.
100. Thompson, The Early Germ ans, pp. 131-40.
jo i. Tbid., pp. 146-49.
102. Syme, C A H 11:146, based on Dio, 67.4.6.
103. Domitian, 7: “Gentinari legionnm castra prohibait, nee plus quam m ille iiu/iimm a ,/im
quant ad signa deponi; quod L . Antoniunt apud duarum legionnm hiberna res novas tm licin loin
ciam cepisse etiam ex depositorum summa vidcbatur.”
104. Syme, “ Some Notes on the Legions under Augustus,” p. 33,11. 1.
105. The deployment did not change until two new legions were raised ( \ \ ......... ... m ,
and X X I I Primigenia) and preparations began lor ibe imasion ol Bin.1111. cm .1 y |i 1 I
Parker, The Roman Legions, p. i oj
 Notes ta l ’ai;o -, i ...

гоб. Л letter of Pliny (LX X IV ) suggested Daco-Parthian contacts. Sunn i d . и.

gestion seriously, e.g., Henderson, Five Roman Emperors, pp. 273-74. C f Slu-i u ш U 1...
Letters o f Pliny, p. 662.
107. Svme, C A H 10:369-73; Holmes, Architect of the Roman Em pire, 2:111 i s, m.l 11.
son, “Native Revolts in the Roman Empire,” pp. 250-32.

jisteredversion’
108. Syme, C A H 10:372.
top. Brunt, review of Meyer, D ie Aussenpolitik des Augustas. For the injunction, sir 1.1. 1
tus, Annals, i л i. For the objection, see Agricola, 13. Tacitus, of course, was writing nl a 11111.
when conquest was in the air; Syme, Tacitus, pp. 1:10-29.
no. Cf. Parker, The Roman Legions , pp. 82-85 antl passim.
i n . Syme, C A H 10:353.
1 12. Tierney, “The Map of Agrippa,” pp. 154-60.

chapter 2. F r o m th e F la v ia n s t o th e S e v e ri
г. Harmand, L'Arm ée et le soldat, p. 132, n. 240; Webster, The Roman Im perial Arm y,
pp. 170-71.
2. See, e.g., the camps described in Richmond, “ Romans in Redesdale.”
3. Harmand, LA rm ée et le soldat, pp. 121-28. Elarmand’s survey of castramétation,
pp. 99-135, is comprehensive.
4. E.g., Webster, The Roman Im perial A rm y, p. 171: “This [the palisade] was merely a
fence to keep out stray natives and wild animals.” See also Harmand, L'Armée et le soldat,
pp. 129-34, where similar opinions are cited.
5. A d c o c k , Roman A r t o f War, p. 13.
6. Translated by Gilliver, “ Roman Art of War,” p. 243.
7. Harkness, M ilita ry System o f the Romans, p. xlix.
8. Adcock, Roman A r t o f War, pp. 13-15.
9. Lib er de munitionibus castrorum, sec. 1: “N unc papilonum tensionem cohort mm supra
scriptarmn ostendimus. Papilio uniis occupât pedes X , accipit increment-urn tensurae pedes II, tegit
homines V III. Plena cent aria habet -milites L X X X ; m in t papiliones X , qui occur unt in longitudine
pedum C X X . Nam quod ad latitudinem heim strigii pedum X X X attinet, papilioni dantur pedes X ,
arm is pedes V, iumentis pedes IX , fiu n t pedes X X IV . Hoe bis, X L V IL I, cum praetendunt, efficitur
striga pedum L X , reliqui pedes X II, qui conversantibus spatio sufficient. Haec pedatura ad plenas
legionis [centurias ] est compulata. E x quibus in vigiliis singulis \quaternt\ e-runt, et non plus quam
nctoiws papiliones singulae tendant. It a fit, ut centurio eorum in eadem pedatura eorum papilionum
tensionem alioquin plus dari oportuisset."
10. Adcock, Roman A r t o f War, p. 15. Cf. Harmand, L'Arm ée et le soldat, p. 129, n. 226,
p. 130, n. 228, and generally" pp. 129-34.
11. Adcock, Roman A r t of War, p. 14.
12. Isaac, Lim its of Em pire, p. 396.
13. Whittaker, Frontiers o f the Roman Em pire, pp. 17-18.
14. Ibid., pp. 10-30.
15. Schlumberger, Syria, 20, 71.
16. V om i,“ Limes,” p. 1280. Cf. Frova, “The Danubian Lim es ,” pp. 25-26. Cf. Condura-
■ In, llarnea, and Diaconu in Proceedings o f the X I I I International Congress o f Byzantine Studies,
I' TO-
17. Wheeler, “Roman Frontier in Mesopotamia,” p. 1 26 and map, p. 115.
iS. hot the meanings nt hnies, see Eorni, "Limes," pp. leys 8;. The hnn/nnlal limes
In I e 1 ! IM U v .e i I I ni I m p e n d s t o h o r n l \ I \ J IC h , | ip. 1' nS | S .
Iо I '. I n W h 11 о п e о I I lie 1 ei ne, / am ' ,i I n I / inntauci f ) i| > i 1 , |
- v| Aille* I n I ' a i ; o 1, 1, Sii

20. Gichon, “45 Years ot Research,” p. 1X9, filing' t un Ha,In,inn, and \miin.imr.
23.5.2.
21. E.g., Alfoldi, Cambridge Ancient History (hereafter, CAH) 12:213; PHaiim, “ Forces n
faiblesses,” p. 96; Swoboda, “Traian and der Pannonische Limes,” p. 197. (If. lieichcm,
I,Année de Dioclétien, p. 104.
22. Weber, CAH 11:3 12 -13 ; Watson, The Roman Soldier, p. 67, commenting on Ycgci
ius’s “obsession” with defense; Wells, German Policy of Augustus, p. 246, deprecating the
“Maginot Line mentality’” of the Flavians.
23. Notwithstanding what he wrote himself: see On War, pp. 357-59.
24. Lander, Roman Stone Fortifications.
25. On the turrets, see Birlev, Research on Hadrian's Wall, pp. 103-10. Cf. Breeze ami
Dobson, “ Hadrian’s Wall.”
26. Birley, Research on Hadrian's Wall, pp. 227-33.
27. Baradez, Vue Aerienne de l'organisation romaine, p. 359. Cf. Berchem, L'Armée de Dm
détien, p. 44, on doubts about the chronological coherence of the outposts and fossatum
proper.
28. Webster, The Roman Imperial Army, pp. 246-48. For the shortcomings of such means
of communication, see Forbes, Studies in Ancient Technology.
29. Robertson, “The Antonine Wall,” p. 102.
30. Richmond, “Trajan’s Army,” pp. 34-36
31. Richmond, “A Roman Arterial Signalling System.”
32. Poidebard, Trace de Rome-, for other open limites, see Bowersock, “A Report on Ara
hia Provincial' PP- 236-42; and Euzennat, “ Limes de Volubilis.”
33. Magie, Roman Rule, p. 1:571.
34. See the Deutsche Limeskommission’s catalog: http://www.deutsche-limeskommission
.de/index.
35. Lepper, Trajan's Parthian War, p. 108.
36. Birley, Research on Hadrian's Wall, pp. 84-85.
37. E.g., Berchem, L'Armée de Dioclétien, p. 126; similarly, Wheeler, “ Roman Frontier in
Mesopotamia,” p. 126.
38. Harmand, La Guerre anti/jue, pp. 177-78, for a list of pre-Roman linear barriers and
their military function.
39. Whittaker, Frontiers of the Roman Empire, pp. 91, 121.
40. Breeze and Dobson, “ Hadrian’s Wall,” p. 77.
41. Birley, Research on Hadrian's Wall, p. 79.
42. Baradez, “ Compléments inédits,” p. 200.
43. Whittaker, Frontiers of the Roman Empire, pp. 147-48.
44. Cichon, “45 Years of Research,” p. 186.
45. Gichcm, “ Roman Frontier Cities,” p. 20t.
46. Simpson and Shaw, “Purpose and Date of the Vallum,” p. 40. Cf. Thompson, Tin-
Early Germans, pp. 114 -15.
47. Richmond, “Hadrian’s Wall,” pp. 51-52.
48. Birley, Research on Hadrian’s Wall, pp. 118-25.
49. Birley, "Mae and Cohortes Milliariae," p. 57; unit strength was 1,000 and 500, for the
military and quingenary units, respectively.
50. Davies, “ Cohortes Equitatae,” p. 751, n. 1.
51. Alfoldy, “ Die Hilfstruppen,” p. 151.
52. Cheesman, Auxilia of the Roman Imperial Army, p. 168.
53. Birley, Research on Hadrian’s Wall, p. 272.
 • \ » / o hi l' av i \ ■''i> I/II : y,

, j . \ !i»>hb, “ 1)ic 1 11Um nippen,' p. i *, i

. I , ui t us, / //i/(u /(•', I 79.
•/>. Thompson, The Early (lennans, [>. 1ih.
S7- Cf. Watson, 77.il’ Roman Soldier, pp. 62-64, where estimates of the weight of kits are

rerF.Kirenr:r.m rrn i"hebitii

■I' milted.
58. Parker, The Roman Legions, pp. 155, 162. Wales, never fully pacified, required an oc-
. upation force until the end of Roman rule. Jarrett, “ Roman Frontier in Wales.”
59. Birley, Research on Hadrian’s Wall, p. 272. Birley’s total is 13,000 infantry, but this
appears to include 3,000 milecastle guards, p. 271. Cf. Frere, Britannia, p. 137. Frere’s figure
■ >f 9,500 men for the sixteen wall forts is not reconcilable with Birley’s figures.
60. Richmond, “ Hadrian’s Wall,” p. 47.
61. Birley, Research on Hadrian’s Wall, p. 271, opts for the figure of 3,000 men. Frere,
Britannia, p. 137, cites a range of 1,500 to 2,000 troops and points out that there is no evi­
dence that these men belonged to numeri rather than regular auxilia, as Birley suggested. See
also Birley, Research on Hadrian’s Wall, pp. 106-9.
62. In addition to Birley’s total in Research on Hadrian’s Wall (p. 272), 11,000 legionary
1 mops are presumed to have been available.
63. Forni, “ Limes’’ pp. 12 12 -13, referring to the later Antonine period. The major fort of
\alen was built under Antoninus Pius, while Pfiinz and Kiisching were rebuilt, all well
behind the perimeter line; Schönberger, “Roman Frontier in Germany,” p. 170.
64. The trend seemed clearer before than it is now; cf. Brogan, “The Roman Limes in
Germany,” pp. 17-18 , with Schönberger, “Roman Frontier in Germany,” pp. 164-65; see
also Demougeot, La Formation de VEurope, pp. 189-90. For Britain, see Richmond, “ Hadri­
an’s Wall,” pp. 45-46, 55; and Birley, Research on Hadrian’s Wall, pp. 134-55, on the Stane-
gate, the line on which the original chain of forts was built.
65. Alföldi, CAH 12:213.
66. Thompson, The Early Germans, pp. 146-49.
67. Morris, “ Vallum Again,” p. 50. The argument is developed further in Birley, “ Hadri-
anic Frontier Policy,” pp. 26-33.
68. Starr, Roman Imperial Navy, pp. 135-37 (Classis Moesica), pp. 138-41 (Classis Pan-
uonica), and pp. 144-52 (Classis Germanica).
69. Mayerson, “ Saracens and the Limes," p. 39.
70. Gichon, “45 Years of Research,” 189; Gichon, “ Roman Frontier Cities,” pp. 195—
207; Gichon, “Origin of the Limes Palestinae,’’ pp. 178, 184. See also the fuller account in
•Vpplebaum and Gichon, Israel and Her Vicinity, pp. 37-47. Cf. Euzennat, “ Limes de Volu-
liilis,” for an open limes (in Mauretania) structured in a remarkably precise checkerboard
pattern. On the Limes Tripolitanus as well, we know of no continuous linear barrier,
while road building began as early as 15-16. See Goodchild and Ward-Perkins, “Limes
Tripolitanus."
71. Roads were always the primary infrastructure of the Syrian limes; see Ghevallier,
l.es Voies romaines, pp. 160-65.
72. Baradez, Fossatum Africae, pp. 163-208, esp. pp. 202-8; Baradez, “ Organisation mili-
taire romaine de l’Algerie.”
73. Fentress, Nnmidia and the Roman Army, p. 112.
74. Cherry, Frontier and Society, 60-64; and Gichon, “45 Years of Research,” p. 189.
75. Garzetti, L’Impero da Tiherio, p. 437.
76. It was only in the Black Sea that the Classis Moesica and the Classis Pontica had to
deal with seaborne opposition, and that was small in scale, from pirates. Starr, Roman Imperial
Navy, pp. 127-28.
 77- ( Bisson, Ships um! Seamanship, |). 270. C f A in it, ‘Moyens dc niiiiiiiiiiiK;il ion,” p 1H
78. Casson, Ships and Seamanship, p. 285.
,
79. This corresponds to the magnum iter. as opposed to the justum iter of 10,000 su p-.,
see Chevallier, Voies romaines, pp. 224-25. Amit, “Moyens de communication,” passim, call и
lates Roman strategic mobility on the basis of the 20-24 Roman miles claimed by Vegciue.
(1.9) for the “ancients,” converted by Amit into kilometers. This seems too high; it is appn>
priate for brisk exercise but not for long-distance marching. Cf. Watson, The Roman Suidin,
P- 55-
80. Tacitus, Histories, 1.31, re German troops sent to Alexandria and recalled. Nor r.
illness surprising: transits could last 50 or 70 days; Casson, Ships and Seamanship, p. 2H9,
n. 82; Starr, Roman Imperial Navy, pp. 186-87.
81. Marin, “Hippagogi.”
82. Millar, “ Emperors, Frontiers, and Foreign Relations,” pp. 7—11, for the effects nl
distance.
83. Parker, The Roman Legions, pp. 119, 158, 168. See Watson, The Roman Soldier, pp. 15
16, based on Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae (hereafter, ILS) 2288 (=CIL 6.3492), reproduced on
p. 160. Cf. Szilâgyi, “ Les Variations des centres de prépondérance militaire,” pp. 119-210.
Szilâgyi mostly accounts for the auxilia by doubling legionary estimates.
84. Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 167.
85. Ibid., pp. 156-58.
86. Ibid., Bowersock, “A Report on Arabia Provincial’ pp. 232-33. Parker estimated 1 ;
legions on the Danube on the eve of the first Dacian war and 13 for the second.
87. .Millar, Roman Near East, p. 93.
88. Eck, “Zum konsularen Status von Iudaea im fruhren 2. Jh.,” BASF 21 (1984): 55.
89. Schäfer, Bar Kokhba War Reconsidered, p. 118.
90. Parker, 'The Roman Legions, p. 135, where it was conjectured that the V II Claudia Pi.i
Fidelis was redeployed to Moesia in the year 58, leaving only the XI Claudia Pia Fidelis in
Dalmatia. More certainly the V II Claudia Pia Fidelis was redeployed to Viminacium some
time during 42-66 C F; see Wilkes, Dalmatia, p. 96.
91. Until the year 6, three of the original four legions remained in Egypt; Syme, “ Some
Notes on the Legions under Augustus,” p. 25. Tn Spain, the number of legions decreased
from an estimated six in 27 BCE to four in 13 ВС Е and three bv 9 C F; ibid., p. 22. One le
gion was removed under Claudius and another during the civil war; Parker, The Roman le­
gions, pp. 131, 144.
92. Jarrett and Mann, “ Britain from Agricola to Gallienus,” pp. 179-81. In Agricola, 24,
Tacitus records his hero's friendly detention of an exiled Irish chief against a possible con
quest of Ireland, which would have served to surround Britain completely with Roman
armies: this definitely suggests a scheme of total conquest. But on the significance of any
scheme of Agricola’s, see Birley, “ Britain under the Flavians,” pp. то-19.
93. Eight new' legions were raised in the years 37 (Gaius) and 79 (Vespasian), but 4 were
disbanded in 70; Bersanetti, Vespasiano, pp. 75—79. This left 29 legions under Vespasian.
Domitian raised I Flavia Minerva in 83 (Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 150), but the total
returned to 29 once V Alaudae was lost in Domitians Dacian war. Ehe number of legions
became 30 when Trajan raised the X X X Ulpia Victrix; ibid., p. 156.
94. Ferri 11, Roman Imperial Grand Strategy, p. 22.
95. Altoldi, “Die Ililfstruppen,” p, 151 and (third century) p. 161.
96. Birlev, "Alae and Cohortes Milliariae," p. 60.
97. Bowersock, Roman Arabia, pp. 169-70.
98. Cantor, Die römischen Agrin/eusoren.
 \<U, \ In l \ / ' <)</ I 1 I

>)<t \ \ n r . i <»n ( I n n ( l i i l I | >п 1>|i ' . l i cti / he R i r a Il <n .H 2 , . i t I c i l i a i m g l u l l л l e w y c a t s i >1

11 Mi i l t l ci l м In и il i m y \ r i il i c v e a l s л I и I l y d e v e l o p e d si r . U r y i i . ' 11 l i l l l l .
..... . h n e t I und Mann, “ Hi nain Imin Agricola tu Gallicans,” p. i 8o.
mi. Nicer, “ I lie Antonine Wall,” p. 36.

inT.CTiFmnrrraiunrCTmi
ma. Robert son, “The Antonine Wall,” for a description of the structures, esp.
('( ■ m<>-iop
in). Jarrett and Mann, “ Britain from Agricola to Gallienus,” p. 189.
104. Steer, “The Antonine Wall,” p. 38.
105. Simpson, “ Roman Forts,” p. 33 and passim; or for greater detail, Simpson, Britovs
.111,1 the Roman Army, pp. 119 -2 1. Cf. Frere, Britannia, pp. т60-61.
106. See Birley, “ Excavations at Carpow,” pp. 258-61, for the policy.
107. Starr, Roman Imperial Navy, pp. 144-52.
108. Whittaker, Frontiers of the Roman Empire, p. 61.
109. Mattern, Rome and the Enemy, pp. 1-23.
1 10. "rip/rm omnen hn\rgis) / a solo extructis item praes[i) / di[i)s per loca opportuna ad / clan-
,latinos latrunculo / rum transitas oppositis / munivit.” ILS 986, cited by Millar, “ Emperors,
frontiers, and Foreign Relations,” p. 8.
i n . Though there were of course differences in emphases and priorities; see Schön­
berger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” pp. 157-58, 164-65.
112. Ibid., p. 155. On the strategy in general, Syme, CAH 11:16 0 -6 1; and Harmand,
I.'Occident romain, pp. 226-27
г 13. Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” pp. 155-56.
114. Ibid., pp. 156-57.
1 15. “ Imperator Caesar Domitianus Augustus, cum Germani more sao e saltibus et obscuris
latebris subinde impugnarent nostros tutumque regressumin profunda silverum huberent, limitibus
per centum viginti milia passuum actis non mutavit tantum statum belli, sed et subiecit dicioni suae
bestes, quorum réfugia nudaverat.” On which, see Forni, “Limes,” p. 1080.
116. Svme, CAH 1 1:162-63, disagrees as does Harmand, L’Occident romain, pp. 228-29.
But Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” p. 158, assesses the new Taunus limes as
the leftover of a failed attempt to achieve greater goals, as per his theory (p. 160) that the
I ears 89-90 marked the abandonment of the last attempt at large-scale conquest.
117. Schönberger, “ Roman F'rontier in Germany,” pp. 158-59.
1 18. Ibid., pp. 161-62.
119. Ibid., pp. 168-70.
120. Ibid., pp. 174-75.
121. Stade, CAH 11:528-29.
122. Except for the short perimeter that cut across the Dobruja—if it was Domitianic.
Trajan’s frontier approached the Danube delta; Longden, САН гг:23 3. ('Ehe legionary base
at Troesmis w'as less than 10 miles south of the Danube bend.)
123. Daicoviciu, La Transilvania, pp. 41-64; and Deinougeot, La Formation de l ’Europe,
pp. 156-60.
124. Alföldi, САН 11:84-85.
125. Daicoviciu, La Transilvania, pp. 52-54.
126. Harmatta, “The Sarmatians in Hungary,” in his Studies in the History of the Sarma-
tuins, pp. 45-46.
127. Syme, CAH 11:168-72; and Demougeot, La Formation de l ’Europe, pp. 162-64.
128. Svme, CAH 11:175-76, based on fragmentary information (Dio, 67.7.1).
129. Tbid., p. 176. Demougeot, La Formation de l ’Europe, pp. 162-64.
130. Syme, CAH 11:176-77; Demougeot, La Fortnation de l ’Europe, pp. 162-64.
 Wi ll', io Г ,/(мл n i I

151. ( Inmipino, “ U m re tour a l’impérialisme de cont|tiele: I .’( )r des I )accs" ( ид 4 ), tu lus

Les Etapes, pp. 106-17. Contra: Lepper, Trajan's Parthian liar, p. 107.
132. See a survey of the debate in Waters, “ The Reign of Trajan,” pp. 417-22.
133. Garzetti, Problemi dell’eta traianea, pp. 51-52.
134. Szilâgyi, “ Les Variations des centres de prépondérance militaire,” p. 205, est iiii.in •.
the imperial perimeter, including Dacia, at 10,200 kilometers, and at 9,600 kilometers with
out it.
135. Daicoviciu, La Transilvania, pp. 89-99-, for the Trajanic settlement in Dacia, w 1
Daicoviciu, “Dacica,” pp. 462-71.
136. Gudea, “ Defensive System of Roman Dacia,” pp. 64-65.
137. Gudea, “ Der dakische Limes.” For Dacia’s role in the overall Danubian strategi,
see Christescu, htoria militarä, pp. 36-42. Wade, “ Roman Auxiliary Units and Camps in
Dacia,” surveyed the evidence.
138. Frova, “The Danubian Limes,” pp. 28-29.
139. Lepper, Trajan’s Parthian War, pp. 109-10. For the subsidization of the Sarmati.ms,
pp. 125, 126. Frova, “The Danubian Limes,” pp. 28-29.
140. Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 157. On auxilia: Forni, “Contributo alia stoii.i,”
esp. 206. See also Christescu, Istoria militarä, pp. 42-46 (on troops) and 47-52 (on fortilu .1
tions). 129.
141. Manni, L’Impero di Gallieno, p. 29.
142. Parker, The Roman Legions, pp. 133—35.
143. Garzetti’s words in Problemi dell’eta traianea, p. 53.
144. Anderson, CAH 10:756-57; Magie, Roman Rule, pp. 551-53.
145. Until then Cappadocia had been ruled by a procurator supported only by auxilui,
Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 134.
146. Ibid., pp. 134-36; Anderson, CAH 10:759-60.
147. Tacitus, Annals, 13—15; Gilmartin, “Corbulo’s Campaigns in the East.”
148. Anderson, CAH 10:765-66.
149. Anderson, CAH 10:768; Magie, Roman Rule, p. 558.
150. Magie, Roman Rule, pp. 558-60. On the X V Apollinaris: Parker, The Roman Legion 1,
p. 137.
i j i . Webster, The Roman Imperial Army, p. 63: “The prodigious efforts, losses and hit
iniliation were all for nothing.”
152. Cf. Henderson, lave Roman Emperors, p. 60.
153. Parker, The Roman Legions, pp. 148-49; Syrne, CAH 11:14 1.
154. Lepper, Trajan’s Parthian War, pp. 110 -12 . Oates, Studies in the Ancient History, sup
ported Lepper, citing climate and terrain (pp. 1-5) and strategic factors (pp. 67-69). Gl
Waters, “The Reign of Trajan,” pp. 422-28.
155. This is the major thesis of Lepper, Trajan’s Parthian War, pp. 112-22. He responds
to objections on pp. 126-36. Cf. Henderson’s review in the Journal of Roman Studies
pp. 125-26.
156. On the strategic virtues of the Khabur-Jebel Sinjar line: Wheeler, “ Roman Fron
tier in Mesopotamia,” p. 127. On rainfall: Oates, Studies in the Ancient History, pp. 1-4 ami
map, p. 2.
157. On the immediate causes of the war, see Longden, CAH 11:240; .Magie, Roman
Rule, p. 606 (the glory motive); Guey, Essai sur la guerre, pp. 32-35; and Lepper, Trajan'1
Parthian War, pp. 205-6. Lepper rejected the trade-route motive, pp. 158-63, and critiqued
the glory motive, pp. 191-204.
 Л и / n in l ' ii e n I I ;n

i-,S. I .ougdcii, (.'. III 11:241, who rejected the (Alexandrian) glory motive. Guey, Essai
;ii hi цист, pp. 140-41, argued that Trajan did not want a diplomatic solution.
159. This is Longden’s chronology in CAH 11:858-59. Lepper’s chronology in Trajan's
I'.irihian War, pp. 31-96, differs: 114 C E , campaign in Armenia; 115, conquest of northern
Mesopotamia; 116, conquest of Adiabene and fall of Ctesiphon; 117, further conquests
и toss the Tigris (Mesene) and the outbreak of the revolts. Cf. Henderson’s review in the
Inimial of Roman Studies, pp. 121-25; and Guey, Essai sur la guerre, p. 107, who offers yet
.mother chronology.
160. Weber, CAH 11:301-2, drew a stark contrast between Trajan’s expansionism and
I ladrian’s pacifism. Magie, Roman Rule, pp. 609-11, concurred. In Lepper, Trajan's Parthian
II ar, pp. 212-13, Hadrian generalized Trajan’s limited withdrawal. In Guey, Essai sur la guerre,
pp. 1 33, 145-46, the formation of client states in 116 -117 was merely another way of retreating.
161. Garzetti, Prohlemi dell’eta traianea, pp. 59, 62.
162. Bowersock, “A Report on Arabia Provincial p. 229. He noted the official phraseol-
ogv, Arabia adquisita, as opposed to capta, implying an administrative change rather than
>imquest. For the security provisions, see ibid., pp. 232-40. For Vespasian’s road building,
see Syme, CAH 11:130. Cf. Henderson in the. Journal of Roman Studies, p. 128, who rejects
1 lie parallel with Flavian policy.
163. Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 138.
164. Ibid., p. 139.
165. This evaluation would not have applied to the legion IV Scythica, drawn from
Moesia. See Parker, The Roman Legions, pp. 135, 138.
166. Bow ersock, “A Report on Arabia Provincial’ pp. 219-29. On the limits of Arabia’s
usefulness, see Applebaum and Gichon, Israel and Her Vicinity, pp. 36-37.
167. Suetonius, Nero, 13; Magie, Roman Rule, p. 561.
168. Suetonius, Vespastanus, 8; Josephus, The Jewish War, 7.7; Magie, Roman Rule,
pp. 573-74. On Sophene: Anderson, CAH 10:758, n. 3.
169. On Agrippa II: Frankfort, “ Le Royaume d’Agrippa II,” pp. 665-66. On the Nabate­
ans: Bowersock, “A Report on Arabia Provincial’ pp. 230-31. For the Syrian statelets,
Charlesworth, CAH 11:40.
170. Richmond, “ Palmyra under the Aegis of Rome,” pp. 42-43. On the Bosporan state,
see Anderson, CAH 10:265-66.
1 7 1 . Magie, Roman Rule, pp. 569-70.
172. Stevenson, Roman Provincial Administration, pp. 50-51.
173. Guey, Essai sur la guerre, pp. 145-46; Rostovtzeff, CAH 11:119 .
174. See Lemosse, Le Régime des relationes, pp. 116-23.
175. Syme, CAH 11:14 1.
T76. Ibid., 11:139. E °r Anatolia, see Magie, Roman Rule, pp. 570-73. For the completed
svstern, see Chevallier, Voies romaines, p. 161.
177. See Magie, Roman Rule, p. 574, 576; on Arabia, see Bowersock, “A Report on Arabia
l’rovincia,” p. 230.
178. Tacitus, Annals, 4.5, with Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 163: Cappadocia had two
legions, Syria three, Judea two, and Arabia one. See also Syme, CAH 11:14 0 -4 1.
179. Braund, Rome and the Friendly King, p. 187.
180. Lemosse, Le Régime des relationes, p. 117, n. 250.
t8i. Domitian massed a force of nine legions against the Dacians in 87 (Parker, The Ro­
man Legions, p. 158), including V Alaudae, possibly lost in the fighting (Watson, The Roman
Soldier, p. 23, n. 43). In his first Dacian war, Trajan had a force of twelve legions on the
240 Notes to Pages 13 0 - 14 0

Danube (Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 156), with thirteen for the second war (ibid., p. 157).
Cf. Longden, CAM 11:231.
182. Lemosse, Le Regime des releitiones, p. 119.
183. Richmond, “ Queen Cartimandua”; Jarrett and Mann, “ Britain from Agricola to
Gallienus,” pp. 179-83; Birley, “The Brigantian Problem.” Cf. Steer, “The Antonine Wall,”
p. 36.
184. On the Batavi, see Tacitus, Germania, 29; on the Frisii, 34; on the Tencteri and
Usipetes, 32. Also Harmand, I'Occident remain, pp. 224-25; and Demougeot, La Formation
de TEurope, p. 143.
185. If the Vita Hadriani (5.6.8) of SHA can be trusted; see also Cordon, “ Subsidization
of Border Peoples,” p. 44.
186. Syme, CAH 11:186.
187. Miller, CAH 12:9. Also Rostovtzeff, CAH 11:119 ; and Magie, Roman Rule,
pp. 685-86.
188. For a more skeptical view, see Thompson, The Early Germans, p. 150, on logistics.
189. Josephus, The Jewish War, 11.18.9. Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 138, deduces from
this passage that vexillationes of the TV Scythica and VI Ferrata were serving with Cestius
Gallus.
190. MacMullen, Soldier and Civilian, pp. 77-78.
191. Ъо ж, Limits of Empire, pp. 139-40.
192. Keppie, Making of the Roman Army, pp. 192-94.
193. Forni, “ Estrazione etnica e sociale,” pp. 386-90.
194. Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 145; Bersanetti, Vespasiano, pp. 75-79. Also Birley, “A
Note on the Title Gemmaf 58.
195. Chilver, “The Army in Politics,” p. 35. Chilver notes that Vespasian did not pur
chase loyalty: his donatives were small, and there was no increase in pay.
196. Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” p. 189 (nos. 38, 51, 21, 32).
197. Ibid,, p. 165.
198. Davies, “Daily Life of the Roman Soldier,” p. 332.
199. Baradez, “ LesTherm es legionnaires de Gemellae,” p. 16.
200. Webster, The Roman Imperial Army, pp. 195-96, 251, 254.
201. Davies, “Medici of the Roman Armed Forces”; for standards, see p. 86.
202. Davies, “Joining the Roman Army,” pp. 208-13.
203. For basic training, see ibid., pp. 209-ю ; and Watson, The Roman Soldier, pp. 54
For an artillery range, see Davies, “The Romans at Burnswark,” pp. 107-8, no.
204. Breeze, “The Organization of the Legion,” p. 50.
205. ILS 2487, translated by Jones, History of Rome, 2:154-55. On professionalism, 1 I
Svrne, “ Hadrian the Intellectual.”
206. “Armorurn peritissimits et ret militaris scientissimus” in the Vita Hadriani ol SI I I,
Henderson, Life and Principate of the Emperor Hadrian, p. 171.
207. Weber, CAH 11:312 -13.
208. Watson, Roman Soldier, pp. 89-92. Also pp. 97-99 on other pay rates; pp. no 4 ..n
stoppages.
209. Wilkins, Roman Artillery, pp. 39-50.
210. Richmond, “Trajan’s Army,” p. 14.
211. There are no grounds to dissent from Cheesman, Aaxilia of the Roman lmptn.il
Army, p. 168, where 220,000 auxiliaries (possibly including nnmeri) are compared i<> 1 4 ,......
legionary troops.
212. Birley, “ M ae and (Abortes Milhariae," pp. ,,. 0 >.
 Notes to Pages /40-/55 24 '

213. Cf. Southern, “Numeri of the Roman Imperial Army.” Mann, “A Note on the
Numeri” p. 502. Cf. Form, “Contribute alia storia,” p. 25.
214. Speidel, “ Rise of Ethnic Units,” pp. 202-31.
215. That is, they were barbarians: ibid., pp. 505-6. In general, see Cheesman, Anxilia of
the Roman Imperial Army, pp. 85-90; Watson, The Roman Soldier, p. 16; Webster, The Roman
Imperial Army, pp. 749-50; Syme, CAH 77:132. For units in Britain, see Simpson, Britons and
the Roman Army, pp. 137-35, but cf. n. 2.
276. Watson, The Roman Soldier, p. 16.
217. Ibid., pp. 99-101. There are no data for the numeri, but given that legionary pay was
224 denarii per year; ala pay, 200; mounted cohors equitnta pay, 750; and foot auxiliary, too;
the mnneri might have received 75 or so.
278. Sherwin-White, Roman Citizenship, pp. 191-92.
219. Ibid., p. 275.
220. Mann, “A Note on the Numeri,” p. 505.
227. See the map (no. 40) opposite p. 216 in Schleiermacher, Der römische Limes.
111. Garzetti, L’Impero da Tiberio, p. 439.
223. Forni, “Contribute! alia storia,” p, 214.
224. Birley, “Alae and Cohortes Milliariaef p. 55.
225. Davies, “Cohortes Equitatae,” p. 752.
226. Cheesman, Anxilia of the Roman Imperial Army, Davies, “ Cohortes Equitatae,”
pp. 754-63; Davies, The Roman Imperial Army, p. 29.
227. Davies, The Roman Imperial Army, p. 29.
228. Rächet, Rome et les Berbères, pp. 796-200.
229. Baradez, “L ’Enciente de Tipasa,” pp. 75—77.
230. See the evidence in Birley, Marcus Aurelius, p. 165.
231. Regibus, La Monarchin militare, p. 108. There is a study of the vexillationes-. Saxer,
l liter'Hebungen zu den vexillationen.
232. iWattern, Rome and the Enemy, p. 97.
233. SHA, 72.13: “Dum Parthicum helium geritur, natum est Marcomanmcmn, quod din eo-
rurn qui aderant arte suspensum est.”
234. Birley, Marais Aurelius, p. 765; and Fitz, “ Réorganization militaire au début des
guerres marcomannes.”
235. ILS 9200, cited by Syme, САН 71:763.
236. Mann, “The Raising of New Legions,” p. 485.

chapter three : Defense-in-Depth

1. Not to be taken for granted. Syrian troops I saw in action in 1967 blundered into a
yully not far frotn their permanent garrison outpost.
2. Ferrill, Roman Imperial Grand Strategy, p. 44.
3. Isaac, Limits of Empire, p. 374.
4. Parker, The Roman Legions, p. 767. For the III Italien at Regensburg: Schönberger,
Roman Frontier in Germant7,” p. 172.
5. Whittaker, Frontiers of the Roman Empire, pp. 206-9.
6. F.g., Heather, “ Late Roman Art of Client Management”; also “ Holding the Line:
1 m i n i e r Defense and the Later Roman Empire,” in The Makers of Ancient Strategy,
IT- ■': 7 ' 4 6-
7. I ovey. Elements of Strategy, pp. 13 3- 34.
S. IhompMiii, l he Eiirly Germans, \>p. 140 40.
1/ Мл \ и ■■, " 1 l u ! hi 11\ 1 i ir I И I be К 0111,1 M N< ild i n p ; IS
 io. In southeastern Europe until llu- 1960s ami in Andean I ,atin America, high« a\ r
nients leading' to international borders were routinely left unpaved as a eounieiam .r.inn
measure.
it. Whittaker, F rontiers o f the R om an E m p ire ; and Isaac, L im its o f E m pire, in extenso.
1 2. Contra: Keppie, M a kin g o f the R om an A rm y , p. 191.
13. For the scarce siege-craft skills of barbarians: Thompson, A R om an R eform er an,I
Inventor, pp. 45-46.
14. Butler, “Defences of the Fourth-Century Fortress at York,” p. 97.
15. Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the North-Western Roman Empire,” p. 197.
16. Ibid., pp. 194-95.
17. Butler, “Defences of the Fourth-Century Fortress at York,” p. 97.
18. Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the North-Western Roman Empire,” p. 193, nme,
that Franks and Alamanni “very seldom tried a siege.”
19. Ct. Whittaker, Frontiers o f the R om an E m pire, p. 196, citing Blocklev, The Fragt» ni
tary Classicizing H istorians o f the L a te r R om an E m pire, pp. 250-32.
20. Thompson, The E arly G erm ans, pp. 133-34.
21. Isaac, L im its o f E m p ire , p. 254, confirmed the strategic shift he elsewhere denied
“The fact that the Adesopotamian cities were fortified on a massive scale implies that
Diocletian and his successors gave up any notion of protecting the countryside against majoi
raids.”
22. By the invention of a new grand strategy; see Luttwak, The G rand Strategy o f the
B yzantine E m pire, ch. 1.
23. The sources are poor; see Birley, M arcus A urelius, pp. 223-45, 283-86, and 11. 24.
24. See Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” pp. 171-72.
25. Birley, M arcus A urelius, p. 165, based on (the ever-dubious) SHA, Vita M a rti, 12.1
26. Oates, Studies in the A n cien t H istory, pp. 72-73; Magic, R om an Rule, pp. 1:660-63.
27. Demougeot, L a F orm ation de PEurope, pp. 215-29; Fitz, “ Military History of Pan
nonia,” pp. 32-36; Oliva, Panuonia, pp. 260-78.
28. Parker, The R om an Legions, pp. 116 -17. See also Mann, “The Raising of New l.c
gions,” pp. 486-89.
29. Brusin, “Le Difese della romana aquileia,” p. 87; Degrassi, l l Confine nord-orientalc,
p. U j.
30. Oliva, Pannoniu, pp. 96-113; V ita M a r a , 21.6-8.
31. Romanelli, “ I.'esercito Romano,” p. 65; cf. Parker, The R om an Legions, p. 168.
32. Demougeot, La F orm ation de PEurope, pp. 220-24; Birley, M arcus Aurelius,
pp. 2 33-45.
33. Demougeot, La Form ation de PEurope, pp. 224-27; Birley, M arcus A urelius, pp. 272
86 and passim.
34. Demougeot, L a F orm ation de PEurope, p. 216, citing Dio, 42.3.1. Weber, Cambridge
A n cien t H istory (hereafter ; C A H ) 11:352, amends this to read 6,000 survivors of a larger initial
force. Background: Oliva, Pannoniu , pp. 299-304. Contra: S H A , V ita M arci, 24.5; cf. Weber,
C A H 11:355, 362.
35. Demougeot, I.a F orm ation de PEurope, p. 395. On Goth attacks in general, see ibid.,
pp. 393-433; and Bury, Invasion o f Europe, pp. 3-22.
36. Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” pp. 176-77.
37. Demougeot, L a F orm ation de PEurope, pp. 521-32; Schönberger, “Roman Frontier in
Germany,” pp. 177-79.
38. Frere, B rita n n ia , pp. 188-89.
 Л nil's ln I ',/t'r \ I (iS I ' I(

(г;. I Vinniigrnt, L a Formation de /'Europe, pp. 419 28; Altoldi, CAH 11:147 5° ' Stan,
Unman imperial Navy, pp. 194-96.
.p>. Demougeot, La Form ation de l'E urope , p. 419.
41. Alföldi, C A H 11:148.

и и д вн ти п гти
42. Millar, “ P. Herennius Dexippus,” pp. 26-27.
4P Thompson, “Athenian Twilight,” pp. 61-65.
44. Frere, B rita n n ia , pp. 188-89, 338, and passim. On the comes and his command, see
ibid., pp. 212, 229.
45. Alföldi, С А Н 12:149; Bury, Invasion o f Europe, p. 22.
46. Christensen, L 'lra n sous les Sassanides , pp. 84-96.
47. Oates, Studies in the A n cien t H istory, p. 93; Miller, C A H 12:16-17; Besnier, L'E tnpire
Iiniiain, pp. 24-25.
48. Wolski, L 'E m p ire Arsacid.
49. Christensen, L 'lra n sous les Sassanides, pp. 97-98.
50. Dio 80.3, 4, cited in Millar, R om an N e a r East, p. 147.
51. Cited in Dodgeon and Lieu, R om an E astern F rontier a n d the Persian W ars, pp. 10 -11.
52. Ibid., p. 220.
53. Ibid., pp. 207-12.
54. Magie, R om an R ule, pp. 695—96; Oates, Studies in the A n cien t H istory, p. 74; Besnier,
L'Em pire rom ain, pp. 105-7.
55. Esslin, С А Н 12:86-88; Christensen, L 'lra n sous les Sassanides, pp. 130-31.
56. Besnier, L 'E m pire rom ain, pp. 151, 153, 177-78.
57. Millar, R om an N e a r E ast, p. 148. Also Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, pp. 159-72.
t ht the treaty of 298 C E , see ibid., pp. 172-74. Cf. Stein, Histoire du B as-E m pire, vol. 1, pt. 1 ,
pp. 79-80, where the date is given as 297 CE. On the treaty of 363 C E , see Seston, Dioclétien
et la tétrarchie, p. 171.
58. Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” p. 175, described the attacks as “a de-
cisive point in the history of Upper Germany and Raetia.”
59. Ibid., p. 176.
60. On the Carpi, see Demougeot, La Formation de l'Europe, pp. 437-39. On the Goths,
see Musset, Les Invasions, pp. 80-82. On the sequence of events, see Demougeot, La Forma­
tion de l'Europe, pp. 409-11.
61. Demougeot, L a F orm ation de l'Europe, p. 412.
62. On Dacia, see ibid., pp. 434-42; on Goth victories after 250, see ibid., pp. 416-25; on
1 he Franks until circa 260, see ibid., pp. 465-89; on Shapur’s threat to eastern Anatolia, see
Besnier, L 'E m pire ro m a in , p. 178.
63. Demougeot, L a F orm ation de l'Europe, p. 466.
64. Millar, R om an N e a r East, p. 179, citing F ragm enta H istoncorum G raecorum 4.189;
Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, pp. 173-74.
65. Mann, “ Frontiers of the Principate,” pp. 524-25; his thesis is here controverted in
extenso.
66. Demougeot, La Formatton de l'Europe, pp. 434-42, 452-57; and Daicoviciu, La Tran­
sylvanie, pp. 165-87. Also Manni, L'Impero di Galliern, pp. 26-31, where each phase is
distinguished.
67. Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” pp. 176-77.
68. Mann, “ Frontiers of the Principate,” p. 529.
69. Lesquier, L 'Arm ée rom aine, pp. 474-77.
70. Thompson, Visigoths, pp. 3-6.
 Ante* fo l ’aor* I A /A'

71. Ibid., pp. 10-12; on the strategy, see Stein, Histoire da Bas Empire, pp. 1jS .’9.
72. Rächet, Rome et les Berbères, pp. 238-50, 252-54.
73. Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, p. 119, n. 1.
74. Ibid., pp. 117-20; Rächet, Rome et les Berbères, pp. 254-56.
75. W arm ington, North African Provinces, p. 8; also Seston, Dioclétien et la tel rai ihn,
pp. 116-17.
76. Rächet, Rome et les Berbères, p. 258; Euzennat, “ Limes de Volubilis,” pp. 198-90.
77. Lesquier, L’Armée romaine, pp. 474-77; Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, p. 158.
78. Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, pp. 168-74; Stein, Histoire du Bas-Empire, p. 80.
79. G ichon, “ T he Negev Frontier,” pp. 49-50; Johnson, Late Roman Fortifications,
p. 198.
80. Gichon, “ T he Negev Frontier,” 53 and passim.
81. Isaac, The Limits of Empire, pp. 128-29, citin g Rothenberg in Roman Frontier Studie*
(1967).
82. Graf, “ Rome and the Saracens.”
83. Gichon, “45 Years o f Research.”
84. Davies, “ The D aily L ife o f the Roman Soldier,” p. 326; Petrikovits, “ Fortifications
in the North-W estern Roman Empire,” p. 188.
85. Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” p. 178; Mertens and Leva, “ Le Fortin
de Braives.”
86. Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the North-W estern Roman Empire,” p. 188.
87. Ibid., p. 189.
88. Demougeot, La Formation de VFurope, p. 497. There were also sea raids.
89. Ibid., p. 498.
90. Besnier, L’Empire romain, pp. 180-81, n. 234.
91. M in or, “ Brigand, Insurrectionist and Separatist Movements,” pp. 118-22.
92. Noted as a trend in fort design in Johnson, Late Roman Fortifications, p. 242; Petriko
vits, “ Fortifications in the North-Western Roman Empire,” p. 193.
93. Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, pp. 178-79 and map opposite p. 374; but cf. map 1,
opposite p. 130, in Berchem, L’Armée de Dioclétien.
94. As recommended by Vegetius, which was noted in Johnson, Late Roman Fortifiai
fions, p. 31; P etrikovits, “ Fortifications in the N orth-W estern Roman Em pire,"
pp. 193-95.
95. Ibid., pp. 195-96.
96. As in Dinogetia-Garvan in Scythia; Condurachi, “ Neue Probleme and Ergebnisse,"
pp. 165-66.
97. Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the North-W estern Roman Empire,” p. 197.
98. Thompson, A Roman Reformer and Inventor, pp. 44-50.
99. Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the N orth-W estern Roman Empire,” p. 197; Ocl
mann, “ The Rhine Limes," pp. 87, 95.
too. Johnson, Late Roman Fortifications, p. 37, cited 3-4 meters, which he claimed was
more than double the thickness in previous periods.
to t. Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the N orth-W estern Roman Empire,” p. 197.
102. Florescu, “ Le Phases de construction.”
103. Frere, Britannia, pp. 342-59; and Butler, “ Defences o f the Fourth-C entury For
tress at York,” p. 97.
104. Richmond, The City Wall of Imperial Rome, p. 243; Corder, “ Reorganization o f the
Defences,” pp. 34-35.
 , \ t'! / \ t o I'./Ul'l i S !,//>

h -, \l.iI mIcii, <,i eefa/ud Roman h idlei v. pp. io, 9O.

I. •<< B it li mmhhI, / /■(■ <bl v II all ip l mjwrial l\n//n\ pp. 79 So; ( iordcr, “ Reorganization <>t
I ln I Iclcuccs," pp. ;6 (diagram).
i"7. I hompson,. I Rum,in Reformer mit! Inventor, pp. 4 ijtt.

r iE ir .t a n n iiir r g im iiin n .iiH

[öS. IVirikovits, " l i>rtil'icati(>ns in the North-Western Roman Empire,” p. T97.
iiKj. Laur-Bdart, “ Rate Limes from Basel to the Lake of Constance,” p. 57; Florescu,
I e Phases ile construction"; Oelmann, “The Rhine Limes,” p. 87.
I 10. Johnson, Lute Roman Fortifications, pp. 58-40.
lit. Petrikovits, “Fortifications in the North-Western Roman Empire,” pp. 198-99.
I [ 2. Gichon, “The Negev Frontier,” p. 52.
i 1 5. Johnson, fmte Roman Fortifications, pp. 44-70.
1 14. Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the North-W'estern Roman Empire,” pp. 199-201.
] 15. Ibid., pp. 201-3; Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” p. 182; Laur-Belart,
I ate Limes from Basel to the Lake of Constance,” p. 58. Cf. Gichon, “’Ehe Origin of the
I unes Palestinae,” pp. 180-81.
116. Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” p. 187, n. 346.
117. Ibid., p. 178.
1 18. E.g., Dio’s third-century views; Jones, History of Rome, p. 2:58.
1 19. Marcianopolis and Philippopolis resisted Cniva successfully; so did Salonika in
■ 76 CE.
120. Brusin, “ Le Difese della romana Aquileia,” p. 87.
121. Butler, “ Late Roman down Walls in Gaul,” p. 26.
122. Ibid.; Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the North-Western Roman Empire,” p. 189.
123. Demougeot, f.a Formation de l'Europe, pp. 485-88.
124. Re the Alamanni of 254, ibid., pp. 488-90; re the Franks, pp. 496-98. See also Butler,
“ Late Roman Town Walls in Gaul,” p. 26.
125. Butler, “Late Roman Tow n W alls in Gaul,” p. 40.
126. ! .alire msec in Renard, Hommages à Albert Grenier, p. 1:925.
127. Thompson, “Athenian Twilight,” p. 63.
128. Johnson, Late Roman Fortifications, p. 99; Butler, “ Late Roman down Walls in Gaul,”
p. 40.
ne). Laur-Belart, “ Late Limes from Basel to the Lake of Constance,” p. 56.
130. Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” p. 178, n. 286.
131. Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the North-Western Roman Empire,” p. 192, n. 30;
Bartolueci in Renard, Hommages à Albert Grenier, pp. 1:241-43.
132. Mac.Ylullen, Soldier and Givilian, pp. 79-80.
133. Cf. Mattinglv, “ Farmers and Frontiers,” pp. 141-43; Goodchild and Ward-Perkins,
''fames I'ripolitanus,” p. 84.
134. Petrikovits, “ Fortifications in the North-W'estern Roman Empire,” p. 191. Its
purpose is irrelevant; it could be done.
135. MacMullen, Soldier and Givilian, pp. 138-51.
136. Bereitem, L'Armée de Dioclétien, pp. 19-24; he dismisses SHA's Severus Alexander,
58.4, as anachronistic.
137. Cf. Stein, Histoire du Bas-Empire, p. 62, among others,
138. Seston, “ Du comitat/ts de Dioclétien,” p. 289.
139. MacMullen, Soldier and Givilian, pp. 1-22, 151-53, and n. 34.
140. Jones, Later Roman Empire, pp. 2:649, 650, 652-53. Cf. Clemente, “Xotitia Dignita-
tirm,” pp. 319-42.
 S o l l I to i n / h

141. M a z z a n u o , . Ispc lli s o a n h d e l q u a r t o srailn, |>|>. ^ 1 ;u.

142. Birley, “ Septimius Severus ami the Roman Arim.” (il. Smith, “Arnu Ri I...... .
PP- 489-500.
143. Isaac, Limits of Empire, pp. 208-13; and Isaac, “.Meaning' of the Terms Lune, ami
L.imitanei.”
144. Bereitem, L'Armée de Dioclétien, pp. 100-101, depicted the dux limitis as Becoming a
purely territorial commander, in charge of limes and limitanei, after the Constant iman
reforms.
145. Ibid., pp. 100-102.
146. MacMullen, Soldier und Civilian, 31. l53.
147. Ibid., paraphrased but reversed. Based on Goodchild and Ward-Perkins, “/.mu i
Tripolitanus,” pp. 94-95.
148. Goodchild and Ward-Perkins, “ Limes Tripolitanus,” p. 43, citing a Theodosian con
stitution (Cod. Tkeocl. 7.15.1).
149. Jones, l.ater Roman Empire, p. 2:663, based on Cod. Just. 1.27.2 (injones, p. ; : ,
11. 130).
150. Schönberger, “ Roman Frontier in Germany,” p. 187.
15a. Berchem, LAnnée de Dioclétien, pp. 91-92, 93. The evidence is from the Notifia Die,
nitatum, but Berchem dates it to Constantine.
152. Clemente, “ Notifia Dignitatum,” pp. 146-51. Others hold that the auxilia uric
smaller (300 men) and the ettuei much larger (1,200 men); Varady, “ New Evidence on Sonic
Problems,” p. 360. Also Clemente, “ Notifia Dignitatum,” p. 151, n. 58.
153. Berchem, I.Armée de Dioclétien, pp. 85, 89, toi.
154. “ Le legioni di frontiera avevano assunto tutti i peggiori attegiamenti degli imboscati d'oepu
tempo. . . . l'icini al nemico senza combatterlo, sedentari, oziosi, politiaruti.” Regibus, La Mon,11
chia militare, p. 63.
T55. For the Severan list, see Jones, Later Roman Empire, pp. 3:368-74, table 9.
156. Homo, Essai sur le règne de l'empereur Aurélien, p. 201, n. 9,
157. Cagnat, L'Armée romaine d'Afrique, pp. 159-61.
158. Summarized in Joncs, L.ater Roman Empire, pp. 3:379-80, table 15.
159. On numbers, ibid., pp. 2:681-82. Cf. Clemente, “Notifia Dignitatum,” pp. 146 56
The tetrarchic centuries may have been reduced to 60 nten; Birlev, “Hadrian’s Wall and If.
Neighbourhood,” p. 7.
160. Vegetius, r.20, 21. See Paschoud, Roma aeterna, pp. ito-18.
161. Marsden, Greek and Roman Artillery, p. 195.
162. Coussin, Les Armes romaines, pp. 480-92.
163. Isaac, “Meaning of the Terms Lûmes and Ldmitunei,” pp. 14 0 -14 1, and others dr.
agree; they depict Diocletian’s changes as merely incremental.
164. Berchem, L’Aimée de Dioclétien, p. 52; Petrikovits, “Fortifications in the Non h
Western Roman Empire,” p. 181. The policy was continued by Constantine; see ibid.,
p. 182; and Thompson, Visigoths, pp. 19-22.
165. Paneg. L.at. 9.18.4, as cited in Berchem, L’Armée de Dioclétien, p. 89. For Malalas, sec
ibid., p. 17.
166. Berchem, LArmée de Dioclétien, pp. 177-78; cf. ibid., pp. 3-6.
167. Ibid., pp. 26-27 and map following p. 130.
168. Seston, Dioclétien et lu tétrarchie, pp. 131-32.
169. Berchem, L’Armée de Dioclétien, pp. 69-71.
170. Jones, Later Roman Empire, p. 1:56.
 \ i i l l ' fil l'uec\ .'Il ] 1 '•I '

......................... ,«.ni№imnni.i.pni»,ii»i
171. l ins 11 .iiisIiii ination is a large subject; see the summaries in Jones, Lain Roman
I injure, pp. 1:61---68; Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, pp. 261-94; anl^ bereitem, “ L’Aiinonc
militaire dans l’empire romain.”
172. Smith, “Army Reforms,” pp. 492-96; and Birley, “ Septimius Severus and the Ro­
man Army,” pp. 63-65.
173. Jones, Later Roman Empire, pp. 2:308-12.
174. Including the uncertain IV Italica; Mann, “The Raising of New Legions,” p. 484.
175. Nischer, “Army Reforms of Diocletian and Constantine,” boldly estimated a
ia) percent increase from 34 to 68 units. Contra: Parker, “ Legions of Diocletian and Con-
1.mtine,” pp. 177-80. But Besnier, L'Empire romain, p. 304 and nn. 160 and 164, endorsed

.
\ 1scher, and Jones, Later Roman Empire, pp. 1:59-60, arrived at the same result.
176. Berchem, L'Armée de Dioclétien, pp. 15-17 and map opposite p. 150.
177. Ibid., pp. 24-26.
178. Jones, Later Roman Empire, p. 1:57.
179. Berchem, L'Armée de Dioclétien, pp. 90-93, endorsed byjones, Later Roman Empire,
I'- 1 :9 9 -
180. Berchem, L’Armée de Dioclétien, pp. 90-91.
1S1. On omet and auxiha under Constantine, see Jones, Later Roman Empire, pp. 1:99-100.
182. Berchem, L’Armée de Dioclétien, p. 85.
183. Ibid., pp. 101-2.
184. Southern and Dixon, Late Roman Army, p. 36 (if an inference can be drawn from a
1 (institution of 372; Cod. Theod. 7.22.8, as cited ibid., p. 102, n. 1).
185. As Zosiinus charged; Jones, Later Roman Empire, p. 2:609.
186. Berchem, L'Armée de Dioclétien, p. 93.
r87- Jones, Later Roman Empire, p. 3:378, table t2.
188. Vârady, “Additional Notes,” pp. 391-406.
189. Clemente, “Notifia Dignitatum,” p. 299, reproduced the list.
190. Alföldi, “ La Grande Crise,” p. 7.
191. Frank, Scholar Palatinae, pp. 17-26.
192. Speidel, Die Equités Singuläres August/.
193. Stein, Histoire du Bas Empire, pp. 1:57-58. Jones, Later Roman Empire, pp. 1:53-54,
2:636-40; Frank, Scholar Palatinae, pp. 33-41.
194. Frank, Scholae Palatinae, pp. 47-49. Cf. Jones, Later Roman Empire, p. 2:613.
195. Frank, Scholae Palatinae, pp. 52-53.
196. Durry, Les Cohortes Prétoriennes-, and Passerini, Coorti Pretorie, pp. 1-53.
197. Passerini, Coorti Pretorie, p. 44.
198. Ibid., p. 53.
199. Ibid., pp. 54-55, 61.
too. Reynolds, Vigiles ofAncient Rome.
201. Mann, “The Raising of New Legions,” n. 27; Birley, Marais Aurelius, p. 217.
202. Smith, “Armv Reforms,” p. 486, n. 28.
203. Ibid., n. i, for ancient, and p. 487,11. 33, for modern opinions.
204. Durry, Les Cohortes Prétoriennes, pp. 81-87, and table, p. 89, n. 4.
205. Birley, “ Septimius Severus and the Roman Army,” p. 65.
206. Platnauer, Life and Reign of the Emperor, pp. 162-63.
207. Alföldi, CAH 12:213.
208. Kern" II, The Fall of the Roman Empire, p. 32; and de Blois, Policy of the Emperor Gal-
henus, pp. 29-30.
 Note, In / I: •i

1 09. Alanni, l.'Impero di (lalhcuo, pp. 58 59; Kcgibus, I.,1 Man,11, In,1 wi/ilarc, pp. -S
Alföldi, CAH 12:216-18; Besnier, L'Empire romain, p. 190.
210. Parker, “Legions of Diocletian and Constantine,” p. 188.
211. Besnier, L'Empire romain, p. 190.
212. Stein, Histoire du Bas-Empire, p. 1:55 and p. 2:430, n. 216, citing Vegetius, 2.6, il.uni
to 260-290. Cf. Parker, “'Antiqua Legio of Vegetius.”
213. Alföldi, CAH 12:217.
214. Ibid., p. 216.
215. Paschoud, Roma aeterna, p. 117.
Eadie, “ Development of Roman Mailed Cavalry.”
216. Ibid., pp. 166 (Josephus) and 167; Coussin, Les Armes romaines, p. 479.
217. Ibid., p. 167.
218. Homo, Essai sur le règne de l ’empereur Aurélien, p. 88.
219. Eadie, “ Development of Roman Mailed Cavalry,” p. 170. Listed in the Notifia arc a
schola, a cuneus, and five équités of clilmnarii in the East, as well as one équités and the sagittal n
in the West.
220. Scston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, pp. 52-53. The date 298 should be 285. Cf. Besnier,
L ’Empire romain, pp. 277-78.
221. Jones, Later Roman Empire, pp. 1:55, 3:376, table 10.
222. Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, p. 299. Cf. Jones, Later Roman Empire, p. 1:53.
223. Jones, Later Roman Empire, p. 3:376, table 10.
224. Stein, Histoire du Bas-Empire, pp. 1:72-73. Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, pp. 302
7, differed in part: “L’armée des comitatenses du Bas-Empire est donc née d'une conception strate
gique de Gallien, dont le danger politique a etc supprime par Dioclétien et dont Constantin a perfa
tionné /'organization technique
225. Passerini, Coorti Pretorie, p. 57. Some Praetorians went to Mauretania with tIn-
Augustus Maximian in 296; cited by Seston, Dioclétien et la tétrarchie, p. 119, n. 1.
226. Berchcm, L ’Armée de Dioclétien, p. 107.
227. Mazzarino, “ L a n eia rii and Seston, “ Du comitatus de Dioclétien,” pp. 293-94.
228. Berchem, L ’Armée de Dioclétien, pp. 107-8. Cf. Jones, Later Roman Empire, pp. 1:51,
53. Nevertheless, Jones (p. 2:608) described the comitatus as “small.”
229. Nischer, “Army Reforms of Diocletian and Constantine.” Contra: Bavnes, “Three
Notes on the Reforms of Diocletian -and Constantine,” pp. 201-8.
230. Seston, “ Du comitatus de Dioclétien,” n. 246. Seston praised Berchem’s method bui
not his conclusions. Vârady, “ New Evidence on Some Problems,” n. 158, rejected tin-
method.
231. Berchem, “On Some Chapters of the Notifia Dignitätum,” p. 147.
232. Jones, latter Roman Empire, p. 3:379, table 15.
233. Ibid., p. 1:98. Cf. Stein, Histoire du Bas-Empire, p. 1:73, where the auxilia are attrih
uted to Diocletian.
234. Jones, Later Roman Empire, pp. 2:649-54.
235. Demougeot, De l’Unité à la division de l ’empire romain, p. 511.
236. Mazzarino, Stilicone, pp. 128-29.
237. Cf. table 3.1 data with Boak, Manpower Shortage, p. 91.
238. Birley, “ Septimius Severus and the Roman Army,” p. 78.
 \ o t c i h i l ’,h 'C \ n/ \<)

I' pilogllC
i. I hey ai r f11 si recorded in a law ol $65; Cod. Fheod., 8.1.10.
I’riscus, Ir. 8, 111 Iraymcuhi Ilistoncorum Graecorum. (. I Sherwin-White, Roman Citizen-
d'rfi. pp. 425- 68 and passim.

Appendix
1. Osgood and Fucker, Force, Order, and Justice, p. 3.
2. Ibid.
p See, for example, Bell, Edwards, and Wagner, Political Power, a compendium of defini-
1 mns in modern American political science. For a phenomenological study in historical per­
spective, see Jouvenel, Power. For a sociological orientation, see Emmet, Function, Purpose
and Powers. For an anthropological perspective, see Walter, Terror and Resistance, which is a
indy of Zulu political life under the kings.
4. Morgenthau, Politics among Nations, p. 26.
5. Bachrach and Baratz, Power and Poverty, pp. 17-38.
6. Ibid.
7. E.g., Dahl, Modern Political Analysis, pp. 39-54; Singer, “ Inter-Nation Influence”; and
I lolsti, International Politics, pp. 154-58.
8. Dahl, Modern Political Analysis, p. 4 ;.
9. For a notable exception, see Bachrach and Baratz, “Decisions and Non-Decisions,”
u here the distinction is made clear, and where it is pointed out that it is noncompliance with
the orders of the powerful that imposes on the latter the costs of using force.
10. It does not matter to whom, or to what groups, the “ownership” of the means of se­
curity (and the burden of providing the inputs) is attributed. Given full internal control, all
1 he resources of a society are available for appropriation by the ruling power, so that societal
costs not borne directly by the latter are still costs to it, at least in possible exactions forgone.
11. For the development of the concept of “suasion” and a description of the actual pro­
cesses resulting from the presence, display, or symbolic application of force, see Luttwak,
Political Uses of Sea Power. The context is naval, but the theory is generally applicable.
12. Blau, Exchange and Power in Social Life, compares power to status but then goes on to
treat it as capital— expendable capital. Cf. Parsons, “On the Concept of Political Power,”
pp. 256-57, where power is defined in terms comparable to money, which also suggests its
exhaustion by use.
13. I mean “rational” in the value-free sense of an ability to align ends and means in a way
intended to optimize the former, whatever they may be.
14. That is, to the Bachrach-Baratz definition mentioned above.
15. This admittedly excludes from consideration cases in w'hich the opponents seek neg­
ative values, for example, glorious martyrdom, as well as cases in which the opponents have no
values vulnerable to attack, or at least no values that are attack-worthy.
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UNPUBLISHED WORKS

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COLLECTIVE WORKS
Congresses o f Roman Frontier Studies (in Chronological Order)

[T h ird ] C o n g ress o f R o m a n F r o n t i e r S tu d ie s , /949. Edited by E ric B. Birley. Durham: Durham

University Registrar, 1952.
C a r n u n t in a : E rg e b n is s e d e r F o rs c h u n g ü b e r d ie G r e n z p r o v in z e n des rö m isch en R eich es, V o rträ g e
1955. Edited bv Furich
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Swoboda. Römische Forschungen in Niederösterreich, vol. 3. Graz and Cologne: H e r­
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L im e s R o m a n u s K o n fe r e n z , N i t r a . Slovenskej Akademie vied Bratislava. Bratislava: Slovenskej
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Q u in tu s C o n g ressu s I n t e r n a t io n a lis L i m i t is R o m a n i S tu d io s o r u m [F ifth Congress]. Acta et D is-
sertationes Archaeologicae. Zagreb: Arheoloski Radovi i Rasprave I II , 1963.
C o ro lla M e m o r ia e E r i c h S w o b o d a D e d ic a ta . Römische Forschungen in Niederösterreich, vol.
5. Graz and Cologne: Hermann Böhlaus Nach!'., 1966.
S t u d ie n z u d e n M ili t ä r g r e n z e n R o m s: V o rträ g e des 6. I n t e r n a t io n a le n L im e s K o n g resses in S i i d -
d e u tsch la n d . Beihefte der Bonner Jahrbücher, vol. 19. Cologne and Graz: Böhlau, 1967.
[7th Congress]. Tel Aviv: Students Organization, 1971.
R o m a n F r o n t i e r S tu d ie s , 1 9 6 7
 . ......................... . .................-p.-frf,
( ) t h e r s ( l)\ I .diteir o r l 'il l e)

Applebaum, Shimon, ami Giehon, Alordechai, eds. Is ra e l a n d H e r I le iu it y m the R o m a n n u l

B y z a n t in e P erio d s. I'd Aviv. Tel Aviv University Press, 1967.
Bell, Roderick, Edwards, David V., and Wagner, Harrison, eds. P o lit ic a l Pover: A R e a d e r in
T h e o r y a n d R esea rch . New York: Free Press, 1969.
Bihaw, Jacqueline, ed. H o m m a g e s à M a r c e l R e n a r d . 5 vols. Collection Latoinus, vol. 102.
Brussels: Latomus, 1969.
Brisson, Jean-Paul, ed. P ro b lè m e s d e la g u e r r e à R o m e . Ecole pratique des hautes études-
Sorbonne 6 section: Sciences économiques et sociales. Centre de recherches historiques
civilisations et sociétés. 12. Paris and The Hague: Mouton and Co., 1969.
Butler, Ronald AL, ed. S o ld ie r a m i C iv ilia n in R o m a n Y o rk sh ire: E ssa ys to C o m m e m o r a te the
N in e te e n th C e n t e n a r y o f the F o u n d a tio n o f Y ork. Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1971.
C a m b r id g e A n c ie n t H isto ry . Gen. ed. John B. Bury. Vols. 10, n , 12. Cambridge: A t the U niver­
sity Press, 1934-1959.
Caprino, C., C o lin i, A. AL, G atti, CL, Pallottino, AI., and Romanelli, P. L a C o lo n n a d i M a rc o
A iir e lio . Rome: L ’Enna di Bretschneider, 1955.
Centre National tie la Recherche Scientifique. L e s E m p e r e u r s r o m a in s d 'E s p a g n e . Colloques
internationaux du centre national de la recherche scientifique. Paris: Editions du centre
national de la recherche scientifique, 1965.
Chevallier, Raymond, ed. M é la n g e s d 'a rch éo lo g ie et d 'h is to ire o ffe r ts à A n d r é P ig a n io l. Ecole
pratique des hautes études— V ie Section Centre de recherches historiques. 5 vols.
Paris: S.F.V.P.E.N., L966.
Grimes, W. F., ed. A sp ects o f A rc h a e o lo g y in B r it a in a n d B e y o n d : E ssa ys P re s e n te d to O. ( i. S .
C r a n fo r d . London: H . W. Edwards, 1951.
Howard, AL, ed. T h e T h e o ry a n d P ra c tic e o f W a r: E ssa ys P re s e n te d to C a p ta in B . I I . L id d e ll H a rt.
London: Cassell, 1965.
M e la n g e s M a r c e l D i i r r y : R e v u e des étu d es la tin e s. Vol. 47 bis. Paris: Soc. d’édition Les Belles
Lettres, 1969.
M illa r, Fergus, Berciu, D., Frye, Richard N., Kossack, Georg, and Rice, Tamara Talbot.
T h e R o m a n E m p ir e a n d Its N e ig h b o u rs . London: \ Lei Jen leid and Nicolson, 1967.
P ro c e e d in g s o f the X I I I I n t e r n a t io n a l C o n g re ss o f B y z a n t in e S tu d ie s . Edited by J. M . I lussey, D.
Obolensky, and S. Runciman. Oxford: A t the Clarendon Press, 1967.
Renard, Marcel, ed. H o m m a g e s à A lb e r t G r e n ie r . 3 vols. Collection Latoinus, vol. 58. Brussels:
Latomus, 1962.
Schafer, Peter, ed. T h e B a r K o k h b a W a r R e c o n s id e re d : N eve P e rs p e c tiv e s on the S e c o n d J e w is h
R e v o lt a g a in s t R o m e . Tubingen: M o h r Siebeck, 2003.
Tem porini, Hildegard, ed. A u fs t ie g u n d N ie d e r g a n g d e r R ö m isch en W e h : G esch ich te a n d K u lt u r
R o m s in S p ie g e l d e r n e u e re n F o rs c h u n g [A X R W j. Berlin: W alter de G ruyter, 1974.

SELECTED REVIEWS OF THE FIRST EDITION

Badian, E. “ In Defense o f Empire.” N e w Y o rk R e v ie w o f Books. June 23, 1977.

Birlev, A. R. C la s sic a l R e v ie w 29 (1979): 181.
Brisson, J. P. I.a to m u s (1979): 772—73.
Broche, B. C o m m e n t a r y M a g a z in e , September 1, 1977.
Brunt, P. A. “ Power and Pax Romana.” T im e s L it e r a r y S u p p le m e n t, February 10, 1978.
Cohen, E. P o litic a l Sc ien ce Q u a r t e r ly 93 (1978): 174-75.
Gruen, E. J o u r n a l o f In te r d is c ip lin a r y H is to r y 8 (1978): 563-66.
Ill''' I 1 I - .■ . I I ■ ( I tj 0) 1 [ 4.
I ...... 1 /.••,-<;.//.•/ Uihi.ii y lh>iniy 70 (April 2006): 353-6*.
I 1 I I " i *r m i i t n i s m m u ! A n c i e n t F o r e i g n Relatio ns.” Classical J o u r n a l 9 7 (2002):

: ■ ’' I
\ l i' M u l l e n , K . lin e m a n H istorical Review 82 ( 1 9 7 7 ) : 9 3 0 - 3 1 .
Mum, I ( . i'm u T , Force and the Frontiers o f the E .m p i r e C J o i i r n a l o f R o m a n S t u d ie s 6 9
1 11 1 an. 1 83.
M .u slu ll, \. Queen's Q uarterly.
M o r g a n . A l . Ci . Classical W orld 7 1 (1978): 4 8 5 -8 6 .
Ward, A. Al. elnnals of the A m erican A cadem y o f Political m id Social Science 434 (1977): 222-23.
Wells, C . ,\I. A m erican J o u r n a l o f Philology 99 (1978): 527-29.
W ightm an, E. Al. Phoenix 32 (1978): 174-79.
W ilcoxon, G. D. M ilita ry A ffa ir s 41 (1977): 220-21.
Yavetz, Z. N e w Republic , May 21, 1977.
 Index

Page numbers in italics refer to maps, figures, and rabies.

Abgar XI, 173 artillery: airrobalhsta, 139; in legion, 1 j

Aelianus, Tiberius Plautius Silvanus, organization of, 42; in siege warf.in
102 47-48; wall defenses and, 187
Africa. See North Africa Asia Minor, raids on, r68
Agricola, Cn. Julius, 99 Athens: raids on, 168; wall circuit of, i<m
Agrippa L 40-41 Augusta Libanensis, 205, 208-9
Agrippa 11, 28, 41, 42, 125 Augustus, 6, 8, 18, 32, 53-54, 2-to
nine (cavalry wings), 11, 46, 47, 81, 142, Aurelian, 173, 183, 187, 212, 214
195-96, 202, 204-5 Aureolus, 212
Alamanni: incursions by, 183, 193; threat anxiha (auxiliary forces): as complementary
posed by, 168, 174-75, 177 to legionary forces, ri, 28, 44; in first and
Alexander, Severus, 169, 173 second centuries CE, /y; at Hadrian’s
Alexander the Great, 2 Wall, 81; local recruitment of, 18; in
Anatolia: annexation of, 127-28; colonies in, Lower Germany, 97; under principate,
18; provinces' of, 8, 20 195- reliability of, 44-45; structure and
Anatolian sector, 27, 59. See also Armenia; function of, 139-40; transformation
Cappadocia; Syria of, 199
annexations and retrocessions, 27, 40, 41, 53,
123-24, 127-30 Baquates, 178
Antiochus IV, 28, 33, 40, 41, 125, 126. See also barbarians. See specific peoples
Commagene Bar Kokhba, revolt of, 25
Antonine era, 59-60 Batavi, as client tribe, 21
Antonine system. See preclusive defense Bedriacum, battle of, 56, 57
strategy Berchem, Denis van, 195, 215
Antonine Wall, 100-101 Blemmyes, 179
Antony, 29, 33 Bohemia, offensive into, 54
Appian, The Foreign Wars, 107 borders. See frontiers
Aquileia, 167, 212 Bosporan state, 20
Archelaus, 32, 33, 40 Bowersock, G., 98
Ardashir I, 172, 173, 174 brigands, bands of (bagandae), 183, 192
Armenia: as buffer state, 24, 118-19, 121, Britain: client relationships in, 21, 42; as
131-32; conquest of, 59; Parthian invasion client state, 131; coastal defense of, 169;
of, 166; strategic role of, 8, 720; suzerainty expansion into, 99-100; invasion of, 9;
over, 1 24; I indates and, 9 legions in, 97, -
j o o ; wall frontiers of,
i o i

Arminins, 7, 35 704-5. See also Hadrian’s Wall

annv. S e c m 1 In,ii \ 11 nn •. 1 1<• i11«nr.), m 1 111.1 r\ butler states: Armenia as, 24, 118-19, 121;
units (JrglMJr,, -.pc* IIn ), I\<j1II.III .11 III\ ( Krhounc as, 126, 1 32; role of, 131-32
Ary.H'hU, H. Sec ,i!\n I’.n 1 In.1 r.niyiindl, 177
270 Index

Cappadocia: annexation ot, 40, 129; as client Constantine, 178, 205-6, 215, 216
kingdom, 8, 20, 27; security of, 118-19, Constantius I Chlorus, 148
121. See also Archelaus Corbulo, Cn. Domitius, 39, 43, 119. 121, 134
Carpi, 168, 174, 177 Cottian Alps, transit point of, 20
Carrhae, 8, 46-47, 173 Cotys III, 40
Carthaginians, 2 crisis of third century, 118, 151, /70-7/.
Carus, 173 See also defense-in-depth strategy
cavalry: alae. 11,4 6 ,4 7 ,8 1, 142, 195-96, 202, cuneu 199,206
204-5; in anxilia, /7; cohortes eqnitatae, 78, Cyrenaica, 8
80, 141-42; citnei, 199; disbanding of, 214;
in legions, /4; mobile, 212-13; organ­ Dacia: annexation of, 130; attack on Moesia,
ization ot, 42-43, 44, 45-46; tactics of, 58; as client state, 59; combat strength of,
46-47; vexilLttio, 213; weapons and armor 49; conquest of, i t i , 114, 115, 116 -1 7;
of, 213-14 deployment of legions in, 95-96; Limes
Cerialis, Q. Petilius, 45 Porolissensis, 115, 118, 141; provinces of,
Chatti, 103, 106-7, T37> L5L 166 114 -15, 177-78; relationship with, 110 -11
Cherusci, 21, 34, 35, 48 Dalmatia, 7, 9, 16-17
Cicero, 25 Danube: as border, 98, 102, no; bridge
Cilicia province, 128 across, 178; fortifications along, 103;
cities, defenses of, 192-95, 2421121 incursions along, 166-68; perimeter
Civilis, revolt of, 17, 44-45, 48, 57-58 between Rhine and, 103, 106; riparian
civil war: Augustus and, 54; Flavian army lands of, 7
policy following, 136—37; Julio-Claudians Decebalus, 58, 59, 110 - 11, 114, 130
and, 6, 10, 16; succession by, 146-47; Decius, 147, 158, 174, 200
tetrarchy and, 148; Vespasian and, 56-57, defense-in-depth strategy: adoption of,
126 15 1- 52; Augusta Libanensis, 208- 9;
Claudius, 9, 39-40, 41, 212 border troops in, 176; decline of, 202;
Claudius II, 147 Diocletian and, 202-5; fortifications in,
Clausewitzian approach to grand strategy, xv 152- 55, 182-85, 187, i88-8(j. 190-95;
client states: changes to system of, 67; German frontier, 1S6; goal of, 157-58,
creation of, 131; decline of system of, izt, 166; as inherently unstable, 158, 159, 166;
125-32; deployment of forces in, 50-51; operational methods of, /62-65; overview
hegemonic expansion and, 19-21; Jewish of, 149-50, 221-22; rearward defense ami,
War and, 126-27; management of, 28-29, 156-57; reliance on, 152; resilience of,
32-35, 38-42; provincial territories and, 157; shallow, 182, 202, 205; societal and
25-26; role in security system, 24-28, logistical costs of, 158-59, 194-95;
54-55, 219-20. See also specific states territorial losses and, 176-78; transition
coastal defense, 169 from shallow to deep, 205-6
cohortes eqnitatae (infantry units), 11, 46, 81, defensive systems: coastal, 169; connminica
141-42, 195-96,202, 204-5 tions, 69, 81, 155; cordon deployment,
colonies and strategic control, 18-19 77-78, 81, 83; elastic defense, 149, 150,
Comana, 20 /60-6/, 202; evaluation of, 67-68;
co/nitatenses (field forces), 206, 215, 216, fortresses, 137, 155-56; forward delense,
217-18, 219 86-8". 178, 179; garrisons and oporal mnal
Commagene, 20, 27, 40, 126 reserves, 74; hospitals, 1^7; linear ban in
Commodus, 146 74 75; as m u h d e and nl L u s i v e, OS /»«>, S,
 ^ ^ s ja ^ a ! ! a ^ s ! B a ! ^ c r 3 a ! |d d ^ l ? ^ a m g > ^ u ^ ^ u j q u j o g ^ j i i _ A q j 3 3 ^ J a A U 0 2 |
Index

80-82, 175-76; roads, 74, 127-28; scale I u p l i i H' 11■111! let*, 1 2 1 - 2 2

of, 178; tactical functions of, 75-77, I 1111 .|m l'>111 hi ,11 ions in, 183; managn 111 m
tranformation from hegemonic expan­ ■ • i l l ....... "I, n 34, 38-39; second-mu »m \
sionism to, 133, 137; watchtowers and 111 mi 11 1 . hi, 1 ! : /5; walled cities in,
outpost forts, 69. See also defense-in-dept h 111 mi
strategy; fortified strongholds; limes; I !.. V- I. ■ f
preclusive defense strategy ' si< Inil «11.•' and domestic instability,
degeneration thesis of border troops, 195 *\ G ^75
Deiotarus, 25, 28
deterrence, use of, 3-4 l l i m u "Mil 1 1<^-99
Dexippus, 168 Ih Id I...... (I"/ in h llc n s e s ) , 199, 215, 216,
Dio, 124 ■I 1•‘ ' I<;
Diocletian: abdication of, 149; as emperor, I L i s I .Ml ,0 ,S, 67 96 98 2 127-28
, - , I X,

148; military policy of, 151, 202-5, 2 14 1s ; I.... in d ■ 11 muj>holds: defense-in-depth

Persia and, 176, 179 Ml II' r \ ami. i s - -55, 182-85, 187, 1 8 8 - 8 9 ,
Dobruja, 115, 169, 174 0 r- defensible hard points, 190;
domestic instability and external attack, d> pl"\ nu ni ni forces at, 187, 190;
147-48,169,175 1 >i<" 1«11 an and, 202-3; earlier forts
Domitian: Dacia and, i n ; deployment of .....I......Ii", ns -56; fighting towers of,
forces and, 50; as emperor, 58; German r ni ■. 111, io<) 91; ground plans of,
campaign of, 103; guards of, 210; limes on i S j s,, no uiicr defense structure, 185;
Taunus Mountains, 106; North African Imi1|mr.c «>i, no 92; siting of, 184; support
campaign of, 49; Saturninus and, 136 lioiu. i ,' s y, tactical functions of, 153—55.
dynasties, individual character in, 29, 32 vw1 a/wi 1<.,id loris
loi waid dvIHIM', 156, /64-65, 178, 179
East: deployment of legions in, 94-95; I o , ..ii mu \11 k ae: barriers of, 76; description
forward defense system in, 179; incursions of. no, iii.nim nance of, 198; outpost forts,
along frontier of, 166; under Julio- (><), [Mi l I X I SC o f , K 8 —8 9

Claudians, 50-37; legions recruited in, E1.ink., l i n e a l piiscd by, 168, 174-75
135; management of clients of, 33—34, 40; In im 1, a-, ( l i e n ) t r i b e , 2 I

policy of Trajan in, 118-19, 121-25; h o m ie r, absence of perimeter defense, 19;

reorganization of under Vespasian, m I n u a m . n>_f -5 ; Danube as, 98, 102, no,
127-29; Roman, /23; seaborne incursions ion oS; dcfense-in-depth, 762-63,
in, 168 d e f e n s e o f , i \ $-44, 216-17; demarcation

Eburacum, fortress of, 155, 190 o f , 6 y 66 67; elastic defense, 149, 150,

Edessa, 173 t(u> 6 / , i n Europe, 772-75; forward

Egypt: fortifications in, 203; frontiers in, 177; d e f e n s e , /64-65; in Germany, 1 0 8 - y , 177,

military forces in, 17, 96; as province, 8; /<V6; “1in isible," of client relationships,
retreat from, 179 20-21; models of organization of, 70-77,
elastic defense, 149, 150, 160-61, 202 72-75; in Nabatean Arabia, 121 ; policy
emperor: as chosen by Senate, 58-59; toward, 107, no, 114-15; rectification
protection for, 2 10 -11; succession of, campaigns along, 58, 102, 103; reorganiza­
146-47, 148-49, 175. See also tetrarchies; tion of, 175-79, 1 8 0 — 8 i \ rivers as, 101-2;
specific emperors “scientific,” 66, 99-100, 122, 132; in second
empire: hegemonic, 29; models of, 22-25; century, 64-65; strategic dimension o f
superiorit v of, origins of, 2; territorial, 25 defense of, 89-91, 94-10y n>6 7, in« 11,
 h/,lr\

frontiers {cont.) lot; strategic withdrawal iroin provinces

114-15, 118-19, 121-25; tactical dimension by, 124
of defense of, 67-69, 74-78, 80-85, 88-89; Hadrian’s Wall: Antonine Wall compared to,
Taunus Mountain, 106-7; in third century, 100; barrier elements of, 79; deployment
176-79; troops along, 195-99. See also of forces at, 80, 81-82; description of, 66,
fortified strongholds; Khabur-Jebel 75-76; location of, 98; purpose of, 77;
Sinjar-Tigris line; Rhine rampart walk of, 74; turrets along, 69;
frontier troops (limitanei), 195-99, 201, 202, vallum of, 76-77
216-17, 219 hegemonic empire, 22, 29
Frontinus, Strategemata, 43, 45, 103, 139 hegemonic expansionism: East under
Julio-Claudians, 30-5/; geographic limits
Gaius (Caligula), 9, 39, 40-41 of, 49-50; overview of, 4-5, 10 -11, 16-19,
Gaius Marius, 42 53-55, 219-20; strategic deployment of
Galatia, 8, 25, 28, 128 forces, 50—53; tactical organization of
Galba (emperor), 56 army, 42-50; transformation to preclusive
Galba, S. Sulpicius, 10 defense from, 133, 137. See also client states
Galerius, 148, 173, 176, 179 Hermunduri, as client tribe, 21, 39
Gallienus, 183, 212, 213 Herod, 32, 33
Galius, C. Cestius, 134-35 Herodian, 172
Gaul: coastal defense of, 169; provinces of, Heruli, 168, 175
6-7; revolts in, 18; walled cities in, 192,
T93 Iazyges, 21, no, in , 166
gentiles, 195 Iberia, 179
geography: of empire, and deployment of Illyricum, revolt in, 7, 18, 220. See also
forces, 51-52, 91; of hegemonic expansion, Maroboduus; Pannonian revolt
49-50; Roman knowledge of, 54, 98 infantry: in auxilia, 75; classes of, 42-43;
Gepids, 175 cohortes equitatae, 11,4 6 ,8 1, 141-42,
Germanicus, 45, 48 195-96, 202, 204-5; lanciarii, 215; missiles
Germany: in first century, 36-57; frontiers of, 47; tactics of, 46
in, ioS-y, 177, i86\ incursions into, 7; insurgency, internal, control of, 18
legions in, 56; management of client tribes Israel, 85, 88, 197
in, 38-40. See also Lower Germany; Upper Italy, 7, 16, 183
Germany Ituraea, 40, 41
Gordian III, 148, 173 Iuthungi, 177, 183
Goths: siege technology of, 156; threat posed
by, 168, 169, 174, 175 Jewish War, 18, 57, 125-26
grand strategy: reaction to reviews of, xi-xii; Josephus, The Jewish War, 4, 28, 41, 125,
reviews of first edition on, ix-xi; Roman G 2- 33’ G 5. 213
achievement in, xv; succession of three, Journal of Roman Studies, review in, xi
ix. See also defense-in-depth strategy; Juba II, 20
hegemonic expansionism; preclusive Judea: as client kingdom, 8; defeat of Galius
defense strategy in, 134-35; Flavian cause in, 57; as
Greece, raids on, 168 province, 20, 53
Julio-Claudian system: East under, 30-91;
Hadrian: army of, 138-39, 140; as emperor, efficiency of, 84; elements of, 118; overview
59, 146; frontier fortifications of, 63, 66, of, 6-10, 219-20; post-Flavian system
 tr.i,

< ( )111| ).n <•(! 11 >, 8 ; S .| . S i r <//'" I I u 111 -.1 ,il < V .1111 .h ..
hegemonic i'\jt.msunusm \ I .nil r| .1111.1 .1 . < li rn l I-. 1M|'d< hu , 8 . ■ ■ <),
Julius ( laesar, 6, iS, j i f 1(ml id \ in . 1 ' , 1.1 u f. m , 1 ;N, w .11 1.11 < in , ,
jus posiliminii and client slates, i<; :o A la u n , I 78
Justinian, 198 Maximian, 148, 178 79
Mesi){)otamia, 66, 172, 17}, 176 77
Kaegi, Walter K., xii military-agricultural colonics, 197
Khabur-Jehel Sinjar-Lake Van line, 173 military history, views of, xii, xvi
Khabur-Jebel Sinjar-Tigris line, 66, 121-22, military power, definition of, 223
124-25,147,172,176-77 military units (legions): along borders,
kings, client, 24, 226, 228. See also specific 89-91, 95, 97, 128-29;in Britain, 80,
kings 81-82; camps of, 17; in client states, 28-29,
34, 50-53; decline of, 200-202; Diocletian
lanciarii, 215 and, 204; equipment of, 139; in first and
Langobardi, 167 second centuries, /4, 16-17, !9> functions
leadership: integrity of, 146-47, 148-49, 175; of, 195, 204-5; in Germanies, 56; marching
military, 1, 196, 197-98, 199, 206-7 camps of, 60-62; at Masada, 3-4; numbers
legions. See military units (legions); military and manpower of, 10 -11; pay and upkeep
units (legions, specific) for, 16; in provinces, 94-98; raising of,
Levant, 1 2 1 - 2 2 211; reorganization of follow ing civil war,
limes: as defended frontier, 66; definition of, 16; shortage of men for, 11, 16; tactical
19; “open,” 85; provincial forces and, 203; organization of, 42-50; tax collection and,
of Raetia, 74, 82; role of, 84 7; territorialization of, 142-43, 147-48; in
Limes Porolissensis, 115, 118, 141 third century, 199-200; transformation of,
Limes Tripolitanus, 194 199; vexillationes, 143-44, 175, 202, 204-5
limitand (frontier troops), 195-99, 201, 202, military units (legions, specific): I Adiutrix,
216-17, 219 56, 102, 136; II Adiutrix, 136, 143; V
Livy, 47 Alaudae, 44, 236n93, 239ni8i; XV
Lower Germany: auxiliary troops in, 97; Apollinaris, 25, 119, 125; III Augusta, 26,
calvary deployed in, 80; as client state, 131; 137, 142; V III Augusta, 102, 20T; XI
legions in, 97; military command for, 7. Claudia, 102, 178, 190; VII Claudia Pia
See also Germany; Upper Germany Fidelis, 2 36n9o; III Cyrenaica, 96; XXII
Lucius Verus, 59, 143, 146 Deiotariana, 28, 96; V I Ferrata, 25, 96,
Lvcia, 20 119, 134, 200; IV Flavia Felix, 96, 136;
XV I Flavia Firma, 121, 136; I Flavia
Macedonia, 7, 168 Minerva, 236n93; X Fretensis, 25, 96, 125,
Malalas, 203 134, 182; XII Fulminata, 121, 125, 129,
Malchus, 28, 125 134, 135; III Gallica, no, 119, 125, 134;
Marcellinus, Ammainus, 185 XVI Gallica, 44, 136; XIII Gemina, 43,
marching camp metaphor, 62-63 114, 115, 199; XIVGem ina, 102, 137; VI!
Marcomanni: as client tribe, 21, 38, 39; Gemina ex Glabiana, 136; I Germanica,
Dacia and, m ; incursions by, 166-67; 44, 136; II Herculia, 178; IX Hispana, 26;
offensive against, 7; revolt by, 143 I Italics, 125; II Italica, 95, 145, 151, 167.
Marcus Aurelius, 59, 143-44, 146, 167, 212 211; III Italica, 82, 95, 145, 151, 167, 211,
Maroboduus, 33, 39, 52, 53 IV Maeedonica, 44, 136; V Maeedonu .1.
Masada, siege of, 3—4, 26 25, 125, 143, 199; 1 Minervia, 143, 201, • u .
■ /1 In ,It \

imlitarv units (legions, specific) Unj/f.) palatini (palate t n ><>| .■ 1

I Parthica, 172, 211; II Parthica, 2 1i; III Palestine, 205
Parrhica, 172, 200, 211; X V Primigenia, Palmyra, 214
44, 136; X XII Primigenia, 200-201; XXI Pannonia, 8, 167
Rapax, 137; IV Scythica, 119; II Traiana, Pannonian revolt, 7, 17, 52-53
178, 2z 1; X X X Ulpia, 211; X X X Ulpia Parthamaspates, 124, 127, 131, 132
Victrix, 201, 236093; X X Valeria Victrix, Parthia: Armenia and, 118, 166; combat
81; V I Victrix, 81 strength of, 49; defense against, 88; empire
military units (non-legionary): home guards of, and Roman Fast, /25; overthrow of,
and militias, 192; irregulars, 141; limitanei, 147, 169; threat posed by, 8, 18, 24-25,
195-99, 201, 202, 216-17, 219; numeri, 169, 172; vulnerability of, 172
14 0-4 1, 195; palatini, 219. See also alae; Parthian War: under Marcus Aurelius,
auxilia; Praetorian Guard 143-44, 212; under Nero, 9; under Trajan,
milites exploratores, 206 121-24
Mithridates, 41 Paterculus, Velleius, 45, 52
modern war, change in nature of, xv-xvi patron-client relationships in municipal life,
Moesia, 52, 58, 206 21, 24
perimeter defense, 19. See also limes
Nabatean Arabia: annexation of, 125, 128; Persia, 147, 169, 176
borders of, 121; as client state, 126; Philip the Arab, 148, 173
deployment of legions in, 96; Herod Pius, Antoninus, 59, 146
and, 32; as merchant state, 20 Pliny, 11, 20, h i
Napoleon, xii Polemo I, 33, 42
Nero, 9-10, 40, 56, 119, 125-26 Polemo II, 40, 41
Nerva, M. Cocceius, 58, 59, 146 political culture of aristocracy, xiii-xiv
Nobades, 179 Polybius, 42
Noricum, 7, 151 Pontus: annexation of, 127; as client state,
North Africa: combat strength of, 49; 20, 27; seaborne incursions into, 168;
provincial territories of, 8; raids in, 178; security of, 118-19
Tingitana, retreat in, 178-79; warfare in, Postumus, 147
25-26. See also Fossatum Africae power: dynamic energy of, 224-25; of
Notitia Dignitatum, 187, 200-201, 205, empire, 228; force and, 223-24, 226-27;
206-7, 2IO>2I4> 2I6 as perceptual process, 225-26, 227-28
nunieri, 140-41, 195 Praetorian Guard: Claudius and, 9;
Numidia, 88-89, 178 description of, 210; murders by, 56; Nero
and, 10; Nerva and, 59; Severus and, 211;
Obii, 167 succession and, 146
Octavian, 6, 29 preclusive defense strategy: army and,
Osrhoene: annexation of, 132; as buffer state, 132-44; client states and, 131; cost of,
126, 132; as client state, 127, 129; loss of, 158; Julio-Claudian system compared
173; suzerainty over, 124 to, 83-84; overview of, 96, 97-98,
Osroes, 122 220-21; Parthia in, 169, 172; reaction
Otho, M. Slavius, 56 to penetration of, 150-51; reversions
to, 157-58, 159; vulnerability of, 166,
Paetus, L. Caesennius, 119 173-74
Palaestina III (Salutaris), 182 principate, 6, 146, 195
 nqmcQ d d llA q p ^ ü sÄ u Q S I
provincial te r r i t o r i e s : ol , \< u 11j Mi n .1. s I
security oi, 25-26, 157; sii .11 rpii wiili nnlliM 1 1 ' ill' . Oil

drawal from, 124; taxation of, >S; of m d h .1 m ni ni . 1 1» ;• mi 1 1 1 1 1 1 111

tetrarchy, i So -~Hi \ troops deployed 111. ( 11•:■ Hui'., \pn (III ). i n 1 11 ( .( f \ in

/99-207. See also annexations and (non ley.i< n u i \ )

retrocessions; fortified strongholds; Rnmam/ai n m. .is pnhi K .11 i l ' >n<

spécifie provinces Rnxolani, 1 m, 1 >1

Rufus, ( 7 Velum i Id
Ouadi; as clienrtribe, 21, 38, 39; Dacia and, rural settlements, drlriiM'nl, m| m
111; incursions by, 166-67
//tinilnh/irgin/n, 182, 190 sacer comitatns, 21 s
Sarmatians: in Banat, 177, 1 /S, 1 <>jn)>.>j
Kactia: defense of, 151; limes of, 74, 82; strength ot, 49; Dacia and. u.| m.
palisades and fences of, 76; as province, 7 Diocletian anti, 203; suppicssioh nl, 10 .
rearward defense, 156-57 threatposed bv, 16X. Seen/.»* Ia/\yc.
revolts: Bar Kokhba, 25; of Civilis, 17, 44-45, Sassanids: combat st rengi li nl, 49; ddr.ii nl
48, 57-58; Illyricum, 7, 18, 220; Marco- 179; Parthia and, 147. 169; siege rimmcs
manni, 143; native, within empire, 17-18; of, 185; threat posed by, 172 74
Pannonian, 7, 17, 52-53; ofTacfarinas, 18, Saturninus, L. Antonius, 58, m3, 1 11, 136
25- 26 Saxons, threat posed by, 168, 169
Rhine: as border, 98, 101; fortifications Scipio Africanus, 139
along, ro2-3; military force in sector, Scorpion Pass, 182
206-7: perimeter between Danube and, Scriptures liistoriae A u g it s it u \ 166 0 •, 1 <n>
103, 106 Scythia, 205-6
Rhoemetalces I, 26, 40, 53 seaborne incursions, 168-69
ripeuses (provincial forces), 199-207 security systems: for civil seennt \, s.| s ,.
road forts, 153—54, 182, 183, 191, 192 89; client states role in, 24- 28, v . 1,
Roman army: along borders, 195-99; as 1 25-32; complexity of, 3; cvaluai mn nl
career, 1; central field armies, 202, 206, 219-22; overview of, 4-5, 53 5^; p«m. 1
207, 210-18, 219; discipline of, 138; dual and, 223-24. See also defense m drpili
army structure, 21:5-17; economy of, strategy; frontiers; hegemonic <\p.i/r
t o ; elasticity of, 144-45; engineering ism;Julio-Claudian system; unlit.n \
campaigns of, 103, 133; estimates of size preclusive defense strategy
of, 216-17, 21 7; expeditionary corps, Segestes, 35
142-44; leadership of, 196, 197-98, 199, Senate, emperors chosen bv, -38
206-7: mobile field forces, 205-6; mobility Severus, A. Caecina, 52
of, 68-69, 78, 80-82,92-93, 175-76, Severus, Septimius: as emperor, 1 p,
212-13; numeric 140-41; pay for, 2410217; military policy of, 211, 217, P.u 1 in • »■>,(
political use of, 2, 3-4, rg, 34, 49-50, 172; recruitment and moral <>) 11
90; preparedness of, 132-36, 138-39; under, 204; in Scotland, 9, «■ u
provincial, 199-207; psychological use of, Shapur I, 157, 172, 173, 174 7-,
3, 61-62, 144; recruitment for, 140; Shapur II, 185
societal and logistical cost of, 21 8; siege technolog}', 156, 172 7;, is,
supervision of, 197-98; supplies required Sohaemus, 28, 125, 126
for, 153; supply of, by client states, 28; Sophene, 126, 127
tactical use of, 2-3, 141-42; transport Spain, occupation of, 6, 17
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Strata Diodetiana, 203, 205 Tiberius: annexation, taxes, and, 129; at
strategic mobility in Roman Empire, 92-93 death of Augustus, 8-9; diplomatic policx
strategic statecraft, 1, 4 ot, 35, 38, 39, 40; Germans and, 21;
strategic thought, dominant forms of, xv Pannonian revolt and, 52
strategy: definition of, 98; education in, Tingitana, retreat in, 178-79
xiii-xiv; as form of systematic group Tipasa, 142
thinking, xi-xii; as interred from action or Tiridates, 9, 119
inaction, xi; paradoxical logic of, xiii, 99, Titus, 58, 126
130-31, 157; views ot, xii-xiii. See also Trajan: conquest of Dacia by, no, 111, 114;
grand strategy death of, 124; as emperor, 59, 146; Parthian
subsidization, policy of, 38-39, 131 War of, 121-24; policy in East of, 124-25
succession, 146-47, 148-49, 175 Transcaucasia, 179
Suetonius: Augustus, 24; Domitum, 50; Gains, Transylvania, no, 114, 118, 177, 197
39; Nero, 119; Tiberius, 17; Vespasianus, 127,
129, 135 Upper Germany, 7, 76. See also Germany;
Suevi, 39. See also Marcomanni; Quadi Lower Germany
superiority ot empire, origins of, 2 Urban cohorts, 210-11
surveying techniques of Romans, xiii
survival of imperial power, 4, 5 Valens, 158
Syria: annexation ot, 127-28; in defense Valcntinian, 159
system, 118; military forces in, 51, 96, Valerian, 147, 157-58, 173
134-35; province, 8, 20; Sassanids and, Vandals, 175
172; Vespasian and, 57 Vannius, 39
Varian disaster, 18
Tabula Peutiiigeriana, 98 Varus, P. Quinetilius, 7, 10, 18, 35, 45
Tacfarinas, revolt of, 18, 25-26 Vegetius, 213
Tacitus: Agricola, 33, 103; Annals, 11, 16, 17, Vespasian: armv policies of, 136-37; client
18, 35, 38, 39, 43, 4j, 48, 52, 54, 96, 129, states and, 27, 126, 127-30; dynastic
126, 129, 134, 210; Germania, 25, 28-29, •ambition of, 58; as emperor, 56-57;
38, 103, 152; Histories, 17, 44, too, iio , military forces of, 125, 213; Praetorian
126-27, >3‘ cohorts and, 211; siege of Masada and, 4
tactics of forward defense, 86-8~ I'exillatiom's (detachments from legions),
Taifali, 177 143-44, U5> 202, 204-5
Taunus Mountain frontier, 106-7 Vindex, C. Julius, 9-10
taxation system, 149, 204 Visigoths, 177, 178
territorial empire, 2;, 176-77 Vitellius, Aldus, 56, 57, 211
tetrarchies, 20, 148-49, 180-81 Vologases I, 119, 121
Teucrid principality, 20
Thrace: as client kingdom, 7, 8, 20, 29; Goth Wales, 2351158
incursion into, 174; raids on, r68; warfare weapons, 1, 213-14. See also artillery; siege
in, 26 technology
threats to empire: by Alamanni, 168, 174-75,
177; by Franks, 168, 174-75; by Goths, Zenodorus, 33
168, 169, 174, 175; byParthia, 8, 18, 24-25, Zosimus, 216
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