campbell 2006 amjarchaeol110-2

7/27/2019 Campbell 2006 AmJArchaeol110-2

1/3

Writingon the Roman Army:Discharges and SiegecraftREVIEWARTICLE

DUNCAN B. CAMPBELLRoman Military Diplomas. Vol. 4, by MargaretRoxan and Paul Holder BICSSuppl. 82). Pp. xix+313, pls. 68. Institute of ClassicalStudies,Schoolof Advanced Study,Universityof London 2003.75. ISBN 0-900587-93-8 (paper).Documenting the Roman Army. Essays in

Honour of Margaret Roxan, edited by //.WilkesBICSSuppl. 81). Pp. xvii + 204, figs. 20,tables 17. Institute of Classical Studies, Schoolof Advanced Study,Universityof London 2003.45. ISBN 0-900587-92-X (paper).Athenaeus Mechanicus, On Machines, trans-lated with introduction and commentary byDavid Whitehead nd EH Blyth(Historia Einzel-shrift182). Pp. 236, figs. 23. Franz SteinerVerlag,

Stuttgart2004. 40. ISBN3-515-08532-7(paper).Two of the volumes under review here concern Ro-man military diplomas, those bronze diptychs, hingedand sealed, that conferred certain rights on the soldiersof auxiliary regiments. More than 180 were originallyassembled by the great German scholar Herbert Nessel-hauf in CIL16 (1936) and its supplement (1955). But itbecame the life's work of MargaretRoxan, who passedaway nJune 2003, to gather subsequent discoveries andpublish them in a standard format. Her RomanMilitaryDiplomas1954-1 9771 was originally envisaged as a provi-sional measure, pending the organization of a secondCILsupplement. But it was soon followed by RomanMili-taryDiplomas 978-1984,2 n which Roxan mooted the pos-sibility of a third volume; this duly appeared as RomanMilitaryDiplomas 985-1993? These publications,conven-tionallycited as RMD1, 2, and 3, have long since becomethe recognized source for militarydiploma studies.Now we have the fourth such collection, ably edited

and brought to publication by Paul Holder. As in previ-ous volumes of RMD, his one opens with a checklist inte-gratingthe contents, in this case 121 items, into the widerchronological series of published diplomas,which in 2002numbered some 500. Pagination (363-675) and diplomanumbering (nos. 202-322) continue the sequence estab-lished in RMD 1-3, and the usual seven indices covernames in general, along with those of the witnesses, re-

cipients, governorsand prefects,unit commanders,units,and places. There are four pages of notes, signaling revi-sions to previously published diplomas, and a table pro-vides key information (diploma type, date of issue,province or fleet, and findspot) for each of the 121 items.Again, each entry consists of a description of the piece,often accompanied by a photograph, and a transcriptofthe content, along with an expanded and annotated text.Diplomas are known to have been extracts from com-prehensive constitutiones,promulgated by the emperorand listing the names of all soldiers discharged from aprovincial army (or from the garrison of Rome) on aparticulardate. These names were perhaps routinely en-graved on sets of three plaques, each divided into sixcolumns (e.g., diploma CIL 16 16 was extracted from"tabula III pagina VI"), and were displayed in Rome at alocation that, from A.D. 90, lay behind the Temple ofthe DivineAugustus.Appendix 3 to RMD4 liststhe knownlocations of these constitutionesprior to this date. (Notethat on p. 617, the diploma of 30 MayA.D. 85 is RMD4,no. 213, not no. 214. Interestingly, this diploma refers tocohorsXIIIurbana, he Urban cohort based in Carthage,without naming its tribune; Roxan [414] suggests thathis name might have been omitted if he was absent witha detachment in Europe, where one of the unit's centuri-ons was decorated. Equally, if the tribunate of the well-known C. Velius Rufus fell at this time, the diploma mayhave been issued during his temporary reassignmentas dux exercitusAfricietMauretanici n Mauretania.)4The second of the volumes under reviewpresents 10papers delivered in 2002 at a colloquium in honor ofRoxan; a bibliography of her work (xiii-xvii) demon-strates the zeal with which she pursued her chosen spe-cialty,having come to the subject late in life. The topicsaddressed by the contributors range from equestriancareers (A.R. Birley,"The Commissioning of EquestrianOfficers")and anniversarydates (S. Dusanic, "TheImpe-rialPropaganda of Significant Day-dates") o militaryde-ployment (P.Holder, "AuxiliaryDeployment in the Reignof Hadrian") and strategy (DJ. Breeze, "Auxiliaries,Le-gionaries,and the Operationof Hadrian'sWall") A rangeof evidence is considered, including literature (D.B.Saddington, "AnAugustan Officer on the Roman Army:Militaria n VelleiusPaterculus"),tombstones (L. Keppie,"The Commemoration of MilitaryService on FuneraryMonuments of the EarlyRoman Empire"), ostraca (V.A.Maxfield, "Ostracaand the Roman Armyin the EasternDesert"),and writingtablets (R.S.O.Tomlin, "Document-

1Roxan1978.2Roxan1985.3Roxan1994.4/LS9200.

307AmericanJournal of Archaeology110 (2006) 307-9


2/3

308 DUNCAN B. CAMPBELL [AJA 110ing the Roman Army at Carlisle").But, naturally, giventhe circumstances of the volume's origin, the subject ofmilitarydiplomas is raised (notably,W. Eck, "Der Kaiserals Herr des Heeres: Militardiplome und die kaiserlicheReichsregierung,"and P. Weiss, "The Future of RomanMilitaryDiplomata:Fortschritte,Probleme und kunftigeAufgaben").The eight-page index is a welcome addition,if a little idiosyncratic;for example, there are entries for"lettuce" and "cabbage"(in the context of soldiers' gar-dens at Mons Claudianus,according to Egyptianostraca)but nothing under "diploma,"and the pick-axeknown asthe dolabraappearsas "dolabrum."There is much of interest here, though not everycon-tributor adheres to the theme of documentation prom-ised by the title. One notable exception is Maxfield'spaper on the information that can be drawn from inscrip-tions on ostraca, those recycled sherds of pottery used asthe notepads of antiquity.Another is Tomlin's overviewof the documents from Carlisle,which consist of amph-ora labels and ink tablets,as well as inscriptionson stone.The evidence of diplomas is fully exploited in Holder'sdensely annotated paper, in which he sketches out thedeployment of Hadrian'sarmy.Movingprovince by prov-ince, he attempts to trace each garrison by reference tothe Hadrianicdiplomas (numberingsome 70 or 80) along-side earlier and later examples,where these can shed lighton troop movements, as well as a handful of inscriptions.His findings are summarized in a series of 18 tables, andthe conclusion is drawn that the auxiliaryestablishmentnumbered approximately 218,000 men, excluding offic-ers. However,it is not alwayseasy to follow the thread ofthe argument. For example, Holder believes that cohorsCisipadensium as in Lower Moesia under Hadrian, "be-cause it is attested nowhere else" (104), but table 2 ap-pears to illustrate amove from Upper Moesiain A.D. 100to Thrace in 138; if it had spent the interim in LowerMoesia,we might have expected a batch of time-expiredpediteso appearin RMD4, no. 235 (A.D. 125). Of course,as Holder admits, the result is simplya random sample ofeach provincial garrison at different stages of Hadrian'sreign; we are a very long wayfrom drawing up an auxil-iaryorder of battle for any particularyear.The snapshotof Upper Moesia,for example, shows thatin A.D. 132therewere definitely two alae and seven (possibly 10) cohortes,whereas for Cilicia, we know only that in 121 there wasone cohort; for Dalmatia, there is no clear snapshot atall, but the armypossibly consisted of the three cohortes,attested long before and long after Hadrian.

Among a number of areas touched upon by Eck, inhis wide-ranging study of militarydiplomas and imperialgovernment, are the likely annual discharge statistics. Ifa constitutio ould run to three tabulae,each made up ofsix paginae, and if each pagina carried 46 or so names(e.g., CIL 16 11 records that the recipient was listed at"locus"46), then a typical discharge mayhave numbered900 men. If so, then the survivalrate is not good. Severalconstitutiones re known from three diplomas; the con-stitutioof 22 December 68 is known from four diplomas,and that of 1 September 114 perhaps five. If 900 copiesoriginally existed, the latter represents a sample of only

0.55%. As Eck points out, statistically,the 800 diplomascurrentlyextant (CIL16 and RMD1-4 have507, and morethan 130 awaitedpublication in 2002, with new examplesappearing almost every week) represent an original to-tal exceeding 150,000. It is salutaryto reflect that on 17July 122, when Hadrian released veterans from 13 alaeand 37 cohortesn Britain, there may have been about500 veterans requiring diplomas. The logistical implica-tions of such an exercise are staggering. Producing anddistributing the diplomas required byveterans from twodozen provincial armies must have been a full-timeindustry, and it is not surprising if delays occasionallyoccurred.In RMD4, appendix 4 lists 16 "delayed"diplomas is-sued by Trajan, in which the date implied by his impe-rial nomenclature (in most cases, the tribuniciapotestas)is at variance with the stated consular date. The inclu-sion here of RMD2, no. 86, and CIL16 59 perhaps re-quires clarification, as both fragments entirely omitTrajan's tribuniciapotestas.A slightly different dilemmais posed by RMD3, no. 155, and 4, no. 229, both of whichrelate to the army of Raetia in the same year,A.D. 116.Attemptingto explain thisperceivedirregularity,he origi-nal editor of 4, no. 229 (H. Wolff), suggested that thisdiploma was intended for A.D. 115 but was delayed forsome reason and closely followed by 3, no. 155. The caseis not entirely unprecedented, as two constitutiones ereissued for the Dacian army in 110 (CIL16 57, 163). Inboth of the Raetian diplomas, Trajan's nomenclaturematches the consular dating to give internal consistency.In the case of CIL16 62, however, the discrepancy be-tweenTrajan's itles (December A.D. 115-December 116)and the consular date (8 September 117) is so great as tosuggest exceptional circumstances. In more than 500 di-plomas, we find a similar degree of divergence only inCIL16 38, where the consular date of 13July94 is signifi-cantly adrift from Domitian's nomenclature (indicatingthe 12 months from September 92); this example is eas-ily explained, however, as a scribal error in represent-ing Domitian's tribuniciapotestasas "XII" nstead of therequired "XIII" i.e., the 12 months from September 93).With reference to CIL 16 62, the late Sir Ronald Symehad earlier suggested a delay arisingfrom "an accumula-tion of discharges when a period of warfareended,"5anexplanation favored byRoxan (619) ;but a simple scribalerror in representing Trajan's tribuniciapotestasseemsmore likely.RMD4, nos. 225 and 226, perhaps provide a third illus-tration of two constitutionesssued in the same year forthe same provincial army.Only the latter preserves theconsular date, 3 May114, but both carrythe same impe-rial date for the year up to 9 December 113. This mighthave been explained as a scribal error but for the factthat Trajan's itle "Optimus"wasinserted, as an obviouslylater addition, above the top line of the text; the title isthought to have been taken at some point between 16December 113 and 19July 114. Although Roxan consid-ered the possibilitythat Optimus couldpossiblyhave beenadded (illegally?)byan admiringveteran,"she concludedthat "these [diplomas] must have been partiallyengraved

5Birley1984,1287.


3/3

2006] WRITING ON THE ROMAN ARMY 309before 10 December 113" (620). A similardrawn-outpro-cess is implied by RMD4, no. 227 (which originally ap-peared as RMD 1, no. 14), where Trajan'stitles on theinterior face, usually considered the "authoritative" er-sion of the text, imply a date in 113, while those on theexterior face imply114;the consular date on both is 9July114.Another set of "delayed"diplomas relates to the const-itutioof 1 September 114for the armyof Lower Pannonia.The dating of CIL16 61, RMD4, no. 228, and, by analogy,RMD3, nos. 152 and 153, is internally consistent (apartfrom a minor scribal error on the inner face of CIL 1661), but a delay has been inferred by the fact that, at thetime of issue, the unit commander had moved on. (RMD2, no. 87, probably derives from the same constitutiobutlacks explicit dating.) Similarly, RMD4, no. 223, is in-cluded in the "delayed" ategorybecause the named gov-ernor is thought to have vacated his post by the time ofthe diploma's issue.

The significance of these minor anomalies goes farbeyond the reign of Trajan,for there are several otherdiplomas that display similar discrepancies. These arelisted byEck in the colloquium volume (73-5) , where hedrawsthe logical conclusion that the process, althoughclosely regulated, could be a long one. He also notes theincrease in issuing diplomas under Antoninus Pius, fol-lowed by a complete dearth during the decade 168-178,and he ponders the likely cause of such disruption. Per-haps dismissal was postponed for those veterans whomanaged to survive the plague and the endemic warfareof these years. Or, perhaps the explanation is simpler:bronze diplomas cost money and, at a time when the cof-fers were empty, documents might have been issued in alessexpensiveform,which has failed to survive.The maplewood discharge tablet from Vindonissa shows that legaldocuments could be issued on alternative materials.6On a related topic, in RMD4, appendix 1 lists threenew discharge certificates, with a brief reminder of thetwo previously noted documents of this type.7The sig-nificance of the latter pair had been a mystery,as theybasically confirmed the veteran status of the recipient,which would have been readilyapparent from the man'sdiploma. The three new examples, however,postdate theconstitutioAntoninianaof A.D. 212, by which all free in-habitants of the empire were made citizens, so we maysuppose that there was an ulterior motive in issuing thesetabulaehonestaemissionis.Indeed, as Roxan astutely ob-served, from that date it will have become important forveterans to assert their elevated status, not simply as citi-zens but as honestiores.The final volume under review here addresses an en-tirely different aspect of Roman armystudies, being thefirstEnglish translation of Athenaeus Mechanicus' work.The Greek text was made available, with German trans-lation and commentary, in 1912, but the relative obscu-rity of the publication ensured that it was read by few

scholars in the English-speaking world. Athenaeus isbarely named in Winter's GreekFortifications* nd Law-rence cites the evidence of Vitruviuswithout mentioningthe parallelpassagesof Athenaeus, which often shed lighton the Roman writer's text.9 In this new edition, White-head and Blyth provide an extensive commentary, inwhichtheycovermuch of interest to scholarsof siegecraft.10According to the theory proposed by Conrad Cicho-rius in 1922, this brief compendium of siege machinerywas composed probably by the philosopher Athenaeusof Seleucia during his stay in Rome in the 20s B.C., andwas presented (again, probably) to Augustus' nephew,M.ClaudiusMarcellus.Building upon this identification,Whitehead and Blythsketch out a conjectural biographyfor Athenaeus, suggesting that he had a special interestin militaryengineering, fostered at the (probable) Rho-dian school of mechanics run in the 40s by Agesistratus.Later,having fallen foul of the politics in his hometown,he arrived in Rome at a time when Vitruviuswas com-posing his De architectura. ut it remains a mystery whyAthenaeus imagined that a treatise on ancient siege ma-chines was an appropriate vademecumor a young princepreparingfor warfare n Spain.Whitehead and Blythmaybe correct when they claim that, by the 20s, "Romangen-erals had forgotten (if they had ever known) manyof theachievements of Carthaginian and Greek siege-warfare"(175) . ButRomansiegecrafthad left its ownlegacy:withinAthenaeus' own lifetime, Roman armies had conductedtwo sophisticated sieges of Jerusalem11 and similarlycomplex operations at the likes of Noviodunum,12Pinden-issus,13 nd Metulum.14The young Marcellusmight havebeen better served by a copy of Caesar's BellumGallicum,but whether or not he found an opportunityto putAthen-aeus' advice into practice,we should be grateful that suchan intriguing treatise has survived from antiquity.

2 OAKAVENUEBEARSDENGLASGOWG6l [email protected]

Works CitedBirley,A.R., ed. 1984. RomanPapers.Vol. 3. Oxford: Clar-endon Press.Lawrence,A.W. 1979. GreekAims in Fortification.Oxford:

Clarendon Press.Roxan,Margaret.1978.RomanMilitaryDiplomas 954-1977.London:Universityof London, Instituteof Archaeology. . 1985. RomanMilitaryDiplomas 978-1984. London:Universityof London, Institute of Archaeology. . 1994.RomanMilitaryDiplomas 985-1993. London:Universityof London, Institute of Archaeology.Winter,F.E.1971. GreekFortifications.ondon: Routledge.

6Roxan1994,appx.7Roxan1978,appx.;Britannia 9(1988):341-47.8Winter1971.9Lawrence1979.101 have reviewed his volume in more detail for BMCR

(http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/2005/2005-07-63.html)."Joseph Bf 1.141-54, 1.343-57.12Caes.B Gall.2.12-13.13Cic.Aft.5.20.14Cass.Dio 49.35.

campbell 2006 amjarchaeol110-2

Documents