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ΣϒΝΤΕΛΕΙΑ ΤΙΡΩΝΩΝ

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

M. T. Rostovtseff
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Extract

Modern inquiries into the history of the Roman army have elucidated the fact that there were two periods in the evolution of the Roman recruiting-system, whether of the Roman legions or of the auxiliary troops. The first period embraced the first two centuries of the Roman Empire, while the second began with Diocletian. The most characteristic features of the first period were as follows: recruiting of legions among the town population or territories attributed to a town; recruiting of auxiliary troops chiefly among the population of non-municipal territories; prevalence of the idea of conscription, which remained as a matter of fact chiefly theoretical as far as the legions were concerned, the latter consisting chiefly of volunteers; granting of Roman citizenship to soldiers who were serving in the legions at the moment of their being enrolled, and the receiving of Roman citizenship by the soldiers of auxiliary troops after the completion of their period of service; absence of any form of compulsion in the recruiting system. The second period presents entirely different features. The distinction between legions and auxiliary troops vanished almost completely, as both were recruited chiefly among the rural population; for the idea of conscription as the fulfilment of the duty of citizenship was substituted either the idea of military service for money, the idea of mercenary troops, or the idea of compulsory military service, this service being treated in the same way as the compulsory levying of taxes.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 8 , November 1918 , pp. 26 - 33
Copyright
Copyright ©M. T. Rostovtseff 1918. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

page 26 note 1 The standard work on Roman conscription of the first and second centuries A.D. is the article of Th. Mommsen, Die Conscriptionsordnung der römischen Kaiserzeit (Hermes, xix, and Gesamm. Schriften, vi, 20 foll.); cf. the articles Dilectus in Daremberg et Saglio, Dict. d. Ant. (Cagnat) and Pauly-Wissowa R.E. (Liebenam). New materials for Africa in Cagnat, L'armée romaine d'Afrique, 2 ed. i, 287 foll, and for Egypt J. Lesquier, L'armée romaine d'Egypte, Le Caire, 1918, 203 foll. No attention is paid in these works to the conditions of the third century A.D.

page 26 note 2 For the period after Diocletian see Th. Mommsen, Das römische Militärwesen seit Diocletian, Gesamm. Schriften, vi, 206 foll. and the above-quoted articles of Liebenam and Cagnat. Fresh evidence is afforded by the Greek papyri of Egypt, chiefly from the second half of the fourth century A.D.; see P. Leipz, 34–35; 54; 61, 62, and the introduction of Mitteis to n. 54; Wilcken, Chresto., 465–467, cf. 188 and Oxy. 1190; Wilcken, Grundz. 408 foll.; Maspero, J., Organisation militaire de l'Egypte byzantine (Bibl. des Hautes Études, n. 201), Paris 1912, 52 foll.Google Scholar; Gelzer, Studien, 48 foll.; Bell, , The Byzantine Servile State, Journal of Eg. Arch. iv (1912), 106Google Scholar.

page 26 note 3 See e.g. Proc. B. Vand, 2, 16: δσ (the emperor) ὑμᾶσ ἐξ ἀγροῠ ῇκοντασ σύν τϵ τῇ πήρᾳ καὶ χιτωνίσκῳ ἑνὶ ξυναγαγὼν ὲσ Βυζάντιον τηλικούσδϵ ϵἶναι πϵποίηκϵ: cf. Socrates, H. Eccl. iv, 34, quoted below, p. 28.

page 27 note 1 See the papyri quoted above, p. 26, note 2.

page 27 note 2 See Mommsen, Ges. Schr. vi, 253: ‘die im Steuerweg herbeigeführte Rekrutenstellung des Grundbesitzers, die ihrer Entstehung nach noch im Dunklen liegt, ist wahrscheinlich an die Stelle der älteren allgemeinen Wehrpflicht getreten.’

page 28 note 1 Comp. further below and the Greek papyri quoted above, p. 26, note 2. I venture to suggest that in Oxy. 1180–1181, the tax paid in gold and called συντέλϵια should be identified with the χρυσὸς τιρώνων.

page 28 note 2 See Cod. Th. vii, 13, 2; Amm. 21, 6, 6; Mommsen, Ges. Schr. vi, 254, note; Seeck in Pauly-Wissowa, R.E. s.v.

page 29 note 1 Seure, , Bull. de Corr. Hell. xxii, (1898), 542Google Scholar.

page 29 note 2 Kalinka, Antike Denkmäler Bulgariens, 34.

page 29 note 3 See Rostowzew, , Klio, vi, 249Google Scholar foll.; Wilcken, Grundz. 374 foll.; Schubart, Einleitung, 325; Fiebig, P., Zeitschrift für Neutest. Wissenschaft, xviii (1917), 64Google Scholar foll. Fiebig collected the evidence of the Talmud on the ἀγγαρϵῖαι which partly coincides with evidence brought together by me. It shows how heavily the ἀγγαρϵῖαι pressed on the population of Judea precisely in the third century A.D. Instructive is the combination of ἀγγαρϵῖαι with corn-payments as in the inscription of Pizus, see Lev. r. Par. 12 (Est. r. Par. 5) and Lev. r. Par. 23, 5.

page 30 note 1 See Dessau, Inscr. Lat. Sel. Add. 8909 and 9180; Seeck in Pauly-Wissowa, R. E. iii, 1066; Seure, l.c. 542; Cagnat, L'armée romaine d'Afrique, 63 fo11.

page 30 note 2 It is to be noted that in later times the burden of providing draught-cattle for the cursus publicus was closely connected with the fulfilling of police-duties, see O. Hirschfeld, Die Sicherheitspolizei, Kl. Schr. 595.

page 31 note 1 von Domaszewski, A., Neue Heidelberger Jahrb. x (1900), 241Google Scholar.

page 31 note 2 See Domaszewski, l.c. p. 240: ‘so erwuchs das Heer allmählich zu einem Giftbaum der das Mark des Staates aussog, und die ganze Regierungs-Kunst des dritten Jahrhunderts gipfelt darin Geld für die Gier der Söldner zu schaffen’; comp. the same author, Die Rangordnung des röm. Heeres, 196.

page 32 note 1 See e.g. the extremely instructive story told by Her. vii, 4, of the rising of land-owners and peasants in Africa against the exactions of the procurator of the emperor Maximinus, the rising which brought Gordian to the throne.

page 33 note 1 See Rostowzew, Studien zur Geschichte des römischen Kolonates, 303; J. Keil and A. von Premerstein, Dritte Reise, p. 57 foll, and the inscriptions n. 9, 28, 55, comp. Dittenberger, Or. 519 (245–7 A.D.); Bruns, Fontes, n. 99 and Oxy. 1100 (206 A.D.) The inscription of Skaptoparene is republished in Dittenberger, Syll. 3, 888 (Hiller von Gaertringen), comp. Preisigke, , Die Inschrift von Skaptoparene in ihrer Beziehung zur Kaiserlichen Kanzlei in Rom. Strassburg, 1917Google Scholar (Schr. der Wiss. Ges. in Strassburg, 30). The same conditions already prevailed in the Roman provinces in the second century, as is shown by Epict. iv. 1, 79: ἂν δ᾿ ἀγγαρεία ᾗ καὶ στρατιώτης ἐπιλάβηται, ἄφες, μὴ ἀντίτεινε μηδὲ γόγγυζε εἰ δὲ μή, πληγὰς λαβὼν οὐδὲν ἦττον ἀπολεῖς καὶ τὸ ὀνάριον (Lietzmann, Handb. zum N. T. ad Mt. 5, 41 (1909).

page 33 note 2 J. Keil and A. von Premerstein, l.c. p. 43.