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Modern Day Hercules posted:I have also heard this, but I can't remember from where, could have been a lovely history channel special for all I know. It doesn't strike me as being too accurate, at least not for most of Rome's history. Greeks would sometimes just have single dudes fight and which ever dude won would decide who won a battle, but I know Romans did not practice that. Roman soldiers didn't even learn single combat ifaik, they only learned how to fight in formation. I can't imagine too many groups would just give up after Rome raised another legion, instead of raising another army themselves, assuming they could A few pages back but Rome is still a thread topic. Roman soldiers were the best trained in the ancient world, and that went from the conditioning, to the formation tactics, to individual combat. Roman soldiers essentially used a shield wall but since they used short swords most of the combat was relatively individual. Just look at Ceaser's Gallic campaigns for example after example of Roman legions beating numerically superior opponents. It was quite literally unfair as they would beat you one on one, or in formation, or over time, or in a siege. The insane amount of discipline and physical conditioning, plus uniform arms and armor made the Romans far and away the best army of the ancient world until something like 300AD, and even after that they still held out another 175 years.
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Oct 31, 2011 22:17
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DarkCrawler posted:It really is ridiculous how many Emperors were assassinated or murdered. Trajan is often counted as the best, but it is hard to argue with Augustus' resume. The Lex Julia being used in 1400 by the Byzantines is a drat good legacy, and he set the foundation that allowed the Pax Romana to exist.
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Nov 1, 2011 21:26
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College Rockout posted:Could you expand on the second part? What group of peoples had better armies than the Romans after 300AD? I was speaking in general, and posters above me have elaborated very well. What I meant was the average legion was not the powerhouse it used to be. Boudicca was beaten by what, 2 1/2 legions? That was no longer happening later on. The reforms to go to a more cavalry centric army, the split in the infantry to Comitatenses and Limitanei (mobile, highly equipped and local badly equipped), plus the extended reliance on barbarian auxila all meant the legion that built the empire was no longer there, in form or spirit. The discipline was no longer there in the same uniform manner it was before, and it was no longer the case that a legion would always be better equipped and more skilled then an equivalent number of troops. Obviously great things could still be done with what was there, just look at Constantine, but you were not seeing legions annihilating their enemies like Marius did the Tutones and Cimbri.
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Nov 2, 2011 21:31
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Deception posted:You fail to mention that Diocletian also ruled with 3 other emperors including Constantine's father. The WRE and ERM are not only split into two entities, but by 4 during Diocletian's time. It was improbable for a land mass the size of the roman empire to be ruled by one single emperor even by Augustinian standards. Constantine tried and still had problems when he unified the empire, Justinian failed miserably and squandered the treasury when he tried to reconquer lost territory. I'm a bit confused here, Augustus, the 5 Good Emperors, and Claudius all did a fine job of managing the gigantic Empire. Do you mean the situation became untenable in the later periods? Also can I safely assume that everyone here loves taking the Byzantines to glory in Total War games?
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Nov 5, 2011 04:17
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Rodrigo Diaz posted:That is post-Marius. Earlier Republican armies were based around the soldier-farmer, nominally anyway. This breaks down pre-Marius, the soldiers had already been being used in extended deployments prior to Marius, and his reforms helped makes that practice sustainable. The wars in Greece, North Africa, Sicily, and Spain all had extended deployments of nominal soldier/farmers. raptus posted:Is organized warfare even possible without agriculture? It certainly helps, but tribes can (and still do) kill each other over hunting and foraging grounds too. I guess it depends on how you define when it stops being a skirmish and becomes a war.
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Jan 23, 2012 23:50
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Why? Obviously agriculture allowed professional soldiers, or at least actual armies of multiple thousands, but many hunter gather societies constantly kill members of rival tribes, and engage in what is basically warfare. Resources are scarce and worth fighting over. Again I think we need to define "warfare" first before going anywhere else. To me, killing rivals over resources counts, since the motivations are the same, even of the body count is not.
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Jan 24, 2012 00:01
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Rodrigo Diaz posted:Ah, cool. My Roman history knowledge of any depth basically starts and ends with the late Republic, though it should have been obvious with the Punic Wars. v You were basically right though, the Romans were just stubborn enough to do it despite the problems. Soldiers were coming home to decrepit land, or the land had been absorbed by some senator in his estate. This could not go on forever, cue Marius. (obviously this is the dramatically and criminally shortened version.) 5inc posted:This is the crux of the matter, I think, though I would disagree with your position on it. People have fought over resources since there were either, but I don't think it's any more fair to call that "war" as it would be to call the police an army. By your definition, it would seem every murder would be classified as "war", and that doesn't seem to reflect the reality of the situation. I was viewing it as consistent killings/violence to benefit the group, and I think you make a very good point that I neglected on it's rarity. The original question however was whether war was possible sans agriculture. I agree that it does not happen often, but I would say it does occur. Tribes do drive each other out of territories completely, and massacres do happen, and I have hard time defining that action as anything other then war. In short, I think wars happen outside of agriculture, but pretty drat rarely. WoodrowSkillson fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Jan 24, 2012 |
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Jan 24, 2012 01:07
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ChaosSamusX posted:My friends and I were discussing this recently; how far in the future could a Roman Legion (at the height of their quality) be teleported, pitted against an army typical of that time period, but equal in size, and expect to win. It came down mostly to the effectiveness of a Legion against a Tercio-type unit and vice versa, and how much of an impact steel and gunpowder would have on the battle. The Roman logistics and discipline alone would have allowed them to mop the floor with most western European armies until like 1200-1300. The Romans also used the best steel swords, plate armor, and advanced siege engines. Until you hit guns and fully articulated plate armor, the Romans already had done or fought anything medieval Europe could have thrown at them. Anyone else not using guns or advanced armor is in the same boat. Gunpowder changes a lot, but Roman discipline would beat a SMALL group of firearms. After that obviously guns change everything. Horse archers gave the Romans a ton of trouble, but their standard method of beating them was to simply hire their cousins to go fight for Rome and thus counter the horse archers.
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Jan 28, 2012 09:53
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Rodrigo Diaz posted:The Romans had by no means faced everything medieval Europe could throw at them, and had seriously lost against a selection of things medieval Europe had available. The failure of the legion to deal effectively with German battle avoidance until Arminius' death shows that the normal medieval mode of warfare was not to their strength. The Romans also never had to deal with knights, which were unlike the Asiatic cataphracts in their mobility, speed, use of the couched lance, large shields, horse shoes, high-backed saddles, and stirrups. Even early 11th century knights were hugely superior to European cavalry of the 1st-4th century AD, who relied upon ponies, in effect. Centuries of husbandry and the importation of Middle Eastern horses into Europe had by the 11th century produced a much superior tool. The more powerful crossbows, and the complex castle system of the medieval period were also beyond Roman experience. Considering he said the legions at their prime, the legions lost battles but won wars against Germans, Greeks, Carthaginians, Spanish, Parthians, and more. Everything from horse archers to phalanxes to hordes. Knights would be the killer, you are right, I was making too distinct of a line in my head when I said articulated plate. I was thinking knights when I said that(It was late and I was tired.) The issue would be whether there are enough knights to do the job, as the pila would still be bad news for the knight's horses if they are outnumbered. I guess a better answer would be something like 900CE then, or whatever point marks Europe moving more to very large walls and large groups of knights in combat. Also whenever it was that Armies could be larger then 10000 people again, as the Romans had no problem fielding 20000 man legionary armies, plus auxiliaries. In terms of infantry, the Roman legionary was more disciplined and better equipped then anyone outside of dismounted knights until later medieval periods. On the topic of equipment, I was under the impression that the lorica segmentata was in effect lighter then the hamata since it was strapped to the body as opposed to hanging off the shoulders. Also did it completely leave the underarms open, or did they have chain there to fill the gaps? I think I was wrong to say the Romans had the "best" steel, but it was better then nearly anything militia will be using against them.
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Jan 28, 2012 20:01
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No Hunnic migration would possibly have allowed the western empire to stay power much longer then it did. The Huns moving in to eastern Europre is what forced the Goths and Vandals and Alans to try and get away from them. No Goth and Vandal migration would have allowed the Rhine and Danube to remain effective borders. The western empire obviously had a ton of problems, but the German migrations, and the WRE's horrible handling of basically every situation related to them, are what caused a lot of the problems post 350 or so. No migrations also keeps the East and West less divided, as there would be no semi Gothic state in Illyria, and less squabbles over sending help.
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Feb 5, 2012 18:25
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The Huns changed the dynamic of the German/Roman wars though. It was no longer simply wars for treasure and loot. You now had entire peoples at the border demanding asylum, or simply invading. They intended now to conquer Roman land and stay there, not invade, steal stuff, and go home. This put a gigantic amount of pressure on the WRE, and the subsequent things that happened in the early 5th century pretty much doomed the WRE.
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Feb 5, 2012 18:51
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Cities also have unemployed people in them that can stir up trouble, whereas pretty much everyone in the countryside is working on a farm to some. Most probably never knew anything different, and it would be very hard to link multiple groups of farming peasants together.
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Feb 7, 2012 17:42
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Farecoal posted:Was there ever any Roman plans to invade Scandinavia? Or, hell, plans to invade other places, like the area of Poland/East Germany? Also, when did Europeans first "discover" Sub-Saharan Africa? The Romans never got that far north in Europe proper. They were aware of the area though, and called is Scanda I think. The Romans definitely wanted to conquer Germany north and east of the Rhine, but failed to do so. The end of their goals came with the disaster at Teutoburg Forest. In that battle, An army led by a general named Varus got fooled by a local guide and wandered into an ambush in a valley. Around 20,000 Romans died in the fighting, exterminating 3 whole legions and 6 allied cohorts. This disaster led to a few retaliatory campaigns which extended de-facto Roman control east of the Rhine for a bit, but with no intentions of actually conquering and integrating the land. The disaster led Augustus to conclude that expansion beyond the Rhine was not worth the time and effort to do so, and Hadrian, many years later, cemented that as permanent policy. The disaster so shook up Augustus, that until the day he died he would scream "Varus! Give me back my Legions!" at random times. Various Romans at times claimed they would repeat Alexander's conquest of Persia, and did campaign all around the Middle-East, Normally about as far east as Babylon, and once all the way to the Persian Gulf. These never went that far, as the Parthians and then Sassanid Empires were too large to fully conquer, even if the Romans could beat up their Western forces. They also would attempt to conquer north of the Danube, and held Dacia for like a hundred years, but never got any further up towards Hungary then that.
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Feb 8, 2012 04:15
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EvanSchenck posted:Traditionally historians took it as read that Rome ceased expanding into Germany because of the defeat at Teutoburg Forest. However, I think more recent work has indicated that it wasn't the defeat as much as the lack of a compelling reason to continue expanding into Germany, which was comparatively poor, sparsely populated, and geographically isolated from Rome's base of power in the Mediterranean region. They couldn't allow the Germanic tribes to threaten possessions that were actually valuable, like Gaul, so they went in to break up Arminius's federation. As far as taking and holding land Germany was more trouble than it was worth. I'm by no means a classicist, but that's what I got from reading about it. The thing is the disaster at Teutoburg is what helped solidify the idea that Rome was not "meant" to hold northeastern Germany. Barring Teutoburg, Rome may gave devoted the resources into conquering Germany, and if it did so history would be very dfferant.
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Feb 19, 2012 10:30
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Algol Star posted:After getting into such a horrible position at Carrhae could Crassus have won? Is there anything a block of infantry can do against mounted archers other than to hunker up and wait it out? Not where he was, no. Once he got led into the desert it was over. If it was somewhere near cities where they could have gotten to provisions they would have survived to fight another day. Crassus tried to wait it out, but the Parthians had a baggage train wheeling stacks and stacks of new arrows in constantly. All infantry can do against mounted archers is wait it out, or have bigger longer range bows then the horsemen do. Horse archers did not often have anything that could match the state of the art infantry bows. I think the Mongols were the ones with the bow that had the elongated top half to add power and distance, but even then there were longbows to counter it. Problem was the Romans thought bows were for sissies, and yeah, not many of those in Crassus' legions.
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Mar 10, 2012 03:20
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Iseeyouseemeseeyou posted:Do you know much about the Battle of Teutoburg Forest? Teutoburg was talked about on pg118 of this thread. What did you want to know about it specifically besides what happened? Are you asking if the change of composition of the Legions led to the downfall of the WRE? If so, it did not cause it on its own, but it did not really help things. The legions shifted to a more cavalry centric model in the late Empire, partly because they were fighting horsemnen, and also because they could not longer afford the number of legions required to secure the borders. Instead they had large armies of cavalry that could move quickly to respond to invasions. However the infantry definitely suffered, and it was not unfelt. The inhuman discipline of the Legions was what won the Romans their Empire, and the loss of that hurt a lot. If you had the old Legions in 400, a lot may have been different, since those battles in Gaul may have gone a lot better for the Romans. "Why the WRE fell?" is a really hard question to answer, because there is no one reason for it. Bad leadership, horrible treatment of the Goths, paying the soldiers so much they could not afford to field enough armies, constant civil war, The Huns, The Vandals, The Goths, The Sassanids, The Franks, and Josephus running around with giant joints in chariots getting all the troops high.
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Mar 28, 2012 23:52
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ganglysumbia posted:Few can agree on when it fell, let alone why. I think to begin to understand the answer to that question you have to understand the entire history of Rome. Hell, some historians have made arguements that the WRE is alive and well today. Um how is that exactly? Is it by claiming the Church inherited enough that it survived? I know its a bit murky as to WHEN the ending was, but 476 is a pretty good spot to put it.
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Mar 29, 2012 04:45
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Mans posted:The reason why the old Legions didn't exist in 400 was because the classical Roman Legions consumed 70 to 80% of the Empire's resources. the empire was totally dependent of conquering new and rich land to loot, enslave and plunder to sustain it's massive well-trained army. When they reached Scotland, the Arabian and Saharan Desert and the impenetrable peoples north of the Danube and invigorated descendants of the Persians the conquests stopped and the Legions devoured themselves raw. It was simply impossible for such a well-trained army to exist in 400 A.D. It's also unfair to call the Roman armies of that time as incompetent. They had to deal with a myriad of enemies, both from outside and inside the state and they had to deal with them swiftly (both in terms of reaching their enemy fast and in terms of beating them soundly so they could move on to fight another enemy). A lot of the ridiculous spending on the troops came well after the height of the Legions' power under Trajan. As the military became the de facto government, pay kept being increased and increased to ludicrous levels. They also had a ton of recruitment issues as people from the inner empire had no interest in dying in the frozen north when their home in Carthage was quite comfortable. The earlier Empire supported far more troops on less money then the late Empire could.
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Mar 31, 2012 03:08
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FishFood posted:I wouldn't say the Dark Ages were a step back in tactics and equipment, just a different environment. Instead of a single, large, dominant state, there are many smaller groups led by warlords. War in Western Europe changed from that of large-scale conquest with large standing armies to more localized affairs. In fact, in some ways technology got better. Improved metallurgy made crafting longer swords easier, stirrups arrived, new designs in fortifications, etc. I'd say there was a definite drop in tactics and equipment, at least from the early to mid Empire. You are dead on with the late empire stuff, but if you were to transport Martel and his army back to 100 and duke it out with Rome, Rome wins. They had more and better generals, hundreds of years of documented military experience, and better equipment. Roman logistics alone would basically beat any other army until those tech advances you mentioned started cropping up, which was when, like 900-1000? The much, much reduced economies meant that even as some little pockets of tech were developed, the overall European landscape took until 1300 or so to start matching the infrastructure it had under the Empire.
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Apr 6, 2012 04:10
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Red7 posted:The shape of a diamond, otherwise that would be the most expensive militia known to man :P Though that reminds me of something I may have mentioned in here or somewhere else before. I've always wondered how super effective of equipment modern tech could make for a soldier prior to massive use of firearms. Like kevlar and ceramic armor, carbon fiber spear shafts, that kind of stuff. Some dude with a diamond encrusted spear and sword made from the best steel alloy we have for the job. Like could you make a nigh invincible warrior or were they so good at what they made, that not even our tech would compensate. I know its silly but its something I remember thinking about while reading about ancient arms/armor.
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Apr 12, 2012 04:39
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Mans posted:They (correct me if i'm wrong) got their asses handed to them by wandering Gauls and the Samnites. And the Gladius came later when the Romans experienced first hand in the Iberian Peninsula how a gladius-like weapon is effective in a flexible medium-armored infantry. It was common for the pre-Marian Roman armies to still use spears since a sword wasn't cheap and a soldier was supposed to provide it's own equipment. The flexibility of the formation allowed the rotation of the units, which by itself was a massive improvement over the "fight until you drop" phalanx tactics. Such flexibility also meant that a broken line wouldn't spell out doom for everyone around the breach. Rome changed over after the 1st Samnite war I believe. The Samnites were hill tribes that had a complete advantage in rocky terrain over the Roman hoplite phalanxes. The Romans realized they needed more mobility and thus converted to the Maniple system. This is when the Hastati, Principes, and Triarii show up. 2 sword based infantry classes and a hoplite type veteran class. The Legions were armed by the state now and thus used short swords and large shields. They did not provide their own weapons and armor anymore. As to them against the Phalanx, that has already been covered, but yeah, basically the Romans were more heavily armored then the phalanx troops and were mobile enough to flank them. Once they were in close they had a total advantage over the phalanx troops and would rout or slaughter them.
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Apr 13, 2012 05:05
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Modus Operandi posted:I'm curious as to how Roman infantry advanced past the initial Marian reforms. I know they adopted more cavalry in late antiquity and smaller legions to combat dispersed invading hordes. I want to know more about their equipment and small unit tactics though. The Marian reforms only changed the pilum in terms of equipment. Marius made it so the metal portion of the shaft wound bend even easier to help the pila get lodged in enemy shields. The rest of the reforms were all about the structure and doctrine of the military. The other big changes happened over time, with people like Caesar moving away from the Triplex Acies and into a more uniform front line with another line behind that one. They also phased out the Triarii and merged the Hastati and Principes into just legionaries that all used the same equipment. Around the time of Augustus' reign is when the Lorica Segmentata and the Gallic helmet started being widely used. That is the famous armor that every legionary ever is shown wearing. The army mostly stayed the same until around 300AD or so after the Empire had been through the civil wars of the 3rd century and was in harder economic times. Also they were fighting more cavalry and the army switched over to a more cavalry centered construction. The army was losing discipline and was did not have the same resources as before, and as a result the soldiers started moving away from the old equipment. Chain mail became the standard armor again, and helmets were not worn as much. The Gladius sword and Scutum shield were replaced by the Spatha, a longer sword previously only used by cavalry, and round or oval shields.
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Apr 22, 2012 01:25
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Mans posted:I've read that Livy wrote a book about how Alexander the Great and his army would fare against a Roman legion. I laughed and then remembered what WOULD happen if Alexander met Scipio Africanus, Alexander's cavalry would probably put Hannibal's to shame and it's charge was much more powerful, but on the other hand the phalanx never really had any success against the Legions. Depends what era of the legions you are talking about. It's Livy so I'm going with the legions at the height of their power vs Alexander at the height of his. Historically the legions beat up on every phalanx based army they fought. However all of the successor states had far less effective phalanxes then Alexander fielded. Alexanders troops could march and redeploy the phalanx far faster then any army before or after. This would be a tough nut for the Romans to crack, as their success were based off completely outmaneuvering their opponents. Also as you said the Companions would be a force to be reckoned with, considering they were a fast moving fast acting heavy cavalry elite. However the Roman legions at their height when Caesar and Agrippa were commanding them were the most dominant military force in the ancient world, bar none. Their infantry was the best trained and most well equipped in the world. They had allies and client states to provide cavalry, many from the same provinces Alexander once held. The Romans also used their Pila as anti-cavalry spears on more the one occasion, and combined with the discipline and cohesion, would be a challenge to the Companions as their strength was not charging massed organized infantry. The Romans fought off the Parthians successfully for hundreds of years, after learning from Crassus debacle at Carrahe, and they fields plenty of heavy cavalry. Basically if Caesar and Alexander were able to duke it out, it would comes down to generalship. Who could maneuver the other into fighting on ground unsuited for the other, and if the Romans could flank the phalanx. I'd say the edge goes to the Romans, since Alexander's army still has the gaping flaw that if the legionaries breached the phalanx, they were done. Basically there are more ways for Alexander to lose then for the Romans. The Romans have to avoid frontally assaulting the phalanx and keep the Compainions at bay. Alexander has to somehow fight off all he Roman cavalry, charge the legionaries and not lose his cavalry to the pila of the Romans, and make sure his phalanx never gets flanked, even though the Romans soldiers o nteh flank are just as good as the soldiers in the center.
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May 11, 2012 04:44
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New Division posted:I would quibble with the use of the word 'rare' to describe the frequency of tank on tank combat in the ETO, but it is true that it was definitely less common and on much smaller scale than the armored fighting on the Eastern Front. Anecdotally my grandfather was a Staff Sargent in the Army, and the worst memories he had from the war was having to clean what was left of the crews of Shermans out after they fought Tigers or Panthers. At least among him and his comrades they all were bitter about the US not having tanks more up to the challenge of the tank on tank combat they did see.
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May 15, 2012 01:14
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gradenko_2000 posted:Was there a particular reason why the Russian rail gauge was wider than that used by Germany (and the rest of Western Europe)? Carthage relied almost exclusively on mercenaries from Iberia and Numidia to fight its wars. In the first Punic war the Romans were beaten back from Carthage by a Spartan general commanding Greek troops, Numidian cavalry, Iberian and Libyan infantry, and some Carthaginians mixed in.
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Jul 5, 2012 00:23
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