Roman Org.

[Aaron Sanderson]

Ok. Grabbed one of my history books, Yes I did study this stuff, and
pulled up a couple of org. charts for a Roman legion.

At the time of Caeser a century had only a couple of people who weren't
regular troopers. A centurion, who wasn't a promoted trooper but had
bought his commision. An optio, the second in command; a signifer, who
carried the units standards; and either a Cornicen or a Tubicen who
played different types of horns. And had a total of 80 men.

By the time of the late first century this had grown to 160 men for the
first five cohorts and 80 men each for the last six cohorts.
They had also added a rank called Tesseraius, don't know what that one
does.

Augustus cut the legions back to a total of 30. In addition to this
there were many axiliaries which were drawn from local tribes mainly.
By the time of Constantine things had completely gone out the window so
it is hard to say how large each unit was. However, there is one source
that claims the Romans had 150 legions going in the east and 180 legions
in the west at around c. 395.

Sorry for the long history lesson, must be habit from way to many
research papers.

The recovering Student,
AmS.

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[Eric Dunn]

n the west at around c. 395.
>
>Sorry for the long history lesson, must be habit from way to many
>research papers.
>
>The recovering Student,
>AmS.
>

Exactly the type of info I was hoping for... :)

Now, if someone could get us some valid info for what medieval units were
made up of--of course, I think they were less of a unit--and more of an
army or "horde" *grin*

I mean, take the Crusades for example. All those knights running
around--what was the military make up?

What about the battle of Hastings--what did each side look like,
organizationally speaking?

E

[Richard the Mighty]

>"150 legions going in the east and 180 legions"
>
>330 legions?
>
>At between 4000-6000 men per legion[what I vaguely recollect they
were],
>that gives Rome an army of 1,320,000 - 1,980,000 I find this numbers to
>be ludicrously high for the date in question.
>
>I myself had always heard it was more along your 30 Legions number,
>which still makes an army of 120,000 - 180,000 or 600-900 Birthright
>Units, which is still a large number, hehehe.

During the time of the battles between Augustus and Antony, there were
seventy legions, which was reduced to 28 when Augustus took over.

Another interesting fact is that up until AD 367, a man had to be 6 feet
tall (although they took 5'10") to join the army! In 367 they passed a
law which allowed a few units of men 5'7" tall to be formed. So, they
really could have had a large army if they wanted to, but I don't think
it would be in the millions.

Richard


"I don't want the world, I just want your half..." -- TMBG


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[E Gray]

- -----Original Message-----
From: lialos@crosslink.net
To: birthright@MPGN.COM
Date: Friday, May 08, 1998 7:43 AM
Subject: Re: [BIRTHRIGHT] - Roman Org.


>"150 legions going in the east and 180 legions"
>
>330 legions?


>At between 4000-6000 men per legion[what I vaguely recollect they were],
>that gives Rome an army of 1,320,000 - 1,980,000 I find this numbers to
>be ludicrously high for the date in question.


Hmm, well some of those legions would have been understrength(heck I'm
fairly sure the late Imperial legions were smaller than older units, maybe
only
1000 men), and many may have been "paper" legions, but most of them would
probably just be units stationed along the frontier to try and keep out the
barbarians.
Heck, Valens lost 40000 men at the battle of Adrianople just 17 years
before the date given before, and still had another 20000 without waiting
for more units to arrive..

>I myself had always heard it was more along your 30 Legions number,
>which still makes an army of 120,000 - 180,000 or 600-900 Birthright
>Units, which is still a large number, hehehe.


That number would be correct for many periods, but not all..

[E Gray]

- -----Original Message-----
From: Eric Dunn
To: birthright@MPGN.COM
Date: Friday, May 08, 1998 7:10 AM
Subject: Re: [BIRTHRIGHT] - Roman Org.


>n the west at around c. 395.

>Exactly the type of info I was hoping for... :)
>
>Now, if someone could get us some valid info for what medieval units were
>made up of--of course, I think they were less of a unit--and more of an
>army or "horde" *grin*
>
>I mean, take the Crusades for example. All those knights running
>around--what was the military make up?


Well, what you ought to do is go to a book store and look in the Military
History section and see if you can find a book covering medieval battles
both during the Crusades and at other times. Mostly though I'd say it
would be a case of who one was sworn to follow and/or where one came
from that led to the formation of units.

>What about the battle of Hastings--what did each side look like,
>organizationally speaking?


Hmm, William had 4-7 thousand men, in units of archers, infantrymen
and knights(in 3 groups), Harold had 7000 men, many half-armed
untrained peasants....put his trained troops on one ridge, and his
less trained men on the flanks...other than that I don't know..

[E Gray]

- -----Original Message-----
From: lialos@crosslink.net
To: birthright@MPGN.COM
Date: Friday, May 08, 1998 8:02 AM
Subject: Re: [BIRTHRIGHT] - Roman Org.



>Once again someone with more knowledge than I on this subject will need
>to correct me[and I'm sure someone will].


Sorry, we really don't have that *much* information on the battle of
Tours(or Poiters, some prefer that)..

>At the Battle of Tours where the Moorish expansion into Europe was
>halted, weren't there less than a hundred knights on each side? Don;'t
>know why I am saying this, but the fact seems to stick in my mind.


Hmm, possible, but I'm fairly sure there were more than 100 men
involved on each side...

[lialos@crosslink.ne]

"150 legions going in the east and 180 legions"

330 legions?

At between 4000-6000 men per legion[what I vaguely recollect they were],
that gives Rome an army of 1,320,000 - 1,980,000 I find this numbers to
be ludicrously high for the date in question.

I myself had always heard it was more along your 30 Legions number,
which still makes an army of 120,000 - 180,000 or 600-900 Birthright
Units, which is still a large number, hehehe.

Tripp

Tripp

[David Sean Brown]

> Another interesting fact is that up until AD 367, a man had to be 6 feet
> tall (although they took 5'10") to join the army! In 367 they passed a
> law which allowed a few units of men 5'7" tall to be formed. So, they
> really could have had a large army if they wanted to, but I don't think
> it would be in the millions.

Just kinda curious about the accuracy of this...the average height of a
man during the time of the roman empire was roughly 5'6"...a man who was
6' tall would have been considered something of a giant! How did they
manager to find enought guys to fill up their legions with that kind of
regulation? Any ideas?

Sean

[James Ruhland]

>
> Sorry, we really don't have that *much* information on the battle of
> Tours(or Poiters, some prefer that)..
>
> >At the Battle of Tours where the Moorish expansion into Europe was
> >halted, weren't there less than a hundred knights on each side? Don;'t
> >know why I am saying this, but the fact seems to stick in my mind.
>
Semi-reasonable guestimates put the total # involved per side somewhere
between 5-10,000 men. Chuck "the Hammer's" army probably had more like
1,000 of what we would term "knights".
A note on Tours and halting the Moslem expansion into Europe: IMO, Tours
was just a skirmish. After all, an arab army of about 80,000, plus a large
fleet (several hundred ships) etc, besieged Constantinople in 717-18. If
they had won that battle, then we'd all be speaking Arabic today. That's
where the expansion into Europe was really halted. A few Franks hardly
mattered one way or the other.

Re the below: 100 knights isn't the same as 100 men.
>
> Hmm, possible, but I'm fairly sure there were more than 100 men
> involved on each side...
>
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[James Ruhland]

>
>
> >"150 legions going in the east and 180 legions"
> >
> >330 legions?
>
>
> >At between 4000-6000 men per legion[what I vaguely recollect they were],
> >that gives Rome an army of 1,320,000 - 1,980,000 I find this numbers to
> >be ludicrously high for the date in question.
>
Late Roman Legions were more like 2,000 men strong, tops. And the mobile
portion of the Legion (I.E. the part that would be sent anywhere, as
opposed to being on semi-permanent garrison duity) was significantly
smaller (half that # or less).

[lialos@crosslink.ne]

Eric Dunn wrote:
>
> n the west at around c. 395.
> >
> >Sorry for the long history lesson, must be habit from way to many
> >research papers.
> >
> >The recovering Student,
> >AmS.
> >
>
> Exactly the type of info I was hoping for... :)
>
> Now, if someone could get us some valid info for what medieval units were
> made up of--of course, I think they were less of a unit--and more of an
> army or "horde" *grin*
>
> I mean, take the Crusades for example. All those knights running
> around--what was the military make up?
>
> What about the battle of Hastings--what did each side look like,
> organizationally speaking?
>
> E
>
> ************************************************** *************************
> >
Once again someone with more knowledge than I on this subject will need
to correct me[and I'm sure someone will].

At the Battle of Tours where the Moorish expansion into Europe was
halted, weren't there less than a hundred knights on each side? Don;'t
know why I am saying this, but the fact seems to stick in my mind.

Tripp

[James Ruhland]

>
> Now, if someone could get us some valid info for what medieval units were
> made up of--of course, I think they were less of a unit--and more of an
> army or "horde" *grin*
>
> I mean, take the Crusades for example. All those knights running
> around--what was the military make up?
>
The crusaders (at least the ones that made it past, say, Nicea) were fairly
sophisticated militarily (of course, being dumb clucks, once they went back
home, they returned to the "horde" method of organizing their armies for a
good streach).

Several battles (especially ones conducted in the imediate aftermath of
the capture of Jerusalem) had very few knights involved (30-60 at some
points), and armies numbering in the hundreds (or low thousands). Once the
crusader armies got "weeded out" of the undisiplined rabble and feckless
ninnys (right around/after the siege of Antioch by the Turks, I.E. once
they got rid of Stephan of Blois et al), some very sophisticated combined
arms tactics started showing up (of course, the crusaders had seen what
real militarys were capable of in their experiences with the East Romans &
the Turns. . .but that shows that they were smart enough to adapt such
tactics to their own forces once given a proper template).
Long digression: These particular battles really show the effect of morale
in a way that game systems usually don't cover. The Arab (and to a lesser
degree, Turkish) forces that faced Baldwin & Godfrey's armies vastly
outnumbered them, but the Knights (especially) had developed a reputation
for invincibility (which was later lost/thrown away, but that's another
story), so the 1st sign of trouble (I.E. a charge of a few knights hitting
home) and the Arabic army would route.

[Samuel Weiss]

OK, based on my experience with Imperium Romanum, the boardgame from West
End, and all the wonderful research the developers and designer did on it, I
can offer the following.
1. The number of legions was around 20-30, except during civl war periods,
when that would be the number per claimant.
2. The late empire legions (after the Thrid Century and valens mentioned
recently) were half the size of the older legions.
3. Large numbers of troops were stationed as limes along the borders in
Europe. Such were not counted among the legionary strength as i recall.
4. After the Goths moved in Kicking our buddy Valens butt as has been noted,
the empire, both East and West, began hiring large numbers of Gothic and
other Germanic mercenaries. these were invariably heavy cavalry formations
and were not counted as regular legions.
So there could have been 330 "legions" in the empire, but only around 25
usually were real legions. The rest being garrison troops and mercs. And
condsidering how often the empire fought as the migrations and civil wars
picked up, I don't see those numbers as being unreasonable. Or of the large
numbers of kills for a legion to be properly experienced as being out of
line either. But that's me. I was just a grunt playtester, you should go
find Al Nofi (the designer) and ask him for details on this.

Samwise

[James Ruhland]

> 3. Large numbers of troops were stationed as limes along the borders in
> Europe. Such were not counted among the legionary strength as i recall.
>
Technically, they were parts of Legions, If I remember correctly. But these
guys were in "static" defence, and eventually (rapidly) they developed home
lives & families, and would rebel if anyone tried to send them someplace
else (and they lost much of their military discipline & effectiveness. . .)

The 1/2 Legion, the "real" Legion is that part which didn't get tied into
static defence on the Limes, and was shifted around. Eventually (actually,
somewhat quickly), they lost all "real" connection to the "other half" of
the Legion, which might be stationed in Gaul, say, while the mobile force
was in Thrace or even Syria.

[Aaron Sanderson]

>
>"150 legions going in the east and 180 legions"
>
>330 legions?
>
>At between 4000-6000 men per legion[what I vaguely recollect they
were],
>that gives Rome an army of 1,320,000 - 1,980,000 I find this numbers to
>be ludicrously high for the date in question.
>
>I myself had always heard it was more along your 30 Legions number,
>which still makes an army of 120,000 - 180,000 or 600-900 Birthright
>Units, which is still a large number, hehehe.
>
>Tripp
>

Ok. You must realize that this army was covering an area from Scotland
to the Black Sea to Persia to North Africa, and then some. Second. By
the time of that writing, ~395 IIRC, then the size of a legion had
broken down. Rome was basically taking entire German tribes and making
them part of the R. Army to defend the frontier against their cousins.
You must remember that Hadrian's Wall crosses most of Scotland and that
there were walls like that all over in Europe at the time. The 30
Legion number is only accurate durning the time of Augustus. And we
know that there were at least 60 legions before he cut them down in
number in an effort to try to prevent civil wars. Rome had a huge army.
That is one of the major reasons for their downfall, to many people on
the walls and not enough planting crops.

AmS.

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[E Gray]

- -----Original Message-----
From: Aaron Sanderson
To: birthright@MPGN.COM
Date: Friday, May 08, 1998 6:11 PM
Subject: Re: [BIRTHRIGHT] - Roman Org.


>Rome had a huge army.
>That is one of the major reasons for their downfall, to many people on
>the walls and not enough planting crops.


Um, not really. The Romans had plenty of people to plant crops, they
just didn't have the infrastructure to transport it, and make full use of
it.
Heck, they didn't take advantage of what they did have(like a Horse-thresher
that handled grain much faster than men). A bigger problem was Rome
began to rely on wealth the Legions got and spent that stuff like sand,
and when the Legions eventually stopped gathering much gold, well..

Another factor was the Armies were no longer made of citizens or
those who wanted to be citizens, just barbarian tribes paid in gold
and loot, without concern for the empire, compounded by people
decided to leave while the getting was good and establish their
own territory in the hinterland.