Enlistment Contracts in the Roman Army

[L C Cinna]

+ or Until he has completed the required years to qualify for retirement?

Yes. Even then he could be called up as a veteran under dire circumstances. His son had to enlist as a soldier too.

question: I know that this was practice in the late Roman army but I don't remember reading that the sons had to become soldiers as well during the principate as the army usually had more volunteers than they needed anyways. I know that any Roman citizen could be called to arms because the republican law was never abolished but the imperial army never really had to use that and that forced recruitments were used during the late empire.


Can anybody tell me when the law was passed which forced the sons to take up the job of their fathers?