Project- Influences of Roman military on modern day riot control

[Bryan]

You've never played rugby have you? If you had, you'd know that a captain at the bottom of the scrumage is no longer capable of being a captain. If you are in the scrumage - there are only three things you can do: push forward, get pushed back or collapse. And it's almost impossible to talk to the guy next to you let alone organise the "rest of the troops".

And the last thing I'd want if I were a Roman solider, is some nancy centurion getting caught up in the scrimage of the front line, allowing the enemy to work their way around the flank and come at me from behind because THEY WERE NOT DOING THEIR JOB AND WATCHING MY BACK.

And what we have here is a basic misunderstanding of ancient Roman combat by your comparison of it to a modern rugby scrim. You're doing the same thing by trying to interpret modern riots being "just like" ancient warfare because a few small similarities existed. Its a form of presentism, an anachronistic misinterpretation of past historical events by trying to explain them with modern concepts. The Romans didn't play Rugby and Rugby isn't especially similar at all to how a Roman century would be fighting in battle.  

A Roman milites isn't supposed to worry at all about his flanks, that is so far outside of his responsibilities its really not worth mentioning. So he shouldn't be worried about his "nancy" centurion getting distracted (your description doesn't even make sense, someone fighting in the front ranks is the last one to call a wimp, which is what Nancy means). The century isn't operating all alone in a large field like a rugby team. Apples and oranges. 

The flanks were the responsibility of the centurion to some extent, they would have had some ability to dictate their century's depth and frontage and choosing whether to advance recklessly across bad terrain without flanking unit protection. But a centurion wouldn't be "watching his soldier's backs" because other, some junior (the optio) and more more senior, that was their job, to command the whole of the battle lines. The centurion's only responsibility was his own person centurion, or his maniple, which would often be supported by many other centuries/maniples in their cohort or battle line, most of the time with other reserve lines close behind them (the reasoning to prevent breakthrough and small unit flank attacks), as well as having light infantry attached to them, often fighting from within the gaps between units. 

What modern military theorists call "Commanding" (vice Leading) was the role of the tribunes, prefects, legates, and Praetorian/Consular generals, who either rode or walked immediately behind the front line, their jobs to rally forces in the local area, control advances and retreats, orchestrate line relief, etc. They'd be the ones who would be watching the centuries involved in a fight from a superior position (immediately behind, often on horseback for height), and most importantly they also had the authority to command other forces and coordinate manipular and cohortal maneuvers (a centurion had no authority to order anything outside his own century/maniple, and there was little he could do anyway to his own unit once it was firmly committed to close combat). Meaning if a centurion in the back of his century somehow realized he was being flanked the tribune would have seen it too, the centurion couldn't alter his unit's formation while engaged in close combat anyway, nor could he order a nearby centurion to redeploy his century to support. A tribune could order a nearby century to support, he had the command authority and he was in a position to best get them to act. 

Let's look at the evidence:

- There is no evidence the Romans had sub officers in their front ranks, but there would have had to have been someone to lead from example in the front. 

- We know the most courageous rankers in the unit were made standard bearers, and that carried with it an increased risk of death. We know that it was the centurion's job to protect the standard bearer. 

- We know the "chosen man" Optio, assistant to the centurion, often served in the rear of the formation, to keep the men in line, force them to advance, prevent them from retreating. 

- We know the tribunes were immediately behind the leading battle line, they often jumped into hard fighting in the front lines, leading by example, they too suffered large casualties, similar to centurions, that they often served on horseback, and that because they wore gaudy uniforms from horseback within missile range of the front line and couldn't use evasive maneuvering to limit getting hit, it made their job more dangerous. 

- We know centurions often suffered extraordinarily high casualty rates in comparison to normal rankers, which means they would have put themselves in very dangerous positions. 

Since centurions weren't on horseback like many of the senior officers were, since they were the lowest true small unit leader with real meaningful authority gifted by the tribunes or general (representing SPQR), that they still were killed in large numbers despite wearing some of the best equipment available, and since most would have been, at the very least, mediocre skilled warriors with sword, shield, and pilum, since the standard was in the front to lead the men and they had to protect it, then it means the centurions led from the front, they didn't command from the rear. Not in every situation, but in most, especially pitched battle advances and clashes. 

Whether they were front center, in the line, front right, in the ranks, or kind of floating center or right in front of the leading rank, that's a guess, but I'd lean that they had a specific position within the leading rank, which was theirs, which they would fill when fighting in a pitched battle, leading right, the position of honor for a unit.