RomanArmyTalk

Salve! This is my first post so bear with me..... I'm still relatively new to the study of the Roman army and usually try to read anything i can find about it. My favorite legion is the X Equitata (and subsequently the X Gemina) and i thought i had become fairly familiar with it's history. So it was a shock when i read Stephen Dando-Collins Book "Caesar's Legion". In it, not only did he connect the X Equitata to the X Fretensis, but he also contradicts many other legion histories. In particular, the XIX,XXV and XXVI legions at the Varian Disaster(to be fair in the script he lists the XVII,XVIII, and XIX but it's in the glossary that he switches the XVII and XVIII for the XXV and XXVI). I am really curious as to what is right. What evidence is there for the legions with Varus and what legion was the descendant of the X Equitata? Gratias Tibi! Aurelius

Quote:Salve! This is my first post so bear with me

Hi Aurelius,

First things first - Welcome.
Second - I have moved the post to the proped section. No harm done, but best take care in which section you post - that's why we have them.
Third - please add your real (first) name to your signature. It's in your profile.

Aurelius,

Welcome to RAT. I have not read to book you are referring to, but from my research in re-founding the Tenth Equitata/Equestris in Chicago I have found the following:

Legio Decima did not become known as Equestris/Equitata until after being famously mounted by Caesar. Legions in the Republican Era did not commonly have Nomen like Later Imperial Legions, in fact many of the long named legions recieved each Nomen over a period of time and were not founded as such.

Another interesting find are coins referring to the tenth as Veneria, or Of Venus, due to Caesars connection and claim of decending from the Goddess, and the use of the Bull, the holy Animal of Venus.

As a re-enactment group we represent X Equestris Veneria at the end of its career from 44 BC-30 BC, from the death of its founder through the rise of Augustus and subsequent dissolution of the Legion.

After the end of the second set of Civil Wars, and the rise of Octavian (later Augustus), the veterans of the tenth equestris revolted over pay issues. As punishment Augustus stripped the legion of its titles, and later re-constituted the legion by mixing remnents of other veteran legions into one unit, thus the Tenth Gemina (or Twin), due to its make up of legionaries from multiple legions.

X Fretensis was a seperate legion and actually co-existed with X Equestris during the civil wars b/t Octvian and Antony, with X Fretensis fighting with Octavian and X Equestris fighting on Antony's side. X Fretensis gets its name (supposedly) from the battle of Nautocolus (spelling), where M. Agrippa deferated Q. Pompeaus at the Straights of Messana, again this was at a time where X Equestris still existed as a legion.

As for Equestris vs. Equitata, I have seen both used, and would also love to know which is the correct usage.

As for your Varus Legion question, I can't answer that for sure, but most sources will argue definatively it was 17-18-19, they have found specific relics placing i belive 17 and 19 there, and the 18th is supposed to have been there as well.

I haven't read that book either, nor any other books by the same author. Judging from this topic here on RAT I also never will.

The works of Stephen Dando Collins have been debated widely on this board over the years, and not much positive said about them. His claims of a link between the Caesarian tenth legion and the later Fretensis, and likewise his numbering of the lost legions of Varus, are backed by no proof at all. There were perhaps various tenth legions - the Caesarian one, the X Equestris (not Equitata) and X Veneria noted on inscriptions, which were perhaps separate units, or perhaps the same. Keppie (The Making of the Roman Army from Republic to Empire) supposes Equestris to be Caesar's legion, and most subsequent historical works have gone along with him. There is, however, a proven link between the legions Equestris and Gemina - an inscription set up in the Forum of Augustus by the soldiers and centurions of 'Legion X Gemina Equestris' (see Keppie p.135).

These threads go further into the subject of Dando-Collins and the tenth legion(s):

link from old RAT

link from old RAT

- Nathan

The books in his series are good reading, but as I have found out, they are more good fiction than accurate history.
It took a lot of reading in between the lines over the last few years to get a handle on the trueth, but I would agree with most of what is said in these posts.

That is the first I have heard of the Venus nomen, but it sounds sensible.
I had heard of the attachment of the Equestris after the famous mounted legion episode though.
slowly the pieces fit togther.

Stephen Dando-Collins Book

I rest my case..............

M.VIB.M.

Quote:As for Equestris vs. Equitata, I have seen both used, and would also love to know which is the correct usage.

As I mentioned above, I believe Equestris is the more correct as a legion title - although perhaps somebody who actually understands latin ( :oops: ) might be better placed to answer the question of why this should be.

Both equitata and equestris are usually translated into English as 'mounted', and a Cohors Equitata, for example, is a mounted auxiliary cohort (well, part-mounted actually, just to confuse things further...). Legio Equitata, then, would mean 'mounted legion', which the tenth were not. A better translation for Legio Equestris might perhaps be 'legion of the mounted men' - a fine-to-invisible distinction in English, but there is a difference: the legion were at one point mounted, or had some relation to cavalry, but are not any more...

If we follow Keppie in relating the cognomen to the episode in Caesar's commentaries, when he uses the tenth as a bodyguard during his meeting with Ariovistus, there might be a clue to the choice of name. Having already awarded the tenth the prestigious role of praetorian cohort, Caesar then mounts the legion on horses taken from the German cavalry, "in order that he might have a body-guard as trustworthy as possible, should there be any need for action. And when this was done, one of the soldiers of the tenth legion said, not without a touch of humor, "that Caesar did more for them than he had promised; he had promised to have the tenth legion in place of his praetorian cohort; but he now converted them into horse." (Latin: Quod cum fieret, non inridicule quidam ex militibus X. legionis dixit: plus quam pollicitus esset Caesarem facere; pollicitum se in cohortis praetoriae loco X. legionem habiturum ad equum rescribere.) (Caesar, Gallic Wars, 1.42)

'Not without a touch of humour' indicates that there's a joke going on here: again, the translation doesn't catch it, but the implication is that Caesar is going to do more than turn the tenth into cavalry (the horse of the Gallic wars being mostly German and Gallic auxiliaries anyway, so not very exalted). Instead, I think, the humorous soldier is suggesting that Caesar is going to enrol the legion in the Ordo Equestris, the Equestrian Order, or lower rank of the Roman nobility ('Knights' in the not-very-helpful English) - entry to the order carried a hefty property/wealth qualification, and equestrians supplied the junior and staff officers of the army. In effect, then, Caesar isn't actually telling the soldiers he's going to turn them into cavalry - he's telling them he's going to make them rich!

The cognomen Equestris, therefore, might imply more than simply 'mounted' - it's a boast too, perhaps, implying that the men of the legion consider themselves (or Caesar considered them) equal in honour and dignity to the nobility.

- Nathan

Interesting insite, I always like to learn more about our representative legion. So what of the Veneria (of venus) title? I have seen it on coins with the X moniker, but was this the same or a different 10th? Caesar did claim to be decended directly from Venus, so again this would make sense. Interesting though.

Thank you so much. I had feared that the Dando-Collins books were more fiction than truth, but it was hard for me to be sure. So was the X Equestris recruited in Spain as claimed by Dando-Collins?

Quote:So what of the Veneria (of venus) title? I have seen it on coins with the X moniker, but was this the same or a different 10th? Caesar did claim to be decended directly from Venus, so again this would make sense. Interesting though.

Only one inscription, apparently, according to Ritterling:

[url:2hlk04fm]http://www.romanarmy.com/cms/content/view/23/113/[/url]

...although more might have appeared since his day (?). I assume the link to Equestris would be their presumed Caesarian origin, but it's a bit tenuous. Then again, legion names before the principiate were probably more like nicknames than formal titles, so I suppose they could have more than one... There are very few legions - V Alaudae and the Legio Martia (number unknown), IIRC - referred to by name rather than by number in literature from republican times.

- Nathan

That Caesars men could make these jokes in front of him, like the equestrian joke, shows the love and respect they mutually shared.

Also during a triumph in Rome, the legionaries chanted dirty songs, of which according to some authors the words were something like:

Women guard your daughters, keep them inside because the old horny bald goat is in town again !!

*now thats from my mind, the correct songtext i do not have at the moment.

M.VIB.M.

That is the translated interpretation I am familiar with, from novel to Penguin...

Quote:So was the X Equestris recruited in Spain as claimed by Dando-Collins?

Almost certainly not. One of the threads I linked above is called 'Origins of the Tenth Legion' ( link from old RAT ), and deals with this specific question. The most coherent theory would be that the legion were raised in Italy or Cisalpine Gaul between 64 and 60 BC.

Quote:That is the translated interpretation I am familiar with, from novel to Penguin...

Yes, it's not an original observation! - it comes from Keppie. I think a connection between Caesar's tenth and X Equestris was also proposed by Paavo Castren in an essay called 'About the Legion X Equestris' (Arctos 8, 1974). He was working from an inscription to two former tribunes of X Equestris named Tillius, set up in Pompeii, which I think he dates to shortly after the eastern campaigns of Antony (I can't find the actual essay though - has anyone seen it?).

A couple of other points - the colony of Nyon in Switzerland, apparently established by Caesar c.BC44, was originally named Colonia Julia Equestris. J.P.C Best's essay 'Colonia Julia Equestris and Legio Decima Equestris' (in Talanta 3, 1971) suggests a link - but was the colony named after settled veterans of the legion, or perhaps the legion so named because it was raised from veterans from the colony? Again, if anyone has the essay perhaps they could comment...

Servius Honoratus' commentary on the Aeneid (ad Aen I.720) refers to a little-known goddess named Venus Equestris, supposed to be a latinised form of the eastern Astarte. If this is true it suggests a link between the two tenth legion epithets Veneria and Equestis - perhaps at one point this legion used both? But this might mean that that the Equestris cognomen came from the name of the goddess rather than the famous episode with Ariovistus...

It's a fascinating subject - perhaps somebody should write a book about it? :roll:

- Nathan

Well, logically, the colony is in Helvetii lands? That would seem to point to the colony being populated from veterans from the Legion?