+- RomanArmyTalk (https://www.romanarmytalk.com/rat)
+-- Forum: Research Arena (https://www.romanarmytalk.com/rat/forumdisplay.php?fid=4)
+--- Forum: Roman Military History & Archaeology (https://www.romanarmytalk.com/rat/forumdisplay.php?fid=8)
+--- Thread: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) (/showthread.php?tid=17319)
Pages:
1
2
Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - LvpvsRomanvs - 08-12-2010
Salvete!
I've been thinking of drawing a researched interpretation of a Batavian auxiliary during the conquest of Britain. As I was going through my picture collection for some inspiration today I couldn't help noticing that almost all of the auxiliaries have a rather uniform appearance. Studies have shown that the appearance of Roman legionaries wouldn't exactly have been uniform, so I was wondering whether this would also be the case for auxiliaries?
They always seem to be wearing lorica hamata, bronze helmets, oval shields etc. e.g.:
[attachment=2:1o7x7epf]<!-- ia2 Roman-Auxiliary.jpg<!-- ia2 [/attachment:1o7x7epf]
But could their appearance have looked somewhat different? One interpretation I like is Johnny Shumate's Flavian auxiliary:
[attachment=1:1o7x7epf]<!-- ia1 Batavian Auxiliary.jpg<!-- ia1 [/attachment:1o7x7epf]
Could it be possible that an auxiliary would have worn equipment usually associated with legionary infantry - in this case the helmet? Perhaps they could have worn segmentata, and maybe have had rectangular shields? But if this is so, how would one differenciate legionary from auxiliary? Was this apparent uniformity something that identifies them? - though, I have doubts that uniformity was the case.
Could the auxiliaries have even worn their own tribal attire along with their Roman military equipment? Maybe even hung heads or scalps from their belts, as such things were commonplace amongst auxiliaries (this can be see this on Trajan's column - but it is interesting to see that the legionaries do not take heads - think I'll make another thread for that).
Here an auxiliary is about to take a head in this interpretation:
[attachment=0:1o7x7epf]<!-- ia0 Auxiliaries at Mons Grapius.JPG<!-- ia0 [/attachment:1o7x7epf]
Another thing worth mentioning is the idea that the Tropaeum Traiani depicts auxiliaries? (even though this matter is of a later period, it would be interesting to hear other people's views).
Does anyone have any interesting views on this matter?
Grazie,
Lorenzo.
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Caballo - 08-12-2010
Great to hear that you are researching the Batavians! Peronis is the real expert here, but these links should start you off.
You'll find a lot of useful information here
http://www.romanarmy.net/batavian.htm
Tribal attire may well have been worn as well- for example the Batavian helmet http://www.romanarmy.net/batavianhelm.htm
![[Image: helmad3.jpg]](http://www.romanarmy.net/images/Pages/Military/helmad3.jpg)
And there is evidence of lorica segmentata use as well from Batavian finds. http://www.romanarmy.net/batlorica.htm
And we go for a look that is not uniform but identifiable as a unit. You'll find more reading in the new Osprey on Mons Graupius which focusses on the Batavian role in winning that battle.
http://www.ospreypublishing.com/store/M ... 1846039263
That is probably enough reading for a morning!
Cheers
Caballo
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Graham Sumner - 08-13-2010
Hello Lorenzo
Quote:I couldn't help noticing that almost all of the auxiliaries have a rather uniform appearance.
Do you mean original sources or re-enactors?
In the first century AD. the main source for Auxiliary clothing and equipment are the series of tombstones found in the Rhineland area of Germany. On those monuments without the weapons and inscriptions it is often difficult to tell the Auxiliaries apart from the Legionaries and even when the distinction is clear the Auxiliaries sometimes appear to have more elaborate personal equipment than the legionaries.
In the main this consists of a cloak and tunic in a very very fine material which is formed into elaborate drapes. When weapons and shields are shown on these monuments Bishop and Coulston (Roman Military Equipment, 2006 second edition) noted that the Auxiliaries tend to have flat shields either oval or rectangular and carry hasta while the Legionaries have curved shields and pila. This difference in battle equipment is also supported by the description of an engagement in Britain by Tacitus who mentions the difference in battle equipment between Legionaries and Auxiliaries. However he also confuses things by saying elsewhere that it was Roman policy to equip the allies with Roman weapons and standards.
This policy can be supported to a degree by the correspondence of individual soldiers and orders for clothing were there appears to be no distinction between Auxiliaries and Legionaries. While it appears to be accepted that citizens who enrolled in the army presumably dressed in their own clothes were then issued with military clothing there are those who think that the same scenario does not apply to those who were recruited into the Auxilia. However there does not appear to be any solid evidence to support the theory that recruits who enlisted into the regular Auxiliary units continued to wear their native dress. Apart from a few references to very senior officers of the likes of Caesar and Antony occassionaly in local clothing there is also no evidence of ordinary soldiers at this date going native as regards dress.
That situation would undoubtedly occur when local warriors were recruited specifically for a campaign who would fight and wear what they already had and what the troops of many of the allied nations would wear is by and large anybodies guess.
Until recently it appeared to be accepted that Auxiliaries were given old Legionary equipment when they in turn were issued with the new stuff. This was how it was done in the modern Colonial forces so it was assumed the Romans operated the same way. Either that or the Auxiliaries were issued with plainer equipment and if you adhere to the Russell Robinson classification of Auxiliary helmet types and follow the belief that only Legionaries wore the segmented armour then you are very limited to what you can wear as an Auxiliary re-enactor and this explains the very uniform appearance of some modern groups. However as mentioned some of the equipment worn by Auxiliaries on the Rhineland sculptures is as elaborate if not more so than their Legionary counterparts and furthermore you find segmentata fittings on Auxiliary sites not just at Legionary fortresses. Again you should read Bishop and Coulston on this.
Trajan's column from the early second century shows a variety of auxiliaries but basically of what we would now term regular and irregular types. Trajan's column is however guilty of giving the regular Auxiliaries both foot and horse a somewhat uniform appearance, much as it has done with the Legionaries of that era. However the irregular Auxiliaries come in a variety of styles including un-armoured barbarians wearing just trousers equipped with clubs, un-armoured slingers and stone throwers in tunic and cloak and archers in both short and ankle length tunics. Be wary of the latter however as there is no evidence for the ankle length tunics anywhere else, they are certainly not Eastern dress either as some have asserted. The column now shows Legionaries and regular Auxiliaries in different styles of tunic. The Legionary appears to be the standard wide, calf length tunic but that worn by the Auxiliaries does not even cover the buttocks and modesty is only maintained by the wearing of knee length trousers called bracae.
Common sense dictates that in certain theatres of operations soldiers must have worn more suitable types of clothing apart from that designed originally for an Italian climate. Unfortunately there is little evidence for this other than the bracae mentioned above. However by the third century again both Auxiliaries and Legionaries commonly wear identical long sleeved tunics and long trousers with rectangular cloaks. When this happened exactly is hard to tell from the surviving evidence but it must have occurred before its sudden appearance in third century sculpture.
If this all seems far from straightforward that is because sadly it is but more evidence is coming to light all the time.
Hope this helps a bit.
Graham.
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - LvpvsRomanvs - 08-13-2010
Quote:Do you mean original sources or re-enactors?
I meant re-enactors and some of the artwork depicting auxiliaries. I don't think I have seen any depictions that move away from the standard auxiliary helmet, lorica hamata etc. But I could be wrong, ofcourse.
Quote:Until recently it appeared to be accepted that Auxiliaries were given old Legionary equipment when they in turn were issued with the new stuff. This was how it was done in the modern Colonial forces so it was assumed the Romans operated the same way. Either that or the Auxiliaries were issued with plainer equipment and if you adhere to the Russell Robinson classification of Auxiliary helmet types and follow the belief that only Legionaries wore the segmented armour then you are very limited to what you can wear as an Auxiliary re-enactor and this explains the very uniform appearance of some modern groups. However as mentioned some of the equipment worn by Auxiliaries on the Rhineland sculptures is as elaborate if not more so than their Legionary counterparts and furthermore you find segmentata fittings on Auxiliary sites not just at Legionary fortresses. Again you should read Bishop and Coulston on this.
So I suppose it would not be that bad to have the auxiliary wearing lorcia segmentata rather than hamata. My visualisation of a Batavian auxiliary of the mid-1st century would be:
+ Imperial Gallic B with cheek-pieces and neck-guard still intact, decorated with the fur and feathers seen above. Perhaps something that can be percieved as some sort of unit identification? - though I'm not sure how it would be fixed onto the helmet?
+ Lorica Segmentata (Corbridge type).
+ A tunic with a native pattern? - I have seen depictions of auxiliaries by Peter Connolly who wear tunics with a sort of 'check' patter - but they represent auxiliaries of the Tungrian and Batavian cohorts of the early 2nd Century stationed as Vindolanda, so their tunic designs may have been influenced by British fashion - which I don't think would have been so influencial by the mid-1st century.
+ Braccae
+ Standard issue Caligae?
+ Hasta
+Gladius
+Flat oval shield.
- Lorenzo.
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Phaichtos - 08-13-2010
I know it is like the "holy grail" of our knowledge about Roman military accoutrement, but I think sometimes we rely a bit too heavily on Trajan's column for these kind of things. To me, the written sources are mixed on the subject, and a lot of them tend to have been written by non-soldiers, anyway; just the other day I was reading some primary sources on the Second Punic war for instance, and it seemed to me that one of the authors was a bit confused over just exactly what weapons the troops were using. Grave stones would be a definite help, but even then, who knows if the artwork portrays the deceased soldier "as he was" or rather as some kind of ideal (I am sure this varied).
I say all this to say that, if the standard front line citizen legionaries had a "mixed bag" of equipment, I think it would be silly to assume that the auxilia all were dressed exactly alike. I think that monuments like Trajan's column are more designed to portray an idealized version of the dichotomy between citizen legionaries and their non-citizen auxiliary counterparts and in reality, we could expect a very varied appearance among the later especially, perhaps even incorporating a great deal of items of totemic significance to these indigenous peoples.
By the way, I first saw that Batavian helmet reproduced at an exhibition at Kalkriese, and it really struck me how much it reminded me of things I had seen in America in relation to our own natives, with headdresses of skins and feathers. I find things like this fascinating
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Graham Sumner - 08-13-2010
Hi Lorenzo
I still think you should read Bishop and Coulston in particular pages 254-9.
Quote:So I suppose it would not be that bad to have the auxiliary wearing lorcia segmentata rather than hamata. My visualisation of a Batavian auxiliary of the mid-1st century would be:
Well if you want to be different you could wear a leather jerkin over a mail shirt and subarmalis as suggested by Robinson.
Quote:+ Imperial Gallic B with cheek-pieces and neck-guard still intact, decorated with the fur and feathers seen above. Perhaps something that can be percieved as some sort of unit identification? - though I'm not sure how it would be fixed onto the helmet?
As far as I understood the helmet was 'modified' or perhaps defaced by a Batavian rebel to look 'non Roman'. Would a regular Auxiliary do this? The shield design and standards should give unit identification. Agreed Robinson's classification offers little choice of helmet types for Auxiliaries, more work needs to be done in that area. Perhaps Mike Bishop can help out here?
Quote:+ Lorica Segmentata (Corbridge type).
if you do not want to accept the conventional stereotypical look then why accept the conventional stereotypical view that you should be armoured at all? You could argue that the tombstones evidence shows battle-dress therefore un-armoured but with perhaps a helmet. You can support this view with several other examples of soldiers depicted fighting but without armour. It is as unconventional as all your other suggestions but at least you can say it is based on an interpretation of the available evidence rather than just speculation.
Quote:+ A tunic with a native pattern? - I have seen depictions of auxiliaries by Peter Connolly who wear tunics with a sort of 'check' patter - but they represent auxiliaries of the Tungrian and Batavian cohorts of the early 2nd Century stationed as Vindolanda, so their tunic designs may have been influenced by British fashion - which I don't think would have been so influencial by the mid-1st century.While there is some very small textile fragments from Vindolanda with patterns, their use by the military is speculative at best. There are also plain coloured textiles at Vindolanda. It is very often the women who retain native styles in fashion longer than the men who adopt Roman clothing soon after contact.
Quote:+ Braccae
OK.
Quote:+ Standard issue Caligae?
Depending on the date you could go with Vindolanda fell boots. There is no evidence for classic caligae from there as yet, even from the earlist Flavian levels.
Quote:+ Hasta
You could spoil yourself and have two!
Quote:+GladiusOK
Quote:+Flat oval shield.
As you want to look different why not go for the rectangular flat type!
Sorry for rambling, I just happen to be painting an Auxiliary in Britain myself at this very moment. So I am struggling with all of these very issues myself
Graham.
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Caballo - 08-13-2010
Just for info , heres a number of us as Batavians from Cohors I Batavorum.
![[Image: 27a.jpg]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v221/PaulHB/27a.jpg)
![[Image: DSCF1501.jpg]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v221/PaulHB/DSCF1501.jpg)
![[Image: auxilia.jpg]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v221/PaulHB/auxilia.jpg)
Identifiably a unit, but not uniform.
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Graham Sumner - 08-13-2010
Paul
I just wish you guys would go into red-brown like Johnny's illustration, ironically taken from a photo of Adrian! :wink:
Graham.
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - mcbishop - 08-13-2010
Quote:
...reminds me of the old Prince Charles joke that includes the line 'wear the fox hat'...
Mike Bishop
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Caballo - 08-13-2010
Quote:I just wish you guys would go into red-brown like Johnny's illustration, ironically taken from a photo of Adrian!
Fair point, as I agree that there is more evidence for red than any other (especially after the Herculaneum soldier).
Mind you, it is actually very difficult to see what tunic colour is worn (see pic below,). We have actually moved away from a uniform tunic colour here (see pics above)- but you have to look closely as 90% of the tunic is covered by armour, subarmalis etc. Which may mean that the Great Tunic Wars were fought in vain....
![[Image: Skirmish3aacopy.jpg]](http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v221/PaulHB/Skirmish3aacopy.jpg)
Quote:'wear the fox hat'...Given the roadkill I sometimes sport on my helmet, I tend to get this one a lot... :roll:
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Graham Sumner - 08-13-2010
Quote:Mind you, it is actually very difficult to see what tunic colour is worn (see pic below,).
Funnily enough Paul I mentioned that very point many years ago and showed a similar photograph, I got nowhere at the time.
I have also mentioned above the standards and shields as unit identity. Without those of course when off duty the soldiers identity was highlighted by the military tunic, military cloak and belt. Nick Fuentes also suggested that scarf colour could be used for unit identity. I liked his suggestion that Legions recruited from amongst the Marines had blue ones.
I just bring up the red brown colour because I am constantly being told by dyers and textile experts that a green colour would be achieved by double dyeing and that therefore that would be expensive. As that produces a washed out shade I guess that the deep shade you guys have would consequently require even more dyeing and so be even more costly. That is presumably why the ancient pictorial sources rarely show green at all and even then it only appears associated with Guard units or hunting scenes and some smaller items like scarves or saddlecloths.
Otherwise I quite like the appearance of your group.
Graham.
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Ron Andrea - 08-13-2010
Great pictures. Thank you.
Where and when were they taken?
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Phaichtos - 08-14-2010
I agree, those are some amazing shots, Paul
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Gaius Julius Caesar - 08-14-2010
Taken at Lunt Roman Fort, home (modern) of the XIIIIth Legio GMV and the Batavians pictured.
I would second Cabalos comment tha tthe yhave moved away from a standard green to a more varied set of shades and textures.
They look very authentic, even if the colour as you state Mr Sumner is maybe less appropriate for a bunch of sh**p sha**ers like them :mrgreen:
Ade also put me onto some wool that was woad dyed, and a paler, gray blue, as opposed to the striking
modern blue seen on the legionaries in th pictures.
Re: Equipment of the Imperial Roman Auxiliary (infantry) - Ron Andrea - 08-14-2010
[url:3c8qxpfa]http://www.caerleon.net/[/url] also has some excellent stills and videos of Legio II Augustus.