Origin of Legion

[Crispvs]

I've known that 'legio' origionally meant 'levy' or something similar for quite some years, but one thing I have been wondering about recently is the origin of the words 'miles' and 'centuria'.<br>
I know that 'miles' (soldier) and 'mille' (a thousand) are different words, but could they have had a common origin. I have been wondering whether the early hoplite or pre-hoplite Roman army dating to when Rome was still quite small might have had a nominal strength of a thousand men who would have formed the phalanx. A soldier could therefore have been nicknamed a 'thousander' or something similar, which eventually became the word 'miles'. Taking the idea further the Roman phalanx could have been made up of ten units equivalent in nature to Greek 'lochoi', each of which would have had a nominal strength of one hundred, hence 'centuria'. Perhaps then the 'mille' was composed of ten 'centuriae'. Over time, as the organizational needs of the army changed the size of centuriae changed as well but the term 'centuria' presumably stuck, just as the code name 'tanks' has stuck to what would otherwise have been known as armoured battle tractors. Extending the argument further, given the fact that in most Greek city states there was a dramatic power shift towards the army (or more specifically its champion) at about the same time that hoplite style warfare was introduced, could it not be the case that the introduction of 'centuriae' into 'civilian' society (for wealth assessment and voting) was a result of a militarization of power in society in line with the thinking of the new holders of power? This would neatly explain voting centuries based on wealth (bear in mind here the 'Camillan' army of five classes of soldier based on the amount of equipment each man could afford to own) but not necessarily size and the intimate part that military service played in political progress under the Republic, not to mention the existence of the Marsic and Salian colleges of priests, both dedicated to the war god under different names and both composed of men from the part of society most likely to hold both civil and military power. Any silence on this organization in the writings of Augustan period writers would perhaps be due the changing nature of the army not having been accurately recorded for future generations and instead becoming suffused with legends.<br>
Obviously this is all supposition, but what do other people think, particularly the philologists amongst you?<br>
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Crispvs <p></p><i></i>