12-20-2013, 12:55 PM
Sorry for the late side note:
'taxiarchos' is a very tricky word - see, for example, the entry on LSJ, here: http://stephanus.tlg.uci.edu/lsj/lsj.htm...ontext=lsj which defines it variously as centurion, military tribune, ordinarius, even as legate! It could also mean senior centurion, possibly primuspilus (cf. Plutarch, Pomp. 78.1-79.1 on L. Septimius).
Because it isn't a directly translatable word it needs context. Here, we don't really have any. Antonius' guard was not (necessarily) organised like a normal legionary force. This was a new kind of Roman military unit: a large-scale personal guard, not a legion. We can't be sure it didn't have a different kind of organisational structure as well.
However, given the normal organisation of Roman citizen units, and the later praetorian units, it is likely that the guard was led by tribunes of some sort. Possibly tribuni cohortis rather than tribuni militum.
Perhaps, given the uniqueness of the unit, some ambiguity was present in Appian's own sources, and this is why Appian chose an ambiguous term.
You make an interesting point about the detail that they 'participated in his council'. This would be an argument against taxiarchos for tribune. However, I'm not sure that I would translate τῶν φανερῶν βουλευμάτων as 'his consilium', rather as 'those plans that he made known'. In other words, I think it's a more general comment about Antonius' public statements and private schemes.
It promotes the idea of Antonius as duplicitous, while emphasising that the taxiarchoi were important figures within Antonius' guard - a clear foreshadowing of their later role in promoting reconciliation with Octavian later in Book 3 (cf. Appian, BC 3.29-32). It also shows how Antonius was actively courting veterans and, perhaps, promoting them above their 'station' - which, again, foreshadows their later resistance to his orders.
'taxiarchos' is a very tricky word - see, for example, the entry on LSJ, here: http://stephanus.tlg.uci.edu/lsj/lsj.htm...ontext=lsj which defines it variously as centurion, military tribune, ordinarius, even as legate! It could also mean senior centurion, possibly primuspilus (cf. Plutarch, Pomp. 78.1-79.1 on L. Septimius).
Because it isn't a directly translatable word it needs context. Here, we don't really have any. Antonius' guard was not (necessarily) organised like a normal legionary force. This was a new kind of Roman military unit: a large-scale personal guard, not a legion. We can't be sure it didn't have a different kind of organisational structure as well.
However, given the normal organisation of Roman citizen units, and the later praetorian units, it is likely that the guard was led by tribunes of some sort. Possibly tribuni cohortis rather than tribuni militum.
Perhaps, given the uniqueness of the unit, some ambiguity was present in Appian's own sources, and this is why Appian chose an ambiguous term.
You make an interesting point about the detail that they 'participated in his council'. This would be an argument against taxiarchos for tribune. However, I'm not sure that I would translate τῶν φανερῶν βουλευμάτων as 'his consilium', rather as 'those plans that he made known'. In other words, I think it's a more general comment about Antonius' public statements and private schemes.
It promotes the idea of Antonius as duplicitous, while emphasising that the taxiarchoi were important figures within Antonius' guard - a clear foreshadowing of their later role in promoting reconciliation with Octavian later in Book 3 (cf. Appian, BC 3.29-32). It also shows how Antonius was actively courting veterans and, perhaps, promoting them above their 'station' - which, again, foreshadows their later resistance to his orders.
Tom Wrobel
email = [email protected]
email = [email protected]
