02-06-2014, 03:36 PM
Quote: It may perhaps be associated with the claim attributed to him of having armed his men with captured Persian equipment (SHA, Severus Alexander, 56. 5). I am not aware of any specific evidence for Parthian nobles having fled to the Roman empire.
I think Eadie suggests that this remark in the Hist. Aug. may be an anachronism. Alexander is made to say that he armed his men using the equipment of the type of cataphract the Parthians called clibanarii: cataphractarios, quos illi clibanarios vocant (Alex Sev 56.5). This is clearly different to other sorts of cataphracti, which had existed in the Roman army since Hadrian's day. Clibanarii, on the other hand, don't seem to appear until the 4th century. Many of these units mentioned in the ND have an eastern association - clibanarii Parthi, or Persae, or Palmirenorum. Clearly the Romans believed that clibanarii were 'eastern' cavalry. Cataphract, however, apparently had no such suggested origin.
There is a note in Herodian (7.2) that Alexander Severus' army in Germania included many Moorish javelin men and Osrhoenian and Armenian archers... included, too, were a number of Parthian mercenaries. These all seem to be light cavalry, unless the 'mercenaries' were equipped differently.
(But we're getting a bit off topic here, as always seems to happen in these cases...
)
Nathan Ross
