The Semispatha and the Saex

[Renatus]

The full Latin text from Vegetius is as follows (II, XV):

Haec erat grauis armatura, quia habebant cassides catafractas ocreas scuta gladios maiores, quos spathas uocant, et alios minores, quos semispathia nominant, plumbatas quinas positas in scutis, quas primo impetu iaciunt, item bina missibilia, unum maius ferro triangulo unciarum nouem, hastili pedem quinque semis, quod pilum uocabant, nunc spiculum dicitur, ad cuius ictum exercebantur praecipue milites, quod arte et uirtute directum et scutatos pedites et loricatos equites saepe transuerberat, aliud minus ferro unciarum quinque, hastili pedum trium semis, quod tunc uericulum, nunc uerutum dicitur.

I wonder if any RAT member can render the Latin into English which is different from Milner's translation?

I'm not going to do the whole thing but I would translate the piece in bold as follows:

'because they had helmets, mail coats, greaves, shields, larger swords (which they call spathae) and other smaller ones (which they name semispathia)'

I don't think that semispathium and pugio are the same. My guess would be that Vegetius knew that the legionary of old carried two edged weapons, one larger than the other, and that, in his own time, the Roman armoury included two swords, the spatha and the semispathium, again of differing sizes. To him, gladius was a generic term for 'sword' and he may not have even heard of pugio. His idea was to improve the army by returning to the methods of the past but he saw no reason why it should not have up-to-date equipment. So he gave his old-style legionaries modern weapons.