10-25-2006, 12:29 AM
no not civilians but when you take a look at Flavius Josephus for example who describes the events in Judaea of that time period and later (meaning the Jewish rebellion) he mentiones local troops of the king and the Judean government several times. The impression I got was that actually all the guard and police duties were up to local Judaean troops and that the Romans only interfered when there was some major event.
To me it seems like the whole process of guarding and police duties in Jerusalem where carried out by loyal locals and the Romans only interfered if necessary, even if there was a Roman garrison in the town. The feeling I got when reading this was that the Romans switched their troops quite often and tried to concentrate them near their bases like Caesarea for example and sometimes sent their soldiers out to the country to keep order there but tried not to show too much presence within the town itself whenever possible.
I'd say that the few occasions where Roman troops occur in Judaea in Josephus before the war are auxiliaries and that the Roman policy was to show presence in the area but stay out of local affairs as much as possible.
To me it seems like the whole process of guarding and police duties in Jerusalem where carried out by loyal locals and the Romans only interfered if necessary, even if there was a Roman garrison in the town. The feeling I got when reading this was that the Romans switched their troops quite often and tried to concentrate them near their bases like Caesarea for example and sometimes sent their soldiers out to the country to keep order there but tried not to show too much presence within the town itself whenever possible.
I'd say that the few occasions where Roman troops occur in Judaea in Josephus before the war are auxiliaries and that the Roman policy was to show presence in the area but stay out of local affairs as much as possible.
RESTITVTOR LIBERTATIS ET ROMANAE RELIGIONIS
DEDITICIVS MINERVAE ET MVSARVM
[Micha F.]
DEDITICIVS MINERVAE ET MVSARVM
[Micha F.]