"Non-combatants" in late Republic legions

[Sardaukar]

Interestingly, when foragers and servants near Q.Cicero's camp came under attack by the Germans (B.G.6.40), the servants showed a basic military sense by making for the nearest high ground and, when dislodged, joining the legionaries who were forming up and followed the veterans in a charge into the camp and safety. It's at this point that Caesar tells us the 'camp followers' - merchants, prostitutes, soothsayers etc. - who were camping beneath the fortifications (ie: outside the camp) were wiped out. This indicates the clear difference between camp servants and camp followers.

Snipped a lot to save space, sorry ! :oops:

That is indeed what I ment with "non-combatants", since there seems to have been sort of "class" that did belong to legion. They did not usually fight and were probably not trained to. But in many desperate situations, they did arm themselves and fought. I think that also happened when legion commanded by Sabinius and Cotta (was it 14th ?) was wiped out by Nervii commanded by Ambiorix.

So, that'd indicate there was definite difference between camp/legion servants and camp followers. Might even be that those servants were distributed as 1-2 per contubernium. Evil Wikipedia-source would say that there was 2 servants attached to each octet..but alas, haven't found any real source that actually says so (not been looking too hard, tho).

That'd make them more akin to modern supply troops and it'd make sense to have them inside legionary camp and have "camp followers" forbidden inside legionary camp (since they did not belong to organization where everyone has his own dedicated place in camp).