Battle of Teutoburg Forest

[Iosephus Augustus]

I am interested in the Battle of Teutoburg Forest and the "Lost Legions" (XVII, XVIII, XIX). In addition to Tony Clunn, Adrian Murdock, and Peter Wells' account, are there any other significant written and or film sources available in English to include articles/theses/dissertations that I could peruse? Appreciate your assistance.

QUINTILI VARE, LEGIONIS REDDE

[Joe_71]

Not read it myself, but the following has been on some notes of mine for a while; hope it helps.

Schlüter, W. 1999. The Battle of the Teutoburg Forest: archaeological research at Kalkriese near Osnabrück. In J.D. Creighton and R.J.A. Wilson (eds.) Roman Germany: studies in cultural interaction, 125-159. Portsmouth, RI: JRA Supplementary Series, 32.

[Jona Lendering]

The book to read is Adrian Murdoch, Rome's Greatest Defeat. Massacre in the Teutoburg Forest; (Gloucestershire: Sutton, 2006) ISBN 0-7509-4015-8.

The book to avoid is Peter Wells, The Battle That Stopped Rome (2003). The author appears to believe that writing for a more general audience is a license to be inaccurate. Inventing a twenty-sixth legion is just one error. I wrote him, but of course he did not reply.

[Iosephus Augustus]

Not read it myself, but the following has been on some notes of mine for a while; hope it helps.

Schlüter, W. 1999. The Battle of the Teutoburg Forest: archaeological research at Kalkriese near Osnabrück. In J.D. Creighton and R.J.A. Wilson (eds.) Roman Germany: studies in cultural interaction, 125-159. Portsmouth, RI: JRA Supplementary Series, 32.

Thanks Joe...will certainly look it up.

[Iosephus Augustus]

The book to read is Adrian Murdoch, Rome's Greatest Defeat. Massacre in the Teutoburg Forest; (Gloucestershire: Sutton, 2006) ISBN 0-7509-4015-8.

The book to avoid is Peter Wells, The Battle That Stopped Rome (2003). The author appears to believe that writing for a more general audience is a license to be inaccurate. Inventing a twenty-sixth legion is just one error. I wrote him, but of course he did not reply.

After reading your comments I went back to Amazon.com to read customer reviews and readers generally support your assessment of both of these books. On the other hand, I don't pay attention to editorial reviews since these are seldom critical. Nonetheless, since forewarned is forearmed I bought the book for $4.78 to see for myself. I'll add my thoughts after I read the book.

[SigniferOne]

The book to read is Adrian Murdoch, Rome's Greatest Defeat. Massacre in the Teutoburg Forest; (Gloucestershire: Sutton, 2006) ISBN 0-7509-4015-8.

The book to avoid is Peter Wells, The Battle That Stopped Rome (2003). The author appears to believe that writing for a more general audience is a license to be inaccurate. Inventing a twenty-sixth legion is just one error. I wrote him, but of course he did not reply.

Out of curiosity, what are some of the other errors he commits? He seems to have incurred the ire of quite a few people.

[Jona Lendering]

Out of curiosity, what are some of the other errors he commits? He seems to have incurred the ire of quite a few people.

Quite simply: he ignores Tacitus and Cassius Dio, because they wrote one and two centuries after the events. Which is nonsense, because Tacitus has, through Pliny's (lost) History of the Germanic Wars, access to eye witnesses; and something similar can be said about the source of Dio, which may have been Pliny as well. But what is really strange, is that he does accept topographical descriptions by these authors. But you can not have it both ways: either you accept the historical account and can also use the topography, or you ignore the historical account and can not use the topography.

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Odd, these comments of yours Jona, as it was the first book I read on the subject, and it seems to stick to the facts as known, including excellent photos of the finds and a description of the archaeology.
The other book seems to rely on modern interpretation and art to flesh out the story. :?

I did not get a sense Wells ignored Tacitus or Dio, perhaps he did not rely on contant quotation of references? I really cannot follow the objections which rate the one book over the other....

[Jona Lendering]

it seems to stick to the facts as known ... I did not get a sense Wells ignored Tacitus or Dio

One of the points where he ignores them, is that he presents the battle as a one-day affair. Dio explicitly mentions a protracted struggle; Tacitus -quoting Pliny- mentions several camps, which also suggests (but does not prove) that fighting took several days.

Wells wants it to be a one-day fight. He offers an analysis that it was possible to gather sufficient Germanic men to create an army, but that is insufficient proof, because he ignores two steps that are necessary for this argument: (a) that this assembly of men could be used as an army (hunting experience makes no warriors) and (b) that what was potentially possible, actually happened.

The first objection is perhaps not very important; but the second is. In the terms of formal logic: Wells confuses the modalities of his statements.

[Praefectusclassis]

And coming up, the first Ancient Warfare special issue

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

And coming up, the first Ancient Warfare special issue

Speaking of, when was the last issue out, I seem to have missed, somewhere!!

Yes I see your point there Jona...it was 2003 when I read it. He does seem to copress the final collapse as the whole affair. I was under some strain at he time due to my mothers illness, so I guess I have viewd the book rather
haphazardly. It would explain why I am always wondering where the finds were found that give the information for the longer strung out battle, as I was only aware of the finds in the area described......the other book does notseem to describe any more finds than Wells.

So, I guess I would have the same questions, where is the more up to date information on the archaeology to be found?

[Praefectusclassis]

December '08 Byron. If it got lost, lemme know on my AW mail address

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Thanks Jasper, will keep looking!

[Caledonia]

If you have access to JSTOR, there's a good article by Herbert Benario (with the very origianl title of "Teutoburg") where he speculates on whether another commander could have prevented the ambush. He's been writing articles on Roman Germany since the '50s.

Livius.org does good job of running through the main ancient sources and going over the battle:
[url:37ru1ru7]http://www.livius.org/te-tg/teutoburg/teutoburg01.htm[/url]

Also, there's a book by Theodor Mommsen (a.k.a. the only historian to win a Nobel prize) compiled from students' lecture notes, called A History of Rome Under the Emperors. It doesn't have a huge section about Teutoburg but it's worth reading. This guy identified the site of the battle one hundred years before Clunn found it and was laughed at.

[Jona Lendering]

Theodor Mommsen (a.k.a. the only historian to win a Nobel prize)

Not entirely true: Churchill won his Nobel Prize for his History of the Second World War. And to be honest, I have read laureates who wrote worse prose.