KIA

[Quintus Aurelius Lepidus]

what was the status of roman soldiers killed in action, i mean KIA ? how did they put the dead onto their records?

causaria missio is when they are too wounded to fight... (so they get fired)

[D B Campbell]

how did they put the dead onto their records?

A black Greek letter ? (the theta nigrum) beside the deceased's name in the records (Gr. ???????, "death").

[Arminius Primus]

Ave Fratres,

This is a current topic for us, as we are trying to get a standardized casualty notification system in place for our deployed troops. It doesn't do to have the press asking the family about their thoughts on their now deceased son , before they were notified of the event. Granted we didn't have that sort of thing to deal with in the empire but there probably had to be some sort of procedure to notify the surviving family. Plus , there were always issues such as pay and savings account, armor turn in, personal effects etc to deal with. Is there any literary record of this sort of procedure. Or did everything revert to the legion, Sort of the Legion as Family concept ?? Would there be a difference in procedures between the Auxillae and the Legions based on the citizenship issue?? I remember seeing somewhere that the average soldier could create a will that dictated the disposition of his property, so was that sort of thing solely an individual responsibility?

Regards from a clear and very warm Balkans, Arminius Primus aka Al

[D B Campbell]

Clearly, soldiers could die intestate, because there was legislation governing the correct procedure in such a case. But equally, there are many examples of Roman soldiers' wills, where an heir (or heirs) were nominated to deal with the soldier's estate. So it looks as if it was down to personal choice. (It's a huge subject with its own specialist literature.)