Auxiliary Cohorts and their titles

[Lucius Duccius Rufinus]

Thanks for responses to date. However I remain unclear as to why this happened. Would it not have been simpler to have different numbers? Does this use of the same name not make it difficult for us to track the movements of a particular unit?
Mick Saunders

I'll bet they just forgot about us in the heat of the moment, Mick. You know what it's like, one minute your pushing for green policies, and preserving the environment for the future generations, the next, someone pulls up in a stonkin' V8 supercar and offers to let you drive, and all those good intentions go up in a puff of smoke... :roll: Probably something similar :mrgreen:

Byron, what your forgetting is that it wouldnt be a turbo charged supercar, it would be a 4 horse drawn chariot with sything blades and big iron rims for that added bling bling! (goes from 0 to 10MPH in 3 minutes!! wowzer!)

[Nathan Ross]

Hmmmm, now the gauntlet is down....hmmmmm desert...camels in deserts....camels ships of the sea.....camel jockies...camel sailors....
getting anywhere? :mrgreen:

Wasn't it the sailors of the Misene fleet who were employed in operating the awnings at the Colosseum? Could these Arabian sailors have been erecting giant sunshades in the desert to keep the troops cool? :wink:

[Praefectusclassis]

Oh crap, there goes my thesis... :roll: :lol: :lol:

[Gaius Julius Caesar]

Hmmmm, now the gauntlet is down....hmmmmm desert...camels in deserts....camels ships of the sea.....camel jockies...camel sailors....
getting anywhere? :mrgreen:

Wasn't it the sailors of the Misene fleet who were employed in operating the awnings at the Colosseum? Could these Arabian sailors have been erecting giant sunshades in the desert to keep the troops cool? :wink:

Stretched between the camels! :wink:

[Rado]

Hello dear friends
Me and my brother already prepare the Signum for Cohorts which to be included in our Legio IVScythica. Currently we collect information about cohorts which were included in LEG IIII SCYTHICA with written archaeological and historical evidence.From military diplomas, gravestones and more other historical sources.
What we have now about this is - auxilia cohors "I Cispadanensium"
Please if you have more information about veterans and their cohorts-names and numbers included in LEG IIII SCYTHICA to share it with us. We need it to prepare our legionary Standard with the exact information.For which I thank you in advance.
Greetings Radostin Kolchev

[D B Campbell]

Currently we collect information about cohorts which were included in LEG IIII SCYTHICA with written archaeological and historical evidence. From military diplomas, gravestones and more other historical sources.

The theory that specific auxiliary units were "attached" to individual legions has been discredited.* Is this what you mean?

What we have now about this is - auxilia cohors "I Cispadanensium"

What makes you think that this cohort was associated with the Fourth Scythica Legion? I do not follow your logic. :?

* Dietwulf Baatz, "Kommandobereiche der Legionslegaten", Germania 67 (1989), pp. 169-178.

[Rado]

AVE D B Campbell
For as in our club LEG IIII SCYTHICA is very important to know is anyone has any information from military diplomas, gravestones and other historical sources about cohorts names and numbers from I to X which were included in IIII SCYTHICA. This are the sources that make me say that auxilia cohors "I Cispadanensium" was included in was included in IIII SCYTHICA
http://www.romanarmy.com/cms/content/view/33/113/
”Records at the permanent camp of the legion in Moesia refers also the promotion of the veteran L. Campanius Verecundus to signifer and further to centurio of coh. I Cisipadensium (CIL V 8185). A cohors that still later belonged to the Moesian army (as is well known, promotions from old legionary soldiers to non-commissioned officers of the auxilia took place only within the same Provincial exercitus). In addition the Centurio Etuvius Capreolus from Vienna, who served 35 years with IIII Scythica (Dessau 9090) and rose from the ranks to Centurionate, and was conscripted at the latest, in the time of Tiberius.”
[attachment=1:1q3k2599]<!-- ia1 Clipboard01.jpg<!-- ia1 [/attachment:1q3k2599]
http://www.roma-victrix.com/auxilia/aux ... tes_cf.htm
It is possible that my translation is not quite right.. I ask to be excused
..auxilia cohors I Cispadanensium (Cispadensium / Cisipadensium) Maximinianaa. In Moesia in the beginning of the first century A.D.with Legio IV Scythica. In Syria (from 56/57 A.D.). Attached to the Legio IV Scythica following in the campaignmn inParthian with Caesennius Corbulo and Peto (58-62).

Here is a monument from Philipopolis Plovdiv Bulgaria associated with IIII Scythian Legion:
Tombstone of C. IULIUS. GRATUS which is reads:
C IULIUS. GRATUS.
VET. COH V. PRAE.
VIXIT . ANN. XXXX
MILL. ANN. XX. DO
MO BERYTO
H. S. EST.
C IULIUS. GRATUS
VET. LEG. IIII. SCYT.
HERES. FACIEN
DUM ……..
Was there a praetorian cohorts in the legions?
VALE OPTIME

[D B Campbell]

”Records at the permanent camp of the legion in Moesia refers also the promotion of the veteran L. Campanius Verecundus to signifer and further to centurio of coh. I Cisipadensium (CIL V 8185). A cohors that still later belonged to the Moesian army (as is well known, promotions from old legionary soldiers to non-commissioned officers of the auxilia took place only within the same Provincial exercitus).

I believe that you have misunderstood the process. This inscription shows that a signifer from your legion was promoted by transfer to a different autonomous unit -- the cohors I Cisipadensium was not part of the legio IV Scythica. Such transfers were not uncommon. Tiberius Claudius Maximus is probably the best-known example.

Attached to the Legio IV Scythica following in the campaignmn in Parthian with Caesennius Corbulo and Peto (58-62).

I am not aware of the evidence for this. But it would not be uncommon for auxiliary units to accompany a legion when reinforcing a war zone.

Here is a monument from Philipopolis Plovdiv Bulgaria associated with IIII Scythian Legion. ... Was there a praetorian cohorts in the legions?

No -- no Praetorian cohort in a legion. Your tombstone appears to have been erected by a father (the legionary veteran) for his son (the praetorian).

[Rado]

Please if anyone has further information on the origin of Auxilia cohors I Cispadanensium . Where was formed? From which part of Roman Empire legionaries were mobilized?

[Nathan Ross]

If the name really is 'Cispadanensium', the cohort would presumably have been originally formed in the region of the old Gallia Cispadana - that part of the Cisalpine Gaul (ie northern Italy) south of the Po (Padus) and north of the Rubicon. The inhabitants of this area were made full Roman citizens in 88BC, before those across the Po (Gallia Transpadana), who only got the Latin right. After Caesar, the whole of Cisalpine Gaul was given citizenship and integrated with Italy.

The name of the cohort therefore refers to an area of northern Italy, actually a fertile recruiting ground for legionary troops in the early empire. Perhaps it was originally one of the Roman volunteer citizen cohorts? Like most other auxiliary units, however, it would have recruited locally as time went on, and so probably lost its original 'Italian' character.

- Nathan

[Francesco]

I believe that during the late Roman Empire, with the creation of mobile army (exercitus comitatenses), many units at various levels were divided into many small units
these small units used in most mobile army gathered to hold on but not the original names, the object of veneration and therefore immutable.
So yo can find legions e cohorts with the same name in a lot of different places

[Rado]

This is a satisfactory answer.Thank you Nathan. Because we are looking for such a Auxilia cohors which had joint participation with IIII SCYTHICA and for now it's on what we have stopped our attention.

[popularis]

If the name really is 'Cispadanensium'...Perhaps it was originally one of the Roman volunteer citizen cohorts?

This one was bugging me, because it wasn't one of the early volunteer citizen cohorts I'd heard of. A quick check in Spaul (Cohors2, 2000, p.464) suggests that the unit was probably Cohors I Cisipadensium, and was from Syrtis Major (the African one, not the Martian one, google isn't helpful here ), in Africa Proconsularis.

The unit is an early one though - as the relatively narrow geographical range of the name implies - and is generally only attested in the 1st century (cf. Spaul). But there's a mid-late second century inscription (CIL 6.3529) that mentions a "cohors Afrorum in Dacia", which could only realistically be this unit, and a dedication to the emperor Maxentius in AD235 from a cohors I cispandensium (CIL 3.14429).

For the truly interested, Spaul references an article which discusses the unit: "Roxan, M.H. and Weiss, P. (1998), Die Auxiliartruppen der Provinz Thracia. Neue Militär-diplome der Antoninenzeit, Chiron 28, 371-420".

blue skies

Tom

[Nathan Ross]

the unit was probably Cohors I Cisipadensium, and was from Syrtis Major

Aha! yes, that makes more sense - the altered spelling brings up quite a few inscriptions, mostly from Moesia. And the cohort presumably originally recruited from the 'Cisipades' mentioned in Pliny's Natural History? So Africans, not Italians...

a dedication to the emperor Maxentius in AD235 from a cohors I cispandensium (CIL 3.14429).

I find this one listed as follows:

Imp(eratori) Caesar] / [[Gaio Iulio Vero]] / [[Maximino]] Aug(usto) / pontifici max(imo) / tribuniciae po/test(ate) co(n)s(uli) p(atri) p(atriae) / coh(ors) I Cis(i)pa[d(ensium)] / [[Maximiniana]] / devota numini / maiestatiq(ue) eius / d(e) p(ecunis) quaestur(ae) de/dicante Domitio An/[t]igono cl(arissimo) v(iro) leg(ato) Aug(usti) pr(o) p[r(aetore)]

So the name, and the identity, is perhaps the same. Though the emperor is surely Maximinus Thrax, not Maxentius! :-)

- Nathan

[markhebb]

Did you find this in Jeno Fitz' work Nathan?

cheers,
Mark