09-03-2010, 09:34 AM
What Nathan said 
[1]
The length of service question is tricky. While some inscriptions include the length of service (e.g. trib. mil. III), most don't in the early empire. So we assume, I think rightly, that "trib. mil." with no numbering might indicate a longer period than one year. Personally, I think that 2-3 years is a bit too short per post on average, as it means that the equestrian "junior officer career" would have lasted less than a decade. It's also important that the 2-3 years estimate comes from, IIRC, detailed analysis of career patterns in the Eastern legions. Helpful for you, I know, but career patterns in the West were probably different. However, in the early Empire it seems that most Eastern officers held only the military tribunate and no other junior officer position. This is generally seen as an act of confirming their status as equestrians and as members of the broader Roman elite (i.e. beyond their own towns), rather than as a springboard to higher office.
In the early Empire at least (and Titus is after the period I've studied in detail), I'm not sure that Birely's suggestion that equestrian-ranked military tribunes were in their thirties is right. For the Augustan era, for example, two thirds of non-senatorial junior officers - military tribunes and prefects - appear to have held their first post before any municipal position, which suggests that they were less than 30 at the time. It's very difficult, in any case, to use a stated age of death from an imperial inscription to draw general demographic conclusions: it's not normal for the age to be put on the inscription, and so we have to wonder why the dedicators chose to do so.
The distinction between these two age ranges (Birley's late 30s vs men in their 20s) is important. Men in their late thirties are, as above, generally seen as holding the military tribunate as an act of confirming their status as equestrians. If they were younger men, then it's more likely that they would have had ambitions of future promotion. It's not that unusual to find men with equestrian junior officer careers who end up as senators, after all.
blue skies
Tom
[1] Just realised that could be read wrong. What I was trying to say was, "I agree with what Nathan said"!
[1]The length of service question is tricky. While some inscriptions include the length of service (e.g. trib. mil. III), most don't in the early empire. So we assume, I think rightly, that "trib. mil." with no numbering might indicate a longer period than one year. Personally, I think that 2-3 years is a bit too short per post on average, as it means that the equestrian "junior officer career" would have lasted less than a decade. It's also important that the 2-3 years estimate comes from, IIRC, detailed analysis of career patterns in the Eastern legions. Helpful for you, I know, but career patterns in the West were probably different. However, in the early Empire it seems that most Eastern officers held only the military tribunate and no other junior officer position. This is generally seen as an act of confirming their status as equestrians and as members of the broader Roman elite (i.e. beyond their own towns), rather than as a springboard to higher office.
In the early Empire at least (and Titus is after the period I've studied in detail), I'm not sure that Birely's suggestion that equestrian-ranked military tribunes were in their thirties is right. For the Augustan era, for example, two thirds of non-senatorial junior officers - military tribunes and prefects - appear to have held their first post before any municipal position, which suggests that they were less than 30 at the time. It's very difficult, in any case, to use a stated age of death from an imperial inscription to draw general demographic conclusions: it's not normal for the age to be put on the inscription, and so we have to wonder why the dedicators chose to do so.
The distinction between these two age ranges (Birley's late 30s vs men in their 20s) is important. Men in their late thirties are, as above, generally seen as holding the military tribunate as an act of confirming their status as equestrians. If they were younger men, then it's more likely that they would have had ambitions of future promotion. It's not that unusual to find men with equestrian junior officer careers who end up as senators, after all.
blue skies
Tom
[1] Just realised that could be read wrong. What I was trying to say was, "I agree with what Nathan said"!
Tom Wrobel
email = [email protected]
email = [email protected]
