The arms, equipment and impact of Late Roman Clibanarii

[Kai]

Come on, Michael, if that was really your opinion you would not have taken apart my last post like that, would you? You don’t need to worry about wasting my time. 8)

With regard to the taking apart my post I get the impression you are overly zealous in doing so, because you did lose vital information thereby - e.g. Huyse’s paper I referenced on the Clibanarius-etymology including the part on the clibanus where you can find more about this "assertion". Admittedly I have to be more precise saying that clibanus only later was used, and that incorrectly, while in the beginning we more often read of clibanum, also being the more correct word.

What indeed is a bit of a waste is going for the tradition of Ammianus Marcellinus’s text, but anyway. Besides Gelenius, whose work does count as manuscript in philology - sorry, rules are set by the philologists - we have fifteen manuscripts, most of them dating to the 15th century.

C Colbertinus Parisinus Latinus 5821
D Vaticanus Latinus 1874
E Vaticanus Latinus 2969
F Florentinus Marcianus I V 43
H Parisinus Latinus 5819
K Caesenas Malatestianus XIV 4
N Neapolitanus Parisinus Latinus 6120
P Petrinus E 27
Q Corvinianus Mutinensis (Lat. 425, VI G 21)
R Vaticanus Reginensis Latinus 1994
T Tolosanus Parisinus Latinus 5820
U Vaticanus Latinus Urbinas 416
V Vaticanus Latinus 1873
W Venetus Marcianus 388 Bess.
Y Vaticanus Latinus 3341

V is especially important, as it is the oldest surviving one, which was the basis of most of the other manuscripts. It was recognized to be at least partially corrupt by its discoverer Poggio Bracciolini already in 1449. Its frequent lacunae and spurious letters are a good reason why it is dangerous to rely on it alone and make counter reading extremely important. This is where lectio difficilior enters: incapable of reading the original clearly (note the "uncis inclusi" in the more complete apparati, to which Loeb does not count btw), the reading used most seldom by copyists is preferred as superior. This is how personati came into modern editions of the text.
Poggio failed where Gelenius succeeded: convincing the monks of a monastery on Hersfeld to hand him over the local manuscript (called M today). Gelenius reading may not have been perfect but that, just like in case of the corrupt V, is no reason to discard it.
The fragments of M found in Marburg or more recently in Kassel number less than 10 folios, which proved Gelenius was not fantasizing but indeed had an older manuscript independent from V. It is also noteworthy that his changes were mostly conjectures as the fragments show. They also revealed mistakes, not nearly enough to discredit Gelenius though.

Short: V does not read personati clearly, the minority of copyists did. Despite repeating myself: it is only a lectio difficilior. As I said before as well, to me this is in no way a compelling argument, especially with Gelenius around. Building on that is thus unacceptable to me, and I am wondered you put so much weight on it – all the more when I with the argument I present make the impression of being at the "liberty to ignore" something, implying rather strict adherence to academic conventions...


If Ammianus noted the Iranian origin of clibanus or not, the latter being assumed by Huyse, is completely unrelated to the truthfulness of this etymology. This etymology is also completely unrelated to SHA, which makes it the opposite of a circular argument. It is, after all, a philological argument, while the note of the SHA is historical as in presenting that the Persians called these troopers clibanarii, as would be Ammianus if the respective reading is correct. Unless the SHA copied from Ammianus, that makes three unrelated points going in the same direction although if by itself none is 100% safe.
Equally I cannot offer an argument why he used or not used a term, at least none I would consider convincing even for me, much less for anyone else. Same would go for the speculations about Eutrop and Festus. Getting back to a factual basis what remains is simple: they did not think "the term should not be applied to non-Roman troops", as you do.
Just not to forget it, four out of eight clibanarii units having an eastern epithet, five actually when including the Palmyrean unit, is quite a lot to me. You are free not to call it mass anyway.


On a lighter note, of course you can convince me. Otherwise discussions would be terribly boring. I am just hoping you got more in your sleeves than the likes of a fuzzy, disputable reading and trying to get an "official" terminology out of historical or panegyric texts. Concerning official terms, legal texts, or epigraphics offer a much more intriguing way of getting them, imho.

regards
Kai