Roman Camps

[jwhall]

Howdy,

I'm a complete Nube here, so I'll apologize in advance for any mistakes. :-)

The question I had was on the Roman camps; I've read in a few sources now that the
legions would make camp, no matter where they were, every night.

I can understand the advantages of this... but it just seems impossible to do what I've read about.

Stephen Dando-Collins has them digging a trench 10 ft deep, using the dirt to make a raised earthen wall, and then with each legionaire having two stakes that he carried with him to form a wall. On top of that, he says that there were guard towers, and places for artillery.

It just seems like it wouldn't be possible to do after marching 20 miles, or maybe 10 miles, or after fighting a battle all day. Further, how do you do this in some areas, say Syria where the earth may be super hard packed some times of the year? Or maybe in Britain where it may be very wet and the earth too damp?

I guess what I'm asking is were there some times they just said 'eh, bag it' and didn't do it?

Jim

[Matthew Amt]

Ave and Welcome!

Nah, not a dumb question. As I understand it, a camp with full-sized ditches and ramparts was only needed when in enemy territory. The depth I've heard was 8 feet, with a 6-foot rampart, but presumably that could vary a bit and I don't remember what the primary sources might say. Certainly the well-known double-ended palisade stakes could be used to form a fence on top of the rampart, but they were actually *not* a regular part of a legionary's marching load. Might have been toted on the mules or in carts.

In peacetime, or in an area (hopefully) safe from enemy attack, the ditch and rampart would be much smaller. I believe they were dispensed with altogether in certain circumstances, though I'm sure a general like Corbulo wouldn't allow slackness like that! If nothing else, some sort of barrier helps keep the animals from wandering off.

There have been experiments by reenactors involving a day's march followed by entrenching. Apparently the digging of the ditch can be done in a couple hours, and involves an entirely different set of muscles from the marching! Gives you a chance to work the kinks out of your back. And once the tents are up, you sleep like a baby! (Except for sentry duty, of course!) Also, entrenching the camp would happen *before* a battle, not after it, since that's where the baggage would be parked, and where the troops could retreat if defeated in the open field.

Someone else may be able to sprinkle this nicely with some primary references. (Please?)

Enjoy, and Vale,

Matthew

[jvrjenivs]

well. not with ancient sources, but I would also say that a 10ft ditch (that's 3m in metrics, right?) sounds more like a permanent ditch.

At the end of a day of marching in enemy territory we're indeed told a ditch was made, as Matt already said. This one would be really smaller. From my own experience I can tell you it certainly is possible, although most of us modern luxury buffs wouldn't take it for a whole week or month to do daily. But if you're trained I'm convinced it's possible.

Next, you've to also take into account what a marching column look like. Well, it's huge to say the least. This means that probably the time between the moment the front and the tail reach 'camp' stretches over a long time. Well, in this time soldiers can start with the entrenching

Now, about your mentioning of 'after battle'. Well, I would comment on two points. Firstly most battles were 'arranged' in ancient times. That means the battle started with getting your soldiers fielded in front of your enemy. Now, in this situation you would just make sure you have your camp in your back, so you can get back to it.

Secondly and much more interesting is a small comment on the evidence for camps after attack during marching. The first example that comes into my mind is the famous battle of the Teutoburger forest, The Varus disaster of 9AD in Germany (see the Ancient warfare magazin special). When analysing the finds of camp sites and slaughtered soldiers, we can see that even in the middle of the battle a new camp was built to protect the soldiers during the night, as the battle seems to have taken about 3 days in total.
So, they certainly were able to built a camp after battle

Then about the look of the marching camp. Well, I think you shoud see 'towers' and 'places for artillery' very simple. I would say they certainly protected their camp with artillery, and you want this on a place where you can have a good view, which is on a stable place in you wall. (e.g. the place where in a fortified camp the towers would be)

[Nathan Ross]

Stephen Dando-Collins exaggerates, rather (not untypically hock: )

There are several source descriptions of Roman marching camps. Polybius is the most detailed, but he provides no dimensions for the ditches.

Josephus, describing the army in the late first century, reports:

The camp, and all that is in it, is encompassed with a wall round about, and that sooner than one would imagine, and this by the multitude and the skill of the laborers; and, if occasion require, a trench is drawn round the whole, whose depth is four cubits, and its breadth equal.
Josephus Jewish Wars III.5.2

A cubit is approximately one and a half feet - so the ditches are about 6 feet across and deep. Note 'as occasion requires' - implying this wasn't always done!

The military writer known as 'Pseudo-Hyginus' also describes camps (probably second to third century) in De Munitionibus Castrorum. I can't find an english translation readily available, but Smith's Dictionary provides a handy gloss, courtesy of Lacus Curtius:

“The Fossa might be of two kinds, a. The Fossa fastigata, with both sides sloping, so as to form a wedge; or, b. the Fossa Punica, of which the outer side was perpendicular, the inner side sloping, as in the fossa fastigiata. The breadth in either case was to be at least 5 feet... The Vallum was formed of earth and turf, or of stone, 6 feet in height, 8 feet broad.
When the nature of the ground did not admit of the construction of a sufficient vallum, then a cheval-de frise (cervoli) was substituted. When neither a Vallum nor Cervoli could be employed, then the camp was surrounded by a ring of armed men four deep, numerous sentries were posted in each line, and the cavalry patrolled in turn in every direction… when no danger was apprehended, a ditch alone was considered sufficient; and even this was excavated merely for the sake of exercising the men (causa disciplinae).”
From 'Roman Camps' in Smith's Dictionary

Lastly, Vegetius provides details of the (presumably) later Roman army camp:

There are three methods of entrenching a camp. The first is for the case when the army is on the march and will continue in the camp for only one night. They then throw up a slight parapet of turf and plant it with a row of palisades or caltrops of wood. The sods are cut with iron instruments. If the earth is held strongly together by the roots of the grass, they are cut in the form of a brick a foot and one half high, a foot broad and a foot and one half long. If the earth is so loose that the turf cannot be cut in this form, they run a slight trench round the camp, five feet broad and three feet deep. The earth taken from the trench forms a parapet on the inside and this secures the army from danger.
Vegetius – De Re Militari Book III

So it seems there were variations based on terrain and an assessment of local dangers, but a ditch of between 5 and 6 wide and 3 to 6 deep was normal, with either a vallum of appropriate size or some other field defence as a deterrent to attackers.

Gary Brueggeman put together a very detailed website some years ago reconstructing all aspects of the Roman army on the march. It survives as a copy here, if you can live with the pop-ups and adverts:

Brueggeman - Camp Size

- Nathan

[M. Demetrius]

In enemy territory, especially when in a hostile environment, no, they would probably not just scatter out a bunch of bedrolls and call it a day. That's how you get ambushed and destroyed at night. Even if not in direct contact, you can be sure that an enemy force would have scouts out to keep an eye on what the Romans were up to. This was not a game to them.

If you were to march 20 miles a day, say, 15-20 days a month, for two or three years, the walk would not seem to be such a hard task, right? Digging is the same. Some soil isn't as easy to dig as other soil. A successful army will make adjustments in depth and width, and add other breastworks, etc., to make up for a shallower ditch/berm construction. Remember also, that sharp sticks could be had anywhere there were trees. There were no rules they had to follow about cutting down trees and making boards, planks, spikes, etc. from the local forests.

Polybius gives a really detailed account of the division of labor and how the tasks were broken up so several things could be done at once.

[PhilusEstilius]

In most situations the Romans new just where they were going and an advance party or Vanguard would be sent ahead with officers and engineers, these soldiers would march the regular distance and select the site where the camp was to be built taking into account it's outlook.
In fact the engineers would even mark out just where everyone had to go including the centre point for the Commander, and even with the length of the group everyone would get his fair share of the work the front marchers even getting a rest while the late comers take over and be all done by sunset.

[M. Demetrius]

Organized. That's the best single word to describe the Roman Army, IMHO.:!:

[PhilusEstilius]

I think you hit the nail right on the head there David

[jwhall]

Thanks for all the responses!

It makes more sense now, but it still amazes me.

That is the one thing, I think, that leaves me really impressed with the Roman Army.
It wasn't unbeatable; especially if it was poorly led. But it seems its awesome engineering, logistics, and organization just seemd to put its 'normal' so much above another armies 'normal', and allowed it to bounce back from defeats really well when they happened and just keep grinding.

[Epictetus]

How would they camp deep inside safe Roman territory? Would they still make a "proper" camp with ditches, simply find a place and bed down, or would they be housed with locals?

I'm thinking that, at least in urban areas, they billeted with locals. We have some extant complaints about this, and at least one Senate ruling making Senators themselves immune. Also, I swear I read a fascinating account of a homeowner who allowed a soldier into his house and then barred the doors. The soldier left some of his armour and weapons inside and then went back out in the street. The trick was that the homeowner had to let him back in to retrieve his gear, but when the door was opened the soldier brought all his buddies in, too. Of course, once they were inside the homeowner couldn't do anything about it. I think I read this in Mitchell's Anatolia, but now I can't find it.

Edit: Ah, here is some info from Nigel Pollard's Soldiers, cities and civilians in Roman Syria. It looks like billeting was compuslory for the locals to some extent, as well as providing goods in kind.

So perhaps proper marching camps were rare in safe areas.

[Alexandr K]

Note 'as occasion requires' - implying this wasn't always done!

Indeed, the De munitionibus castrorum 49 also informs us that in friendly and secure places the ditch is dug only for the sake of discipline. Kate Gilliver argued quite convincingly, that in fact in friendly and secure territories the Roman army didn't have to build a proper fortified marching camp every night:

Gilliver, C.M., 1993. Hedgehogs, caltrops and palisade stakes. Journal of Roman Military Equipment Studies, 4, pp.49-54.


Nathan provided the most important sources for the depth and width of the ditch. I would just add that on another place Vegetius mentions also other dimensions depending on how much danger there is from the enemy (I.24). So according to Vegetius the dimensions can vary between 3-9 feet in depth and 5-17 feet in width. Also Caesar on two places provides dimensions of ditches around his camps - 18 feet (Caes. B.G. II.5) and 15 feet (B.C. I.41). But in both cases and attack on the camp may have been expected, therefore the fortifications were stronger.

Generally it seems that there was no standard rule with regard to the fortifications, which were built according to the situation. Also excavated temporary camps in Britain and Wales show a variety of dimensions of the ditches.

Greetings
Alexandr

[mcbishop]

So perhaps proper marching camps were rare in safe areas.

Alternatively it is an accident of survival and function of their location. 'Overnight' or 'marching' camps are the least substantial, following the classical descriptions cited above, yet the bulk of archaeological finds of temporary camps are those with defences that fall within the groups where an enemy posed a threat. In fact, in Britain, only one really falls into the slightest group and that is Arosfa Garreg in Wales (Davies and Jones 2006, 101–4)* with a 'ditch' only 1.5m wide and 0.5m deep (and, where excavated, even less substantial, a depression thought to be caused by trampling). This was found in an uncultivated upland environment (but note that such locations are still vulnerable to later peat cutting). Such sites are the most vulnerable in lowland, arable areas, so such lowland areas within the frontiers may have had their fair share of such camps, only for them to disappear with subsequent agriculture. It is a bit like arguing whether segmentata or hamata were more common in the army – you can't tell because the evidence is skewed.

The interesting thing that Arosfa Garreg shows is that ditches were not always complete (Davies and Jones 2006, 103 cite this example along with Bellshiel and Limestone Corner for incomplete ditches, and Cawfields for having no ditch except on one of the tituli).

Discussion of the whole issue of 'marching' camps can be found in Davies and Jones (2006, 5–7) along with consideration of the difficulties of classifying these things.

Mike Bishop

Davies, J. L. and Jones, R. H. 2006: Roman Camps in Wales and the Marches, Cardiff

[john roberts]

One problem with reenacting is that centurions don't get to beat the soldiers with sticks for being lazy. Real Roman centurions could do that and no doubt it helped enormously to make the soldiers see the virtue of digging and hauling dirt. Also, there was always the shining example of the commander Glabrio, who didn't fortify his camp at the base of Mt. Vesuvius and got wiped out by Spartacus in a night attack. Moral: Don't fortify and a rabble of slaves can wipe you out.
Here's something I haven't seen addressed: Is there any evidence that Roman armies on the march could round up local labor to help with the heavy, unskilled work? If that advance party could get a few thousand peasants working while the rest were catching up, it would speed things up quite a bit, especially in heavily populated places like Syria and Egypt. We've all seen those old films of huge engineering projects in India, mostly carried out with long lines of skinny guys schlepping baskets of dirt.

[Matthew Amt]

Is there any evidence that Roman armies on the march could round up local labor to help with the heavy, unskilled work? If that advance party could get a few thousand peasants working while the rest were catching up, it would speed things up quite a bit, especially in heavily populated places like Syria and Egypt.

I kinda doubt it. Peasants would be pretty spread out, and it would take longer to gather them--and then organize them and show them what to do--than it would for the troops to just do the digging. A full-size Roman army would often outnumber the local population! A big town or city would be different, but assuming you didn't just quarter the troops in private homes, you'd still have to get the laborers out to the site and organized, and in this case you'd have to issue shovels cuz most townsfolk wouldn't own one.

If you're in friendly territory there would have to be pre-established laws about collecting labor like that, and possibly even compensation which would get pretty expensive. Or you risk resentment or just plain refusal to work. If you try this in enemy territory, of course, you've just let a couple thousand potential hostiles into your perimeter and armed them with shovels and picks, with most of your force still strung out on the road...

Matthew

[Epictetus]

Forced labour was very common in construction projects, like public buildings or roads. But the logistics for getting locals to work on a marching camp seems daunting. In municipal construction projects, corvee labour was required a couple days each month, and so presumably the people would know a month beforehand when they were required to work. Would an army on the march know exactly where they would need a camp a month in advance?