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New Book on Roman Army - Die Armee der Caesaren
#1
Salvete!

Messrs. Bishop and Coulston, read this and weep; everybody else, get your German dictionaries ready!

Apparently March 2012 will see the publication of the opus magnum of one of the leading German authorities on the Roman military, Prof. Thomas Fischer:

Die Armee der Caesaren

will, according to the information on the publisher's website, cover all aspects of the Roman army of the Empire on ca. 400 pages with almost 600 illustrations (according to a well-informed source many of them of yet unpublished finds). You can find more information (in German only) on the website of the publisher:

www.verlag-pustet.de

My wife is lucky that this is coming too late for Christmas!
Regards,


Jens Horstkotte
Munich, Germany
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#2
well I will probably buy it for Easter
-----------------
Gelu I.
www.terradacica.ro
www.porolissumsalaj.ro
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#3
Quote:Messrs. Bishop and Coulston, read this and weep; everybody else, get your German dictionaries ready!
I suppose the proof of the pudding will be, er, in the reading.

Quote:Das Buch mit über 560 z.T. erstmals publizierten Bildern wurde vor allem auch geschrieben, um die populären Vorstellungen und Bilder von der Bewaffnung und Ausrüstung der römischen Armee auf den Prüfstand zu stellen.
"With over 560 pictures, many published for the first time, the book was written in particular to test the commonly-held ideas and impressions of the armament and equipment of the Roman army."

A laudable aim. We need a good, all-round, up-to-date discussion of the Roman army. Fingers crossed that this is it.
posted by Duncan B Campbell
https://ninth-legion.blogspot.com/
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#4
Bother

My tentative New Year resolution of no more new books has just crashed and burned already I feel Confusedhock:
Moi Watson

Life should NOT be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in an attractive and well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, Merlot in one hand, Cigar in the other; body thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and screaming "WOO HOO, what a ride!
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#5
"With over 560 pictures, many published for the first time, the book was written in particular to test the commonly-held ideas and impressions of the armament and equipment of the Roman army."


Sounds like 'Arms and Armour of the Imperial Roman Soldier' by D'Amato!

Graham
"Is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream" Edgar Allan Poe.

"Every brush-stroke is torn from my body" The Rebel, Tony Hancock.

"..I sweated in that damn dirty armor....TWENTY YEARS!', Charlton Heston, The Warlord.
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#6
Hi ,
Amazon informed me yesterday that they didn't know when they'd be able to fulfill my order.
I suspect they have trouble negotiating an "extra low" wholesale price. :mrgreen:
No big book this easter. Sad

Greez

Simplex
Siggi K.
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#7
Got mine today.
Delivery from Pustet-Verlag was swift.
Had a quick readover.
"Opus Magnum" -- I don't think so.
Scant 394 pages to cover all aspects of the roman imperial army wont't do.
My first impression :
military mobilia : + , at least to about 300AD.
military immobilia: + , -- the same goes here, basically, but the gaps in detailing the Rhein-Iller-Donau-Limes of late antiquity are visible, to put it mildly. I can't judge all of his writing about the lower danube limes/eastern part of the empire as my knowledge here is only cursory. But the late roman fortifications and the sector of Northsea to Vienna during late antiquity would have deserved a few words more on them, and less status quo with mistakes included. (e.g. the "vallatum" problem - fact is: 1) no late roman fortification at Manching has been proven yet -- so what ? 2)Weltenburg -- there are justified doubts, that the mortar in the building in question on the Frauenberg is NOT from roman times. So what ?)
Enuff quibbling/nagging.
For german-speaking readers seeking compact informations for re-enactment this may the "101" of roman army equipment. This may also be a good overview for touristic guides.
As far as I can judge (and further reading may correct me there), this one should also be mandatory for all public libraries, the small flaws included nonwithstanding.
Worth the 50,00 € subscription price -- any day !

Greez

Simplex
Siggi K.
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#8
Salvete!

I have at last been able to fetch my copy from the local book shop yesterday. I have yet only scanned through the text but to me the photos alone are worth the 50 Euro price tag:

Mr. Fischer appears to be quite well connected to the collectors' scene which means that something like 50% to 75% of items shown are from private collections and have never been published before and even quite a number of provenanced finds were new to me. My personal highlights are:

(1) A headless statue from Egypt showing a warrior with a third century Dosenortband sword wearing a long scale shirt and what appears to be scale leg/shin armour.

(2) A breast plate from a lorica segmentata embellished with denarii(!) riveted to it (so much for peasant armor!)

(3) A number of spectacularly colorful belt sets from the Antonine and later periods.

(4) A dozen or so yet unpublished cheek pieces from helmets.

(5) A helmet from Pompeii (due for publication by Salvatore Ortisi in his corpus of militaria from the Vesuv cities). The helmet is a typical "Pseudoattic" (or "Auxiliary Cavalry" if you prefer) embellished helmet except that it has no neck guard, i.e. it is basically a skull cap. Without further information, one can speculate on the following:

(a) it could be just what it is; we know from portraits that military leaders may have worn these helmets without cheek pieces so a further reduction to a mere skull cap is not impossible

(b) a neck guard could have been riveted on such as the "Imperial Italic" from the same area

© it could be a gladiator helmet of an Eques as these are shown without neck guards. The brim we see on depictions of this helmet type could be a later addition or could have been separately attached.

In addition to beautiful photos the book appears to offer a lot of information on Roman military equipment and - to a limited extent - also military organisation and history. The first few chapters deal with equipment from a functional perspective followed by a chronological Section which offers first a summary of equipment used and then a short selection of context dated finds. I find this approach quite useful, e.g. you get a reconstruction drawing of a legionary from the Marcomannic wars with some commentary and on the next page a neat (although somewhat small) overview of Marcomannic war find sites (Eining, Iza, Musov etc.) with drawings of finds, all very concise a lot of information condensed into just 2 pages.

Finally, there are two somewhat disconnected Annexes dealing with military camps (again with a lot of maps and ground plans) and with Roman ships and marines (including the first ever reconstruction drawing I have seen of the "military" ship from Pisa).

As Simplex points out the book is aimed at a wider audience and the huge chronological scope means that it appears to offer more of a summary of current thinking than ground-breaking discussion but there are very original parts such as a revised helmet typology (which is basically a refinement of the "Continental" system Montefortino-Hagenau-Weisenau-Niederbieber by adding a number of subtypes). Interestling, he also admits helmets shown in art but not currently supported by finds (such as the "smurf caps") into his typology. I will have to read these Sections in detail for a more thorough review.

The aim and scope of the book are also to blame for some of its limitations: in particular the information on the illustrations is often very tearse ("unprovenanced, private collection"). There are so many photos that some are often drastically reduced in size (e.g. the only picture of six(!) unpublished cheek pieces from private collections is hardly larger than a post stamp). [EDIT: IN MY ORIGINAL POST I STATED THAT THERE ARE ONLY LIMITED FOOTNOTES. IN FACT, THE TEXT IS QUITE EXTENSIVELY ANNOTATED, I MERELY OVERLOOKED THE FACT THAT THE FOOTNOTES ARE PRINTED AS ENDNOTES AT THE END OF EACH CHAPTER.]

Also the photos are used to illustrate the text but the finds on the photos are not discussed in detail and there are no measurements given. This will make it very difficult for the reader to find more information on, or even attempt to reconstruct the items.

Should you buy it even if you have not (yet) mastered the language of Goethe and Schiller? Well I would have bought it even if it were written in Swahili but as you can take from the above, I have a finds and photos fetish. Even if you do not, you may find the illustrations alone worth the money. However, if you speak English, a little dictionary should be all you need to sort through the text. After all, English is just a "substratally Celticized, superstratally Romanized Low German dialect" (http://www.rotary-muenchen.de/2005-2006/...nemann.pdf).
Regards,


Jens Horstkotte
Munich, Germany
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#9
Not much to add to this consummate review. :-)
Christian K.

No reconstruendum => No reconstruction.

Ut desint vires, tamen est laudanda voluntas.
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#10
Yes, good review!

Quote:Interestling, he also admits helmets shown in art but not currently supported by finds (such as the "smurf caps") into his typology.
Does he have anything to say about those 'sou'wester' or 'morion' shaped helmets (Arch of Constantine / Mikkalus frieze / Dura frescoes - I'm sure you know the ones I mean)?
Nathan Ross
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#11
Yes, I know what you are referring to. I will still have to read the book in full but I believe he does not deal with these.
Regards,


Jens Horstkotte
Munich, Germany
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#12
ON FURTHER REVIEW I HAVE TO CORRECT MY REVIEW IN ONE POINT: IN MY ORIGINAL POST I STATED THAT THERE ARE ONLY LIMITED FOOTNOTES. IN FACT, THE TEXT IS QUITE EXTENSIVELY ANNOTATED, I MERELY OVERLOOKED THE FACT THAT THE FOOTNOTES ARE PRINTED AS ENDNOTES AT THE END OF EACH CHAPTER.
Regards,


Jens Horstkotte
Munich, Germany
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