Crassus\' Lost Legions

[Dangun]

Which seven legions did Crassus lose at Carrhae in 53BCE?

I have read over Plutarch and Dio's accounts, but they vague as to where the legions were raised or what there name and number was.

By comparison we know that it was the XVII, XVIII and XIX that were lost by Varus at Teutoburg Forest in 9CE.

Any help would be much appreciated.

Cheers

[Mark Hygate]

To the best of my knowledge, I'm not sure an actual answer (which I can't give as I too don't know of a relevant source) will help you that much; but there's a lot of others here .

The 28 legions that Augustus ratified post the Civil Wars (from which the 3 you mention were lost), the later losses, the replacements and the extra 3 then recruited by Severus (which I believe were the last 'proper' ones) to take them to 33; are the formerly numbered and named ones with which we are familiar.

The 7 you are after, unlike for example, the 10 legions that Caesar had (some of which survived) were most probably part of a separate numbering system and/or some that Pompey still had (pre-Civil War). In all likelihood there just isn't any record of their numeric designations, not that it would help overly much anyway I'm afraid.

[Nathan Ross]

The legions of the republic were not intended to be permanent units, and so followed no very coherent system of numbering - legions were regularly disbanded, reconstituted and renumbered, often with duplicate numbers. Four were raised every year by the consuls (the consular series, numbered I-IIII), and Crassus would probably have taken two or all of these east with him after he was consul with Pompeius. As proconsul in Syria, he could also raise new legions in his province, either from Roman settlers or veterans. There may have been some standing legions left behind in Syria from Pompeius' campaigns as well.

Quite possibly, then, Crassus' legions were simply numbered I-VII. A series of Augustan denarii commemorates the return of the captured standards, and one version shows a kneeling Parthian presenting a vexillum or signum with the numeral X. This could refer to a tenth legion under Crassus's command, or maybe simply to a tenth cohort.

[Sean Manning]

To make things worse, "X" patterns had been popular on Southwest Asian vexilla for the last thousand years. In a Roman context I would guess that the coin shows the numeral rather than just a X-shaped pattern, but I don't know enough about Roman banners and Crassus' force composition to be sure.