Cohorts, Cavalry and Whatever Goes

[Sean Manning]

Sean wrote:
For example, Livy does not say that Scipio's legions consisted of 6200 men, he says that they consisted of 6200 pedites ("footmen") and 300 equites ("horsemen") making 6500 men, just like Polybius 6.20 says that a legion consists of 4200 πεζοὶ ("footmen") and 300 ἱππεῖς ("horsemen")

This is nit-picking. Footmen or men, horsemen or cavalry, what’s the difference? In the end doesn’t it amount to 6200 infantry and 300 cavalry or 6200 humans and 300 horses with 300 men on their backs.

Back in the original post you analyzed the size of the legions which fought at Zama. You noted that Livy's figures (Ab Urbe Condita 29.24) for the strength of the legions which left Sicily is larger than Appian's figures for the legions at the battle. You then asked “Now are the cavalry included in the 6200 man legion?” You then suggested that these had really been legions of 5700 infantry and 300 cavalry, but Livy added 500 cavalry to the infantry to get an infantry total, then listed 300 cavalry separately (see also this post). Saying “men and cavalry” implies that there is some ambiguity whether the first total covers all soldiers or just infantry, when there is none in the Latin. Or to put it another way, when I read your argument and checked the Latin my first thought was "Why doesn't he address this? Did he check the Latin?"

Now, hypothetically one could create an argument that Livy meant something different than the obvious reading, or was mistaken, but I have not seen that. I don't claim to know how a legion of 5,000 or 6,200 foot was organized (I mostly do Greek and Achaemenid history these days) but I don't find your arithmetic operations on the figures in the sources convincing either.