Roman Army before and after the Marius' Reforms

[Bryan]

oh, and btw, im 39 years old (this month). A lot of my friends sometimes go play a football on the field. Sometimes they play against younger guys, but as they are getting older, more and more they just refuse such proposals, because they just dont like losing to 16-17 (or a bit older) years old.. they just cant run fast enough, and long enough as those teenagers..

Melee combat is very fatiguing. Of course you can have individuals who train every day, and they might have a bettter condition than some 18years old.. but it would be by no means a standard in a whole population.. and same was true in Roman society... Legionaries before Marius were not military professionals.. they were farmers, therefore their constitution would be impacted by the farming.

Caesar became the Proconsul of Gaul in 58 BC, took command of a pre-existing consular army of four legions, which included Legio X. So at the latest, those legions were raised in 59 BC, but they could have been raised earlier. The battle of Munda occurred in 45 BC, at least fourteen years later. So the youngest seventeen year old recruits in Legio X when it was enlisted would have been at youngest thirty one years old. Meanwhile centurions would have been even older in 59 BC, men like Scaeva, Crastinus, and others within the army we clearly not young men. And considering how well they did in their later career, and how well the even older centurions are known to have performed, I don't think age really affected their fighting abilities negatively. Combat wasn't a sprint, it was more a marathon, and older people still do quite well with them, especially those who of the ancient world who weren't weakened by soft living like us modern couch potato types (me included). 

There was a article in one of the recent Ancient Warfare Magazine, IX.5,  about the Macedonian Silver Shields, "The Silver Shields after Alexander - Old Men's War". Good article, you should read it, it talks about the effectiveness of old soldiers (to include those over 60 years old still fighting in the front lines). I really enjoyed this print from the article: