[split] Psychology of the Roman soldier

[JaM]

"Horum adventu tanta rerum commutatio est facta ut nostri, etiam qui vulneribus confecti procubuissent, scutis innixi proelium redintegrarent, calones perterritos hostes conspicati etiam inermes armatis occurrerent"...

By their arrival, so great a change of matters was made, that our men, even those who had fallen down exhausted with wounds, leaned on their shields, and renewed the fight

Bello Gallico, Book II,27

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ719TEESWQ

look how those brave US soldiers during firefight in Ramadi, hide behind the wall, ducking from fire... How quite different from your presentation.... they are not firing back under fire..  they are not running towards enemy ignoring own protection...  

And i can post here hundreds of similar videos...  from Iraq, Avghanistan...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZ2SWWDt8Wg


second one - shooting over the fence, not aiming just firing blindly....  here it goes your "warrior psychology"....

[Bryan]

LOL, I served in Iraq as an infantryman for two 12 month deployments, I fought in numerous street battles. You have no credibility in this subject, you're having watched a couple youtube videos doesn't make you a subject matter expert, especially when arguing the subject with someone actually experienced. That's akin to the virgin who watches porn online trying to lecture about sex to a married person who has had double digit sexual partners. You don't have a clue at all what you're talking about and I seriously don't think you even have conversed with anyone who has actually seen the elephant.

[JaM]

yeah right, you are only authority in the world on the combat.. there is no point in discussing anything with you. You must have been like Rambo there then, bullets bouncing off you... anyway, you asked for original source for legionarii leaning on the shield in combat and I gave you Caesar... and you rather chose to ignore it and instead ranted about porn.. thats prime example what an internet troll you are

[Bryan]

yeah right, you are only authority in the world on the combat.. there is no point in discussing anything with you. You must have been like Rambo there then, bullets bouncing off you...  anyway, you asked for  original source for legionarii leaning on the shield and I gave you Caesar... and you rather chose to ignore it and instead ranted about  porn.. thats prime example what an internet troll you are

Key word you didn't bold in your post about Caesar's soldiers, they were exhausted and most were so wounded they could barely stand. Not surprising in that situation they leaned on their shields as it was common custom among Romans to lean on scuta while resting, many did it during guard duty, enough so that as consul during the 3rd Macedonian War Aemilius Paullus banned camp sentries from carrying their scuta while on guard duty. There are countless descriptions that describe Romans in close combat with scuta, numerous iconography images that show the fighting stance of soldiers and gladiators (who used the identical shield common among soldiers of the time), none show the scutum resting on the ground like a pavise while the milite/gladiator fights from around it. I don't know where you heard this from, but simply by holding a properly sized scuta should tell you it wasn't something that could be done easily, without crouching significantly to the point the soldier would almost be kneeling on the ground. The only scuta type that are large enough are those of the Pydna monument and the Alter of Ahenobarbus, which show a abnormally long scuta that come up to the soldier's armpit area. They are much longer than Polybius' scuta, scuta in other iconography, and the recovered Fayum scutum, which would have come up to the upper abdominal area/lower chest while resting on the ground for a person of 5'4"-5'6", the height of a typical Roman male. 

I'm not the only authority on combat, far from it. But I do have actual combat experience, which means I have experience while you have theory only. Typically, regardless of the subject, be it combat, wood carving, sex, someone who actually done it for years on end is typically seen as more of an expert than someone who heard stories from others or watched videos on it. I might go on youtube and watch a video on wood carving, but that doesn't turn me into an expert on furniture making, and I would be out of line trying to debate wood carving with a master carpenter. And I frequently don't let virgins lecture me about sex either, because they are lecturing from a position of ignorance and lack of experience, where I wouldn't be. Same applies to modern combat. I've studied it extensively as someone whose profession it was and I did it for years in real combat, while you've only studied it (though judging by your conclusions and theories about modern combat I would be wary of your education, from my biased viewpoint it seems you put too much stock in things you read on internet forums and less on actual books, preferably numerous books on the same subject from differing viewpoints that give you a broader viewpoint).

[Timus]

Connoly argued in his main book that the roman shield (at least the republican one ?) was more like a pavise type of shield. That just don't ring true to me. My understanding is that this idea is based on a faulty/overweight reconstruction of a scutum.

[Bryan]

Connoly argued in his main book that the roman shield (at least the republican one ?) was more like a pavise type of shield. That just don't ring true to me. My understanding is that this idea is based on a faulty/overweight reconstruction of a scutum.

I've read this too and don't believe it to be the case. I think he wanted to explain the shoulder doubling and the large neck rims on helmets that came about over time, but both of those weren't Roman designs, they were either carry overs from the Greeks or the Celts, neither of whom really fought closely as the Romans. It was one of his older theories and I believe even he stopped following it later in his experimental archaeology studies. Using the scuta as a pavise would not have been possible with the cut down oval/rectangular scuta that were popular in the Late Republic, nor with Polybius' scuta, nor with the Fayum scuta (which is only a few inches taller than the Polybius scuta). I built a Republican style scutum out of two layers of luan plywood, to Polybius' specifications, and it only comes up to my upper abs when standing up. I'm 5'10", about 3-4" taller than the average Roman, to fight from resting the shield bottom on the ground would mean crouching so low that to cut or stab over the shield top would be suicidially dangerous, even without penetrating armor a hard blow has the potential to do physical harm through blunt force trauma. 

I'm still trying to find the wood to build a 5 foot square sheets of plywood, big enough to replicate the scuta that appeared on the Alter Ahenobarbus and Aemilius Paullus' Pydna monument, which would have come up to the armpit area while resting on the ground (which on my 5'10" frame came out to about 55 inches). I think there is a possibility that it was possible to crouch low enough behind this scuta type only; however, the very large size might have been an iconography mistake, similar to the very unusually small size for scuta on later art. But having drilled a bit with my scutum on rudis on a pallus in the backyard, and sparred a few times, I can definitely say that it makes more sense to hold it off the ground, hunch over a bit, either brace the shield with the left elbow and left knee, or hold it outward a bit and let the titling action happen freely, with the shield protecting all the way from the mid shin region to above the face and neck. 

[Ross Cowan]

Here is a great article written by RAT's own Ross Cowan:

Roman Warriors: The Myth of the Military Machine

The above link is dead, but 'Roman Warriors: The Myth of the Military Machine' is available again here.

Re. the psychology and motivations of the Roman soldier, I haven't gone through the complete thread, but for the legionary of the Late Republic, there is much of relevance in Arthur Keaveney's The Army in the Roman Revolution. 

Cheers,

R!

[Bryan]

Here is a great article written by RAT's own Ross Cowan:

Roman Warriors: The Myth of the Military Machine

The above link is dead, but 'Roman Warriors: The Myth of the Military Machine' is available again here (scan of the illustrated magazine article) and here (text only blog version). I'll be posting a fully illustrated and referenced blog version when I finish my current Osprey project.

Re. the psychology and motivations of the Roman soldier, I haven't gone through the complete thread, but for the legionary of the Late Republic, there is much of relevance in Arthur Keaveney's The Army in the Roman Revolution. 

Cheers,

R!

Just ordered it! Thanks for the recommendation. Looking forward to your new Osprey book coming out soon!