Who were the Arcani ?

[Chance1234]

Firstly hello to one and all on this forum,

Ive recently been reading Peoples of Roman Britain "The Carvetii" by Nicholas Higham and Barri Jones.

There is a bried mention of the Arcani in this book which mentions that that they were responsible for frontier surveillance in the outpost forts, that they were the equivilant of the third century exploratores and there is a cryptic reference to them from what i pesume is the missing books Ammianus Marcellinus,

Unfortuantly, i have no further information or cross references to the arcani, the explorates , and what the cryptic reference and the missing books are!

so any light on these areas very much apprectiated,

[D B Campbell]

the missing books Ammianus Marcellinus

Not missing, Chance. The reference is 28.3.8.
AFAIK the manuscripts have "areani", but this has been universally emended to read "arcani" (= some kind of secret police). But some still believe that the manuscript reading should stand, and that these areani were some kind of irregular troops (like exploratores) quartered in the annexes (areae) of the outpost forts.

See, e.g.:
J.G.F. Hind, "Who betrayed Britain to the barbarians in AD 367?", in Northern History 19 (1983) pp. 1-7.
J.C. Mann, "Loca", in Archaeologia Aeliana (5th series) 20 (1992), pp. 53-55.

[Chance1234]

Many thanks for the book suggestions, i will keep an eye out for them

regards