A Question on Roman man to man fighting.

[s_taillebois]

Usually the Roman army on the move, spent a fair amount of time fortifying their encampments. Accordingly, one of the most successful pieces of Roman military equipment, was the shovel. Can't say the later European fortifications were directly based on Roman models (although the locations oft were)...because Gaullic fortified towns already existed. However the Carolingians did copy the fortified Roman Gate for their own useage...and then stuck it on churches.
As far as Roman individual fighting tactics, as already mentioned, a good place to look is in Roman reliefs, many of the mosiacs dealt with gladiatoral conflict.
Although some periods tended to go back to Rome as a model (ie Carolingians and Italian Renn) they kept thier own tactics, styles and weapons for individual conflict. I.E. The Italians, copied some of the martial 'look' of Rome, but only in the clothing.
Well outside of the period of this forum, but the Napoleonic military copied the gladius for some units, as did the US in the civil war...but these were really symbols rather than useable weapons.

[JeanryChandler]

Agreed, fortifications were a key to Roman success. Each soldier also carried spikes which were used to help fortify the perimiter ditch.

Military intel is another as I mentioned in the Spanish colonies thread.

But that ties into another more basic cultural issue.

The Romans owed a great deal of their military success to the profound difference in their attitude toward war itself. To the Celts and other tribal cultures in Europe, war was very ritualized, (the individual combats etc. are a good example of this, as is the 'trash talk' before each fight)

One aspect of this was that there was a certain etiquette to a victory. You usually let the losing side pay off the victor in treasure and food and whatnot, which helped prevent mutual annihilation. Hostages were taken from the important families, and the women and children were left alone.

But the Romans didn't play by those rules. So if they for example lost 10 major battles to the Celts in the 4th century, it's ok for them, they can pay off the "barbarians", (as in the famous sacking of Rome and the whole 'Vae Victus' incident with the bent scales), go back to lick their wounds, learn as many lessons as possible, and return to fight another day.

Thats because all the Romans had to do is win once.

When the Romans win, there is no buying them off. Normal procedure for the losers, (as per the Gauls at Alesia with Vercingetorix) is that all of the fighting age men are slaughtered, the women and children are sold into slavery. A remnant of the tribe might be allowed to persist as a client state if they are lucky.

The Romans used their voracious appetite for Slaves and their ruthless pragmatism to cripple any enemy they could defeat.

In retrospect it is amazing how long it took the Celts as a people to notice what was happening to their neighboring tribes in this respect, but they were too absorbed in their own internal conflicts and in being Celts, to worry much about the Romans until it was too late.

Jeanry

[M Wallgren]

The best source I have found to replicate gladius techniques is I.33, although the weapons are obviously very different. At this stage, I would suggest getting a good replica gladius (easily available) and start using it. You will quickly find that it is both a formidable cutting as well as thrusting weapon. E-mail me or PM if you want to discuss comparing techniques. I have compiled some information.

Thanx Gene!

I will sertanly do this. For the time being I am a little occupied with the training of the three new Whiteshirts we have here and the Advanced groupe is doing alot of work in kampfringen - groundfighting experimentation. Hopefully we will get on to this soon. Got my head bent on onhanded swordplay for a while now.

I will PM you for more detailed thoughts as soon as I can get them down in writing.

Thanx again.

Martin

[M Wallgren]

A thought that pops into my head is how much of the tactics and fightingstyles we think of as western medieval is infact adopted from the Bysantine empire via the Variags who where fighters in the Emperors Bodyguard and came from eastern scandinavia (my hometurf, hehe). This guys often served 10 years or more and would have been pretty daft if they didn´t learn one or two things there. And there cousins and brothers became dukes and so on in france and later kings of England.

I wonder...

[Joachim Nilsson]

Well, they wouldn't have been employed down there in the first place if they didn't already know a thing or two about fighting. <img src="/forum/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" />

[s_taillebois]

Or if the Byzantines weren't so proficient at buying off their enemies. The Rus, for example, eventually wearied of trying to get through Constantanople, and as noted ended up as an elite unit. The Byzantines co-opted quite a few of the Turks also.
Because of the affluence and military influence of the Byzantines...they did end up with mercenaries from quite a distance away...some of the Saxons who lost at hastings eventually ended up at Constantanople.
The Byzantine skill at buying off, co-opting potential enemies was something the early Crusaders never could comprehend...and the early Crusaders tendancy to kill everything around was not particularly comprehensible from a Byzantine view.
Ironically, it was German mercenaries, in service of the Turks, that placed a major role in finally taking down the Byzantine empire.
So, it could be said the real weapon which preserved the Byzantine empire was astute diplomacy, and that's what also eventually destroyed it...

[JeanryChandler]

Seeing as they were hired normally as intact military groups or companies of Varjazi, one would assume they knew how to fight already, and to do so as a group.

Given their high status and the respect the Byzantines held for their prowess in combat, it seems they could do so well, though I'm sure they learned a bit about large unit and combined arms tactics.

And without a doubt, as with the Norse who went to other corrupted ... er I mean civilized climes, they learned all sorts of interesting new ideas about government, law, status, wealth...


JR