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loss. When

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someone mentions the Roman army, your mind

1:00

might immediately think of the legionaries. The

1:02

Roman citizen soldiers that became

1:04

some of the most feared

1:07

professional fighters of antiquity. Particularly

1:09

during the early imperial period,

1:11

roughly 2,000 years ago, equipped

1:13

with their iconic banded iron

1:15

Lorica segmentata armour, their short

1:17

gladdiest stabbing swords, large scutum

1:19

shields, helmets and so on. However,

1:23

the legionaries couldn't win Rome's wars on

1:25

their own. Just as important

1:27

to the success of the Roman army, if

1:29

not more important, were another key troop

1:31

type. The auxiliaries. Recruited

1:35

from across the empire, auxiliary soldiers could

1:37

be cavalry, they could be infantry, they

1:39

could be skirmishers. They served

1:41

various roles from front line troops

1:43

to garrison border guards along frontiers

1:45

like Hadrian's Wolf. The

1:48

stories of these soldiers, who they were, where they

1:50

came from and where they served in the empire

1:52

are amazing. And to talk

1:54

through what we know, well I was delighted to

1:56

interview fan favourite and historical fiction heavyweight,

1:59

Dr Ben. Now,

2:01

Ben, he knows all the things about

2:03

the Roman army, from cavalry to tombstones,

2:05

and I really do hope you enjoy.

2:13

Ben, great to have you on

2:15

the podcast as always. Welcome back. Thank

2:17

you, Justin. Lovely to be here. Looking

2:19

forward to this. Now, especially after the

2:21

success of our chat about the Roman

2:23

Legion, we had to do that other

2:25

key part of the Roman army, the

2:27

story of the Roman auxiliary. It always

2:29

feels as if the Legionary gets the

2:31

limelight. However, these other units,

2:34

they were equally, if not more

2:36

important in the whole creating and

2:38

sustaining of the Roman Empire. Indeed,

2:40

like any empire, the

2:42

Romans relied on non-citizen people to

2:44

fight in their armies, both

2:46

for numbers, but also in particular types

2:48

of situation where they needed missile troops

2:50

or whatever. They played a

2:52

huge role in the Roman army, and

2:55

very frustratingly, we know very little about

2:57

them. So there are lots of details

2:59

that we know, but nitty gritty. There'll

3:02

be a lot of times during this podcast where I'll say,

3:04

well, we think this, but we're not really sure. So we're

3:08

all prepared for that. Don't you worry, my

3:10

friend, you'll provide more than enough information anyway.

3:12

I'm no doubt at all. First

3:14

of all, when talking about the auxiliary

3:16

soldier, what do we mean by

3:19

an auxiliary? In

3:21

terms of the Romans from the Republic through

3:24

to the Empire, we

3:26

literally mean a non-citizen soldier generally.

3:28

They could be foot soldiers and

3:30

they could be cavalry. And

3:33

then there's lots more detail, but the simplest

3:35

explanation is a non-citizen soldier. And so someone

3:37

who wasn't a citizen of the Roman Empire,

3:40

and remember that for most of

3:42

Rome's history, because most of Rome's history

3:44

was before the Empire, during the Republic,

3:47

maybe non-citizens would have been regarded as

3:49

socially inferior to Romans, quite likely afterwards

3:52

as well. But there was a definite

3:54

difference in status between a legionary and

3:56

an auxiliary soldier or a Roman cavalryman.

4:00

in non-Roman cavalrymen. It's worth mentioning

4:02

that during the Middle Republic,

4:04

for example, during the wars against Hannibal,

4:06

that Rome's cavalry was formed of young

4:08

noblemen, citizens and also soci, people from

4:10

the peninsula of Italy who were subjugated

4:12

by Rome but were fighting for Rome.

4:15

Would it almost felt as if the

4:17

auxiliary was seen as a second-class soldier

4:19

compared to the legionary at the top?

4:21

Yeah, definitely. In Britain, just

4:23

because of the British podcast, it's

4:26

worth mentioning, the British Empire used

4:28

to use its non-citizen troops as

4:30

much more expendable than British

4:32

troops. So there were significant numbers of troops

4:34

from India and Africa in both World War

4:36

I and World War II. And

4:39

I think it's, to give you an idea, and I'm

4:41

not throwing stones here at all, but the

4:43

British Department of the War Office, whatever the name

4:46

of it is, the government ministry that deals with

4:48

the war, Department of Defense,

4:50

did not actually record the names of

4:52

the African soldiers who died in the

4:54

British Army in World War II. That's

4:58

only 70 or 80 years ago, and they didn't

5:00

bother recording them. So that shows you

5:03

the attitude that they're great, but we

5:05

don't need to record their names. And

5:07

so, with nothing like that from Roman

5:09

times, but social attitudes

5:11

were much more hard-line two thousand

5:13

years ago. For example, your average

5:15

Roman was misogynistic and homophobic and

5:17

racist. And so, I

5:20

have no doubt that your average

5:22

legionary and your average legionary officer,

5:24

particularly noblemen, would have looked down

5:26

on auxiliary soldiers.

5:28

And yet, what's interesting is, when we talk

5:31

about the pre-incupate, the commanding

5:33

officers will come into the reason why,

5:35

maybe later, but the commanding officers of

5:37

auxiliary units were Romans. So

5:40

you would have had a real difference there. You

5:42

would have had young Roman

5:44

nobles in their mid-twenties, potentially

5:46

even only teenagers, catapulted into

5:49

command a

5:51

cohort, 480 infantry, who spoke a

5:53

different language and weren't Roman citizens.

5:55

And there may have been real

5:58

problems there with a young nobleman. dealing

6:00

with those men and the centurions of

6:02

that unit would have been natives as

6:04

well, if you like. And

6:06

they might have had chips on their shoulders

6:08

against young noblemen. And to look at

6:10

a British Army unit in World War II, say, you

6:12

get a young lieutenant comes in and he's 21 years

6:14

old, and he's got a grizzled old sergeant who knows

6:17

10 times more than he does. And if he doesn't

6:19

get on with the sergeant, then things aren't going to

6:21

go very well, are they? So you've got all those

6:23

kind of possibilities that must have existed.

6:25

I guess before we go on to the origins,

6:27

I mean, for looking at the auxiliaries, and I

6:29

know you include auxiliaries in various books that you've

6:31

written about the Roman Empire and the Roman Army.

6:34

What types of sources do you have available to

6:37

try and learn more about these

6:39

units, how they fought, how they were organized

6:41

and so on? So the sources, like

6:43

they are with everything to do with

6:45

the Roman military or the Roman civilization,

6:47

consisted of two main prongs. One is

6:50

archaeological evidence, and then the second is

6:52

written evidence that has come down to

6:54

us frequently through multiple

6:56

translations and potentially not

6:59

what it was originally, but you can only

7:01

use what you've got. And so,

7:03

for example, the units that we know existed,

7:05

the reason we know about a lot of

7:07

the units is because in

7:09

specific Roman forts, and a really good

7:12

example of this is the forts along

7:14

Hadrian's Wall, because auxiliaries

7:16

were used in border defense.

7:19

If you need men to protect your borders, the

7:21

legions are busy building roads and

7:23

bridges and aqueducts. They were kept

7:25

back, for example, close to

7:28

Hadrian's Wall. The nearest legion was in York, which

7:30

is a significant distance. I'm going to say it's

7:32

at least 80 miles or 100 miles south of

7:35

Hadrian's Wall, but the forts

7:38

all along Hadrian's Wall, which were every five

7:40

to eight miles and were either

7:42

cohort or double cohort in strength,

7:45

those were manned by auxiliaries. And

7:48

that was their primary role. And the limes,

7:50

which is essentially the border area along the

7:52

Rhine and the Danube, and the gap between,

7:55

which was obviously where barbarians could come in

7:57

more easily than having to cross those rivers.

8:00

The forts along those frontiers were

8:02

also manned by auxiliary and

8:05

for example tombstone this one of the most common

8:07

ways we know on Romans

8:09

whether they were civilian or military would

8:11

record the profession because they wanted you

8:13

the person looking at their gravestone to

8:15

know what they'd done Roman

8:17

gravestones were very much about being

8:19

seen so Your

8:21

listeners may know that Romans were not allowed to

8:24

be buried within the confines of a town or

8:26

a fort They have to be buried outside because

8:28

it was regarded as very bad luck so

8:30

the roads into Rome and Pompeii and

8:33

any Roman town were lined with tombs

8:35

and You only have to go

8:37

to Pompeii to see the size of some of

8:39

the tombs to realize how important it was For

8:42

status after death. So the best

8:44

example I can actually think of

8:46

is in Cologne There

8:48

is the tomb of an ordinary legionary soldier

8:50

who'd obviously done well my son as you'd

8:52

say in England He'd done really well for

8:55

himself and probably become the equivalent of a

8:57

millionaire because his tombstones 50 feet high And

9:00

there's a statue of him on the top of it So

9:02

you would have seen it for about a mile or

9:04

two before you got to it and at

9:06

the bottom industry He's an ordinary soldier. But

9:08

anyway come back to auxiliary tombstone so frequently

9:10

you will have the name of a man

9:13

the unit he was in and The

9:16

number of years he served and when he died

9:18

or how he died whether he was killed or

9:20

in war whether he drowned or something And if

9:22

he was a cavalryman, he'll usually be on a

9:24

horse trampling a naked barbarian And

9:26

if he was an infantryman, he'll be

9:28

shown as an infantryman the auxiliaries used

9:31

oval shields Not your curved shields like

9:33

legionaries And if he was

9:35

an archer He will have arrows and a

9:37

bow like the tombstone of a Syrian Archer

9:40

which was found near Hadrian's Wall So,

9:42

you know, there were Syrians serving in Hadrian's Wall.

9:45

There were Belgians. There were Gauls. There were Thracians

9:47

There were people from all over the empire something

9:50

the Romans learned in the Batavian

9:52

revolt of the late 60s A.D.

9:56

Batavians being a tribe from modern-day Germany

9:59

and they were auxiliaries serving in their own

10:01

area. The British learned this the

10:03

hard way as well. They've forgotten what

10:05

the Romans had learned is that it's not

10:07

a very good idea to have men who

10:09

are trained soldiers in their own area because

10:11

if they've become unhappy with rule, as the

10:13

Batavians did, they started a revolt that actually

10:15

set up an independent kingdom and took about

10:17

three years to quell. After

10:19

that, the Romans pretty much never

10:21

stationed auxiliaries in the regions they

10:24

were from. We think

10:26

that's also why they replaced their

10:28

commanders because up to that point,

10:30

roughly, the auxiliary units

10:32

had been commanded by essentially chieftains of

10:35

the tribe they were from. Like Arminius

10:37

and his cavalry, right? Indeed, exactly, in

10:39

AD9. That's a prime example. The Romans

10:41

were very wary of that. There was

10:43

Jogurtha or Jogurtha in North Africa who

10:45

led auxiliaries there and then led a

10:48

rebellion. There were examples from all around

10:50

the Roman Empire. After that, the commanders

10:52

were a Roman nobleman, not from the

10:54

tribe that the unit was raised from,

10:56

if you like. I remember seeing one

10:58

of those tombstone examples in the UK,

11:01

not in Hadrian's rule, but at the

11:03

Colchis Museum. As you say, it's this auxiliary

11:05

cavalryman trampling a barbarian beneath. It's very interesting.

11:07

You can see the details on the armour

11:09

and so on. It's a lot of attention

11:11

that has put in it. That

11:14

would have been painted as well. It would have been

11:16

painted, yes. It's important to mention that all those tombstones

11:18

were painted and the statues

11:20

of gods and goddesses, the

11:22

50-foot-high statues of Augustus, they were painted

11:24

to look realistic. All the buildings

11:27

were as well. How do we

11:29

know that? Because archaeological finds

11:31

from places like Pompeii and

11:33

Herculaneum, and I'm not a

11:35

geologist or archaeologist, so I don't know the

11:37

exact reason, but it's to do with the

11:39

lack of oxygen. Sometimes you will get paint

11:42

surviving, like whole paintings in Pompeii. Other times

11:44

you just get traces and

11:46

advances over the last ten years where

11:48

scientists use fractured light. So they break

11:50

light into its constituent colours to look

11:53

at these stone works. They can actually

11:55

work out the colours of the paint

11:57

that were used on the individual parts

11:59

of the world. cavalrymen, for example. And

12:02

so if you go to somewhere like

12:04

Zanten in Germany, which is an incredible

12:06

archaeological site, it is the town of

12:08

Vettora, later Colonia Opia Triana, but it

12:11

was the base of two of the

12:13

legions that went and were slaughtered at

12:15

the Teutoburg Forest. And outside

12:17

the three-storey town gate there that

12:19

they've rebuilt, there are painted tombstones.

12:22

You could argue that they're not representative, but

12:24

they've tried to do it accurately. And they're

12:26

far more vivid when it's a guy on

12:28

a horse in all his armors coloured and

12:30

the horse's nostrils are flaring and flesh covered

12:33

and there's blood on the person that he's

12:35

trampling and so on. If

12:37

we take a step back, like before

12:39

the time of these classic auxiliaries in

12:41

the Imperial period of Rome, if

12:44

we go 100 years before, hundreds of years

12:46

before, let's say time, the Punic Wars and

12:48

the Republic, what do

12:50

we know about non-Roman

12:52

soldiers in the Roman army in this

12:54

early stage of the Roman Empire, let's

12:57

say as they're expanding in Italy? So

13:00

we know, we actually know very little

13:02

about the Roman armies through much of

13:04

the period. I mean, there are descriptions

13:06

of the Roman Legion from Polybius during

13:08

the Punic Wars, but

13:10

I would immediately caveat this with I'm

13:12

not a Roman academic, but I've spent

13:15

nearly 20 years writing about Rome and

13:17

I've written 14 novels set in that

13:19

period and have hundreds of textbooks. So

13:22

I've read a lot about the whole

13:24

Roman world and particularly the military and

13:27

my only awareness of non-citizen

13:30

troops during

13:32

the mid-Republic is

13:34

just reference to their use in

13:37

a particular campaign. So

13:39

for example, when Scipio who became

13:41

Afrikanis went to North Africa and

13:43

bearded the lion in his den

13:46

and beat Hannibal at his own game, he

13:49

had Numidian cavalry. He was able to pay more

13:51

money. He got the best Numidian cavalry and Hannibal

13:53

was left with the dregs. And

13:55

there are examples as well, for example,

13:57

in the very late Republic of Caesar,

14:00

Julius Caesar, in his

14:02

campaigns in Gaul, using

14:04

Spanish, Iberian cavalry, Gaulish

14:07

cavalry, German cavalry. By

14:10

this stage, just alluding back to what I

14:12

mentioned briefly, the cavalry was no longer made

14:14

up of young noblemen, and there's a very

14:16

interesting textbook by Jeremiah McCall that I read

14:18

on the theory behind that. Why did they

14:20

stop? But it's just

14:22

literally reference to those men. There isn't

14:24

reference to unit size. There isn't reference

14:27

to commanders, although it's highly likely their

14:29

commanders would have been their own people,

14:31

and they were fighting for money, and they

14:34

weren't fighting in uniform like later auxiliaries were.

14:36

They were indeed very similar in appearance to

14:38

Roman legionaries, but during the Puget Wars and

14:40

then say under Julius Caesar, first century BC,

14:42

you wouldn't have known they were any different

14:44

to sometimes the men they were fighting. So

14:47

if they were Gaulish and they were fighting

14:49

in Gaul, they quite possibly looked like the guys

14:51

they were fighting. It's just they were fighting beside

14:53

the legionaries. How did they get identified from friend

14:55

from foe in the middle of a battle? Good

14:57

question. We don't know. We

14:59

don't know, and it's quite interesting when you look

15:02

at the Hellenistic period, you look at Hellenistic armies

15:04

which recruited, let's say, Galatians and Gauls, and they

15:06

were very clearly identified as mercenaries

15:08

in the surviving sources fighting alongside

15:11

the phalanx or the Seleucids or the Macedonians.

15:14

It almost feels as if these non-Roman

15:16

allies, whether they're Numidians or

15:19

they could be Cretan archers

15:21

or slingers or Gallic fighters.

15:24

Can we distinguish them from the types of

15:26

mercenaries? Yeah, they were mercenaries. There

15:29

wasn't the promise of citizenship at the end

15:31

either. There was during the Printer Page. They

15:33

were literally just fighting for money and

15:36

make no bones about it. When

15:38

they won a battle, they would have taken whatever they found,

15:40

whether that be on a battlefield or in a town. Legionaries

15:43

were supposed to hand in what they found, but

15:45

of course they didn't. You just look up wars

15:47

up until the modern day. There were British

15:50

soldiers coming back from Afghanistan with Kalashnikovs in

15:52

their luggage. The kind of thing people do.

15:55

And going on from that, the

15:57

formal auxiliaries don't emerge until you

15:59

get... the early Imperial period before that

16:01

you have these units and then also names

16:03

like the Socie as well. Yeah, so to

16:06

try and describe it in the timeline, during

16:09

the Middle Republic, which is the Arpunic Wars, and

16:11

we won't go much further than that because we

16:13

know even less, you will have

16:15

had mercenaries fighting with

16:17

the Roman armies in different

16:19

campaigns and in different battlefield

16:22

situations, literally recruited locally, fighting

16:24

locally, probably not going away

16:27

from that area, just disbanded whenever

16:29

they weren't needed. The

16:31

cavalry of the Roman Empire at that

16:33

time when a consular army, there were

16:35

two consular armies that were fielded each

16:38

year and until Hannibal, when they had to

16:40

expand big time, that's all the Romans used

16:42

to have generally. They had

16:44

cavalry that fought with them and they

16:46

were citizen cavalry, young noblemen, and there

16:48

were 300 of them to each legion,

16:50

so 4,200 Polybian legionaries and 300 cavalry.

16:56

The Socie were the non-citizen

16:58

troops forcibly provided to the

17:01

Republic of Rome by its

17:03

subjugated allies in

17:06

Peninsular Italy. So I'm talking

17:08

Samnites, Campanians, Brutians, Lechanians, Etruscans.

17:11

There were literally all the peoples of

17:13

Italy that had gradually been conquered by

17:15

Rome as it expanded in the 4th

17:18

and 3rd and even 2nd centuries BC.

17:21

They had to provide as part of their

17:23

tribute to Rome, if you like, troops when

17:25

there was a war and they had to

17:27

provide the same number as you had in

17:29

a legion. So for every 4,200 legionaries

17:31

and 300 cavalry, you had 4,200 Socie infantry and

17:33

cavalry and they

17:40

were largely, we believe,

17:43

equipped and armed the same way as the

17:45

Romans were. There was very little difference between

17:47

them. You then move forward

17:49

in history to the 1st century

17:51

BC and by then, Romans

17:54

did not serve as cavalry anymore.

17:56

And Jeremiah McCall's theory is that

17:58

young noblemen could see a... Are

18:00

quicker route to wealth and political success

18:02

by staying in Rome and particularly when

18:04

the with an emperor you know climbing

18:06

the greasy pole in the last. And

18:09

it's a theory, but it's of reason. Be

18:11

good when I think. But anyway, by then. The

18:14

cavalry was non roman, exclusively on his.

18:16

it's shrunk to one hundred and twenty

18:18

men are legion, So there were four

18:20

thousand, Eight hundred legionaries. Alright, sometimes or

18:22

more you could argue in the mid

18:24

fifties, up to five thousand men, but

18:27

about five thousand infantry and one hundred

18:29

and twenty cavalry. They. Were broken

18:31

down into term May a term as

18:33

the singular thirty man term As a

18:35

for term may in a legion. Each

18:38

term are led by to curie and and

18:40

they were non citizens, they were Spanish, they

18:42

were goal or saber German. They were basically

18:44

wherever they could get good horseman. But.

18:46

The were also auxiliary see did other things

18:48

like as you mentioned the archers. We know

18:50

battles in the one thirties where the Romans

18:53

had archers and they'd line them up behind

18:55

the infantry to lob the arrows overhead before

18:57

the infantry attacked. The are images

18:59

and Trajan's call him a Slingers and the

19:01

famous singers were the ones from the by

19:04

the Eric islands who famously. As children

19:06

didn't get fed and their target the have to

19:08

learn to hit age six or seven was a

19:10

loaf of bread on a pole and the didn't

19:12

eat in the say hit the loaf of bread.

19:16

They were either apparently could hit a

19:18

straw bale at six hundred paces spots

19:20

the archer units as I mentioned concrete

19:23

from Syria there or cavalry units and.

19:25

We don't know exactly when, but some

19:27

time either during the reign of Augustus up

19:30

until the reign of Claudius. The.

19:32

Auxiliary were formerly drawn up

19:34

in to units. And. They became

19:36

defined size and we know something

19:38

about that and that's what they

19:40

remained for at least you know,

19:42

another hundred hundred and fifty years

19:44

until you get into the later

19:46

Roman period and everything started going

19:49

wrong. flu seventy Explore the say

19:51

to sling isn't listening Shockers got

19:53

to read examples of. These.

19:55

Making a consensual in front of us the before?

19:57

then? let's kind of. Keep. On days

19:59

before. of either Augustus or going up to

20:01

Claudius. You said we know a bit about

20:03

this, so what do we know about the

20:05

structure of the official auxiliary? Yeah. So

20:08

we know that there were three types

20:10

of auxiliary units. There were infantry

20:13

units, there were cavalry

20:15

units, and there were mixed infantry

20:17

and cavalry units. And then

20:19

there were two types of those each. So

20:21

there were six types of auxiliary units. So

20:24

your typical cohort, as it was called,

20:26

was 480 infantry.

20:28

And that's, as your listeners, I'm sure, will be

20:31

aware, a century of Roman

20:33

soldiers was only 80 men. We don't know

20:35

why. Originally, probably sixth, seventh century BC, it

20:37

may well have been 100 men, but it

20:40

was cut to 80 and nobody knows why,

20:42

but the name remained the same. So six

20:44

centuries of 80 men, each commanded

20:47

by a centurion, centurion number one being

20:49

the most important, just like in the

20:52

Legion down to number six. So the

20:54

centurion number one, he would

20:56

have been a man of maybe 20 or

20:59

30 years experience, whereas the most junior centurion

21:01

might have only just been promoted to the

21:03

centurion. And they

21:05

would have been armed

21:07

very similarly to Roman

21:10

legionaries, i.e. they had

21:12

male shirts. They didn't wear the

21:14

plated armor, the Lorca segmentata. So

21:16

when that came in, you might

21:18

have been able to quite easily

21:20

distinguish a legionary from an auxiliary

21:22

infantryman. They had the Gladius

21:24

sword, the shield, as I mentioned earlier, were

21:27

oval and flat, possibly sometimes

21:29

hexagonal, but definitely not the curved shape

21:31

of the legionary. So that was another

21:33

way you could tell the difference. Helmets

21:35

varied would have been possibly cheaper than

21:38

the legionaries ones, but also look very

21:40

similar. And they would have had a

21:42

dagger as well. And they weren't armed

21:44

with a pilum like legionaries were, you

21:47

could have a double cohort.

21:49

So the two types, and again,

21:51

forgive my pronunciation, a normal cohort

21:54

was a quingunary Q-U-I-N-G-E-N-A-R-Y. And

21:56

a double cohort was called a miliary cohort.

21:58

And that was essentially 960 soldiers,

22:02

even though it sounds like a thousand, it was 960. And

22:05

then it gets more confusing when you go

22:08

into the cavalry. So the cavalry cohorts were

22:10

known as ale, so singular, a la as

22:12

in wing in Latin, because cavalry fight on

22:14

the wings, a splurrow ale.

22:17

And the subunit of 30 men

22:19

had become 32 men by this stage, we

22:21

don't know why. And in normal

22:24

sized a la was 480 men, which was 16

22:26

files of 32. So

22:31

it was just, sorry, it was 512 men, a piggy pardon, 16 times

22:33

32 is 512. So

22:37

it was slightly larger than 500. And

22:40

then, bizarrely, and I just remember I

22:42

got it wrong, the infantry double size cohort was

22:44

10 centuries, not 12, it was only 800 men.

22:48

So you'd logically think it was six double this, but

22:50

it wasn't, it was 10 centuries, and it was only

22:52

800 men. And the same

22:54

in the cavalry, it was not your

22:56

doubling of numbers. So a double sized,

22:59

a miliary cavalry a la was 768

23:01

soldiers on horseback. Your

23:05

mixed cohorts then, and they were

23:07

called cohorts equitata, and they were

23:10

perfect for use in areas like

23:12

Hadrian's Wall. For those of you

23:14

who don't know the geography around Hadrian's Wall, it's

23:16

very rolling countryside with a lot of

23:18

ups and downs. And moving

23:21

fast is not possible on

23:23

foot. So when you've got

23:25

potentially mobile raiders, tribesmen on

23:27

horses, being able to use

23:30

cavalry units of your own is very

23:32

important. So there were a lot of

23:34

auxiliary cavalry along Hadrian's Wall. And

23:36

a mixed infantry cavalry force is like a mini

23:38

army, you're able to do lots of things rather

23:40

than just one or the other. So

23:43

a mixed cohort could either be one

23:45

cohort in size or double cohort in

23:47

size. The figures on that

23:49

are far less clear. But the

23:52

assumption is, it's the same as it would have

23:54

been if it were one of the types, you

23:56

just double it up, but we don't actually know.

23:59

The command commanders of those cohorts, whether

24:01

they were cavalry or infantry, were called

24:03

prefects and they were Roman

24:06

noblemen who were, as I

24:08

mentioned earlier, probably only in their

24:10

early to mid-twenties and would have

24:12

been literally parachuted in. There

24:14

you go. You're going to do that for a number of

24:16

years. And I mean, a lot of them probably were from

24:19

military families, but if they weren't, it

24:21

would have been like hell on earth being

24:23

sent from somewhere very civilized, like Roman Gaul

24:25

or even Italy or Roman Spain, which is

24:27

very civilized by the second century AD, to

24:29

serve on Hadrian's Wall, commanding a

24:32

crowd of savage, you know, savage ghouls

24:34

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26:27

talking about whether these auxiliaries were

26:29

Gauls or Thracians or Syrians and

26:32

so on, with the Roman

26:34

legionaries, was there almost a

26:37

threshold as to you had to,

26:39

in the Republic, be above a

26:42

certain amount of wealth before you could apply to

26:44

be an auxiliary? Do we know whether

26:46

they had to pass a certain threshold if you're

26:48

a non-Roman citizen to apply to join the Auxilia?

26:50

Were there any type of qualifications

26:54

that someone needed to be able to join a group of

26:56

the Auxilia? I'm aware of nothing like

26:58

that. There will have been, but we don't know.

27:00

It's one of those really annoying questions. We just

27:02

touched on it before we started the talk. For

27:06

example, one of the forts on Hadrian's Wall

27:08

had a unit of Tungrians serving

27:10

there. Tungria is modern-day

27:13

Tongeren in Belgium. How

27:17

did men make their way from Tongeren to

27:19

Hadrian's Wall? How

27:22

often did recruiting officers go there and

27:24

say, join the Romans? Come and fight

27:26

for us. 25 years. Why

27:28

did men do it? Well, in the 25-year service, they

27:31

got Roman citizenship. When they got

27:33

married after they'd left, all their children, or

27:35

if they had a common-law wife and then

27:37

married legally after they left, because Roman soldiers

27:39

weren't allowed to marry and neither were auxiliaries

27:42

until 212 AD, your children

27:44

instantly became citizens and so did your wife.

27:46

That was a huge thing, a very desired

27:48

thing. We don't have any knowledge of how

27:50

that went on, but it must have. It

27:53

didn't continue though, because just like I'm

27:55

going to say the Gordon Highlanders. I don't know

27:58

why that popped into my mind in the... British

28:00

Army, but when a British Army regiment

28:02

from, say, Scotland or Ireland or somewhere

28:05

else gets moved to a base in

28:07

Germany and is there for years, men

28:10

join it who aren't from wherever the

28:12

Gordon Highlanders started. So that

28:14

very naturally happened on Hadrian's Wall

28:17

because, as your listeners will know, settlements

28:20

would spring up outside every Roman force. It

28:22

was called a vicus, and basically locals would

28:24

come to buy and sell and trade and

28:27

open taverns, restaurants, making stuff that Roman soldiers needed

28:29

just because they were soldiers didn't mean they didn't

28:31

need all the things that people need from day

28:33

to day living. And inevitably

28:35

relationships would start and men would have common

28:38

old wives and families and so on. And

28:41

what was quite common in Roman times was

28:43

that when a man finished his service, was

28:45

he just stayed where he was? Because if

28:47

he had a local wife and kids, why

28:50

would he go back to Tungria? He might well

28:52

just stay there, especially if he wanted to open

28:54

a business and talk to his other veteran friends.

28:56

So what happened then, there

28:58

was a big tradition in the Roman

29:01

Empire, just like there is among military

29:03

families in any country today, of sons

29:05

joining the same regiment that their father had been

29:08

in. So when you had

29:10

a half British, half Tungrian man

29:13

joining the unit, and then

29:15

you had the son of that guy, you had

29:17

a quarter, and so on it went. So within

29:19

say 60, 80, 100 years, you

29:21

had men in units that

29:23

were called Tungrian or Thracian or whatever,

29:25

but they weren't anymore. They would have

29:27

been Romano-British, but the name of

29:30

the unit continued. What we don't

29:32

know is whether you still had fresh blood

29:34

coming in from those areas. Maybe you did,

29:36

but it's one of those again, we just

29:39

don't know. If we focus in on certain

29:41

classes of fighters, of auxiliaries that we

29:43

have, you already mentioned like the spear,

29:45

rams, melee, infantry men, chain mail and

29:48

the spear and the oval shield. You

29:51

did highlight earlier the slingers. I mean, let's

29:53

talk about some of these missile infantry because

29:55

it almost feels like the missile

29:57

infantry became almost completely.

30:00

completely non-Roman, auxiliary troops

30:02

for a large part of the

30:04

imperial period? Yeah, that's true.

30:06

I get asked that in talks a lot. Why

30:08

did the Romans not have archers? The

30:11

simple answer is they did, but just

30:13

not very often. It's difficult

30:15

to answer why, because again, we don't

30:17

know. But there are examples, like you've

30:19

mentioned, of Cretan archers fighting for Caesar,

30:21

I think it is, and Arian

30:24

writing in the second

30:26

century AD referring to wars in the

30:28

Middle East, I think, talks about the

30:30

Romans having archers that I refer to

30:32

shooting over the heads of the advancing

30:35

legionaries, a bit like Agincourt, to

30:37

hit whatever they hit. If the enemy are

30:39

packed densely enough, it doesn't matter. And

30:41

there are images of slingers on Trajan's

30:44

Column, which is about the invasion of

30:46

Dacia in the early second century. But

30:49

there's very little mention of it in the

30:51

text, just images of them. And interestingly, those

30:53

slingers have their stones in a fold

30:55

of their tunic, which is striking is

30:58

very impractical, because early aric slingers had

31:00

a pouch. So slingers

31:02

were not used very much,

31:04

though, because they're not very effective when you're

31:06

wearing a lot of armor. I

31:09

know it's not slingers, but there's an example of when you

31:11

haven't got armor at the Battle of Telemons in 225 BC.

31:15

There were a Berserker Gaul, if you like,

31:17

who ran naked against the Roman infantry and

31:19

who were only armed with light spears. But

31:21

apparently they butchered those Gauls because they didn't

31:23

have any armor. So

31:26

if you had a decent helmet on,

31:28

sling bullets generally only weigh between 30

31:30

and 90 grams, that's between one and

31:32

three ounces. If you're not wearing

31:34

a helmet, it'll kill you quite easily. And the

31:36

ones that we've got here on the table, I

31:38

mean, they're much smaller. But if they

31:40

hit you in the eye, or if you're

31:43

not wearing a helmet, you could still get

31:45

concussion. But if I'd been a Roman Legionary,

31:47

I would have looked down on them because you pretty much

31:49

can't hurt me with your sling bullets. I mean, they did

31:51

use them, didn't they? They used them in the Civil War.

31:53

You've got those famous sling bullets from Italy,

31:55

and there are references to ladies' private

31:57

parts and ouch and things like that.

32:00

literally inscribed on them, found outside town

32:02

walls of Italy, but they

32:04

weren't a large part of the Romans. I think

32:06

they more used archers. But again, they

32:08

didn't use them a lot. And I only know

32:11

that battle I've referred to with Arian and the

32:13

unit on Hadrian's wall, but generally the

32:15

battering ram of the legionaries was

32:18

so effective. And remember their javelins,

32:20

their pela, they carried either one

32:22

or two, depending on which historian

32:25

you believe. And

32:27

they released them at 50 paces.

32:31

And we don't know, but you know, reenactors and

32:33

historians like to try and work these things out.

32:35

But a reasonable way that

32:37

they might have attacked is for the

32:39

first, say five or six ranks to

32:41

throw their javelins, and they

32:43

start running. And then the

32:45

men behind them throw as well. And you

32:47

potentially got javelins from

32:49

10 ranks of men landing as

32:52

you've got a charging tide of

32:54

legionaries coming in. And

32:56

I saw a really funny video by a

32:58

reenactor where he got his neighborhood street, he

33:00

just talked to all the local kids, American

33:02

guy. And you know, the one of the

33:04

things when you're in a swimming pool that

33:06

you can walk a water after

33:08

the little foam strip, you can put your arms

33:10

over and float on in the swimming pool if

33:12

you don't want to swim for learning to swim.

33:15

But you know, if you're at a barbecue party,

33:17

and you're just there enjoying yourself, you have one

33:19

of them, he got like 50 of

33:21

them. And he got all these little kids, he

33:23

put on his Roman armor, and he stood

33:26

there. And obviously, they've never thrown spears or

33:28

woggles. But he got them to throw them

33:30

at him practice in rows.

33:33

And he said, it was absolutely terrifying

33:35

when you had 10 or 15 of them

33:38

coming in at any one time, he didn't

33:40

know what to do. So he

33:42

was just theorizing, you know, imagine that

33:44

was Pila javelins coming in with a

33:46

line of legionaries who are all armed

33:48

and armored better than you are, because

33:51

generally the Romans were, you

33:53

know, battles were potentially won just from

33:55

the javelins. Because when you look

33:57

at the perception of the auxiliary sometimes is

33:59

provided. you know, specialist troops, singers

34:01

or archers and so on and so forth. But

34:04

actually, as you've highlighted there, with the legionaries

34:06

being so central and

34:08

so powerful to overwhelm many

34:10

different enemies, do we actually

34:13

hear of auxiliary soldiers being

34:15

critical to certain Roman victories?

34:17

Yeah. Oh, yeah. People

34:19

might think of auxiliaries as those missile

34:21

troops or whatever, but the majority of

34:24

auxiliaries are either infantry or cavalry. It's

34:27

worth talking about the auxiliary cavalry in

34:29

a minute. But the auxiliary infantry, looking

34:31

fairly identical to the legionaries, apart

34:33

from their oval shields, there's a brilliant example.

34:36

So the Battle of Mons Gropius, which took

34:38

place in northern Scotland. If

34:40

you ever have a Scottish person tell you that

34:42

the Romans didn't conquer Scotland, just say one word

34:44

to them, Agricola. Agricola was the

34:47

Roman general who led an army up

34:49

into Scotland with a fleet following him

34:51

up the east coast of England and

34:53

up past Edinburgh. And he took three

34:55

years to literally lay waste to Scotland.

34:58

And he beat everybody he fought. And

35:00

at the Battle of Mons Gropius, which

35:03

is potentially as far north as Inverness,

35:05

which is very far north, indeed, this

35:07

campaign has been confirmed with aerial footage

35:10

of marching camps all the way up

35:12

there. And that was a

35:14

battle where 30,000 Caledonian tribesmen,

35:16

which is a lot of warriors,

35:19

came to face Agricola. And

35:21

I'm not sure of his numbers. He

35:23

may have had fewer than that, but

35:25

he certainly he wasn't very outnumbered. But

35:28

it's remarkable that at number one, he

35:30

deployed only the auxiliaries at the beginning

35:33

of the battle. And number two, they

35:35

won the battle on their own. So they

35:37

were just sent in as infantry and are

35:40

recorded as having killed most of the 30,000

35:42

Caledonian with the loss of only a

35:44

few hundred men. Now, if you take away

35:46

the likely highly exaggerated, I was fishing and

35:48

I caught a fish this big and you

35:51

all know the gesture I'm making. Roman

35:53

histories are very biased. Even if you I

35:55

like to divide the figures by between two

35:57

and four, even if you divide it by four.

36:00

It's still 7,500 Caledonian tribesmen with the loss of

36:02

300 Roman, well, auxiliaries. No

36:06

legionaries were harmed in the filming of this battle. So

36:09

there's a really good example. And what's worth mentioning

36:11

about that battle as well is that

36:13

it's one of the only examples that

36:16

we have of a specific maneuver, training

36:18

maneuver that Roman soldiers will have been

36:20

taught because it won't just have been

36:22

the auxiliaries. Sadly, for

36:24

those of you that are interested in

36:26

me writing all my novels about the

36:28

Roman army, there is no Roman training

36:31

manual for the army that survived. I'm

36:33

making a joke here, but it would be

36:35

brilliant. But people who were writing history 2000

36:38

years ago didn't think of writing anything like this

36:41

because they expected you to know it. If you

36:43

were writing a novel set today,

36:45

you wouldn't describe what electricity is or

36:47

a car or a mobile phone is

36:49

because everyone really knows. It was the

36:51

same 2000 years ago. So

36:54

the point is about this battle, that the maneuver

36:56

that I use this in every talk I ever

36:58

give, a Roman shield has a great big

37:00

metal boss in the center of it. And the

37:02

hand grips behind that. I'm sure you're all familiar

37:05

with what it looks like. You could polish it

37:07

highly and potentially use it as a mirror

37:09

because most ordinary men wouldn't have had them, but

37:11

it was used as a weapon. So this maneuver

37:14

was to punch at the face of

37:16

your enemy with the boss. And

37:18

if you hit him in the face, you're

37:20

going to break his nose or his jaw

37:22

because of the impact and he'll reel back

37:25

bleeding and then you stick him with your

37:27

sword. If he dodged

37:29

the move by throwing his head

37:31

back, which is your instinct when someone's throwing a

37:33

punch or waving a great big shield boss in

37:36

your face, they stab them in the throat. So

37:39

it was this one, two, one, two. So

37:41

the shield was a weapon as well. It

37:43

wasn't just a very protective piece of equipment.

37:46

So that's a really good example of the

37:48

auxiliaries being used in a frontline role and

37:51

winning a battle without the loss of any citizens.

37:53

Because as I mentioned at the beginning, they would

37:55

have been valued far less than Roman soldiers. Were

37:58

they paid less? We think... So we don't

38:00

again know but it's thought that they

38:03

were paid between Half and

38:05

three-quarters of what a Roman soldier was paid

38:07

but bearing in mind that Roman soldier was

38:09

very well paid That was potentially still very

38:11

good money if you're a tribesman from Thrace

38:13

or somewhere like that What did

38:15

an auxiliary expect after they signed up? You know

38:18

obviously with a legionary some 25 years of service

38:20

and then land and property at the end I

38:22

mean, no, they didn't get land or

38:24

property. That was the benefit of the legionary. They

38:27

just got citizenship, right? So that's where it differs.

38:29

So yes, could they expect instead? It's funny I

38:31

was trying to think about it today the benefits

38:33

of having a British or my case an Irish

38:35

passport I mean, it means I can travel anywhere

38:38

in the world, you know without making having to

38:40

get visas and so on But that doesn't quite

38:42

get across becoming a Roman citizen was a huge

38:44

step up in your social status Because

38:47

it meant you could vote and you could advance

38:49

your social career and climb the social ladder And

38:52

not every auxiliary wanted that I mean presumably a

38:54

lot of them just went back to where

38:56

they came from and what people Made of them

38:58

being a Roman citizen. We don't know but

39:00

they went so what? but Becoming

39:03

a Roman citizen was clearly a big draw

39:05

Because of the number of auxiliary units that

39:07

there were and the fact that it was

39:09

something that's recorded on tombstones and so on

39:12

But after 25 years, which it

39:14

has to be mentioned is longer

39:16

than Romans had to serve Although

39:18

there are periods on Romans had to serve 25 years

39:21

there are plenty of periods of Roman history when it was only 16

39:24

years or 20 and As

39:26

I said in a school that I was giving

39:28

a talk to yesterday that could change at the

39:30

Emperor's Whim so we know of times in the

39:32

first century the under Augustus when there was a

39:34

shortage of manpower and There

39:38

was a decree that all you guys that

39:40

think you're retiring next year You're not you're staying

39:42

in for another five years because we need the

39:44

soldiers and there was a mutiny actually It's one

39:46

of the only mutinies against bad treatment on the

39:48

Rhine but when they were

39:50

discharged from the Legion, they were

39:52

given a diploma and Some

39:55

of these have survived these would have been enormous

39:57

big plaques on walls in Rome, but then they

39:59

were given individual ones as soldiers and

40:02

several hundred of them have survived both

40:04

for legionaries and auxiliaries and for me

40:06

one of the my most favorite things

40:08

to see because they're little pieces of

40:10

bronze rectangular in shape about five

40:12

inches by three and there are two of

40:14

them and they have holes in them so

40:16

they can be tied together with wire so

40:19

they can close like a little book and this

40:22

is important to mention that an individual

40:24

Roman legionary would get an individual diploma

40:27

but auxiliary units only got

40:29

units diplomas so it the whole unit

40:31

of Thracians get citizenship and they'll all

40:33

have just been given the same thing

40:35

not a different guy's name on each

40:37

one but they were a very important

40:40

legal document that they would have been

40:42

very proud possessions of and it had

40:44

the name the unit where they served

40:46

and so on and so on but

40:48

to be seven witnesses whose names are

40:50

inscribed on it as well and there

40:52

are examples of those for auxiliaries they're

40:55

just wonderful pieces of information that open

40:57

up history they pull aside the curtain if

40:59

you like in a much bigger way than a

41:02

piece of a Roman belt or a sword or

41:04

something like that because they're very personal even

41:07

though their unit rather than particular

41:09

individual soldiers. Alright well let's

41:11

have a look at some of these particular

41:13

soldiers whether they're from Thracian or their Tungrians

41:15

and I'd like to ask before

41:18

we completely wrap up because you did mention them

41:20

earlier and I don't think we've really covered this

41:22

class in depth at least following the

41:25

Augustine or Claudian introductions to the

41:27

auxiliaries. Talk to me about

41:30

auxiliary cavalry and the role

41:32

that they would have played

41:35

for the Roman Legion in the Imperial period. So

41:37

to be fair the cavalry were

41:40

a force that the Roman army

41:42

never relied on massively

41:44

the way other civilizations did or

41:46

other peoples did so when

41:48

they went to Parthia they were completely undone because

41:50

the Parthians were all on horses for

41:53

example and again we don't know

41:55

but cavalry were integral to an

41:58

army because they're fast-moving so They

42:00

acted as scouts. They were

42:02

able to do reconnaissance and warn

42:04

of ambushes potentially, also find sources

42:06

of food quicker than men

42:08

on foot could. They would be used to

42:10

go up and down the army column as

42:13

well. You need to remember that an army

42:15

column in Roman times is sometimes up to

42:17

10 or even more miles in length. So

42:20

the front of the army, people in the middle and

42:22

the back have absolutely no idea what's going on, unless

42:24

there's a horse coming to tell them, or a man

42:26

on a horse. They

42:28

were a very important part of the

42:30

army, but when battles happened, they

42:33

were deployed, but

42:35

it wasn't uncommon for the Romans

42:37

to face enemies whose cavalry was

42:39

actually superior to theirs, Parthians

42:42

being an example and the best

42:45

example, maybe Numidians as well. So

42:47

in battles, they weren't as important,

42:49

but it is worth mentioning here

42:51

that something that the Roman

42:53

cavalry used to use, a couple

42:55

of things, and wear did potentially

42:58

mean they were good hammer blows

43:00

to people that weren't expecting it.

43:03

So Hadrian, when he was touring

43:05

his empire, saw a famous cavalry display

43:07

at Lambisis in North Africa and he

43:09

wrote it down. He wrote down what

43:11

he saw. We know

43:13

that the cavalrymen were doing all these

43:16

various drills and throwing spears and feats

43:18

of horsemanship and so on, and they

43:20

were wearing their parade dress. Quite

43:23

a few of you will be familiar

43:25

with the Roman cavalry helmet that has

43:27

a face piece that can be lifted

43:29

up and put down

43:31

to cover the face entirely. And

43:34

these would have been used in parades. What's

43:37

interesting is that quite a few of

43:39

them have been found. One of the

43:41

densest number of finds of these helmets

43:43

is at a place called Nijmegen in

43:46

Holland, Netherlands where there must

43:48

have been a cavalry unit because they

43:50

found maybe 10 or 15 of

43:52

these helmets. The helmets were commonly tinned

43:55

so that it looked like there was hair forming

43:57

the back and sides and top of the helmet.

44:00

A lot of them actually had braided horse hair

44:02

on the helmet as well, so it looked like

44:04

a real person's head. And

44:06

the face piece was commonly covered

44:08

in a very fine layer of

44:11

silver, real silver foil. And

44:14

if you Google that image, if you're not familiar with it,

44:16

it's terrifying. I've known

44:18

this for years because Roman reenactors wear these

44:20

when they're fighting, and they have no problem.

44:23

Think of knights in the Middle Ages. They

44:25

were fighting with these tiny little visor helmets.

44:28

They've actually found some of these helmets now

44:30

with dents in them and

44:32

scratches and things like that.

44:34

So injuries from actual something

44:36

hitting them, probably in combat.

44:38

So personally, and any Roman reenactor

44:40

I know who's a cavalryman, and they ride

44:43

without stirrups and glad about it, can throw

44:45

spears and hit bales of straw, reckon

44:48

that they probably use them in battle as

44:50

well. And it's worth mentioning here the Draco,

44:52

which is a standard used

44:54

by Roman cavalry of the period. That gives

44:56

rise to the word dragon. And

44:59

it was a pole on the

45:01

top of which was carved a

45:03

metal ravening mouth of a mythical

45:05

beast. And there was a strip

45:07

of colored fabric that came off the open back

45:09

of that. And when you ride

45:11

into battle, because they've reconstructed them, when you

45:13

ride a horse fast holding one of them,

45:16

it makes a horrible noise. So

45:18

a bit like the Carnixes, which were

45:21

the vertical battle trumpets that the Gauls

45:23

used in Britain and in Lake Trasimene,

45:25

which is one of Hannibal's great victories,

45:28

look up Voice of the Carnix by John

45:30

Kenny on YouTube. And so they've reconstructed them.

45:33

The noise they make is terrifying. So a

45:35

bit like those, it's highly likely

45:37

that the cavalry will have been used in

45:39

battles and that that could have been a

45:41

real psychological weapon. If you're a misty morning

45:43

and 120 guys come riding out of the

45:45

fog making a noise like that and they

45:47

all look like aliens, you know, people

45:50

might run away. So their

45:52

main weapons in this period were a

45:54

one handed thrusting spear and a bundle

45:56

of light throwing spears, but they also

45:59

probably... almost definitely had a

46:01

spaffa as well, which is a long

46:03

slashing sword. It's anywhere in length from

46:06

26 inches to 36 inches blade only,

46:08

so very long indeed, and you know

46:10

much better reaching down from a horse

46:12

to chop someone's arm off or something.

46:14

So they were without doubt used

46:16

in battles, but not

46:19

in the sort of way that Battle

46:21

of Canay 6000 cavalry

46:24

divided on 3000 on each wing

46:26

against Hannibal's cavalry, where they were a big part

46:28

of the battle. There just weren't enough of them

46:30

to do that, which is why my

46:32

feeling is that they were more scouts

46:35

and shock attack, rather than an important

46:37

part of a big full

46:39

on thousands of men against thousands of men

46:42

battle. Well Ben, this has been great, a

46:44

very comprehensive detailed chat.

46:46

Last but certainly not least, you have

46:48

written many, many books all about the

46:50

Roman army, which includes talks about the

46:53

auxiliary units. They are all about these

46:55

books, aren't they? Yeah, so I

46:57

kind of forget now, I've had 17 or 18 books,

47:00

14 set in ancient Rome. So

47:02

a trilogy about Crassus' disastrous

47:04

invasion of Parthia in 53

47:06

BC, 20,000

47:09

legionaries killed in one day by

47:11

arrows, and I've written two books

47:13

about Spartacus, the most famous slave

47:15

that ever existed. I have had a

47:18

trilogy about Hannibal, about the war

47:20

between Roman Carthage in the second

47:22

one, and I haven't finished that yet,

47:24

finishing that in a couple of years. I've

47:26

written a trilogy about the Varian

47:28

disaster and Germanicus' campaigns into Germania

47:30

in 1415 and 16 AD.

47:33

They were amazing to write, and I've

47:35

also written a duology of books about

47:38

the Roman invasion of Macedon and

47:40

Greece, literally 18 months

47:43

after the Battle of Zama. Imagine

47:45

America or Britain deciding to go into

47:47

a major world war, 18 months

47:49

after World War II, I don't think it

47:52

would have gone down too well with the population, but that's what

47:54

Rome did in 200 BC and

47:56

they conquered Macedon. I've also had

47:58

a book of short stories, one of which is... about

48:00

that lovely emperor called Caligula. Alright

48:03

Ben, we get the message, you written a lot

48:05

on this topic. Alright, okay, fair enough. It

48:08

just goes for me to say thank you so much for taking the

48:10

time to come back on the forecast today. Oh, thank you and I

48:12

hope your listeners enjoy this. Well,

48:16

there you go. There was Dr. Ben Kane

48:18

talking all the things the Roman auxiliary soldier

48:20

and why these people were so critical to

48:22

the success of the Roman army. It wasn't

48:25

just the legionary soldiers. I hope you enjoyed

48:27

today's episode. It's always a pleasure having Dr.

48:29

Ben Kane on the show. He is a

48:31

fan favourite. And don't you worry, we will

48:33

be doing more on the Roman army in

48:36

the months ahead, particularly a

48:38

horrific massive defeat that they suffered

48:40

in the forests of Germania in

48:42

the Teutoburg Forest in 9 AD.

48:46

Varus, give me back my legion. That's

48:48

all to come on the ancients in the months

48:50

ahead. Last thing for me, wherever

48:52

you listen to the ancients, whether that be on

48:54

Spotify or on Apple Podcasts, make sure that you

48:57

are following the podcast, that you are subscribed, so

48:59

that you don't miss out when we release new

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episodes twice every week. But that's

49:04

enough from me and I will see you in the

49:06

next episode. I'm

49:26

Ina Garten. Welcome to Be My Guest, the

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