Aims
Objectives
Lecture summary
Lecture structure
Sources
Further work

Aims
To explore issues relating to our understanding of the Roman military
To examine a range of epigraphic and papyrological material
To consider the context in which the Roman army operated within Egypt
To establish partially the role of the Roman military in securing peace in Egypt and the manner in which the Roman army operated as an institution

Objectives
By the end of this session, students should be better able

• to consider the role of the army in Egyptian society
• to use epigraphic and/or papyrological material to consider issues relating to the Roman army
• consider the military and geo-political situation of Egypt in the Roman period
  
• discuss methodological issues relating to the use of anecdotal information in papyri
  
• discuss the role of the army as a police force in Egypt and consider the value of this material for our understanding of Egyptian society

Lecture Structure

• Introduction
  • Images of the Roman Army
    • Ideals and Reality: the image of the army as an nineteenth-century construct.
  • The Roman army as a symbol of Romanness (and the decline of the Roman world)
  • Contemporary views of Romanity
  • Lecture (i) What did the Roman army do?
  • Lecture (ii) The integration of the army with civilians
• Test Case: The Koptos Building Inscription
  • Date
  • How to read it?
  • What does it mean/tell us about the Roman army?
• The Army at War
  • Conquest
  • Internal defence and war: Revolts of the chora.
  • Jewish Revolts
  • Defence and the borders
• The Location of the army: a rational strategy?
• The Army at Peace
  • Hunt's Pridianum as an example
  • P. Gen. Lat 1
• Soldiers and centurions

Petitions to Centurions

The social logic of petitions: taking problems outside the community

Conclusions

Sources

The Koptos Building Inscription: CIL III 6627 (Koptos, Egypt.):

Table 1

Table 2

Centurions
C.Terentius Maximus, L.Iulius Montanus, L.Domitius Aper. Total 3 centurions. Total of above 7 cohorts, 10 centurions 61 equites, 788 soldiers. By those who are written above, these stones have been dedicated and erected. They built and repaired the camps at Apollonos Hydreuma 23 December completed 1 August, Berenice 12 December, Myos Hormos 15 January.

P.Gen. I 17: To Iulius Iulianus, centurion, and Iulius Conon, decurion. From Nemesous, daughter of Gnatios, mother Nemesilla,from the village of Philadelphia in the Heraklides district. My husband Nemesion, son of Nemesion, the praktor agurikon of the village went away from me on the sixth of Phamonoth about the eigth hour and is yet to return. I first took this up with the public officials of the village but... P. Kell. 20. (AD 300-320) To Aurelius Herodes, the mosteminent praeses of the Thebaid from Aurelius Pamouris son of Psais, from the village of Kellis of the city of the Mothities of the Great Oasis. Nothing (was regarded) by many of those in those times of turmoil more terrible of forceful, my lord praeses, {than to suffer} violence and arrogance. For Psa.s, from the same city of the Mothites, a locally powerful man, took my donkey away, forcefully and acting like a tyrant, while at the very moment I was still an adolescent, and he came into onflict with the [ ] from men. As I am a person of limited means and as through my [ ] I earn my living, I necessarily take refuge with you, my lord, through this petition, asking and begging you to order that...

Further Work
Bibliography: The Roman Army
Essay: 6: How effectively did the Roman army suppress social unrest?
Seminar: Cannibals and Culture I and II
Lecture: Soldier and Society

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