Disclaimer: this is a fictional character I have made up to talk about daily life in roman Legion.

It has been a month since I’ve joined the Roman army. It has been hard. I am to be awake and dressed by the time the cock crows at dawn. After a quick breakfast of cold meat, we gather for parade where roll call is taken and the other soldiers are reprimanded for falling back asleep while standing. My duties include cleaning the stables and latrines. I hate it. The smells are foul and I get dirty again very quickly. I can’t wait until it’s my turn to guard the gates. After I finish my cleaning I go for training. It’s very difficult but I enjoy the exercise and escape from the stench of the stables. I’m not very good with a sword yet but I’m quickly improving. I can never wait for dinner and I devour the delicious meal of meat, bread and beer. Tonight is my turn for the night watch. I dread this more than cleaning the stables. Last time I dozed off while on watch for a moment and was fined a week’s pay.

It has been 3 months since I’ve been on campaign. I miss mother and my sisters. Today my Contubernium was allowed to go on leave for a day to the local town where we went to the bathhouses which weren’t as fancy as the ones back home but they were a welcome distraction for my pains. Because of all my training I have many aches and the warm water and cheap oils of the Unctorium (massage room) soothed my many aches. The only thing that wasn’t different from home was the games. I played a couple games of Tali and I haven’t yet lost my luck! Afterwards we went to the taverns to explore the local food and drink. The freshness and succulence of the food was a welcome change to the cooking of the other soldiers back at the camp. The best part was we were finally able to drink wine. Although the wine was not of similar quality as in the city, but it would suffice as we could not have wine in camp. A lovely lady caught my attention but we had to return to camp before the camp closed for the night.

Works Cited

Cavazzi, F. The Roman Army. 2012. Web. February 2012.

Davies, Roy. Service in the Roman Army. Ed. D.J. Breeze, V. Mansfield and V. Maxfield. New York: Columbia University Press, 1989.

Elton, Hugh. “Off the Battlefield: The Civilians View of Late Roman Soldiers.” Expedition 39 (1997): 42.

MacMullen, Ramsay. “The Legion as a Society.” Historia: Zeitschrift Für Alte Geschichte (1984): 440-456. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/4435901&gt;.

Matyszak, Philip. Legionary: The Roman Soldiers Unofficial Manual. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd., 2009.

Stout, S.E. “Training Soldiers for the Roman Legion.” The Classical Journal 16.7 (1921): 423-431. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/3288082&gt;.

The Roman Army. n.d. 

As a knight, chivalry is your main mission. Stories are told of the brave knights who rescue the damsel in distress and slay the mythical dragons. When there weren’t dragons to slay or damsels to save, tournaments were your best option to demonstrate your chivalry. Even if you don’t win the tournaments you still gain respect by participating and being brave enough to get knocked off a horse by a lance. Tournaments were also a great way to keep in shape and improve your skill by having “friendly” competition with your fellow knights. Tournaments began as mock battles to keep up the the physical shape of the soldiers. Since war was scarce and many good men are lost in war, the knights developed a way to train the soldiers in a friendly yet competitive manner.

There are two kinds of tournament; jousting and melee. The joust is an individual tournament event.  By far the most popularized form of tournament (Heath Ledger in A Knight’s Tale), Jousting was done on horseback with you galloping toward your opponent and trying to either knock them off their horse in “Joust of War” or shattering your lance by hitting it against your  opponents armour in a “Joust of Peace.” In a joust you would face your opponent 3 times, each time armed with full armor including a helmet, a lance under your right arm and over the neck of the horse and a shield placed on your left should where the opponents would strike you. Very few people were actually injured during the jousts. If you would like to experience joust first hand you can play a jousting game at the royalarmouries.org http://www.royalarmouries.org/visit-us/leeds/leeds-galleries/tournament-gallery/tournament-fun/tournament-games

Melee is a team tournament fought either on foot or horseback (Tourney). This is the closest to the original tournaments but less popular and more dangerous. The melee was generally fought using blunt swords and maces which are similar to what one would use come wartime. There were more casualties and injuries associated with the melee than with jousting. William Montague, the earl of Salisbury was reported to have killed his own son in a tournament in 1382 (Prestwich).  Rules were put into place to prevent such incidents from happening but the rules weren’t always successful and tragedies happened.

Besides earning respect from the people, a chivalrous knight can win prizes from competing in the tournaments. The victorious knight can win gold, better armor, horses or even the hand of a beautiful maiden. You can also take your opponents horse if you knock him all the off and in some cases even his armor as a trophy.

Works Cited

Knights Tournaments. n.d. Web. 27 March 2012. <http://www.middle-ages.org.uk/knights-tournaments.htm&gt;.

Medieval Tournaments. n.d. 27 March 2012. <http://www.castles.me.uk/medieval-tournaments.htm&gt;.

Prestwich, Michael. Knight: The Medieval Warriors Unofficial Manual. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd., 2010. Print.

Royal Armouries. Introduction to Tournaments. n.d. Video. 27 March 2012. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9ga0rQIX90&list=PL02602420B0F3E430&index=1&feature=plpp_video&gt;.

—. Tournament Events. n.d. Web. 27 March 2012. <http://www.royalarmouries.org/home&gt;.

Wikipedia. Tournaments (Medieval). n.d. Web. 27 March 2012. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tournament_(medieval)&gt;.

Hannibal employed many soldiers from many different places. His army consisted of soldiers from Africa, Spain, Italy and he even had Celtic soldiers. Each group of soldiers brought their own culturally used armour and weapons to battle with the Romans.

The African soldiers wore very colorful uniforms that came in different varieties. The heavy infantry wore chain mail over their clothes and carried heavy shields. They mostly fought with an assortment of exotic weapons which they were well trained with and proved to be useful and deadly when they wielded them. They also used spears and long and short swords.

The Iberian or Spanish soldiers carried wooded shields and used sling and javelins as well as swords and spears. The heavy infantry also wore chain mail and used the typical heavy roman sword.  They also used the falcata which is a sickle shaped sword made of iron or steel. The falcata is made from 3 lamina or sheet of steel.

an Iberian Falcata

The Celts or Gauls were armed simple iron long swords. The swords weren’t of very good quality and were used more effectively when hacking rather than stabbing (Polybius).  Both Plutarch and Polybius describe the Celts as often ceasing fighting so as to straighten their swords. Polybius and Livy also assert that the Celts didn’t wear any armour and often fought naked.

Sources

Wikipedia contributors. “Carthiganian Army.” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, Web. [Cited 17 Feb. 2012.] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carthaginian_Army

Wikipedia contributors. “Hannibal.” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, Web. [Cited 17 Feb. 2012.]

Knox, E.L. Skip. The Punic Wars: Battle of Cannae. Boise State University History of Western Civilization. [Cited 17 Feb 2012.] http://www.boisestate.edu/courses/westciv/punicwar/09.shtml

Shean, John F. Hannibal’s Mules: The Logistical Limitations of Hannibal’s Army and the Battle of Cannae, 216 B.C.. Franz Steiner Verlag, 1996. [Cited 16 Feb 2012.] http://www.jstor.org/stable/4436417

Pleiner, Radomir. ”The Celtic Sword.” Oxford: Clarendon Press (1993). Print. [Cited 16 Feb 2012]

http://www.unrv.com/empire/invasion-of-italy.php [Cited 16 Feb 2012 Web]

Polybius. Shuckburgh, Evelyn S. (trans.) “Histories”. London, New York. Macmillan. 1889. Reprint Bloomington 1962. Perseus.tufts.edu. [Cited 16 Feb 2012] Web http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0234:book=15:chapter=9

Livius, Titus. “The History of Rome”. Electronic Text Center, University of Virginia Library. Web  [Cited 16 Feb 2012] http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=Liv4His.sgm&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=5&division=div1

Polybius. “The Battle of Cannae.” Fordham University.  [Cited 16 Feb 2012] Web http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/ancient/polybius-cannae.asp

The Battle of Marathon was fought on the plain of Marathon around the 10 of September or 12 of August 490 according to the full moon. The Persians sailed to the bay of Marathon (25 miles from Athens). The Athenian general Miltiades quickly formed a small army of hoplites or infrantrymen. There were about 10,000 heavily armed Athenians and 1,000 Plataeans (Livius) that went to fight against the numerous army of Persia at the Battle of Marathon. The great runner Pheidippides was sent to Sparta to request reinforcements but the Spartans could not respond due to the religious festival of Carneia which prevented the Spartans from any military operation until the full moon. The 11,000 hoplites were divided into ten tribes with a Strategoi (generals) over each “tribe.”(Tucker). Miltiades, Aristides and Themistocles were some of the generals over the tribes. Callimachus was elected by the tribes to be the polemarch.

Callimachus was in command of the right wing which consisted of the Athenians while the left wing was commanded by the Plataeans. The wings surrounded the numerous Persians in what modern sources call a “double envelopment” (Tucker). The Persians deemed the endeavor to be “Suicidal Madness” as written by Herodotus of Halicarnassus. However the Greeks were able to defeat the Persians and save Athens as well as capture seven of their ships. Afterwards, the Greeks left a detachment to make sure the Persians did not return. The Persians had already set course for Athens but when they arrived they found that the rest of small but successful Greek Army ready for them. The Persians Retreated and thus ended the Battle of Marathon.

Figure 1: the way the Greeks(Red) surrounded the Persians(Blue); source: en.wikipedia.org/Double_envelopment

Works Cited

J.A. S. Evans. “Herodotus and the Battle of Marathon.” http://www.jstor.org. [Online] 3st Qtr. 1993. [Cited: Jan 31, 2012.] http://www.jstor.org/stable/4436293

Doenges, Norman A. “The Campain of the Battle of the Marathon.” www.jstor.org. [Online] 1st Qtr. 1988. [Cited: Jan 31, 2012.] http://www.jstor.org.hal.weber.edu:2200/stable/4436491?seq=7.

“Battle of the Marathon.” en.wikipedia.org. [Online] January 9, 2012. [Cited: January 31, 2012.] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_marathon.

Battle of Marathon. http://www.livius.org. [Online] September 12, 2010. [Cited: Jan 31, 2012.] http://www.livius.org/man-md/marathon/marathon.html.

Tucker, Spencer. “Battles That Changed History: An Encyclopedia of World Conflict.” Greenwood Publishing Group. ABC-CLIO Nov. 11, 2010. [Cited Jan 31, 2012] Print.

Herodotus of Halicarnassus. Ed: A.D. Godley. “The Histories” Perseus.tufts.edu. [Cited Jan 31, 2012] http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0126&redirect=true