The Roman Army, 31 BC–AD 337: A Sourcebook

136 The Roman Army
Cocidius was a Celtic god of war apparently sometimes linked with Mars, and
common in the vicinity of Hadrian’s Wall.
MILITARY COLLEGIA
Collegia (associations of people involved in the same occupation, or
for a particular purpose) were common in the Roman world. The
government, fearing threats to public order, required all to have a
licence, but in practice permitted many burial societies or religious
associations, which fulfilled the needs of ordinary people, to exist
unlicensed. Rank and file soldiers were forbidden to associate in
collegia, presumably because the presence of private clubs inside the
normal structure of a military unit was held to be prejudicial to
discipline, and possibly divisive. Principales, however, and other
soldiers performing specialist tasks were permitted to associate; they
already belonged to a restricted group, and emperors, who were
prepared to allow association if some benefit could be expected,
doubtless hoped that collegia which they sanctioned, by identifying
with the imperial family and honouring imperial achievements, would
set an example to other soldiers.
Military collegia are found in all parts of the empire by the time of
Hadrian, but evidence that there was a substantial increase in their
numbers in the reign of Septimius Severus may be misleading, since it
is based entirely on inscriptions, largely from the camp of the III Augusta
at Lambaesis in Africa. Perhaps, because of the pay rise that Severus
granted to the army, more collegia than before chose to set up honorary
inscriptions; and the situation in Africa need not have been typical of
other military camps.
Army collegia often fulfilled a religious purpose; the schola or meeting
hall of the collegium was used as a sanctuary for military divinities and
statues of the imperial family and the emperor, who acted as a protecting
spirit of the collegium. The collegia at Lambaesis charged a joining fee
(scamnarium) from which they provided mutual assistance for their
members who were discharged, or left the collegium because of a
transfer or promotion to another unit, and on behalf of soldiers who
had died; certain essential military expenses could also be met from the
common fund. So, military collegia shared the functions of the collegia
tenuiorum which the government tolerated among civilians. Veteran
soldiers often organized themselves in the same way (collegia—Meiggs
1973:311–36; military collegia—De Ruggiero, Diz. epig., s.v. collegia,
pp. 367–9).