The Roman Army: A Social and Institutional History - Karatunov.net

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The Roman A rmy
In the fifth season, Tacitus describes naval operations on the west coast of
Scotland. Agricola drew up his troops somewhere facing Ireland, which he said
he could have su b du ed with on ly one legi on . Perhaps it is fortu n a te that he
n ever tri ed , s i n ce many another military leader has seri o u s ly undere s ti m a ted
the land and people of Ireland. In the sixth season, he nearly won a victory, but
it eluded him, and he brought the tribes to battle in the seventh. His real success
is not that he won the battle but that he managed to persuade the tribesmen to
u n i te and figh t . In Scotland it is usu a lly the invader who gets into difficulti e s
and starves, while the tribes retreat into the mountains and wait, but the combined
naval and land operations of the sixth season perhaps wasted their lands
and harassed them to the point where they had nothing to lose. They chose a
l e ader call ed Ca l gac u s , wh i ch means the Sword s m a n , and faced the Rom a n s .
Tacitus uses the fabricated prebattle speeches of both leaders to put forward the
opposing points of view of the Britons and the Romans.
The final battle was at a place called Mons Graupius. Speculation as to where
this was has filled many an article in journals and still occupies scholars today.
The site requires a hill, of which there is no shortage in Scotland, and a Roman
camp nearby. Both are present in Aberdeenshire at Durno, with the hill of Bennachie
in the background, but this is only one likely location for this elusive battle.
The tribesmen formed up on the slope, relying on the momentum of their
initial charge to break the Roman ranks. Agricola put his legions just in front of
his camp, with the auxiliary forces in the front line, infantry in the center, and
cavalry on the wings. This formation with legions in the rear was not unusual in
the late first century. Agricola kept four cavalry units in reserve to throw into
the battle wherever it should be necessary, probably to counter the necessity of
extending his line further than he would have liked to avoid being outflanked.
Agricola had his horse taken away before battle was joined in order to lead
from the front, which meant that he had to rely on his officers to make the correct
responses to whatever the Britons did in areas where he could not persona
lly direct devel opm en t s . In the even t , he did not have to em p l oy his legi on s .
The auxiliaries withstood the charge when the Britons closed, and the reserve
alae broke the British ranks and worked around to the rear, trapping them between
the two forces. The Britons fled, widely dispersed, and next day the Roman
scouts could not find anyone to fight. The tribesmen were defeated in this
battle, but resistance was not eradicated. The natives were contained by a line of
forts blocking all the mouths of the glens, controlling access between the Highlands
and the Lowlands, but if the Romans had remained in Scotland it is likely
that there would have been more hard fighting against bands of rebels before
Romanization could begin.
Agricola sent his fleet all around the island after the battle, thus proving that
it was not attached to another land mass, and he made a point of returning to
the south in a very leisurely manner, demonstrating Roman sovereignty. He had