 Map of all the territories once occupied by the Roman Empire, along with locations of limes Roman military borders and fortifications were part of a grand strategy of territorial defense in the Roman Empire. By the early second century, the Roman Empire had reached the peak of its territorial expansion and rather than constantly the expanding their borders as earlier in the Empire and Republic, the Romans solidifed their position by fortifying their strategic position with a series of fortifications and established lines of defense. Historian Adrian Goldsworthy argues that the Romans had reached the natural limits which their military traditions afforded them conquest over and that beyond the borders as fortified in the early to mid Empire lay peoples whose military traditions made them militarily unconquerable by the Romans. In particular, Goldsowrthy argues that the cavalry-based warfare of the Parthians, Persians and Huns presented an insurmountable challenge to the expansion of Rome's infantry-based armies. The branches of the Roman military at the highest level were the Roman army and the Roman navy. ...
The Roman army is the set of land-based military forces employed by the Roman Kingdom, Roman republic and later Roman empire as part of the Roman military. ...
velites hastati principes triarii equites legionaries auxiliae foederati praetorians vigiles frumentarii accensi rorarii herculanians cohortes urbanae dromedarii bucelarii speculatores immunes clibinarii) ...
This is a list of Roman legions. ...
// Manius Acilius Glabrio -- Manius Acilius Glabrio (consul 191 BC) -- Manius Acilius Glabrio (consul 91) -- Titus Aebutius Helva -- Aegidius -- Lucius Aemilius Barbula -- Marcus Aemilius Lepidus (triumvir) -- Lucius Aemilius Paulus Macedonicus -- Marcus Aemilius Scaurus (praetor 56 BC) -- Flavius Aëtius -- Lucius Afranius (consul) -- Sextus Calpurnius Agricola -- Gnaeus Julius Agricola -- Flavius Antoninus -- Marcus...
The Roman Navy (Latin: Classis) operated between the First Punic war and the end of the Western Roman Empire. ...
The Roman Navy (Latin: Classis) operated between the First Punic war and the end of the Western Roman Empire. ...
Root directory at Military history of ancient Rome Ancient Rome was a state whose history was often closely entwined with its military history over the roughly 13 centuries that the Roman state existed. ...
The following is a List of Roman wars fought by the ancient Roman Kingdom, Roman Republic and Roman Empire, organized by date. ...
The following is a List of Roman battles (fought by the Roman Kingdom, the Roman Republic, and the Roman Empire), organized by date. ...
As with most other military forces the Roman military adopted a carrot and stick approach to military, with an extensive list of decorations for military gallantry and likewise a range of punishments for the punishment of military transgressions. ...
Root directory at Military history of ancient Rome From sticks and stones to ballistae and quinquiremes. ...
Roman military engineering is that Roman engineering carried out by the Roman Army - almost exclusively by the Roman legions for the furthering of military objectives. ...
Basic ideal plan of a Roman castrum. ...
Roman siege engines were, for the most part, adapted from Hellenistic siege technology. ...
Disclaimer:This article makes extensive use of images used by kind permission of the Creative Assembly made with the Rome: Total War computer game. ...
Root directory at Military history of ancient Rome Romes military was always tightly keyed to its political system. ...
The strategy of the Roman military encompasses its grand strategy (the arrangements made by the state to implement its political goals through a selection of military goals, a process of diplomacy backed by threat of military action, and a dedication to the military of part of its production and resources...
Root directory at Strategy of the Roman military Roman infantry tactics refers to the theoretical and historical deployment, formation and manouvers of the Roman infantry from the start of the Roman Republic to the fall of the Western Roman Empire. ...
Grand strategy is military strategy considered at the level of the movement and use of an entire nation state or empires resources. ...
The Roman Empire is the name given to both the imperial domain developed by the city-state of Rome and also the corresponding phase of that civilization, characterized by an autocratic form of government. ...
The Roman Empire is the name given to both the imperial domain developed by the city-state of Rome and also the corresponding phase of that civilization, characterized by an autocratic form of government. ...
Adrian Goldsworthy (born 1969) is a British historian and military writer. ...
Reproduction of a Parthian warrior as depicted on Trajans Column The Parthian Empire was the dominating force on the Iranian plateau beginning in the late 3rd century BCE, and intermittently controlled Mesopotamia between ca 190 BCE and 224 CE. Origins Bust of Parthian soldier, Esgh-abad Museum, Turkmenia. ...
The Persians of Iran (officially named Persia by West until 1935 while still referred to as Persia by some) are an Iranian people who speak Persian (locally named Fârsi by native speakers) and often refer to themselves as ethnic Iranians as well. ...
The Huns were a confederation of Eurasian tribes who appeared in Europe in the 4th century, the most famous person being Attila. ...
Nature of the fortifications The borders of the Roman Empire, which fluctuated throughout the empire's history, were a combination of natural frontiers (the Rhine and Danube rivers to the north and east, the Atlantic to the West, and deserts to the South) and man-made fortifications which separated the lands of the empire from the "barbarian" lands beyond. The Roman Empire is the name given to both the imperial domain developed by the city-state of Rome and also the corresponding phase of that civilization, characterized by an autocratic form of government. ...
Individual fortifications had been constructed by the Roman military from as early as the building of Rome's first civic walls in the 6th or 7th century BC. However, systematic construction of fortifications around the periphery of the empire on a strategic scale began around 40 under Emperor Caligula. The coherent construction of these fortifications on a strategic scale (i.e. to protect the empire as a whole rather than fortifying individual settlements) are known as the limes, and continued until around 270. Centuries: 1st century BC - 1st century - 2nd century Decades: 10s BC - 0s - 10s - 20s - 30s - 40s - 50s - 60s - 70s - 80s - 90s 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 Sometimes the 40s is used as shorthand for the 1940s, the 1840s, or other such decades in various centuries...
Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (August 31, 12 – January 24, 41), most commonly known as Caligula, was the third Roman Emperor and a member of the Julio-Claudian dynastyhe also liked to have sex with animals, ruling from 37 to 41. ...
The limes Germanicus, 2nd century. ...
Centuries: 2nd century - 3rd century - 4th century Decades: 220s - 230s - 240s - 250s - 260s - 270s - 280s - 290s - 300s - 310s - 320s Years: 270 271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 Events Crisis of the Third Century Significant people Aurelian, Roman Emperor Marcus Claudius Tacitus, Roman Emperor Probus, Roman Emperor Categories...
The limes consisted of fortresses for legions or vexillations (eg Segedunum Roman Fort) as well as a system of roads for the rapid transit of troops and, in some places, extensive walls. Perhaps the most famous example of these is Hadrian's Wall in Great Britain, which was built across the entire width of the country to protect from attack from tribes located in modern-day Scotland. The so-called Limes Brittanicus is perhaps the best example of the ulimate limes - like the Great Wall of China, it was an attempt to construct a continuous man-made fortification along the length of an entire border, a massive undertaking. However, it is not correct to interpret other limes in the same way or to view the limes as an impenetrable barrier. Other limes would not have had a continous man-made fortification for the entirety of their length. In places, a river, desert or natural outcropping of rock could provide the same effect for zero outlay. Also, fortifications even as impressive as Hadrian's Wall were not unbreachable: with milecastles some distance apart and patrols infrequent, small enemy forces would have been able to penetrate the defences easily for small-scale raiding. Additionally, a large army would have been able to force a crossing of the limes using seige equipment. The value of the limes lay not in its absolute impenetrability but, as S. Thomas Parker argues, in its hindrance to the enemy: granting a delay or warning that could be used to summon concentrated Roman forces to the site. The limes are therefore perhaps better seen as an instrument allowing a greater economy of force in defense of a border than otherwise would be necessary to provide the same level of defense. Segedunum was a Roman fort in modern-day Northumberland, UK. The fort lies at the eastern end of Hadrians Wall and on the banks of the River Tyne. ...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
The Great Wall in the winter The Great Wall of China (Traditional Chinese: ; Simplified Chinese: ; pinyin: Wà nlÇ Chángchéng; literally The long wall of 10,000 Li (里)¹) is a Chinese fortification built from the 5th century BC until the beginning of the 17th century, in order to protect...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
After 270, the maintenance of an impenetrable solid frontier was abandoned by Constantine I in favour of a policy, whether deliberate or forced by circumstance, of "defense in depth". This called for the maintenance of a softer, deeper perimeter area of defense, with concentrated hard points throughout its depth. The idea was that any invading force of a sufficient size could penetrate the initial perimeter but in doing so with any element of surprise or rapid movement would be forced to leave several defended hard points (fortresses) to its rear, hampering its lines of supply and communications, and threatening surrounding of the force. Bronze statue of Constantine I in York, England, near the spot where he was proclaimed Emperor in 306 For other uses, see Constantine I (disambiguation). ...
Defence in depth is a military stategy sometimes also called elastic defence. ...
In the very late Empire the frontiers became even more elastic, with little effort expended in maintaining frontier defense. Instead, armies were concentrated near the heart of the empire, and enemies allowed to penetrate in cases as far inwards as the Italian peninsula before being met in battle.
Northern borders
Britannia After conquering much of the modern landmass of the United Kingdom, the Romans halted their northern expansion around mid-Scotland. Although doubtlessly capable of conquering the entirety of Scotland should it have been desirable, the Romans deemed the task not to be worthwhile due to the paucity of its resources and the relative infertility of its land. However, this presented a problem for the Romans in that it left them with a border shared with a people who made repeated raids and insurrections against them. Unlike other borders throughout the empire, there was no natural border to fall back on such as desert or wide river that crossed the whole peninsula, so instead a series of defenses were built in southern to mid-Scotland in order to protect the province of Britannia from the Scots.
Although the border was not a continuous wall, a series of fortifications known as Gask Ridge in mid-Scotland may well be Rome's earliest fortified land frontier. Constructed in the 70s or 80s, it was superseded by the later Hadrian's Wall 40 years later and then the final Antonine Wall twenty years after that. Rather than representing a series of consecutive advancements, the border should be seen as fluctuating - the Antonine Wall for example was between 142 and 144, was abandoned by 164 and briefly re-occupated in 208. The Gask Ridge is the modern name given to an early series of fortifications, built by the Romans in mid-Scotland. ...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
The Antonine Wall, looking east, from Barr Hill between Twechar and Croy The Antonine Wall, remains of Roman fortlet, Barr Hill, near Twechar Location of Hadrians Wall and the Antonine Wall in Scotland and Northern England. ...
Although records are scarce, there are indications that the border fluctuated between the various fortifications depending on the local strength of the military. There is archealogical evidence for widespread burning of fortifications, but it is disputed whether this represents fortifications falling to attack or part of the normal process of the Roman military to destroy their own fortified camps on abandonment so as to furnish the enemy with a fortified base at their expense.
These northern fortifications are sometimes styled the Limes Britannicus. The average garrison of the wall fortifications is thought to have been around 10,000 men. Along with a continuous wall (except in the case of Gask Ridge), there existed a metalled road immediately behind the wall for transport of troops. Along the wall there existed a few large forts for legions or vexillations, as well as a series of milecastles - effectively watchtowers that were unable to defend a stretch of wall against anything but low-scale raiding but were able to signal attack to legionary forts by means of fire signals atop the towers. A milecastle was a fortified structure that stood along Hadrians Wall in Great Britain. ...
In the later Empire, Roman Britannia found itself increasing vulnerable to exteneral agression, in parallel to attacks felt across the length of the Empire's borders. However, since Britannia shared no land bridge with continental Europe, the method of attack and thus methods of defence varied from the imperial standard. A series of naval forts was built along the south east coast, initially to combat piracy but later to protect from raiding and the threat of invasion from Saxons that eventually led to the Saxon occupation of Lowland Britain by 600 and is relefected in the name of the fortifications: the Saxon Shore Forts. Each shore fort both protected against direct attack and also sheltered a small naval sub-fleet of vessels that could patrol the coast against pirates and raiders. Centuries: 6th century 7th century 8th century Decades: 550s - 560s - 570s - 580s - 590s - 600s - 610s - 620s - 630s - 640s - 650s Years: 600 601 602 603 604 605 606 607 608 609 World population grows to about 208 million. ...
The Saxon Shore is the collective name given to a series of fortifications built along the south-east coast of what is now England, during the latter years of the Roman occupation of Britain. ...
Continental Europe In continental Europe, the borders were generally well defined, usually following the courses of major rivers such as the Rhine and the Danube. Nevertheless those were not always the final border lines: the province of Dacia, modern Romania, was completely on the other side of the Rhine, and the province of Germania Magna, which must not be confunded with Germania Inferior and Germania Superior, was the land between the Rhine, the Danube and the Elbe (Although this province was lost three years after it's creation as a result of the Battle of Teutoburg Forest). The limes that ran across the line of the Rhine-Danube was known as the Limes Germanicus. It consisted of: Loreley At 1,320 kilometres (820 miles) and an average discharge of more than 2,000 cubic meters per second, the Rhine (Dutch Rijn, French Rhin, German Rhein, Italian: Reno, Romansch: Rein, ) is one of the longest and most important rivers in Europe. ...
The Danube (ancient Danuvius, ancient Greek Istros) is the longest river of the European Union and Europes second-longest[3] (after the Volga). ...
Dacia, in ancient geography the land of the Daci, named by the ancient Greeks Getae, was a large district of Southeastern Europe, bounded on the north by the Carpathians, on the south by the Danube, on the west by the Tisa, on the east by the Tyras or Nistru, now...
The Roman province of Germania Inferior, 120 AD Germania Inferior (in English: Lower Germany) was a Roman province located on the left bank of the Rhine, in todays southern Netherlands and western Germany. ...
Categories: Historical stubs | Ancient Roman provinces | German history | Germany | History of the Germanic peoples ...
The River Elbe (Czech Labe , Sorbian/Lusatian Åobjo, German Elbe) is one of the major waterways of Central Europe. ...
Battle of the Teutoburg Forest Conflict Roman-Germanic wars Date 9 Place Teutoburg Forest Result German victory In the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest (AD 9) an alliance of Germanic tribes led by Arminius (also known in German as Hermann), the son of Segimerus of the Cherusci, ambushed and wiped...
Map of Upper Germanic Limes The Limes Germanicus (Latin for German frontier) was a remarkable line of frontier forts (limes) that bounded the ancient Roman provinces of Germania Superior and Raetia, and divided the Roman Empire and the unsubdued Germanic tribes, from the years 83 to 260. ...
- The Lower (Northern) Germanic Limes, which extended from the North Sea at Katwijk in the Netherlands along the Rhine;
- The Upper Germanic Limes (just to be confusing, also called the Rhaetian Limes or simply "the Limes") started from the Rhine at Rheinbrohl (Neuwied (district)) across the Taunus mountains to the river Main (East of Hanau), then along the Main to Miltenberg, and from Osterburken (Neckar-Odenwald-Kreis) south to Lorch (Ostalbkreis) in a nearly perfect straight line of more than 70 km;
- The proper Rhaetian Limes extended east from Lorch to Eining (close to Kelheim) on the Danube. The total length was 568 km (353 miles). It included at least 60 castles and 900 watchtowers.
Eastern borders The eastern borders changed many times, of which the longest lasting was the Euphrates river, eventual to be left behind as the romans defeated their rivals, the parthians, with the march on their capital, Susa. The parthians were a people that lived in the nowdays Iran and west Iraq. However they didn't attemp to romanize the whole Parthian Empire, they left a puppet king for the remainder of the empire and took only the lands that comprise modern Iraq, which became Assyria and Mesopotamia. In Dacia, the limes between the Black Sea and the Danube were a mix of the camps and the wall defenses: the Limes Moesiae was the conjunction of two, and sometimes three, lines of vallum, with a Great Camp and many minor camps spread through the fortifications. The Euphrates (the traditional Greek name, Arabic: الÙرات Al-Furat, Armenian: ÔµÖƒÖ€Õ¡Õ¿ Yeá¹—rat, Hebrew: פְּרָת Perath, Kurdish: Ferat, Azeri: FÉ™rat, Old Persian: Ufrat, Syriac: ܦܪܘܬ or ܦܪܬ Frot or Prâth, Turkish: Fırat, Akkadian: Pu-rat-tu) is the westernmost of the two great rivers that define Mesopotamia (the other being the...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
Winged sphinx from the palace of Darius the Great at Susa. ...
Roman province of Assyria, 120 CE Assyria was a province of the Roman Empire, roughly situated in modern-day northern Iraq. ...
Mesopotamia refers to the region now occupied by modern Iraq, eastern Syria, southeastern Turkey, and Southwest Iran. ...
Dacia, in ancient geography the land of the Daci, named by the ancient Greeks Getae, was a large district of Southeastern Europe, bounded on the north by the Carpathians, on the south by the Danube, on the west by the Tisa, on the east by the Tyras or Nistru, now...
Southern borders At its greatest extent, the southern borders were the desterts of Arabia and Sahara, that represented a natural barrier to prevent expansion. The Empire controlled the mediterranean shores and the mountains opposin it. However the romans attempted twice to occupate effectively the Siwa Oasis (and failed) and controlled the Nile many miles into Africa until the nowdays border between Egipt and Sudan. For Mauretania there was a single wall with forts on both sides of it. In other places, such as Syria and Arabia Petraea, there wasn't a continuous wall intead there was a net of border settlements and forts occupied by the roman army. The Siwa Oasis is an oasis in Egypt, located between the Qattara Depression and the Egyptian Sand Sea in the Libyan Desert. ...
The Nile (Arabic: ‎, translit: , Ancient Egyptian iteru) is a major north-flowing river in Africa, generally regarded as the longest river on Earth, though some sources claim the Amazon in South America is longer. ...
Arabia Petraea Arabia Petraea, also called Provincia Arabia or simply Arabia, was a province of the Roman Empire beginning in the second century; it consisted of the former Nabataean kingdom in modern Jordan, southern modern Syria Sinai, and northwestern Saudi Arabia. ...
- Limes Arabicus, (called the Limes Uranus) the frontier of the Roman province of Arabia Petraea facing the desert
- Limes Tripolitanus, the frontier in modern Libya facing the Sahara
The desert frontier of the Roman province of Arabia Petraea. ...
Arabia Petraea Arabia Petraea, also called Provincia Arabia or simply Arabia, was a province of the Roman Empire beginning in the second century; it consisted of the former Nabataean kingdom in modern Jordan, southern modern Syria Sinai, and northwestern Saudi Arabia. ...
Western borders Mainly protected by the Atlantic coast and unfortified.
References - Nuovo Atlante Storico De Agostini, by "Instituto Geografico De Agostini", ISBN 88-451-3698-5. Novara 1995.
- Corso di storia antica e medievale 1 (seconda edizione) by Augusto Camer and Renato Fabietti ISBN 88-08-24230-7
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