The Unknown Warrior (9 page)

Caerleon also appears to have had a temple to Mithras outside the fort, according to inscriptions excavated at the site (Brewer, 2000: 42). Dedications at one of the temples to Mithras in Poetovia, Slovenia, included entire groups of soldiers from the Legio V Macedonica, and Legio XIII Gemina although here, as on other Mithraic sites, dedications by officers were more frequent than by ordinary legionaries (Clauss, 2001: 34, 36).

Medicine

In addition to the widely known assemblage of medical equipment from civilian sites of the Roman Empire (Jackson, 1990), medical tools are also found in differing military contexts – from forts to battle sites. At Exeter instruments used to probe the wounds of infantrymen or to mix medicines have been recovered (Holbrook and Bidwell, 1991: 257–9). Forts were provided with hospitals to treat wounded and sick soldiers (
valetudinarium
).

People with medical skills would also be taken on campaign with the legions to work with battle-injured soldiers. Among the finds at Kalkriese were a bone elevator (
elevatorium
) and the bronze handle of a medical knife (Schlüter, 1999: 147). A field-dressing station during a battle in the Dacian campaigns is depicted on Trajan's Column (Goldsworthy, 2000: 128).

Perhaps some of the archaeobotanical evidence derived from the Bearsden fort ditch might also hint at medicinal treatments. Here, some barley was found that resembled pearl barley that had been rubbed with a pestle and mortar – Pliny wrote of the use of this in medicines (Dickson and Dickson, 2000: 124). The fragments of linseed located in the same context might have been used in a poultice of some form (
ibid.
: 122).

We have already mentioned the presence of human whipworm and roundworm in the sewage in the Bearsden fort, but Roman legionaries were afflicted with other parasites, too. A soldier's comb was recently excavated from waterlogged levels at the fort at Carlisle (Luguvalium), which still retained an intact 3mm-long head louse. This was recovered from levels within the fort dating to
c.
AD
72–3 (see BBC News, 2004a). The misery caused by lice is more readily associated with the infantryman of the First World War, but parasites are something with which the infantryman from the ancient past was also familiar.

One of the writing tablets from Vindolanda details the sickness suffered by the legionaries. Of those present at the base, some thirty-one were listed as being unfit for service (inv. no. 88.841), this figure being made up of: sick 15, wounded 6, and 10 suffering from inflammation of the eyes (Bowman, 2003: 16). A further tablet mentions a hospital for the soldiers (inv. no. 195, 198).

THE PRISONER

In the past we have been almost totally dependent on the classical authors for evidence about prisoners of war and their camps in the Roman period. Such gems as Tacitus' line in the
Agricola
when, in reference to the Emperor Domitian, he wrote, ‘He was conscious of the ridicule that his sham triumph over Germany had excited when he had bought slaves in the market to have their dress and hair made up to look like prisoners of war' (Tacitus, 1970: 91), confirm our thoughts that prisoners of war were used in victory parades. Roman prisoners were also kept, for example, ‘In the mid 170s Marcus Aurelius made a peace settlement with a tribe called the Iazyges on the Danube frontier. The deal included a return of Roman prisoners …' (de la Bédoyère, 2001: 74). We also have recourse to several contemporary monuments that are relevant, for example: the depictions of Dacian prisoners of war being presented to the Emperor on Trajan's Column in Rome; defeated Gauls chained to a victory monument on the triumphal arch at Carpentras (Carpentorate) (King, 1990: 42); and barbarian prisoners being lead away by Roman soldiers on the
Tropaeum Traiani
at Adamklissi in Romania (Dorutju, 1961).

In addition to carvings of prisoners taken by the Roman legions, there are also depictions of prisoners of war and associated trophies of captured military hardware on coins of the era – for example, an issue of
denarius
of Julius Caesar (
c.
46–45
BC
) shows such a collection of victory elements and the legend
CAESAR
beneath (Wiegels, 2000: 8).

In recent years several authors have suggested that perhaps we do have archaeological evidence for these camps and for the incarceration of prisoners before they were enslaved, used in triumphal processions or in the arena. The excavation of the fort of Vindolanda on Hadrian's Wall in northern Britain is a case in point. The work of the Birleys here is fascinating: ‘In the early third century something very curious happened at Vindolanda. The entire fort was levelled and dozens of circular, stone huts were erected, in neat rows. They were clearly not to house Roman troops. It had something to do with Severus' expedition. He was in Britain from 208–11 with a vast expeditionary force, intending to re-conquer all north Britain – a return to the policy of Agricola (or Domitian). Native Britons were surely quartered at Vindolanda: hostages from Caledonia …' (Birley, 2002: 159). These circular buildings might hold up to 2,000 people and are unlike structures at any other fort in the empire. Little more evidence was obtained from them as they had been kept clean in antiquity. Is it possible that circular houses at a fort equate, necessarily, with prisoners, can they not be Roman? It is true to say that they are unusual and that barracks and similar structures of Roman use are generally rectangular, but it is not impossible that they are Roman. Furthermore, circular stone dwelling structures of Roman vintage are known on other sites in Britain, at Ironmongers Piece in Marshfield, South Gloucestershire, for example.

De la Bédoyère has also suggested that the massive ‘Saxon Shore' forts on the south-east coast of England, and mentioned in the late Roman record of military dispositions – the ‘Notitia Dignitatum' – might have been used as a holding camp for prisoners: ‘Under Probus (276–82), “Bergundian” and “Vanda” prisoners-of-war seized in continental wars were reputedly despatched to Britain to keep them out of the mainland empire, later serving as imperial allies' (de la Bédoyère, 2001: 104).

All our evidence for prisoner-of-war camps thus relates to Roman captives rather than captive Romans – perhaps it is simply a weakness in the archaeological record that traces of Romans captured by Britons, Germans, or Gauls have not, as yet, been found. Not all combat was quite so final as the defeat of the Varus legions in
AD
9 by Arminius, when the taking of Roman prisoners was perhaps not high on the agenda of the Cherusci – after all, we have the account of prisoner exchange, above. Roman carvings of the torture of their men by female Dacian captors (using a flaming torch) could perhaps be taken as propaganda to confirm the barbarity of Rome's enemies.

MEMORIALS AND BURIALS

For many men, burial on the battlefield was probably generally in a mass-grave – a mode of deposition that we shall see in all subsequent chapters – although, by the end of the nineteenth century, a greater effort was made to name the individual soldier on monuments, and to provide single graves. Despite the fact that commemorations of victories with trophies and triumphal arches were far more likely within the Roman Empire, it is not true to say that individual soldiers were not remembered. Perhaps one of the most intriguing monuments is the fragmentary altar, the
Tropaeum Traiani
, found at Adamklissi in Romania. This once had walls 11.67m long by 6m high with the names of legionary and auxiliary soldiers who had fallen fighting for the Roman Republic in Dacia (Dorutju, 1961; Hope, 2003: 91–2).

Those legionaries who survived to live a long retirement were also given burials that noted their lives in the army. Many Roman military tombstones have been recovered from sites across the Empire, frequently in close proximity to the fort in which the soldier was based, and often depicting him with all the accoutrements of soldiery. The information on these tombstones often relates to the unit in which the individual served, length of service, age and tribe. Part of a soldier's wage was taken at source to pay for membership of a ‘burial club' so that, in the event of his death, sufficient funds would be in place for the funeral. As Hope (2003: 93) states: ‘For the soldier, basic, anonymous, and communal burial must have been the common expectation during war. Peacetime could present a very different scenario, with the soldier receiving individual burial, often in a marked grave.'

One unusual relief, probably a tombstone, from Croy Hill in Scotland (and now in Edinburgh Museum), is thought to date to the mid-second century
AD
. Although there are no inscriptions to assist in identifying the individuals depicted, the stone shows three people. Their panoply of arms includes helmets, cylindrical shields (
scuta
) and heavy throwing spears (
pila
). The three men are shown wearing military cloaks (
paennla
) and the figure on the left has padded armour. Cowan (2003b: 59) has speculated that this carving may represent a father and his two sons.

The heirs of a deceased soldier could also be responsible for constructing his memorial, one example being that of Caius Valerius Vales, now in the Museum of Archaeology in Corinth. This translation of the inscription on the tombstone reads:

Caius Valerius Vales, son of Caius, of the voting tribe Quirina, of the Camunni, soldier of Legio VIII Augusta, of the centuria of Senucio, 35 years of age, served 14 years, [lies here]. His heir set this up according to his will.

(The relief depicts the soldier with his
gladius
; see Kos, 1978.)

The costume and accoutrements of third-century soldiers are depicted on a number of tombstones. One example, from Istanbul, Turkey, portrays a soldier of the ‘humble Numerus Divitensium' – Aprilius Spicatus (Sumner, 2003: 7). Another, that of Aurelius Lustinus, a soldier of Legio II Italica, shows a man with weighted
pilum
and an oval shield. Lustinus was killed in a campaign against the Dacians (Cowan, 2003b: 7).

Despite the provision of often elaborate mausolea and tombstones, burial was far from being the only mode for treating the remains of the dead. Cremation was also popular – an example of this that might relate to the remains of Roman legionaries is to be found at Exeter, the site of a legionary fortress from
c.
AD
55 to 75 almost certainly for the Legio II Augusta (Salvatore, 2001: 125). Excavations, appropriately enough on the site of the former ‘Valiant Soldier' public house, revealed at least three Roman military buildings containing three broadly contemporary cremation pits. These pits lay on high ground some 200m outside the south gate of the fortress and thus meeting Roman burial customs of burial outside the settlement boundary (
ibid.
: 126). All the cremations were given grave goods that one might expect of the everyday soldier – pottery vessels, gaming counters, drinking beakers and a small religious figurine associated with the army.

These pits contained many bones, representing at least two and possibly three individuals who could have served with the legionary garrison. Pit VS356 (0.82m wide by 1m long and surviving to 0.54m deep) held an almost complete beaker, a near-complete glass funnel, fortress wares and charred bones (
ibid.
: 129). Pit VS368 (1.5sq m and 1.14m deep) had a complete south-east Dorset Ware pedestalled bowl or urn, a south Gaulish decorated samian vessel and an incomplete bronze lamp (
ibid.
: 133).

The cremation and its associated artefacts in Pit VS362 (some 3m by 2m wide and 0.5m deep) were perhaps the greatest indicators of a military funeral. The burnt bones in this deposit were accompanied by at least two flagons, one of which is of a fabric associated with army supply, three stamped samian vessels, fragments from four glass vessels, two gaming counters (one black, one white), a coin of Nero, and a small bronze figure of the goddess Victory (
ibid.
: 133). We must not assume that this was necessarily even the cremated body of a man, let alone a soldier; Cool (2005: 34) refers to the burning of two Roman adult women on a pyre at Brougham, Cumbria – these with the bodies of horses and with military equipment accompanying them.

For the purposes of our study, however, the information derived from excavations of the buried skeletons of soldiers is far more useful.

THE FALLEN

The remains of Roman soldiers (and possible Roman soldiers) have come from a number of varied contexts, their demise being equally disparate. Those who died after retirement could be afforded the pleasantries of a formal funeral, of the ceremonies associated with cremation or burial and the subsequent monuments of memorial. Those who were killed in battles in which the Roman army was defeated and did not hold the field afterwards were not so fortunate. Examples of burials of the martial dead are found throughout the Empire and include such unusual cases as the ‘inhumation' of a body at Lugdunum (Lyon) in France – assumed to be hurried. The artefacts found with this man were deemed important as they included ‘one of the first
spathae
[long swords] which can be associated with an infantryman … This discovery, which can perhaps be linked with the battle there in
AD
197 (the soldier's purse contained twelve silver
denarii
, the latest being struck under Septimius Severus in
AD
194), also gives us accurate information on the new method of hanging the
spatha
' (Feugère, 2002: 115–16). In addition to the sword and coins, artefacts such as a brooch and sword chape were found, as were belt fittings composed of letters spelling out ‘Utere Felix' or ‘use luckily' – perhaps somewhat ironic given the fate of its owner.

In
AD
79 during the same eruption of Vesuvius that buried Pompeii, the city of Herculaneum was covered by lava and mud. Excavations of the city in the 1980s revealed not only buildings and artefacts, but also the skeletal remains of many of the inhabitants. Some of the most poignant of these were found in the seafront chambers (Gore, 1984: 570) and were of individuals trying desperately to escape. The human remains included those of an individual who was armed. This man – said to be around 37 years of age at death – was found face down with a dagger and a short sword (
gladius
), which was attached to the remains of a military-style belt (Guzzo, 2003: 74). He was accompanied in death by a series of carpentry tools, an adze and three chisels, that may have been in a bag on his back (Gore, 1984: 572–3). The pathology showed three missing front teeth and a lump in the femur, interpreted as resulting from a possible stab wound. So who was this man? De la Bédoyère (2001: 203–4) is in no doubt that if the body had been found in Britain, it would have been immediately taken as being the remains of a legionary. As there was no fort nearby, he suggested that the man was ‘probably a soldier, but going about his business in a wealthy civilian settlement either in a private capacity or because he had an official post in the city connected with a public building project, security of policing … he is a reminder that the Roman world was not divided into clearly demarcated civilian and military zones' (
ibid.
: 204).