TEXT: Roman Centurions 
  31 BC–AD 500
  The Classical and Late Empire 
  Men-at-Arms
  OSPREY
  P U B L I S H I N G
  Raffaele D’Amato • Illustrated by Giuseppe Rava
  © Osprey Publishing • www.ospreypublishing.com
  
  Men-at-Arms • 479
  Roman Centurions 
  31 BC–AD 500
  The Classical and Late Empire
  Raffaele D’Amato • Illustrated by Giuseppe Rava
  Series editor Martin Windrow
  © Osprey Publishing • www.ospreypublishing.com
  
  ROMAN CENTURIONS 31 BC–AD 500
  THE CLASSICAL AND LATE EMPIRE
  A fighting centurion of Legio II
  Augusta, from the Arc d’Orange
  in southern France, 29 BC or 
  AD 21; see Plate A2 for 
  reconstruction. 
  (in situ; author’s photo) 
  INTRODUCTION
  For the safety of the Emperor, the vow that I,
  Lucius Maximus Gaetulicus, son of Lucius, 
  of the tribe Voltinia, from Vienna, made
  as a new recruit in Legion XX Valeria Victrix 
  – to Imperial Victory, All-Divine and Most Reverend – 
  I have now fulfilled as chief centurion of 
  Legion I Italica, in the consulship of Marullus
  and Aelianus, after 57 years of service
  (Inscription of AD 184 from Novae in 
  Lower Moesia – modern Bulgaria)
  I wanted to hold slaughtered Dacians. I held them.
  I wanted to sit on a chair of peace. I sat on it.
  I wanted to take part in famous triumphs. It was done.
  I wanted the full benefits of a chief centurion. I have had them.
  I wanted to see naked nymphs. I saw them.
  (Inscription from Africa by anonymous veteran of 
  Trajan’s Dacian Wars – AE, 1928, 27)
  W
  hen an imperial Roman soldier signed his
  contract for 25 years of military service, his
  greatest ambition was to become a centurion
  – the most experienced, reliable and admired class of
  officers in the Roman military machine. The senior
  officers who commanded and staffed Roman 
  formations were essentially non-specialists, with little or
  no formal training, so the army relied upon the 
  centurions for the crucial level of command between
  the military tribunes and the common soldiers. 
  In modern terms, we might characterize the legionary
  centurionate as a large and stratified organization of
  ‘warrant officers’, holding all appointments between
  platoon and battalion commands. It was these 
  professional fighting men – sometimes with as much as
  20 years’ experience under their belt – who maintained
  day-to-day training, discipline and organization, and
  who provided personal tactical leadership in battle. 
  Many of these elite combat officers were destined 
  to rise to more senior posts in the army, and later in
  the civilian administration, and in the process they
  transformed the social status and wealth of their
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  families. The serving and former senior centurions of the legions were a
  group enjoying considerable influence both within and beyond the
  armies, and on occasions members of this class were instrumental in
  setting up and casting down Emperors of Rome. 
  In this necessarily short work, following my Men-at-Arms 470 on 
  centurions of the pre-Augustan periods, I have assembled only a
  selection of the many references to centurions left to us by ancient
  writers; my aim is to give a general idea of their place in military and civil
  society, of their military careers, and of their equipment. Details of their
  regular duties and tactical leadership are not repeated here from 
  MAA 470, in order to leave space for other material. For the same reason 
  I have not touched here upon the centurions of the Imperial Fleets – for
  which see my MAA 451, Imperial Roman Naval Forces 31 BC–AD 500 – and
  only very briefly on the Late Roman officer rank of centenarius. 
  ORGANIZATION 
  THE EARLY PRINCIPATE
  Legionary centurions 
  In the early 1st century AD a single legion was usually composed of 
  60 centuriae, with a complement of about 5,240 men. Three or more
  centuriae (six, according to Pseudo-Hyg., De Mun. Castr. I, 7, 1, 30) were
  formed into a cohors, a unit of about 240–500 men (Josephus, BJ, 15, 6;
  Pseudo-Hyg., De Mun. Castr. I, 2); the legion was thus divided into ten
  cohorts. The centuria was the basic sub-unit, usually of 80 milites gregarii,
  under the centurio (Josephus, BJ, I, 4,3; hekatontarchês in the eastern part
  of the empire, BJ, VI, 1, 8). However, Martial specifically mentions a 
  centurion who led 100 men (Ep., X, 26). Each centuria was further divided
  into ten contubernia – tent and messing squads. 
  The precedence of units and sub-units within the legion reflected the
  order of march or advance. The First Cohort, cohors prima,
  had twice the number of men (Pseudo-Hyg., De
  Mun. Castr. III), so it was usually 800–1,000
  strong; during the 1st century AD it
  consisted of five, not six, double-sized
  centuriae, 
  commanded 
  by
  centurions termed collectively as
  primi ordines (thus giving the
  legion a total of 59 rather than
  60 centurions). Within all
  cohorts the centurions’ titles
  of appointment still reflected
  the three old troop-types of
  the Consular legion – the
  hastati, principi and pili. The
  Second to Tenth Cohorts each
  had six centurions, titled, from
  junior to senior, as the hastatus
  posterior, hastatus prior, princeps posterior,
  princeps prior, pilus posterior, and pilus prior.
  The number of the cohort prefixed each of
  these titles; e.g., the nonus hastatus posterior
  Bronze gorgoneion or Medusa
  mask, 1st century AD, as visibly
  applied to the breast of the
  ringmail shirt worn by the 
  centurion on the Arc d’Orange –
  see page 3. Originally the eyes
  and mouth were painted in white
  and red, giving it an even more
  striking appearance – it should
  be remembered that in Classical
  mythology, those who faced the
  gorgon’s stare were turned to
  stone. (Museo Archeologico
  Nazionale, Este; author’s photo,
  courtesy of the museum) 
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  commanded the second of
  the two centuriae of hastati –
  and was thus the most
  junior centurion – within
  the Ninth Cohort.
  Within the primi ordines
  the ascending order of
  superiority 
  was 
  hastatus 
  posterior, princeps posterior,
  hastatus, princeps, and primus
  pilus. These First Cohort
  centurions outranked all
  centurions of the other
  cohorts. The primus pilus
  (‘first javelin’) was the
  senior centurion in the
  whole legion (Mart., Ep., I,
  31; 93). He commanded the senior (front, or right-hand) centuria within
  the First Cohort, and thus that whole cohort. Only eight officers in a fully-
  officered legion outranked the primus pilus: the legate (legatus legionis)
  commanding the legion; his second-in-command, the senior tribune
  (tribunus laticlavus); the camp prefect (praefectus castrorum); and the five
  other tribunes (tribuni angusticlavii), who apparently served as staff
  officers to the legate.
  The term centuriones ordinarii (SHA, Firm. XIV, 2) was applied to
  centurions actually in command of centuries, as opposed to those
  detailed for detached service – e.g. on the staff of a governor, in the
  Praetorian Guard, or commanding independent, non-legionary units.
  Each centurion, however senior, had his own allocated centuria; this
  was a self-contained sub-unit, and was identified by the centurion’s
  name. The tents of the ten contubernia making up a century were
  grouped together in the marching camp, and in permanent posts
  each centuria had its own accommodation in a barrack block – usually
  ten double rooms, with the century office and the centurion’s living
  quarters at the end. Writing of Vespasian’s army, Josephus (BJ, III, 5,
  3) stated that ‘their times also for sleeping and watching and rising 
  are notified beforehand by the sound of trumpets, nor is any thing
  done without such a signal; and in the morning the soldiers go every
  one to their centurions, and these centurions to their tribunes, to
  salute them’. 
  The term principales indicated all men ranking between the common
  milites gregarii and the centurions – roughly, what we would call ‘non-
  commissioned officers’. Within each centuria they comprised the signifer
  (standard-bearer – in the century of the primus pilus, the aquilifer or eagle-
  bearer); the optio (the centurion’s second-in-command); the cornicen and
  bucinator (hornist and trumpeter); and the tesserarius (administrative
  assistant – what we might call the ‘orderly room clerk’). 
  Detached appointments: the auxilia
  The non-citizen auxilia or auxiliary units made up approximately half of
  the Roman army, and were organized in infantry or mixed cohortes and
  cavalry alae. These separate units of c. 500 or c. 1,000 men were usually
  A centurion’s sword of Mainz
  type, and decorated greaves,
  from a lost monument in
  Avignon dating from the 
  1st century BC or 1st century
  AD. (Musée Calvet, Avignon;
  author’s photo, courtesy of 
  the museum) 
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  Details from the funerary stele
  of L. Blattius Vetus, a centurion
  of Legio IIII (IV) Macedonica,
  dated to the end of the 1st
  century BC; see Plate A1. One
  side of the stele (left) displays
  his dona militaria, which under
  close examination can be
  identified as two torques and
  nine phalerae. The other side
  shows, protruding from behind 
  a curved scutum shield, the
  scabbard chape of a gladius
  sword of Mainz type (centre),
  and the end of a vitis vine-staff
  (right). The latter is intriguingly
  carved in the Egyptian lotus-
  flower shape – this identifies
  Blattius as a veteran of
  Augustus’s campaign in Egypt –
  and may also have been painted.
  Interestingly, the stele is also
  carved with only a single greave
  (ocrea), perhaps echoing the
  traditional Samnite style of
  wearing a greave on the left leg
  only. (Archaeological Museum,
  Este; author’s photo, courtesy 
  of the museum) 
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  commanded by a tribune or a prefect – ranks reserved for men of the
  superior ‘equestrian’ social class, which was defined by proven wealth –
  but they relied for the maintenance of discipline, training and tactical
  leadership upon centurions or decurions, who enjoyed the same status
  as legionary centurions. The auxiliary centurions were mainly
  promoted from the ranks (or, especially in the 1st–2nd centuries AD,
  from among principales) of the legions. In a minority of cases centurions
  and decurions were entrusted with the command of some of the
  auxiliary units (CIL, III, 1918, 8739, 11936, 14370 2; VII, 371), and
  apparently without entirely losing their connection with their parent
  legion (CIL, II, 4083, 4114; III, 7904; VIII, 2749). There is mention of
  the secondment of a centurion from Legio X Fretensis to Britain as
  praepositus cohortis prima hispanorum – Commander of the First Cohort of
  Spaniards; this may have been at the time of the major campaign led by
  the Emperor Septimius Severus (r. AD 193–122 – CIL, VII, 371). When,
  atypically, a centurion was transferred from a legionary appointment to
  a unit command in the auxiliary troops, this was no real promotion; the
  man performed the duties of unit commander, but his rank remained
  that of centurion. 
  In the 2nd and the first part of the 3rd century AD, centurions were
  also detached from their legions and assigned as praepositi (commanders)
  of more temporary independent native units (numeri) that we might term
  ‘frontier scouts’. For example, many inscriptions from the North African
  fort of Calceus Herculis (El Kantara) relate to a centurion who was sent
  to command either a Numerus Palmyrenorum or, less probably, a centuria
  of Legio III Augusta stationed there (AE 1926.144–145; 1933.42; CIL VIII,
  2497–2498). Another inscription mentions that during the reign of
  Commodus (r. AD 180–192) a police post (burgus speculatorius) was
  established for the safety of travellers at a road junction on the route
  between Calceus Herculis and Mesarfelta, and was commanded by a
  centurio praepositus of the Numerus Hemesenorum. (CIL, VIII,
  2494–2495). At a later period centurions given some independent staff
  appointments may have been permanently detached from their legions
  (CIL, VIII, 7050). 
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  Detail of the helmet carved on
  the funerary monument to an
  unidentified late 1st-century BC
  centurion; the stone was re-
  used in about AD 1000 during
  the building of a church at
  Megliadino San Fidenzio. The
  crest running from front to back
  is probably of ostrich or peacock
  feathers, like those carved more
  clearly on a centurion’s helmet
  on the contemporaneous
  mausoleum of the Julii at
  Glanum (Saint-Remy – see 
  MAA 470, page 18). Other faces
  of the stele show a centurion’s
  greaves and vine-staff.
  (Archaeological Museum, 
  Este; author’s photo, courtesy 
  of the museum) 
  The Praetorian Guard, urbaniciani,
  vigiles, and frumentarii
  The emperors’ Praetorian cohortes of the imperial
  bodyguard had their centuriae and centuriones (Suet., Nero,
  47). The term of service in these cohorts was 16 years,
  and on completion of this period the most efficient
  soldiers were invited to continue their service
  indefinitely, with increased pay and rank, as evocati. This
  was a regular status, giving access to a range of possible
  employments; many – though not all – evocati were either
  ex-centurions, or would later be promoted to that rank.
  Originally Rome had three cohortes urbanae of city
  guards, each cohort being commanded by one tribune
  and six centurions. In the time of the Flavians this was
  increased to four cohorts, each with about 500 men.
  Seven cohorts of vigiles were raised in AD 6, with 
  policing and fire-watching duties. These were under the control of the
  praefectus vigilum, each having one tribune, a princeps, and seven more
  junior centurions.
  Legionary centurions given detached postings to the staff of superior
  commanders such as provincial governors might, for example, serve as
  drill-masters (exercitores) or even commanders of the governor’s equites
  singulares cavalry. There are inscriptions recording such titles as centurio
  et campidoctor (training officer), and centurio stratorum (‘of the grooms’). 
  Such postings were presumably a useful opportunity to earn the
  favour of an influential patron, but were not actual promotions. 
  The same was not true of those called centuriones frumentarii
  (or frumentariorum), who were given command of the frumentarii –
  soldiers detailed for service away from their legions, acting as a sort of
  imperial police and intelligence corps. This posting was a definite step
  up in a centurion’s career (CIL XI, 5215, CIL VI, 1080). The ranking
  centurion was called the princeps peregrinorum, and the corps’ Rome
  headquarters was termed the castra peregrina. The centuriones frumentarii
  were sometimes still connected with their legions (CIL II, 1450; III,
  1980, 4787, 4801?, 7041, 7420; VI, 423), but this was not the general
  rule, and in most cases the connection must have been merely nominal.
  For example, an inscription in the House of the Vestals in Rome attests
  that at the time of Alexander Severus (r. 222–235) a certain Titus Flavius
  Domitianus, ex-speculator of Legio III Parthica Severiana, ranked as
  hastatus (third-ranking centurion) in Legio X Fretensis, and at the same
  time held the position of princeps peregrinorum. This command of 
  the frumentarii would certainly require his presence in Rome, while the
  legion of which he was nominally a senior member was stationed 
  in Palestine. 
  THE LATER EMPIRE
  In the early 3rd century all the ancient rank titles still appear in the sources
  (SHA, Clod. Alb., XI, 6; Al. Sev., L, 2; CIL III, 4114 = 10888). After the army
  reforms of Diocletian and Constantine (rr. AD 284–305, 306–337) we still
  find the rank of centurion, but this seems now to have been incorporated
  as simply part of the complex military structures of the Late Empire. In
  general, the 'old-style' units such as legiones (regardless of these being later
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  8
  classed as palatinae, comitatenses or limitanei), cohortes and alae
  retained the traditional internal structure and rank system,
  which indeed would survive until the 7th century. The
  distinction between cohortes, centuriae and manipuli
  within the legion is still remembered by
  Ammianus (Amm. Marc. XVII, 13, 25; XXI, 13,
  9; XXIII, 5, 15; XXIV, 6, 9; XXV, 3, 4; XXVI, 2,
  3; XXVII, 10, 10).Their officers continued to be
  called tribunes, centurions and decurions; but
  at the same time ‘new-style’ units were created –
  the comitatenses, namely scholae, vexillationes,
  auxilia palatina and some cunei – with an 
  apparently different hierarchy of ranks 
  and appointments. 
  Eusebius (Vita Constantini, IV, 51) states that
  when the Emperor Constantine divided the
  empire between his three sons, he assigned to
  each of them teachers in the arts of the war,
  and a retinue consisting of infantry of several
  classes (óplitai, doryphóroi, somatofylakes),
  commanded 
  respectively 
  by 
  centurions
  (lochagoi), generals (strategoí) and tribunes
  (taxíarchoi). In these infantry units, and in the
  new raised Scholae Palatinae, below the senior
  officer rank known as senator we find the
  ducenarius (commander of 200 men), and the
  centurio in the old-style units, together with the
  centenarius (commander of 100 men) in the
  Scholae, the Comitatus of the Dux, and in other
  infantry and cavalry units such as the
  Cataphractarii and Sagittarii. 
  A rank structure for the late 4th century
  cavalry is indicated in a passage by Hieronymus
  in c. 
  AD 386–387 (Liber contra Iohannem
  Hierosolimitanum, 19); in ascending order from
  raw recruit upwards, this sequence is tiro, eques or pedes, semissalis, circitor,
  biarchus, centenarius, ducenarius, senator and tribunus. (Interestingly,
  Vegetius mentions the ducenarius as a rank between the centurion and
  the primus pilus of his ‘Legio Antiqua’.) It is, however, clear that by the
  380s the previously high status of the most flexible rank in the Roman
  military tradition had fallen to simply that of the ‘officer commanding
  100 men’.
  With the division of the empire, the rank of centurio or centenarius is
  mentioned at the beginning of the 5th century in both the armies, but
  after the fall of the West it survived only in the East. The legio or bandon
  was commanded by a tribunus or comes, assisted by a vicarius. Each unit
  was still divided into centuries (lochoi), under the command of a centurio
  or centenarius, and each centuria was divided in dekarchiai (ten-man
  squads). The legio of the 5th century counted only about 1,000 men,
  while the average strength of its constituent part, then termed a numerus,
  was about 500 men. The centurio or centenarius still commanded 100 men
  in the late 5th century. 
  Detail of the monument to
  Marcus Petronius Classicus,
  from Poetovium, AD 20–45,
  showing the helmet with a crista
  transversa of very clearly carved
  feathers – compare with Plate
  B3. (Archaeological Museum,
  Ptuj, Slovenia; photo courtesy 
  Dr Mojca Vomer Gojkovič) 
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  At the bottom of the stele to M.
  Petronius Classicus are
  representations of his greaves
  flanking his vine-staff.
  (Archaeological Museum, Ptuj,
  Slovenia; photo courtesy 
  Dr Mojca Vomer Gojkovič) 
  Central panel of the monument
  to M. Petronius Classicus,
  showing part of the squared
  harness upon which his
  decorations of torques and
  phalerae are mounted – compare
  with Plate B3. (Archaeological
  Museum, Ptuj, Slovenia; photo
  courtesy Dr Mojca Vomer
  Gojkovič) 
  CAREERS 
  Selection and appointment
  In the Consular period almost the only, and certainly the most important
  qualification for the centurionate had been bravery and leadership in
  battle. By the early Principate and thereafter, additional qualities were
  required, recalled by Vegetius in the late 4th century AD. The infantry
  centurion was chosen for his stature, strength, and skill at arms. He was
  to be vigilant, temperate, and ready to execute orders without question;
  he must be a strict disciplinarian, active in exercising his soldiers, and
  ensuring that they were clean and well-dressed, with brightly polished
  weapons (Ep., II, 14). Centurions should be literate, ideally at least 
  30 years old, with some years of military service behind them. To a great
  extent the centurionate received men who were already part of an elite
  cadre, combining the military virtues with the necessary administrative
  competence. 
  Since they were socially heterogeneous, they had varying levels of
  literacy, but this might be respectable. The official language of the army
  was still Latin until AD 630, but in the Eastern Empire the main spoken
  language had been Greek since as early as the 1st century. So Greek words
  and ‘translations’ (e.g. hekantontarch for centurio) – known from earlier
  sources such the Gospels, Josephus and Arrian – were probably the
  nomenclature used alongside the Latin terms in the ‘real-world’ Eastern
  Roman army since the early Empire. There are references in the New
  Testament to centurions who spoke both Latin and Greek, and, by
  implication, probably Aramaic as well (e.g. Matthew, VIII, 5–13; Acts, X,
  22–48). 
  Although in the early period they usually rose from the ranks, some well-
  connected men who secured letters of recommendation from important
  patrons were appointed centurions straight from civilian life, through the
  exercise of patronage on
  their behalf. The youngest
  recorded beneficiary of this
  sort of ‘direct commission’
  was an 18-year-old; the
  relevant inscription (CIL,
  III, 1480) shows that the
  candidate was a member of
  the equestrian order – the
  distinct 
  and 
  superior
  ‘knightly’ social class of the
  wealthy bourgoisie. Many
  passages in the literature
  indicate that young men of
  the better classes often
  solicited the emperor for a
  direct 
  appointment 
  as
  centurion – either because
  they wished to follow the
  profession of arms seriously,
  or because of straitened
  financial circumstances. 
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  Nominally, a centurion’s appointment had to be
  approved by the emperor himself; in practice the name
  of a serving soldier was presumably submitted via a chain
  of recommendation, from his unit officers up through
  the governor of the province. Letters by Pliny the
  Younger (III, 8; IV, 4) attest that other powerful persons
  might try to exercise their influence in favour of
  candidates. Particular bureaucrats in the imperial
  administration dealt with such matters; at the end of the
  1st century AD, Statius wrote that the chief of the office
  ab epistulis was involved in the appointment of centurions
  (Silvae, V, 1, 94–95). The historian Birley stressed the role
  of this bureau in the careers of centurions, whose
  ‘dossiers’ it kept. Juvenal (Satires, XIV, 193) wrote that the
  office a libellis dealt with requests for appointments
  directed to the emperor. When an application was
  approved, it was a third office of the imperial chancellory
  – a codicillis – that was responsible for drawing up the
  written document of appointment, or codicillus. 
  Although it might seem hard to believe that the
  Emperor of Rome personally concerned himself with
  this process, Campbell and Dobson have estimated an
  annual requirement amounting only to some 90 new
  centurions for the legions and seven for the Praetorians,
  and the selection of 12 civilians for direct commissions
  from among the names submitted by patrons. While it
  seems unlikely that all decisions about candidates for 
  the centurionate would be laid before the emperor 
  in person, his involvement would be symbolically
  important in cases of promotion for courage on the
  battlefield, and practically important when choices
  demanded some delicacy – as, for example, when the candidate had been
  put forward following acclamation by his fellow soldiers (especially
  during the periods of civil war). It is also plausible that decisions relating
  to troop movements and postings obliged the emperor and his closest
  advisers to maintain at least a minimum knowledge of the members of the
  most important officer class in his armies. Some decisions were certainly
  made explicity by emperors: Caracalla (r. AD 211–217) even appointed as
  centurions some men of his Germanic bodyguard, the famous Leones
  (Cassius Dio, LXXIX,7). 
  An official ceremony was held for the investiture of a new centurion. An
  interesting votive inscription (AE.1993, 1363) from the 3rd century AD
  was discovered in the camp of Legio I Italica at Novae in modern Bulgaria.
  This centurion thanked the gods for his promotion (ordinatio) as primus
  pilus of his legion, obtained – according to Speidel’s interpretation – by the
  choice of the legionary tribunes. The ceremony would have been held on
  an auspicious military holiday, and – by analogy with Josephus’s
  description of a pay parade – it would have taken place in the presence of
  the legionaries, turned out in all their finery (BJ, V, 349–351). A dais would
  have been erected in the courtyard of the Principia of the camp or fortress,
  and the ceremony was probably perfomed by the legion’s tribunes; the
  candidate became a centurion at the moment when he was presented with
  Wax encaustic portrait of a
  Trajanic-period officer from
  Fayoum, Egypt; the sword
  baldric over his right shoulder
  suggests that he is a centurion –
  see Plate E2. (Egyptian Museum,
  Cairo, inv. 33257; photo courtesy
  Dr Ashraf Nageh)
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  his vine-staff and the codicillus containing the
  imperial edict of appointment. The account by
  Eusebius of Caesarea (Hist. Eccl., VII, 15) of the
  martyrdom of one Marinos, denounced as 
  a Christian by another soldier during his
  investiture, makes clear that the ceremony was
  conducted in front of the troops, and that it
  involved the presentation of the vitis. 
  Career progression and social class
  During the early Empire, legionary centurions
  gradually rose in seniority within their cohort,
  commanding centuries with successively higher
  precedence, until they commanded the senior
  centuria and therefore the whole cohort. Most
  centurions of the Second to Tenth cohorts
  seem not to have advanced beyond this level.
  Only the very best were then promoted to
  become primi ordines, commanding the five
  doubled centuriae of the First Cohort, and also
  taking on staff roles within the legion. Such
  promotion was initially to hastatus posterior of
  the First Cohort, and thence in four steps to
  primus pilus. 
  This rank was the most coveted and the most
  difficult to reach, because it demanded
  considerable education, administrative talent, and the support of an
  influential patron. The appointment as ‘first javelin’ in a legion could
  only be held for one year, after which he either retired (rarely), or moved
  on in his career. All those who had occupied the position of primus pilus
  formed a class or order called primipilares, and enjoyed special rewards
  and privileges (Suet., Gaius, 44). Those who continued in the army
  thereafter might be appointed for a time to the staffs of commanding
  officers, or were at the emperor’s disposal for temporary duties and extra-
  legionary commands. 
  The primipilate became the chief gateway by which men of modest
  background and fortune might gain admission to positions usually
  reserved for members of the privileged classes. All primipilares or 
  ex-primipili were granted by the emperor a sum of money sufficient to
  qualify them for admission to the equestrian order, thus opening the way 
  to possible appointments as tribunes and prefects. In some cases a man
  might hold the primipilate twice, in two different legions – sometimes
  consecutively (primus pilus bis), sometimes with one or more other posts
  intervening (primus pilus iterum). In most cases – particularly after the
  period of the Flavian emperors – the first primipilate was followed by
  appointment as a tribune in the city of Rome (in ascending importance,
  tribunus cohortis vigilum, tribunus cohortis urbanae), and a second primipilate
  by the tribunate of a Praetorian cohort. The records of such promotions
  suggest that these city tribunates were even more exclusively reserved for
  the primipilares than were the commands of auxiliary units for officers of
  equestrian birth – no doubt emperors believed that they could more safely
  entrust their own security and the tranquillity of the capital to these
  Monument to Marcus Cocceius
  Superianus, a centurion of Legio
  X Gemina, and his brother
  Valerius Lucilianus, a member of
  the Praetorian Guard; 2nd–3rd
  centuries AD, from Lobor-Zlatar,
  Croatia. They are shown flanking
  their mother, Septimia Lucilla,
  who dedicated the stele,
  probably together with their
  father Cocceius Superianus, a
  signifer of Legio X Gemina. Under
  close examination both brothers
  can be seen to wear the long-
  sleeved tunica militaris manicata,
  fitted anaxyrides trousers, closed
  calcei boots, and the sagum
  cloak. A millefiori buckle is
  represented on the centre of the
  bossed cingulum, and the sword
  scabbard with circular chape
  hangs from a baldric decorated
  with circular phalerae. Both
  tunics are decorated with three
  ranges of vertical stripes (clavi
  or loroi); and the cloak is
  fastened at the right shoulder 
  by a round fibula. (Zagreb
  Archaeological Museum; author’s
  photo, courtesy of the museum) 
  11
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  hardened old soldiers than to young officers of the superior classes. It is
  noteworthy that there are many examples of primipilares promoted to
  legionary tribunates during the 1st century AD, despite the fact that during
  the early part of this period there were not enough tribunes’ positions for
  all the candidates of senatorial birth who sought them (Suet., Aug., 28). 
  Among those advanced from the primipilate to legionary tribunates,
  many had been made primipili after having already occupied commands
  that confirm their pre-existing equestrian status (CIL, XI, 3801; XII, 2455
  and 4371). In the large majority of cases the men who advanced from the
  primipilate to superior commands had apparently begun their careers
  with direct commissions as legionary centurions and were usually of
  equestrian rank, though some may have belonged to the so-called
  ‘decurial class’ in rural municipalities.
  In other cases a second primipilate was followed by an appointment as
  praefectus castrorum (later, praefectus legionis), or as a procurator. (It would
  seem that emperors held out the hope of this latter – a lucrative post in
  the administration of a province – to induce trusted officers to accept 
  a second appointment as primus pilus in the meantime.) One example 
  was M. Pompeius Asper, primus pilus of Legio III Cyrenaica, who was 
  then appointed praefectus castrorum of Legio XX Valeria Victrix, and
  subsequently rose to praefectus legionis, legatus legionis, tribunus cohortis
  vigilum, tribunus cohortis urbanae, tribunus cohortis praetoriae, and so on. 
  In cases of direct imperial appointments, the career of a centurion
  might carry him to the highest levels of society. Some rose to be admitted
  to the Senate – although, according to Cassius Dio (LXII, 26, 6), Maecenas
  advised Augustus to admit only those who had commenced their military
  careers as directly commissioned centurions, and not those promoted from
  the ranks. Cassius Dio also mentions one ex-centurion who actually rose to
  the elevated rank of praefectus urbis in Rome. A certain Adventus had first
  served as a mercenary among the spies and scouts, and had then been
  appointed centurion; he was later advanced by Macrinus (r. 217–218) to a
  procuratorship, then appointed a senator, co-consul, and finally Prefect of
  The sarcophagus of a late 
  3rd-century Roman centurion
  was used in early Christian times
  to house the remains of St Victor,
  a Roman officer martyred under
  the Emperor Maximianus
  Herculius (r. 286–305). An officer,
  displaying the characteristics 
  of a centurion of the time of
  Claudius II to Maximianus, is
  depicted four times on the
  sarcophagus – mounted, in two
  hunting scenes (note the javelin
  or verutum – see Plate F2), and
  standing, holding the mushroom-
  headed staff of rank typical of
  the Tetrarchic period. (Crypt of 
  St Vittore in Ciel d’Oro, Milan;
  author’s photos, by permission 
  of the Milan Archdiocese)
  12
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  the City, though by then ‘he could neither see by reason of old age, nor
  read for lack of education, nor accomplish anything for want of experience’
  (Cass. Dio, LXXIX,14). The reason for Adventus’s advancement was the
  support that he gave to Macrinus in front of the legions when the latter 
  was proclaimed emperor following the assassination of his predecessor,
  Caracalla, at Carre, so at that time Adventus was probably either a legionary
  primus pilus or a centurion of the Praetorian Guard. 
  Many centurions of humble origin climbed high in times of anarchy
  during the 3rd and 4th centuries, and some even to the throne itself; for
  instance, Maximinus Thrax (r. 235–238) had been a primus pilus under
  Caracalla (SHA, Maxim., IV, 4). However, even in more generally settled
  times we find the sons and grandsons of centurions profiting from the
  social mobility that this rank could bring; the best example is probably
  the Emperor Vespasian (r. AD 69–79), whose grandfather and father
  were respectively an evocatus ex-centurion and a former primus pilus
  (Suet., Vesp., 2).1
  Despite these examples of glittering careers, however, many men served
  for decades in the same rank without ever being promoted. There are
  examples of men in their sixties and even seventies still serving as
  centurions in their legions (CIL VIII, 217 – Petronius Fortunatus; CIL VIII,
  Stele of an unidentified
  centurion from Aquileia, end of
  the 3rd century AD. He holds a
  vitis with the mushroom-shaped
  head, and his cingulum is
  fastened with a ring buckle.
  (Museo Archeologico Nazionale,
  Aquileia; author’s photos,
  courtesy of the museum)
  13
  1  In 1907 the historian G.H. Allen suggested a career sequence for officers in the Severan army at the turn of the
  2nd–3rd centuries AD – see Bibliography. This was based on two stone pedestals (CIL VI, 1057 and 1058) from
  the Caelian Hill in Rome, one erected in AD 210 and the other a few years earlier, and each inscribed with the
  names of about a thousand soldiers of Cohors V Vigilum; many individuals whose names appeared on the earlier
  stone as common soldiers are listed on the later stone as principales. By comparing these lists with the wider
  epigraphic record, Allen compiled a suggested sequence of the successive steps of advancement in the army. 
  In brief, Allen suggested five main paths of promotion to legionary centurion:
  (1) From centurion of troops stationed in Rome, to a more senior legionary centurion’s post. In some instances 
  a Praetorian centurion was promoted directly to primus pilus of a legion; so far as we can judge from the scarce
  evidence, a promotion from centurion in the Praetorian cohorts direct to a tribunate would be extraordinary. 
  (2) From principalis in a city garrison unit, directly to the legionary centurionate. (Note that all promoted from
  principalis to centurion within the Rome garrison cohorts had previously served as evocati.)
  (3) From legionary principalis to legionary centurion, after at least ten years’ military service.
  (4) From centurion or decurion of an auxiliary unit, to legionary centurion; in some cases these had been
  legionary soldiers before being promoted on their transfer into the auxiliaries. 
  (5) Counter-intuitively, some officers of equestrian birth were appointed legionary centurions not before but after
  having filled one or more of the positions reserved for members of that social order (for example, CIL, II, 2424
  gives the cursus honorum of one individual as: praefectus cohortis – centurio – primus pilus; and CIL X, 5829
  lists another as praefectus cohortis – tribunus legionis – centurio – primus pilus).
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  2877 – T. Flavius Virilis). Of the
  18 centurions known to have
  served for over 40 years, only 
  four are recorded as having been
  appointed primus pilus. 
  * * *
  It is clear from the above 
  that centurions fell into two
  distinct groups: those who were
  promoted from the ranks; and
  those who began their military
  careers with ‘direct commissions’
  into 
  the 
  centurionate 
  –
  significant numbers of whom
  were already of the equestrian 
  class that ex-rankers could 
  only 
  achieve 
  by 
  reaching 
  the 
  pinnacle 
  of 
  legionary
  promotion as primipili. 
  It is to be expected that those who subsequently rose from the
  centurionate to high commands belonged to the latter class, due to their
  combination of younger age, practical experience and social connections,
  and this is broadly confirmed by the inscriptions. Most of those who
  advanced beyond primus pilus had begun their careers as ‘directly
  commissioned’ centurions, or, in exceptional cases, were ex-soldiers of the
  Praetorian cohorts who had been promoted centurion. The prefects and
  tribunes who were former centurions – usually called viri militares –
  probably became more numerous as the higher social classes gradually
  withdrew from military service during the 3rd century. We find in this
  period examples of legionary principales who rose to become primi pili, and
  finally attained the equestrian positions. It has been conjectured that in
  the 3rd century the centurionate became the first position in the regular
  equestrian career path (cursus honorum), but the epigraphic evidence is
  still insufficient to prove this. From the mid-3rd century there was certainly
  greater social mobility, in that men of the equestrian class were now being
  appointed to more senior posts previously held only by senators, such as
  the command of a legion. These men, with the advantage of greater
  military experience as former senior centurions, often took command of
  substantial forces, and were given the title dux. 
  Quasi-military duties
  Centurions fulfilled a wide range of state duties besides the command of
  units; for example, they were responsible for logistics, in that they
  supervised the collection of provisions for the army by contractors (FIRA,
  3, n.137). Centurions and ex-centurion evocati are also recorded in police
  and even judicial roles. They were responsible for escorting important
  prisoners – e.g., the centurion charged with escorting St Paul to the
  Antonia Fortress in Jerusalem, who protected him from the attacks of the
  Jewish mob (Acts, XXI, 38). They commanded the troops sent out to hunt
  down brigands, both in Italy and the provinces. The military authorities
  were charged with the arrest and execution of small-time criminals, and in
  General view and detail of 
  the panoply of a centurion from
  the Trophaeum Traiani, the
  monument at the Adamklissi city
  gate restored by Constantine the
  Great in AD 316. The armour
  depicted is a typical scaled
  lorica squamata of the 3rd
  century AD, but is noteworthy
  for the breast decoration; this
  represents Mars Ultor, with a
  transverse helmet crest.
  Interestingly, the sword is slung
  on the right side. See Plate F1.
  (Adamklissi Museum; author’s
  photos, courtesy of the museum)
  14
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  practice such cases would 
  be delegated to the man in
  charge of a detachment of
  soldiers – often a centurion. 
  A number of legal cases
  recorded on papyri in
  Egypt 
  suggest 
  that
  centurions also exercised
  an informal but effective
  judicial authority, arriving at
  de facto remedies for litigants
  (and there is no reason to
  suppose that the same was
  not true in other provinces).
  The cases dealt with – among
  other things – assaults, thefts, tax
  collection, and the criminal activities of
  administrators. Centurions were ordered
  to bring individuals to justice, to carry out
  searches, and to provide some kind of protection
  for litigants who were presumably unable or unwilling
  to exercise their full legal rights but who hoped for a quick settlement.
  It is interesting that they or their advisers appealed to Roman
  centurions as figures of authority. Clearly, local people would want to
  keep on the right side of them, and in practice centurions, backed up
  by their soldiers, administered a kind of rough-and-ready justice. They
  thus brought the operation of the central government right into village
  life, and emphasized the apparently all-seeing presence of the Roman
  army. 
  RISKS & REWARDS
  On campaign, the centurion was held personally responsible for the
  efficiency of the men under his command, and in battle he was expected
  to provide unflinching personal leadership. Apart from the dangers of
  hand-to-hand combat that they faced in their regular service, centurions –
  despite their privileged status – were by no means immune from the
  harshest punishments themselves. From those to whom much was given,
  much was demanded, and a perceived failure of courage or judgement
  might bring execution (Suet., Aug., XXIV; Tib., 60) – even crucifixion
  (SHA, Avid. Cass., IV, 6; Clod. Alb., XI, 6). A centurion’s immediate reward
  for submitting himself to such mercilessly high expectations was the pay,
  and it has been estimated that in the early 1st century AD this was about
  15 times that of a legionary.2 Campbell and Dobson have calculated that a
  centurion received five times the salary of a Praetorian guardsman, and a
  In this rare
  fragment from
  an early 4th-
  century Christian
  sarcophagus,
  Constantine’s
  army is shown
  marching
  towards Rome. 
  The figure on the
  right, identified as a
  centurion by his vine-
  staff, wears the pileus
  Pannonicus, the leather
  ‘pill-box’ military cap
  characteristic of this period –
  see Plate G1. (Musei Vaticani,
  Città del Vaticano; photo author’s
  collection) 
  15
  2  During the reign of Augustus, the total annual salary bill for the centurions of the Second to Tenth Cohorts of
  the 25 legions then existing has been calculated at c. 13,500 sesterces; that for the First Cohort primi ordines
  at c. 27,000 sesterces, plus c. 54,000 for the primipili; so the annual grand total was 94,500 sesterces –
  roughly 4 per cent of the regular army’s total annual pay bill of c. 2,362,500 sesterces. To set this in context, at
  that time the state’s entire outgoings on the army and the navy has been calculated at c. 370 million sesterces.
  By Domitian’s reign (AD 81–96) this military budget had risen to c. 600 million sesterces; the pay bill for the
  legionary centurions was then c. 36 million, and by the reign of Septimius Severus (AD 193–211) it had risen 
  to c. 60 million sesterces.
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  primus pilus 20 times as
  much – and thus about
  60 times the pay of a
  legionary miles gregarius. 
  At 
  intervals,
  emperors also granted
  donatives 
  – 
  cash
  bonuses – to the troops,
  on such occasions as
  their 
  accession, 
  the
  celebration 
  of 
  an
  important victory, or
  some 
  other 
  happy
  public event. These
  were 
  also 
  granted
  simply at times when it
  was judged wise to
  bolster 
  the 
  army’s
  loyalty, 
  and 
  it 
  is 
  not surprising that on
  these 
  occasions 
  the
  Praetorians and the
  legionary 
  centurions
  received more generous
  sums than the common
  soldiers. In addition to their wages and bonuses, of course, centurions
  were known for coercing bribes from soldiers to show them favourable
  treatment (it was the centurion alone who could allocate men for harder
  or easier tasks, or recommend them for promotion to principalis). 
  This abuse was so endemic that emperors were obliged to tolerate it, and
  the granting of a donative was sometimes a tacit way of enabling the troops
  to pay off their debts.
  The loyalty and obedience of the legions depended to a significant
  extent on the loyalty of the centurions, particularly the primi ordines,
  whose influence might be crucial in times of unrest or disputed
  succession. It was one evidence of Caligula’s reckless madness that he
  apparently deprived many primi pili of their careers – on the pretence of
  age and infirmity – when they were only just short of qualifying for the
  rewards of completing their service (Suetonius, Gaius, 44). When
  Commodus advanced Pescennius Niger to the consulship ahead of
  Severus, the latter was angrily convinced that he had been denied the
  honour on the advice of the primipilares (SHA, Pesc. Nig., V, 6). 
  The literature includes many instances of centurions of the Praetorian
  Guard in Rome being recruited for conspiracies to depose emperors
  (Suet., Tib., 12; Div. Claud., 11), and when weak or unpopular emperors
  were with their armies in the field the senior legionary centurions might
  exploit their proximity to power in the same way. In a speech of 29 BC, 
  Agrippa advised Augustus to reserve for his own decision legal cases 
  that threatened centurions who were prominent in their home
  communities with disenfranchisement or death, and the right to punish
  centurions for crimes committed against civilians was also reserved to 
  the emperor. 
  16
  Portrait detail, and general view,
  of the monument to the senior
  centurion M. Caelius, who died
  in the Teutoburg Forest disaster
  of AD 9; see Plate A3 for
  reconstruction. The inscription
  (CIL 13.8648) is translated as
  follows: ‘M. Caelius, son of Titus,
  of the tribe Lemonia, from
  Bononia, centurion of Legion
  XIIX [i.e. 18 – XVIII], 53½ years
  old, fell in Varus’s war.
  Permission is granted to place
  his bones within [the
  monument]. His brother Publius
  Caelius, son of Titus, of the tribe
  Lemonia, erected this.’ 
  This gives us the centurion’s
  praenomen (Marcus, or
  Manlius?); his nomen (Caelius),
  clearly of Etruscan origin; his
  origo (Bononia, in northern Italy);
  and his gens (Lemonia). His
  bones were, of course, never
  recovered to be placed under
  the monument; at best, they 
  may have been among those
  gathered up from the site of the
  massacre and buried on the spot
  by Germanicus Caesar’s army 
  in AD 15. (Rheinisches Landes
  Museum, Bonn; detail photo
  courtesy Dr Stefano Izzo; 
  main photo Nic Fields) 
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  It was among the centurionate that emperors
  and other magnates sought trustworthy and
  ruthless men to act as their agents on delicate – or
  criminal – missions. These might involve simply
  acting as secret personal couriers or envoys
  (Herodian, Rom. Hist., VII, 6, 5; Amm. Marc.,
  XVIII, VI, 20–22). However, many centurions
  were also employed as thugs or assassins, to
  intimidate or murder personalities who were too
  prominent to attack openly (e.g., Suet., Tib., 53;
  Div. Claud., 29; SHA, Did. Jul., 5; Pesc. Nig., 2). The
  future Emperor Caracalla ordered centurions of
  the Praetorian Guard to kill his brother Geta in
  the presence of his mother (Cass. Dio, LXXVIII,
  2) – though he was not above wielding the blade
  in person, as in the case of the Praetorian Prefect,
  Plautianus (Cass. Dio, LXXVII). 
  While such involvement in the affairs of the
  powerful might bring short-term rewards it was
  obviously extremely dangerous, especially if a
  centurion chose the wrong side; but such risks
  were hardly a novelty, especially to men who were
  tough enough to have risen from the ranks. 
  SOCIAL STATUS 
  From early in the Empire a significant proportion of centurions were
  drawn from the equestrian class, and among these men Italians were the
  most prominent group. These officers already enjoyed an important
  status in Roman society. There was nothing to prevent equestrians who
  had received a direct commission into the centurionate from being
  appointed eventually to the Senate, the highest council of state (Cass.
  Dio., LII, 24) – a highly desirable goal, especially for ex-centurions of the
  Praetorian Guard living in Rome. 
  There was also a gradual increase in the proportion of more humbly-
  born men who rose from the centurionate to equestrian rank, and were
  then promoted to further posts in the civil administration. While it is
  clear that this practice went back at least to the reign of Hadrian (r. AD
  117–138), it was especially evident under Septimius Severus. Perhaps – as
  suggested by Campbell – Severus consciously planned to change the basis
  of Roman local government by appointing men with a tough military
  background to junior positions, with the intention of gradually advancing
  them further to form a new class of robust and obedient administrators.
  However, on the available evidence, in the Severan period only just over
  30 per cent of equestrian procurators with former military service were
  ex-centurions, while more than 57 per cent had held the traditional
  equestrian ranks.
  Centurions were particularly well provided for in retirement, and often
  became leading citizens in their communities. One inscription from Varia
  near Tivoli (CIL, XIV 3472) records that the retired centurion M. Helvius
  Rufus Civica paid for the building of public baths for his fellow citizens
  and travellers. Even during their regular service, centurions – like other
  17
  Trajan surrounded by his primi
  ordines, from Trajan’s Column,
  first quarter of the 2nd century
  AD. (Cast, Museo della Civiltà
  Romana; photo author’s
  collection)
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  soldiers – might be active in business: buying and selling property,
  contracting debts for investment, and lending money. The economic
  acumen of the centurions and tribunes of the Praetorian Guard even
  prompted the Emperor Caligula (r. AD 37–41) to raise new taxes 
  on them (Suet., Gaius., 40). The profession of ‘tax-farmer’ – contracted
  tax-gatherer – was often held by officers of ability and means, especially
  primipilares (CIL III. 6809). It was probably to boost economic activity in
  the territory of Antium that the Emperor Nero (r. AD 54–68) established
  a colony with veterans of the Praetorian Guard, and obliged the
  wealthiest of the chief centurions to move there (Suet., Nero, 47). 
  Religious observances
  Religion was a fundamental aspect in the life of a centurion; these officers
  played a central role in the religious life of the army, which was intimately
  linked to the concepts of hierarchy and loyalty. The various dedicatory
  inscriptions that they left during the 1st–3rd centuries AD form an
  important part of the epigraphic record; they often identify individuals
  and units, and may include dating evidence. Some 125 inscriptions by
  18
  Trajan and bodyguards, from
  Metopa X of the Adamklissi
  Monument, first quarter of the
  2nd century AD. Given his close
  proximity to the emperor, the
  man on the right, wearing the
  sword on the left side of his
  body, can perhaps be identified
  as a Praetorian centurion, or
  even as a praepositus of the
  Equites Singulares – compare
  with Plate D. (ex-Florescu;
  author’s collection)
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  centurions of the Rhine army have recently been analyzed by
  Piret; ten of these were made by primipili. 
  Such votive inscriptions generally appeal to, or record
  thanks to, the gods for favour, a success or an achievement, in
  the name of an individual or a unit. It is noteworthy that the
  centurions making these dedications were often in command
  of vexillationes – detachments serving away from their legions –
  or of auxilia; in such circumstances no more senior officer
  might be available to carry out this pious duty. Some
  inscriptions simply solicit good health for the dedicatee and
  his family; some offer thanks for divine favour in such matters
  as a journey safely completed or success in the hunt, or even
  acknowledge a divine vision experienced by an individual.
  Some record a promotion, e.g. one from Bu Njem (AE,
  1991.1620) raised by Aurelius Variscen on his appointment as
  centurion in Legio III Augusta, as requested by his vexillatio.
  During periods of intensive warfare, such as the 2nd-century
  campaigns against the Quadi and Marcomanni, centurions
  offered collective dedications to the gods, asking for divine
  protection for a whole unit; in many such cases they
  simultaneously prayed for the good health and fortune of 
  the emperor (CIL, XIII, 7996, 8203). Some specify the
  accompanying sacrificial offering; e.g., a bronze tablet found
  near Tongeren records the dedication of a spear and shield to
  the goddess Vihansa – a local Germanic deity – by Q. Catius
  Libo, a centurion of Legio III Cyrenaica (ILS 4755 = XIII
  3592). The III Cyrenaica was stationed in the East, so Libo was
  not serving locally; the most probable context is that he was a
  returning soldier fulfilling a vow made before his departure, to deposit
  his weapons at Vihansa’s shrine if he came safely home.
  Dedications were made to a very wide range of deities: to those of the
  Roman pantheon, especially Jupiter Optimus Maximus, Hercules,
  Minerva, and Juno Regina; to the Imperial cult; to local deities whose
  attributes were identified with those of Roman gods and godesses, or
  (rarely in the Rhineland) to purely Celtic deities such as ‘the Mothers’;
  to divine personifications, such as Victory; to the spirits of the place, or
  the unit (genii loci, genii centuriae); and to the standards of the legions –
  the cult of the eagle was popular among primipili. Since early in the
  Empire many centurions had also joined Oriental cults, such as those of
  Jupiter Dolichenus (typically represented in uniform – CIL, XIII, 8620),
  Mithras (CIL, XIII, 7362), and Cybele (CIL, XIII, 6292). 
  ARMS & EQUIPMENT 
  THE EARLY PRINCIPATE
  Distinctive characteristics of the centurion’s equipment throughout this
  period included the silvering of elements on his body armour, distinctive
  insignia on his helmet, greaves on his legs, the wearing of the sword on
  the left side of the body, and the vine-staff as the symbol of his rank. It is
  these details that allow us to recognize centurions on those figurative
  monuments where their rank is not indicated by inscriptions. 
  Altars were often raised to mark
  the completion of a building
  task. Soldiers of Legio VI Victrix
  carved this one at Castlecary on
  the Antonine Wall in Scotland, to
  commemorate the erection of a
  temple to Mercury.  They give
  their origins as the province 
  of Noricum (roughly, modern
  Austria), and – interestingly –
  Italy. It is estimated that by the
  mid-2nd century only about one
  per cent of legionary soldiers
  were recruited in Italy itself. 
  (Nic Fields) 
  19
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  Helmets 
  The helmet (galea) of the centurion
  had silvered insignia to allow his
  men to recognize him easily 
  in battle. Vegetius (Epit. II, 16)
  specifically 
  mentions 
  ‘iron
  helmets, but fitted with silvered
  and transverse crests, that 
  they might be more easily
  distinguished by their men’. 
  At 
  least 
  throughout 
  the 
  1st century AD, continuing 
  the tradition of the Consular
  period, the crest was usually (but
  not invariably) the crista transversa,
  i.e. it ran across the helmet from side to
  side. However, this is clearly visible on only two gravestones:
  those of T. Calidius Severus from Carnuntum, and of 
  M. Petronius Classicus Marrucinus from Poetovium (see page 8). 
  On the Arc d’Orange dating from the early Principate the centurion is
  already equipped with the new kind of helmet of Weisenau typology, but
  the horsehair crest is set front-to-back and ends in a horse-tail. The helmet
  of an unknown Augustan centurion from Este (see page 7) – which seems
  to be of Buggenum type – shows a high front-to-back crest made of ostrich-
  feathers, very similar to that represented on the Julii monument at
  Saint-Remy de Provence (see MAA 470). On a frieze representing soldiers
  of Augustan–Tiberian date from Arles a centurion marching among his
  men has a crest of plumes arranged transversally. 
  A splendid helmet recovered from Sisak in Croatia is of Weisenau type
  and has attachments for a transverse crest; this specimen is more or 
  less contemporary with the Calidius and Marrucinus gravestones, and
  presents different layers of silvering, thus confirming Vegetius’ comment.
  We can suppose that the crest-holder on such helmets was silvered or
  painted in silver colour, but even the plumes may also have been coloured
  in a similar way. However, late military treatises mention helmet crests of
  the same main colour as the shield, and this may also have applied in the
  earlier period. 
  The centurions on Trajan’s Column wear helmets apparently of
  Imperial Gallic and Imperial Italic types, but without any evident crests.
  Developments of helmets of these two typologies are also visible for
  centurions on monuments of the Antonine period, together with highly
  decorated Attic-style helmets, which seem to be particular to centurions
  of the Praetorian Guard. 
  In the Eastern provinces of the empire, centurions wore helmets
  shaped according to the Hellenic style beside more typically Roman
  types. Clear evidence is provided by the stele of Mikkales, from the end of
  the 1st century AD, on which a group of centurions are represented.
  While some wear Attic-style helmets, the centurion performing the
  military greeting has a Buggenum-type helmet typical of the Italic
  tradition. Its continued use is confirmed by a bronze specimen of 
  the same date from Bythinia, preserved in the Archaeological Museum 
  in Istanbul. 
  A helmet of Weisenau type –
  Imperial Gallic C or D, by
  Robinson’s classification – from
  Sisak, Croatia; found in the 
  Kupa river, it has been dated to
  the second quarter of the 1st
  century AD. The helmet shows
  evidence of three layers of
  decorative plating in silver and
  gilding, applied at three different
  times during its use. The small
  ring preserved on one side, and
  a corresponding hole on the
  other side where a ring has been
  lost, indicate a system for
  attaching a transverse crest.
  Both these features strongly
  suggest the richly decorated
  helmet of a centurion.
  (Archaeological Museum, 
  Zagreb; photo courtesy 
  Prof Radman-Livaja) 
  20
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  Shields 
  The centurion on the Arc d’Orange 
  has 
  a 
  half-trapezoidal 
  scutum
  of
  Augustan–Tiberian date, bearing the
  capricorn digma of Legio II Augusta
  surrounded 
  by 
  two 
  volutes. 
  The
  centurion’s shield was sometimes the same
  as that carried by his men, and the semi-
  cylindrical shield is fully attested for
  centurions in some funerary monuments,
  e.g. that of L. Blattius of Legio IIII (IV)
  Macedonica, from Fregole. However, the
  monument of a centurion or evocatus from
  Liebnitz, today in Graz Museum and
  probably dating from the 1st century AD
  or the Hadrianic period, shows the
  employment of a round clipeus, held
  internally by a single strap corresponding
  with its boss. The oval shield also used by legionary infantry is the main
  type found for centurions on monuments of Antonine date, such as the
  pedestals of the columns of Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius, among
  many other figurative sources. 
  Body armour 
  Ringmail armour is well documented for centurions of the
  Augustan–Tiberian period, that on the Arc d’Orange being the most
  striking example. This gallica has short sleeves emerging from under the
  humeralia shoulder guards; of crotch length, it is decorated with an
  appliqué Medusa mask on the breast. It shows that the Celtic fastening
  system had became the standard, with a pivoting hook attached to the
  breast and engaging with the shoulder guards. Metopa X from
  Adamklissi shows the Emperor Trajan with two soldiers clad in crotch-
  length mail armour; one of them wears the gladius slung on his left side,
  and can perhaps be identified as a primus ordo of Legio I Italica, based in
  Lower Moesia, to which the monument was probably dedicated. 
  The ‘muscled’ cuirass (lorica, thorax, statos), in both leather (corium) and
  metal (lorica ferrea) is well attested on grave stelae and other monuments.
  The well-known monument to the centurion M. Caelius of Legio XVIII,
  killed in the Teutoburg Forest disaster while serving under P. Quinctilius
  Varus in AD 9, shows (under torques, and phalerae medallions attached to
  the usual leather harness) a muscled cuirass with attached shoulder
  guards. Traces of brown colour indicating a leather corium were still visible
  when the costume historian Hottenroth copied the monument in 1888;
  the navel detail on the belly precludes the possibility that Caelius’s armour
  was painted to represent mail. The cuirass has short sleeves, to which are
  directly attached – probably by sewing – two rows of short pteryges
  (protective vertical strips) of the same brown colour. The use of a brown
  (thus probably leather) muscled cuirass with similar-coloured attached
  pteryges is further confirmed by the painting, dated to the first half of the
  1st century AD, in the Villa of Varanus at Stabiae, which shows a man
  dressed as an officer performing a ritual dance. The 1st century AD Torino
  stele also shows a centurion in such an armour, probably of leather. 
  21
  Cheek-guard of another helmet
  of Weisenau typology, found at
  Hod Hill in Dorset, England, 
  and dating from the Claudian
  invasion of AD 43; the surviving
  fragments show stylistic
  similarity with the helmet from
  Sisak. The same site yielded
  bronze scales plated with 
  white metal, recalling the 
  shape of those represented 
  on the gravestone of 
  Q. Sertorius Festus, and it can
  not be excluded that helmet and
  scales were both part of the
  armour of a centurion. This
  hypothesis was suggested by 
  the late H. Russell Robinson,
  who classified the cheek-piece
  as Imperial Gallic Type F. 
  (British Museum, photo 
  author’s collection) 
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  Shorter and more practical metal cuirasses of Hellenic style
  were also used, like that represented in the Louvre relief
  traditionally said to represent Praetorians but more probably
  legionaries of the Emperor Claudius. In this case the muscled
  armour is worn by a junior officer, distinguished by a gorgon-
  mask decoration and the fringed cinctorium; he is probably
  a centurion, by analogy with a similar short armour
  (although clearly made of leather) worn by the centurio or
  evocatus from Leibnitz preserved in the Graz Museum.
  These kinds of armour are still worn by centurions on
  Trajan’s Column. 
  The gravestone at Graz shows better details of a similar
  cuirass, with leather shoulder guards shaped like those of
  an old linen armour, again with a metal plaque centred on
  the breast representing a gorgon (gorgoneion). The short
  extensions covering the upper arm, shaped as true sleeves,
  are clearer. A reconstructed centurion in the Museo della
  Cività Romana shows such leather armour fitted with
  short sleeves that do not restrict the movement of the arm;
  it was enough to use soft leather and hardened leather for
  different parts of the same armour, and to cut a small
  opening under the armpits to allow movement, as in
  some buff-leather coats of the 17th century. These shoulder
  protections were the forerunners of the ‘spherical’ shoulder defences of
  Late Imperial muscled armours and corselets. 
  This is probably also the style of armour worn by M. Favonius Facilis,
  the centurion of Legio XX Valeria Victrix whose gravestone is in
  Colchester. H. Russell Robinson considered this armour to be mail,
  because it is constructed to fit over the shoulders and on the upper arms,
  but his reasoning – that thick leather would have prevented the man from
  raising his arm above the elbow – did not take into consideration the
  presence of the short sleeves. These are not very clearly shown on the
  unfinished tombstone, but are clearly visible on other monuments where
  the same armour is represented. A second possibility is that the armour
  was a Roman version of the Greek linothorax made with a very broad neck
  opening, which would have allowed the wearer to take the cuirass on and
  off unaided (as recently shown by the British expert model-maker
  William Brown). In such a case the layers of quilted linen were covered
  with thin layers of leather, as in the specimen from Vindonissa 
  (Brugg, Switzerland). The armour was probably worn over a subarmalis or
  ‘under-cuirass’ also made of padded linen. 
  Moreover, what was considered a broad-plated cingulum (military waist
  belt) on the Facilis monument was probably a leather reinforcement
  actually on the armour and fitted with metal appiqués, as clearly shown
  on a painting from the House of the Vetii in Pompeii; there a similar belt,
  painted red, is shown upon an identical armour, worn by a tribunus or
  centurio. This kind of belt, created in this period and attached directly to
  the armour, survived long into the Byzantine period. The armour has
  shoulder doubling, which – together with the leather belt – provided
  further layers of protection over vulnerable areas. A small miniature of a
  leather armour similar to that of Facilis is shown on a 1st-century AD
  triumphal relief associated with Legio VII Pia Fidelis from Gardun
  Relief from Augusta Taurinorum,
  Italy, representing a centurion
  with his calo or servant. The
  centurion is clad in a ‘muscled’
  armour, probably of bronze
  (statos). His servant wears the
  paenula, the typical soldier’s
  cloak of the early Empire, and
  has a military dagger hanging 
  at his right hip. (Museo
  Archeologico, Turin; author’s
  photo, courtesy of the museum) 
  22
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  (ancient Tilurium) and preserved in Split
  Museum, Croatia. The holes of the sleeves of
  the leather armour are perfectly visible, as
  are the thick pteryges at the lower edge.
  A third kind of armour worn by
  centurions was the squama (scale) cuirass. 
  In the language of the Eastern legions the
  epithet lepidotós, as applied to a thorax, was
  contrasted with the epithet folidotós (Arr.,
  Tact., 13–14); the former denotes a similarity
  to the scales of a fish, the latter to the scales
  of a snake. The resemblance to fish scales
  (squamae piscis) is shown on the bronze
  armour of the mid-1st century AD centurion
  Quintus Sertorius Festus from Verona, 
  from which Hottenroth probably copied the
  original colours. Here the scales are similar
  to feathers (plumatae) – ending in a point,
  and characterized by a raised ridge down 
  the middle. The armour has short sleeves,
  ending in two rows of overlapping scales,
  and is worn over a subarmalis with pteryges.
  The scales are attached by thongs to a
  leather backing, which gives to the whole
  body a slightly ‘anatomical’ shape when
  worn. Scales like these have been found in Nekrasovskaya Stanitsa, in a
  Sarmatian context of the 1st–2nd centuries AD; they are of different sizes,
  from 2cm (0.78in) to 6–8cm (2.36–3.14in) in length, and 2cm wide. True
  Roman specimens come from Hod Hill in Dorset, each 2.6cm (1in) long,
  and plated with white metal.
  Besides metal and leather corselets, the iconography seems to suggest
  the employment of felt armours. Such padded armour may be visible on
  the controversial gravestone of the centurion T. Calidius Severus of Legio
  XV Apollinaris, which has always been interpreted as a scale armour; but
  if it is, why are the scales cut off abruptly at the lower edge of the corselet?
  On monuments where scales are effectively represented, the last line of
  squamae overlap the visible part of the under-cuirass. Moreover, the
  surface of Severus’s armour is divided into roughly-carved squared
  rhomboids, like the typical effect of padded armours (coactilia or centones)
  made of heavy felt or wool – as shown on the earlier Arc d’Orange and
  the later sarcophagus from Split. The Calidius monument thus probably
  represents a centone, and can be inserted in the tradition of the padded
  doublets worn by centurions and decurions of the Augustan period.
  To the author’s knowledge, there are no known clear representations or
  descriptions of centurions wearing the famous lorica segmentata – but a
  strong clue is found on one little-published monument. A carved
  procession of soldiers from the Templum Gentis Flaviae (c. AD 95), whose
  fragments are shared between the Museo Nazionale Romano and Ann
  Arbor Museum in the USA, includes, among others, a man wearing an
  Attic helmet with a richly embossed frontal diadem, and a lorica segmentata
  of Corbridge type. All the soldiers are wearing the same kind of cuirass; but
  this man seems to have a staff in his right hand, and separated fragments
  23
  Tombstone portrait of a centurio
  or evocatus from Leibnitz, 1st
  century AD or Hadrianic period.
  The distinctions of the evocati
  were identical to those of the
  centurions, since they had equal
  status. Note the apparently
  leather cuirass modelled on the
  old linen type, with a gorgoneion
  on the breast, and two layers 
  of pteryges visible at the upper 
  arm above the short tunic sleeve
  and apparently integral to the
  cuirass. The inside surface of
  the round clipeus shield clearly
  shows a central grip across the
  concave boss. (Archaeological
  Museum, Graz; photo courtesy
  Dr Cesare Rusalen)
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  clearly show both segmented armour and a gladius (short sword) slung on
  the left side. The man depicted was probably a centurion, perhaps of the
  Praetorian Guard, perhaps of one of the legions that conquered Jerusalem
  in AD 70 – the Templum Gentis Flaviae was built to celebrate the glory of
  the Flavian dynasty and their victory in the Jewish War. 
  On some monuments where the segmented cuirass is represented – e.g.
  the Column of Marcus Aurelius – it is not easy to distinguish centurions
  from common soldiers. On the sarcophagus of the Portonaccio, a figure
  has been identified both by Ross Cowan and by the present author as a
  possible centurion, perhaps of a cohort of Civium Volontariorum or
  Diogmitai recruited in the Eastern provinces. He displays banded armour
  composed of two separate pieces, clearly made of leather fixed to a cloth
  backing. Perhaps this organic form of lorica segmentata was in use in the
  Eastern provinces (as seems to be attested by other monuments), and, if
  our identification is correct, that included use by centurions. 
  Greaves
  Leg armour was a constant in the equipment of centurions of the 1st and
  2nd centuries AD. Greaves of
  Greek typology with embossed
  knee-protectors are worn by the
  centurion on the Arc d’Orange,
  and are shown on a fragmentary
  monument 
  from 
  Avignon.
  Embossed greaves are visible on
  many 
  monuments 
  and
  centurions’ tombstones – e.g.
  those 
  of 
  Calidius 
  Severus,
  Sertorius Festus and Marrucinus
  – and on the Trophaeum Traiani
  at Adamklissi, whose panoply
  probably represents a Praetorian
  centurion or a primus pilus of the
  victorious Legio I Italica. A rare
  These greaves – measuring
  about 40cm (15.75in) by 15cm
  (5.9in) wide – have been dated as
  2nd century AD but are probably
  1st century. Of an early type,
  they show a stylized lion-mask
  on the knee-piece, volute
  decoration on the front, and a
  small ‘star’ low at centre front,
  just above the cut-out for the
  instep. This kind of greave is
  visible on the monuments to
  several centurions, e.g. Sertorius
  Festus at Verona and Calidius at
  Carnuntum. In the author’s view
  the decorative style and the
  fastening suggest a date before
  the end of the 1st century AD.
  (Private collection)
  Detail of the elaborately
  embossed greaves on the
  Sertorius Festus monument;
  these were probably made in 
  a springy copper alloy, then
  silvered, perhaps with gilt
  decoration. (Archaeological
  Museum, Verona: author’s photo,
  courtesy of the museum) 
  24
  (continued on page 33)
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  A
  AUGUSTAN–TIBERIAN PERIOD, 1st CENTURY BC–1st CENTURY AD
  1: L. Blattius Vetus, Legio IV Macedonica, end of 1st cent BC 
  2: Centurion of Legio II Augusta, AD 21 
  3: M. Caelius, Legio XVIII , AD 9 
  1
  2
  3
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  B
  THE JULIO-CLAUDIAN DYNASTY, AD 14–64 
  1: Q. Sertorius Festus, Legio XI Claudia Pia Fidelis 
  2: Titus Calidius Severus, Legio XV Apollinaris 
  3: M. Petronius Classicus Marrucinus, Legio VIII Augusta 
  1
  2
  3
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  C
  THE FLAVIAN DYNASTY, AD 69–96: 
  INVESTITURE OF A CENTURION
  1: Tribunus legionis
  2: Centurio
  3: Imaginarius
  4: Cornicen
  1
  2
  3
  4
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  D
  3
  4
  2
  TRAJAN’S FIRST DACIAN CAMPAIGN, AD 101–102 
  1: Emperor Trajan 
  2 & 3: Primi ordines, battle order 
  4: Centurio ordinarius of Legio IV Flavia Felix
  1
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  E
  ANTONINE AND SEVERAN PERIODS, 2nd–3rd CENTURIES AD 
  1: Centurion of VII Praetorian Cohort, c.AD 150
  2: Centurion from Philadelphia, Egypt; between AD 117 and 138
  3: Centurion of Legio II Parthica, late 2nd-early 3rd century 
  3
  2
  1
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  F
  THE ANARCHY OF THE 3rd CENTURY AD
  1: Centurio primus ordo of Legio I Italica; Abrittus, June AD 251 
  2: Centurion hunting on horseback; Mediolanum, late 3rd century AD
  3: Centurio ordinarius of Legio III Diocletiana; Thebes, late 3rd century AD 
  3
  2
  1
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  G
  THE BATTLE FOR ITALY, EARLY 4th CENTURY AD 
  1: Centurio ordinarius, army of Constantine the Great 
  2: Aurelius Vitalis, Legio IV Flavia 
  3: Aurelius Processanus, VI Praetorian Cohort 
  4: Valerius Aulucentius, Legio XI Claudia 
  3
  4
  2
  1
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  H
  WESTERN & EASTERN EMPIRES, 4th–5th CENTURIES AD
  1: Centenarius of a Legio Palatina; Rome, AD 350 
  2: Centenarius of Scholae Palatinae; Constantinople, AD 390 
  3: Centenarius of Western Roman infantry; Concordia Sagittaria, 5th century AD 
  2
  3
  1
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  specimen of a pair of centurion’s ocreae in
  silvered bronze are preserved in a private
  collection: they show on the knees embossed
  lion’s heads, similar to those visible on the
  greaves of Sertorius and Marrucinus.
  Weapons
  The 
  weapon 
  of 
  the 
  centurion 
  of 
  the
  Augustan–Tiberian period is well illustrated 
  on the Arc d’Orange; he brandishes a long
  cutting sword, similar to specimens from the 
  Late Consular period, and still fitted with a 
  bi-lenticular pommel. But a Mainz-type gladius
  already appears on fragments of a relief from
  Avignon, beside the greaves of a centurion; it
  seems be decorated with tufts on the guard and
  pommel (capulus – Suetonius, Aug., XXVI). The
  Mainz type of sword is also clearly visible on 
  the gravestone of Blattius from Este. On the
  monument to Favonius Facilis the weapon begins
  to suggest a transitional type of gladius between
  the Mainz and Pompeii typologies, like that of
  Nonienus Pudens from Strasbourg. Centurions’
  swords and scabbards were highly decorated with
  silver and bronze fittings and plates.
  On centurions’ gravestones the sword is
  invariably represented as worn on the left side of
  the body, and the dagger on the right, i.e. opposite
  to those of the ordinary milites gregarii. Practical
  reasons for an officer to wear the sword on the left
  have been suggested in a recent discussion with Dr
  Massimo Bizzarri: standing clear of the closed-up
  ranks of his men, the officer would perhaps
  benefit from a faster and easier way to draw his
  sword, which would also allow his men to see more easily orders signalled
  with his raised hand. The sword baldric (balteus) represented on the
  centurions portrayed in the Fayoum paintings are very often dyed in red or
  purple colour (fucatus), and fitted with silver and gilded bosses (cingulum
  bullatum – Varro, DLL, V, 116); many examples of the latter, representing
  Imperial heads, have been found in archaeological contexts. 
  The pilum and the hasta are also attested among the weapons 
  of centurions by gravestones and figurative monuments of the 1st and
  2nd centuries AD. 
  THE LATER EMPIRE
  Helmets
  The crista transversa of the centurion disappears from the iconography at
  the beginning of the 2nd century AD. (Nevertheless, an isolated possible
  example in a centurion’s panoply is visible on the Trophaeum Trajani
  monument erected by Constantine the Great in about AD 316.) 
  A very important specimen of late Roman helmet from the fortified
  camp at Intercisa in Hungary is furnished with a ‘blade-like’ front-to-
  Fragment of a greave, or possibly
  the lining to a greave, made 
  of leather and linen. This
  exceptional specimen, dated to
  the 1st–3rd centuries AD and
  restored by Gansser-Burckhardt,
  is a so-far-unique example of a
  greave or lining made from
  organic materials. Note the
  presence of two layers, of linen
  and leather. (Photo courtesy
  Vindonissa Museum, Brugg,
  Switzerland)
  33
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  back metal crest. If silvered, this feature may have been a prerogative of
  junior officers, or even of centenarii or centurions; this would explain
  why Vegetius in the late 4th century AD still mentions the ‘silvered’ crista
  as a traditional distinction of the centurion. 
  Between the 3rd and 4th centuries AD, centurions of the Praetorian
  Guard are represented on monuments with Pseudo-Attic helmets,
  sometimes with a crest fashioned like an eagle’s beak at the front. 
  High plumes characterized the helmets of infantry and cavalry centenarii. 
  A high-plumed crest is visible on a late-style Roman helmet carved on the
  tombstone of Klaudius (? Flavius) Ingenuus, a centenarius in the Numerus
  Equitum Catafractariorum Seniorum, from Lyon. Although this is a cavalry
  officer’s helmet, we may suppose that those of the infantry were 
  very similar. 
  Shields
  The continued use of the Imperial rectangular scutum by centurions of
  the early 3rd century AD is confirmed by the stele of a centurion with the
  A centenarius of a Legio
  Palatina, AD 320–350, in a fresco
  in the Via Latina catacomb,
  Rome. See Plate H1 for a
  reconstruction. (in situ; photo
  courtesy Pontificia Accademia)
  34
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  vitis (although with the balteus over his left shoulder ?), and a soldier with
  rectangular shield, paenula cloak and caligae sandals, now in the Istanbul
  Museum. The oval shields typical of the later 3rd and 4th centuries were
  also carried by infantry centurions and centenarii, as is visible in the Via
  Latina catacomb paintings. The centenarius of the Via Latina – Ipogeum
  of Dino Compagni – shows very clearly the leather rim of the shield and
  the central metallic boss. The late Western Roman legionaries in the
  mosaics of Santa Maria Maggiore, Rome, which date from AD 432, show
  the use of large oval scuta – forerunners of the skoutaria of the Byzantine
  period – by both milites legionarii and officers. 
  Body armour
  Modestus, author for the Emperor Tacitus in AD 275 of a small booklet
  on military terminology, uses the term bellicosa lorica for the war-armours
  and heavy body protection of the centenarii (De Voc., 9). The name is also
  used by Vegetius (I, 20; II,15,16); and both Modestus (De Voc. 11,13,19)
  and Vegetius give to the ordinarii and centuriones fighting in the front line
  the cataphracta or gravis lorica (body armour) and greaves that covered
  the soldier from head to foot. 
  The many gravestones representing centurions of the 3rd and 
  4th centuries mainly show them clad in military dress – i.e. with tunica
  militaris, sagum or fringed lacerna, and pileus – but not in armour. One very
  interesting exception was that of Aurelius Vitalis from Eporedia (Ivrea),
  which represented this centurion of the Legio IIII (IV) Flavia in full
  armour on horseback. The stele is today lost, but a unknown Renaissance
  artist reproduced the figure with the arms and armour of his own age.
  Aurelius Vitalis was therefore probably completely armoured with a
  cataphracta and ocreae, thus supporting Vegetius. The fact that an infantry
  centurion was now depicted on horseback is also interesting. 
  The centurion’s panoply on the Constantinian monument of
  Trophaeum Traiani shows a unique squama and elaborate greaves.
  Ringmail fitted with long sleeves, muscled armours, and lavishly painted
  armours in linen or leather, are all attested in artistic sources from the
  4th–5th centuries AD. 
  Weapons
  An early 3rd-century monument from Thessaloniki shows a soldier
  dressed in a paenula, and beside him a centurion with a vine-staff, both
  of them still wearing the sword on the right side of the body.
  Conversely, the gravestones of centurions of the 3rd and 4th centuries
  AD show evidence for the typical long spatha worn on the left side, 
  as also by common soldiers of that period. The scabbard of the
  centenarius in the Via Latina catacomb painting is typical of swords of
  Gundremmingen typology, and the presence of semispathae beside
  longer examples is a characteristic of the officers in the Santa Maria
  Maggiore mosaics. 
  The use of missile weapons by late Roman centurions is clearly
  mentioned by Vegetius, and iconography confirms the employment of
  javelins and hastae. The unknown centurion from Milan is represented on
  his sarcophagus hunting with a javelin-like verutum, fitted with a pyramidal
  head, while the Via Latina officer carries two javelins in addition to his
  long spatha. 
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  CLOTHING & DISTINCTIONS
  Centurions of the early Principate wore tunics and cloaks substantially
  identical to those of the common soldiers, although the colours of these
  garments were indicative of the ranks. At least the primi ordines used a
  candida vestis (pure white tunic). The description left by Tacitus (Hist., II,
  89) of Vitellius’s army entering Rome in AD 69 is clear: ‘in front of the
  eagle marched the camp prefects, the tribunes and the centurions of the
  first rank, all dressed in pure white’. White is the tunic colour of the
  centurions portrayed in the encaustic paintings from Fayoum, and in the
  19th century Hottenroth recorded the tunic on the monument to 
  M. Caelius as being white. 
  The use of the military cloak (sagum, sagulum) is attested both in
  literary and figurative sources: e.g., the centurion Cornelius, addressing
  the Senate in the name of Augustus (Suet., Aug. XXV), wore a sagulum
  under which he hid the hilt of his sword. The sagum of centurions is
  represented as fitted with tassels (tufae) on many gravestones, e.g. those
  of Favonius Facilis and Sertorius
  Festus. Its colour seems often to have
  been a medium blue – at least, that 
  is the colour copied by Hottenroth
  from Sertorius Festus’s gravestone,
  and Fayoum portraits of officers,
  identified by the sword worn on the
  left side of the body, show blue cloaks. 
  Gravestones of Late Empire date
  give us detailed representations of the
  clothing worn by centurions. Tunics
  with long, tight sleeves, close-fitting
  trousers, fringed lacernae or sagula
  cloaks are the rule from the end of the
  2nd to the 4th centuries, and colours
  are suggested by the frescoes of
  Diocletian’s period from the military
  shrine of the Luxor temple (though
  today these only survive in watercolour
  copies). The white tunics are widely
  decorated with purple stripes and
  patches – clavi, segmenta, orbiculi; the
  anaxyrida trousers are red-brown or
  ochre, while the cloaks are yellow or 
  red-brown, decorated with wide
  circular 
  orbiculi. 
  (Interestingly,
  however, one centurion is dressed in a
  black tunic.)
  The cloaks (saga, chlamyda) of late
  Roman centurions or centenarii were
  widely decorated with embroidery.
  Their lower edges were sometimes
  ornamented with fringes and wide
  purple borders, upon which were
  Statuette of a centurion, late
  2nd–early 3rd century AD. 
  This piece, 23.5cm (9.2in) high,
  shows a clean-shaven centurion
  wearing a short sleeveless tunic,
  and a short sagulum cloak
  fastened at the right shoulder 
  by a disk fibula – see Plate E3.
  Note the sword slung on his left,
  the vitis in his right hand and 
  the scroll in his left. (Private
  collection; drawing by 
  Giuseppe Rava) 
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  applied images of swastikas (tetragamma, crux gammata), often
  alternating in direction. Cloaks are invariably fastened at the right
  shoulder by a ‘crossbow’-shaped or circular brooch. Tight-fitting
  trousers are also visible in countless images of soldiers of all ranks,
  including a centurion in the Piazza Armerina mosaics. 
  Vegetius (Epitom., I, 20) wrote that ‘Until almost the present age the use
  of the Pannonian leather caps worn by our soldiers has been maintained,
  so that being constantly accustomed to having the head covered they
  might be less sensible of the weight of the helmet’. This ‘pillbox’ cap was
  also worn by centurions; on the Arch of Constantine it is visible upon the
  heads of two seated officers. Monaci identified the subjects on the arch as
  officers and soldiers of Legio V Macedonica or XIII Gemina, and of 
  XV Apollinaris, from the associated standard-bearers carrying the imagines
  of Victoria and Sol Invictus (although it is likelier that the Victoria would
  represent Legio I Minervia). Although the seated officers are not clearly
  identified as centurions, a figure on a rare fragment of a sarcophagus
  representing Constantine’s vision of the Cross wears the same uniform,
  Western Roman centurio or
  centenarius, c. AD 360, from the
  mosaic of the Great Hunt scene
  in the Villa del Tellaro at Noto,
  Sicily. This striking image of a
  centurion supervising soldiers
  hunting has recently emerged
  among the new restored mosaics
  of this magnificent villa, which
  probably belonged to someone of
  high military rank in the army of
  Julianus. Note the long staff with
  its swollen head; and also the
  hem of the sagum, decorated
  with a continuous pattern of the
  swastika motif (crux gammata,
  tetragamma) indicative of
  military rank. See also Plate H2.
  (Photo Dr Lamberto Rubini,
  courtesy Parco Archeologico
  della Villa del Tellaro) 
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  and can be identified as a centurion by his vine-staff. The same pileus cap
  is clearly worn by the centurion Flavius Augustalis from Aquileia, and by
  two centurions in the Piazza Armerina mosaics. 
  Ring-buckles on belts are visible on some 3rd-century centurions’
  funerary monuments, and disappeared slowly; they are still recognizable
  on many gravestones in the Balkans dating from the early 4th century
  and Constantine’s reign. 
  Rank symbols and decorations
  The vitis, the staff or cudgel of vine wood, was considered synonymous
  with the centurionate, and its importance is underlined by various
  authors. Thus Ovid: ‘The good general commits the vitis to one to
  command one hundred’ (Ars Amatoria, III, 527); and Juvenal (Satires, XIV,
  193) recommends the schoolboy who is unequal to the study of the law to
  ‘send in a petition for a centurion's vine-staff’. The centurion Sempronius
  Densus, who died defending the Emperor Galba sword in hand, 
  is described thus: ‘lifting up the staff with which centurions punish soldiers
  deserving of stripes, he cried out to the assailants and ordered them to
  spare the emperor’ (Plut., Galba, XXVI). The importance of this rank
  symbol was maintained through the centuries; Eusebius (VII,15,2), writing
  about the martyrdom of the Christian centurion Marinos during the reign
  of either Valerian or Gallienus (rr. 253–268), stated that ‘the vine-branch
  is a certain mark of honour among the Romans, and those who obtain it
  become, they say, centurions’.
  The vitis is attested on gravestones, monuments and mosaics from the
  1st to the 4th century; for example, on the stelae of Favonius Facilis from
  Colchester, of Aurelius Mucianus, of a centenarius from Laskarevo, of 
  a centurion and his wife from Augusta Raurica, in paintings in the military
  shrine at Luxor, and the mosaics at Tellaro and Piazza Armerina.
  Praetorians and Equites Singulares with the rank of centurion are always
  represented on their gravestones with the vitis. Its shape during the earlier
  Principate is usually that of a straight staff, slightly curved on the top. Later
  the staff acquired a mushroom-shaped head; confirmed in many artistic
  representations, this shape survived into the Byzantine period. 
  Fragment of a military cloak from
  Antinoë, Egypt, probably second
  half of 4th century AD. In 1902
  the French archaeologist Albert
  Gayet discovered the grave of a
  Roman officer; the body was
  wrapped in narrow, interlaced
  yellow and red bandages,
  according with Egyptian custom
  of the Graeco-Roman period, and
  on the outer band a black ink
  inscription partly survived. This
  gave an illegible name, followed
  by a title indicating the rank of
  centurion, and the number of a
  legion. Over the body was a
  cloak, decorated on its lower
  edge with this repeated crux
  gammata pattern recalling the
  Villa del Tellaro mosaic. Among
  various grave-goods the most
  striking discovery was the metal
  upper shaft of a vitis, with a
  pommel in the form of a bronze
  bust of Bacchus – the god of
  grapes and wine, and thus
  associated with the vine. The
  dead man was a Christian, but
  pagan items were still buried
  with him, including small
  terracotta statues of Bès-
  Hercules, and Minerva armed
  with a sword. (ex-Gayet, 1903;
  photo author’s collection) 
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  Grave stele of Aurelius Mucianus,
  a centurio deputatus of the early
  3rd century AD, perhaps from
  Nicomedia or Rodosto-Perinthos.
  Note the clear depiction of the
  vine-staff. Personally responsible
  for the training and discipline of
  the legionaries under their
  command, centurions had a well-
  deserved reputation for dealing
  out harsh punishment. In his
  Annals (I, 23), Tacitus describes 
  a mutiny during which mutineers
  ‘killed a centurion, Lucilius, to
  whom, with soldier's humour,
  they had given the nickname
  Cedo Alteram (‘Gimme Another’)
  – because when he had broken
  one vine-stick across a soldier's
  back, he would call in a loud
  voice for another... and another.’
  (Istanbul Archaeological Museum; 
  author’s photo, courtesy of 
  the museum)
  Histories of Christian military martyrs of the 3rd and 4th centuries
  mention, among others, the centurion Marcellus, who, after refusing to
  worship the imperial standards, flung away his vine-staff and sword belt.
  The military belt (cingulum, balteus) was a symbol of the armed soldier,
  and is invariably represented on the gravestones of centurions. According
  to Suetonius (Aug., XXIV), centurions who dishonoured themselves in
  battle were deprived of their sword belts. 
  Centurions proudly displayed their military decorations and gifts (dona
  militaria) over their armour. Tacitus, describing Vitellius’s triumphal entry
  into Rome, writes that ‘the other centurions, with polished arms and
  decorations gleaming, marched each with his centuria. The common
  soldiers' medals and torques were likewise bright and shining’. The
  monument to M. Caelius, set up by his brother at Xanten in Lower
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  Germany, has a carving of him in full uniform holding 
  his centurion’s staff and displaying his decorations: phalerae (large
  medallions), armillae (arm bands), and torques (stylized neck rings),
  together with the corona civica on his head. Some of these are very similar
  to an original set of dona militaria found at Lauersfort, Germany. During
  the Empire some decorations became, in time, restricted to various ranks.
  Nobody below the rank of centurion could win the gold crowns, i.e. the
  corona vallaris, corona muralis and corona aurea; chief centurions could also
  receive the silver spearhead (hasta pura). 
  The military decorations were – as in the Late Consular age – displayed
  on the centurion’s torso on a complex leather harness, and were also
  worn in battle. Many of them had been gained before the soldier was
  promoted from the ranks; for instance, the centurion Helvius Rufus
  Civica was still an ordinary miles gregarius when he saved a Roman’s life
  during the campaigns against the Berbers led by Tacfarinas in AD 18. 
  He was decorated by the Proconsul Apronius with the torques and hasta
  pura; the Emperor Tiberius added the civic crown – hence the soldier’s
  extra name, Civica (Tacitus, Ann., III, 21). 
  Centurions who were members of the equestrian or ‘knightly’ order
  had the right to wear its gold ring on their left hand (see MAA 470, page
  23, photo of Lorarius stele). Septimius Severus extended this right to the
  principales, but in his time it was no longer reserved only to the equestrian
  order. In Roman society external signs of distinction had great
  importance, and the emperor’s decision would have been greatly
  appreciated by soldiers for allowing them access to higher ranks. 
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  (Rome, 1847) 
  Roman torques decoration from
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  made from several forged and
  soldered segments, has
  terminals shaped like lions’
  heads; the diameter is 12.6cm
  (4.9in). Among the military
  distinctions for bravery awarded
  to soldiers up to and including
  the rank of centurion, these
  rings are always shown in pairs,
  clearly visible at the front of the
  shoulders – as on the Caelius
  monument, page 16. (Photo
  courtesy Hermann Historica
  International Auktion) 
  40
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  Gravestone of the centurion 
  Q. Sertorius Festus, mid-1st
  century AD. Details of his nine
  phalerae are hardly discernible
  today, but can be partly
  reconstructed with the aid of 
  a drawing made by the 19th-
  century Italian archaeologist
  dell’Orti Manara. The upper
  discs at left and right show
  eagle motifs, and between them
  is a pelta shield with five
  spreading vegetal designs. At
  centre is a gorgoneion; below
  this is a horse in right profile,
  flanked by two male faces – one
  of them bearded, and probably
  representing Neptune, tutelary
  god of the Legio XI Claudia.
  (Archaeological Museum,
  Verona; author’s photo, 
  courtesy of the museum)
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  2003)
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  Castr.), in C.M. Gilliver, ‘De munitionibus castrorum: Text and Translation’
  (JRMES, Vol. 4, 1993; 33–48) 
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  (Cambridge University Press, 2010) 
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  Tacitus, Histories (Hist.), (LCL, HUP, 1925–1931) 
  41
  © Osprey Publishing • www.ospreypublishing.com
  
  A phalera from Vindonissa, with
  a blue glass centre portraying 
  an emperor of the Julio-Claudian
  dynasty – probably Gaius
  Caligula (r. AD 37–41) or
  Claudius (r. AD 41–54).
  (Vindonissa Museum, Brugg,
  Switzerland; author’s photo,
  courtesy of the museum) 
  42
  Varro, On the Latin Language (DLL), (LCL, HUP, 1938) 
  Vegetius (Veg.), Epitoma Rei Militaris (Epit.), (Oxford, 2004) 
  Velleius Paterculus (Vell. Pat.), Compendium of Roman History (LCL, 1924)
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  (Plan)’, in Supplementary Papers of the American School of Classical Studies
  in Rome, II, 8 (1907), 1–25 
  Antonucci, C., ‘The Praetorians, the Bodyguard of the Emperor Trajan,
  2nd cent. AD’, in Ancient Warrior, 1 (1994), 3–11 
  Baehr, 
  W., 
  Centurionibus 
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  Epigraphicae
  (Berlin, 1900) 
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  the Centurionate’, in Carnuntum Jahrbuch (1963–64), 21–33
  Bishop, M.C. & J.C.N. Coulston, Roman Military Equipment from the Punic
  Wars to the Fall of Rome (London, 1993)
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  Collection (London, 1962) 
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  435–451 
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  (London & New York, 2002) 
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  locales dans le mond Hellènistiques et Romain (Rome, 2000), 339–348 
  D’Amato, R., Arms and Armour of the Imperial Roman Soldier from Marius to
  Commodus, 112 BC–AD 192 (London, 2009) 
  Dobson, B., ‘Legionary Centurion or Equestrian Officer? A Comparison
  of Pay and Prospects’, in Ancient Society, 3 (1972), 193–207 
  Dobson, B., ‘The Significance of the Centurion and Primipilis in the
  Roman Army’, in ANRW, II, 1 (1974), 392–434 
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  Kaiserzeit (Braunschweig, 1882) 
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  in Sisak in the Holdings of the Archaeological Museum in Zagreb
  (Zagreb, 2004) 
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  590–596 
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  155–169 
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  BELOW LEFT Chalcedony phalera
  representing a Bacchic figure,
  probably 3rd century AD. Small
  holes seem to be for horizontal
  and vertical attachment to the
  straps of a leather supporting
  harness. This specimen is 4.8cm
  (1.8in) high and 2.3cm (0.9in)
  thick. (Private collection, photo
  courtesy Dr Cesare Rusalen) 
  BELOW Another 3rd-century
  chalcedony phalera, this one
  representing a Eros figure.
  (Kunsthistorisches Museum,
  Vienna; photo courtesy 
  Dr Cesare Rusalen) 
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  44
  B2: Titus Calidius Severus, Legio XV Apollinaris 
  The helmet is based upon the panoply shown on his grave
  stele, and the specimen from Sisak in the Balkans that
  shows multi-layered silvering and a fitting for a transverse
  crest. The armour is usually interpreted as a squama or scale
  cuirass, but the author believes it more probably represents
  a padded armour (centone) made of organic materials –
  multi-layered felt and wool – worn over a second organic
  subarmalis. Note the human-mask knee decorations on his
  greaves, and the highly decorated elements of his horse
  harness, also copied from his gravestone. The colours are
  based upon those once visible on the stele of Silius Attonis
  of the cavalry unit Ala Picentiana. 
  PLATE COMMENTARIES
  A: THE AUGUSTAN–TIBERIAN PERIOD, 1st
  CENTURY BC–1st CENTURY AD
  A1: L. Blattius Vetus, Legio IIII (IV)
  Macedonica, end of 1st century BC 
  Blattius is reconstructed from his funerary stele from Fregole
  (Monselice). Centurions were sometimes armed with the
  same concave rectangular shield as their soldiers, here of
  curve-sided shape. He wears a transverse helmet crest of
  feather plumes; a scale cuirass complete with his harness of
  decorations; his gladius worn on his left side, greaves and
  vine-staff all attest to his rank. It is interesting that his
  gravestone shows the top of his vitis carved to the shape of
  the Egyptian lotus-flower motif; Blattius was in fact a veteran
  of Octavian’s army at the battle of Actium, and apparently
  ornamented his staff of rank to recall that service. 
  A2: Centurion of Legio II Augusta, AD 21 
  This officer of Tiberius’s reign (AD 14–37) is copied from the
  Arc d’Orange in southern France. His helmet has a front-to-
  back crest of horsehair. His ringmail lorica gallica bears a
  gorgon’s-mask motif below the fastening hook for the
  humeralia shoulder-guards, which is similar to a specimen
  from Kalkriese – where German archaeologists have
  identified one of the dispersed sites of the Teutoburg Forest
  disaster. He is armed with a gladius copied from one found
  in the River Saone. Note the capricorn shield deigmaton of
  Legio II Augusta, as visible on the Arc d’Orange; the shape
  of the shield is the same as in A1.
  A3: M. Caelius, senior centurion of Legio XIIX
  (XVIII), AD 9 
  Marcus (or Manlius) Caelius, who died in the Varus
  campaign, is reconstructed from his monument found near
  the legionary base at Xanten, Holland, and from military
  fittings found on the battlefield location at Kalkriese. The
  splendour – and therefore the expense – of the monument
  raised by this officer’s brother strongly suggests that he was,
  if not the primus pilus, then certainly one of the primi ordines
  of the First Cohort, although the damaged inscription does
  not absolutely confirm this. On his wrists, and on his leather
  lorica with attached leather pteryges, he displays his full set
  of decorations: armillae, torques, and phalerae. Note also
  the corona civica, which bore the Latin inscription ‘ob civem
  servatum’. The blue cloak follows Hottenroth’s copy of the
  Sertorius Festus monument (see B1), and darker blue cloaks
  are also shown on 2nd-century encaustic portraits, believed
  to depict centurions, from Fayoum in Egypt. 
  B: THE JULIO-CLAUDIAN DYNASTY, AD 14–64 
  B1: Q. Sertorius Festus, Legio XI Claudia Pia
  Fidelis 
  Another much-decorated centurio reconstructed mainly
  from his gravestone, which shows his dona militaria fastened
  to a leather harness worn over his squama plumata, and the
  corona civica on his head. The scales of the armour are
  copied from specimens found at Hod Hill, Dorset; identical
  to those represented on the gravestone, they are
  strengthened by a raised median rib. Note the fastening of
  the cuirass on the left side, after a suggestion by H. Russell
  Robinson. The colours of this reconstruction are based upon
  the 19th-century drawing by Hottenroth, made when traces
  of colour were still visible on the monument.
  Panoply on the tombstone of T. Calidius, a centurion of
  Legio XV Apollinaris, 1st–2nd centuries AD (see Plate B2).
  Note the armour, probably a centone made of padded,
  quilted fabric. The helmet seems to be of Weisenau
  typology, and has a transverse crest of separated elements
  – feathers? The greaves are embossed at the knee with
  human head motifs of typical Celtic pattern.
  (Kunsthistoriches Museum, Vienna; photo courtesy Dr
  Cesare Rusalen) 
  © Osprey Publishing • www.ospreypublishing.com
  
  45
  B3: Marcus Petronius Classicus Marrucinus,
  Legio VIII Augusta
  The funerary monument to this Bruttian centurio, from
  Poetovium, shows the best example of a crista transversa
  visible on Early Empire gravestones of centurions; it seems
  to be mounted with goose feathers. The gravestone also
  shows that the helmet, of Weisenau typology, was fitted
  with cheek-guards furnished with metal ears, as on the
  contemporary helmets of Weiler type. The linen and leather
  body armour (corium), fitted with painted humeralia and
  ‘belt’, has been reconstructed from a similar specimen from
  Gardun (Tilurium); imitating Greek models, it is comparable
  with that shown on the Colchester stele of the centurion
  Facilis. Its colour is copied from a painting from the House
  of the Vettii at Pompeii. Note that his phalerae have coloured
  glass centres, like a contemporary specimen from
  Vindonissa in Switzerland (see page 42). 
  C: THE FLAVIAN DYNASTY, AD 69–96:
  INVESTITURE OF A CENTURION
  This scene reconstructs an ordinatio ceremony of c. AD 78,
  during which a centurion is presented with his latia vitis and
  codicillus. Standard-bearers and trumpeters stand behind
  the foreground figures on the dais in the courtyard of a
  legionary fortress, surrounded by parading troops.
  C1: Tribunus legionis
  The officer is clad in his most splendid armour and
  accoutrements. Note the Pseudo-Corinthian helmet, from
  the specimen found at Autun; his silvered and lavishly
  decorated metal lorica, with a gilded gorgoneion breast
  ornament; his parazonium sword, and the scarlet sash (zona
  militaris) tied on the breast with the ‘Hercules knot’, a
  symbol of high authority. His decorative boots are cothurni,
  with leonine flaps. 
  C2: Centurio
  This officer is based upon a gravestone in Porta Borsari,
  Verona. The ‘muscled’ metal stadios was one of the various
  Fragments of sculpture from the Templum Gentis Flaviae, 
  c. AD 95, and probably representing a centurion. This may
  be the only clear representation of a centurion – perhaps 
  of the Emperor Domitian’s Praetorian Guard, or of a Flavian
  legion – clad in a lorica segmentata (see Plate D4). He
  wears an Attic helmet with a richly embossed frontal
  diadem, and a cuirass of the Corbridge type. Note the
  sword worn on the left side of the body, and the right 
  hand gripping a staff – with the decorated helmet, these 
  are persuasive indications of the rank of centurio. 
  (Museo Nazionale Romano, courtesy Dr Marina Mattei) 
  armours used by centurions, and is worn here over a linen
  subarmalis with decorative white and red pteryges. Note the
  rear of his greaves, and of the torso harness bearing his
  decorations. He has his sword and dagger slung on a
  balteus and a cingulum, and carries a pilum javelin. He is
  receiving his vitis from the tribune. 
  C3: Imaginarius
  The image-bearer of the legion (Veg., Ep. II, VII), who ranked
  as a principalis, is based here on the funerary monument of
  Genialis. His decorated helmet is fitted with a facial mask; to
  show this, we have here thrown back over his shoulders the
  pelt of a bear’s head and front paws that was normally worn
  over the helmet. His armour is a corium, a semi-rigid leather
  corselet with large shoulder defences; it is reconstructed
  from the fragments of leather armour found at Vindonissa.
  The imperial imago in silver and gilt is from an original in the
  Museo Nazionale in Naples. 
  C4: Cornicen
  The hornist is copied from Trajan’s Column. His helmet, too,
  is covered with an animal skin. He wears ringmail armour,
  which allowed taking a deeper breath when sounding horn
  calls; the round clipeus shield slung from his shoulder was
  less encumbering than the legionary’s scutum. 
  © Osprey Publishing • www.ospreypublishing.com
  
  46
  E2: Centurion from Philadelphia, Egypt;
  between AD 117 and 138
  Based upon an encaustic wax portrait from Fayoum. The
  pure white tunic, decorated with vertical clavi, is worn
  together with a blue sagum – apparently, the typical colours
  of centurions’ uniform, as suggested not only by the
  Fayoum portraits but also by then-surviving traces of colour
  on European monuments copied in the 19th century by
  Hottenroth. On the 2nd-century Fayoum portraits the baldric
  is often dyed red-purple (fucatus), pink-red, or dark blue,
  and decorated with alternating silver and gold bosses. Its
  position over the right shoulder, indicating that the sword
  was slung on the man’s left side, is at this date confirmation
  that the portrait depicts an officer. 
  E3: Centurion of Legio II Parthica, late 2nd-
  early 3rd century 
  This officer of the new legion raised by the Emperor
  Septimius Severus is taken from a statuette probably from
  Rome, and today in a private collection. Note the mid-length
  semispatha sword, copied from the Lauriacum specimen,
  worn slung from a broad baldric decorated with pierced
  bronze fittings; and the long rank staff, which now begins to
  have a mushroom-shaped head. The sleeveless tunic is a
  silk paragauda, decorated with clavi in purple-pink, and the
  brown woollen anaxyrides are fitted to the legs. Woollen
  udones (socks) knitted in bright colours are visible above the
  nailed calcei, which are from specimens found at Dura
  Europos. 
  D: TRAJAN’S FIRST
  DACIAN CAMPAIGN, AD
  101–102 
  D1: Emperor Trajan in full
  armour 
  The emperor (r. AD 98–117) wears
  a metal ‘muscled’ lorica, silvered,
  painted, and with gilt bronze
  appliqués, of a quality suitable for
  the divine and heroic figure of the
  optimus princeps. The armour is
  worn over a subarmalis with four
  levels 
  of 
  pteryges. 
  The
  reconstruction is taken from the
  Adamklissi 
  Monument 
  and
  Trajan’s 
  Column; 
  note 
  the
  emperor’s employment of military
  caligae sandals, and the plain
  military sagum cloak instead of
  the officer’s paludamentum. 
  D2 & D3: Primi ordines,
  battle order 
  The senior centurion holding the
  emperor’s sword and helmet (2) is
  based upon Metopa X of the
  Adamklissi Monument; note his
  crotch-length ringmail armour,
  worn over a thorax laneus and a
  padded 
  subarmalis. 
  The
  centurion at left (3) is based upon
  Trajan’s Column; he is protected
  by a short leather ‘muscled’
  cuirass of Greek typology, like
  that of the centurion from
  Liebnitz. Both these officers are wearing military cloaks and
  calf-length feminalia trousers.
  D4: Centurio ordinarius of Legio IIII (IV) Flavia
  Felix
  In a vignette typical of the savagery of the Dacian Wars, as
  confirmed by the monuments, a legionary centurion hot from
  battle offers his emperor severed Dacian heads. We base his
  appearance on the intriguing fragmentary carvings from the
  Templum Gentis Flaviae (see photos on page 45). His helmet
  is of Attic style, with a decorated ‘diadem’ plate above the
  brow, and he wears – uniquely, in the evidence discovered
  so far – the same lorica segmentata or ferrea as the
  legionaries depicted on Trajan’s Column, here of Corbridge
  style. Note the balteoli protecting the genitals, and the
  cingulum with silvered plates and buckles, copied from the
  specimens found at Tekjie.
  E: THE ANTONINE AND SEVERAN PERIODS,
  2nd–3rd CENTURIES AD 
  E1: Centurion of VII Praetorian Cohort, 
  c. AD 150
  The simple but magnificent equipment of this Praetorian
  Guard officer is taken from the base of the Column of
  Antoninus Pius (r. 138–161). It comprises an Attic-style
  helmet with rich decoration and a high ostrich-plume crest;
  a leather ‘muscled’ cuirass; and the Praetorian Guard
  pattern of oval shield decorated with volutes. 
  Roman centurion of the early
  4th century AD, in a detail of
  the mosaic from Villa del
  Casale, Piazza Armerina
  (compare with Plate G1). 
  His staff of rank has a very
  pronounced head, and his tight-
  fitting, long-sleeved tunic is
  decorated with the typical
  woven-in bands and patches of
  the period – clavi, segmenta,
  and orbiculi. There is some
  evidence that these decorations
  were sometimes removed from
  worn-out garments and
  appliquéd to new ones. Detail
  photos of a number of recovered
  examples will be found in MAA
  425, Roman Military Clothing
  (3): AD 400–640. (Author’s
  collection) 
  © Osprey Publishing • www.ospreypublishing.com
  
  47
  F: THE ANARCHY OF THE 3rd CENTURY AD
  F1: Centurio primus ordo of Legio I Italica;
  Abrittus, June AD 251 
  This reconstruction uses descriptions by Modestus and
  Vegetius, together with military finds by Bulgarian
  archaeologists on the battlefield of Abrittus, and carvings on
  the retrospective Trophaeum Traiani monument of AD 316.
  The helmet, of Heddernheim typology – see Robinson’s so-
  called ‘Auxiliary Cavalry Type E’ – has been fitted with a
  transverse crest. The scale armour is supplemented by
  shoulder pieces, and is worn over a thick, multi-layered
  subarmalis coloured red (cum purpura maura – SHA, Claud.,
  14, 8). The shield blazon is speculatively copied from that
  shown for Legio I Italica in the early 5th-century Notitia
  Dignitatum. 
  F2: Centurion hunting on horseback;
  Mediolanum, late 3rd century AD
  The centurion who figures in the carvings on the Milan
  sarcophagus is represented hunting from horseback, with a
  javelin of verutum type. Note his tunica, decorated with clavi,
  segmenta and orbiculi; the fringed lacerna cloak, the
  anaxyrides and the closed calcei. The colours of his horse
  harness are based upon the Piazza Armerina mosaics. 
  F3: Centurio ordinarius of Legio III Diocletiana;
  Thebes, late 3rd century AD 
  This centurion is represented as if offering a votive sacrifice
  to the gods. His garment colours are copied from those of
  the centurions painted on the walls of the Luxor military
  shrine, dating from Diocletian’s reign (AD 284–305). Note
  that his leather armour is made of crocodile-hide scales, of
  which specimens of at least three different types have
  survived from Roman Egypt. Later writers of military
  treatises associated the colour of the helmet crest with that
  of the main field of the shield. 
  G: THE BATTLE FOR ITALY, EARLY 4th
  CENTURY AD 
  This plate imagines an episode in AD 312 during the civil war
  between Constantine and Maxentius, when a parley was
  arranged between centurions of the opposing sides.
  G1: Centurio ordinarius, army of Constantine
  the Great 
  From the mosaics at the Villa del Casale, Piazza Armerina.
  This officer wears the pileus pannonicus typical of Late
  Roman soldiers, a tunic richly decorated with woven or
  embroidered work, tight anaxyrida and black campagi
  thonged shoes; he carries the usual centurion’s staff with a
  mushroom-shaped head. 
  G2: Aurelius Vitalis, centurio of Legio IIII (IV)
  Flavia 
  This 
  Constantinian 
  officer 
  has 
  been 
  tentatively
  reconstructed by analogy with his stele – which was lost
  after being redrawn in anachronistic armour during the 16th
  century – and by comparison with a statuette of a fully
  armoured cavalryman from Trecenta. His Pseudo-Attic
  helmet is based on one recently found at Vetren (Tegulicium),
  and he is completely protected by a plate armour
  (cataphracta) and greaves. He is armed with both hasta and
  spatha. Note his horse harness, of heavy weather-proofed
  fabric. 
  G3: Aurelius Processanus, centurio of VI
  Praetorian Cohort 
  This heavily armoured Praetorian officer is reconstructed
  following the images of Praetorians on the Arch of
  Constantine, with colours from the Piazza Armerina mosaics.
  The helmet bears some resemblance to the find from the
  River Wensum, Norfolk, which Robinson classified as a 3rd-
  century ‘Cavalry Sports Type H’. Note the Maxentian
  Praetorian vexillum in the background. 
  G4: Valerius Aulucentius, centurio of Legio XI
  Claudia 
  Again, this officer is reconstructed from his funerary stele.
  Under the heavily fringed cloak his tunic is a good deal plainer
  than that of G1, but he too carries the vitis to mark his rank.
  H: WESTERN & EASTERN EMPIRES, 4th–5th
  CENTURIES AD
  H1: Centenarius of a Legio Palatina; Rome, 
  AD 350 
  This officer is copied from the catacomb painting in the Via
  Latina. The helmet, fitted with a silvered metallic crest and a
  bronze appliqué showing the Christian chrismon, is from a
  piece once in the collection of Axel Guttman. Note the lined
  and fringed mantle; the long-sleeved mail shirt, based on the
  specimen from South Shields, England; and the old-
  fashioned 
  spatha
  with 
  the 
  scabbard 
  chape 
  of
  Gundremmingen type. Inside the shield, we follow Vegetius in
  showing short, weighted throwing darts (plumbatae); the
  officer also carries two weighted javelins, the colours of their
  painted shafts copied from the medieval miniatures in the
  Anonymus de Rebus Bellicis.
  H2: Centenarius of Scholae Palatinae;
  Constantinople, AD 390 
  A centenarius of the Palatine Guards was charged by the
  Emperor Theodosius I with the transport from Alexandria to
  the new capital of an Egyptian obelisk of the Pharaoh
  Thutmosis III, once in Karnak. When it was installed in the
  Hippodrome, its base was carved with an image of the officer
  performing his duty. The ‘pageboy bob’ hairstyle is typical of
  the Germanic bodyguards of the period, as is the tunic
  decorated with orbiculi, clavi, segmenta and tabulae; the pure
  white tunic (candida tunica) was now reserved to the Scholae
  Palatinae. His sagum is ornamented with swastikas, from the
  original specimen found in a probable centurion’s grave at
  Antinoë, Egypt – as was the metal part of his staff,
  surmounted by a bronze image of Bacchus.
  H3: Centenarius of Western Roman infantry;
  Concordia Sagittaria, 5th century AD 
  This officer is based upon the mosaics of Santa Maria
  Maggiore, one of the best sources for reconstructions of the
  late Western Roman armies. The Attic-style helmet is
  reconstructed from the mosaics and a specimen found at
  Richborough, England; its silvered crest is surmounted by
  multicoloured feathers. Note the painted cuirass of leather
  and linen, its bronze fittings taken from finds at Concordia
  Sagittaria near the Adriatic coast of NE Italy; it is worn over a
  padded thoracomacus. The semispatha and the long spatha
  are decorated in 5th-century cloisonné style, and are of
  Byzantine production. Note the combined use of campagi
  raeticulati and udones as protection for the feet. 
  © Osprey Publishing • www.ospreypublishing.com
  
  48
  INDEX
  References to illustrations are shown in bold.
  Plates are shown with page and caption
  locators in brackets.
  Adamklissi, Trophaeum Traiani monument  
  14, 18, 24, 33, 35, 46, 47
  Adventus  12–13
  Agrippa  16
  altars  19
  Antonine Wall  19
  Arc d’Orange, France  3, 4, 20, 21, 24, 33, 44
  Aurelius Mucianus  38, 39
  Aurelius Processanus  G3(31, 47)
  Aurelius Variscen  19
  Aurelius Vitalis  G2(31, 47), 35
  auxilia detached appointments  5–6
  Blattius Vetus, L.  6, 21, A1(25, 44), 33
  Caelius, Marcus (or Manlius)  16, 21, 
  A3(25, 44), 36, 39–40
  Calceus Herculis (El Kantara) fort  6
  Calidius Severus, Titus  20, 23, 24, 24, 
  B2(26, 44), 44
  Caligula, Emperor  16, 18
  Campbell, B.  10, 15–16, 17
  Caracalla  10, 13, 17
  careers  9–15; appointment  10–11; 
  progression  11–14; quasi-military duties  
  14–15, 17; selection  9; social class  14
  Catius Libo, Q.  19
  cavalry, late 4th century  8
  centenarii, 4th–5th century  H(32, 47), 34, 
  35, 37
  centuriae (self-contained sub-units)  4, 5
  centurio deputatus 39
  centurio ordinarii 5, D4(28, 46), F3(30, 47), 
  G1(31, 47)
  centurion, senior, 1st-century  16, 21
  centurions
  1st century BC  A1(25, 44)
  1st century AD  3, 6, 23, A2, A3(25, 44), B1,
  B2(26, 44), B3(26, 45), C2(27, 45)
  2nd century AD  D4(28, 46), E(29, 46); 
  late  11, 36
  3rd century AD  12, 13, 14; early  11, 
  E3(29, 46), 36; late  F(30, 47)
  4th century AD  46; early  15, G(31, 47)
  clothing  36–38; cap, ‘pill-box’ 
  (pileus Pannonicus)  15, 37, 38; cloaks  36, 
  36–37, 37, 38; tunics  36, 46
  Cocceius Superianus, Marcus  11
  cohorts, organization  4–5
  Colchester  22
  Concordia Sagittaria  47
  Constantine, Emperor  8; army  15, 
  G1, G2(31, 47)
  Cornelius  36
  cornicen (hornist)  5, C4(27, 45)
  Dacian campaign (AD 101–102)  3, D(28, 46)
  decorations  39–40; phalerae (large medallions)
  40, 41, 42; torques 40, 40
  detached postings  5–6, 7
  Dobson, B.  10, 15–16
  equestrians  11, 17
  equipment  see also clothing
  armour, body: cuirasses  21, 22, 23, 23, 45; 
  early principate  21–24; later empire  35; 
  leather  22–23, 23; padded  23, 44; 
  ringmail 21; segmented  23–24, 45
  armour, leg (greaves)  5, 9, 24, 24, 33, 
  33, 35, 44
  early principate  19–24
  helmets  7, 8, 45; early principate  20; 
  Imperial Gallic  20, 21; Imperial Italic 
  20; later empire  33–34; Weisenau 
  type 20, 20, 21, 44
  later empire  33–35
  shields  21, 34–35
  Eusebius of Caesarea  8, 11, 38
  evocati (re-enlisted soldiers with superior status)
  7, 14, 23
  Favonius Facilis, M.  22, 33, 36, 38
  Flavius Augustalis  38
  Flavius Domitianus, Titus  7
  frumentarii, centuriones (detached soldiers in 
  police or intelligence roles)  7
  Gayet, Albert  38
  gorgoneion (Medusa mask), bronze  4
  Graz Museum  21, 22, 23
  Helvius Rufus Civica, M.  17, 40
  Hod Hill, Dorset  21, 23, 44
  Hottenroth  21, 23, 36, 44, 46
  imaginarius (image-bearer)  C3(27, 45)
  inscriptions, votive  10, 18–19
  investiture  C(27, 45)
  Ipogeum of Dino Compagni  34, 35
  Josephus  4, 5, 10
  Juvenal  10, 38
  Klaudius Ingenuus  34
  language spoken  9
  legiones 4, 7–8; Legio I Italica  10, 21, 24, 
  F1(30, 47); Legio II Augusta  3, 21, 
  A2(25, 44); Legio II Parthica  E3(29, 46); 
  Legio III Augusta  19; Legio III Cyrenaica  
  12, 19; Legio IIII (IV) Flavia  G2(31, 47), 
  35; Legio IIII (IV) Macedonica  6, 21, 
  A1(25, 44); Legio V Macedonica  37; 
  Legio VI Victrix  19; Legio VII Pia Fidelis  
  22–23; Legio VIII Augusta  B3(26, 45); 
  Legio X Gemina  11; Legio XI Claudia Pia 
  Fidelis  B1(26, 44), G4(31, 47); Legio XIII 
  Gemina  37; Legio XV Apollinaris  23, 
  B2(26, 44), 37, 44; Legio XIIX (XVIII)  16, 
  A3(25, 44); Legio XX Valeria Victrix  12, 
  22; Legio Palatina  H1(32, 47), 34
  Leibnitz  21, 22, 23
  Lucilius (‘Cedo Alteram’)  39
  Lucilla, Septimia  11
  Macrinus  12, 13
  Maecenas  12
  Marcellus  39
  Maximinus Thrax  13
  Medusa mask (gorgoneion), bronze  4
  Modestus  35, 47
  native units, independent (numeri)  6
  Nero, Emperor  18
  Noto, Sicily, Villa del Tellaro mosaic  37
  Numerus Hemesenorum  6
  officer, Trajanic-period  10
  organization  4–8; auxilia detached 
  appointments  5–6; early principate  4–7; 
  later empire  7–8; legionary centurions  
  4–5; Praetorian Guard  7
  Ovid  38
  Palatine Guards  8, H2(32, 47)
  Pescennius Niger  16
  Petronius Classicus Marrucinus, Marcus  8, 9, 
  20, 24, B3(26, 45)
  Piazza Armerina: mosaics  37, 38, 47; Villa del 
  Casale  46, 47
  Plautianus  17
  Pompeii, House of the Vettii  22, 45
  Pompeius Asper, M.  12
  praefecti castrorum (camp commanders)  5, 12
  Praetorian Guard  11, 16, 17, 18, 20, 34; 
  centurio, VI Cohort  G3(31, 47); officer, VII 
  Cohort  E1(29, 46); organization  7
  primi ordines (centurions of First Cohort)  4, 
  11, 16, 17, D2, D3(28, 46), F1(30, 47)
  primipilares (‘first javelins’ – senior centurions 
  of legion)  5, 11–12, 13, 14, 15–16, 
  18, 19
  principals (‘non-commissioned officers’)  5
  rank symbols  38–39; belt  22, 39; vitis
  (vine-staff)  6, 9, 12, 13, 15, 36, 38–40, 39, 46
  religious observances  18–19, 19
  rewards  15–17
  risks  15
  Robinson, H. Russell  22, 47
  Rome: Arch of Constantine  37–38, 47; House 
  of the Vestals  7; Portonaccio  24; Santa 
  Maria Maggiore  35, 47; Trajan’s Column  
  17, 20, 22, 45, 46; Via Latina catacomb  34, 
  35, 47
  St Paul  14
  St Victor  12
  Sempronius Densus  38
  Sertorius Festus, Quintus  23, 24, 24, 
  B1(26, 44), 36, 41
  Severus, Septimius  16, 17, 40
  social status  17–19; religious observances  
  18–19
  Stabiae, Villa of Varanus  21
  Tacitus  36, 39, 39
  Templum Gentis Flaviae  23, 24, 45, 46
  Teutoburg Forest disaster (AD 9)  16, 21, 44
  Theodosius I, Emperor  47
  Trajan, Emperor  17, 18, 21, D1(28, 46); 
  bodyguards  18
  tribuni legiones (senior officers)  11–12, 
  C1(27, 45)
  urbaniciani (city guards)  7
  Valerius Aulucentius  G4(31, 47)
  Valerius Lucilianus  11
  Vegetius  9, 20, 34, 35, 36, 47
  Vespasian, Emperor  13; army  5
  vigiles (police)  7
  Vitellius’s army  36
  weapons: early principate  33; javelins (veruta)
  12, 35; later empire  35; swords (gladii)  5, 
  6, 33, 36
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  Artist’s Note
  Readers may care to note that the original paintings from which the colour
  plates in this book were prepared are available for private sale. All reproduction
  copyright whatsoever is retained by the Publishers. All enquiries should be
  addressed to:
  Giuseppe Rava, via Borgotto 17, 48018 Faenza (RA), Italy
  www.g-rava.it
  info@g-rava.it
  The Publishers regret that they can enter into no correspondence upon this
  matter
  Source abbreviations used in
  this text, additional to sources
  in Bibliography:
  AE Année épigraphique
  CIL Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum
  JRMES Journal of Roman Military Equipment Studies (UK)
  PL Patrologia Latina
  Glossary of Latin terms used in
  this text
  cataphractus: armoured soldier
  centuria: unit commanded by a centurion, 80–100 men
  cohors: cohort – one-tenth of a legion, a unit of c. 500 men; or a separate,
  non-legionary unit of either c. 500 or c. 1,000 men
  evocatus, pl. evocati: re-enlisted soldier with superior status and special duties
  frumentarius: legionary soldier detached to serve in intelligence or police role
  hastatus: a centurion in the First Cohort, third-ranking in the legion
  hastatus posterior: a centurion in the First Cohort, fifth-ranking in the legion;
  also, most junior of the six centurions in other cohorts
  imago: standard bearing the emperor’s image
  legatus: commander of a legion, and provincial governor
  legio, pl. legiones: the main Roman army formation, composed (pre-4th cent
  AD) of between 4,000 and 6,000 men
  optio, pl. optiones: a centurion’s second-in-command
  pilus prior: the senior centurion, and commander, of the Second to Tenth
  Cohorts of a legion
  praefectus castrorum: camp commander – third-ranking officer within a legion
  praefectus praetorio: commander of the Praetorian Guard
  praefectus urbanus: commander of the Urban Cohorts in Rome
  praefectus vigilum: commander of the Vigiles – a police appointment in Rome
  primi ordines: the centurions of the First Cohort of a legion
  primus pilus: ‘first javelin’ – the senior centurion of a legion, commanding the
  First Cohort; pl. primipilares, high-status class of serving and former
  holders of that appointment
  princeps: the second-ranking centurion in the legion, a centurion in the
  First Cohort
  princeps posterior: the fourth-ranking centurion in the legion, a centurion in the
  First Cohort; also, the junior of the two centurions of the centuriae of
  principes within the other cohorts
  princeps prior: the senior of the two centurions of the centuriae of principes
  within each cohort
  principalis, pl. principales: promoted soldier below the rank of centurion –
  ‘NCO’
  principia: headquarters tent/ building in a military camp/ fort
  tribuni: senior officers subordinate to the legion commander
  vitis (latia v.): vine-staff – the symbol of centurion’s rank
  First published in Great Britain in 2012 by Osprey Publishing,
  Midland House, West Way, Botley, Oxford, OX2 0PH, UK
  44-02 23rd Street, Suite 219, Long Island City, NY 11101, USA
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  © 2012 Osprey Publishing Ltd.
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  Patents Act, 1988, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
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  electrical, chemical, mechanical, optical, photocopying, recording or otherwise,
  without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. Enquiries should
  be addressed to the Publishers.
  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
  Print ISBN: 978 1 84908 795 7
  PDF ebook ISBN: 978 1 84908 796 4
  ePub ebook ISBN: 978 1 78096 039 5
  Editor: Martin Windrow
  Page layout by: Melissa Orrom Swan, Oxford
  Index by Alan Thatcher
  Typeset in Helvetica Neue and ITC New Baskerville
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  Dedication
  To the great friends who share with me every day
  my passion for the ancient world: Andrea Salimbeti,
  Luca Ferrando, Massimo Bizzarri and Vito Silvestro
  Acknowledgements
  The author wishes to express his sincere gratitude to the following friends,
  colleagues and institutions for their generous help during the preparation of
  this book, though lack of space prevents me from detailing their individual
  contributions:
  Prof Livio Zerbini, Laboratory of the Danubian Provinces, University of Ferrara;
  Dr Marina Mattei, former Director, Musei Capitolini; Dr Mojca Vomer Gojkovic,
  Provincial Museum, Ptuj, Slovenia; Dr Ashraf Nageh, Coptic Museum, Cairo,
  Egypt; Prof Ivan Radman-Livaja & Dr Ante Rendic-Miocevic, Archaeological
  Museum, Zagreb; Jacopo De Vecchi & Mons Erminio De Scalzi, Church of St
  Ambrogio, Milan; Cesare Rusalen, Legio I Italica re-enactment association &
  website Roma-Victrix.com; Hermann Historica oHG, Munich, Germany; Dr
  Elodia Bianchin, Museo Nazionale Atestino; Museo Archeologico,Verona;
  Museo Civita Romana, Rome; Museo Archeologico, Turin; Musei Vaticani, & Dr
  Barbara Mazzei, Pontificia Accademia, Vatican City; Musée Calvet, Avignon,
  France; Adamklissi Museum, Romania; British Museum, London; Vindonissa
  Museum, Brugg, Switzerland; Istanbul Archaeological Museum, Turkey; Dr
  Lamberto Rubini; Dr Stefano Izzo; Dr Nic Fields; Dr Andrea Salimbeti; Dr
  Massimo Bizzarri; and finally, a special acknowledgement to Giuseppe Rava,
  for his passionate interpretation of my instructions for the colour plates, and r
  the illustration on page 36.
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SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Osprey System/Men at Arms Series (MAA)/MAA 479 - Roman Centurions 31BC - 500AD.pdf