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The Lower Danube under Trajan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2012

Ronald Syme
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Extract

A papyrus in the British Museum (2851) furnishes detailed information about an auxiliary regiment in Moesia Inferior, a cohors equitata, namely Cohors I Hispanorum veterana. Conveniently known from its first editor as ‘Hunt's Pridianum’, the document has much to reveal about military life, army book-keeping—and imperial history. A revised text had long been needed. It is now to hand, with new and decisive readings, edited with exemplary care by R. O. Fink. Further, a new date appears to emerge. Not 115, but 99.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Roman Studies , Volume 49 , Issue 1-2 , November 1959 , pp. 26 - 33
Copyright
Copyright © Ronald Syme 1959. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies

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References

1 Fink, R. O., JRS XLVIII (1958), 102 ff.Google Scholar, with photograph, plate XVII. Professor Fink's photograph is now with the Papyri collection in the Ashmolean Museum.

Mr. C. H. Roberts and Dr. J. W. B. Barns devoted time and valuable help to discussing some of the readings with me. Further, and most important, on inquiry about the item ‘c[o]s’ (11, 30), Mr. T. C. Skeat and Professor E. G. Turner inspected the papyrus. They kindly permit me to cite their findings.

In this paper annotation has been kept to a strict minimum.

2 The editor makes no secret of the fragility of ‘af̣ṛ[i]c̣ạnus’ (o.c. 105). Further, Dr. Barns disbelieves in the ‘f’, entirely.

3 CIL III, 141472 = ILS 8907 (Syene).

4 CIL XVI, 44 f.

5 Pliny, Epp. II, 11, 5.

6 Mr. Roberts and Dr. Barns were not able to discover ‘c[o]s’ on the photograph. On inspection of the papyrus, Mr. Skeat and Professor Turner pronounce against ‘c[o]s’ (whether in cursive or capitals). They state, after giving reasons against each letter, that ‘the whole reading “c[o]s” appears to us definitely unlikely. It is true that the papyrus has been badly damaged at this point, and one of the horizontal fibres has come adrift, but even when all possible allowances are made we cannot bring ourselves to accept “c[o]s”.’

7 CIL XVI, 50.

8 CIL XVI, 54.

9 cf. PIR 2 H 126.

10 CIL XVI, 160

11 CIL XVI, 46 (dated May 8).

12 CIL XI, 1833; Not. Scav. 1925, 224 (Arretium); cf. Groag's remarks in PIR 2 C 732.

13 Dig. XLVIII, 5, 28, 6.

14 CIL XIII, 1809. But he might be the a studiis M. Aemilius C.f. Laetus, (CIL XIII, 1779Google Scholar = ILS 1460: Lugdunum), cf. PIR 2 A 357.

15 AE 1923, 33. Another inscription from these quarries attests the ‘singulares pedites Acili Strabonis leg. Aug.’ (CIL XIII, 7709 = ILS 3456). This Acilius Strabo has been assigned to the reign of Vespasian, cf. PIR 2 A 82, following Ritterling-Stein, Fasti des r. Deutschland unter dem Prinzipat (1932), 56 f. But he may belong about fifty years later. Observe the legate of Numidia, L. Acilius Strabo Clodius Nummus (PIR 2 A 83). This man may (or may not) be identical with C. Clodius Nummus (suff. 144), cf. JRS XLVIII (1958), 5 f.

16 Dr. Barns allows me to state that he would be prepared to read the word as ‘ịụṣti’. Mr. Skeat and Professor Turner observe ‘your conjecture “fabi-ịụṣti’ seems to us all but certain. The only doubtful letter is the “s”, which is so faint that all one can say is that there is nothing in the traces inconsistent with “s”.’

17 PIR 2 F 41.

18 Epp. VII, 2, 2.

19 JRS XLVII (1957), 131 ff. The conjecture is registered in PIR 2 H 126—where, however, the editors have opted for Moesia Superior. Their choice was presumably influenced by a belief that Sosius Senecio (cos. 99) was in Moesia Inferior c. 106.

20 CIL XVI, 50.

21 CIL XVI, 38 f.

22 CIL XVI, 47.

23 CIL XVI, 48.

24 Juvenal IV, 149.

25 FO XIX.

26 A. Stein, Die Legaten von Moesien (1940), 59 ff.

27 E. Groag, P-W III A, 1184. Accepted by Stein, o.c. 62 f.

28 ILS 1035.

29 cf. JRS XLVII (1957), 132.

30 Epp. IV, 4, 3: ‘multa beneficia in multos contulisti’. This letter was unfortunately not noticed by Stein.

31 CIL III, 12467.

32 Epp. X, 87,3.

33 Epp. X, 42, etc. For the year of his consulship, AE 1954, 223.

34 cf. Tacitus (1958), 659 f.

35 CIL III, 777.

36 CIL III, 12470.

37 CIL XVI, 44.

38 CIL XVI, 46, cf. 31 (a Pannonian diploma of 85).

39 CIL III, 141472 = ILS 8907. A diploma registers the cohort in 83 (CIL XVI, 29). For the other Egyptian evidence, C. Cichorius, P-W IV, 298; J. Lesquier, L' armée romaine d' Égypte d' Auguste à Dioclétien (1918), 88 f.

40 CIL XVI, 4; ILS 2720 (the inscr. recording the posts of Q. Attius Priscus, tr. mil. of I Adiutrix in 97). Also presumably the tile stamps at Scarbantia, Poetovio, and Carnuntum, dated to the second half of the first century by Szilágyi, J., Arch, ért.3 III (1942), 189Google Scholar.

41 CIL XVI, 54.

42 Below, p. 30.

43 cf. B. Saria, P-W III A, 47 ff.

44 Patsch, C., Wiss. Mitt. aus Bosnien und der Hercegovina VIII (1901), 163 ffGoogle Scholar.

45 AE 1956, 124 (Diana Veteranorum), with the commentary of Pflaum, H. G., Libyca III (1955), 135 ffGoogle Scholar.

46 CIL XVI, 67.

47 CIL XVI, 46.

48 Sherk, R. K., AJP LXXVIII (1957), 55 fGoogle Scholar.

49 Le Bas II, 1359, cf. the revised text of L. Robert, Les gladiateurs dans le monde grec (1940), 78 f.

50 Cited from BCH IV (1880), 103 by R. K. Sherk (o.c. 55). But his version is defective and obsolete, as is pointed out by L. Robert, Bull. ép. 1958, no. 93. He ignored the Latin text and failed to see that the document had been correctly published by Vulić, N., Spomenik LXXI (1931), 178Google Scholar, no. 468 (with photograph); Arch. Karte von Jugoslavien: Blatt Prilep— Bitolj (1937), 35. The Latin text is CIL III, 7318.

51 CIL XVI, 57; 163 (diplomata of the Dacian army, of 110). The Cohors I Hispanorum p.f. of those documents can be identified as the cohort previously in Moesia Superior c. 105 (CIL XVI, 54), without the title of honour.

52 Possibly, however, the document had been carried off to Egypt by an ex-prefect or some other official (as Professor Birley suggests to me).

53 CIL XVI, 75. For the evidence from Bretçu, see W. Wagner, Die Dislokation der r. Auxiliar-formationen in den Provinzen Noricum, Pannonien, Moesien und Dakien von Augustus bis Gallienus (1938), 150.

54 cf. W. Wagner, o.c. 146 ff. Fortunately I Flavia Hispanorum milliaria (o.c. 151 f.) is easily distinguishable. In Moesia Superior in 93 and 100 (CIL XVI, 39; 46), it wins the titles ‘Ulpia’ and ‘c.R.’ in the Second Dacian War (57; 163) and stays in Dacia.

55 CIL XVI, 54; 75.

56 CIL XVI, 57; 163 (Dacia); 159; 164 (Dacia Porolissensis).

57 cf. C. Daicoviciu's article on Porolissum, P-W XXII, 267.

58 Ptolemy III, 10, 6.

59 cf. most conveniently, Vulpe, R., Rev. arch.5 XXXIV (1931), 237 ffGoogle Scholar.

60 For some hesitations, E. Polaschek, P-W XX, 1723.

61 C. Patsch, P-W III, 1070. For the presumed site (Stolniceni) see D. Tudor, Oltenia Romana (1958), 47.

62 Eutropius VIII, 6, 2.

63 cf. arguments adduced in Laureae Aquincenses I (1938), 284; JRS XXXVI (1946), 164.

64 cf. CAH XI (1936), 185 f.

65 E. Ritterling, P-W XII, 1574. Add the dedication of A.D. 42, AE 1957, 286. The gravestone of a soldier, early and lacking cognomen, published as AE 1957, 298, was discovered in 1906 and is on record as CIL III, 14492.

66 Tacitus, , Hist. III, 10Google Scholar, 1, cf. 9, 2.

67 Hist. I, 79, 1.

68 Pârvan, V., Riv. fil. LII (1924), 324Google Scholar.

69 E. Ritterling, P-W XII, 1697 f. The earliest document is AE 1936, 14, during the governorship of Q. Pompeius Falco (? 115–8). The legion may have been for a short time at Oescus (cf. AE 1935, 78), as suggested by Gerov, B., Rev. phil. LXXVI (1950), 146Google Scholar.

70 For its sojourn at Brigetio, Szilágyi, J., Acta Arch. Ac. Sc. Hung. II (1952), 201 fGoogle Scholar.

71 Patsch, C., Wiener Ak., phil.-hist. K.l., Sitzungsberichte 217, 1 (1937), 3Google Scholar; 47. He suggests that V Alaudae (destroyed c. 86) was there replaced by IV Flavia.

72 For the establishment in Dacia from Trajan to M. Aurelius, see Forni, G., Athenaeum, NS XXXVI (1958), 193 ffGoogle Scholar.

73 Dio LXVIII, 9, 5: καὶ τῆς χώρας τῆς ἑαλωκυίας ἀποστῆναι.

74 cf. Longden, R. P., CAH XI (1936), 229Google Scholar.

75 Dio LXVIII, 12, 1. Cf. Fronto, p. 217 N = Haines II, p. 214: ‘in Dacia captus vir consularis’. Possibly therefore Cn. Pompeius Longinus (suff. 90), cf. Tacitus (1958), 52; 647.

76 Dio LXVIII, 12, 2: τήν τε χώραν μέχρι τοῦ Ἴστρου κομίσασθοι καὶ τὰ χρήματα, ὅσα ἐς τὸν πόλεμον ἐδεδαπανήκει ἀπολαβεῖν.

77 Dio LXVIII, 10, 3.

78 As concerns the item ‘[f]ạustino’, it will be recalled that A. Caecilius Faustinus was in fact the predecessor of L. Fabius Justus as governor of Moesia Inferior, and might have left before the month of May, 105 (above p. 28).