Romans = great warriors???

Your article is nicely expressed, Calvo. I think you will find Rome suffered more than several defeats. That is not to say their army was inferior, they just lacked manpower, suitable recruits and good leaders. As you say the morale of the ruling junta was fading away because robber barons came to power in the countryside and bands of Germanic tribes who had slipped through the decaying borders roamed about looking for la dolce vita, the good life. They didn�t want to fight anybody they just wanted to settle down with the wealth and security that Rome had always promised but never delivered.

It was not so much the barbarians that dealt the death blow but organized Christian warriors who could read and write and ready to take over the Roman administration. They admired Rome but could no longer stand the corruption. They won but were largely untrained in the affairs of Empire.

Edited by elenos - 29-Jun-2007 at 19:23

Since the crisis of the 3rd century, the Roman empire evolved towards a feudal state by all means. The classic social system based on citizenship, law, and paterfamilies had all but phased out and the powerful landlords that dominated the countryside were the predecessors to the medieval feuds. All the barbarians did was deliver a final blow to the "nominal" central authority.

I've always wondered about Rome not being built in a day, for many indications show how it was. Let me explain further,  Rome was on top of a sewer and water system, built before the first brick was laid. How can that be? This shows the original builders were working to a pre-arranged and professional plan where cost was no object and experts gave advice. This is not what Roman history tells us, of Rome rising from a group of farming villages. The building of Rome was therefore very swift, and built in day or the blink of an eye so to speak.

Originally posted by edgewaters The Roman infantry at Adrianople were run down and slaughtered by cavalry; that's not "performing very well". If they performed well, they would have won; they outnumbered their opponents two to one, and did not lack cavalry forces themselves.

as i told you it was a matter of tactics and preparation and inteligence. The romans underestimate the goths also thanks to their past victories.
And this flaws are more than enough not only to lose a battle but a entire war. As for the inf running, (first not all run) second what do you want them to do, the battle was lost....at that point everybody would run: no matter if roman, germans, greek ect.

Absolutely. But the reverse is also true, and had been from Rome's inception. Where do you think the gladius or the bossed shield or chainmail or the Roman helmet came from?

yes i know, but the barbarians rome fought at the end of the empire, was not the same kind of barbarians Marius, caesar and other fought at the beginning. The Germans, learned what the romans knew about war and they adapted it to their style (eks. Arminius served under the roman comand). Pretty much all the barbararian who crossed the rhine were already romanicised. Look at the ostrogths when they occupyed italy, it was hard to see the difference by a native italian and a goth invader only by the customs.

Yes, there was. Western Roman armies became anachronisms, as demonstrated by the Eastern empire in the Battle of Save (not to mention numerous barbarian groups).

I sincerely doubt you know what a anacronism is. WRE army was more or less the equivalent of their opponents (the link you gave me with the late romans and the goth warriror remember?) the fall of rome was not a military matter but a politcal one.

Because they didn't adapt to new fighting styles, the appearance of new threats, and a changing battlefield. Infantry itself wasn't obsolete, just the Roman infantry doctrine (in the Western Empire, anyway).

nonono, the romans adapted...they changed their army completely, so much that you could barely resemble them. But the problem with rome was mot military, but moral and economic. The reason of the fall of Rome has not to be found in the army, but by the politicians (who many times also were generals).

Gentlemen, there in a nutshell is the greatest problem Rome ever failed to face. The latifundia, the vast estates worked by armies of slaves for the profit of the few, had passed their use by date. To have lands worked by free men would have been far more efficient, but would have meant sharing the profits, something the ruling class, the central authority, could never allow.  

Even the greatness of the Roman armies could not hold back the tide of those �barbarians� who, on the whole, didn�t want to bring down the system of law and order, but were demanding a fairer share of the lands. However the land barons seized the chance to set up their own form of goovernment and took the side of the barbarians for a while at least.

Originally posted by elenos <p ="Msonormal">Gentlemen, there in a nutshell is the greatest problem <st1:City><st1:place>Rome</st1:place></st1:City> ever failed to face. The latifundia, the vast estates worked by armies of slaves for the profit of the few, had passed their use by date. To have lands worked by free men would have been far more efficient, but would have meant sharing the profits, something the ruling class, the central authority, could never allow.

Actually latifundia more or less survived on after Rome - they just evolved into manorialism.

Originally posted by Mumbloid as i told you it was a matter of tactics and preparation and inteligence.

And tactics don't reflect on the state of a military?

yes i know, but the barbarians rome fought at the end of the empire, was not the same kind of barbarians Marius, caesar and other fought at the beginning. The Germans, learned what the romans knew about war and they adapted it to their style

The Germans adapted to a Roman lifestyle - but they took remarkably little from Rome in war. It was the Romans, who adopted their equipment, not the other way around - same with tactics like the increasing reliance on heavy cavalry and skirmishers.

German forces did not fight in the style of the Romans. Command was much less centralized, which had its advantages well into the Middle Ages. If command is centralized, it is possible to control troops and execute strategies with more efficiency, but it is also a weakness - if the commander is a poor strategist or leader, for instance, but also the army is vulnerable to disruption of communications. A Germanic war-band was flexible; if they were cut off from the main host or if the leader of the host was killed, they were not thrown into the same disarray as Roman forces under the same situation.

This method of fighting was well-suited to the conflicts of the age, in which set piece battles had given way to open field battles (not unlike what happened in the 20th century).

nonono, the romans adapted...they changed their army completely, so much that you could barely resemble them.

They changed alot, yes, but their military culture simply couldn't adapt in some ways. For all the changes in equipment and strategies, they were never able to quit the notion of such strong reliance on acting according to a plan set in motion and guided by a singular leader. The army was still viewed as a machine, directed by a single man, with the men as cogs in the machine. This way of thinking about battle was not useful again until the late middle ages or early modern age, and died out once again in the trenches of WW1. Today we fight like the barbarians did - there is still a leader and a plan, but small units are flexible and capable of acting without any direction.

But the problem with rome was mot military, but moral and economic. The reason of the fall of Rome has not to be found in the army, but by the politicians (who many times also were generals).

If you choose to look at it that way - and I think it is a valid interpretation - then yes, military failure is only symptomatic, but it applies across the board - not just to Rome. When the Romans began to inflict major losses of territory on the Celts, it was the result of a warrior class softened by Roman luxuries and lifestyle and a society rendered decadent. Where Romans had once written that Celtic warriors were capable of "living on grass" in the field, and described Roman legions actually fleeing the field in fear at the mere sight of Brennus' forces at Allia, the situation was reversed in time. Tacitus writes of a battle, much later, between Agricola and some Britons:

"These are the men who last year attacked one
legion like thieves in the night—and you defeated them by raising the battle-cry. There are the greatest runaways of all ..."

Caesar wrote of a Celtic tribe dwelling on the fringes of Gaul near the Germanic frontier:

"Of all these, the Belgae are the bravest, because they are farthest from the civilisation and refinement of[our] Province, and merchants least frequently resort to them and import those things which tend to effeminate the mind"

Edited by edgewaters - 04-Jul-2007 at 21:05

Originally posted by Mumbloid ... this is partially true, but remember that before Adrianople Romans didnt have trouble dealing with German warbands. ... this...."mistake" will be repated over and over again uintil modern times (pre- and - post ww1)

Set-piece battles worked well in some periods, while the loose system of open field battles did not always work well. Alot had to do with technology, social organization, and population patterns. The barbarians faced by the Romans during their height of power, were not adapted well to *that* period - the Roman system of set-piece battles worked far better. But with changing technology and changing society, set-piece battles started to lose relevance. What good were huge formations when you had to deal with the banditry of many dozens of small fighting forces across a front that was hundreds of miles long? Relatively small tribes were able to take tribute from Rome (the notion of "mercenary" is often a fiction - it was tribute) because Rome had no other means to respond; they were infiltrated and overwhelmed.

Infliltration continued to be a succesful well into the Dark Ages. The Vikings, for instance, were masters of it - they had the mobility to strike anywhere without warning. It wasn't limited to them though. The Franks used it - that's why the Danevirke had to be built. The Saxons used it - which is why the Romans hastily constructed the Saxon Shore fortifications in England, which continued to be used after they left.

I think this is a littlebit semplicistic, there are lot of factor that goes trough, about the celts, the lack of political unity (witch was�largely used by the romans against the Celts) was�determinant.

Sure, but they hadn't always been so disunited. They were able to field quite large, and apparently somewhat organized, fighting forces under a powerful leader in earlier times - Vercingetorix was just a shadow of the kind of power that the two Brennuses must have held, a leader produced by desperation rather than will to conquer. When the Celts swept down on Italy and Greece, they found both places lacking political unity ...

Disunity was key to the success of Germanic barbarians against the Romans, as well. If the Germans were united under a single institution of some sort, a kingdom or the like, it would have been a simple matter for the Romans to engage them in a series of set-piece battles and establish dominance. Disunity did not favour the Celts because by the time of Caesar's conquest they simply weren't as warlike as they had once been - trade and particularly agriculture had improved so much for them, and that's what they were focussed on. While the Germans were composed of wandering tribes, the Celts were huddled stationary in their oppidum - it was just a matter of sieging them one by one.

No metter how many time you attack it, in the end it grounds you down to dust...so was with the romans...Hannibal won Trebbia, Lake Trasimene, Cannae....but in the end he was defeated and Hannibal could do nothing....
the roman strength was in discipline, every single barbarian fought for it's own(like the greeks before the phalanx formation)
and i never heard they were great warriors...

Tactics they learned from Brennus ...

Edited by Mumbloid - 10-Jul-2007 at 12:13