Legions of Rome (24 page)

In
AD
42, Claudius had only been on the throne for a little over a year when Furius Camillus Scribonianus, governor of Dalmatia, ordered the two legions of his province, the 7th and the 11th, to prepare to march on Rome to depose Claudius. Five days later, men of the 7th and 11th killed Scribonianus and the officers supporting his rebellion. In his gratitude, Claudius bestowed the titles
Claudia Pia Fidelis
on the two loyal legions: “Claudius’ Loyal and Patriotic.” Nonetheless, the authoritarian general sent to take over in Dalmatia executed the soldiers who had killed their own officers, as an example, even though they had done so in support of the emperor. The 7th Claudia Pia Fidelis was immediately transferred to Moesia.

By
AD
69, Tettius Julianus was commanding the 7th Claudia, as it was now commonly known. The governor of Moesia, taking advantage of the upheaval caused by the war of succession that year, sent a centurion to kill Julianus to settle an old personal feud. Julianus escaped to the mountains. Following the war, rivals in the Senate accused Julianus of deserting his legion when he had gone into hiding, and the House had withdrawn his praetorship. Once Vespasian arrived at Rome and learned the facts, Julianus’ rank was restored.

Meanwhile, Julianus’ legion, led in his absence by its senior tribune, swore for Vespasian in
AD
69 and fought under Vespasian’s general Primus at Bedriacum and Cremona later that year, playing a leading role in defeating the Vitellianist forces: “The fiercest struggle was maintained by the 3rd [Gallica] and 7th Legions.” [Tac.,
H
,
III
, 29] The 7th was subsequently in the army that fought its way into Rome to make Vespasian emperor.

Vespasian posted the legion back to Viminacium in Moesia (now Kostolac, in Serbia). In
AD
88–89, during Domitian’s otherwise disastrous war with the Dacians, Tettius Julianus had his opportunity to repay the faith shown in him by Domitian’s father by leading a Roman army to a bloody victory over Dacian forces at Tapae in
central Dacia. The gravestone of Tiberius Claudia Maximus (then a standard-bearer in the 7th Claudia’s mounted squadron, who was later decorated by Domitian) reveals that the legion was one of Julianus’ units in this campaign. [
AE
1969/70, 583]

On this war’s conclusion, with a treaty which strongly favored the Dacians, Domitian divided Moesia into two provinces, Upper and Lower Moesia. The 7th Claudia was stationed in Upper Moesia, the western part of the old province.

The 7th Claudia took part in Trajan’s two Dacian Wars of
AD
101–102 and 105–106 which finally conquered Decebalus and brought Dacia into the empire. From its long-term base at Viminacium, the legion would also have been involved in the grueling wars against the Germans, waged by Marcus Aurelius along the Danube, which occupied most of his reign between
AD
161 and 180.

With the surrender of Dacia by Aurelian in
AD
274, the 7th Claudia remained at Viminacium, in what became reclassified as Upper Dacia, although it was below the Danube. The legion was still based in this region at the end of the fourth century, at Cuppis. [Not. Dig.] It had apparently by that time spawned two more 7th Legions, the 7th Seniors and 7th Juniors. If they survived the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the fifth century, these units would all have been incorporated into the Byzantine army.

7TH GEMINA LEGION

LEGIO VII GEMINA

The Twinned 7th Legion

EMBLEM:

Bull.

BIRTH SIGN:

Gemini—she-wolf and twins (probably).

FOUNDATION:

Founded in AD 68 by Galba.

RECRUITMENT AREA:

Initially eastern Spain.

POSTINGS:

Rome, Carnuntum, Legio (Hispania).

BATTLE HONORS:

Second Battle of Bedriacum, AD 69.
Battle of Cremona, AD 69.
Battle of Rome, AD 69.

NOTABLE COMMANDER:

Marcus Ulpius Traianus (later Emperor Trajan).

GALBA’S SEVENTH

Formed by Galba in Spain, this unit marched to Rome to overthrow Nero, then led the way under Primus to make Vespasian emperor. It became the home legion of Spain
.

For his tilt at Nero’s throne, Sulpicius Galba raised this legion in his province of Hispania Tarraconensis, or Nearer Spain, in the summer of
AD
68. The legion apparently took the number
VII
because it was raised in the traditional Spanish recruiting grounds of the 7th Claudia Legion. Known as the 7th Hispana and 7th Galbiana, or Galba’s 7th Legion, for the next two years, the new legion escorted Galba to Rome. He then sent the unit to Carnuntum in Pannonia under the command of Marcus Antonius Primus, an ambitious general once convicted for fraud, who, after the death of both Galba and Otho, led the army of Vespasian that marched into Italy to dethrone Vitellius.

The 7th Galbiana fought alongside the 7th Claudia Legion in Primus’ army in the
AD
69 Second Battle of Bedriacum. Following that victory, the legion played a leading role in the capture of Cremona, where it “attacked the ramparts in wedge formation, endeavoring to force an entrance.” [Tac.,
H
,
III
, 29] The legion also helped take Rome and install Vespasian as emperor. It appears to have suffered heavy casualties in these battles, for in
AD
70 Vespasian combined it with another—apparently the
18th Legion, which had been reformed by Nero and had several cohorts on the Rhine at the time of the Civilis Revolt—to create the 7th Gemina Legion.

As the 7th Gemina, and at full strength, the legion returned to Carnuntum. In
AD
74, Vespasian transferred it to Spain. The base that it created in northern Spain would sponsor a civilian
vicus
, which, as the base of a legion, was called Legio; it grew into the modern city of Leon. The 7th Gemina was still there in around
AD
230 during the reign of Severus Alexander when Cassius Dio made a survey of legion dispositions.

There is no firm evidence of the legion’s existence after the third century. The Franks invaded Spain during that century, destroying Tarraco, the capital of Nearer Spain. The Notitia Dignitatum lists a prefect of the 7th Gemina Legion stationed at Leon at the end of the fourth century, yet the legion itself is listed under the command of the Master of the Military for the Orient, without a station. This and other discrepancies in the Notitia suggest that some of that document’s listings were either more notional than actual or were of an earlier date than some other listings.

8TH AUGUSTA LEGION

LEGIO VIII AUGUSTA

Augustus’ 8th Legion

ORIGIN OF TITLE:

Awarded by Augustus for meritorious service in the Cantabrian Wars.

EMBLEM:

Bull.

BIRTH SIGN:

Capricorn (probably).

FOUNDATION:

A republican legion taken over by Caesar.

RECRUITMENT AREA:

Initially Italy, later Spain.

POSTINGS:

Hispania, Poetovio, Novae, Argentoratum.

BATTLE HONORS:

Cantabrian War, 29-19 BC.
Second Battle of Bedriacum, AD 69.
Battle of Cremona, AD 69.
Battle of Rome, AD 69.

THE WORKADAY EIGHTH

Heroes in the Cantabrian and Pannonian Wars for Augustus, this legion fought for Vespasian against Vitellius and Civilis and was on the front line against the Alemanni and the Franks
.

The 8th was a hardworking legion that was reliable if unspectacular. Stemming from the republican 8th Legion which served Caesar in the Gallic War and the Civil War, the 8th saw service in Augustus’ Cantabrian Wars (as a result of which it almost certainly gained its Augusta title), then in the Pannonian War. Thereafter it was stationed at Poetovio in Pannonia until the reign of Claudius.

The discovery of an 8th Legion shield boss in an English river led some historians to postulate that the unit was involved in the invasion of Britain, but there is no evidence of this. The shield boss may have belonged to a soldier on temporary assignment to a unit in Britain, a common occurrence.

By
AD
45 the legion was based at Novae in Moesia. In
AD
69 the 8th Augusta marched for Otho, then, after his death, swore for Vespasian, and fought in the Italian battles that made him emperor. In
AD
70, it joined the army that terminated the Civilis Revolt on the Rhine, after which it was stationed at Argentoratum on the
Upper Rhine, where it served for 300 years fighting Germans, Sarmatians and Goths. By
AD
371 the legion had relocated to Zurzach in Switzerland.

The Octovani Legion shown on the Notitia Dignitatum, late in the fourth century, as one of the twelve palatine legions under the Master of Foot, may have stemmed from the 8th Augusta.