François Gauthier (University of British Columbia)
This paper wishes to reexamine the evidence concerning legions allegedly raised among non-Romans in the last decades of the Republic (the so-called legiones vernaculae). Whereas some modern historians have understood this as part of a phenomenon foreshadowing the reforms of Augustus and the formal inclusion of auxiliary forces in the Roman army, others have been more reluctant to believe the testimony of some of the literary sources.
Perhaps most famously, the creation of the Alauda legion by Caesar has most often been seen as a novelty by modern historians. According to Suetonius, this unit was formed entirely of Gauls who did not have Roman citizenship (Suet. Iul. 24.2). Most analyses have followed Suetonius and proposed that this legion endured until the late first century CE (Yoshimura, 1963-1964, Brunt 1971, Saddington 1982). However, more recent studies have challenged this traditional depiction, arguing that these soldiers should be understood as part of Caesar’s auxiliaries rather than forming a Roman-style legion (Gerardin 2009). Moreover, according to Caesar’s writings, Pompey’s lieutenants in Spain raised a legio vernacula the context of the civil war (Caes. Ciu. 2.40.4). However, François Cadiou’s detailed analysis of the evidence has shown that these soldiers may actually have been Roman citizens (Cadiou 2008).
Despite the doubts rightly expressed by Cadiou and Gerardin, it seems that certain legions were indeed raised among non-Romans or at least were open to non-Romans. Pompey himself is said to have raised large numbers of non-Romans in Greece and Macedon to fill the ranks of his legions before confronting Caesar (Caes. Ciu. 3.4.1-3). Additionally, the Celtic king Deioterianus is said to have raised two Roman style legions in the east, one of which survived into the imperial period (Cic. ad Att. 6.1.14; BAlex 39-40). An additonal legion had also been raised from Pontic recruits (BAlex. 34, 39-40), and Brutus recruited three legions made up of Macedonians in 44 before the battle of Philippi (App. BC 3.79).
The aim of this paper is to examine the evidence pertaining to legiones vernaculae in order to decipher whether their appearance represented a new trend in army recruitment, or was an isolated phenomenon. I argue that, whereas some of these units may indeed have been ill understood by sources from the imperial period, others were indeed legions of non-Romans that operated on the Roman model, contributing to integrate provincials in the military structures of the Roman army. The reason for the creation of these units was mostly due to the practical realities of civil war, at a time when the protagonists did not always have access to Italy for recruitment operations.