No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
A note on the promotion of the centurions
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 September 2012
Extract
When the cohort took the place of the maniple as the tactical unit of the Roman army, the legion was divided into ten cohorts, each of which contained six centuries. Each century was commanded by a centurion, and these officers were classified as pili, principes and hastati in such a way that there were two centurions of each grade, distinguished as prior and posterior, in each cohort. These names originally referred to the three lines of maniples in the acies, and their retention as titles for the centurions, when their former significance had become obsolete, suggests that it was a convenient way of denoting seniority. It is of interest to try and discover on what principle promotions were made.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © H. M. D. Parker 1926. Exclusive Licence to Publish: The Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies
References
page 45 note 1 In this section I have in the main followed von Domaszewski, Die Rangordnung, 91 ff. and Mommsen, , Eph. Epigr. iv, 226Google Scholar. Other theories are conveniently collected in Rice Holmes, Conquest of Gaul (Ed. 2), p. 567–579.
page 45 note 2 De Bell. Gall., i, 41.
page 45 note 3 Ibid., v. 28.
page 45 note 4 De Bell. Civ., iii, 53.
page 46 note 1 De Bell. Gall., vi. 40.
page 47 note 1 Primus pilus posterior is never found.
page 48 note 1 Veg. ii. 8.
page 51 note 1 Even in ‘normal’ cases a centurion who started in the posterior grade of a rank (e.g. x hastatus posterior) might after a promotion find himself in the prior grade (e.g. ix hastatus prior). This, I believe, happened to Vitalis on one occasion.
page 51 note 2 Hist. iii, 22: So too Rice Holmes Conquest of Gaul, p. 567.
page 51 note 3 e.g. De Bell. Gall., ii, 26.