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· Introduction to Legion: life in the Roman army British Museum Exhibition
0:04 · Legion is an exhibition unique in its scope.
0:08 · We follow the journey of one Roman citizen
0:10 · in his quest to become a legionary
0:12 · and belong to one of the world's most infamous fighting forces.
0:16 · Claudius Terentianus
0:17 · was a Roman soldier in the beginning of the second century.
0:21 · The surviving letters he sent home
0:22 · are as enlightening as they are rare.
0:25 · In Roman history, we have a tendency to focus on the aristocracy,
0:28 · the important people and the world changing events
0:31 · But in Legion, we illuminate the day to day
0:33 · experiences of the soldiers and those around them.
0:38 · The life of a Roman soldier wasn’t easy,
0:40 · full of violence and hardship
0:42 · and death from battle or disease was likely
0:45 · But the rewards of that service were potentially life changing.
0:50 · So, what did it take to
0:51 · become part of the Roman army?
1:05 · I beg you, father.
1:07 · If it meets with your approval to send me from there
1:09 · military sandals and a pair of felt socks.
1:13 · I was ordered to take the oath.
· How to join the Roman Army
1:17 · So you want to join the Roman army, but would you be able to get in?
1:21 · Not everyone could join the Roman army.
1:23 · The first perhaps simplest requirement was height.
1:26 · and it was five foot ten in Roman feet.
1:28 · This is slightly different to what it is today,
1:30 · but it would have been about 172cm.
1:33 · You had to be under the age of 35.
1:35 · However, as long as you met the height requirement,
1:37 · you could be as young as, say, 13 and still join the Roman army.
1:41 · As well as these two requirements, you also needed a good letter of recommendation.
1:45 · Now, this would be a letter from someone
1:46 · recommending you to a position in the Roman army.
1:50 · This is one of the Vindolanda tablets, and it's actually a letter of recommendation.
1:53 · It's a letter written by a man named Karus to Flavius Cerialis
1:56 · The commander at Vindolanda,
1:58 · and he's recommending a soldier for a position
2:01 · at Carlisle.
2:03 · The Roman army needed to know that their recruits
2:05 · and future soldiers were up to the task, and letters of recommendation
2:08 · were really great way of ensuring that this would happen.
2:11 · Now, Terentianus, as a Roman citizen
2:14 · expected to join the elite legions, that's certainly what he wanted.
2:17 · But he fell short with his letter of recommendation.
2:19 · He couldn't get a good enough one.
2:21 · Instead, he got a letter written by a couple of his friends
2:23 · that got him into the auxiliary marines.
2:25 · Not exactly what he wanted.
2:27 · Hopeful Roman soldiers would start
· Roman Military Training
2:28 · as recruits wouldn't become immediate soldiers.
2:31 · They had to go through quite grueling training.
2:33 · Objects like these would have been used in that training
2:36 · a wooden target in the shape of an individual, a person,
2:39 · and this wooden sword you can see, perhaps on the surface of this target,
2:43 · also the damage that might have been caused by practice swords.
2:47 · This skull comes from the
2:48 · fort at Vindolanda and it's probably used as target practice.
2:52 · If you look closely, the holes are square in shape.
2:55 · This matches the bolts used in Roman bolts shooters.
· Roman Military Oath Sacramentum
2:58 · This coin shows us
2:59 · the moment of a Roman soldier taking his oath or the sacramentum
3:02 · as it was called.
3:03 · We don't know much about the Roman military oath.
3:05 · This is one of the very few depictions we have of it.
3:08 · It shows two soldiers
3:10 · with one recruit kneeling in the middle.
3:12 · The recruit has a piglet, and the two soldiers have their swords on it.
3:16 · This piglet may have been sacrificed during the taking of the oath.
3:20 · At this point, you're swearing yourself to the army.
3:23 · Now, even if you're a citizen protected by Roman law
3:26 · in this moment, you're swearing away those rights
3:29 · which means that were you to desert
3:31 · or somehow fail in your obligations,
3:34 · they would have the right to punish you as they saw fit.
3:36 · This is a really significant moment in every soldier's life
3:39 · and Terentianus writes about it,
3:41 · and when he does, he says he was ordered to take the oath.
3:47 · Both Kalabel and Deipistus
3:48 · have enlisted in the Augustan fleet of Alexandria.
3:52 · No one has reckoned up the chances of their lives.
3:55 · I went by boat,
3:56 · and with their help, I enlisted in the fleet.
3:58 · Lest I seem to you to wander like a fugitive,
· Positions in the Roman Army
4:01 · lured on by bitter hope.
4:05 · So now you're in the Army.
4:06 · But where do you fit in?
4:08 · If you were a Roman citizen,
4:10 · you'd normally want to join the Roman legions.
4:12 · Better pay, better conditions.
4:15 · However, if you were a non Roman citizen,
4:18 · you still had the option of joining the auxiliary support services.
4:21 · One of these auxiliary units was the Roman marines,
4:25 · and this is the one that Terentianus joined.
4:27 · While he was marine Terentianus hated it.
4:30 · At one point he rails,
4:31 · “They paid no more attention to me than a sponge on a stick.”
4:34 · The Roman form of toilet paper.
4:36 · He has his equipment nicked by his own officers. While he's in sickbay,
4:40 · he then has his bedding stolen. A miserable time all round.
4:44 · Claudius Terentianus
4:45 · could read and write.
4:46 · This is a rare skill in antiquity.
4:49 · With the ability to read and write,
4:50 · you could read and write orders
4:52 · and this was the key to getting promoted
4:54 · roles in the Roman army.
4:56 · A good promoted rule might be the standard bearer.
4:59 · This was a man on double the pay of an ordinary soldier.
5:03 · This tombstone shows Imaginifer,
5:06 · He holds the imago, the image of a bust of the Emperor.
5:09 · In his other hand, you can see he has a scroll.
5:12 · He's telling us he can read and write
5:14 · an important function of promoted men.
5:17 · Standard bearers held the standards of either the regiment
5:20 · or the particular century to which they belonged.
5:23 · You had to lead from the front, so you had to be brave.
5:26 · You had to be able to read and write,
5:28 · of course, as all promoted men did,
5:30 · but you also had to be numerate because, Roman, standard bearers,
5:34 · kept the pay and the accounts for their men.
5:37 · The top position
5:38 · for a commoner would be the role of centurion,
5:41 · commander of a century.
5:43 · We have one example of a centurion
5:45 · who managed to become a centurion
5:48 · by vote of the legion, from being a standard bearer.
5:51 · He must have been able to show his bravery in the face of battle.
5:55 · It was a position of high responsibility and power.
5:58 · Centurions were paid to start with 15 times
6:01 · the wages of an ordinary soldier.
6:03 · He was very valued in the Roman army.
6:07 · One role that would
6:08 · tempt even legionaries was the role of cavalry.
6:11 · The cavalry was one of the most glamorous roles in the Roman army,
6:15 · and the chance to show off came with the cavalry sports,
6:18 · a very specialist form of cavalry parade.
6:22 · It included standards like this unique survival,
6:25 · the Draco of Koblenz,
6:27 · this draco comes from the fortress of Niederbieber
6:30 · on the Rhineland frontier.
6:31 · It dates to the late second century or early third century A.D.
6:35 · it's the only one that's ever been found.
6:38 · The draco would be mounted on a pole
6:40 · the head's hollow, so it would make a whistling sound
6:43 · as the rider rode along. It was attached to a windsock
6:46 · that billowed out like a fearsome tail.
6:48 · Originally gilded,
6:50 · this is a unique example surviving from the Rhineland.
6:53 · The draco standard, interestingly, was adopted
6:55 · from Rome’s enemies, the Sarmatians,
6:57 · it’s very much emblematic of the Roman practice of incorporating
7:02 · the ideas, the symbols of the enemy and making them their own.
7:10 · I ask and beg you, father,
7:12 · to send to me a battle sword,
7:14 · a pickaxe, a grappling iron,
7:16 · two of the best spears attainable,
7:18 · a cloak of beaverskin and a girdled tunic,
· Roman Army Equipment
7:21 · together with my trousers,
7:22 · so that I may have them.
7:24 · I wore out my tunic before I entered the service,
7:27 · and my trousers were laid away new.
7:32 · Okay so you found your place in the army,
7:34 · how do you get your equipment?
7:36 · There were three ways to get your equipment.
7:39 · The easiest way that Terentianus found was to request
7:41 · it from home, he was, after all, from a military family.
7:44 · Otherwise, soldiers would have to purchase their equipment from the armorer,
7:49 · but at the end of service, they could sell it back and recoup their deposit,
7:52 · so there was also a very strong second hand market,
7:55 · and we have helmets that have not just
7:57 · one or two owners names inscribed on them,
7:59 · but three, even four, suggesting
8:02 · a very lengthy period of service.
8:04 · This example shows, what a legionary might have looked like
8:08 · towards the end of the second century.
8:10 · He has a cuirass, a segmental cuirass.
8:13 · He also has protection extended to the sword arm.
8:17 · A manica or armored sleeve.
8:18 · It looks very gladiatorial.
8:20 · In fact, it probably is borrowed from gladiator equipment.
8:23 · The helmet is still gleaming from the Rhine,
8:27 · and it's got extra strips on the bowl of the helmet
8:30 · and a very wide neck guard.
8:33 · Typical equipment for a legionary
8:35 · is this pilum or armor piercing javelin,
8:38 · it would be thrown at the enemy,
8:40 · hopefully piercing the shield
8:42 · and reaching the defender behind it.
8:45 · He's shown with, a very late period gladius short sword.
8:49 · This is a particular type known as a ring pommel sword
8:52 · and it's virtually the last era when legionaries carried short swords.
8:57 · The other piece of equipment vital
8:58 · for heavy infantry legionaries was the scutum
· Only Surviving Roman Shield Scutum
9:01 · or long shield.
9:03 · This one in particular
9:05 · is the only surviving example.
9:07 · It comes from the eastern city of Dura-Europos
9:10 · on the Euphrates frontier, and it's been preserved
9:13 · by the dry environments of the Syrian desert.
9:16 · The main feature you can see is the
9:18 · wonderful painted decoration.
9:20 · This is painted on leather, on top of plywood
9:23 · with a bronze binding.
9:26 · Images include Victories,
9:28 · a Roman eagle and probably
9:30 · a regimental symbol of a lion.
9:32 · In the corners are four swastikas.
9:34 · In antiquity, this was simply a symbol of good luck.
9:38 · Conservators preserved it,
9:39 · trying to maintain as much as possible of the painted surface.
9:42 · So it is slightly more curled than it would have been in real life.
9:46 · Also, it must have been a spare part.
9:48 · It lacks the nail holes needed for the boss,
9:51 · the metal plate that would protected the hand
9:54 · that gripped the shield in the middle.
9:57 · The boss next to it was found in the Tyne
10:00 · it's from the second century AD,
10:01 · and it belongs to a soldier called Juvitatus.
10:05 · The boss protects the hand holding the shield,
10:07 · but it could be used as a kind of punch in its own offensive way.
10:12 · We're extremely fortunate in
10:14 · this exhibition to have what is the finest preserved
· Roman Legionary Army Cuirass
10:18 · and the earliest example of a Roman legionary’s
10:21 · body armor or cuirass.
10:23 · This example turned up in excavation
10:26 · on the battlefield in 2014.
10:29 · After four years of conservation,
10:31 · it's been returned to absolutely stunning condition.
10:35 · It's so well preserved
10:36 · you can see that some of the buckles have been opened.
10:38 · Chemical analysis of the soil
10:40 · inside the cuirass suggests
10:43 · somebody died inside and perhaps,
10:46 · these buckles have been opened to plunge in the final knife blow.
10:51 · This object reminds us
10:52 · of the hazards of being a Roman soldier.
10:54 · The risk of violence combined with disease
10:58 · and illness made life as Roman soldier a very risky one.
11:01 · In A.D. 115, Terentianus himself faced a revolt of his own.
11:06 · The Jewish diaspora revolt, which spreads to Alexandria,
11:10 · and he talks about putting down the anarchy
11:12 · and the uproar of the city.
11:14 · He himself was wounded.
11:18 · He sent me word about a woman.
11:20 · With my consent, he was buying one for me. As far back as two years ago,
11:24 · I would have taken a woman into my house,
11:26 · but I did not permit myself,
11:28 · nor do I permit myself to take anyone without your approval.
11:32 · If you remain steadfast in refusal the rest of your life,
· Life in a Roman Fort
11:35 · I shall do without my woman.
11:37 · If not, the woman whom you approve,
11:40 · is also the one whom I also want.
11:44 · Now as a Roman soldier,
11:45 · if you've survived battle how might your downtime look?
11:48 · Not every soldier would have faced the dangers of battle.
11:50 · But almost all soldiers would have known the day to day
11:53 · life of living in a Roman fort.
11:55 · Roman forts were like miniature towns
11:57 · built for Roman soldiers to live in.
11:59 · They were permanent structures built in areas
12:01 · where the Romans felt they needed to maintain a presence.
12:05 · Military communities weren't just made up of Roman soldiers.
12:07 · The soldiers themselves had families, wives and children.
12:11 · Roman soldiers weren't officially
12:12 · allowed to marry unless they were officers or held certain positions.
12:16 · But we know that they did.
12:17 · They had women who they considered their wives
12:19 · and wrote to their families, referring to them as their wives
12:22 · and they had children who they wanted to provide for.
12:24 · Now Terentianus writes home asking for permission to buy a woman.
12:28 · This would be a concubine,
12:30 · and so he needs permission to bring a woman into his household.
12:33 · One of the most famous women from a military community in Britain is Regina.
12:37 · This is her tombstone erected by her husband,
12:40 · a man named Barates, who was a Roman soldier.
12:43 · Now, Regina's story is a little bit more complicated than that
12:46 · she was his wife.
12:46 · She was actually initially his concubine, which is to say, an enslaved woman.
12:51 · Eventually he freed her and married her.
12:54 · We don't know the context for that, and we don't know
12:56 · how much choice she will have had in that decision.
12:58 · but it gives us an interesting insight into the dynamic of their relationship.
13:02 · It's an incredibly elaborate tombstone, and Regina
13:05 · is shown as a very elegant, very Roman woman. But one of the more interesting
13:09 · aspects of this tombstone is the inscriptions at the bottom.
13:12 · Inside a square, as you'd expect,
13:14 · is an inscription written in Latin.
13:17 · But beneath it, is the added inscription in Aramaic.
13:20 · The original language of her husband, Barates.
13:23 · A final lament for his wife
13:25 · that says Regina, the freed women of Barates, alas.
13:29 · Soldiers were recruited from
13:31 · many different areas of the Roman Empire,
13:33 · So many of them would have been bilingual, and we expect that
13:35 · probably their children will have been bilingual too.
13:37 · Terentianus himself writes in both Latin and Ancient Greek,
13:41 · a common language spoken in Egypt.
13:44 · Forts were also places where soldiers spent
13:46 · a lot of their free time, and they loved playing games.
13:50 · This extraordinary object is a bronze dice tower.
13:53 · Now, this was used for rolling dice.
13:55 · You drop the dice at the top of the tower
13:58 · and there are some levels inside the tower that would force the dice to roll.
14:01 · This was fun for when you're just rolling dice,
14:03 · but it's actually a very useful device as well
14:06 · because it's an anti cheating device
14:08 · now we know that the Romans loved to play games and they loved to gamble,
14:11 · but we also know that quite a lot of cheating went on.
14:14 · We found loaded dice that almost always roll sixes.
14:17 · This device makes sure that doesn't happen.
14:20 · On the front of the dice tower, there's an inscription.
14:22 · It says PICTOS VICTOS HOSTIS DELETA
14:26 · LUDITE SECURITA
14:27 · which means: “The Picts have been defeated.
14:29 · All hostiles are vanquished.
14:30 · Now use me in safety.”
14:33 · One of the most famous Vindolanda tablets depicts
14:36 · a very ordinary moment in people's lives, which might surprise you.
14:40 · This is a birthday party invitation, and in fact,
14:42 · probably the oldest birthday party invitation in the world.
14:45 · It's an invitation from a woman named Claudia Severa,
14:47 · to her friend Lepidina.
14:49 · To celebrate her birthday on the 11th of September.
14:51 · Though most of the invitation would have been written by a scribe,
14:54 · at the end, there's a final message that's written by Claudia Severa herself.
14:58 · This makes it the oldest known
14:59 · female handwriting in Britain.
15:01 · On the invite,
15:02 · Claudia Severa writes: “I shall expect you, sister.
15:05 · Farewell, sister,
15:06 · my dearest soul, as I hope to prosper and hail.”
15:12 · Receive with my recommendation
15:14 · the discharged soldier Terentianus
15:16 · who brings you this letter.
15:18 · Let him know what sort of villagers
15:19 · we have, lest he get into trouble,
15:21 · since he is a man of means and desirous of residing there.
· Retirement from the Roman Army
15:25 · If you completed your 25 years of service,
15:28 · what awaited you as a reward at the end?
15:31 · You don't know exactly how many soldiers survived
15:33 · to the end of their service, But numbers around 50% tend to be suggested.
15:37 · Once you completed your 25 years of service, you might get something like this
15:41 · a Roman military bronze diploma.
15:43 · This was awarded to auxiliary soldiers, non-citizen soldiers
15:47 · after 25 years of service granting them their citizenship.
15:51 · This bronze diploma was awarded to an Egyptian rower
15:53 · who actually did 26 years of service.
15:56 · He's getting his citizenship on
15:58 · the 8th of September of the year AD 79, and that citizenship
16:01 · extends to his wife Tapaea and his son, Carpinius.
16:05 · Now, this reward may not look like much,
16:07 · but Roman citizenship was arguably priceless.
16:10 · It wasn't just for Marcus Papirius,
16:13 · but for his children and his children's children,
16:15 · so it ensured the future of his family,
16:17 · a future where they would get the same protections in Roman law
16:20 · as other Roman citizens.
16:22 · If you were a citizen, like Terentianus,
16:25 · you could expect a lump sum of ten years salary.
16:28 · What we might think of nowadays as a pension to live comfortably,
16:31 · perhaps buy land, retire
16:33 · with your family and have a peaceful life.
16:36 · You've done your time. You've served the army.
16:38 · This is your reward.
16:40 · This coin hoard, known as the
16:41 · Didcot hoard, is a hoard of 126 gold coins,
16:46 · which amounts to just over what a soldier
16:48 · might expect to get the ten years of salary.
16:51 · Seeing these coins brought together shows you the level of this reward
16:55 · and why it might be worthwhile
16:56 · for a soldier to risk his life for 25 years.
· What happened to Claudius Terentianus?
17:00 · Now for those of you who are eager to learn about the fate of Terentianus,
17:03 · I'm happy to tell you that we can say he does survive.
17:06 · We know this not from his own words and his letters, but ironically,
17:10 · given that he doesn't get a good enough letter of recommendation to join the Army,
17:13 · he does get a letter of recommendation as a retired veteran to rent a property,
17:17 · and it describes him as a man of means.
17:27 · Thank you for joining us
17:28 · on this tour of the Legion exhibition.
17:31 · These objects offer a small insight
17:33 · into the lives and experiences
17:35 · of serving in one of history's
17:37 · most notorious military institutions.
17:40 · We hope this has given you a better understanding of what life was really like
17:43 · in the Roman army. Although the exhibition is now over,
17:46 · if you want to learn more, the catalog is available to buy now.

Transcript
	·	Introduction to Legion: life in the Roman army British Museum Exhibition
0:04	·	Legion is an exhibition unique in its scope.
0:08	·	We follow the journey of one Roman citizen
0:10	·	in his quest to become a legionary
0:12	·	and belong to one of the world's most infamous fighting forces.
0:16	·	Claudius Terentianus
0:17	·	was a Roman soldier in the beginning of the second century.
0:21	·	The surviving letters he sent home
0:22	·	are as enlightening as they are rare.
0:25	·	In Roman history, we have a tendency to focus on the aristocracy,
0:28	·	the important people and the world changing events
0:31	·	But in Legion, we illuminate the day to day
0:33	·	experiences of the soldiers and those around them.
0:38	·	The life of a Roman soldier wasn’t easy,
0:40	·	full of violence and hardship
0:42	·	and death from battle or disease was likely
0:45	·	But the rewards of that service were potentially life changing.
0:50	·	So, what did it take to
0:51	·	become part of the Roman army?
1:05	·	I beg you, father.
1:07	·	If it meets with your approval to send me from there
1:09	·	military sandals and a pair of felt socks.
1:13	·	I was ordered to take the oath.
	·	How to join the Roman Army
1:17	·	So you want to join the Roman army, but would you be able to get in?
1:21	·	Not everyone could join the Roman army.
1:23	·	The first perhaps simplest requirement was height.
1:26	·	and it was five foot ten in Roman feet.
1:28	·	This is slightly different to what it is today,
1:30	·	but it would have been about 172cm.
1:33	·	You had to be under the age of 35.
1:35	·	However, as long as you met the height requirement,
1:37	·	you could be as young as, say, 13 and still join the Roman army.
1:41	·	As well as these two requirements, you also needed a good letter of recommendation.
1:45	·	Now, this would be a letter from someone
1:46	·	recommending you to a position in the Roman army.
1:50	·	This is one of the Vindolanda tablets, and it's actually a letter of recommendation.
1:53	·	It's a letter written by a man named Karus to Flavius Cerialis
1:56	·	The commander at Vindolanda,
1:58	·	and he's recommending a soldier for a position
2:01	·	at Carlisle.
2:03	·	The Roman army needed to know that their recruits
2:05	·	and future soldiers were up to the task, and letters of recommendation
2:08	·	were really great way of ensuring that this would happen.
2:11	·	Now, Terentianus, as a Roman citizen
2:14	·	expected to join the elite legions, that's certainly what he wanted.
2:17	·	But he fell short with his letter of recommendation.
2:19	·	He couldn't get a good enough one.
2:21	·	Instead, he got a letter written by a couple of his friends
2:23	·	that got him into the auxiliary marines.
2:25	·	Not exactly what he wanted.
2:27	·	Hopeful Roman soldiers would start
	·	Roman Military Training
2:28	·	as recruits wouldn't become immediate soldiers.
2:31	·	They had to go through quite grueling training.
2:33	·	Objects like these would have been used in that training
2:36	·	a wooden target in the shape of an individual, a person,
2:39	·	and this wooden sword you can see, perhaps on the surface of this target,
2:43	·	also the damage that might have been caused by practice swords.
2:47	·	This skull comes from the
2:48	·	fort at Vindolanda and it's probably used as target practice.
2:52	·	If you look closely, the holes are square in shape.
2:55	·	This matches the bolts used in Roman bolts shooters.
	·	Roman Military Oath Sacramentum
2:58	·	This coin shows us
2:59	·	the moment of a Roman soldier taking his oath or the sacramentum
3:02	·	as it was called.
3:03	·	We don't know much about the Roman military oath.
3:05	·	This is one of the very few depictions we have of it.
3:08	·	It shows two soldiers
3:10	·	with one recruit kneeling in the middle.
3:12	·	The recruit has a piglet, and the two soldiers have their swords on it.
3:16	·	This piglet may have been sacrificed during the taking of the oath.
3:20	·	At this point, you're swearing yourself to the army.
3:23	·	Now, even if you're a citizen protected by Roman law
3:26	·	in this moment, you're swearing away those rights
3:29	·	which means that were you to desert
3:31	·	or somehow fail in your obligations,
3:34	·	they would have the right to punish you as they saw fit.
3:36	·	This is a really significant moment in every soldier's life
3:39	·	and Terentianus writes about it,
3:41	·	and when he does, he says he was ordered to take the oath.
3:47	·	Both Kalabel and Deipistus
3:48	·	have enlisted in the Augustan fleet of Alexandria.
3:52	·	No one has reckoned up the chances of their lives.
3:55	·	I went by boat,
3:56	·	and with their help, I enlisted in the fleet.
3:58	·	Lest I seem to you to wander like a fugitive,
	·	Positions in the Roman Army
4:01	·	lured on by bitter hope.
4:05	·	So now you're in the Army.
4:06	·	But where do you fit in?
4:08	·	If you were a Roman citizen,
4:10	·	you'd normally want to join the Roman legions.
4:12	·	Better pay, better conditions.
4:15	·	However, if you were a non Roman citizen,
4:18	·	you still had the option of joining the auxiliary support services.
4:21	·	One of these auxiliary units was the Roman marines,
4:25	·	and this is the one that Terentianus joined.
4:27	·	While he was marine Terentianus hated it.
4:30	·	At one point he rails,
4:31	·	“They paid no more attention to me than a sponge on a stick.”
4:34	·	The Roman form of toilet paper.
4:36	·	He has his equipment nicked by his own officers. While he's in sickbay,
4:40	·	he then has his bedding stolen. A miserable time all round.
4:44	·	Claudius Terentianus
4:45	·	could read and write.
4:46	·	This is a rare skill in antiquity.
4:49	·	With the ability to read and write,
4:50	·	you could read and write orders
4:52	·	and this was the key to getting promoted
4:54	·	roles in the Roman army.
4:56	·	A good promoted rule might be the standard bearer.
4:59	·	This was a man on double the pay of an ordinary soldier.
5:03	·	This tombstone shows Imaginifer,
5:06	·	He holds the imago, the image of a bust of the Emperor.
5:09	·	In his other hand, you can see he has a scroll.
5:12	·	He's telling us he can read and write
5:14	·	an important function of promoted men.
5:17	·	Standard bearers held the standards of either the regiment
5:20	·	or the particular century to which they belonged.
5:23	·	You had to lead from the front, so you had to be brave.
5:26	·	You had to be able to read and write,
5:28	·	of course, as all promoted men did,
5:30	·	but you also had to be numerate because, Roman, standard bearers,
5:34	·	kept the pay and the accounts for their men.
5:37	·	The top position
5:38	·	for a commoner would be the role of centurion,
5:41	·	commander of a century.
5:43	·	We have one example of a centurion
5:45	·	who managed to become a centurion
5:48	·	by vote of the legion, from being a standard bearer.
5:51	·	He must have been able to show his bravery in the face of battle.
5:55	·	It was a position of high responsibility and power.
5:58	·	Centurions were paid to start with 15 times
6:01	·	the wages of an ordinary soldier.
6:03	·	He was very valued in the Roman army.
6:07	·	One role that would
6:08	·	tempt even legionaries was the role of cavalry.
6:11	·	The cavalry was one of the most glamorous roles in the Roman army,
6:15	·	and the chance to show off came with the cavalry sports,
6:18	·	a very specialist form of cavalry parade.
6:22	·	It included standards like this unique survival,
6:25	·	the Draco of Koblenz,
6:27	·	this draco comes from the fortress of Niederbieber
6:30	·	on the Rhineland frontier.
6:31	·	It dates to the late second century or early third century A.D.
6:35	·	it's the only one that's ever been found.
6:38	·	The draco would be mounted on a pole
6:40	·	the head's hollow, so it would make a whistling sound
6:43	·	as the rider rode along. It was attached to a windsock
6:46	·	that billowed out like a fearsome tail.
6:48	·	Originally gilded,
6:50	·	this is a unique example surviving from the Rhineland.
6:53	·	The draco standard, interestingly, was adopted
6:55	·	from Rome’s enemies, the Sarmatians,
6:57	·	it’s very much emblematic of the Roman practice of incorporating
7:02	·	the ideas, the symbols of the enemy and making them their own.
7:10	·	I ask and beg you, father,
7:12	·	to send to me a battle sword,
7:14	·	a pickaxe, a grappling iron,
7:16	·	two of the best spears attainable,
7:18	·	a cloak of beaverskin and a girdled tunic,
	·	Roman Army Equipment
7:21	·	together with my trousers,
7:22	·	so that I may have them.
7:24	·	I wore out my tunic before I entered the service,
7:27	·	and my trousers were laid away new.
7:32	·	Okay so you found your place in the army,
7:34	·	how do you get your equipment?
7:36	·	There were three ways to get your equipment.
7:39	·	The easiest way that Terentianus found was to request
7:41	·	it from home, he was, after all, from a military family.
7:44	·	Otherwise, soldiers would have to purchase their equipment from the armorer,
7:49	·	but at the end of service, they could sell it back and recoup their deposit,
7:52	·	so there was also a very strong second hand market,
7:55	·	and we have helmets that have not just
7:57	·	one or two owners names inscribed on them,
7:59	·	but three, even four, suggesting
8:02	·	a very lengthy period of service.
8:04	·	This example shows, what a legionary might have looked like
8:08	·	towards the end of the second century.
8:10	·	He has a cuirass, a segmental cuirass.
8:13	·	He also has protection extended to the sword arm.
8:17	·	A manica or armored sleeve.
8:18	·	It looks very gladiatorial.
8:20	·	In fact, it probably is borrowed from gladiator equipment.
8:23	·	The helmet is still gleaming from the Rhine,
8:27	·	and it's got extra strips on the bowl of the helmet
8:30	·	and a very wide neck guard.
8:33	·	Typical equipment for a legionary
8:35	·	is this pilum or armor piercing javelin,
8:38	·	it would be thrown at the enemy,
8:40	·	hopefully piercing the shield
8:42	·	and reaching the defender behind it.
8:45	·	He's shown with, a very late period gladius short sword.
8:49	·	This is a particular type known as a ring pommel sword
8:52	·	and it's virtually the last era when legionaries carried short swords.
8:57	·	The other piece of equipment vital
8:58	·	for heavy infantry legionaries was the scutum
	·	Only Surviving Roman Shield Scutum
9:01	·	or long shield.
9:03	·	This one in particular
9:05	·	is the only surviving example.
9:07	·	It comes from the eastern city of Dura-Europos
9:10	·	on the Euphrates frontier, and it's been preserved
9:13	·	by the dry environments of the Syrian desert.
9:16	·	The main feature you can see is the
9:18	·	wonderful painted decoration.
9:20	·	This is painted on leather, on top of plywood
9:23	·	with a bronze binding.
9:26	·	Images include Victories,
9:28	·	a Roman eagle and probably
9:30	·	a regimental symbol of a lion.
9:32	·	In the corners are four swastikas.
9:34	·	In antiquity, this was simply a symbol of good luck.
9:38	·	Conservators preserved it,
9:39	·	trying to maintain as much as possible of the painted surface.
9:42	·	So it is slightly more curled than it would have been in real life.
9:46	·	Also, it must have been a spare part.
9:48	·	It lacks the nail holes needed for the boss,
9:51	·	the metal plate that would protected the hand
9:54	·	that gripped the shield in the middle.
9:57	·	The boss next to it was found in the Tyne
10:00	·	it's from the second century AD,
10:01	·	and it belongs to a soldier called Juvitatus.
10:05	·	The boss protects the hand holding the shield,
10:07	·	but it could be used as a kind of punch in its own offensive way.
10:12	·	We're extremely fortunate in
10:14	·	this exhibition to have what is the finest preserved
	·	Roman Legionary Army Cuirass
10:18	·	and the earliest example of a Roman legionary’s
10:21	·	body armor or cuirass.
10:23	·	This example turned up in excavation
10:26	·	on the battlefield in 2014.
10:29	·	After four years of conservation,
10:31	·	it's been returned to absolutely stunning condition.
10:35	·	It's so well preserved
10:36	·	you can see that some of the buckles have been opened.
10:38	·	Chemical analysis of the soil
10:40	·	inside the cuirass suggests
10:43	·	somebody died inside and perhaps,
10:46	·	these buckles have been opened to plunge in the final knife blow.
10:51	·	This object reminds us
10:52	·	of the hazards of being a Roman soldier.
10:54	·	The risk of violence combined with disease
10:58	·	and illness made life as Roman soldier a very risky one.
11:01	·	In A.D. 115, Terentianus himself faced a revolt of his own.
11:06	·	The Jewish diaspora revolt, which spreads to Alexandria,
11:10	·	and he talks about putting down the anarchy
11:12	·	and the uproar of the city.
11:14	·	He himself was wounded.
11:18	·	He sent me word about a woman.
11:20	·	With my consent, he was buying one for me. As far back as two years ago,
11:24	·	I would have taken a woman into my house,
11:26	·	but I did not permit myself,
11:28	·	nor do I permit myself to take anyone without your approval.
11:32	·	If you remain steadfast in refusal the rest of your life,
	·	Life in a Roman Fort
11:35	·	I shall do without my woman.
11:37	·	If not, the woman whom you approve,
11:40	·	is also the one whom I also want.
11:44	·	Now as a Roman soldier,
11:45	·	if you've survived battle how might your downtime look?
11:48	·	Not every soldier would have faced the dangers of battle.
11:50	·	But almost all soldiers would have known the day to day
11:53	·	life of living in a Roman fort.
11:55	·	Roman forts were like miniature towns
11:57	·	built for Roman soldiers to live in.
11:59	·	They were permanent structures built in areas
12:01	·	where the Romans felt they needed to maintain a presence.
12:05	·	Military communities weren't just made up of Roman soldiers.
12:07	·	The soldiers themselves had families, wives and children.
12:11	·	Roman soldiers weren't officially
12:12	·	allowed to marry unless they were officers or held certain positions.
12:16	·	But we know that they did.
12:17	·	They had women who they considered their wives
12:19	·	and wrote to their families, referring to them as their wives
12:22	·	and they had children who they wanted to provide for.
12:24	·	Now Terentianus writes home asking for permission to buy a woman.
12:28	·	This would be a concubine,
12:30	·	and so he needs permission to bring a woman into his household.
12:33	·	One of the most famous women from a military community in Britain is Regina.
12:37	·	This is her tombstone erected by her husband,
12:40	·	a man named Barates, who was a Roman soldier.
12:43	·	Now, Regina's story is a little bit more complicated than that
12:46	·	she was his wife.
12:46	·	She was actually initially his concubine, which is to say, an enslaved woman.
12:51	·	Eventually he freed her and married her.
12:54	·	We don't know the context for that, and we don't know
12:56	·	how much choice she will have had in that decision.
12:58	·	but it gives us an interesting insight into the dynamic of their relationship.
13:02	·	It's an incredibly elaborate tombstone, and Regina
13:05	·	is shown as a very elegant, very Roman woman. But one of the more interesting
13:09	·	aspects of this tombstone is the inscriptions at the bottom.
13:12	·	Inside a square, as you'd expect,
13:14	·	is an inscription written in Latin.
13:17	·	But beneath it, is the added inscription in Aramaic.
13:20	·	The original language of her husband, Barates.
13:23	·	A final lament for his wife
13:25	·	that says Regina, the freed women of Barates, alas.
13:29	·	Soldiers were recruited from
13:31	·	many different areas of the Roman Empire,
13:33	·	So many of them would have been bilingual, and we expect that
13:35	·	probably their children will have been bilingual too.
13:37	·	Terentianus himself writes in both Latin and Ancient Greek,
13:41	·	a common language spoken in Egypt.
13:44	·	Forts were also places where soldiers spent
13:46	·	a lot of their free time, and they loved playing games.
13:50	·	This extraordinary object is a bronze dice tower.
13:53	·	Now, this was used for rolling dice.
13:55	·	You drop the dice at the top of the tower
13:58	·	and there are some levels inside the tower that would force the dice to roll.
14:01	·	This was fun for when you're just rolling dice,
14:03	·	but it's actually a very useful device as well
14:06	·	because it's an anti cheating device
14:08	·	now we know that the Romans loved to play games and they loved to gamble,
14:11	·	but we also know that quite a lot of cheating went on.
14:14	·	We found loaded dice that almost always roll sixes.
14:17	·	This device makes sure that doesn't happen.
14:20	·	On the front of the dice tower, there's an inscription.
14:22	·	It says PICTOS VICTOS HOSTIS DELETA
14:26	·	LUDITE SECURITA
14:27	·	which means: “The Picts have been defeated.
14:29	·	All hostiles are vanquished.
14:30	·	Now use me in safety.”
14:33	·	One of the most famous Vindolanda tablets depicts
14:36	·	a very ordinary moment in people's lives, which might surprise you.
14:40	·	This is a birthday party invitation, and in fact,
14:42	·	probably the oldest birthday party invitation in the world.
14:45	·	It's an invitation from a woman named Claudia Severa,
14:47	·	to her friend Lepidina.
14:49	·	To celebrate her birthday on the 11th of September.
14:51	·	Though most of the invitation would have been written by a scribe,
14:54	·	at the end, there's a final message that's written by Claudia Severa herself.
14:58	·	This makes it the oldest known
14:59	·	female handwriting in Britain.
15:01	·	On the invite,
15:02	·	Claudia Severa writes: “I shall expect you, sister.
15:05	·	Farewell, sister,
15:06	·	my dearest soul, as I hope to prosper and hail.”
15:12	·	Receive with my recommendation
15:14	·	the discharged soldier Terentianus
15:16	·	who brings you this letter.
15:18	·	Let him know what sort of villagers
15:19	·	we have, lest he get into trouble,
15:21	·	since he is a man of means and desirous of residing there.
	·	Retirement from the Roman Army
15:25	·	If you completed your 25 years of service,
15:28	·	what awaited you as a reward at the end?
15:31	·	You don't know exactly how many soldiers survived
15:33	·	to the end of their service, But numbers around 50% tend to be suggested.
15:37	·	Once you completed your 25 years of service, you might get something like this
15:41	·	a Roman military bronze diploma.
15:43	·	This was awarded to auxiliary soldiers, non-citizen soldiers
15:47	·	after 25 years of service granting them their citizenship.
15:51	·	This bronze diploma was awarded to an Egyptian rower
15:53	·	who actually did 26 years of service.
15:56	·	He's getting his citizenship on
15:58	·	the 8th of September of the year AD 79, and that citizenship
16:01	·	extends to his wife Tapaea and his son, Carpinius.
16:05	·	Now, this reward may not look like much,
16:07	·	but Roman citizenship was arguably priceless.
16:10	·	It wasn't just for Marcus Papirius,
16:13	·	but for his children and his children's children,
16:15	·	so it ensured the future of his family,
16:17	·	a future where they would get the same protections in Roman law
16:20	·	as other Roman citizens.
16:22	·	If you were a citizen, like Terentianus,
16:25	·	you could expect a lump sum of ten years salary.
16:28	·	What we might think of nowadays as a pension to live comfortably,
16:31	·	perhaps buy land, retire
16:33	·	with your family and have a peaceful life.
16:36	·	You've done your time. You've served the army.
16:38	·	This is your reward.
16:40	·	This coin hoard, known as the
16:41	·	Didcot hoard, is a hoard of 126 gold coins,
16:46	·	which amounts to just over what a soldier
16:48	·	might expect to get the ten years of salary.
16:51	·	Seeing these coins brought together shows you the level of this reward
16:55	·	and why it might be worthwhile
16:56	·	for a soldier to risk his life for 25 years.
	·	What happened to Claudius Terentianus?
17:00	·	Now for those of you who are eager to learn about the fate of Terentianus,
17:03	·	I'm happy to tell you that we can say he does survive.
17:06	·	We know this not from his own words and his letters, but ironically,
17:10	·	given that he doesn't get a good enough letter of recommendation to join the Army,
17:13	·	he does get a letter of recommendation as a retired veteran to rent a property,
17:17	·	and it describes him as a man of means.
17:27	·	Thank you for joining us
17:28	·	on this tour of the Legion exhibition.
17:31	·	These objects offer a small insight
17:33	·	into the lives and experiences
17:35	·	of serving in one of history's
17:37	·	most notorious military institutions.
17:40	·	We hope this has given you a better understanding of what life was really like
17:43	·	in the Roman army. Although the exhibition is now over,
17:46	·	if you want to learn more, the catalog is available to buy now.