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The Roman legion (Latin: legiō, Latin: [ˈɫɛɡioː]), the largest military unit of the Roman army, was composed of Roman citizens serving as legionaries.During the Roman Republic the manipular legion comprised 4,200 infantry and 300 cavalry.
Nero, Sestertius with countermark "X" of Legio X Gemina. Obv: Laureate bust right. Rev: Nero riding horse right, holding spear, DECVRSIO in exergue; S C across fields. This is a list of Roman legions, including key facts about each legion, primarily focusing on the Principate (early Empire, 27 BC – 284 AD) legions, for which there exists substantial literary, epigraphic and archaeological ...
In the Imperial Legion, ten contubernia formed a centuria. Maniple – The pre-Marian sub-unit of the Roman Legions, consisting of 120 men (60 for the Triarii). Legio – A legion in the pre-Marian armies consisted of 60 manipuli of infantry and 10 turmae of cavalry. By 250 BC, there would be four Legions, two commanded by each Consul: two ...
A recreation of Roman legionaries wearing the lorica segmentata, 1st–3rd century.Other equipment in view include the galea (helmet), pilum (spear) and scutum (shield). The Roman legionary (in Latin legionarius; pl.: legionarii) was a citizen soldier of the Roman army.
Roman soldiers of around 101 AD from a cast of Trajan's column, c. 113 AD (Victoria and Albert Museum, London) Through the final years of the 1st century AD, the legions remained the backbone of the Roman army, although the auxilia in fact outnumbered them by up to half as much again. [87]
Service in the legions was limited to property-owning Roman citizens, normally those known as iuniores (age 16–46). The army's senior officers, including its commanders-in-chief, the Roman consuls, were all elected annually at the People's Assembly. Only equites (members of the Roman knightly order) were eligible to serve as senior officers.
At the time of the Pyrrhic War, the Roman army in the field consisted of four armies, [7] each of which contained two legions of Roman citizens and two units of allies. Each legion consisted of 4,200–5,000 infantry [8] and 300 cavalry, [8] while the allied units had an equal number of infantry but three times as many cavalry (900 cavalry per ...
A diagram of a late 1st-century AD Roman legion. The dual-structure configuration of legions/auxilia established by Augustus remained essentially intact until the late 3rd century, with only minor modifications made during that long period. The senior officers of the army were, until the 3rd century, mainly from the Italian aristocracy.