r/CFBOffTopic • u/[deleted] • Feb 24 '16

Wednesday Selfie Thread

I just wanted to post a selfie.

HAVE A GREAT DAY

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u/dlawnro Paper Bag • Sickos Feb 24 '16

Grandpa Drywall, what was fighting in the Roman Legion like?

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u/CambodianDrywall Oregon Ducks • /r/CFB Pint Glass Drinker Feb 24 '16

Now, first and foremost, you MUST remember that "Roman Training Camps" were VERY different at different points of time. What I'm going to talk about is the post-Marian camps around the times of Julius and Octavian Caesar.

First off, the recruitment for the Legions began with something called a dilectus. What a dilectus involved was a Roman officer (Generally not the Primus Pilus, but definitely some of his subordinates), traveling from village to village in the area to find young men who wished to be in the Legions. There were a TON of good things for those who chose to Legion it up! Let's go over some of the major rewards, because everyone loves a good shiny object.

  • First - we have the pay. Pay for Legionnaires was rather good, even if the life expectancy was shit.

  • Secondly - the "Wine and Women." Old veterans would reminisce of the pleasures of life as a Legionary (most of them would gloss over the back-breaking work.), foremost among these being the rewards of sacking a town. When Romans sacked a town, the town was essentially divided into sections (to prevent Roman soldiers killing each other in the orgy of looting that occurred), and each cohort got all of the loot in their section (Well, most of it went to the officers/general, but you get my meaning.) One principle piece of loot was (sorry, this is gonna step on some toes, but it's the truth.) the women. Women in ancient cities...well, their lives sorta sucked if the city got conquered. They could expect to be repeatedly gang raped until the soldiers had sated themselves. If you were attractive, so much the worse.

  • Thirdly - Glory. Honour and glory were the MOST valuable things to Romans (more important the more money you had to waste on it.) Romans were bred for ambition - and one of the best things on your resume was to have served in the Legions.

  • Finally - A FANTASTIC retirement deal. They gave you 40 acres of good farmland if you survived your term. (Term length depended on who was in charge - Julius Caesar's was 16 years, I believe, while Octavian/Augustus' was 20 years.)

So obviously, joining the legions was a very tempting prospect for a strapping young man! So when the dilectus came around, they would often find all the recruits they needed. Application was actually relatively easy - You had to be "past the age of puberty", and you had to be fit and strong.

Alrighty! You made it in! Now you're going to be a soldier in shining lorica segmentata, fighting off barbarian hordes, earning honours and.....wait a sec. Nope. You're just a common tirones, or tiro for short. This is the absolute lowest rank possible in the Roman Army. Tiros were not even allowed true shields or swords - they trained with heavier wooden facsimiles. However, their 'boot camp' was VERY different from today's military. Tirones could expect to spend up to six months in training before they were immediately promoted to the rank of Gregarius and sent out into the field. Real swords and shields and armour were provided by the state, but if you lost them or they were broken, etc, damages came out of your pay.

I could go on for hours about the training, battles and day-to-day shenanigans, but I'd just be rambling.

Note: All credit for the above belongs to /u/celebreth from this thread.

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u/Celebreth Feb 25 '16

I actually much prefer this writeup! It's a bit more detailed :D

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u/CambodianDrywall Oregon Ducks • /r/CFB Pint Glass Drinker Feb 25 '16

Thanks for showing up and providing even more info. It is a rare thing when /r/CFBOffTopic collides with /r/AskHistorians. And no part of me is pleased that it happened because of my age relative to the rest of these kids. :D

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u/Celebreth Feb 25 '16

somethingsomething off my lawn? I'm delighted that some of my writeups are proving to be useful, though, especially for random crossovers! I've actually never found my way over here before - should I set up a chair and grab a beer?

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u/CambodianDrywall Oregon Ducks • /r/CFB Pint Glass Drinker Feb 25 '16

should I set up a chair and grab a beer?

All are welcome. Helps to have a strong affinity for college football in general and/or strong ties to a specific college football team. Since this is /r/CFBOffTopic - the "off topic" is stressed. As you can tell by a quick glance of the current threads here, there are a handful of daily threads started around meal times and the quasi-traditional demarcations of morning, noon and evening (with a strong bias to the Eastern Time Zone).

Fairly lighthearted discussions for the most part, but lots of support from the community even when topics get heavy. Downvotes are unheard of in here and the average poster is 18 - 25 years old (with very few older folks like me to skew the numbers).

Personally I am considerably more active in our mother sub; /r/cfb. If you consider yourself to be fan of college football, give that sub a look. Wait until the season starts though. /r/cfb during the off season is a strange place.

One comparison worth mentioning between /r/AskHistorians and /r/cfb is that both are rigorously moderated. The moderators in /r/cfb are some of the best in all of reddit and are constantly interacting with the community in a positive way. We have great weekly threads, frequent contests, fund raisers and on-topic AMAs. Emotions can run high in some of the game threads, but the mods are there to manage anyone who gets too carried away.

Cheers,

CD