The Military Reforms of Marius
The Consul of Rome Improves The Roman Army
Jun 18, 2009 Nate Breidenbaugh
Prior to the 1st Century BCE, a citizen had to be a member of the Roman landed aristocracy in order to serve in the army. Taking from the Greek model, He had to own property of a certain value, he had to supply his own equipment, and he would be led my one of his own class, not all of whom were adept military leaders.
The Military Structure
During the Republican period the Roman soldiers in each legion were organized by wealth and experience into four classes: Velites, who were skirmishers; Hastati, who were younger men armed with swords and light armor; Principes, who were regulars better armed than the Hastati, and finally the Triarii, who were the older, wealthier, more experiences veterans who fought with spears as a reserve. All men carried the Pilum, or heavy javelin, except the Velites, who carried lighter javelins.
The soldiers were organized into Maniples (Latin for “Handful”) of sixty or 120 men, depending upon class—the Triarii fought in maniples of sixty—and ten maniples fought in a line. In theory, 1200 men made up each line of a legion.
The Maniples would fight the enemy until they were exhausted or wiped out, then a unit of “better” troops would take its place. This would leave the enemy exhausted while the Romans would have their best troops fresh and ready to fight.
Problems With The Army’s Structure
The manipular system was very inflexible; it was not capable of dealing with significant shifts of favor in a battle. If flanked, one of the lines could be broken entirely, with disastrous consequences for the entire legion. Furthermore, each type of soldier was given to different tasks, e.g. skirmishing, holding a line, reinforcements, etc; and if one type was not available to meet the threat for which it was appropriate, the effectiveness of the whole legion was diminished.
The landowning class had dwindled due to constant warring, and many had bought up large estates and replaced the free men who farmed them with slaves. The cities had filled up with disgruntled poor citizens, who lived in poverty.
The Professional Cohorts: “Marius’ Mules”
When he was elected Consul in 107 BCE, Marius found himself in need of more recruits to fight a war against the invading Cimbri and Teutones in Gaul. The landowning classes were stretched thin, and so he revolutionized the Roman army by doing away with the landowning requirement for military service. Now all citizens could serve as paid soldiers, rather than as volunteers, and he created a new class in Roman society. The poor recruited in droves, and Marius’ legions were trained to the same standard. They were also uniformly equipped at the state’s expense, which made training and arming easy.
The soldiers were equipped to sustain themselves on a march, thus eliminating the need for a large baggage train to follow the army and inevitably slow its pace. The equipment is estimated to have weighed in at over fifty pounds. The weight of the equipment earned the soldiers the nickname “Marius’ Mules.” Incidentally, Marius is also credited with the introduction of the quick-release system for the soldier’s packs.
He also did away with the Manipular system—and the class of velites--and reorganized his soldiers into Centuries of eighty men each. Six of these made up a Cohort, and ten Cohorts made up a Legion. Each of these was led by junior officers such as Centurions, who were recruited from the ranks.
Each cohort was made up of men who fought in the same way, which gave the legions much more flexibility. The cohorts still arrayed in three lines, but they were capable of fighting independently of one another.
The Impact Upon Society
The social upheaval brought on by Marius’ reforms cannot be understated, as it marked the shift in loyalty of the Roman soldier from the state to the general who employed him. The Senate was often helpless to control the Consul-generals who led the legions, and in many cases the Consuls would act in open defiance to the Senate, while standing confidently behind the military might (and often political clout) of their legions. Consuls such as Pompey, Crassus, and Julius Caesar would war for control of Rome herself.
As for Marius himself, he fought for control of a campaign against Pontus (Modern-Day Turkey) against a Consul named Sulla, who invaded Rome and forced Marius to flee. Marius died in 86 BCE, and upon Sulla’s return from Pontus, he used his army’s influence to brutally exterminate the followers of Marius and declare himself Rome’s first dictator. The power of the Legions had supplanted the power of the State or Senate, and the path to empire under Marius’ nephew, Gaius Julius (Julius Caesar), was laid.
Sources:
Ackroyd, Peter. Ancient Rome: Voyages Through Time. New York, DK Publishing, 2005.
“Marius Reforms The Legions” at unrv.com.
“Cohort And Tactics Information” at vassar.edu
Gaius Marius
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