![]() | Marian reforms has been listed as one of the
Warfare good articles under the
good article criteria. If you can improve it further,
please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can
reassess it. Review: July 18, 2023. ( Reviewed version). |
![]() | This article is rated GA-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
How reliable is this as definite fact? While the position that their were no specific Marian reforms seems correct by wider histography, a huge amount of core positions in this page (e.g. poverty of legionnaires didn't exist and most legionaires were actually still 1st and 2nd class landowners) seem to derive explicitly from this book, despite the fact that much of the books content seems to be opinion rather than explicit histography. Many cases seems to take a position of "because this fact isn't 100% true in all cases, it must be 100% false in all cases).... 90.91.194.4 ( talk) 09:29, 27 May 2024 (UTC)
Sources would be well appreciated. Lucius Domitius 20:34, 18 December 2005 (UTC)
It is generally known as the Marius Reforms (at least in the UK). I cant say I've heard it with this variant before. After all he is known as Marius, not Marian. -- RND talk 10:49, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Yes, that's definitely what it is. One doesn't speak of the "Julius calendar" but of the "Julian calendar"; likewise with "Marius" and "Marian." It certainly should remain as is.
I added the External Links header to follow standard wiki layout. The link was almost lost with just [1] showing. -- RND talk 11:03, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
This is kind of off topic but in Ancient Rome by Pamela Bradley it says that "During his second consulship Marius carried out a major reorganisation of the army" ie The Marian Reforms.
this was after the war against Jugurtha and not during as suggested in the article, I suggest some should fix this. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
203.24.9.99 (
talk)
03:55, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
In the Cohort (military unit) page, the First Cohort states that while Marius's original plan for a legion was 10 cohorts of 480 soldiers, the concept of the First Cohort as a double strength unit of 800 was set in stone in the first century AD. This page refers to the double strength First Cohort as being the first of the 10 in Marius's definition of a legion, rather than a post-Marian alteration. Since the reforms regarding military structure are so clearly based around consistency (both in terms of unit size and capabilities) it seems more likely that the original plan was that a legion was 10 cohorts of 480 soldiers (and 120 support staff), making a legion of 4800 soldiers (with 1200 support). However, just because I don't like the idea of a special First Cohort being almost twice as large as the rest doesn't mean Marius didn't - I have no idea which of these is correct, only that the articles are inconsistent. If anyone out there knows their military history well enough to know what changes were made by Marius and which were adaptations to his original plan, could they please make the necessary alterations to the erroneous page? Rashkavar ( talk) 05:20, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
The idea of a double strength first cohort might not have been a universal thing. There is evidence that some legions were structured this way, but it is not at all clear that every legion was. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.74.0.22 ( talk) 12:52, 3 January 2019 (UTC)
There is no mention here of Marius' invention of the silver eagle standards each legion carried and which became a superstitious symbol of Rome's power. This is the one aspect of the Marian reforms that would be familiar to anyone who has ever seen a Roman legion depicted in a movie. - J. Conti 108.20.137.173 ( talk) 05:51, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
The idea that there were non-combatants regularly attached to each century is commonly found around the internet, but it is disputed theory at best. There is no ancient evidence to support the idea of non-combatants. This is a modern theory that attempts to reconcile the sometimes contradictory nature of the ancient evidence. Ancient descriptions of the Roman army in writers like Polybius, Vegetius, Caesar, and Pseudo-Hygenius never mention non-combatants as part of any military unit or as regular members of an army. The numbers provided by the ancient sources for the various units (centuries, cohorts, legions) are confused and often contradictory. For example, Pseudo-Hygenius specifically states that a century contains 80 men. But elsewhere states that there are 600 men in a cohort. This is an apparent contradiction. Some scholars have attempted to resolve this contradiction by supposing that there were extra non-combatants included among the 600 men in the cohort. This could explain the discrepancy, but nowhere does Pseudo-Hygenius or any other source state that there were non-combatants in a legion. It is merely speculation. There are also many times when various authors describe cohorts and legions in action; not only in combat but also on the march, building camps, and doing other manual labor. At no time does any source ever mention non-combatants being involved in the work of a legion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.74.0.22 ( talk) 13:03, 3 January 2019 (UTC)
Marius' reforms were not a major break from past practice. The armies in the late republic were broadly similar with those of the middle republic: "the composition of the post-Marian armies... did not differ markedly from the past". [1] [2]
"The property qualification for army service had become nearly meaningless by 107" with exemptions from the property qualifications becoming commonplace and recurrent. [3] Marius's recruitment reforms simply made plain what had been for some time commonplace, [3] out of need for men or simply the expediency of calling up urban volunteers rather than conscripting farmers. [4] There also is no evidence that Marius introduced the cohort.
Soldiers and veterans were not permanent clients of their generals. [5] Defections were common. Having some oath of loyalty was symbolic more of a general's lack of security than actual loyalty. [6] The Roman army was not professionalised, [7] nor was there any break between military and civilian service. [8] Ifly6 ( talk) 15:46, 14 June 2021 (UTC)
References
{{
cite book}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link)The number of men per legion here is 5 times what is cited in a different article on the Roman army that goes through the entire history of the Roman legions. Would you two authors please sync up on your sources and decide which ones are exaggerating? The numbers here look like what Gibbon has and my study of his work shows he didn't handle his facts properly. 100.15.127.199 ( talk) 14:26, 17 November 2021 (UTC)
Cited six times throughout the article, and given a veneer of reliablity by being hosted on
academia.edu, this seems like a very dubiously reliable source. I can't find any evidence that it's been published by any sort of reliable source, and the author is described on his academia.edu profile as I'm a 18 year old bibliophile, logophile, anti-theophile, technophile, and partially an audiophile. I'm diseased, too. Huzzah!
Caeciliusinhorto-public (
talk)
15:26, 15 August 2022 (UTC)
from someone pretty qualified. The good news is that he tends to mention his sources so we should get something to cite. The bad news is his suggestion so far has a 390 euro paywall. ©Geni ( talk) 19:41, 28 June 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
GA toolbox |
---|
Reviewing |
Reviewer: UndercoverClassicist ( talk · contribs) 12:06, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
I should say at the outset that I'm hugely impressed with the recent work on this article: having read Bret Devereux's critique of the old one, it's extremely impressive to see such a dramatic turnaround on a topic with many eyes on it and where, I suspect, making bold changes is not always easy. Will give it a read now and make initial comments. I'm a classicist but this isn't my specific field, so I'll try to make tentative comments on content as well as form, but please do bear my relative inexpertise in mind.
Resolved matters
|
---|
|
For much of the twentieth century, historians held that the property qualification separating the five classes and the was reduced over the course of the second century to a nugatory level due to a shortage of manpower. It is not clear whether, over the course of the second century BC, the qualification was actually reduced.: the join between these two sentences is a little confusing. As we've started the first one with a time phrase, it would help to do the same for the second: when did we start to change our minds? Alternatively, we could give some idea as to why C20th historians thought as they did, and why that evidence is no longer considered convincing.
"The view that the property qualification... was progressively reduced derives much of its plausibility from the fact that it fits well with received doctrine on Roman manpower... It would thus smack of circularity to use the supposed second century reduction in the property qualification as evidence for the shortage of assidui."Ifly6 ( talk) 16:00, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
It is not clear whether, over the course of the second century BC, the qualification was actually reduced, as the basis for that belief was merely three undated figures for it which could be ordered in a descending order) very hard to follow. Suggest something like
However, the basis for that belief was merely three undated Roman figures for the amount of property required to serve, and it is therefore unclear whether that qualification actually did reduce over time.UndercoverClassicist ( talk) 11:23, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
In traditional modern historiography: I'd suggest coming up with a consistent shorthand for "the view that Marius snapped his fingers and everything changed overnight". I'm not sure that modern is quite right, given that we're situating this as an outdated paradigm, but also worry that traditional might give it a bit more gravitas than needed.
Beyond the attribution to Marius of setting the precedent for recruiting the poor, made by the historian Valerius Maximus in the early 1st century AD, only two reforms (distinguished from mere actions taken by Marius) are attributed, in sources postdating his career by hundreds of years, to Marius directly: a redesign of the pilum and sole use of the eagle as the legionary standard: this is a very long sentence, with lots of subordination: Cicero would have loved it, but it would be clearer if split down.
The second edition Cambridge Ancient History: why this and not Lintott by name?
It is sometimes claimed that Marius' decision...: as this narrative goes on, it starts to get unclear that we're still talking about a discredited point of view; the tone sounds as if we're simply stating facts, until the sharp stop of "there are, however...".
Beyond continued conscription after Marius' time, especially during the Social War, the wealth and social background of the men who joined before and after the opening of recruitment changed little: I don't think beyond quite works in this context: usually, it should mean "except for", but conscription is being identified as as point of continuity.
only five asses per day: can we put that into context as to roughly how much it was?
Extremely lowwith Gruen quote "bare subsistence" added to note. Ifly6 ( talk) 16:26, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
Marius' redesign did not stick: MOS:IDIOM would like this rephrased more literally, particularly as pila do, literally, stick into shields and people.
Pliny's Natural History: as before, contextualise. Can we make it explicit that the eagle was the universal standard by Pliny's day, and so he's doing the classic Roman thing of projecting something important back onto a great man of the past?
before deploying them in the Lusitanian War c. 145 BC, which is the problem of having the abbreviation in body text. As the date is for the deployment, not the war, I'd suggest
before deploying them in approximately 145 BC during the Lusitanian War. UndercoverClassicist ( talk) 11:23, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
Polybius': we've given a date for the battle, but more important to give one for Polybius (and perhaps to explain a bit about him to establish that he knew what he was talking about).
Only during the civil wars: I'd give an explicit time period here, as we're trying to date this development. Likewise for triumviral period later.
later last century BC. Ifly6 ( talk) 16:00, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
mutineers demanded lands as a pretext for larger donatives: I'm not sure the word pretext (a false justification for something) is quite right here: do we mean that mutineers demanded lands as a form of donative?
largely in the interest of creating exempla (moral parables) of traditions broken rather than conveying historical events: I think the antithesis here is a little strong: would suggest removing the second part, as Val. Max. would probably have argued that the two were one and the same. It's certainly not a distinction that any Roman historian would have recognised, and an increasingly problematic one in modern historiography (with apologies to poor old Ranke).
Ifly6 ( talk) 16:32, 15 July 2023 (UTC)Thus, on closer inspection, most of the texts mentioning the dilectus of 107 do not make the levy as such the object of their discourse, but use the trace of it in the collective memory as a pretext to formulate moral considerations which, in reality, constitute their real subject (ambitio for Sallust; consuetudo for Valerius Maximus) or which arise from the most stereotypical observations of the political imagination (acting bono publico in Exuperantius; the drift of superbia for John the Lydian). However, the discursive practices of ancient authors – whether they are historians, biographers, or rhetoricians – do not guarantee that these interpretations necessarily have a direct relationship with the historical fact on which they claim to be based.
Much of this work, however, did not carry over into the Anglophone scholarship until the 1980s / The British classicist Peter Brunt, in his 1971 book Italian Manpower, also questioned the extent to which Polybius' descriptions reflected the army of the mid-second century: these two sentences don't quite fit together. Was Brunt a radical outlier in 1971, or had he only taken on part of the revisionist view?
William Harris: who and when was he?
William Vernon Harris, an American classicist, first showed in 1979means that the first time Harris showed it was in 1979, but I think we mean that Harris was the first to show it, and that he did so in 1979. UndercoverClassicist ( talk) 11:23, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
this recast Marius' call in 107BC for volunteers as Numidia not being a rich eastern kingdom on which Roman armies could engorge themselves: this is a bit confusing. I think phrasing it in the positive (that is, getting rid of the not) would help.
this recast Marius' call in 107 BC for volunteers as reflecting enthusiasm emerging from the relative scarcity of expected plunder from Numidia: I no longer understand this (lots of abstract nouns, which might be the problem). Do we mean that Marius called for volunteers because he expected there to be relatively little plunder available in Numidia (and therefore that soldiers weren't signing up in their usual numbers)? UndercoverClassicist ( talk) 11:23, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
Do we mean that Marius called for volunteers because he expected there to be relatively little plunder available in Numidia (and therefore that soldiers weren't signing up in their usual numbers)?Yes. Ifly6 ( talk) 16:36, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
and the bidding wars for military loyalty that waged concurrently with the actual fighting: this could be clearer: in particular, we could establish the extent to which bidding wars is (not) a metaphor.
bidding warsbecause it is not a metaphor. Ifly6 ( talk) 16:00, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
generals' attempts to secure military loyalty with pay increases? Ifly6 ( talk) 21:35, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
Rüstow's book became the main progenitor of the comprehensive Marian reforms hypothesis, likely because it was written in German instead of Latin.
Faszcza 2021, p. 21. Rüstow's book became the main progenitor of the comprehensive Marian reforms hypothesis, likely because it was written in German instead of Latin.Ifly6 ( talk) 16:53, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
Earwig's happy: it flags up a few bits of overlap with online sources, but those are limited to the fact that both have cited the same sources. I can't see anything on the CLOP side to be concerned about at this stage.
In each case, could I have the direct quotation for the sourced material. I don't need translations from French, but would appreciate them from Polish.
Under the this scheme, the proletarii were exempt from conscription except when an emergency, called a tumultus, was declared; under such circumstances, the poorest were levied as well. The first documented instance of the proletarii being called up was some time in the fourth century; they first received arms at state expense in c. 281 BC, at the start of the Pyrrhic War.(OCD 4).
An emergency levy (tumultuarius dilectus) was the only time that *proletarii (citizens who fell below the military census qualification for military service) could be enrolled (Gell. 16. 10. 11–13), and on a famous occasion, probably the invasion of *Pyrrhus in 281 BCE, they were for the first time armed at public expense (Enn., Ann. 170–2 Skutsch; Cassius Hemina fr. 21 Peter).Ifly6 ( talk) 01:54, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
I had talked to Taylor. There are no in-depth historiographies in English. Rafferty recommended Cadiou, already cited, but Cadiou's historiographical section in the introduction goes only back to the late 19th century. Ifly6 ( talk) 15:36, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
I don't have current access to the original Cadiou in French; the only place nearby that has it is the Library of Congress. I wrote for myself an English translation, however. Ifly6 ( talk) 15:44, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)
(Criteria marked
are unassessed)
It's a good article, but while it casts doubt on the traditional modern historiography of the "Marian reforms", it never offers an alternative. So if there never was one specific set of monumental reforms, the question becomes, did the changes ever occur at all? And if so, of what nature were they, exactly?
Currently, only the very last two paragraphs of the article attempt an explanation (section: Contemporary historiography). But I'm still left with the feeling of a gaping hole after all the critique has been done. Or is it simply the case, as one of the sources states, that we just don't have an alternative? Just don't know? "Cadiou has not given us a coherent new account of the late republican army, but he has demolished the old one." [2]
If so, this could be made explicit, so that an amateur hobbyist like me could sleep in peace without the nagging feeling like they've missed something. MrThe1And0nly ( talk) 13:35, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
"Reform" | c. 100 BC | Marius? | Ever? |
---|---|---|---|
Army proletarianisation (Big bad client armies) |
![]() |
![]() |
|
Equipment changes | ![]() |
![]() |
|
State-purchased equipment | ![]() |
![]() |
|
More training | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Bye bye horsies | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Cohorts > maniples | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Land for veterans | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Citizenship for veterans | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Ever?to mark reforms that happened but not around 100 BC: it is not always perfectly clear when they happened but it was not around 100 BC; the superscripts mark whether they happened before or after 100 BC. How they should be thought of, however, is as evolutionary expediencies or accretions taken step-by-step to solve immediate problems rather than as some monumental project by one visionary man. Ifly6 ( talk) 18:34, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
ten asses a day is the value set on life and limb; out of this, clothing, arms, tents, as well as the mercy of centurions and exemptions from duty have to be purchased. Ifly6 ( talk) 20:17, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
References
I question the staggering number of words like "supposed," "alleged," "putative," etc. I get having disclaimers at the start of disputed topics, but not every sentence. It's really just too much. It stops the flow and comes across like someone has an ax to grind.
Foregrounding the current skepticism this much leaves it unclear what this article is even about. Is this an article about a period in Roman history that was later subject to exaggeration and myth making, or about a 19th Century just-so story that's bad and wrong and here's why?
I'd like to see the narrative cleaned up and tackled chronologically with a neutral POV. 98.176.69.41 ( talk) 02:41, 11 October 2023 (UTC)
period in Roman historywhich the phrase "Marian reforms" would describe. The consensus among historians today is that the "Marian reforms" as described in the 19th century did not exist at almost every level. Composing this reply itself raises the wording issue you brought: I initially tried to write the article is about the reforms but this is not accurate since they did not exist; I therefore must write
the article is about the supposed reforms.
why are we immediately moving "beyond" an important near-contempory source suggesting an early origin to the "reform" narrative?: that's exactly what Wikipedia's policies tell us to do, given that no high-quality, scholarly treatment today takes that primary source at face value. Similarly, if modern scholars have published works probing the origins of the "Marian Reforms" narrative, we should use and cite them, but we can't do that if they haven't (this is the policy against using research that has not appeared in print elsewhere). UndercoverClassicist T· C 07:45, 2 April 2024 (UTC)
![]() | Marian reforms has been listed as one of the
Warfare good articles under the
good article criteria. If you can improve it further,
please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can
reassess it. Review: July 18, 2023. ( Reviewed version). |
![]() | This article is rated GA-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
How reliable is this as definite fact? While the position that their were no specific Marian reforms seems correct by wider histography, a huge amount of core positions in this page (e.g. poverty of legionnaires didn't exist and most legionaires were actually still 1st and 2nd class landowners) seem to derive explicitly from this book, despite the fact that much of the books content seems to be opinion rather than explicit histography. Many cases seems to take a position of "because this fact isn't 100% true in all cases, it must be 100% false in all cases).... 90.91.194.4 ( talk) 09:29, 27 May 2024 (UTC)
Sources would be well appreciated. Lucius Domitius 20:34, 18 December 2005 (UTC)
It is generally known as the Marius Reforms (at least in the UK). I cant say I've heard it with this variant before. After all he is known as Marius, not Marian. -- RND talk 10:49, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
Yes, that's definitely what it is. One doesn't speak of the "Julius calendar" but of the "Julian calendar"; likewise with "Marius" and "Marian." It certainly should remain as is.
I added the External Links header to follow standard wiki layout. The link was almost lost with just [1] showing. -- RND talk 11:03, 29 June 2006 (UTC)
This is kind of off topic but in Ancient Rome by Pamela Bradley it says that "During his second consulship Marius carried out a major reorganisation of the army" ie The Marian Reforms.
this was after the war against Jugurtha and not during as suggested in the article, I suggest some should fix this. —Preceding
unsigned comment added by
203.24.9.99 (
talk)
03:55, 20 October 2009 (UTC)
In the Cohort (military unit) page, the First Cohort states that while Marius's original plan for a legion was 10 cohorts of 480 soldiers, the concept of the First Cohort as a double strength unit of 800 was set in stone in the first century AD. This page refers to the double strength First Cohort as being the first of the 10 in Marius's definition of a legion, rather than a post-Marian alteration. Since the reforms regarding military structure are so clearly based around consistency (both in terms of unit size and capabilities) it seems more likely that the original plan was that a legion was 10 cohorts of 480 soldiers (and 120 support staff), making a legion of 4800 soldiers (with 1200 support). However, just because I don't like the idea of a special First Cohort being almost twice as large as the rest doesn't mean Marius didn't - I have no idea which of these is correct, only that the articles are inconsistent. If anyone out there knows their military history well enough to know what changes were made by Marius and which were adaptations to his original plan, could they please make the necessary alterations to the erroneous page? Rashkavar ( talk) 05:20, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
The idea of a double strength first cohort might not have been a universal thing. There is evidence that some legions were structured this way, but it is not at all clear that every legion was. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.74.0.22 ( talk) 12:52, 3 January 2019 (UTC)
There is no mention here of Marius' invention of the silver eagle standards each legion carried and which became a superstitious symbol of Rome's power. This is the one aspect of the Marian reforms that would be familiar to anyone who has ever seen a Roman legion depicted in a movie. - J. Conti 108.20.137.173 ( talk) 05:51, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
The idea that there were non-combatants regularly attached to each century is commonly found around the internet, but it is disputed theory at best. There is no ancient evidence to support the idea of non-combatants. This is a modern theory that attempts to reconcile the sometimes contradictory nature of the ancient evidence. Ancient descriptions of the Roman army in writers like Polybius, Vegetius, Caesar, and Pseudo-Hygenius never mention non-combatants as part of any military unit or as regular members of an army. The numbers provided by the ancient sources for the various units (centuries, cohorts, legions) are confused and often contradictory. For example, Pseudo-Hygenius specifically states that a century contains 80 men. But elsewhere states that there are 600 men in a cohort. This is an apparent contradiction. Some scholars have attempted to resolve this contradiction by supposing that there were extra non-combatants included among the 600 men in the cohort. This could explain the discrepancy, but nowhere does Pseudo-Hygenius or any other source state that there were non-combatants in a legion. It is merely speculation. There are also many times when various authors describe cohorts and legions in action; not only in combat but also on the march, building camps, and doing other manual labor. At no time does any source ever mention non-combatants being involved in the work of a legion. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.74.0.22 ( talk) 13:03, 3 January 2019 (UTC)
Marius' reforms were not a major break from past practice. The armies in the late republic were broadly similar with those of the middle republic: "the composition of the post-Marian armies... did not differ markedly from the past". [1] [2]
"The property qualification for army service had become nearly meaningless by 107" with exemptions from the property qualifications becoming commonplace and recurrent. [3] Marius's recruitment reforms simply made plain what had been for some time commonplace, [3] out of need for men or simply the expediency of calling up urban volunteers rather than conscripting farmers. [4] There also is no evidence that Marius introduced the cohort.
Soldiers and veterans were not permanent clients of their generals. [5] Defections were common. Having some oath of loyalty was symbolic more of a general's lack of security than actual loyalty. [6] The Roman army was not professionalised, [7] nor was there any break between military and civilian service. [8] Ifly6 ( talk) 15:46, 14 June 2021 (UTC)
References
{{
cite book}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link)The number of men per legion here is 5 times what is cited in a different article on the Roman army that goes through the entire history of the Roman legions. Would you two authors please sync up on your sources and decide which ones are exaggerating? The numbers here look like what Gibbon has and my study of his work shows he didn't handle his facts properly. 100.15.127.199 ( talk) 14:26, 17 November 2021 (UTC)
Cited six times throughout the article, and given a veneer of reliablity by being hosted on
academia.edu, this seems like a very dubiously reliable source. I can't find any evidence that it's been published by any sort of reliable source, and the author is described on his academia.edu profile as I'm a 18 year old bibliophile, logophile, anti-theophile, technophile, and partially an audiophile. I'm diseased, too. Huzzah!
Caeciliusinhorto-public (
talk)
15:26, 15 August 2022 (UTC)
from someone pretty qualified. The good news is that he tends to mention his sources so we should get something to cite. The bad news is his suggestion so far has a 390 euro paywall. ©Geni ( talk) 19:41, 28 June 2023 (UTC)
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
GA toolbox |
---|
Reviewing |
Reviewer: UndercoverClassicist ( talk · contribs) 12:06, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
I should say at the outset that I'm hugely impressed with the recent work on this article: having read Bret Devereux's critique of the old one, it's extremely impressive to see such a dramatic turnaround on a topic with many eyes on it and where, I suspect, making bold changes is not always easy. Will give it a read now and make initial comments. I'm a classicist but this isn't my specific field, so I'll try to make tentative comments on content as well as form, but please do bear my relative inexpertise in mind.
Resolved matters
|
---|
|
For much of the twentieth century, historians held that the property qualification separating the five classes and the was reduced over the course of the second century to a nugatory level due to a shortage of manpower. It is not clear whether, over the course of the second century BC, the qualification was actually reduced.: the join between these two sentences is a little confusing. As we've started the first one with a time phrase, it would help to do the same for the second: when did we start to change our minds? Alternatively, we could give some idea as to why C20th historians thought as they did, and why that evidence is no longer considered convincing.
"The view that the property qualification... was progressively reduced derives much of its plausibility from the fact that it fits well with received doctrine on Roman manpower... It would thus smack of circularity to use the supposed second century reduction in the property qualification as evidence for the shortage of assidui."Ifly6 ( talk) 16:00, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
It is not clear whether, over the course of the second century BC, the qualification was actually reduced, as the basis for that belief was merely three undated figures for it which could be ordered in a descending order) very hard to follow. Suggest something like
However, the basis for that belief was merely three undated Roman figures for the amount of property required to serve, and it is therefore unclear whether that qualification actually did reduce over time.UndercoverClassicist ( talk) 11:23, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
In traditional modern historiography: I'd suggest coming up with a consistent shorthand for "the view that Marius snapped his fingers and everything changed overnight". I'm not sure that modern is quite right, given that we're situating this as an outdated paradigm, but also worry that traditional might give it a bit more gravitas than needed.
Beyond the attribution to Marius of setting the precedent for recruiting the poor, made by the historian Valerius Maximus in the early 1st century AD, only two reforms (distinguished from mere actions taken by Marius) are attributed, in sources postdating his career by hundreds of years, to Marius directly: a redesign of the pilum and sole use of the eagle as the legionary standard: this is a very long sentence, with lots of subordination: Cicero would have loved it, but it would be clearer if split down.
The second edition Cambridge Ancient History: why this and not Lintott by name?
It is sometimes claimed that Marius' decision...: as this narrative goes on, it starts to get unclear that we're still talking about a discredited point of view; the tone sounds as if we're simply stating facts, until the sharp stop of "there are, however...".
Beyond continued conscription after Marius' time, especially during the Social War, the wealth and social background of the men who joined before and after the opening of recruitment changed little: I don't think beyond quite works in this context: usually, it should mean "except for", but conscription is being identified as as point of continuity.
only five asses per day: can we put that into context as to roughly how much it was?
Extremely lowwith Gruen quote "bare subsistence" added to note. Ifly6 ( talk) 16:26, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
Marius' redesign did not stick: MOS:IDIOM would like this rephrased more literally, particularly as pila do, literally, stick into shields and people.
Pliny's Natural History: as before, contextualise. Can we make it explicit that the eagle was the universal standard by Pliny's day, and so he's doing the classic Roman thing of projecting something important back onto a great man of the past?
before deploying them in the Lusitanian War c. 145 BC, which is the problem of having the abbreviation in body text. As the date is for the deployment, not the war, I'd suggest
before deploying them in approximately 145 BC during the Lusitanian War. UndercoverClassicist ( talk) 11:23, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
Polybius': we've given a date for the battle, but more important to give one for Polybius (and perhaps to explain a bit about him to establish that he knew what he was talking about).
Only during the civil wars: I'd give an explicit time period here, as we're trying to date this development. Likewise for triumviral period later.
later last century BC. Ifly6 ( talk) 16:00, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
mutineers demanded lands as a pretext for larger donatives: I'm not sure the word pretext (a false justification for something) is quite right here: do we mean that mutineers demanded lands as a form of donative?
largely in the interest of creating exempla (moral parables) of traditions broken rather than conveying historical events: I think the antithesis here is a little strong: would suggest removing the second part, as Val. Max. would probably have argued that the two were one and the same. It's certainly not a distinction that any Roman historian would have recognised, and an increasingly problematic one in modern historiography (with apologies to poor old Ranke).
Ifly6 ( talk) 16:32, 15 July 2023 (UTC)Thus, on closer inspection, most of the texts mentioning the dilectus of 107 do not make the levy as such the object of their discourse, but use the trace of it in the collective memory as a pretext to formulate moral considerations which, in reality, constitute their real subject (ambitio for Sallust; consuetudo for Valerius Maximus) or which arise from the most stereotypical observations of the political imagination (acting bono publico in Exuperantius; the drift of superbia for John the Lydian). However, the discursive practices of ancient authors – whether they are historians, biographers, or rhetoricians – do not guarantee that these interpretations necessarily have a direct relationship with the historical fact on which they claim to be based.
Much of this work, however, did not carry over into the Anglophone scholarship until the 1980s / The British classicist Peter Brunt, in his 1971 book Italian Manpower, also questioned the extent to which Polybius' descriptions reflected the army of the mid-second century: these two sentences don't quite fit together. Was Brunt a radical outlier in 1971, or had he only taken on part of the revisionist view?
William Harris: who and when was he?
William Vernon Harris, an American classicist, first showed in 1979means that the first time Harris showed it was in 1979, but I think we mean that Harris was the first to show it, and that he did so in 1979. UndercoverClassicist ( talk) 11:23, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
this recast Marius' call in 107BC for volunteers as Numidia not being a rich eastern kingdom on which Roman armies could engorge themselves: this is a bit confusing. I think phrasing it in the positive (that is, getting rid of the not) would help.
this recast Marius' call in 107 BC for volunteers as reflecting enthusiasm emerging from the relative scarcity of expected plunder from Numidia: I no longer understand this (lots of abstract nouns, which might be the problem). Do we mean that Marius called for volunteers because he expected there to be relatively little plunder available in Numidia (and therefore that soldiers weren't signing up in their usual numbers)? UndercoverClassicist ( talk) 11:23, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
Do we mean that Marius called for volunteers because he expected there to be relatively little plunder available in Numidia (and therefore that soldiers weren't signing up in their usual numbers)?Yes. Ifly6 ( talk) 16:36, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
and the bidding wars for military loyalty that waged concurrently with the actual fighting: this could be clearer: in particular, we could establish the extent to which bidding wars is (not) a metaphor.
bidding warsbecause it is not a metaphor. Ifly6 ( talk) 16:00, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
generals' attempts to secure military loyalty with pay increases? Ifly6 ( talk) 21:35, 13 July 2023 (UTC)
Rüstow's book became the main progenitor of the comprehensive Marian reforms hypothesis, likely because it was written in German instead of Latin.
Faszcza 2021, p. 21. Rüstow's book became the main progenitor of the comprehensive Marian reforms hypothesis, likely because it was written in German instead of Latin.Ifly6 ( talk) 16:53, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
Earwig's happy: it flags up a few bits of overlap with online sources, but those are limited to the fact that both have cited the same sources. I can't see anything on the CLOP side to be concerned about at this stage.
In each case, could I have the direct quotation for the sourced material. I don't need translations from French, but would appreciate them from Polish.
Under the this scheme, the proletarii were exempt from conscription except when an emergency, called a tumultus, was declared; under such circumstances, the poorest were levied as well. The first documented instance of the proletarii being called up was some time in the fourth century; they first received arms at state expense in c. 281 BC, at the start of the Pyrrhic War.(OCD 4).
An emergency levy (tumultuarius dilectus) was the only time that *proletarii (citizens who fell below the military census qualification for military service) could be enrolled (Gell. 16. 10. 11–13), and on a famous occasion, probably the invasion of *Pyrrhus in 281 BCE, they were for the first time armed at public expense (Enn., Ann. 170–2 Skutsch; Cassius Hemina fr. 21 Peter).Ifly6 ( talk) 01:54, 15 July 2023 (UTC)
I had talked to Taylor. There are no in-depth historiographies in English. Rafferty recommended Cadiou, already cited, but Cadiou's historiographical section in the introduction goes only back to the late 19th century. Ifly6 ( talk) 15:36, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
I don't have current access to the original Cadiou in French; the only place nearby that has it is the Library of Congress. I wrote for myself an English translation, however. Ifly6 ( talk) 15:44, 14 July 2023 (UTC)
GA review (see here for what the criteria are, and here for what they are not)
(Criteria marked
are unassessed)
It's a good article, but while it casts doubt on the traditional modern historiography of the "Marian reforms", it never offers an alternative. So if there never was one specific set of monumental reforms, the question becomes, did the changes ever occur at all? And if so, of what nature were they, exactly?
Currently, only the very last two paragraphs of the article attempt an explanation (section: Contemporary historiography). But I'm still left with the feeling of a gaping hole after all the critique has been done. Or is it simply the case, as one of the sources states, that we just don't have an alternative? Just don't know? "Cadiou has not given us a coherent new account of the late republican army, but he has demolished the old one." [2]
If so, this could be made explicit, so that an amateur hobbyist like me could sleep in peace without the nagging feeling like they've missed something. MrThe1And0nly ( talk) 13:35, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
"Reform" | c. 100 BC | Marius? | Ever? |
---|---|---|---|
Army proletarianisation (Big bad client armies) |
![]() |
![]() |
|
Equipment changes | ![]() |
![]() |
|
State-purchased equipment | ![]() |
![]() |
|
More training | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Bye bye horsies | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Cohorts > maniples | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Land for veterans | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Citizenship for veterans | ![]() |
![]() |
![]() |
Ever?to mark reforms that happened but not around 100 BC: it is not always perfectly clear when they happened but it was not around 100 BC; the superscripts mark whether they happened before or after 100 BC. How they should be thought of, however, is as evolutionary expediencies or accretions taken step-by-step to solve immediate problems rather than as some monumental project by one visionary man. Ifly6 ( talk) 18:34, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
ten asses a day is the value set on life and limb; out of this, clothing, arms, tents, as well as the mercy of centurions and exemptions from duty have to be purchased. Ifly6 ( talk) 20:17, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
References
I question the staggering number of words like "supposed," "alleged," "putative," etc. I get having disclaimers at the start of disputed topics, but not every sentence. It's really just too much. It stops the flow and comes across like someone has an ax to grind.
Foregrounding the current skepticism this much leaves it unclear what this article is even about. Is this an article about a period in Roman history that was later subject to exaggeration and myth making, or about a 19th Century just-so story that's bad and wrong and here's why?
I'd like to see the narrative cleaned up and tackled chronologically with a neutral POV. 98.176.69.41 ( talk) 02:41, 11 October 2023 (UTC)
period in Roman historywhich the phrase "Marian reforms" would describe. The consensus among historians today is that the "Marian reforms" as described in the 19th century did not exist at almost every level. Composing this reply itself raises the wording issue you brought: I initially tried to write the article is about the reforms but this is not accurate since they did not exist; I therefore must write
the article is about the supposed reforms.
why are we immediately moving "beyond" an important near-contempory source suggesting an early origin to the "reform" narrative?: that's exactly what Wikipedia's policies tell us to do, given that no high-quality, scholarly treatment today takes that primary source at face value. Similarly, if modern scholars have published works probing the origins of the "Marian Reforms" narrative, we should use and cite them, but we can't do that if they haven't (this is the policy against using research that has not appeared in print elsewhere). UndercoverClassicist T· C 07:45, 2 April 2024 (UTC)