CAVALRY EQUIPMENT OF THE ROMAN ARMY IN THE FIRST CENTURY A.D.
M.C. BishopINTRODUCTIONThe main aim of this paper is to identify and describe the elementsthat went together to make up Roman military horse (or riding) harnessin the first century A.D.
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Closely linked with this, however, will be aconsideration of just how much the archaeological evidence can tell usabout the military use of mounts.
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It is to be hoped that the presentwork will at least serve to generate new interest in cavalry equipmentand provoke discussion about the functions of its various components.There are two main source areas for the study of Roman militaryhorse equipment: monuments depicting its use and artefacts recoveredfrom the archaeological record.Pictorial evidence, most notably that represented by sculpture, canbe used to show how the various elements of horse harness functioned asa whole. The value of such depictions is hotly debated, but it isgenerally true that funerary monuments tend to give a more accuratepicture than official sculpture, although both categories vary widely inquality.
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Two types of tombstone, the 'Reiter' and the 'Totenmahl' arecharacteristic of the first century A.D. (although not exclusively so):
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these show, in the first instance, the deceased cavalryman riding hismount in combat, often with a cowering barbarian being trampled beneaththe horse;
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the other type depicts the dead man enjoying a funerarybanquet in the afterlife in an upper scene, whilst his horse is paradedin all its equipment in a lower.
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Totenmahl depictions usually show thehorse being controlled from behind by means of long-reins and with itssaddle covered by an overblanket, whilst the trooper's calo carriesspare spears (javelins?). As has been noted, the quality could vary andthere are cases where the sculptor probably did not understand hissubject matter, but some of the best pieces, like the stone of T.Flavius Bassus at Köln, appear to be detailed documents of the way inwhich horse harness functioned.
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As well as private funerary monuments, mention must be made ofofficial sculpture, if only to sound the now customary note of cautionabout interpreting it too literally. It is certainly important toappreciate that Trajan's Column, which is traditionally regarded as aprime source of information about the Roman army,
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includes a number ofclues to the fact that it is not a useful source for the study ofcavalry equipment, and these will be outlined later in some detail. Muchthe same is true of most of the major monuments of the city of Rome,
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but examination of some provincial sculpture of an official nature ismore productive. The triumphal arch at Orange,
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which is probablyTiberian, is a good example of this, with important details aboutharness being confirmed by the static weapons friezes, whilst the battlescenes provide an interesting comparison with the depiction of Romancavalry on the Rhineland tombstones.67
Originally published in Coulston, J.C. (ed.) 1988:
Military Equipment and the Identity of Roman Soldiers. Proceedings of the Fourth Roman Military Equipment Conference
, BAR International Series
394
, Oxford
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