Augustus Military Power Essay

During his reign, Augustus made a number of changes how the Roman military operated. As Rome shifted from a Republic to Empire and the ideas of what Rome was to be was carefully being crafted by Augustus to fit his own narrative, the army went through a number of changes to support the new dynamic of Empire and Emperor. These changes to the army allowed the army to grow to fit its new role, and helped Rome to become a true military power.

“Aged nineteen years old I mustered an army at my personal decision and personal expense, and with it I liberated the state, which had been oppressed by a despotic faction.” 1

After the assassination of Caesar, his nephew and adopted Son took it upon himself to bring to justice those who had murdered his great-uncle. In the quotation above, we see that the young Augustus , who did not yet have his own military command, had to raise his own army and fund them himself. Though the

funding of armies was not a typical expense that was bore by a single person, the concept of raising legions in times of war as needed was in fact the accepted practice. By doing this, it was easy to create a military of appropriate size for campaigns, but had its drawbacks. Every time the soldiers were released from duty once the conflict was over, the collective military experience was lost instead of passed on to new recruits. Additionally, it meant that every time a new army had to be raised, the entire force had to be trained before it could leave on campaign, which took a large amount of time and money and increased the cost overall.2
After his war with Antony, Augustus had a large amount of legions and was unsure what to do with them. While he kept his word and settled the troops of Julius Caesar, he instead discharged the soldiers under his command instead of disbanding the legions. The twenty eight existing legions of the time became the foundation for the Roman army for the foreseeable future. Instead of building up and breaking down legions perpetually, Augustus created the idea of a full-time standing army. This new professional army was to be on campaign in perpetuity, with recruits spending a set amount of time serving in a legion before returning to normal life in Rome or one of her colonies. This eliminated having to train large amounts of fresh recruits for campaigns, or having to conscript large numbers of Romans to create legions. It also introduced a new level of professionalism into the Roman army with a mix of seasoned soldiers and new recruits to benefit from their experience; this ensured that the legions had a stable base that was consistently a strong fighting force. 3
Additionally with these standing armies and fixed terms of service, it allowed the Empire to remain functionally at war indefinitely. This meant that the Empire was able to keep pressure on its borders, and set the stage for expansion in the following centuries. Effectively, Augustus managed to create a system that transformed Rome from being an occasionally conquering state to one that wielded large amounts of military power across its entire empire simultaneously with relative ease. One of the greatest repercussions that we can see from these actions is the relative peace enjoyed by those under Roman control. With civil war eliminated the permanent legions garrisoned around the Empire allowed for stronger, more stable borders, keeping peace inside the Empire and protecting it from outside threats.
With this increase in permanent legions and the length of term of service at sixteen years, there was another problem that needed to be answered.4 A standing professional army of the size aimed for by Augustus was too large to be composed entirely of Italians.

Prior to Augustus’s reforms, when legions were raised, they were comprised almost entirely of Italian recruits. This was out of the question with this new standing army, and filling the ranks with Italians gave way to supplementing legions with local auxiliaries, then later integrating these Romanised locals into a legions structure proper.5 This action undertaken by Augustus seems to have had ramifications as the centuries progressed, with the percentage of Italian born recruits steadily dropping, to the point where by the time of Hadrian, there were almost not Italians serving in the legions. Augustus’s methods of recruiting elsewhere to support the strength of his legions became so successful that they became the primary method of filling the requirements of the Empires new professional

army.