Legiones I
| Cognomina: |
Italica ("Italian");
Italica Severiana ("Severus' Italian") |
| Foundation: |
By Nero, circa 67 CE, to
participate in planned Caspian invasion |
| Birthdate |
Dies natalis 20 September
(CIL iii.7591) |
| Notable
Commanders: |
None |
| Major Actions: |
First and second battles of
Cremona (civil war, 69 CE); Dacian/Sarmatian campaigns (86-90 CE); Dacian
wars (101-106 CE); Marcommanic wars (166-180 CE) |
| Permanent
Stations: |
Lugdunum, Gaul (now Lyon,
France); Novae (near Svishtov, Bulgaria) |
| Discussion: |
Legio I Italica
was enrolled by Nero circa 67 CE to augment Roman forces in advance of a
projected expedition against the Albani tribe living near the Bosporus
straits, the entrance to the Caspian Sea. (Suetonius, Life of
Nero 19.2)
The theatrically vainglorious Nero styled his new
Italian legion "The Phalanx of Alexander the Great."
While I Italica's initial dilectus recruited
only Italians, future recruits were found mostly outside of Italy.
Out of eight later inscriptions left by I Italica soldiers in
Moesia, two soldiers are Italian, one Narbonese, two Macedonian, and four
of Thracian descent.
|
| 68-69
CE |
I Italica joined the army of Vitellius, defeating
Otho's forces at the first battle of Cremona (also called Bedriacum), but
was itself defeated in turn by Vespasian at the second battle of Cremona.
The victor, Vespasian, posted I Italica along
with the other defeated remnants of Vitellius' legions to Illyricum and
Moesia where they could not threaten his consolidation of imperial
power.
|
| 86-90 CE |
I Italica next saw action
in Domitian's punitive campaigns against the Dacians, 86-88 CE. The
legion also took part in the inconclusive Sarmatian campaign in 89-90, in
which an army of Iazyges and Suebi destroyed Legio V Alaudae.
|
| 101-106 CE |
Under the command of Trajan, a
Roman army including I Italica resumed the offensive against the
Dacian kingdom in two separate wars, 101-102 and 105-106 CE. After
the final victory, I Italica returned to Novae, Lower Moesia.
|
| 166-180 CE |
On the orders of Marcus
Aurelius, I Italica and other legions detached cohorts into task
forces called vexillationes, which were then sent to the defense of
the Rhine against the German tribes of the Marcomanni. The majority
of the legion, with its commander and aquila, remained in Novae.
|
| Post 180 CE |
After 180 CE, little else is
known about I Italica. Like the other frontier legions, it
probably devolved into a regional border militia much less disciplined and
well-equipped than the original.
On the basis of an inscription dated to 224 CE
commemorating the dies natalis of the legion, it seems that a
second cognomen, Severiana, was bestowed (CIL 3.6224).
However, the honorific does not appear in a later inscription of 300 CE (L'Annee
epigraphique, Paris 1981, pg 777). It may have been the product
of a desperate effort by Severus Alexander to legitimize his rule by
association with the dynasty of Septimius Severus, whose name Alexander
assumed.
The 5th c. eastern emperor Justinian attempted to
restore Novae's walls during his efforts to reunify the crumbling Roman
empire, but the work was abandoned and the townsfolk drifted away.
|
| Modern
Re-enactment and Research |
Legio
I Italica
in Atlanta, Georgia.
Novae, near modern Svishtov (Swisjtow), Bulgaria, has
been excavated by Polish and Bulgarian archaeologists.
|
| Cognomina: |
Augusta ("Augustus'
Own"); Germanica ("German-conquering") |
| Foundation: |
Probably by Caesar, circa 48-46
BCE; may have been raised by the consul Pansa against Marcus Antonius, c.
43 BCE |
| Birthdate |
Unknown; emblem unknown |
| Notable
Commanders: |
None |
| Major Actions: |
Civil war (pro-Caesar),
Hispania, 46 BCE
?Battle of Mutina, 43 BCE
?Battle of Phillippi, 42 BCE
Campaigns against Sextus Pompeius, 38-36 BCE
Civil war (pro-Octavian), 32-31 BCE
Cantabrian war, Hispania, c. 26-19 BCE
Civil war (Vitellius) 69 CE
Revolt of Civilis, 70 CE |
| Permanent
Stations: |
Colonia Agrippinensis (Cologne,
Germany)
Bonna (Bonn, Germany) |
[map to be added]
| Discussion: |
It is thought that Legio I
(later called Augusta and then reconstituted as I Germanica)
was raised in Italy by Julius Caesar after he entered his second
consulship in 48 BCE, just after he had crossed the Rubicon river,
plunging the Roman world into civil war. At the same time he also
raised three other legions using the numerals traditionally reserved for
consular legions (I-IV).
It is also possible that the consul Caius Vibius Pansa
raised Legio I with several others in 43 BCE, to support the
senatorial forces in alliance with Octavian against Marcus Antonius,
culminating in a clash at Mutina.
|
|
48-44 BCE
|
There is no evidence that the
green Legio I accompanied Caesar's 12-legion expeditionary force
across the Adriatic Sea to confront Pompeius Magnus' senatorial army at
Dyrrhachium and Pharsalus. Left behind
in Italy, Legio I apparently sat out the campaigns Caesar waged
against Pharnaces II in Asia Minor as well as the victory over the
Pompeians at Thapsus in North Africa (46 BCE). Legio
I may have gotten its first chance to fight in 46, as part of Caesar's
hasty campaign against the stubborn holdouts of Pompeian resistance in
Spain. In the Spanish War (ch. 26.4), Caesar recounts a taunt
of Gnaeus Pompeius, mocking the inexperience of his legions. While
not specifically mentioned in the sources, Legio I's sister legions
II and III (later Gallica) are; it is therefore not so far a
stretch to place Legio I in the Caesarian army at Munda. Six
months after the triumph at Munda, Caesar was slain. The invasion of
Parthia for which he had been assembling an army in Macedonia -- not
including Legio I, apparently -- was abandoned. |
| 44-36 BCE |
In the scramble for power
following Caesar's assassination, Legio I cast its allegiance to
Octavian, Caesar's young heir.
It is unclear whether Legio I actually fought at
Mutina (43 BCE) against Marcus Antonius; however, if the consul Pansa
raised the legion, combat at Mutina would have been almost a
certainty. It should be mentioned that Pansa, who was mortally
wounded in the fierce fighting, lost over half his men and his raw legions
fled back to their camp in confusion and fear (Appian, Civil Wars
III.69).
Given the massive mobilization of the Triumvirs' forces
to destroy the opposing army of Caesar's assassins Brutus and Cassius, it
seems likely that Legio I took part at the battle of Phillippi in
42 BCE.
Octavian utilized Legio I during his sporadic
suppression of Sextus Pompeius, 38-36 BCE (Appian, Civil Wars
V.112). |
| 35-31 BCE |
The activities of Legio I
are unclear during this period, but it seems reasonable to presume that
the legion transferred across the Adriatic Sea with the great majority of
Octavian's army to fight the Antonian forces at Actium.
|
| 30-16 BCE |
During this period, Legio
I seems to have gained a cognomen -- Augusta -- only to lose it for
their later involvement in a mutiny.
In 26 BCE, Augustus (formerly Octavian) moved forces to
northwestern Hispania to extend Roman domination over the Cantabri
tribe. By 19 BCE, Augustus' general M. Vipsanius Agrippa was still
unable to drive the stubborn Cantabri to submission.
After some Roman troops mutinied over service conditions
and the poor conduct of the campaign, Agrippa punished them by discharge
in disgrace and the removal of the honorific title Augusta from Legio
I (Dio 54.11.5).
The Cantabri were finally subdued that year and Legio
I remained in Spain until c. 16 BCE, when it was transferred to the Rhine
frontier.
|
circa 16 BCE-
9 CE |
Legio I established a
fortress with Legio XX (later Valeria Victrix) at Colonia
Agrippinensis in Lower Germany. Mutiny??
|
| 9-68 CE |
In the wake of the disastrous
loss of Varus' 3 legions to a Cheruscan ambush in the Teutoburgiensis
Saltus, Legio I was transferred to Bonna. His forward German
policy a patent failure, Augustus abandons his plan for a new province of
Germania. The Rhine frontier solidifies under Tiberius and later
emperors.
At some time during this period, perhaps while serving
under the elder Drusus or Germanicus, Legio I won a new cognomen, Germanica,
presumably for victories against the restive German tribes beyond the
Rhine. |
| 69-70 CE |
[incomplete] |
| Modern
Re-enactment and Research |
No re-enactment efforts.
Cf. Ronald Syme, "Some notes on the legions under
Augustus," Journal of Roman Studies 23 (1933) for a discussion
of the continuity of Legio I from the Cantabrian war to the
legion's reappearance on the German frontier. The
evidence for the cognomen Germanica is found in AE 1976, 515
(indicating a possible Augustan date); CIL xii.2234; Dessau ILS
2342 (Claudian period); and AE 1956, 169. |
|
