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ANTH 489
Romans, Arabs and Vikings.
Seafaring in the Mediterranean during the Early Christian Era.
Class 7: Security in the Sea
1.
Importance of sea power was recognized at least in the 12th century BC, when king Ramses III
beat the Sea Peoples fleet (see relief at Medinet Abu).
We don‟t know much about naval warfare among the Myceneans nor the Helladic peoples, but
we have good evidence for advanced naval strategy in the time of the Greco Persian Wars (480
BC) as rival city states organized navies to seek national objectives.
The objective of naval warfare was material and property; and fleet battle was an effort to clear
the way for the victory to control civil and military commerce.
The Romans were perhaps not much of a natural sea power, like the Greeks had been, but we
know that they were as powerful and disciplined on the waters as they were on land.
2.
The Battle of Actium, between the forces of Octavian (63 BC – AD 14) and Mark Anthony (83
BC – 30 BC) on September 2nd 31 BC attest the importance of the Roman navy.
Octavian won the day and is said to have seized 700 of Antony‟s ships. After this a permanent
squadron was sent to the southern coast of Gaul (until Nero). His main fleets were designated the
classis Ravennatium (at Ravenna) and classis Misenatium (at Misenum).
Map shows naval bases and fleet stations at the time of Augustus.
3.
The locations of the fleets were based on availability of large, safe harbors.
However, after the Battle of Actium there were no other major naval engagements. The strong
Roman presence on the seas helped further the Pax Romana and created a safe environment for
the development of commerce.
Although civil wars remained frequent, they were mainly fought on land.
Piracy was reduced to a minor problem by end of 1st century BC.
Rome‟s fleets were kept near coasts as political insurance against the reemergence of threats.
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4.
After the 1st century, the gigantic polyremes of the battle of Actium slowly disappeared.
The largest ships became “fours,” fleets had mainly triremes, and light oared vessels, named
liburnians appeared and developed.
These fleets were equipped mainly for duties requiring speed and agility rather than maximum
fighting power. Their duties – besides fighting piracy – became mundane, such as the transport
of the imperial family.
5.
Reconstruction of a man-of-war second cent. Based on Trajan‟s column.
6.
Around the 1st and 2nd centuries AD inscriptions show that sailors called themselves soldiers.
There was no distinction between rowers and marines, as in the Greek navies.
Specialists and junior officers earned between 1.5 and 2 times the pay of the trumpeters, tactical
officers, standard bearers, doctors and armourers.
Alongside these ranks were specialists whose functions derived from the Greek and Hellenistic
navies. These were concerned with maintaining, rowing and sailing the ships: craftsmen, sailtrimmers, supply officers, rowing masters, etc.
All ships were commanded by a trierarchus. Squadrons were commanded by a nauarchus. The
most senior officers were entitled nauarchus princeps.
As in the army, most of these men were highly competent professionals that had started as
seamen and came up through ranks.
7.
Fleet commanders were Roman knights pursuing a career in the service of the emperor and bore
the title of preaefectus. They were assisted by subpreaefectus.
Latter, during the civil wars AD 68-69, Vespasian (AD 9-79) gave the title of praetoria to the
fleet commanders.
The responsibility of commanding a fleet was granted to the highest grade of equestrian officers.
They would earn 200,000 sesterces per year and ranked just below the four senior preaefectus of
the Night Watch, Corn Supply, Egypt, and the Praetorian Guard.
One of these praetoria was the encyclopaedist and author Pliny the Elder. He was Prefect of the
Misenum fleet when the Vesuvius erupted, in AD 79, and died suffocated after taking some of
his ships across the Bay of Naples to get a closer look at the volcano and rescue the local
inhabitants.
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8.
Provincial fleets were raised to meet local needs and therefore were smaller than the two Italian
fleets, consisting mostly of 2 level liburnians and one trireme as flagship.
A detail from Trajan‟s (AD 53 – 117) column showing ships of his fleet. The vessel in the center
is Trajan‟s flagship – a trireme – but the vessel on the foreground is a liburnian.
9.
The earliest of the provincial fleets may have been the classis Alexandrina, based in the great
harbor of Alexandria, at the mouth of the Nile.
Its role was probably to prevent seizure of the mouth of the Nile from which a major portion of
the corn supply which fed the city of Rome was shipped, and to deal with minor problems along
the coasts of Cyrene, Egypt and Judaea.
It was operational during the Jewish revolt (AD 115 - 117).
10.
Roman Provincial Fleets in the 2nd century:
Classis Syriaca: stationed in the eastern Mediterranean, its origins are obscure. It was probably
used discourage piracy.
Rome‟s other fleets all guarded its northern frontiers and were much more heavily engaged in
actual fighting than were those in the Mediterranean.
Classis Augusta Germanica: Formed by Augustus to help the conquest of Germany. Was
involved in combined operations w/ Roman land forces.
Classis Pannonica: Also formed by Augustus on the middle Danube, had a similar role as
German fleet.
Classis Moesiaca: also patrolled a section of the Danube in the region that is now Bavaria.
Classis Britannica: Formed by Gaius Caligula to help the invasion of Britain, it became a
permanent fleet, based at Dover in Kent.
Excavations have revealed 2 lighthouses at either side of what was the estuary in Roman times
and the remains of an early 2nd century fort.
11.
Perhaps overextended, in the late 2nd century AD the Roman empire witnessed pressure in the
frontiers and the re-emergence of piracy. The role of the fleets became more important, and their
activity increased.
Around AD the German frontier was breached by northern tribes. The Danube respective fleets
were involved in serious fighting.
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12.
Around this time the African and Spanish coasts also saw a resurgence of Moorish raids, which
probably required the attention of the Italian fleets.
By AD 180 an inscription records the existence of a new African fleet, classis nova Libyca.
13.
The assassination of emperor Commodus (AD 161 – 192) plunged the empire back into civil
war, and generals battled one another for the imperial seat.
14.
By the 3rd century, wars in the Orient required movement of troops and supplies from Italy,
which was done in part by sea.
15.
Inscriptions dating to around AD 230 record the appointment of knights to combat piracy in the
region of the Crimea and on the Mediterranean.
Shell-first shipbuilding technique is well-attested on a tombstone relief showing Roman
shipwright at work (early 3rd AD).
16.
In the early 3rd century, around AD 220, the emergence of an aggressive new Persian dynasty
brought yet new dangers to the Roman empire. Italian fleets again transported troops to the
eastern frontier, under Emperor Severus Alexander (AD 208-235) in 231-233 and emperor
Gordian III (AD 225-234) in 243-44.
Severus Alexander suffered the rise of the Sassanids in Persia and new German attacks in Gaul.
Inscriptions reveal that the Misenum fleet had to suppress rebellion in the western Med (North
Africa in AD 258-60).
Frequent absence of the bulk of the fleets together with their Prefects resulted in the appointment
of acting commanders at Misenum and Ravenna with the title of praepositi reliquationis, literally
„those in charge of the remainder‟. These men were usually appointed from the ranks of senior
legionary centurions.
Top: sketch of a galley based on a coin of Allectus AD 293-296 minted in Britain. A similar
ship was depicted in a 4th century mosaic found at Low Ham in Somerset. This type of vessel
was perhaps used by classis Britannica.
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17.
Pressure on both the northern and eastern frontiers resulted in instability. There was also a
resurgence of piracy on the empire coasts.
From the 250‟s to 270‟s the Goths ravaged the coasts of the Black Sea and forced its inhabitants
to build them a fleet to fight the Romans on water. Roman fleets offered resistance but suffered
unknown losses. It is not clear which fleets were involved and we don‟t really know about the
extent of their survival.
The northern riverine fleets did not survive these trials as a significant force. They are not
mentioned in inscriptions after the middle of the 3rd century.
The Goths had overrun the middle and lower Danube frontiers by the 250‟s.
18.
Only the classis Britannica was intact as an effective fighting unit in the northern frontier.
In the 270‟s several new forts were added around Dover, creating the defensive system known as
the Saxon Shore.
19.
The Saxon Shore defense system lasted until at least the later quarter of the 4th century, but the
history of the fleet classis Britannica is obscure after AD 296. It is possible that it was divided
into a number of smaller squadrons.
Notitia Dignitatum: Administrative document of the early 5th century that recorded divisions of
fleets into squadrons.
The document indicates that a small number of squadrons were distributed along the Danube in
the 4th century. Some of these squadrons were independent, some represented the remnants of
the classis Pannonica, and others were attached to a new Danube fleet, the classis Histrica.
Only 2 major fleets survived in the empire, in the early 4th century: the two in Italy (classis
Ravennatium & classis Misenatium).
These fleets came back into prominence as rival emperors vied to achieve sole rule. Constantine
(AD 272-337) acquired a large naval force by defeating Maxentius (AD 278-312) in AD 312.
This naval force was instrumental in the elimination of his final rival, Licinius (AD 250-325).
When Licinius was forced to retreat to Byzantium after a land battle, 80 of Constantine‟s
triacontors (liburnians) defeated 200 of Licinius‟ triremes. After AD 324 triremes are not
mentioned again.
Zosimus, writing in the 5th century, said that the secret of their construction had been forgotten
by then (long ago).
The defeat of Licinius, following the first large naval battle since Actium, about 350 years
before, brought restoration political stability to the Roman world after a century of civil wars.
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23.
The 5th century saw a resurgence of naval warfare. In AD 429 king Geiseric of the Germanic
Vandal tribe crossed the Strait of Gibraltar with 80,000 troops and seized Algerian city of Hippo
Regius (Augustin died during the siege, in AD 430). After gaining territory from the Romans he
moved east and in 439 took Carthage and made it the kingdom‟s capital.
After building a large fleet he raided the western Mediterranean and the coasts of Illyria and
Peloponnese.
The Vandals seized Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, and the Balearic Islands. For 35 years they were
the most powerful fleet in these seas.
After Attila‟s (AD 406-453) retreat, in AD 452, and death, the Romans tried to make peace with
the Vandals but the death of emperor Valetinian III (AD 419-455) and his replacement by the
usurper Petronius Maximus (AD 396-455) the attempt failed and the Vandals sacked Rome in
455.
In 468 they beat the Roman fleet, failed to invade the Peloponnese. In 476 they signed a peace
with the Byzantine empire.
25.
In AD 532 emperor Justinian I (482-565) started his war of conquest of the old Roman empire.
In 533 he assembled 500 transport ships and 92 dromons under general Belisarius (505-565) and
invaded Carthage.
26.
The war to conquer Italy lasted until AD 562. The imperial fleet enabled the army to go where it
would and have the necessary supplies.
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ANTH 489
Romans, Arabs and Vikings.
Seafaring in the Mediterranean during the Early Christian Era.
Class 7: Notitia dignitatum
The notitia dignitatum is a document that details the administrative organization of the Roman
Empire in the early decades of the 5th century. The original is lost, but four 16th century copies
exist, one of which illustrated, have survived.
(http://www.hs-augsburg.de/~harsch/Chronologia/Lspost05/Notitia/not_dig0.html):
It is an important document for our understanding of the organization of the empires (Eastern c.
AD 400 and Western c. AD 420) because it lists several thousand offices, from the highest
positions in the imperial courts to the lowest provincial levels.
It is available at: http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/notitia.html.
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(map from: http://members.ozemail.com.au/~igmaier/map.htm).
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