{"id":99097,"date":"2021-11-21T22:59:06","date_gmt":"2021-11-21T21:59:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/imperiumromanum.pl\/?post_type=ciekawostki&p=99097"},"modified":"2021-11-21T22:59:06","modified_gmt":"2021-11-21T21:59:06","slug":"space-in-formation-and-width-of-front-of-roman-legion","status":"publish","type":"ciekawostki","link":"https:\/\/imperiumromanum.pl\/en\/curiosities\/space-in-formation-and-width-of-front-of-roman-legion\/","title":{"rendered":"Space in formation and width of front of Roman legion"},"content":{"rendered":"

According to Polybius<\/a>1<\/sup>, during the period of the Republic, Roman legionaries in formation<\/a> had about 180 cm of space (both depth and width), which was 3.24 square meters. A more reliable source of information – Vegetius<\/a>2<\/sup> – is to indicate a width of 90 cm and a depth of 200 cm, i.e. 1.8 square meters. <\/p>\n

Polybius<\/a> gives his data in the section on the comparison of the combat value of the legion<\/a> to the phalanx. He compares here the exceptionally large space of the legionaries against the tight array of phalanxes (each was 90 cm wide and deep).<\/p>\n

According to Polybius, the Roman legionary<\/a> was supposed to have enough space to be free to use the sword to strike and throw a javelin, as well as to maintain a sense of security that his companions were nearby.<\/p>\n

As Adrian Goldsworthy points out, Roman soldiers, if we believe ancient records, had much more space in the formation for, for example, British troops during the Napoleonic Wars – soldiers at the beginning of the 19th century could only count at about 50-80 cm deep.<\/p>\n

The Republican standard maniple<\/a>, consisting of 120 soldiers, was usually 6 to 8 ranks wide. With 6 rows of depth, the maniple<\/a> consisted of 20 people in the line, which for the given width of 90 cm for a legionary gave a total of 18 meters of the maniple’s combat line. The depth at 200 cm per soldier is 12 meters deep for the 6th private unit. According to Adrian Goldsworthy, a typical legion would then have the front line, including the intervals between manipulations, 365 meters. In turn, a consular army<\/a> consisting of two Roman legions and two alae<\/em> allies would have a front of almost 1.5 km.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":99094,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"kategorie_ciekawostek":[80],"class_list":["post-99097","ciekawostki","type-ciekawostki","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","kategorie_ciekawostek-army"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/imperiumromanum.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ciekawostki\/99097","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/imperiumromanum.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ciekawostki"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/imperiumromanum.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/ciekawostki"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/imperiumromanum.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ciekawostki\/99097\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imperiumromanum.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/imperiumromanum.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"kategorie_ciekawostek","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/imperiumromanum.pl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/kategorie_ciekawostek?post=99097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}