Italian Hill Tribes (I/36)

Synopsis: Add fortified camps and Aequi emergency levy.

Author: Tim Montgomery

Proposal 1:

Add:

Justification:

See Livy Book VIII 29.2 (Penguin Classics Rome and Italy):

"Then he (the consul) broke their power (the Vestini, a Sabine tribe) in a single action, though not without casualties amongst his own men, so that the Vestini first took refuge in their camp and then, losing confidence in palisades and entrenchments..."

In Livy IX 45.15 the Aequi have a fortified camp with a gate and ramparts (see below).

Proposal 2:

Add:

Only Aequi in 305 BC:

Downgrade Ax(O) to Ax(I) up to half

Justification:

See Livy Book IX 45.15 (Penguin Classics Rome and Italy) in reference to a war between the Romans and Aequi in 305:

"The Aequi had fought no war on their own account for a great many years; their army looked like an emergency levy, without definite leaders or supreme command and was in a state of confusion. (Aequorum exercitus, ut qui suo nomine permultos annos imbelles egissent, tumultuario similis sine ducibus certis, sine imperio trepidare...) Some were all for marching out to battle (against the Romans), others for guarding the camp."

(Livy goes on to describe how they vote to leave their camp and tend to their possessions, thus perplexing the Romans who enter the camp and find it empty. The following year, the Aequi are at war again with the Romans and are defeated.)

The downgrade to Ax(I) reflects the tumultus or "emergency levy", men who haven't had experience in war for a long time; the remainder the troops that were all for marching out to fight the Romans. The downgrade assumes that the existing grade of Irr Ax (O) applies to the bulk of the troops; but there might be a case for the "hill tribes" being regular by this late date.