Romans as Engineers

Donald,

Most of the army was *not* engineers (don't say that - you'll get John
Atkinson all excited!). But they were directed by engineers. Every day, they'd
start their marches early (this is past a certain time period) and their head
units would have already scouted a location and they'd lay out a camp, just
like the one the night before, to house a legion (thousands of guys). It'd
have an earthen rampart and logs emplaced to make assault difficult. It had a
very "standard" shape and size. EVERY NIGHT in hostile country they did this.
What a feat. And I can understand why the soldiers didn't like it. God, I've
dug a trench, moved a mile, dug it again, as pointless PT. Never for a serious
reason... but it was hard work.

They actually beat the crap out of some forces because they attacked at night
and the enemies hadn't thought to build any defences or have any night combat
drills. The Romans were something amazing in their time.

> Thomas Barclay wrote:

> Donald,

Yes they were lead by engineers during building projects, but the troopers did
all the work... (To me this makes them engineers in a "sense", because of all
the "construction knowledge" they gain by doing all that labor.)

One thing I thought was amazing, was in one of my "roman soldier" books. It
was saying that by the time the lead units had found a good camping spot, the
last infantry units wouldn't leave the old camp for another 3 hours, and the
baggage train wouldn't arrive at the new camp for another 5
1/2 hours after that.  Talk about a looong column!  According to the
book, the average distance between camps was about 10 miles, and the effective
length of the marching column was 22.5 miles.

(BTW, that book is: "The Roman WAR Machine" by John Peddie, page 75.)

I got it from the Military Book Club These guys are really cool! You can get
military books on almost any subject. (except secret stuff of
course.)  I was able to get books on my favorite period of history --
the middleages.