WI : Roman Slave Armies

GdwnsnHo

Banned
By and large I've never come across a scenario with the Roman Empire that uses many slaves for non-commercial purposes.

What if after the 3rd Century crisis, or some other point in Roman History, the Empire set up Janissary style armies - be it by conscripting slaves to form an army, with the promise of freedom and citizenship after the war (and the former owner being compensated).

Could this have provided additional manpower during crucial periods?
 
By the time of the Crisis of the Third Century the army was Rome. The Principate was dead and the Emperor was just whichever general could command the loyalty of the most legions.

If a significant portion of those legions were slaves... it wouldn't end well.

Having a Janissary-like state army requires a stable continuity of governement that (most of the time) just didn't exist in Imperial Rome.
 
Romans probably still remember what happens when slaves gets weapons. But hadn't Romans something legion where was criminals? This is probably closest what you can get.
 
Romans probably still remember what happens when slaves gets weapons. But hadn't Romans something legion where was criminals? This is probably closest what you can get.
I was under the impression that towards the end,they did conscript both criminals and slaves.
 
I was under the impression that towards the end,they did conscript both criminals and slaves.


When short of manpower the Romans did arm slaves on several occasions in return for their freedom.

Republican Rome used penal and slave legions in the Punic Wars, the Consul Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus offering freedom to any man that brought him a Carthaginian head, but that was a strictly stopgap measure. This sort of thing happened a few times, but the OP seems to want something more regular, which I don't see happening.
 
It happened during the Second Punic War, I think, in the aftermath of Cannae. The state bought slaves, made them legions, and freed at their discharge.
 
GdwnsnHo In my TL the roman army, was faced with a lack of recruits and Caesar Valentinian, begun recruiting slaves from the Imperial Mines. But not a slave army, more like Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus slave legions, freedom and full citizenship at the end of the service with the extra promise of allowing the former slave to buy the freedom to his family, and if he does so before he leaves the army they also receive roman citizenship.
 
Could this have provided additional manpower during crucial periods?

The main issues about a huge slave army would be the monopolisation of army by the imperium in the IIIrd century, colliding with the private property of domestic slaves; as for compensation, assuming it could be covered with the really poor state of imperial treasury, it wouldn't replace their taskforce utility.

As you said, there was a constant lack of manpower from this point, not only in the army but as well in countryside or other productive tasks.

Using non-domestic slaves as an army, nobody ever risked that in ancient/medieval times AFAIK, without an existential threat : Janissaries or Mameluks weren't your low-bottom slave working in fields or mines, after all.

Now, you certainly had slaves forming at least private armies in Late Antiquity : Ervig's law specifically mention that people owning slaves and eligible for military service had to carry with then one ten of their slaves (altough it was at least as much for political reasons than military).

That bucellarii (houseold troops, roughly) could have been composed with slaves is likely : it was illegal, but that it was specifically mentioned (in a law passed in 476) indirectly points that it existed.

But note that is was most certainly domestic slaves there, as it happened for Arabo-Islamic "slave on horse" situations.
 
Given that one of the manpower problems the Romans faced in its decline was getting land holders to stop hiding their tenants from recruiters, I don't see how slaves would be any easier to find.
 
Given that one of the manpower problems the Romans faced in its decline was getting land holders to stop hiding their tenants from recruiters, I don't see how slaves would be any easier to find.

Slaves were even harder to find, because there were much more tenants than slaves. At least after the structures in agriculture changed latest mid of the 1st century AD.

The romans did not recruit slaves, but they recruited freedmen. Usually just for the Vigiles in Rome and the fleets. But in emergency case also for auxilia cohorts and most probably in rare cases also for legions. Augustus did it after the Clades Variana and Marcus Aurelius did it during the Marcomann Wars.

It is a good guess that some of these freedmen entered the recruiting office as a slave and left it as a free man with the citizen status needed for the respective unit.

The romans also recruited prisoners of war, like the Numerus Vandalorum deployed to Egypt and the Numerus Sarmatorum in Britain. Well, not really prisoners. It was rather a kind of tribute as part of a peace contract. Technically free men, but not serving voluntarily.
 
Slaves were even harder to find, because there were much more tenants than slaves. At least after the structures in agriculture changed latest mid of the 1st century AD.

The slaves represented about 10-15% of the empires population and not only the agriculture slaves, so to say, were available to serve in the army. Given that the emperor was the greatest landowner in the Imperium, he would be able to recruit his own slaves, either the ones serving in the fields and the ones serving in the Imperial Mines.

The romans did not recruit slaves, but they recruited freedmen. Usually just for the Vigiles in Rome and the fleets. But in emergency case also for auxilia cohorts and most probably in rare cases also for legions. Augustus did it after the Clades Variana and Marcus Aurelius did it during the Marcomann Wars.

It is a good guess that some of these freedmen entered the recruiting office as a slave and left it as a free man with the citizen status needed for the respective unit.

It desperate cases that wasn't unusual. Like Cambyses The Mad said, Gracchus recruited slaves in 216 BC. In that year, Fabius Maximus and the Senate decided to induct volunteer slaves into the Roman armies and to have them serve in separate legions to win their freedom.

Another example, but one i can't confirm so it might be wrong, was that after the lost of the three legions in Teutoburg, slaves were conscripted to the legions because of the low number of volunteers and the growing unpopularity of conscription on Italia.

The romans also recruited prisoners of war, like the Numerus Vandalorum deployed to Egypt and the Numerus Sarmatorum in Britain. Well, not really prisoners. It was rather a kind of tribute as part of a peace contract. Technically free men, but not serving voluntarily.

They did, but most of the time such units weren't reliable. During the crisis of the third century, many emperors preferred to put the barbarians into no-win situations, so that they could go and make a deal with them, we don't kill you, but you must serve eight to ten years in my army. Against roman foes they were reliable, but against their own people they weren't that much.

Slave legions could work, but they had to be on a unit were slaves were the minority, lets say in a 1000 men unit they should only be 10-15% of the units' full strength. And with the promise of full citizenship and the rather high salary the legionaries received there is no great reason for them to revolt against the men that gave them freedom and a chance to buy, and free, their family.
 
The slaves represented about 10-15% of the empires population ...

Is this a figure from late empire? You know that the use of slaves in agriculture dropped dramatically during the 1st century AD? Tenants were just more efficient, more casual and more appropriate for a roman landowner who was just looking for interest on equity capital.

The emperor himself already used slaves heavily in civil administration. 50% or more of the staff of a procurator were slaves and freedmen. In the central administration in Rome even more. Education and loyality of these guys was obvioulsy better than what you could expect from the common free roman.


Slave legions could work, but they had to be on a unit were slaves were the minority, lets say in a 1000 men unit they should only be 10-15% of the units' full strength.

That was perhaps already the case. Historians guess, that every legion had about 1000-1200 Calones. It is unclear if these were slaves or free men, but most probably lot of them have been slaves. So your quota is already full.
 
I'm not sure slaves would be any more loyal than foederati to be honest. Indeed, I think it would make things considerably worse if prudent barbarian kings like Alaric or Theodoric actively entice Roman "slave armies" over to their side — and why not? If the barbarians can deliver the goods to the slaves why wouldn't they betray their former masters at the first opportunity. Roman citizenship was becoming more and more meaningless in the 5th century even for the Romans!
 
When short of manpower the Romans did arm slaves on several occasions in return for their freedom.

While true, the Romans almost always did it when they had no options left, and always freed them first. It's not something that they would let become a regular thing.
 
The slaves represented about 10-15% of the empires population
That's an average rate for the classical era, and for the whole of the Empire. In fact, it depended a lot from regions (Gaul had probably significantly less slaves than in Spain, for exemple) and context (during the Late Empire, the servile population ration probably lowered at the benefit of clientelized peasantry).
 
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