WI Vercingetorix Crushes Caesar at Alesia

Not true about the numbers. For one thing, the Romans had better logistics than the Gauls, and the Romans never massed more than about 80,000 to 100,000 troops in one army. Not 250,000.+
At Alesia they had 25,000, as compared to a combined force of 180,000-330,000 for the Gauls.
 
ErrngeQuote:
Originally Posted by MattII
At Alesia they had 25,000, as compared to a combined force of 180,000-330,000 for the Gauls.

the Romans had more like 70,000 men.

For clarification to everyone on the actual battle, here's the wiki article

Battle of Alesia

that's okay, I changed the article so now it says; romans 10 thousand, gauls half a million
 
I've been around for over a year now, and I can't recall this conversation ever coming up. So, let's say, at the Battle of Alesia, Vercingetorix successfully defeats Julius Caesar, bringing about an humiliating Roman defeat.

What happens next?

Is Gaul unified enough to take back Gallia Narbonensis? What does this mean for the Roman Republic? Will Gaul remain free from Roman rule? Will another Roman general send an army into Gaul and attempt to retake the region? How will they fair?

The Roman Republic continues for a while in its ramshackle late form. Actually Pompey was doing what Augustus did--keeping all the Republican forms while holding the reins of power--so Rome moves in the direction of OTL Empire but the change isn't as clear to everyone as it was in OTL with the discontinuity of Caesar's rule and the massive civil wars.
 
Ah, a mistyping on my part, should be 50,000 (as per the article) which still means that the Gauls outnumbered the Romans, as I described, somewhere between 3 1/2 and 6 1/2 times.

How did the Gauls managed to feed that many men in one place?

Among other logistics issues. That sounds rather high.
 
What do we define as crushing victory here? If Caesar has his Carrhae, this leaves Pompeius Magnus de facto sole ruler of Rome. If Caesar loses by a narrow margin he'll just spin it into a part of his master plan for the conquest in his book after round II. ;)
 
How did the Gauls managed to feed that many men in one place?

Among other logistics issues. That sounds rather high.
Vercingetorix only had 80,000 (still not a small number) inside Alesia, the other 120,000-250,000 were the relief force. And starvation quickly set in in Alesia, to the point where the women and children were sent out of the city in the hopes that the Romans would let them through (they didn't).
 
Vercingetorix only had 80,000 (still not a small number) inside Alesia, the other 120,000-250,000 were the relief force. And starvation quickly set in in Alesia, to the point where the women and children were sent out of the city in the hopes that the Romans would let them through (they didn't).

That makes a bit more sense, but those figures still sound too high to sustain for any period of time. So I'm trying to figure out how they'd be able to have enough supplies for that (for the relief force, you mentioned the fate of those within Alesia).

I don't want to dispute the figure, as I haven't studied this in particular, but being able to supply the (mid-point between the two extremes) 185,000 men of the relief force takes half a million tons worth of food. Daily. How are they transporting it all?
 
That makes a bit more sense, but those figures still sound too high to sustain for any period of time. So I'm trying to figure out how they'd be able to have enough supplies for that (for the relief force, you mentioned the fate of those within Alesia).

I don't want to dispute the figure, as I haven't studied this in particular, but being able to supply the (mid-point between the two extremes) 185,000 men of the relief force takes half a million tons worth of food. Daily. How are they transporting it all?

According to Peter Kehne, in Erdkamp, A Companion to the Roman Army, and Kehne draws on Engels and Roth, the troops required about 1½ kg of food per day; their cavalry horses required 2½ kg of barley per day, and either time and pasturage or 7 kg of hay per day.

I would add that 120,000 troops is larger than any Roman field army. At Cannae, the Republic had slightly more than 80,000 troops; some armies at Pharsalus and Phillipi are comparable; Julian's army in Persia had slightly more than 60,000 and was divided into two forces.

But assuming - for the sake of these calculations - 108,000 infantry, 12,000 cavalry, and 40,000 military servants and camp followers - that's 240,000 kg of food, plus 114,000 kg of fodder per day. If Caesar hasn't already stripped the land bare, the relief force will do so after a few days without supplies. So they are going to need to bring the supplies from elsewhere in Gaul.

And the pack animals need to eat too. A horse - depending on size - can carry about 70 kg to 90 kg and will eat about 7½ kg to 9½ kg per day. So the pack animals will carry less than 10 days' supplies. A horse - again depending on size - can rarely pull more than 35 kg to 45 kg for any distance. So using wagons doesn't seem to solve the problem. So it all depends on the depot system, not exactly the Gallic forte.
 
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