In some time after AD 120 (although for a long period of time it was considered to happen before 120 A.D.), the 9th Hispana legion seemed to disappear from the face of the Earth itself. There is no formal explanation nor any written trace in classical texts or inscriptions. However, in last few centuries many of the historians believe that the 9th has been wiped out by a local Scotland tribes called Caledonians. The legion was posted in that time in Scotland and it is suspected that roman authorities hushed entire debacle.
Rosemary Sutcliffe wrote a popular British children’s novel in 1954 named: The Eagle of the Ninth. It’s scenario was based on a fact that 9th Hispana was wiped out in “Pictland” in AD 117. This theory was later widely adopted by Hollywood also and number of films was made following this story line (most recent being
The Eagle, and
Centurion). However, it is important to say that no Roman writer identified tribes in Scotland as “Picts” (literally meaning painted ones) up until the end of third century, and the term Pictland itself wasn’t used until several centuries later. This storyline proved to be very fruit-full on the small (popular tv series) and big screen .
This kind of development didn’t go well with academic community so very soon a counter-theory emerged. It said that 9th Hispana had actually been wiped out a decade later in roman province of Judea, during the Second Jewish Revolt of AD 132-135. Yet there was and still is no proof in support of this theory other than the fact that Roman historian Cassius Dio had written the following concerning Jewish Revolt: “... many Romans, moreover, perished in this war.” {Dio, LXIX, 14}.
Some other academics have suggested that the 9th Hispana (9th from this point on) was the legion which Dio describes being wiped out by Parthian army at Elegeia in Armenia in AD 161 just at the beginning of the reign of Marcus Aurelius. However, up to date opinion is that legion in question was in fact 22nd Deiotariana which was based on the east for entire existence. AD 161 was also four decades after the last known reference to the 9th.
The theory of the 9th’s destruction in Judea did hold sway among academics even though there was no record of the legion leaving Britain, of being stationed in the East, or even of it’s existence during decade between AD 122-132. Evidence does point to the two legions stationed in Judea in that time (10th Fretensis and the 6th Ferrata) being severely weakened during the revolt, but there is no classical source mentioning utter destruction of any legion in Judea.
However, some authors pointed to the evidence of two inscriptions in Holland which they said, put the 9th out of Britain and on the Lower Rhine after AD 122. It was assumed that, as the legion had never previously been stationed on the Lower Rhine, theses inscriptions must have dated from some time after AD 122, meaning the legion had been transferred out of Britain not much after ADF 120. AD 120 is also the last time we have any kind of numismatic evidence of the 9th’s existence.
There is also a fact that another legion took the 9th’s place in Britain in AD 122, and some academics suggested that this shows an orderly transition from one resident legion to another that year. It has also been pointed out that two officers known to have served as laticlavius tribunes with the 9th (Lucius Aemilius Karus around AD 119 and Lucius Norvius Crispinus Martialis Saturninus in AD 121) both lived to enjoy long and distinguished careers. This led them to conclusion that legion could not have been wiped out in or before AD 122 and that it must have existed after that time.
This is worth examining in great detail. With only one laticlavius tribune serving with legion at any one time, Karus, who went to become consul and the governor of Arabia would have left legion by AD 121, and would be replaced by Saturninus as senior tribune and second-in-command of the 9th. Saturninus also became praetor, legion commander, consul and provincial governor. But what is interesting is this: following his posting as a tribune with the 9th, Saturninus did not receive another appointment for twenty-five (25) years. Only then was he again given the command of a legion.
In normal circumstances after leaving a legion, a man who had served as tribune could expect to soon take a seat in the Seante and over the following years, work his way up the promotionally ladder, with a legion command quickly following. After Ad 122, Saturninus’s career stopped in it’s tracks. Emperor Hadrian would have nothing more to do with him. It was only in AD 147 (Emperor Antoninus Pius) that Saturninus at last received legion command, that of the 3rd Augusta stationed in Africa. He was then 50 years old. A legion commander of that age in any time in Roman History is a great rarity indeed. Two years later, Antoninus gave Saturninus a new imperial appointment and his “dead” career was on the move once again, with a consulship around a corner. (CIL, VIII 2747, 18273.).
On the other hand, Saturninus’s predecessor at the 9th, Lucius Karus, had joined the Senate, been a praetor, commanded a legion, been made a consul and became governor of Arabia by AD 142. (AE 1909, 236, Gerasa) All this, he achieved while Saturninus was ignored, with his career peak when appointed as a provincial governor taking place five years prior Saturninus’s career restarting with his appointment of command of the 3rd Augusta Legion.
What stopped Saturninus’s career in it’s tracks? Could it be that he was present at the annihilation of the 9th Hispana Legion in northern Britain in AD 122? Was he, as a mounted officer, among the few men of the legion, able to escape the slaughter by galloping away accompanied by few cavalrymen in the same fashion that Petilius Cerialis had escaped Boudicca’s British rebels in AD 60 when he commanded the 9th? Or was Saturninus taken prisoner and later returned by Caledonians? The disgrace of defeat, surrender or capture was like a heavy burden around th necks of Romans. Many officers and soldiers throughout Roman history committed suicide rather than live to face either of those situations. Was this the reason why Lucius Saturninus was made to pay the price of ignominy for twenty-five years?
This wasn’t the first time a senior officer had been banned from the promotion list after his legion had suffered at the hands of the enemy in Britain. In AD 51 (Emperor Claudius) “...the legion under Manlius Valens had meanwhile been defeated” by the Silures in Wales. (Tac., A, XII.40) Neither this battle nor its location was described by Tacitus. The legion in question was not identified, but it is likely to be the 20th, which had recently arrived in the west of England after being transferred from Colchester in the late AD40s. The legion’s commander (Manlius Valens) survived the battle but the defeat of his unit saw him removed from the lists for next seventeen years.
Through the remainder of the reign Claudius and the entire reign of Nero, Valens received no further appointments. Only in AD 68, when Galba became emperor was Valens restored to the promotional ladder. He was then appointed as commander of another legion, new 1st Italica legion. Valens went on to become consul later in his life, in his ninetieth year to be exact. His case demonstrates a precedent for a senior legion officer being sidelined by the Palatium (Palace) for many years as punishment for defeat of his legion.
Now, we go back to those inscriptions concerning the 9th found in Holland. At Nijmegen, tile stamps of the 9th put men of the legion there, on the Lower Rhine, some time between AD 104 and 120. (Web., IRA, 2) Nearby, at Aachen, there is an altar dedicated by Lucius Lainius Macer, camp-prefect of the 9th. There is no numismatic evidence to show that the legion as a whole ever left Britain. That the altar at Aachen was dedicated by the legion’s camp-prefect tells us that he was leading a vexillation of the unit on detached duty on the Lower Rhine. If the entire legion had been there, its legate or tribune could have been expected to make the dedication.
Others proposed that a detachment of one or more cohorts from the 9th was transferred from Britain to Nijmegen in AD 113 when Trajan was preparing for his AD 114-116 Parthian campaign. (Hold., RAB, I) The theory is that the 9th detachment replaced troops taken from the Rhine and sent to the East for Trajan’s operations.
Also, it has been pointed out that several auxiliary units including the Ala Vocontiorum (cavalry wing) were transferred from Britain to the Lower Rhine in around AD 113, and so probably accompanied the 9th Hispana detachment. (Hold., RAB, I) All these auxiliary units that had transferred with the 9th Hispana vexillation were back at their old stations in Britain by AD 120. This suggests that by AD 120, the 9th detachment has also rejoined the mother legion in Britain, where numismatic evidence put the 9th that year.
Very interesting fact is that five auxiliary units known to be based in Britain up to this time (a cavalry wing and four light infantry cohorts) also disappeared from the face of the Earth in Britain the same year, AD 122 – the Ala Agrippiana Miniata, 1st Nervorium Cohort, 2nd Vasconum CR Cohort, 4th Delmatarum Cohort and 5th Raetorum Cohort. (Hold., DRA, ADRH) There is no record of the existence of these units after AD 122, just as there is no evidence of them being transferred or disbanded. This number of auxiliary units also represents the minimum that legion would take when going on campaign.
Were the 9th and its auxiliary support units ambushed by Caledonian tribes in Scotland in the late summer of AD 122 as they marched unsuspectingly through the lowlands of Scotland? Was the legion exterminated by the Caledonians with the bodies of the fallen Romans stripped and the 9th’s sacred eagle and all its other standards carried away by the victorious tribes? And did the legion’s second-in-command Lucius Saturninus survive the bloody battle and escape back to Roman lines, only to live in shame for the next twenty-five years?
In the spring of AD 122, the new Emperor Hadrian arrived in Britain as part of a long inspection tour of the Empire. That same year, work began on construction of an east-west wall across southern Scotland, from one coast to the other, to keep the barbarian tribes out of Roman Britain. It might be suggested that the annihilation of the 9th that year sponsored the order to build Hadrian’s Wall. But, during his tour of the Empire, Hadrian ordered the construction of strengthened defences including walls on frontiers in numerous places, not just Britain.
Another interesting fact follows. In the summer of AD 122, men from thirteen cavalry alae and thirty-seven auxiliary cohorts stationed in Britain were given honorary discharge after serving the required twenty-five years in Roman military. (Birl., DRA, CEO) It is unlikely, with a legion just recently destroyed on the province’s frontier, that the Emperor would permit any such discharges. Could it be that this discharges took place prior to the annihilation of the 9th, and also played some part in it?
Via traders, word would have reached the tribes of Scotland that the Roman Emperor was touring Britain and had ordered the construction of a wall to keep them out. They may well have also known that many roman auxiliary units would be discharging men that summer, with the auxiliaries concerned looking forward to their retirement. Here was a window of opportunity for the tribes – before the wall was erected and while the auxiliary units were weakened by the discharge of experienced men.
The 9th had moved up to Carlisle from Eburacum (York) some time after AD 108. It is likely the move took place in the summer of AD 122, to permit the legion to commence the earthworks on the wall that Hadrian had ordered to be erected; this brief occupation would explain why the legion left no epigraphic evidence at Carlisle. The move made the 9th the most northerly based of the legions stationed in Britain and the Empire. The Roman fortress at Carlisle, which occupied a site alongside the town that served as the capital of the local Carvetti tribe, became a military base second only in the province to the capital Eburacum. (Tom., DRA, DRAC)
Perhaps in the late summer, once Hadrian had left Britain, the Caledonians sent a message to the commander of the 9th, to entice him north of his base at Carlisle. Perhaps that commander was told that his Emperor’s wall would not be necessary, that the tribes were prepared to sign a lasting peace with Rome – but the commander must come quickly, while the chieftains were all of one mind, and he should bring as many troops as he could to awe the locals and ensure that wavering tribes did not back out of the treaty.
The officer commanding the 9th would have been well aware that Hadrian was all for consolidating the Empire’s borders; in some cases Hadrian had given up territory acquired by his predecessor Trajan and withdrawn troops from what he saw as untenable positions. Unlike Trajan, Hadrian had no desire to expand the Roman Empire; he preferred making peace to making war. So, taken in by the Caledonians, and imagining how pleased his Emperor would be with him if he could give him peace treaty with Caledonians, the commanding officer of the 9th marched his legion, four auxiliary cohorts and a cavalry wing north from Carlisle. And by doing that, he led 7,500 men into a trap.
The tribes of Caledonia had assembled more than 30,000 fighting men in AD 84, to take on the Romans at the Battle of Mons Graupius in Scotland. (Tac., A, 29) It is conceivable that a similar number would have taken part in the ambush of the 9th thirty-eight years later. Among them could be survivors of Mons Graupius and the sons and grandsons of men who had fallen in that battle, all thirsting for revenge. And in short, sharp bloodbath, these men surprised and destroyed the 9th – a legion that had taken part in the Mons Graupius defeat of the Caledonians – and its accompanying auxiliary units. With their ambush, the Caledonians had avenged their people for the defeat at Mons Graupius.
In late AD 122, before the last salary payment period of the year, the 6th Victrix Legion marched out of its base at Vetera on the Lower Rhine. Soon the legion arrived in southern Britain aboard the ships of Britannic Fleet, then hurried north to make its new headquarters at Eburacum. It had come to fill the gap left by the 9th. Soon, too, three new auxiliary units freshly raised by Hadrian arrived in the province. (Hold., DRA, ADRH) Replacements for the men discharged at the beginning of the summer would also have been rushed to Britain. And work on Hadrian’s Wall took on a new urgency.
Yet no one said a word about what had happened to the 9th legion, the legion that had served Julius Caesar and eight Emperors through the Roman Empire’s rise to its zenith. Officially, it was as if the annihilated 9th Hispana Legion had never existed.
(History Corner) - History of Imperial Roman Legions - New Article in Organization Section
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however you snatched another reserved place of mine, i wasn't fast enough...
Originally Posted by Grimbold
