§1. In military service—that is, in restraining men whom no piety or justice draws back from crime—great severity of punishments is needed; for unless fear is present, everything must necessarily go to ruin.
The first kind of punishment was a fine, and the power to exact a pledge so that it would be paid rested with the tribune. Polybius. The same also remains in present armies, although it is scarcely expedient to employ it, because every very wicked man is also very needy.
The second: if a man had neglected his watches, he was beaten with a cudgel. Polybius. The punishment is of this kind. Taking a cudgel, the tribune lightly touches and grazes the condemned man. When this has been done, all who are in the camp strike him, some with cudgels and others with stones, and kill most of them within the camp. But if anyone escapes, he will not be safe even so. How could he be, when there is neither a return to his country for him nor anyone among his relatives who will receive him under a roof? Thus those whom this calamity has overtaken perish most completely.
The third: they were exposed to swords, although this was rare. Tacitus, Annals, book 1: “The legions stood in assembly with drawn swords; the accused was displayed upon the platform by the tribune. If they acclaimed him guilty, he was cast headlong to them and slaughtered, and the soldiers rejoiced in the killings as though absolving themselves.” Now they are shot with the firearms of their comrades, and this death is considered more honorable.
They are handed over to the soldiers to be killed so that the odium may rest upon them, not upon the commanders. Alexander handed over to a cohort those whom he wished to be killed by tortures, so that the others might prove their loyalty by cruelty.
The fourth punishment: the Macedonians buried men beneath stones. Curtius, book 6: “At the given signal, all who had been named by Nicomachus were buried beneath stones according to the custom of their country.”
The fifth: those who had abandoned their rank were struck with the axe. Livy, book 2: the consul Appius scourged with rods and beheaded the centurions and soldiers receiving double pay who had abandoned their rank. An entire legion which had occupied Rhegium was beheaded. They are now struck down with the sword; rods are not customary in military service.
The sixth: to mitigate the punishment of death, bloodletting was devised, which was customarily performed for the sake of disgrace. Gellius, book 10, chapter 8: “This too was a military punishment in antiquity: to order a soldier’s vein to be opened and his blood released for the sake of disgrace. The rationale of this practice is not found in the ancient writings which I, at least, have been able to discover. But I think this was first done to soldiers whose minds were benumbed and had declined from their natural condition, so that it seemed not so much a punishment as a remedy. Later, however, I believe that through custom the same was repeatedly done for many other offenses, as though all who offended were regarded as less than sane.”
Other offenses were also punished. Polybius speaks of them in this manner: “Soldiers ought to pay attention and hearken to the tribunes, and the tribunes to the consuls. A tribune nevertheless has the right and power to fine, exact a pledge, and scourge. The prefects have the same power over the allies. The man who has stolen anything from the camp is beaten with a cudgel, as is the man who has borne false witness, the man who is discovered in the prime of life to have abused his body, and likewise the man who has been fined three times for the same fault. They punish acts of this sort as crimes. But they ascribe the following to cowardice and military disgrace: if any falsely report to the tribunes some brave deed of their own for the sake of honor and reward; if any who have been placed in a guard post or station desert their place through fear; or if anyone has cast away some part of his arms in the very crisis through fear. As a result, some men in guard posts deliberately perish when greater numbers rush upon them, since they are afraid to desert their post for fear of this punishment. Some, even in the very conflict, if by some accident a shield or sword or another weapon has been knocked from them, hurl themselves upon the enemy, resolved either to recover what they have lost or, by dying, to escape manifest disgrace and the reproaches of their own men.”
The seventh: sometimes men are summoned to punishment by lot. Polybius: “But if it happens that a larger number have offended and that several maniples have abandoned their post together, they do not wish to beat them all with cudgels or kill them. Instead, they have discovered a measure and procedure at once expedient and terrifying. For the tribune summons the army, brings the guilty men into the midst, and sharply accuses them. He then chooses by lot sometimes five, at other times eight or twenty—in short, always considering the size of the multitude so that they amount to approximately a tenth part of the offenders—from among all the cowards. Those upon whom that lot has fallen he beats with the cudgel, without any possibility of entreaty, in the manner already described. Measuring out barley instead of wheat to the rest, he orders them to pitch their tents outside the rampart and the protection of the camp. Thus, because the danger and fear arising from the lot hang equally over all, and likewise because the example of the barley given reaches all, that custom produces the greatest measure both of terror and of correction.”
This was decimation, customary among the Romans, which they sometimes changed into punishment of every twentieth or every hundredth man. Capitolinus, in his Macrinus: “When he suffered military mutinies, he decimated the soldiers much more often; sometimes he even ‘centesimated’ them”—which is his own peculiar word—“because he said that he was merciful when he punished every hundredth of those who deserved decimation.”
The eighth: they were struck with a cudgel, or with a vine staff, by a centurion, sometimes severely. Catiline beat M. Marius with vine staffs throughout the whole city while the Roman people looked on. It is still the custom to strike with a cudgel, although not in the ancient manner.
The ninth: they were scourged with rods if, though liable to capital punishment or deserving it, they were permitted to discharge their debt with a milder penalty.
The tenth: to be fed with barley. Augustus decimated cohorts which had yielded their position and fed them barley. Suetonius, book 24. That punishment is not in use, just as decimation is not.
The eleventh: a soldier was said aere dirui or aes resignari when his pay was denied and his years of service did not advance. Valerius, book 2, chapter 7: “Consider how severely the senate regarded the fact that the soldiers had allowed the consul Quintus Petillius to be killed while fighting most bravely against the Ligurians. For it refused to allow the year to count toward the legion’s term of service or to give it pay.”
The twelfth: to pitch camp outside the rampart. Livy, book 10, shows that they were also deprived of tents. And Valerius, book 2, chapter 7: “They decreed that none of them should pitch his quarters within the camp, or fortify with rampart or ditch the place assigned outside it, or have a tent made of hides. They offered a return to their former military rank if anyone took two sets of spoils from the enemy.”
The thirteenth: they were ordered to stand ungirded before the praetorium or in the headquarters, or to dig a ditch, clad only in a tunic for the mockery of all. Caesar Julian led men clothed in women’s dress through the camp, thinking that this punishment would be more grievous to men than death. Charondas ordered those who had not taken up arms for their country to sit in the forum for three days in women’s clothes.
The fourteenth kind of punishment, the gravest among the moderate ones: to change a man’s kind of service. Cavalrymen were reduced to infantrymen, and infantrymen to slingers. Livy, book 25; Valerius, book 2; Ammianus, books 24, 25, and 29. If they failed in their duty in some respect, they were thrust down into an inferior branch of service. Captives returned by Pyrrhus were reduced from cavalryman to infantryman and from infantryman to light-armed soldier, and were ordered to pitch camp outside the rampart until each had taken two sets of spoils from the enemy. Otacilius employed the latter punishment against those whom Hannibal had sent under the yoke. Domitius Corbulo ordered them to redeem disgrace by valor.
The fifteenth: to take their dinner standing, for they always took their midday meal standing. Even now they are compelled to stand for many hours burdened with large firearms if they have committed some offense.
The sixteenth: it was also a military punishment to furnish a spear. Festus: it was called censio hastaria when, as a fine for a military offense, a soldier was ordered to furnish spears.
The seventeenth: to march among the baggage. Ammianus, book 25: “After taking away the standards and breaking their spears, he imposed upon all who were accused of having fled the requirement to march among the baggage, packs, and captives.”
The eighteenth: they were also compelled to winter outside camps and towns. Livy, book 35; Valerius, book 2, chapter 7.
The nineteenth: among the Egyptians it was established by law that the tongue of the man who disclosed secret counsels to the enemy should be cut out.
The twentieth: among the Romans hands were sometimes cut off. Ammianus, book 29; Livy, book 35. Indeed, even legs were cut off. Ammianus, book 23: “Let each man follow his own standards, knowing that if he remains behind anywhere he will be left there with his legs cut off.”
The twenty-first: at times a more severe punishment was to be raised upon a cross. Livy, book 30: “Those who were of the Latin name were struck with the axe; the Romans were raised upon crosses.” A man who deserts to the enemy is tortured and condemned to the beasts.
The twenty-second: at times they were also deprived of burial. Valerius Maximus, book 2, chapter 7.
The twenty-third: Ammianus, book 29, says that deserters were burned. The tribune Hortarius was burned because he had written certain things to the enemy. Ammianus, at the passage cited, and book 21. Those who had given barbarians the opportunity to plunder, or had divided the booty with them, were burned alive.
The twenty-fourth: the emperor Avidius Cassius tied condemned men from top to bottom upon a stake 120 feet long, killing some by fire, others by smoke, and some by fear.
The twenty-fifth: men were also killed beneath a hurdle. Livy, book 4.
The twenty-sixth: they were also killed with arrows, as men now are with firearms. These punishments were unusual.
The twenty-seventh: Macrinus ordered a tribune who had allowed the watches to be deserted to be tied upon a wheeled cart and dragged, both alive and dead.
The twenty-eighth: Aurelian tied an adulterous soldier by the feet to the tops of two trees which had been bent down; when the trees were suddenly released, the man was torn apart and hung from both. Vopiscus, in his Aurelian.
The twenty-ninth: Macrinus also enclosed in ox carcasses two soldiers who had violated the chastity of their host’s maidservant; the heads of the beasts were cut off so that the men could speak with one another more easily.
§2. Punishments were often great even where the faults were not great; their end, however, was discipline. The saying of Clearchus is ancient: “The commander should be feared more than the enemy.” A soldier who refuses battle is punished capitally. Gaius Vacienus cut off the fingers of his left hand so that he would not have to serve, and was punished by confiscation of his goods. In Trajan’s time, a father who rendered his son unfit for war was deported. Ammianus, book 15.
Avidius Cassius ordered centurions to be raised upon crosses because, without his command, they had killed three thousand Sarmatians who were behaving incautiously with only a few soldiers; he said that an ambush might have lain beneath it. Atilius Regulus ordered a fleeing army to be beaten. Cato put to death a soldier who, having been left behind after the fleet had sailed, begged to be taken aboard. When Valerius was consul, a defeated army was ordered to pass the winter under tents. Titus Scaurus forbade his son, because he had yielded his position, to come into his sight; through shame at the disgrace, the son procured death for himself.
Metellus Macedonicus ordered five cohorts which had yielded to the enemy to make their wills, and sent them back to recover the position, threatening that they would not be received except after victory. Manius Curius ordered a legion which had refused the war to cut straw while ungirded, abolished its standards and its name, and enrolled its men in the other legions as replacements. Lucius Piso ordered a cohort prefect to stand daily in the headquarters with the belt of his toga cut, his tunic loosened, and his feet bare, and to abstain from banquets and baths. Corbulo ordered Aemilius Rufus, a prefect of cavalry, to stand in the headquarters with his clothing torn.
In general, military service itself was a punishment, since the soldiers were compelled to labor even without necessity. For Publius Nasica, lest the soldiers decline or become corrupted in the idleness of winter quarters, ordered a fleet to be built.