Illyrian soldiers in the army of the Severe (193-235)

Abstract

This article reconstructs the prominence of the Illyrian legionaries in their ascent with Septimius Severus, their duration throughout the Severe dynasty, and their landing in the Tetrarchy and the Second Flavians. This does not mean to obscure or minimize Severo's superb performance and his great gifts as a statesman and a military man, a point amply demonstrated by the same facts and widely recognized by his contemporaries. But it is worth wondering about the idiosyncrasy and formation of these units, which practically constantly supplied the best imperial troops until well into the 6th century. The Danubian legions will become the key to the political and military panorama, and will be essential both to defeat and expel the growing wave of barbarian peoples and to fight the civil wars and bloody internal conflicts that will devastate the Roman Empire until the rise to the throne of Diocletian in 284. It will be the Illyrian troops that, under the command of Decius, defeat the barbarians on the Danube, and later proclaim their victorious general emperor. For all these reasons, the new front-line Roman forces, the heavy infantry and the legions most prepared for combat, will from now on be found in Illyria and Pannonia, where brilliant generals will also begin to proliferate. Italy, in this way, will be definitively displaced from the preponderance in the military plane.