Bret Devereaux

You can do. I have done it. I can run with an aspis, fence individually with it, punch with it. It can all be done, it’s just exhausting. But a 5th C. BC ekdromos was probably a lot more fit than I am.https://twitter.com/Verghast404/status/1262452292873117699 …

I actually question the idea that people in the ancient world were generally more fit than a reasonably active modern person. In most cases, higher levels of physical activity are offset by lower levels of nutrition.

I wonder how that question can be definitively answered. I bet @FlintDibble knows something about bone analysis.

This was my question. I have read that the better nutrition available in the colonies allowed US militiamen to be taller than stronger than British regulars. Obviously a different time period but we also see some people claim people were generally shorter back in the day 1/2

With Julius Ceaser saying Gauls were on average much taller than Roman Legionaries. How much of that is bigging up the Gaul's for his best selling book? I dunno, but still! A Roman had a lot of kit but also had 2 mules and a slave per 8 man team...

So if talking abt the Roman army, we know they were fed well & lots of meat There's a whole range of archaeological evidence, from human analyses to my favorite animal analyses. The army imported animals from afar, and had specialized animal husbandry and butchery methods