Bret Devereaux

What are you working on that's so closely tied to armor?

Diss-now-book-project is a comparative assessment of the cost of equipment using raw material requirements (esp. worked metal) between the great powers and major non-state actors of the Med., 3rd-2nd cent.

Aim was to draw into question the 'horde upon uncomplaining horde of Italian manpower' thesis (to use Sekunda's phrasing) by showing that Roman soldiers were relatively expensive, not cheap and expendible.

So working proportions who met the census qualification requiring them to purchase mail shirts or comparable armors?

Complicated problem. Polybius' numbers clearly match what we get for the first class of pedites, but serious issues (Polybian legion set in 216, but census requirements match Livy using sextantal as which only comes around in 211.

There's room for doubt about the 'when' of the Polybian legion. And reconstructing the history of the lower classes of pedites is probably impossible. Did requirements shift? Lower qualifications? As w/ Rich, "Supposed Roman Manpower Shortage (1983)...we don't know.

I ended up running numbers for a range of possible prevalence cases to cope with the uncertainty. Ran figures for a legion if the h. inf. was 1/3 loricatus, 40%, 1/2 and 2/3rds.

In practice, given the (vanishing) evidence for the pectoral, probably those are in chronological sequence as we move through the second century and the lorica hamata slowly replaces all of the other common armors. But no way to reconstruct exact timing.