centurio regionarius: a post attested in the Vindolanda tablets, as well as elsewhere in Britain and other provinces. They appear to have been officers on detached service placed in control of an area. A large body of evidence from Egypt shows them dealing with criminal investigations as well as military and administrative tasks.

cohort: the principal tactical unit of the legions. The first cohort consisted of 800 men in five double-strength centuries, while cohorts two to ten were composed of 480 men in six centuries of eighty. Auxiliaries were either formed in milliary cohorts of 800 or more often quingeniary cohorts of 480. Cohortes equitatae or mixed cohorts added 240 and 120 horsemen respectively. These troopers were paid less and given less expensive mounts than the cavalry of the alae.

consilium: the council of officers and other senior advisors routinely employed by a Roman governor or senator to guide him in making decisions.

curator: (i) title given to a soldier placed in charge of an outpost such as a burgus who may or may not have held formal rank; (ii) the second in command to a decurion in a cavalry turma.

decurion: the cavalry equivalent to a centurion, but considered to be junior to them. He commanded a turma.

equestrian: the social class just below the Senate. There were many thousand equestrians (eques, pl. equites) in the Roman Empire, compared to six hundred senators, and a good proportion of equestrians were descendants of aristocracies within the provinces. Those serving in the army followed a different career path to senators.

gladius: Latin word for sword, which by modern convention specifically refers to the short sword used by all legionaries and most auxiliary infantry. By the end of the first century most blades were less than 2 feet long.

legate (legionary): the commander of a legion was a legatus legionis and was a senator at an earlier stage in his career than the provincial governor (see below). He would usually be in his early thirties.

legate (provincial): the governor of a military province like Britain was a legatus Augusti, the representative of the emperor. He was a distinguished senator and usually at least in his forties.

legion: originally the levy of the entire Roman people summoned to war, legion or legio became the name for the most important unit in the army. In the last decades of the first century BC, legions became permanent with their own numbers and usually names and titles. In AD 98 there were twenty-eight legions, but the total was soon raised to thirty.

medicus: an army medical orderly or junior physician.

omnes ad stercus: a duty roster of the first century AD from a century of a legion stationed in Egypt has some soldiers assigned ad stercus, literally to the dung or shit. This probably meant a fatigue party cleaning the latrines – or just possibly mucking out the stables. From this I have invented omnes ad stercus as ‘everyone to the latrines’ or ‘we’re all in the shit’.