The list shows that this corps d’élite was not representative of all the cavalry of the Empire; the proportion of orientals is far too low. It was still upon the Western provinces that the emperors of the second century relied, and from these, therefore, that the guard was recruited. As regards these provinces, the composition of the Equites Singulares reflects fairly accurately the relative importance of each as a recruiting-ground for the auxiliary cavalry of this period, and the change which has taken place in the military situation since the days of Augustus is at once apparent. The Galli[243] and Hispani, who were then the flower of the imperial cavalry, and continued to give their names to nearly half the cavalry regiments in the service, have entirely vanished. Speaking generally, in fact, the inland provinces no longer contribute, and the recruiting-areas have contracted to the purely frontier districts. The relative importance of these, too, has altered since the beginning of the first century. The tribes on the Lower Rhine are still well represented, but the contingent of the German provinces is entirely surpassed by that of Pannonia. If we assume that the honour of serving in the Guards was bestowed upon the natives of each province in proportion to the size of the contingent which they supplied to the cavalry of the line, this increased importance of the Pannonians follows naturally upon the universal adoption of local recruiting for the frontier armies; since not only had the balance of military power now definitely shifted from the Rhine to the Danube,[244] but local conditions required an exceptionally high proportion of mounted men.[245]
The preceding survey of the evidence has purposely omitted that dealing with the oriental regiments, which seemed, on account of its exceptional character, to merit a special discussion. In Pannonia and Dacia we find three such regiments, the Ala I Augusta Ituraeorum and the Cohors I Hemesenorum in Pannonia Inferior, and the Cohors I Augusta Ituraeorum, stationed in Pannonia during the first century, and transferred to Dacia at the time of the creation of the province.[246] Thanks to the recent work of Hungarian archaeologists, the second of these corps, the Cohors I Hemesenorum Miliaria Equitata Civium Romanorum Sagittariorum, to give it its full title, is perhaps better known to us than any other auxiliary regiment.[247] Probably enrolled in the Roman army at the beginning of the second century, at the time of the annexation of the small client kingdom from which its name was derived, this regiment had been transferred to Pannonia by the beginning of the reign of Antoninus Pius, and certainly remained in the province until 240.[248] Throughout this period it seems to have been stationed at Intercisa, where upwards of fifty inscriptions, chiefly sepulchral, have now been discovered, the majority of the latter belonging, as the frequent use of the name Aurelius shows, to the end of the second and the beginning of the third century. Of the five soldiers whose birthplace is mentioned on their tombstones, three came from Hemesa itself, one from Samosata, and one from Arethusa,[249] and the owner of a diploma which dates from between 138 and 146 came from Syria.[250] It is clear, then, that during its whole stay in Pannonia this regiment was not recruited, like the majority of the auxilia, from the neighbouring district, but was constantly in receipt of fresh drafts from the province in which it was originally raised. As further proof of the tenacity with which this connexion was maintained, we find that at the end of the reign of Severus the soldiers dedicated a temple to their deus patrius Sol Aelagabalus.[251] An examination of the evidence dealing with the other oriental regiments leads to the same result. Soldiers discharged in 98 and 110 from the Cohors I Augusta Ituraeorum and the Ala of the same name, give Cyrrhus in Syria and Ituraea as their places of origin, and another Ituraean is mentioned on a sepulchral inscription of the latter regiment in Pannonia.[252] Oriental regiments, and in particular oriental archers, appear also on other provinces[253], and although there is a lack of dated evidence we can hardly doubt that a rule which was maintained along the whole Danube frontier also held good elsewhere.[254]
The reason for the adoption of these exceptional methods in the recruiting of the oriental auxilia was probably the purely military one that good archers were born in Syria, and could not be made elsewhere, but the consequent presence in every frontier army of an oriental element, holding firmly to its own customs and religious beliefs, was a fact of more than military significance. In particular it must be remembered that the enfranchised children of these oriental auxiliaries were qualified and readily accepted for service in the legions. In the inscriptions of the Cohors I Hemesenorum we have abundant evidence of this process, which gave oriental ideas an opportunity for wider penetration.[255]
The British regiments, too, show a tendency to keep up national recruiting, although the evidence on this point is still scanty.[256] In this case the explanation is probably to be found in the intractable nature of the tribes of North Britain, which made it appear undesirable to use the contingents which they supplied near at home. Certainly all the British regiments seem to have been sent abroad, and only one soldier of British origin is found in the province.[257] It would appear, in fact, that the army of Britain was maintained largely by drafts from the Rhine area, but the evidence at present is an insufficient basis for any general conclusions. In Dacia, too, as was natural, the auxilia raised immediately after the conquest were transferred elsewhere. Here, however, there does not seem to have been the same objection to local recruiting for the troops stationed in the province, and the practice was certainly, as has been shown, in force during the second century.
The Numeri.
It is clear, then, that in the second century the cohorts and alae of the Augustan system, with certain definite and limited exceptions, were recruited locally from the provinces in which they were stationed, without any general attempt to justify the ethnical titles which they still bore. At the same moment, however, as this principle seems definitely established, there begin to appear on inscriptions certain regiments of a new type which stand outside the prevailing system. These regiments are given the name numerus, which does not seem to have had any very precise meaning, and for which it is difficult to find an English equivalent. They also bore tribal titles, a list of which is given below, together with the names of the provinces in which numeri of each tribe occur.[258]
Brittones. At least ten numeri in Germania Superior. The earliest inscriptions date from the reign of Pius, and the theory is generally accepted that these Brittones were newly conquered tribesmen from the district lying between the two frontier walls, deported after the campaigns of Lollius Urbicus. These numeri also bear secondary titles derived from the names of the districts in which they were stationed, e.g. Murrenses, clearly connected with the river Murr.[259]
Germani. Dacia.[260]
Palmyreni. Africa,[261] Dacia,[262] and probably Britain.[263]