The prospect of enrichment through the emoluments of military service, or the likelihood of booty, captives and other handouts, should be an incentive for soldiers.89 Roman soldiers received regular pay, in three annual instalments. Domitian added a fourth instalment, but there were no further increases until the end of the second century. Rates of pay were not generous, being little more per day than the wages of a labourer, and there were compulsory stoppages for food and clothing.90 But a labourer could not expect work every day, and the expectation of regular pay-days might well motivate a recruit from a poor background. Furthermore, an annual salary of about 1200 sesterces probably served as a ‘living wage’ by the early second century ad in Italy.91 On retirement from the army legionaries received a pension worth more than ten times a year’s pay, or a plot of land.92 Special consideration was given to wounded or sick soldiers who had to be discharged early.93 In this respect Roman soldiers were better looked after than many soldiers right up to the modern age. What is more, the troops could have confidence in the medical and military hospital facilities available, and could expect that casualties would be speedily treated.94 All citizen-soldiers had a range of legal privileges in respect of making wills and leaving property,95 and also marriage rights on discharge, which ensured that their children would be Roman citizens. From the mid-first century onwards those non-citizens serving in the auxilia received on discharge Roman citizenship and similar marriage rights that brought citizenship to their children.96 This practice may have contributed to the integration of such men and their families into the Roman way of life, although it is difficult to judge the level of national patriotism in the Roman army.97
Perhaps local patriotism was a more potent influence. As local recruiting became more common, especially in the second century, more men tended to serve in the vicinity of where they were born. More importantly, soldiers perhaps came to build up stronger relationships in the military community and beyond because of the practice of housing legions in permanent bases in a fixed location. If troops were needed elsewhere, a detachment (vexillatio) was transferred, while the bulk of the legion and its command and infrastructure remained. Some legions came to develop a long association with the communities that existed or grew up around their barracks. The legion III Augusta was established in Africa from 30 bc, and from the reign of Trajan was stationed at Lambaesis for 140 years until it was temporarily cashiered in ad 238. In the province of Upper Pannonia on the Danube, the legion XIV Gemina was based at Carnuntum from about ad 114 up to the end of Roman control in the area, and a sizeable civilian community developed beside the camp.98 In Spain (Hispania Tarraconsensis) the legion VII Gemina, which had originally been raised by Galba from Roman citizens in the province, returned in ad 75 and was based until the late fourth century at Legio (modern Leon), which took its name from the legion.99 The link between the Romans and the locality is nicely illustrated by the dedication set up by the commander of the legion to the nymphs of a local spring.100 In general, many soldiers had a wife and family in neighbouring settlements, and veteran soldiers often settled in the vicinity.101 There is therefore some reason to suppose that the troops came to have strong emotional attachments to the local area, and might fight more enthusiastically for land and people they considered to be their own.102 There is little clear evidence for this, but in ad 69 the Syrian legions were stirred up by reports that they were to be moved to Germany: ‘the troops felt at home in the camp where they had served so long and for which they had acquired a real affection.’103 Again, it is significant that the soldiers who accompanied Severus Alexander from the Danube to the east for his campaign against the Parthians were desperate to return when they heard that the Germans had overrun Roman territory and threatened their families in their absence.104
By the end of the third century ad a gradual change in the army’s organization had come about, with the development of a field army (comitatenses) which was independent of any territorial or provincial attachment, and could attend on the person of the emperor. The comitatenses by definition were expected to move around the empire at relatively short notice, and it may be that men recruited or transferred into them were younger men who had no family ties. This perhaps undermined the bonds that had sometimes developed between soldiers and the area in which they served. On the other hand, there were also soldiers {limitanei) who were permanently stationed in provinces deemed to need a military presence, and there is no reason to believe that in this period the limitanei were of a significantly inferior quality to the troops of the field army.105
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