AHPC Post 6 Late Roman Limitanei

 

I've got 12 Late Roman infantry from a Limitanei cohort of Tungri. Figures are Victrix plastics, which went together well and painted up nicely. The units designated Limitanei were essentially garrison troops and typically not as well equipped, trained or led as the Comitatenses in the field army. However, quality likely carried considerably between units from part-time militias of farmers who showed up to drill on occasion, to full time regular troops. Some of the later got drafted in the Field Armies as pseudocomitatenses.  Benito recently posted a very fine looking unit of the part timers, while I am envisioning my Tungri as more regular.  

There were two similar named units in Britain in the late 4th Century. The Cohors I Tungrorum was based at Borcovicio (the Housesteads fort in Northumberland). A second unit under the officer Praepositus militum Tungrecanorum were at Dubris (Dover).   That means that  can comfortably field my Tungri against Scots-Irish, Pict and Saxon raider alike. The cohort names indicate that the units were likely originally recruited from Tungri tribesmen in Northern Gaul.  However over time they morphed into locally recruited units of Romano-Britons.

While I did want this unit to be reasonably well equipped, I didn't want them to look as turned out as my veterans from the Field Army of the Comes Britanniae.  Only one officer has metal armour with a couple of sets of leather army and I tried to make them look less look as tightly drilled. I modelled severall figures with outstretched left hands and this gave me troubles keeping some of their shields glued on. Based on an illustration from Simon MacDowell's book on late Roman Infantry I went for blue tunic decorations instead of my usual red one. It took several tubes of blue before I found a colour that I liked and I think that I'll be going back to red in the future.

According to some source the static Limitanei troops typically had more uniform equipment as they drew on local suppliers and arsenals where the Field Armies ranged over large territories and therefore picked stuff up as needed from where ever was local at the time. That might have been true for the units Juilan took from Germany for his disastrous Persian campaign, but my I figure that the Comes Britanniae had a much more limited range and therefore drew from the same armouries.

Reformatting the photos, I noticed that there is stray hair that needs to trimmed from one figure.

I again free hand painted the shields. They look like the work of a 5 year with lacking any artistic talent up close, but ok from a distance. The Notitia Dignitatum doesn't show shield patterns for Limitanei troops so I opted for a variation on the "Head on a Stick" design shown for several Auxiliary Palatina infantry units. I used a crimson vexillum with an impression of a winged victory (or angel) design held by the rather stout and self important fellow in the leather armour.

Twelve 28mm foot figures should be another 60 points, which will also count against the Carausius Emperor of Britain and SPQR side duels.