Who Am I & What Am I Doing?
by Stephen Kenwright PART ONE “…ingressi milites, quis fausta nomina… Soldiers,
who bore auspicious names, entered… Tacitus: Histories, Book IV, 53 |
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Shortly after
joining Comitatus it became clear that I would need to adopt a suitable
period name. On a practical level I
would need to identify my shield to avoid confusion and to communicate in
character during displays, but it seemed it could also be a starting point
for developing a whole identity with a trade to keep me busy and a
‘back-story’ to add depth to my contribution to living history displays.
Funnily enough, however, the most pressing demand was for a username for the
various re-enactment Internet Forums that I wished to join. Will any old name
do? For the amount that they might crop up with the public, probably, but I
have always been annoyingly particular that things - boats, characters in
stories - should be appropriately named.
People's names have been shown to carry cultural preconceptions with
them strong enough to affect the grades given by teachers to otherwise
identical tests. I might even claim
that choosing a name helps us to visualise & therefore bring about a
particular outcome. Much more
appropriately, however, the Romans apparently shared my superstition and
sought to fix it so that the first soldier who enlisted in a new unit or the
first citizen numbered in a census should have a 'fortunate' or
'auspicious' name like 'Victor', '
Felix' and ' Fortunatus' and, as in the above quotation, chose such
individuals for particular religious duties as well. I was
briefly tempted by a joke name, or at least an in-joke like the perfectly
historical but often misused ‘Spurius’ but felt that the general tenor of
Comitatus appeared be a tad more serious.
My top priority would be to compliment without duplicating the
existing names in the group and secondly to help to get the message across
that soldiers in the Late Roman army would have names reflecting a wider
national & cultural mix than in earlier times. Finally and purely for
convenience, rather than have two separate names, I wondered if I could find
one that would could sound Roman for the 4th century, but which
might be adapted to serve for later periods and Germanic shows as well. Fitting the Bill My first surprise
was that I might only need one Roman name rather than the classic three. I knew that during the Republic and early
Empire the ‘Tria Nomina’ of praenomen, nomen and cognomen was used to
distinguish true citizens from foreigners and slaves and gave an indication
of status within the ranks of the patrician and plebeian families. Even at its height there were many
exceptions and variations. More news to me was that a cognomen wasn't
necessarily a personal nickname, but could be passed on as a family name
& even become quite inappropriate - the famous Caius Iulius was very
sensitive about advancing baldness according to Suetonius & some suggest
this was exacerbated by his family cognomen 'Caesar' starting out as a
nickname meaning 'hairy'. As the empire
expanded, foreign names became more common.
Auxiliaries and others gaining citizenship often kept or romanised
their former names, many of them Greek or Germanic in origin, or used the
name of their tribe or place of birth.
At the same time the Tria Nomina system was steadily undermined by the
custom of new citizens adopting the nomen of the reigning Emperor, the local
governor or their sponsor. By the 3rd century, one-fifth of all nomina were
those of emperors. When Caracalla
extended full Roman citizenship to free inhabitants of the empire in 212
A.D., the system lost much of its original purpose and apparently began to
decline in popularity. As Eastern
influence increased fewer family names and more individual by-names were
used; relational (son/daughter of), descriptive (such as Chrysostom,
‘golden-mouthed’), locative, ('of Tarsus') or occupational ('the shepherd'). The Prosopography of the
Later Roman Empire is a good source of names in use in the 6th – 7th
century and some of these have been very helpfully catalogued & made
available on the net, including their comparative frequency. The Byzantine
influence is clear; I discovered that my Christian
name, ‘Stephanus’ transliterated from the
Greek, was quite common, at least in the Eastern Empire. However, half the fun of stage shows is in
adopting a different persona and I carried on looking. A Good name is rather to
be chosen than great riches, Proverbs 22:1 As Christianity
moved from toleration to becoming a fashionable and then state religion, it
became popular to use saints names instead of the nomen. In 416
A.D. Theodosius II required that all serving soldiers should be Christians,
so many of our portrayals are of troops who are at least officially and
perhaps ostentatiously Christian. I therefore started to look for a suitable
saintly name of the time. Faustus,
Marcellus, Menas &
Mercurius were all 4th century Roman
soldier-saints whose names were common in the late period. With the Praesidiensis listed in the Notitia Dignitatum under the Gallic command, I thought
I might find a suitable late Roman across the Channel. Surfing
the Fount of all Knowledge, I came across references to Salvian, often
rendered Salvianus, a fifth century priest in Gaul who criticised Roman rule
as being oppressive. He praised the
virtues of the Germans and argued that the Romans had become decadent in
their Christianity and, therefore, morally inferior to the pagan but honest
barbarian, which I felt was fitting – here was someone who may have seen the
‘barbarisation’ of the army as an improvement. I was struck by
the way that Paul iii was able to locate his impression of Fortunatus with a
real inhabitant of the fort of Arbeia thanks to an inscribed piece of
pottery. People similarly looking to
source authentic names of real Roman personnel might be interested in The Vindolanda Tablets Online, which includes a name list from the 1st &
2nd Century. Hugh Elton also usefully examines the names of
soldiers in "Warfare in Roman Europe AD 350-425". Conveniently for
me, ‘Salvianus’ was used as a cognomen in the three name system and appears
in inscriptions at the frontier fort at Risingham as well as Arbeia and,
importantly, seems to have persisted as a single given name well into our
period in Britain, surviving in late 6th century inscriptions
in Wales. Sorted. Now all I had to do was decide who this character really
was & how he ended up in the army. Further
reading: Warfare in Roman
Europe AD 350-425 by Hugh Elton, Oxford: OUP, 1996 Influence of Names,
in Curiosities of Literature by Isaac D’Israeli, Routledge, undated The Private Life of the Romans by Harold Whetstone Johnston, The
Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire volumes IIIa and IIIb by Martindale, J. R., Cambridge University Press, 1992 Links: Nova Roma has a good summary of the Tria Nomina with some suggested
meanings for cognomen: http://www.novaroma.org/via_romana/names.html Vindolanda
Tablets Online: http://vindolanda.csad.ox.ac.uk/ Index of names from Volume
three of the Prosopography of the
Later Roman Empire: http://www.sca.org/heraldry/laurel/names/byzantine/early_byz_names.html The Military Martyrs includes a lot of later stories about soldiers
who were converted & suffered the consequences, to be treated with some
caution, I suspect: The Prosopography
of Anglo-Saxon England On-line Database: A collection of
articles on medieval names, with some good advice about the reliability of
sources: http://www.s-gabriel.org/names/ A gateway site to
all kinds of historical naming info, some to be used with care: http://www.lowchensaustralia.com/names/medievalnames.htm Finally, for
masochists only - Salvian, On the
Government of God, This Fifth Century Polemic Done into English
by Eva M. Sanford (1930): http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/salvian_gov_00_intro.htm Part Two: The Character of the Nation
…
ab uno Disce omnes. …from one example the character of the
nation may be known. Virgil The Aeneid (II,
65) Continuing my
article for newbies, by a newbie.
Adopting a name suitable to the period has the clear utility of giving
re-enactors the ability to address each other in front of punters (not sure
that Mops - Members Of the Public - is particularly more respectful and
'clients' just sounds sordid).
However, do we also benefit from developing an identity or 'persona'
with a back story as well? Interestingly, I understand that even members of The
Middle Earth Historical Re-enactment Society research a character history in the interests of authenticity in
their re-enactment. Or 'enactment', if you prefer. For
well-organised military re-enactments, most of the basic questions are
answered collectively - a unit's name and history, the circumstances of the
engagement etc. Civilian Living
History displays are also enhanced at group level with a clear dateline,
specific cultural groups portrayed and so on. Given that Comitatus, like many other groups, routinely provide
this level of information, do we feel a genuine benefit from going further as
individuals? Who's your daddy?
Most of us
develop a 'patter' or standardised speech repeated to the public many times
each event. On the face of it,
punters seem unlikely to suddenly start questioning us as to our imagined
birthplace or family status, but more experienced re-enactors will know
better than I if they are ever asked, for example, how they became a soldier
or if recruits always came from the local area. In these cases having a prepared story may be useful. On top of the
'when' provided by the dateline, I think that knowing the rest of the
reporter's '5 Ws': who & what I am, where I came from and why I am here,
promotes my own confidence and hence the punters' confidence in me, even if
not challenged on them. They may help to convey some of the 'character
of the nation' referred to in the rather free translation at the start of
this article. Who are you and why should I care?
Most re-enactors
working with school groups begin by introducing themselves by name and
explaining their status - their rank in a military organisation or their
occupation in the wider world. This
is not simply being 'child friendly', but relates to the way in which we all
learn new information - we feel more comfortable if we can place what we hear
and see in a social context, which helps us to connect new information to
what we already know. Method Acting
It
has been well-established (by Paul McKenna, I imagine) that visualisation
helps one to attain a goal. As Dustin
Hoffman would say, an actor who considers the back story and motivation of
the character is better able to fill in the blanks left by the script - tone
of voice, posture and expression - and thus is often able to give a better
performance. The better amateur
theatre directors I have played for have coached every member of the company
in developing just such personas to add realism & weight to every line or
mimed action & re-action. In
re-enactment I doubt that it is often necessary to produce a theatrical
performance 'in character', especially when attempting to teach someone
something new, as one of our most valuable tools for doing so is by
comparison to modern equivalents; "Looms were often wider than is common
today." "Naalbinding is similar to knitting, but only uses
one needle." "That is herringbone stitch," etc. Furthermore,
tempting as it is, I suppose speaking in Latin, pretending to have a lung
disease and to be afraid of cameras is unlikely to aid communication. Regia Anglorum have some sensible advice
about avoiding introducing jarring anachronisms into the conversation -
enquiring about The Match or high pollen warnings - but not allowing
play-acting to get in the way. I'd
be interested in people's opinions about 'in character' re-enacting. Time waits for no man
One of the big problems we face is that we don't just
cover different peoples, but also a considerable slice of history. However, I believe two basic identities
will cover most events; 'Roman military' including an associated civilian
camp and 'Germanic community'. If you
are keen, they can be adapted slightly for post occupation continental forces
or Sub-Roman Britain (I prefer Christopher Snyder's term 'Brittonic Period'),
Anglian settlers and so on. A happy
life is one which is in accordance with its own nature. Military Diplomas
certifying auxiliaries’ citizenship provide a source of soldiers’ careers up
to the end of the third century, although the majority are from the second
century and most of the free transcriptions available on the web are
untranslated. As a beginner, I
found memorial evidence the most accessible source of simple life histories,
or hints upon which to model a persona. Most evidence is from the Roman occupation period or
the continent. For example, Aurelia Aia (or Faia) was married to a
soldier called Aurelius Marcus stationed at Carvoran Fort (Magnis) at Hadrian's
Wall & came from Colonia Martia Julia Salona in Dalmatia, now Solin in
Croatia. The nature of the dedication may imply she was Christian and Salona
did become an important centre of Christianity later. The memorial of Lucius Vitellius Tancinus (RIB 159) in Bath records his
fathers name, his home country and town: Caurium on the Tagus
river in Lusitania, now Coria in western Spain. This was in the territory of
the Vettones tribe and he served for twenty-six years in the Ala
Vettonum, an auxiliary cavalry unit. The
tombstone of family man Julius Alexander in Lugdunum, modern Lyon, (CIL 13.2000) records his African
nationality, being a citizen of Carthage, ‘in every way the best’ an artist
in glass. He lived 75 years, 48 of
them with his wife ‘without any injuring of spirit’ and blessed with four
children & grandchildren from all of them. Not exactly full biographies but perhaps a starting point
for a character of one's own. My thanks to Victor, Fasta & Fortunatus for their
help. Further
reading: The Roman
Inscriptions of Britain, by RG Collingwood and RP Wright, 1965, OUP reprinted and revised in
1995 by Alan Sutton Publishing, ISBN: 0 7509 0917 X Links: You can find a wealth of epigraphic evidence at
roman-britain.org: http://www.roman-britain.org/main.htm follow>roman>military menu and pick a unit type of interest,
e.g. Cohortes
Britanniarum to find all the related material including diplomas and
memorials. Guy de la Bédoyère has transcribed volume 1 of Collingwood and
Wright's, The Roman Inscriptions of Britain, OUP, 1965: http://www.romanbritain.freeserve.co.uk/INSCRIPTIONS.HTM A handy small
selection of memorial inscriptions: http://www.personal.kent.edu/~bkharvey/roman/texts/texttombs.htm General info on military diplomas: http://www.romancoins.info/MilitaryDiploma.html Searchable &
extensive epigraphic database of the University of Heidelberg: http://www.uni-heidelberg.de/institute/sonst/adw/edh/index.html.en |
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