Complete Roman Army (Hardcover)

The book's divided into the three progressive evolutions of the Roman army, with two complimentary chapters on "The Life of a Roman Soldier" and "The Army at War" interjected between. In each chapter, Goldsworthy further delves into subheadings which the chapter subject additionally diverts to. For instance, during The Republican Army, he includes its origins and its structure as categorized by the captured Greek historian Polybius; for the Principate's groundbreaking Professional Army, he includes the Marian Reform and its officers; under the Life of a Roman Soldier, Goldsworthy includes astutely keen observations on his pettiest specifics like his unauthorized marriages, to more substantial particulars like his equipment and daily routine; in The Army at War, he includes analysis on its campaigns, battles and sieges; and, finally, for The Army of Late Antiquity, he includes the near upheaval-like changes (deteriorating from and consistent with previous armies') that so eclipsed Rome's army in the 3rd to 5th centuries AD.

Very sympathetically thoughtful from Goldsworthy is to irregularly include extra, two-page long features on some of Rome's most famous or administratively important battles, like Hannibal's Cannea and Boudica's annihilation to Late Antiquity's Battle of Strasbourg, which all transparently indicate the opposing armies' units' positions and movements, a casualty toll, a brief synopsis of the climaxing reasons and the outcomes, and a pithy overview of its main protagonists. Unlike some other tripe that's been harrowingly and unaccountably allowed to be published-like Wells' Teutoburg massacre-Goldsworthy's masterpiece boasts scores of illustrations and pictures, about half in color, which are all lucidly sizeable for clear perception, poignantly complementary to helping the understanding of the points discussed, and, for the pictures especially, showing unconventionally obscure Roman relics that educate all the more.

Another excellent meticulousness Goldsworthy does well is the presence of counterbalance in his arguments and fact-exhibition. Per Goldsworthy himself, archeology isn't a hard science in the sense that one can't definitively reconstruct events that are independent from the archeological evidence with certainty. An example of this is when the remaining outlines of Roman forts or camps are only able to edify strictly physical information, such as the capacity of the fort or camp and the types of buildings in it, but not the activities of legionnaires. Such arcane half-truth inevitably ends in objectionable discrepancies. This is where Goldsworthy's scholarly balance comes into play. The purported scholar he is, Goldsworthy doesn't degrade the reader by assumingly imposing only his own prejudicial viewpoints of certain facts-because as was established, there's almost no unit consensus on archeological matters-he generously shares the contrasting theories on almost all areas of interest, making sure the reader's instructed with one viewpoint and then its counter-theory, especially if there are or was more than one scientifically accepted hypothesis. Consider Goldsworthy's postulation about cavalrymen's abilities to still effectively throw spears and swing swords while not possessing the technology of stirrups. While Goldsworthy reveals that this establishment has been proven in recent years, he's also mindful enough to recall the previously held assumption that, even though ancient sources never substantiated it, horsemen were illegally presumed to have not been able to efficiently partake in battle.

Some highlights in Goldsworthy's accomplishment are his knack for delving interestingly into quite minute and particular specifics about warfare psychology and possibly overlooked, little-known reasons for armies' behaviors and certain ways battles develop-all testament to his astuteness. In discussing how any given ancient battle could've progressed, Goldsworthy closely remarks the movements generals would've had to take to managerially administer their leadership over a battle's course. He reasons that, in likelihood, generals would've had to fuse a mixture of close monitoring-the presence of generals just behind a conflict's front lines-with almost surveillance-monitoring, where they'd be up on an incline well behind the front lines to garner a controllably broad view of how the battle was developing, in order to successfully be apt at leading their armies. Other highlights encompass the psychological elements of a legionnaire, or barbarian, for that matter, as they prepare for and endure the impending battle. Tactics done and "rules" of warfare before an engagement-wherein two armies might have camped out for days in each other's plain sight and resorted to intimidation like marching their armies nearer and nearer without engaging, to decide the courageousness of the side that moved its army nearer toward the enemy's lines, and skirmishes before battle to bastardly measure which side owned more prowess-are documented to probe even further the very enigmas of psychology.

Goldsworthy's masterpiece may be an adverse bit excessive for casual Roman aficionados, and a beforehand, general familiarization with Rome might well help to improve the reader's understanding of his book's educational merit. Nonetheless, this comprehensive work is money VERY well spent, for ANYONE seeking Roman enlightenment-from the history buff to the serious Roman studies pupil.

One slight peeve, though: the Empire map alternates between Latin names and modern English ones, as in "Italia" but "Sicily" and not "Sicilia," or "Neopolis" but "Rome" and not "Roma," "Belgica" and "Dacia" but "Lower Germany" instead of "Germania Inferior," etc.