Battle of Aquilonia, 293 BC ⚔️ Roman Legion vs Linen Legion ⚔️ Third Samnite War (Part 3) 

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Hey bro your video is nice . I really like your video. Please make a video on Mugal invasion on Konkon .

Wth are those 500,000 asses????

Does this also account for hired hand? Or would that be a different count?

Yeah. Any idea how large was pop of Rome or Etruscans?

@@veterankasrkin7416 Rome itself was over 100k at this time.

This may be an unpopular opinion, but I think these numbers are highly exeggarated.

@@bosertheropode5443 I agree. Because of the simple fact of how fucking complicated it is to equip men, feed them with no perservatives, organize a chain of command, provide tents, blankets etc etc. For 65k men they would need to have literal factories with assembly lines.

It also speaks to the determination of their early enemies. Rome was able to expand so quickly after unifying their home because they were forged by constant war in a peninsula full of mini Romes.

@@flynnstone3133 true

​@@flynnstone3133the Italian peninsula is just underrated compared to Greece the Italian city states were just as battle hardened as the Greek city states just more multi cultural

Like all things conquering or uniting your surroundings is the hardest step, once that's done the rest is easier with a well battle harden people both from previous allies and foes alike. Both the vikings and mongols started that way before their quickly expand in their own unique way.

That's also the reason it didn't last after such an expansion. What the Rome did until Gaul was step by step expansion and adaptation of peoples conquered into their system.

Roma aterna!!

Legio victris

Roma invicta!

That’s right. And even when Rome gets their ass kicked they take a licking and keep on ticking.

@@willo7734corruption ruined that

But it's exactly the Samnite wars and the Pyrrhic wars that turned Rome into such a power as to make it's victory over Carthage an inevitability.

Probably only because compared to later history, it’s definitely the slow burn. They went about 500 years just playing to live

I know if it apply to every situation but wasn't a notion amongst some military leaders it was not as glorious or honorable to win using surprise tactics? Furthermore, even if a general saw the practicality of using subterfuge would it not be acceptable to the soldiers they commanded? Maybe many took the straightforward approach to avoid hurting cohesion; or perhaps that kind of strategic thinking was very unique and highlights individuals able to orchestrate others almost as extensions of their own mind to allow for the traps and precise unit movements.

Pride is a deadly Sin for a reason.

That's mainly because, to actually use creativity as a weapon of war, you need 3 things that were extremely rare to see together in large armies back then: 1. A competent and experienced chain of command capable of following orders and get things done in time. 2. A gifted commander. 3. A very disciplined, flexible(and also experienced) army. If an army of thousands tried to pull a stunt or take a gamble without any of those conditions, it would probably backfire or end up being useless. Hannibal had spent tons of years fighting against Iberians with their guerilla tactics. And half of his army, which was probably the most flexible army of Antiquity, was comprised by those same Iberians plus southern Gauls, who also excelled at ambushes. That's why he could defeat the Romans the way he did. He had the talent, the experience and the men. Now that I'm writing this, it's quite interesting how every character whom we regard as a "Great Commander" has some unique trait that puts him above the "Good Commanders". Hannibal was an excellent *deceiver* He was an expert at making his enemies fight the battles he wanted them to fight and exploiting the weaknesses he himself created. However, that was also why the fabian tactics ended up being so effective against him. The moment the Romans stopped fighting head on and actively avoided his baits, Hannibal couldn't get anything done anymore. Caesar was an excellent gambler. Period. Alexander was a brutally capable tactician and had one of the best logistics ever seen in History. Al Walid was quick-witted and smelled blood like a shark. Napoleon was the most decisive and commited commander one can ever think of. However, because of that, he sometimes took rash decisions and was unable to recover from them. Agrippa was probably one of the most creative and gifted minds in military history. Frederick II was the luckiest commander to ever live. Genghis Khan and Philip II of Macedon were the best at surrounding themselves with the "right men". Etc...

I believe most of the early European powers thought ambushes and trickery like Hannibal’s as barbaric and against the code of war or something like that. When Scorpio Africanus used just a little trickery to beat Hannibal, he lost a lot of reputation because of this.

Pride seems the right answer. The goal in roman warfare is to subjugate the enemy not to destroy them. They must do so justly to convince the conquered to pledge their allegiance to them. But the problem is, this will only work on weaker enemy. Against peer, they should just destroy them regardless of method. Also ambushes usually works for factions that are in the defensive and know the terrain. Rome is usually in the offensive even at the start of their rise so they have little opportunity to develop that way of thinking.

Thankyou

Thankyou

Thankyou

Thankyou

lol and they took a lot of them flesh wounds! XD

Ottomans, germanics, arabs enter the chat

@@nisarbo3781 not till later - and by then internal strife had crippled the Empire, not to mention the 4th crusade

@@FlashPointHx excuses, nobody is unstoppable. Every empire rises & falls.

@@nisarbo3781yes by then they were barely an empire.

Yeah the Samnites were very similar to the Roman’s in their stubborn mentality.

Just divide by 10 to make it realistic.

Yeah the numbers are often exaggerated by the historians, and we also have no way of knowing the accurate number of troops in Battle

There’s no way the Roman’s captured 65k from Samnium, at best it was probably around 20-35k captured or killed. 65k was probably 80% of Samnites total population.

@@Jean_Jacques148 65,000 is possible if you include women, children, the elderly, etc. Rome had kept censuses of their own population (of course, these were just very likely to be male landowners who could vote/citizens and excluded other parts of the populations) and these alone amounted to 260,000 in 293 BCE. If you take into account women, children, elderly, etc, you can probably get around 780,000 in population. Then, if you also account for non-citizen allies, it could potentially be over 1.5 million. Considering they controlled a sizeable portion of Italy at this time (a quarter, roughly?), it makes sense as historians and statisticians have estimated a population of 7 million in Italy by 14 CE. Of course, that is about three centuries after 293 BCE. However, population growth in this time period was very minuscule and did not see exponential growth until the turn of the postmodern era. So, supposing they did control 1/4 of Italy at this time period, 1.5 million is not far off the mark from 1/4 of 7 million. Indeed, the population of Italy as a whole back in the 3rd Century BCE, accounting for later migration, might actually have been some 5-6 million during this time. So, if you take into account that the Samnites were a notable rival to Rome during the 4th-3rd Century BCE, it would not be unreasonable for Samnium to have such a massive population, nor lose 65,000 people. Supposing after the Samnites were defeated, Rome had possessed 1/3 of Italy or so, it would not be unreasonable to say that the Samnites had as many as 500,000 or so people during this time. 65,000 would have been 13% of that and while a devastating loss, not wholly impossible. Note that a good portion of these casualties might very well be civilians and logistical elements of the armies as well (non-combatants). If we assume that half of the 13% were actual army personnel, we get 6.5%. It makes sense why the Samnites lost the war shortly after this, because that was not 80% of their population, but it might very well have been 80% or more of their army they could muster. For instance, according to Roman census data and Polybios' information regarding Roman forces put to the field during the period between the 1st and 2nd Punic Wars, the Roman Republic could maintain forces equal to 7.5% (roughly) of their entire population, with more capable of being mobilized.

@@doritofeesh Good comment. You make a good argument.

..and pronunciations thoroughly butchered! :)

The Samnite wars are critical to understanding Roman history. Many of their military and administrative practices were based on Samnite practices.

I thought two as was a serstertie?

That must have been right after they coined the saying “Never go in against a Sicilian, when death is on the line!”

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I love grasslands and cows too

They did have larger armies sometimes during the Empire Period but most of it was to defend the Borders or Persian Campaigns