Roman Castra - How Legionaries Built and Lived in their Fortresses 

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: Sources do not confirm that, but running around the fortress without your uniform might have been punishable. Don't let the centurions catch you without your uniform: bit.ly/2kRVWX8

Apart from the roads, aqueducts, order, public health, sanitation, trade, education, irrigation, medicine and wine what have the Romans ever done for us?

the hardest fortresses to live in were those four surrounding Asterix's village

Hospitals with baths, gardens, separate rooms, heated floors... That feeling when people 2000 years ago got better healthcare than you do.

"To Hunt, to bath, to gamble, to laugh, this is living" Lucky him.

Fun fact: "castrum" morphed into "caster" and later "chester" in Old English. So Chester, Winchester, Gloucester, Lancaster, Manchester and all the other towns? Their names are basically variations on "there is a fort here."

Barbarians: “Bloody Roman campers...”

“The mightiest weapon in a legionaries arsenal was not the sword nor the shield, but the Roman shovel.” - Simon Scarrow

Cities would also often grow up around these fortresses as the people who traded with the legions and the families of legionaries would settle outside the fort. Plus being right next to a fortress offered protection.

The Roman Empire was basically history thinking "What if all the Engineers of the world came together and created a country?". Being an Engineer myself, I'm just awed at how even they took so many factors into consideration while building their fortresses. Good design practices were also followed, showing a strong and heavily underrated engineering tradition. Just like Engineers, they were good at borrowing science from others like the Greeks and adapting them for practical use :')

Roman: Join us and enjoy true living standards with gym, pools, sauna, spa etc. Surrounding celts, germanic tribals: How can we get Roman Citizenship? Roman: It's pretty simple 25 years of honorable military service. I don't think anyone can get back to their tribal lifestyle after experiencing such Roman living standard except Arminius

If anyone wants to see what a Roman fort actually looked like, go to South Shields in Northern England where they created a historical reconstruction of the fort of Arbeia, now known as the Arbeia Roman Fort and Museum. It was built in the 2nd century CE, the fort became a major supply depot for the troops manning Hadrian's Wall. It was one of the smaller Roman forts as it housed about 600 men compared to larger fortresses that could house 5,000 people. Nonetheless it had a similar layout with barracks for cavalry and infantry, workshops, granaries, a HQ and commanding officer's houses. Its a pretty impressive reconstruction even though its only partially completed. I really recommend checking it out if you ever get a chance to visit the UK.

"Join the Legion! We have spa!"

K&G do a wonderful job with these brief documentaries. This one sent me off on two hours of binge-googling. I love to learn!

There is a reason why many European nations and other countries admired the Roman Empire long after there gone. Another great video by KnG.

So essentially, these Roman fortresses are pretty much small military towns that allowed soldiers to not only do their normal duties but also work civilian jobs and keep those skills after their tour of duty. Who would have thought that our modern way of teaching technical skills had some basis in the past?

I love that, even in a fortress there is no going around therms. Everyone is in perfect agreement it's a necessity.

Visited a Roman Villa a few years back when we were holidaying up North. Beautifully preserved. It was the home of some local official but it had the underfloor passages for central heating, a mosaic floor and a small stone barracks for about a dozen soldiers The cool thing is the soldiers building didn’t have central heating, it being separate to the villa, but cleverly the bunkhouse was also a stable so all the men and horses crammed together would keep each other warm with body heat in what would be (especially to romans used to the med climate) freezing weather. Romans were bloody clever, no wonder they did so well considering most of Europe thought mud huts were the fancy new thing

Another outstanding video. Jeez you’re making other history channels look like rip offs compared to yours. Keep up the great work.

"...will continue all the way to 1453." Ah, I See You're a Man of Culture As Well

"A good offense is a good defense" Unknown praetorian

Greetings from León (Legio), in the old Hispania. A city created from the camp of Legio VI Victrix and Legio VII Gemina

Nooo, you missed how the soldiers quarters were :( but nice video. It needs a little addition, and also the duties of soldiers watching the walls, how the walls and traps were built.

Now this is civilisation!

This is absolutely brilliant! The extravagance of it ...the feeling of luxury and comfort even in a force of complete military discipline is absolutely astounding. The Romans had taste 😂 Fantastic job Kings and Generals!

Let's not forget there were at least 3 levels of Roman camps and forts: 1) their daily marching camp that they built after marching and dismantled over night, 2) their more permanent forts that they didn't dismantle every day when they were staying in an area for a longer periods such as a few weeks, and 3) their permanent garrison fortresses as mentioned by this article. People often commonly confuse their daily marching camps with their more permanent forts. Their daily marching camps had a small wall composed of wooden stakes that each soldier carried in pairs, and embankments and ditches were just a few feet tall/deep and were only there to delay an attacking enemy. Their marching camps did not have tall wooden walls or tall towers because the stakes were only a few feet high. Page 132 of "The Late Roman Army By Pat Southern" by Pat Southern and Karen R. Dixon distinguishes between daily marching camps and more permanent fortifications where the Romans stayed for longer periods - the daily marching camps had simple wooden stakes on top of a relatively low dirt bank and ditch: "...in the early Empire the Romans built them, perhaps for a variety of reasons. It is usually said that the army on the march built a camp every night, and this is perhaps true in so far as the soldiers carried stakes (pila muralia) with which to form a palisade on top of a bank of earth, which would be raised up from digging the surrounding ditch and turning the soil inwards. The banks need not have been very high or very wide. This sort of temporary camp, quite insubstantial in archaeological terms, may have differed widely from a more permanent camp....camps still evidence in north Britain may be of this more permanent variety." p. 132 books.google.com/books?id=qeTGH_WjDeYC&pg=PA132&dq=pila%20muralia&hl=en&newbks=1&newbks_redir=0&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiMzZ_3j-rlAhVkTd8KHUOOA1YQ6AEwAXoECAEQAg#v=onepage&q=pila%20muralia&f=false "Roman Legionary Fortress 27 BC-AD 378" by Duncan B Campbell talks about the evolution of different types of Roman forts - marching camps vs more permanent forts. "The Roman army had a long tradition of constructing fortified encampments while on campaign. Simple bank-and-ditch defences enclosed an area criss-crossed by a pattern of streets, dividing the camp into a regular layout..." p. 8 Page 66 specifically talks about how daily marching camps evolved into wooden fortifications (that most people typically think about) as the legions were garrisoned permanently in an area, and some evolved into stone and brick fortifications over time. "From the reign of Augustus (27 BC-AD 14) onwards the Roman Army became a standing force with permanent fortresses distributed throughout the empire. These fortresses developed from the temporary fortifications of the legions on campaign into temporary wooden structures, before finally becoming more elaborate stone fortifications designed to stand the test of time" p. 66

When people from the Antiquities have better hygiene than subsequent eras

Oh damn. Last time I was this early Sartorius was owning Romans in Iberia.

I've gotten so used to the voice that it feels weird watching other history videos

Greetings from Castra ad Urbanus (Banja Luka, Bosnia and Herzegovina 🇧🇦)

Romans 2000 years ago: builds indoor plumbing, bath houses, infirmaries, gardens and heated floors Medieval People 1500 years after Romans: gets flu, bleeds self out until dead, shit on the floor

Listening to the History of Byzantium podcast, so I can't wait until you cover the transition to cataphract cavalry and then theme armies.

1:19 i just love a casual Monty Python reference 👍🏻

Kings and Generals is my number 1 RU-vid channel.

I live near the Saalburg...and a small Castellum ruin is on the way if my usual rout I use for day hikes.

These are my favorite kind of video. Battles are neat, but these help me understand.

I love your channel! It’s excellent on every single level. It’s incredibly informative without being incomprehensible, it looks great, and I absolutely love Roman history, so I pretty much stay on your channel all day. I also just bought my Julius Caesar shirt as well as The Roman Collection shirt and I cannot wait to wear them both at school (I’m a teacher) and out on the town. Keep up the great work! My only suggestion would be to pump out more content but quality is much more important than quantity so just keep doing what you’re doing. Thanks for everything you do, I hope you know how much we all appreciate it.

I fully agree on a previous commenter that states that you guys put history related channels or tv programs to shame with your productions and the level of detailed information you provide us. We truly are lucky to have you. Thanks for keeping the quality really high and for finding interesting and educational material to share.

I am absolutely delighted by the amount of work you dedicate and the in detail explanations you provide. Please provide more content like this.

In my hometown of Koblenz in Germany, there is actually an excavation site of an early fortress which is open to the public. In German it is called "Römerkastell". So seeing this video pop up in my feed was quite a welcome surprise.

Truly amazing stuff, hard to believe they had all that over 2000 years ago. I dont even have a tub lol.

Such comfort for the army..the more I watched the video the more I get amazed..thx as always..

The way this intro was worded, makes it sound like an oreintation video for brand new legionairies to the frontier.

I absolutely love this channel. Thank you so much for the great content.

Brilliant stuff, love learning about ancient architecture!

Great video. I love these in depth discriptions of how things were or likely were back then, it gives so much more to the story than just the banners clashing and shattering on the battlefield. The classical age is so distant to us, but yet we want to know more about it. It's what made Lord of The Rings so good, Tolkien and Peter Jackson didn't only make cool battlescenes with superheroes that for some reason never dies. They made a living world, a believeable world that we could enjoy. With these videos that's exactly what you're doing, and I for one love these! Great work, keep it up!

Honestly thank you so much for the layouts of the buildings and names, they're really useful

Great detail, amazing artwork - one of your best yet

I love this booming tempo of your uploads!

So much work in this video. Thank you

Still blown away by your videos and Iv been subbed a few months. I save your videos to watch whilst eating a meal alone (only peace I get with a young family) and I look forward to this. Iv been fascinated by the Roman Empire since I was a child and have heavily researched all aspects of their existence. And yet I still learn new things every time I watch one of your videos. They are informative, interesting and well put together. Keep up the good work

Awesome work once more. And that music piece at the end, love it.

It's great to see how the quality of this channel evolved over the time,you guys are doing a great job! Ps:I'm still waiting for the rest of the slave riots in Sicily under the Roman rule,those videos are so interesting...

On a different subject, I always am intrigued by the constant presence of the "Batavian" cavalry or presence all around the empire (so it seems!?). Are you planning, eventually, on addressing the topic of the Auxiliary cohorts? Thanks!

Dude, watching these videos really surprises me. The romans were breathtaking in all of their aspects, while eerily similar at the same time.

Thank you so much for these videos!

I’ve been wanting a video on this FOREVER

A Roman Legionaire had unironically a higher living standard than me lmao

This was so fascinating! Roman ingenuity always grabs me.

really interesting video, love the channel, thanks a lot for the content!

Your videos are great, I admire your work, keep up doing what you do best!!!

I love learning about Rome and her armies

Do a video on the battle of Didgori.. Great work ! Love this channel

More and more amazed about the roman military machine. Perfect videos!!!

Very Cool - thanks for sharing!

" these don't look like barbarians to me" pyrrhus

Nice to see George Boon getting a mention. He was a friend of my father. I remember my father being very upset when he died about 30 years ago.

Another amazing video!

I certainly enjoy your work , thanks for all the research

Always great to see more KnG videos 😀

Excellent informative Video 👍👍👍

i would love to take a walk around a castrum in its prime. great video ! please consider doing a video on Vindolanda, i enjoyed a visit and am impressed by what they found and are still finding

Love your animations.

Honestly my favourite channel

Finally it’s here!!

Thanks K&G!

Need more videos like this

Interesting to see how organized some of these ancient societies were compared to some of the most powerful nations today. Funny also how There are parts of todays world that will never see this level of civilizational organization

💜 nice work

Awesome video K&G. Will you continue about Roman forts? About canabae, the civilian settlement that usually formed around fort. Or Britains Saxon Shore forts?

Can you guys also make a video about how the Romans quickly built temporary fortresses for encampment during campaigns? For example, when going through Britain and Caesar's army comes under attack, they would quickly built a fortress for defence and stay there overnight. Sometimes, they'd even dismantle the whole thing before daylight and sneak away unnoticed. .... Would be interesting to learn how they quickly set up and dismantle such fortresses, and if they marched from place to place with the prefabricated walls, timber & equipment required for quickly building such fortified temporary encampments.

It's astonishing to what detail we know of these roman camps built 2000 years ago, a testament to their civilization and our ability to study history

Im In love with this series.

Zup K&G. Have you thought of selling merch like battle maps or floor plans of encampments/forts/castles?

Could you discuss the recreational habits of legions in forts and garrisons? Did they get to drink off duty? Visit brothels in the city? Leave the garrison? Thank you for this video!

Amazing. Brilliant!

I have to watch this again.

Nice documentary video. It was interesting to see how the Romans built and operated their fortresses. My compliments to those who made this video a reality.

Fantastic video! The Romans were amazing engineers for their day, even their forts are a marvel.

I'm gonna try to build some of these buildings in Conan Exiles.Thank you for posting quality content

Great video 👍🏻

Shared this video on the fb page of my friends making a new edition of the RPG Lex Arcana and they liked it.

a roman fortress is only 20 km from me away and your viedo is very accurate to the fortress (it s called salburg and is in germany hessen )

such a great video

Great video.

I was born in Bonn and have always lived here and knew that there has been a roman camp, but sadly I don't exactly know where it used to be. Now I'm really interested in it again. Thanks for teaching me something new about my home ☺️

Another unsurprisingly excellent video. Maybe if you do the Roman baths video, you can make a comparison with today's common Turkish baths (Which ,most probably, is a continuous tradition from Eastern Roman Empire)

On the map the province of Flevoland is visible in The Netherlands. The province wasn't fully created until the 1950's after the lake was partly undone of water. The Roman cartographer Pomponius Mela named it Lacus Flevo, or Lake Flevo in English. He named in in 44 AD in his work Pomponius Mela. Maybe something to consider for a next Roman vid.

Great stuff! I would love to see some videos on archaic Greece.

Please do a video on medical services for the troops like surgeons, and other equipment used for field operations by Roman army