latrones - Get a Free Blog

BANDITS IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE
from banditry; because they were generally different in culture and, by
virtue of this difference, alien; and because, as military enemies of Rome
lacking regular commanders, they threw themselves into guerrilla warfare –
a manner of fighting that the Roman army, like all conventional armies,
dreaded. The undifferentiated use of the term latro/latrocinium to describe
two related yet so different aspects of the lifestyle of a foreign people –
banditry and irregular combat – indicates Rome’s lack of appreciation of the
‘difference’ of the ‘Other’.
Bandit raids, as practised by Viriatus while growing up, were, contrary
to Roman prejudice, not simply the expression of lawless gangsterism in a
primitive society. To embark on banditry in youth was a sign of a young
male’s participation in a phase of warrior training and it strengthened his
manly virtues and increased his capacity for great deeds. A successful period
as a bandit was a prerequisite for initiation as a warrior. 36 Diodorus noted
this practice among the Lusitanians and described it in detail:
And a peculiar practice obtains among the Iberians and particularly
among the Lusitanians; for when their young men come to the
bloom of their physical strength, those who are the very poorest
among them in worldly goods and yet excel in vigour of body and
daring equip themselves with no more than valour and arms and
gather in the mountain fastnesses, where they form into bands of
considerable size and then descend upon Iberia and collect wealth
from their pillaging. And this brigandage they continually practise
in a spirit of complete disdain; for using as they do light arms and
being altogether nimble and swift, they are a most difficult people
for other men to subdue. And, speaking generally, they consider the
fastnesses and crags of the mountains to be their native land and
to these places, which large and heavily equipped armies find hard to
traverse, they flee for refuge. Consequently, although the Romans in
their frequent campaigns against the Lusitanians rid them of their
spirit of disdain, they were nevertheless unable, often as they eagerly
set about it, to put a complete end to their plundering. 37
Viriatus could have been the model for the type of young man – from
humble circumstances but by virtue of his background endowed with strength,
spirit, speed and intelligence – whom Diodorus here describes so sympathetically.
In the admission that, down to his own day, the Roman authorities
were incapable of putting an end to this sort of banditry resonates his
admiration for the uncorrupted character – an admiration increased by his
conscious comparison of barbarian virtus and excessive Roman refinement.
Anyone who had in his youth been the leader of a robber band in the Iberian
peninsula had learned what was required for mighty deeds in war. Viriatus
shared this qualification with no less a person than Hannibal. According to
38