What were the purpose of auxilia infantry in the Roman army? What did they use the spears for...

What were the purpose of auxilia infantry in the Roman army? What did they use the spears for? What was their tactical employment?

"What did they use the spears for?" You have got to be kidding.

They were usually frontier guardsmen.

Which is retarded when you think about it, because most aux were originally from the frontier

>Which is retarded when you think about it, because most aux were originally from the frontier

How is that retarded?

Person on the frontier guards the frontier. Why would you bother with the logistics of moving someone from Italy to guard a border when you've got a guy living on the border?

when the romans really got their shit kicked in they could of augmented their forces.

In most cases they were involved in the hottest and most dangerous fighting in battles. Elite units like the Batavi could even go toe to toe with legionaries.

>were originally from the frontier
From a different part of the world. Sarmations stationed in Britain, Spaniards on the Rhine, etc.

Not him, but the problem was if said frontier region broke out in revolt, it had an army that you trained and you equipped sitting right there which would likely side with the locals.

It's one of the reasons the Bar Kokhba revolt was such a nasty affair, Bar Kokhba almost instantly recruited a core of real soldiers, which he then used to train a lot of his other forces.

I don't know how common it was, but I know the Romans put Syrian auxiliaries on Hadrian's wall, so it was my impression they tended to shuffle people around to avoid that sort of thing.

They also fulfilled a niche. Sometimes you needed mobile light infantry and if they died it wasn't as big of a loss as losing one of your professional citizen soldiers.

I'm pretty sure some of it was after the whole "well shit, this happened". Bar Kokhba probably wasn't even the only incident, just the one I know most about.

Spears were way cheaper and easier to use and make than swords.

>What did they use the spears for?
killing barbarians

No, Ansgar. You are the barbarians.

Spears have a longer reach than swords, especially given the quality of metal available then. They still kept a spatha as a sidearm.

It makes sense, if you have a local uprising you dont want your military to be sympathetic to the revolt.

They weren't stationed on the frontier close to the area they were from, especially after the Batavian Revolt when a bunch of Germanic tribesmen teamed up with their allies in the auxiliaries and tore the Romans a new one.

Sarmatians were stationed in Britain, Syrians in Dacia, Gauls in Cappadocia.

Kek

>What were the purpose of auxilia infantry in the Roman army?
To have more dudes in your army when you don't have enough Roman citizen dudes

>What did they use the spears for?
For fighting other dudes with spears, which there were a lot of, and dudes on horses too

>What was their tactical employment?
Flanks, where usually they can fight dudes on horses

a typical republican consular army contained, iirc, two legions, with each legion containing an ala of calvary and an ala of infantry (source, i think, of the word ally). these allied forces filled the gap in the standard formations of heavy infantry - the infantry was light, and the cavalry typically horse archers. light infantry was typically stationed in the gaps between the front formation of cohorts, and also provided cover for the horse archers to rally behind.

>What were the purpose of auxilia infantry in the Roman army?
Their name is pretty self-explanatory. For the tribes it was because their men could be sent in stead of taxes (the Batavi were completely exempt from tribute because their warriors were so famed), and it offered a path towards citizenship.
>what did they use the spears for
Not even going to bother with that
>What was their tactical employment
Varies, but most were light(er) infantry that either acted as a mobile screen or for the flanks. Though some were more specialized, such as Syrians (archers), Batavians (cavalry), and Numidians (light cavalry). Although Rome had dedicated cavalry corps, they were generally under-developed or under-utilized, which led to subjects with specialized cavalry being highly prized (again such as the Batavi)