Caesar ad nāvēs vēnit, atque, ubi subdūxit, cum castrīs mūnītiōne coniūnxit.
Although Caesar
doesn’t give detailed specifications in Dē Bellō Gallicō, Roman military
engineering norms allow us to infer it likely included:
a ditch (fossa)
dug between the ships and the camp perimeter
an earthen rampart
(agger) reinforced with stakes or palisades (vallum)
possibly towers
for watch and defense
This connected
structure effectively enclosed the ships within the camp’s defensive line,
turning both into a single defensible stronghold.
Image
#1: Cross-section of the Roman fieldworks at the siege of Alesia (52BCE)
(1) – (4) and (7):
main defensive line, a palisade, a wall of wooden stakes, used as
a barrier constructed along an earthwork, together with a tower
lorica, -ae [1/f] [i] (soldier’s armour) coat of mail;
cuirass [ii] any form of defence e.g. parapet; breastwork i.e. a military
fortification consisting of a low wall, often with wooden or wicker
defenses
crātis, -is [3/f]: wickerwork
https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=lorica-cn
vallum, -ī [2/n]: wall; rampart; entrenchment
https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=vallum-cn
Modern English:
wall < OE: weall (wall; earthwork; rampart; dam) < La: vallum;
Modern German: Wall (rampart; parapet; embankmen)
agger, -is [3/m]: earthwork, especially defensive
ramparts, dykes, dams, causeways, and piers
https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=agger-cn
pinnae, -ārum [1/f/pl]: battlements i.e the raised parts
behind which defenders could shelter
turris, -is [3/f] (acc. -em or -im): tower, especially
military either for defence or mobile (turrēs ambulātōriae) for siege purposes
https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=turris-cn
Ēruptiōnibus [...]
aggerī ignem īnferēbant (Caesar) │ By sorties they set fire to the
ramparts
turrēs contabulantur, pinnae lōrīcaeque ex
crātibus attexuntur (Caesar) │ towers are constructed, the pinnacles
and protective walls are constructed out of wicker
et lōrīcam vallumque
per fīnīs suōs Trevīrī strūxēre (Tacitus) │ and the Treveri had constructed a breastwork
and rampart across their territory
et dūxit illum in Hierusalem
et statuit eum suprā pinnam templī (Vulgate) │ He led him to Jerusalem,
and set him on the pinnacle of the temple
Image#2: Mediaeval
English siege tower
trenches and obstacles
/ anti-cavalry devices
the image details
a series of ditches (6, 8), forked stakes and spikes (5, 9, 11) and hidden pits
(10) designed to impede enemy advances
(5) cervus, -ī
[2/m]: [i] deer; stag [ii] (from resemblance to the horns of a stag) cervī: forked
stakes
aggerem ac vāllum duodecim pedum exstrūxit. Huic
lōrīcam pinnāsque adiēcit grandibus cervīs ēminentibus ad commissūrās
pluteōrum atque aggeris, quī ascēnsum hostium tardārent, et turrēs
tōtō opere circumdedit, quae pedēs LXXX inter sē distārent (Caesar) │
he raised a rampart and wall twelve feet high; to this he added a
parapet and battlements, with large stakes (cut like
stags' horns), projecting at the joints of the screens and the rampart,
which would hinder the enemy’s ascent, and he surrounded the entire work
with turrets, which were eighty feet distant from one another.
opus, operis [3/n]: [i] (in general) work; labour, [ii]
(here) a military work, either a defensive work, fortification,
or a work of besiegers, a siege-engine, machine, etc.
pluteus, -ī [2/m]: [i] a mobile, protective screen
used in siege warfare to shield soldiers as they approached enemy
fortifications [ii] (here: Caesar is referring to means of defence) a
permanent breastwork, a parapet
Image
#3: pluteus (woodcut from Dē rē mīlitārī; Paris, 1532)
(6), (8) fossa,
-ae [1/]: ditch; trench; moat
fossam pedum vīgintī dīrēctīs lateribus dūxit
(Caesar) │ he dug a trench twenty feet deep,
with perpendicular sides
Image #4:
defensive ditch at the Antonine Wall, Scotland
(9) cippus, -ī
[2/m]: sharpened stake
Quīnī erant
ordines coniunctī inter sē atque implicātī; quō quī intrāverant, sē ipsī
acūtissimīs vallīs induebant. Hōs cippōs appellābant (Caesar) │
There were five rows (of stakes), joined and interwoven with each other;
whoever entered into them impaled themselves on the very sharp stakes.
These they called 'cippi'.
(10) līlium, -ī
[2/n]: a form of defence, consisting of several rows of pits, in which stakes
were planted, rising only four inches above the surface of the ground
reliqua pars scrobis
ad occultandās īnsidiās vīminibus ac virgultīs integēbātur. Huius
generis octōnī ōrdinēs ductī ternōs inter sē pedēs distābant. Id ex
similitūdine flōris līlium appellābant (Caesar)
"The rest of
the ditch, for the purpose of hiding traps, was covered over with
osiers and brushwood. Eight rows of this kind were constructed,
three feet apart from each other. They called it a 'lily' from its
resemblance to the flower."
īnsidia, -ae [1/f], but usu. pl. īnsidiae, -ārum: ambush;
traps
scrobis, -is [3/m]: ditch; trench
virgultum, -ī [2/n]: bushes; burshwood; shrubbery
Image #5: vīmen,
vīminis [3/n]: [i] twig; shoot; [ii] wickerwork; osier
Image #6: the līlia
at Rough Castle, near Falkirk, Scotland
“These pits formed
part of the forward (northern) defences of the Roman fort at Rough Castle, on
the Antonine Wall. They were originally about 3 feet deep and probably held
upright sharpened stakes; these pits were then concealed with brushwood. The
defences here consisted of about ten rows of twenty pits each. These pits were
opened up by excavation in 1903, and have been kept open since then.”
https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/925844
(11) stimulus, -ī [2/m]: a sharp, barbed hook concealed beneath the surface of the ground, to repel hostile troops
Ante haec tāleae
pedem longae ferreīs hāmīs īnfīxīs tōtae in terram īnfodiēbantur mediocribusque
intermissīs spatiīs omnibus locīs disserēbantur; quōs stimulōs nōminābant
(Caesar) │ Stakes a foot long, with iron hooks
attached to them, were entirely sunk in the ground before these (defences), and
were planted in every place at small intervals; these they called spurs
(some translations retain the Latin stimuli)
hāmus, -ī [2/m]: hook; fishhook
tālea, -ae [1/f] (wooden) stake
Image #7: series of wooden defensive spikes strategically
placed in ditches encircling the fort (1st century CE Roman fort in Bad Ems,
Germany)
Image #8: Interesting comparison: the same image #1
alongside the fortifications of the Berlin Wall in the 1980s, the former
designed to keep people out, the latter to keep them in (although I do have a
little bit of pride since, having been through Checkpoint Charlie and
Friedrichstrasse many times in the early 1980s, I was one of the thousands who
took a pick axe to smash it down in 1989)
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