Review of

J. Armstrong 2016, War and society in early Rome. From warlords to generals.
The title of Armstrong seems telling that he will use a new approach to analyze early Rome
through the analysis of the military organization. What Armstrong does, is re-interpreting social
and political structure of Rome, within the Latium geographical horizon, taking distance from the
traditional history of wars and rejecting hellenocentric models, which made the Roman army
derive from the hoplit falanx. Armstrong sees in conflicts the key of wealth and aristocratic
identity and power of early Rome, thanks to the transformation of Roman society, between VI
and IV c. BC, from a coalition of warlords into a civic society with an army fighting for common
goals.
About the way in which he uses the sources, his approach could be debated. On one side, he is
displaying a methodological reflection for the sources interpretation and he provides analysis of
the literary tradition together with archaeological sources, considering this a mandatory task for
“any specialist who ventures into the rough waters of early Rome” (p. 18). On the other hand,
what he does is stating the substantial reliability of the literary sources, considering all the
narratives aspects as derivates from oral or mythical traditions. There are some contradictions,
as for the date of the centuriate assembly, claimed to be in 509 BC and in 367 BC, and
assumptions, like when he never explains why the proto-urban population should coincide with
the plebs, that he claims had no gentes. But what he does, at the end of the day, is using
traditional sources, as annalistic traditions and Latium archaeology, and being aligned with
authors such as Cornell. His main assertion is that the struggle of the orders is a sort of traditional
tell for a conflict between outsider warlords, the Latins likely, that are the ancestors of the
patricians, and the people already settled in the Roman urban context, ancestors of plebeian.
The struggle between these communities and their attempts to adjust between each other in
some way determined all the conflicts, with some peaks, as the fallen of Monarchies and Gauls
sack in 390 BC, and the Rome dominium on the Latin League of the 338 BC, so the Republic starts
in that moment. This seems a bit incoherent, because if the struggle of the orders is a sort of
metaphor, then it is hard to understand how he fits these episodes in the broader history, since
he accepts them and does not consider them as narrative, traditional derived parts.
This attribution with this these two proto-groups, ancestors of the classic division on patricians
and plebeians, is mirrored, according to Armstrong, by the archaeological evidence. So, the
difference of wealth in Latin burials, always interpreted as two social classes of the same society,
should be two different societies, at least at the beginning. While the less rich tombs should
correspond to the proto-urban, egalitarian society, the richer ones belonged to those warlords
linked with élites of other societies, different from the local, urban ones. While this interpretation
can seem innovative, the conclusion is always that they relate to patricians and plebeians.
Moreover, he associates these two types of burials with the local economy of urban community
based on agriculture for the modest ones, while the external warlords and their wealthy tombs
should relate to pastoralism and mobile wealth.
The patricians, so, should have been derived from a regional aristocracy, with an extra-urban
identity, which, thanks to their nature of warlords, were able to dominate the regional area and
the "settled, community-based population of the lower socio-economic classes" of "proto-
plebeians". Despite he admits the possibility of these proto-plebeians raiding in some way in the
warfare, he does not consider their role as central, since the warfare, at least in the archaic phase,
should have been an affair of the warlords proto-patricians, expression of the regional cultural
horizon.

Another interpretation that he provides is the one about the Servian reform. He refuses the
concept of the Roman-hoplit phalanx, stating that is not detectable in the VI c. BC a community-
based army, as it is described in the Servian constitution of the army, on the contrary, some
elements like the wealth base and tribal geography base of the army constitution, spoke about a
structure which is still clan-based, since they were both richer than the urban community and,
Armstrong states, were also establishing around Rome.
In this always smokey interpretation of monarchy, from an acmé of the attempts to adjust
between proto-patricians and proto-plebeians to a reliable fact with an élite king, with roles of
administrating warfare, religion and justice, Armstrong sees its fallen as a smooth substitution of
the king with a coalition of clan members, not that traumatic for the urban proto-plebeian
community. In this passage, the mobile wealth on which warlords based their power was involved
in the economic contraction of central Italy, pushing them to shift their interest on the lands,
perhaps even fighting for them, and this could have determined in some way the realignment of
the proto-plebeians urban political structure against the élite. The main way of acquiring wealth
for this élite is still looting, but this new interest and control of the land, would save them more
sources to expansion and conquest of new territory.
The begin of the collaboration between the two contrasting elements of Roman society, despite
not enough proven archaeologically, is seen by Armstrong in the new magistracies and in the XII
tables law pf the V c. BC, both aspects of plebeians being more included on the political system
and with an official law system. This would have created the ideal soil for the later expansion of
Rome.
The highest point of this cooperation, is seen by Armstrong in the reaction against the Gauls, first
concrete touchstone of what should be considered the Republican army as we know it, with the
evolution of the military magistracies and introduction of the consulate, all contributing, together
with the reconstruction of the Servian walls of 378 BC, to create that higher military status, which
would have made Rome the first power in central Italy. The final merging of the two groups in
one more organized army, had also as a consequence a better definition of Roman citizenship.
All reviewers agree with the improving organization and collective vision and goals of the Roman
army from the Archaic to the middle Republican period, and, moreover, with Armstrong
“stimulating and provocative” prospective for the origin of the two Orders.
The objections they move though, center on two main elements. First one, is the fact the he
sometimes he goes too far beyond the evidence, with too much conjectural reconstructions,
even with archaeological evidence: when he tries to see four phases in the Archaic houses on the
via Sacra, claiming that their being rebuilt every 50 years until 500 BC and then their remaining
until III c. BC, correspond to the first extreme mobility of the élite of proto-patricians, and to the
more stable phase after the monarchy. This interpretation needs deeper proofs for the reason
why they were demolished, the status of the owners... that he does not have. Secondly, the
extreme dualism and positivist approach that wants necessary to reconduct the complex, multi-
characters reality of the VI-IV centuries to a plain dichotomy, should be more problematized.
Starting from the twelve tables law, which is the only context where we find this dichotomy and
dualism between patroni and clientes, patricii and plebes. Moreover, the warlords, should have
had a base in their army, which is not élite enough to be warlords, but still is not part of the urban
proto-plebeians: what is the destiny of these people?
Only Echevarrìa seems more enthusiast of Armstrong’s book, considering his work as an
innovative interpretation of Roman community, which portrays regal and early Republican period
within the whole socio-economic regional context, with the result of providing “a n alternative
vision on the evolution of the war and the Roman army that, not without controversy, will surely
be the subject of analysis and debate in the coming years”. The others reviewers seem much
more skeptical.