Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Legal Evidence for Roman PTSD?

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Combat Stress in Pre-modern Europe

Part of the book series: Mental Health in Historical Perspective ((MHHP))

  • 233 Accesses

Abstract

Much writing on the possibility of PTSD in the Roman army has involved simple assertion that such mental trauma was present in antiquity or has used texts anachronistically or uncritically in an attempt to provide evidence of its existence. Examples include the failure to recognise that many accounts of battle in antiquity were written long after the events in question and are highly coloured by the rhetorical conventions of the day. The dangers of using poetry to capture the reality of battle are even greater. In contrast, this chapter focusses on a series of legal texts from the Digest of Roman Law dating to the third century AD. The ‘dry’ and utilitarian nature of this material means that it is devoid of many of the problems which beset other evidence often used to argue for the presence of PTSD. However, it will be shown that while the legislation it records could be used to argue for the presence of PTSD in the Imperial Roman Army, it is by no means unambiguous in its interpretation and that the legislation can be explained in other, more plausible ways.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 119.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    A. Howell, ‘The Demise of PTSD: From Governing Through Trauma to Governing Resilience’, Alternatives 37.3, 2012, 214–26.

  2. 2.

    Roughly from the ‘Marian reforms’ of the early first century BC to the collapse of the Western Empire in AD 476. The Eastern Roman Empire lies outside the scope of this paper.

  3. 3.

    R. Holmes, Acts of War: the Behaviour of Men in Battle (London: Cassell, 2003), pp. 255–56.

  4. 4.

    See Lord Southborough, Report of the War Office Committee of Enquiry into ‘Shell Shock’ (London: HMSO 1922, reprinted 2014), pp. 28–9, 48, 66. For an ancient example of panic spreading through an army, see Caesar, Bellum Gallicum, 1.39.

  5. 5.

    L. Fulkerson, No Regrets: Remorse in Classical Antiquity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), pp. 180–85; A. Denman, An Analysis of Roman Mutiny Narratives through Multiple Perspectives, Unpublished MA thesis (MacMaster University, 2013).

  6. 6.

    ἐπ᾽ οὖν τούτους ὁ Ἀγρίππας ἐπιστρατεύσας ἔσχε μέν τι καὶ πρὸς τοὺς στρατιώτας ἔργον: πρεσβύτεροι γὰρ οὐκ ὀλίγοι αὐτῶν ὄντες καὶ τῇ συνεχείᾳ τῶν πολέμων τετρυχωμένοι, τούς τε Καντάβρους ὡς καὶ δυσπολεμήτους δεδιότες, οὐκ ἐπείθοντο αὐτῷ. Dio 54.11.

  7. 7.

    See P. Bourne, Men, Stress, and Vietnam (Boston: Little, Brown, 1970).

  8. 8.

    Thus, there is no ancient equivalent of the plethora of memoirs produced after the Napoleonic Wars. The most famous of these is probably The Recollections of Rifleman Harris. Harris, who was illiterate, dictated the book to his friend Capt. Henry Curling, a minor novelist, in the 1830s. The resulting manuscript was then published in 1848. There are very many others, including those written from what in the Roman world would be regarded as the perspective of an ‘auxiliary’, for example, S. Ram Pande, From Sepoy to Subedar Being the Life and Adventures of Subedar Sita Ram, a Native Officer of the Bengal Army, Written and Related by Himself, which was translated from Hindi and published in 1873. The ancient world can offer no equivalents.

  9. 9.

    For the use of these texts in the Middle Ages, see V. Prosperi, ‘The Place of the Father: the Reception of Homer in the Renaissance Canon’, in E. Morra (ed), Building the Canon though the Classics (Leiden: Brill, 1988), pp. 47–69; and F. Mora-Lebrun, ‘Joseph of Exeter: Troy through Dictys and Dares’, in Simms, R.C. (ed), Brill's Companion to Prequels, Sequels, and Retellings of Classical Epic (Leiden: Brill, 2018), pp. 115–33.

  10. 10.

    T. Rice Holmes, The Roman Republic and the Founder of the Empire, vol. 2 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1923), p. 298.

  11. 11.

    The best edition of Caesar’s Bellum Gallicum is that edited by N. Diourn (1999). A poor prose style is not the preserve of the poor. R.H., Storch, ‘The Author Of The “De Bello Hispaniensi”: A Cavalry Officer?’, Acta Classica 20, 1977, 201–04 believes the work to have been written by a cavalry officer, while Van Hoof, ‘The Caesar of the “Bellum Hispaniense”’, Mnemosyne, 27.2, 1974, 123–38 doubts that the work was written by a military man at all.

  12. 12.

    This is a tendency which at times regrettably mars the otherwise excellent work of Van Lommel.

  13. 13.

    T. Mommsen, The Provinces of the Roman Empire: From Caesar to Diocletian, vol. 1 (London: MacMillan & Co., 1909), p. 181.

  14. 14.

    Like Lucan, there is no evidence that Virgil, Statius ever served in the Roman army or had any experience of the empire’s frontiers. Horace did fight in the Civil Wars, but there is no trace of PTSD in any of his poetry which treats his participation in battle with light irony, see Odes 2.7.10.

  15. 15.

    Preserved by Seneca, Suasoriae 1.15.

  16. 16.

    Plutarch (Marius 45) makes clear that Marius’s nightmares when pursued by Sulla at the end of his life are provoked by the imagined future not the past—Marius was suffering from Pre, not Post, Traumatic Stress Disorder.

  17. 17.

    S. Baughman Shively, et al., ‘Characterisation of Interface Astroglial Scarring in the Human Brain After Blast Exposure: A Post-Mortem Case Series’, The Lancet: Neurology 15.9, 2016, 944–53.

  18. 18.

    See S.A. Stouffer, et al., The American Soldier: Combat and Its Aftermath (New York: Wiley, 1949). This is a point stressed by Holmes, Acts of War, 211, citing a Vietnam veteran, ‘I could deal with a man that my talent against his for survival, but how do you deal with him when he ain’t even there?’.

  19. 19.

    See Vegetius, De Re Militari 3.9 and A.K. Goldsworthy, The Roman Army at War, I00 BC-AD 200 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 201–06. For lulls in battle, see S. Koon, Infantry Combat in Livy's Battle Narratives (British Archaeological Reports, International Series 2071) (Oxford: BAR Publishing, 2010).

  20. 20.

    Holmes, Acts of War, 216, notes that a Napoleonic soldier would have campaigned for years before amassing the same amount of time in combat that troops talking part in the Italian campaign of 1944–1995 accrued. The same is true, perhaps more so, of ancient troops.

  21. 21.

    For the ‘Locus of Control’, see J.B. Rotter, Social Learning and Clinical Psychology (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1954); R.S., Lazarus and S. Folkman, Stress, Appraisal, and Coping (New York: Springer, 1984); and E.J. Peacock and P.T.P. Wong, ‘Anticipatory Stress: The Relation of Locus of Control, Optimism, and Control Appraisals to Coping’, Journal of Research In Personality 30, 1996, 204–22.

  22. 22.

    Epictetus, Discourses 2.19.

  23. 23.

    See Seneca, Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium, 3.24. For the use of stoicism in a modern military context, see N. Sherman, Stoic Warriors (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005).

  24. 24.

    See K. van Lommel, ‘The Recognition of Roman Soldiers' Mental Impairment’, Acta Classica 56, 2013, 155–184. Many of the texts discussed here are conveniently gathered together in C.E. Brand, Roman Military Law (Austin and London: University of Texas Press, 1968).

  25. 25.

    Digest (Macer) 49.16.13.3: Missionum generales causae sunt tres: honesta causaria ignominiosa. honesta est, quae tempore militiae impleto datur: causaria, cum quis vitio animi vel corporis minus idoneus militiae renuntiatur: ignominiosa causa est, cum quis propter delictum sacramento solvitur.

  26. 26.

    Digest (Ulpian) 3.2.2.2: multa genera sunt missionum. est honesta, quae emeritis stipendiis vel ante ab imperatore indulgetur: est causaria, quae propter valetudinem laboribus militiae solvit.

  27. 27.

    Codex Iustinianus, 12.35.6: Imperator Gordianus Semel causaria missis militibus instauratio non solet concedi obtentu recuperatae valitudinis melioris, quando non temere dimittantur, nisi quos constet medicis denuntiantibus et iudice competente diligenter etiam investigante vitium contraxisse.

  28. 28.

    Codex Iustinianus, 7.64.9; 10.55.2–3.

  29. 29.

    Constantine exempted from the poll tax those who were invalided out of the service for this reason along with their wives, AE 1937 232 = FIRA2 94.

  30. 30.

    Digest 29.1.4.

  31. 31.

    See Digest 21.1, Cicero, De Officiis 3.17.

  32. 32.

    Je Yeong Sone et al., ‘Helmet Efficacy Against Concussion and Traumatic Brain Injury: A Review’, Journal of Neurosurgery 126.3, 2017, 661–1027.

  33. 33.

    V.J. Belfiglio, ‘Treatment of Traumatic Brain Injury in the Roman Army’, Balkan Military Medical Review 18.4, 2015, 101–05.

  34. 34.

    This section of the Digest is printed in full with an English translation in Brand, Roman Military Law.

  35. 35.

    Digest 49.16.6.7: Qui se vulneravit vel alias mortem sibi conscivit, imperator Hadrianus rescripsit, ut modus eius rei statutus sit, ut, si impatientia doloris aut taedio vitae aut morbo aut furore aut pudore mori maluit, non animadvertatur in eum, sed ignominia mittatur, si nihil tale praetendat, capite puniatur. per vinum aut lasciviam lapsis capitalis poena remittenda est et militiae mutatio irroganda.

  36. 36.

    Digest (Papinian) 29.1.34: Eius militis, qui doloris impatientia vel taedio vitae mori maluit, testamentum valere…divus Hadrianus rescripsit.

  37. 37.

    Digest (Paulus) 48.19.38.12: Miles, qui sibi manus intulit nec factum peregit, nisi impatientia doloris aut morbi luctusve alicuius vel alia causa fecerit, capite puniendus est: alias cum ignominia mittendus est.

  38. 38.

    Digest 28.3.6.7: quod si quis taedio vitae vel valetudinis adversae impatientia vel iactationis, ut quidam philosophi, in ea causa sunt, ut testamenta eorum valeant. quam distinctionem in militis quoque testamento divus hadrianus dedit epistula ad pomponium falconem, ut, si quidem ob conscientiam delicti militaris mori maluit, irritum sit eius testamentum: quod si taedio vel dolore, valere testamentum aut, si intestato decessit, cognatis aut, si non sint, legioni ista sint vindicanda.

  39. 39.

    See, for example, his decision to countenance manslaughter as opposed to murder, Digest 48.8.1.3.

  40. 40.

    See Cassius Dio 69.8, Euphrates is praised by Pliny, Epistulae, 1.10, but harshly criticised by Philostratus, Vitae Sophistorum 1.7.

  41. 41.

    See Seneca, Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium, 3.24, ridiculum est currere ad mortem taedio vitae, ‘it is ridiculous to rush to death from a weariness of life’; vir fortis ac sapiens non fugere debet e vita sed exire, ‘The brave and wise man ought not to flee from life but to leave it’.

  42. 42.

    Scriptores Historiae Augustae, Hadriani, 24.

  43. 43.

    ‘Pomponius Falco’ is probably to be identified with Quintus Roscius Murena Coelius Pompeius Falco. See CIL 10.6231 = ILS 1035.

  44. 44.

    Digest 48.21.3.4.

  45. 45.

    V.J. Belfiglio, ‘Control of epidemics in the Roman army: 27 B.C.–A.D. 476’, International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health 4.5, 2017, 1387–91.

  46. 46.

    E. Durkheim, E, Le Suicide: étude de sociologie (Paris: Alcan, 1897; reprinted, New York: The Free Press, 1951), p. 227; A. Rankin, Seppuku: A History of Samurai Suicide (Tokyo and New York: Kodansha International, 2011).

  47. 47.

    P. Kreuzer, et al., ‘Trauma-Associated Tinnitus’, Journal of Head Trauma Rehabilitation, 29.5, 2014, 432–42.

  48. 48.

    There is an extensive literature on this problem. See H.A. Orloff and C.M. Rapp, ‘The Effects of Load Carriage on Spinal Curvature and Posture’, Spine 29.12, 2004, 1325–29; R. Attwells, ‘Influence of Carrying Heavy Loads on Soldier’s Posture, Movements and Gait’, Ergonomics 49, 2006, 1527–37; J.R. Meakin, et al., ‘The Effect of Axial Load on the Sagittal Plane Curvature of the Upright Human Spine in Vivo’, Journal of Biomechanics 41.13, 2008, 2850–54.

Bibliography

  • Attwells, R., et al., ‘Influence of Carrying Heavy Loads on Soldier's Posture, Movements and Gait’, Ergonomics 49, 2006, 1527–37.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Baughman Shively, S., et al., ‘Characterisation of Interface Astroglial Scarring in the Human Brain After Blast Exposure: A Post-mortem Case Series’, The Lancet: Neurology 15.9, 2016, 944–53.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Belfiglio, V. J., ‘Treatment of Traumatic Brain Injury in the Roman Army’, Balkan Military Medical Review 18.4, 2015, 101–05.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Belfiglio, V.J., ‘Control of Epidemics in the Roman Army: 27 B.C.–A.D. 476’, International Journal of Community Medicine and Public Health 4.5, 2017, 1387–91.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bourne, P., Men, Stress, and Vietnam (Boston: Little, Brown, 1970).

    Google Scholar 

  • Brand, C.E., Roman Military Law (Austin and London: University of Texas Press, 1968).

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Denman A., An Analysis of Roman Mutiny Narratives through Multiple Perspectives, Unpublished MA thesis (MacMaster University, 2013).

    Google Scholar 

  • Diouron, N., Pseudo-César, Guerre d'Espagne (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1999).

    Google Scholar 

  • Durkheim, E, Le Suicide: étude de sociologie (Paris: Alcan, 1897; reprinted, New York: The Free Press, 1951).

    Google Scholar 

  • Frazer, R.M., The Trojan War: the Chronicles of Dictys of Crete and Dares the Phrygian (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1966).

    Google Scholar 

  • Fulkerson, L., No Regrets: Remorse in Classical Antiquity (Oxford: Oxford University Pressm 2013).

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Goldsworthy, A.K., The Roman Army at War, I00 BC-AD 200 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996).

    Google Scholar 

  • Koon, S., Infantry Combat in Livy's Battle Narratives (British Archaeological Reports, International Series 2071) (Oxford: BAR Publishing, 2010).

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Kreuzer, P., et al., ‘Trauma-Associated Tinnitus’, Journal of Head Trauma Rehabilitation, 29.5, 2014, 432–42.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Holmes, R., Acts of War: The Behaviour of Men in Battle (London: Cassell, 2003).

    Google Scholar 

  • Howell, A., ‘The Demise of PTSD: From Governing through Trauma to Governing Resilience’, Alternatives 37.3, 2012, 214–26.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lazarus, R. S. and Folkman, S., Stress, Appraisal, and Coping (New York: Springer, 1984).

    Google Scholar 

  • Lord Southborough, Report of the War Office Committee of Enquiry into ‘Shell Shock’ (London: HMSO 1922, reprinted 2014).

    Google Scholar 

  • Meakin, J.R., et al., ‘The Effect of Axial Load on the Sagittal Plane Curvature of the Upright Human Spine in Vivo’, Journal of Biomechanics 41.13, 2008, 2850–54.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mommsen, T., The Provinces of the Roman Empire: From Caesar to Diocletian, volume1, (London: MacMillan & Co., 1909).

    Google Scholar 

  • Mora-Lebrun, F., ‘Joseph of Exeter: Troy through Dictys and Dares’, in Simms, R.C. (ed), Brill's Companion to Prequels, Sequels, and Retellings of Classical Epic (Leiden: Brill, 2018), pp. 115–33.

    Google Scholar 

  • Orloff, H.A. and Rapp, C.M., ‘The Effects of Load Carriage on Spinal Curvature and Posture’, Spine 29.12, 2004, 1325–29.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Peacock, E.J. and Wong, P.T.P., ‘Anticipatory Stress: The Relation of Locus of Control, Optimism, and Control Appraisals to Coping’, Journal of Research in Personality 30, 1996, 204–22.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Prosperi, V., ‘The Place of the Father: the Reception of Homer in the Renaissance Canon’, in E. Morra (ed), Building the Canon though the Classics (Leiden: Brill, 1988), 47–69.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rankin, A., Seppuku: A History of Samurai Suicide (Tokyo and New York: Kodansha International, 2011).

    Google Scholar 

  • Rice Holmes, T., The Roman Republic and the Founder of the Empire, vol. 2 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1923).

    Google Scholar 

  • Rotter, J. B., Social Learning and Clinical Psychology (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1954).

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Shay, J., Achilles in Vietnam (New York: Maxwell Macmillan International, 1994).

    Google Scholar 

  • Sherman, N., Stoic Warriors (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005)

    Google Scholar 

  • Sone, Je Yeong, et al., ‘Helmet Efficacy Against Concussion and Traumatic Brain Injury: A Review’, Journal of Neurosurgery 126.3, 2017, 661–1027.

    Google Scholar 

  • Storch, R.H., ‘The Author of the ‘De Bello Hispaniensi’: A Cavalry Officer?’, Acta Classica 20, 1977, 201–04.

    Google Scholar 

  • Stouffer S.A., et al., The American Soldier: Combat and Its Aftermath (New York: Wiley, 1949).

    Google Scholar 

  • Van Hoof, ‘The Caesar of the ‘Bellum Hispaniense’’, Mnemosyne, 27.2, 1974, 123–38.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • van Lommel, K., ‘Heroes and Outcasts: Ambiguous Attitudes Towards Impaired and Disfigured Roman Veterans’, Classical World 109.1, 2015, 91–117.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • van Lommel, K., ‘The Recognition of Roman Soldiers' Mental Impairment’, Acta Classica 56, 2013, 155–84.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Manchester, Manchester, UK

    Andrew Fear

Authors
  1. Andrew Fear
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Andrew Fear .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of History, Politics and Philosophy, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK

    Owen Rees

  2. Department of History, Politics and Philosophy, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK

    Kathryn Hurlock

  3. Department of History, Politics and Philosophy, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK

    Jason Crowley

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2022 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Fear, A. (2022). Legal Evidence for Roman PTSD?. In: Rees, O., Hurlock, K., Crowley, J. (eds) Combat Stress in Pre-modern Europe. Mental Health in Historical Perspective. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-09947-2_5

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-09947-2_5

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-031-09946-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-09947-2

  • eBook Packages: HistoryHistory (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation