Decimation (Roman army)
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Decimation (Latin: decimatio; decem = "ten") was a form of military discipline used by officers in the Roman Army to punish mutinous or cowardly soldiers. The word decimation is derived from Latin meaning "removal of a tenth."[1]
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[edit] Procedure
A cohort selected for punishment by decimation was divided into groups of ten; each group drew lots (Sortition), and the soldier on whom the lot fell was executed by his nine comrades, often by stoning or clubbing. The remaining soldiers were given rations of barley instead of wheat and forced to sleep outside of the Roman encampment.
Because the punishment fell by lot, all soldiers in the selected cohort were eligible for execution, regardless of guilt and innocence or rank and distinction.
The leadership was usually executed independent of the 1 in 10 deaths of the rank and file.[citation needed]
[edit] Sources
The earliest documented decimation occurred in 471 BC during the Roman Republic's early wars against the Volsci and is recorded by Livy.[2] The practice was revived by Crassus in 71 BC in the Third Servile War against Spartacus. Julius Caesar is often reported as having used the practice on the 9th Legion during the war against Pompey, but this has been disproved.[3]
Polybius gives one of the first descriptions of the practice in the early 3rd century BC:
- "If ever these same things happen to occur among a large group of men... the officers reject the idea of bludgeoning or slaughtering all the men involved [as is the case with a small group or an individual]. Instead they find a solution for the situation which chooses by a lottery system sometimes five, sometimes eight, sometimes twenty of these men, always calculating the number in this group with reference to the whole unit of offenders so that this group forms one-tenth of all those guilty of cowardice. And these men who are chosen by lot are bludgeoned mercilessly in the manner described above [see original text]."[4]
Plutarch describes the process in his life of Antony. After a defeat in Media:
- "Antony was furious and employed the punishment known as 'decimation' on those who had lost their nerve. What he did was divide the whole lot of them into groups of ten, and then he killed one from each group, who was chosen by lot; the rest, on his orders were given barley rations instead of wheat."[5]
Decimation was still in practice during the Roman Empire. Suetonius records that it was used for the last time by Augustus in 17 BC[6] while Tacitus records that Lucius Apronius used decimation to punish a full cohort of the III Augusta after their defeat by Tacfarinas in AD 20.[7]
Some historic sources attribute to this practice part of the success of Crassus over Spartacus on the Third Servile War.
[edit] Modern instances of decimation
In his book Stalingrad, Antony Beevor recounts how a Soviet Corps commander of a division practiced decimation on retreating soldiers by walking down the line of soldiers at attention, and shooting every tenth soldier in the face until his TT-33 pistol ran out of ammunition.[8]
Decimation can be also used to punish the enemy. In 1918, in the Finnish Civil War, the White troops, after the battle of Varkaus, ordered all the captured Reds to assemble in a single row on the ice of Huruslahti, selected first all leaders and then every fifth prisoner, and executed them on the spot. This incident is known as the Huruslahden arpajaiset (Lottery of Huruslahti; see Finnish Wikipedia article). The Reds had attempted a stratagem by using a white flag as a trap; it had failed, and the Whites punished the Reds for breaching the rules of conflict.[citation needed]
[edit] Current usage of the word
In current English use, the word decimation is often used to refer to an extreme reduction in the number of a population or force, usually greater than the one tenth implied by the "deci" root, and in contrast to the leniency suggested by the Roman practice.[9] While growing, this usage is still not completely accepted. Some other uses of the word are generally regarded as incorrect (complete destruction, harming an indivisible, etc.)[10][11][12]
In Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History, Stephen Jay Gould uses "decimate" to indicate the taking of nine in ten, noting that the Oxford English Dictionary supports the "pedigree" of this "rare" meaning.[13][14]
[edit] In popular culture
In Max Brooks' novel World War Z, the Russian military uses a universal decimation to instill unquestioning discipline in its soldiers after a failed mutiny. This is a true decimation as ten percent of the soldiers are killed.
[edit] See also
- Lachesis (['lækəsɪs], Greek Λάχεσις — "allotter" or drawer of lots) measured the thread of life with her rod. Her Roman equivalent was Decima (the 'Tenth').
[edit] Notes
- ^ decimate. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
- ^ Ab urbe condita, ii.59
- ^ Goldsworthy, Caesar: Life of a Colossus, 407
- ^ Polybius, History of the World. Quoted in Shelton, Jo-Ann, As the Romans Did, p. 248 ISBN 9780195089745
- ^ Plutarch: Antony, c. 39
- ^ Suetonius, Augustus, 24
- ^ Tacitus, Annals, 3
- ^ Antony Beevor, Stalingrad, p. 117.
- ^ Polybius, as above
- ^ decimate - definition of decimate by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus and Encyclopedia
- ^ Should “Decimate” be Annihilated? : OUPblog
- ^ http://www.worldwidewords.org/backissues/wbi080112.txt
- ^ Gould, Wonderful Life: The Burgess Shale and the Nature of History, 47
- ^ Oxford English Dictionary, Second Edition (1989), Volume IV, 331
[edit] External links
- Decimatio, article in Smith's Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities
- Did Julius Caesar Decimate a Legion?
