''Sagittarii'' (Latin, plural form of ''sagittarius'') is the Latin term for archers. The term ''sagittariorum'' in the title of an infantry or cavalry unit indicated a specialized archer regiment. Regular auxiliary units of foot and horse archers appeared in the

Roman army The Roman army () served ancient Rome and the Roman people, enduring through the Roman Kingdom (753–509 BC), the Roman Republic (509–27 BC), and the Roman Empire (27 BC–AD 1453), including the Western Roman Empire (collapsed Fall of the W ...

during the early empire.Jeffrey L. Davies: "Roman Arrowheads from Dinorben and the 'Sagittarii' of the Roman Army", Britannia, Vol. 8. (1977), pp. 257-270. During the

Principate The Principate was the form of imperial government of the Roman Empire from the beginning of the reign of Augustus in 27 BC to the end of the Crisis of the Third Century in AD 284, after which it evolved into the Dominate. The principate was ch ...

roughly two thirds of all archers were on foot and one third were horse archers. Mercenary foot archers already served with the Roman republican army, but horse archers were only introduced after the Romans came into conflict with Eastern armies that relied heavily on mounted archery in the 1st century BC, most notably the Parthians, whose mounted archers were decisive for Crassus's major defeat in the

Battle of Carrhae The Battle of Carrhae () was fought in 53 BC between the Roman Republic and the Parthian Empire near the ancient town of Carrhae (present-day Harran, Turkey). An invading force of seven Roman legion, legions of Roman heavy infantry under Marcus ...

. Since the time of Augustus however, Romans and Italians were also levied as dedicated archers. In the early 1st century BC horse archers were already in widespread use and even supported Roman campaigns against the Germanic tribes in the

Central Europe Central Europe is a geographical region of Europe between Eastern Europe, Eastern, Southern Europe, Southern, Western Europe, Western and Northern Europe, Northern Europe. Central Europe is known for its cultural diversity; however, countries in ...

. The normal weapon of Roman archers, both infantry and cavalry units, was the

composite bow A composite bow is a traditional bow made from horn, wood, and sinew laminated together, a form of laminated bow. The horn is on the belly, facing the archer, and sinew on the outer side of a wooden core. When the bow is drawn, the sinew (s ...

, although

Vegetius Publius (or Flavius) Vegetius Renatus, known as Vegetius (), was a writer of the Later Roman Empire (late 4th century). Nothing is known of his life or station beyond what is contained in his two surviving works: ''Epitoma rei militaris'' (also r ...

recommended training recruits "''arcubus ligneis''" (with wooden bows), which may have been made in the northern European self bow tradition. It has been suggested that most Roman composite bows may have been asymmetric, with lower limbs shorter than the upper.Roman Military Equipment from the Punic Wars to the Fall of Rome (Paperback). M.C. Bishop, J.C. Coulston. Oxbow Books 2005. By the 5th century, there were numerous Roman cavalry regiments trained to use the bow as a supplement to their swords and lances, but the ''sagittarii'' appear to have used the bow as their primary rather than supplemental weapon. According to the ''

Notitia Dignitatum The (Latin for 'List of all dignities and administrations both civil and military') is a document of the Late Roman Empire that details the administrative organization of the Western and the Eastern Roman Empire. It is unique as one of very ...

'', most units of ''sagittarii'', especially ''equites sagittarii'', were in the Eastern empire or in Africa. Possibly some of the other cavalry regiments there carried bows as back-up weapons, but were not the dedicated mounted archers that the ''sagittarii'' were. The use of bows as primary weapons probably originated in the East in the later 4th and earlier 5th centuries to help the Roman army counter Persian and Hunnic bow-armed cavalry. By the time of

Procopius Procopius of Caesarea (; ''Prokópios ho Kaisareús''; ; – 565) was a prominent Late antiquity, late antique Byzantine Greeks, Greek scholar and historian from Caesarea Maritima. Accompanying the Roman general Belisarius in Justinian I, Empe ...

's histories and Maurikios's '' Strategikon'', the main effective field arm of Roman armies was cavalry, many of them armed with bows. After the fall of the Western empire, Eastern Roman armies maintained their tradition of horse archery for centuries.

References

{{reflist Infantry units and formations of ancient Rome

See also

References