Roman legionary tombstone found at Koenigshoffen, the Argentoratum fortress site (Strasbourg), Musee archeologique de Strasbourg · Wikimedia Commons

Fortress of Legio VIII Augusta (Argentorate)

Argentorate

FortGermania Superior · Strasbourg, FranceBuilt 90 CE

About

Legio VIII Augusta made Argentorate its permanent base from around 90 CE, guarding a strategic Rhine crossing at what is now Strasbourg, and the legion never really left, remaining garrisoned here for over three centuries. Excavations beneath the Place du Chateau, four meters under the modern street, uncovered the canabae legionis, the sprawling civilian quarter of shops and huts that grew up around the fortress to house merchants, craftsmen, and soldiers' families, along with painted wall fragments from the house of a Roman officer. By 117 CE the defenses were being reinforced as part of a broader strengthening of the German limes. Two and a half centuries later, this same ground hosted one of the Late Empire's decisive battles, when Julian's army crushed the Alamanni here in 357 CE.

What happened here

A legionary fortress holds five thousand men and is laid out to the same plan everywhere, so a transferred soldier knows his way around on the first day. Two main streets cross at the headquarters building, where the standards and the pay chest are kept in a sunken strongroom under guard. Around it: the commander's house with a courtyard garden, granaries raised on stone piers, a hospital, workshops, and long barrack blocks divided into rooms for eight men who cook and mess together. Training is daily, and building work is constant — soldiers make their own bricks, tiles and boots. A civilian town grows against the walls, with bars, traders and the unofficial families of men who are not legally allowed to marry.

In ancient writing

Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae 16.12
Ammianus gives a detailed narrative of the 357 CE Battle of Argentoratum (Strasbourg) between Julian's Roman army and the Alamanni, fought at this fortress site.