Argentorate
About
Legio VIII Augusta was permanently stationed at Argentorate (Strasbourg), guarding a key Rhine crossing, from c. 90 CE and remained there for over three centuries. By 117 CE the fortress's defenses were being reinforced as part of Hadrian's broader consolidation of the German limes.
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.
Sources
Roman Maps shows the empire frozen at 11 August 117 CE, the day Trajan died — its moment of greatest territorial extent. Explore the full map →