Melitene
About
Legio XII Fulminata was posted to Melitene on the upper Euphrates after the First Jewish-Roman War (from 71-72 CE), guarding the crossing into Armenia and the end of the road east from Caesarea. It took part in Trajan's Armenian campaign (114) and remained based at Melitene through 117 CE and for centuries after (attested there in the Notitia Dignitatum).
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
- Tacitus, Annals Book 15
Tacitus describes Corbulo massing allied cavalry, infantry, and legionary detachments at Melitene before crossing the Euphrates into Armenia during the Parthian War of the early 60s CE.
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 →