Satala
About
Legio XV Apollinaris fought in Trajan's Parthian War (114-117) and was in Egypt in the war's immediate aftermath; scholarship on its movements (Speidel) dates its departure for its new permanent post at Satala, on the Cappadocian-Armenian frontier, to around August 117 CE (i.e., essentially at Trajan's death/Hadrian's accession), arriving and establishing its castrum stativum there by summer 118. At the exact 117 CE snapshot the legion was thus most likely already marching toward, or just arriving at, Satala rather than fully garrisoned in its permanent stone fortress — flagged accordingly.
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.
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 →