Legio IIII Scythica PDF Print E-mail
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Legio IIII Scythica
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9115); obviously also the rock inscription (Cagnat IGR  III  1605) - Greek – Epì Kaisíou Príschou échatontárchou legeônos tetártès. Ôthen àrché   refers to the execution of the work. Another vexillatio of the legion was active in the quarries of Enesch at the Euphrates, as is shown by the inscriptions Année épigr. 1908 No. 25 – 28. Gravestones of individual soldiers are found at Samosata (CIL  III  6048) and Beroea (CIL  III  6049 - 6705). Detached Centurios of the legion are mentioned on monuments in Aradus (III 186 add. p. 972. Cagnat IGR  III  1017), in Canatha (IGR  III  1230 at the time of Commodus), in Rimet- Hazim (IGR  III  1242), all three obviously from the time before Septimus Severus, since the discovery sites lie within the province Syria Phoenice and / or Arabia, where Centurios of the north Syrian legions would no longer officially have come after the separation of the southern areas.

The legion seems to have been little involved in martial incidents outside the eastern parts of the empire. Up to now, its traces are completely missing in the provinces of the west, which could refer to its intervention in the wars along the Danube or on the Rhine. In Trajan’s Parthian war one its tribunes, Statilius Maximus, earned for himself  dona militaria  (CIL  III  10336). For the campaigns under Marcus and Lucius Verus a similar certification of its activity is missing. Under Commodus, soon after the year 180 CE, the legion was commanded by the later emperor Septimius Severus (Hist. aug. Sev. 3, 6), see below list of the legates. But during his elevation in 193 CE, the legion nevertheless seized the party of its up to then provincial governor Pescennius Niger, when he competed for the title with Severus.

In the year 219 CE it was provoked by its legate, Gellius Maximus, to revolt against Elagabalus, which was quickly struck down, just as was a second attempt to rebellion undertaken by it (Dio  LXXIX  7, 1). The legion seems not have been stricken with the punishment of dissolution at that time, as far as one can recognize; however datable certifications over it from the following time are completely failing. But apart from general considerations, the fact of further existence also during later 3. and 4. century is proved by indication of the Notitia Dignitata for the first half of the 5. century, Not. or. XXXIII 23:  praefectus legionis quartae Scythicae, Oresa, thereafter it still lay in its old province Syria, but apparently had changed its permanent camp; probably with the reorganization of the Orient by Diocletian.

5 Legati Aug. leg.:-         L. Funisulanus L. f. Ani. Vettonianus, CIL  III  4013, in the year 62 CE, Tac. ann. XV  7; compare Prosopogr. II p. 99 n. 396.
-    Gellius Maximus, in the year 219  CE, Dio LXXIX 7, 1,  - greek – úpostratègôn èn tè Suría tè étéra toû tetártou toû Schuthichoû teíchous.-         Ti. Iulius Ti. f. Cor. Celsus Polemaeanus, legate under Titus and Domitian, about  80 – 82 CE, Österreichische Jahreshefte VII 1904, Beiblatt p. 56. Année épigr. 1905 No.120 and 121. Ritterling Österreichische Jahreshefte X 1907 p. 299 f.

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