Talk:Legio VIIII Hispania

So is there a story behind the "VIIII" (as opposed to "IX")??

Roman Numerology

Yes, the Legion was referred to as 'VIIII' in several surviving inscriptions, particularly those commemorating the Judean War. Romans were very superstitious, and they often corrupted their "pure" system of Roman numerals so that their numbers were written in ways more auspicious under various numerological systems. Five ('V') was held to be the sacred number of Mars, the Roman god of war, and there is no 'V' anywhere in 'IX' (except in one little-understood numerological system counting the 'points' of various numerals, where the 'X' was held to be an upright 'V' sitting on top of another upside-down 'V!') It's only natural that soldiers marching off to battle would try to propitiate their god of war with offerings on behalf of the 'VIIII' legion instead of the 'IX' legion, considering that this diety was popularly thought to favor the the numeral 'V!' This sort of number-play wasn't limited to the military, though... followers of Hermes/Thoth/Mercury considered the number "two" to be sacred, and inscribed the number in all sorts of bizarre ways that held significance for them. They also took note of the fact that in standard Roman numerals 'II' looked nearly the same whether written horizontally or vertically, due to the horizontal bars added to the tops and bottoms of Roman numerals, and that it was also very similar to the astrological sign for Gemini. You also have examples of a few Latin words being made up solely of letters which are also Roman numerals-- these were especially significant under Roman numerological systems. The most famous of these is the word, "LVX," lux, meaning "light," which also has a literal number-value of 65 in corrupted Roman numerals. In 'proper' Roman numerals, '65' would have been rendered LXV, but the corrupted version LVX was often preferred in situations where it had more religious meaning as a reference to "light."

By the way, in addition to the '9' in "Ninth Legion" being written "IX" and "VIIII," there are also surviving Roman inscriptions where '9' is written "VIV" (also the Latin root for "life"), and even "IVV," because these corruptions of standard Roman numerals were also thought to be more favorable to Mars.

This sort of stuff is mostly academic, but it interests me, just as all things Roman interest me. Military service was thought to be a sacred duty, or even a religious rite, in the early Imperial era-- especially during the Claudian dynasty. Even rank-and-file soldiers had to go through a ceremonial investiture, dedicating themselves to the worship of Mars and to studying the art of warfare, before they were eligible to enlist. We don't have anything comparable to the Roman state religion in modern Western civilization-- it permeated everything! I'm reading and researching, and want to try to capture some of this symbolism in the inner workings of our company.

Great question!

--Maccalus