A condensed treatment of the proposed readings to date for the ARM[...]S lacuna of the L. Artorius Castus stone:
1) ARMENIOS is possible. Castus takes legionary troops under the Roman governor of Britain and commander of the war against Armenia, Statius Priscus. The problems with this scenario are distance (other known uses of British troops has them reach places only about halfway to Armenia) and chronology. There were huge forces already available to Priscus and we are told that when he left Britain trouble was stirring. The Armenian War under L. Verus was in the 160s, with Castus' procuratorship immediately following. While an Antonine date for the stone is accepted by several authorities, this is true only for the late or terminal Antonine. There is no evidence British troops served other emperors in later Armenian wars.
2) ARMORICOS. There is no record of Armorica rebelling. Proponents equate this problematically with the Commodan Deserters' War. Also, we need a nested C and O to make the reading fit the space, and we have side-conjoined C/O ligature elsewhere on the stone.
3) ARMATOS. Originated by Dr. Linda A. Malcor. 'Armed men', while it fits perfectly on the stone without ligatures and would thus seem to be an elegant solution, is universally rejected as too vague and nonspecific. I myself have failed to make it work (and I did genuinely try!) and was unable to find a single scholar who would back this reading. I've published numerous pieces that go into great depth on the unfeasibility of ARMATOS. Included in these articles are extensive citations from the most highly regarded Latin epigraphers and Roman military historians in the world. Interested readers can find these posts here on this blog.
4) AN UNKNOWN PLACE, PERSONAL OR ETHNIC NAME. Not helpful, and unlikely, as we would not expect an otherwise very rare or unknown entity to be recorded for posterity on a cursus.
5) ARM(ATAS) GENTES. My original idea. I've satisfied all necessary conditions for this to be a valid reading (as Salway and Graham can confirm). As Castus was prefect of the Sixth, a legion always northward-oriented, he might naturally have been expected to lead legionary forces against armed tribes in the North. This fits the Severus and Caracalla campaigns against the Caledonii and Maeatae confederations. This could have happened while Severus was sick at York and Caracalla had to go north on his own. As an aside, and strictly from the perspective of possible legend development (and not from that of history!), a Dark Age Arthur (now accepted as deriving from L. Artorius) fights the Miathi ( = Maeatae) and the Caledonians. He also fights at a trajectus (perfectly rendered by Welsh tribruit) that has been identified with Caracalla's Forth crossing at Queensferry. The rest of the Historia Brittonum Arthurian battles (save that of Badon, to which Arthur was improperly attached) stretch along or close to the Roman Dere Street, ending in the south at York, the headquarters of Castus' Sixth Legion.
So there you have it: why I think Castus fought under Caracalla. His special procuratorship of Liburnia may have been instituted on an emergency basis during Caracalla's Germanic wars.
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