Dromedarii
Encyclopedia
Dromedarii were camel
riding auxiliary
forces recruited in the desert provinces of the Late Roman Empire
.
They were developed to take the place of horse
s where horses were not common. They were also very successful against enemy horses, as the smell of the camel is absolutely repulsive to a horse and will quickly make them reluctant to enter battle or even stay in the immediate area.
Camel
A camel is an even-toed ungulate within the genus Camelus, bearing distinctive fatty deposits known as humps on its back. There are two species of camels: the dromedary or Arabian camel has a single hump, and the bactrian has two humps. Dromedaries are native to the dry desert areas of West Asia,...
riding auxiliary
Auxiliaries (Roman military)
Auxiliaries formed the standing non-citizen corps of the Roman army of the Principate , alongside the citizen legions...
forces recruited in the desert provinces of the Late Roman Empire
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
.
They were developed to take the place of horse
Horse
The horse is one of two extant subspecies of Equus ferus, or the wild horse. It is a single-hooved mammal belonging to the taxonomic family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature into the large, single-toed animal of today...
s where horses were not common. They were also very successful against enemy horses, as the smell of the camel is absolutely repulsive to a horse and will quickly make them reluctant to enter battle or even stay in the immediate area.
Secondary sources
- Dixon, Karen Ramsey and Pat Southern (1997). The Roman Cavalry: From the First to the Third Century AD. London: Routledge.