How tall and robust was an ancient Roman?

by philg

I’m listening to The Other Side of History: Daily Life in the Ancient World in my car. What are your prejudices about people in ancient times? Were they short of stature? Frail? Short-lived? According to the professor, the minimum height to enlist in the Roman Army was 5’10” (they reduced it to 5’8″ when they got desperate for recruits).

How tough were these guys? They could carry close to 100 lbs. on 20-mile, 5-hour marches. If pushed they could march for 30 miles in a day.

How long did they live? They joined the army at roughly the same age as today’s soldiers, around 20 years old with an upper limit of 36. They were entitled to retire with the ancient equivalent of a pension after 25 or 26 years of service (compare to the U.S. military’s 20-year rule).

Obviously these were the taller and tougher men of ancient Rome.

7 thoughts on “How tall and robust was an ancient Roman?”

  1. There is simply no way the minimum height to enlist in the Roman Legions was 5’10”.

  2. The 5’10” requirement may have applied only to elite troops.

    https://books.google.com/books?id=LfRiXN5hhCUC&pg=PA9&lpg=PA9&dq=minimum+height+ancient+roman+soldier&source=bl&ots=vzvy6XXA7l&sig=7P52BGuJv6x0RvSf-p3ssUPboi4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi9qJaGn6XKAhXFTBQKHVNUBEkQ6AEIOjAI#v=onepage&q=minimum%20height%20ancient%20roman%20soldier&f=false

    If the Ancient Romans will have applied the 5’10” cutoff for their recruits Parisians will now speak some Gaelic language.

  3. Doesn’t seem likely unless some kind of genetic shortening has occurred in the meantime. Other online sources mention 5’6″ for Roman soldiers. It seems to me that in Spain, 90% of the population fall within 4’10”-5’6″. Italians seemed taller overall, but even hundreds of years later, 5’10” and taller would seem to be a small percentage of the population. As of 2012, the average height of a US Army Ranger was 5’9″.

  4. As a marathon runner, I can say with some authority that carrying 100lbs on 20mile 5hr march would be a near super-human feat. I’m guessing someone embellished the facts, either the Romans to scare their enemies or a history professor to sell more books.

  5. Is the guy giving his measure in English feet? The Romans had their own “foot” which was a little shorter than a modern foot.

  7. Interesting cuisine from the Romans, I guess one could grow tall back in those days if one had access to a lot of food. One being the edible dormouse:

    The edible dormouse was farmed and eaten by the ancient Romans and the Etruscans (usually as a snack), hence the word edible in its name. The Romans would catch dormice from the wild in autumn when they were fattest.[27] The dormice were kept and raised either in large pits or (in less spacious urban surroundings) in terra cotta containers, the gliraria,[28] something like contemporary hamster cages.
    They fed these captive dormice walnuts, chestnuts, and acorns for fattening. The dormice were served by either roasting them and dipping them in honey or stuffing them with a mixture of pork, pine nuts, and other flavorings.[27] It was, however, very important to upper-class Romans that the dormice be separated from other products of the hunt, like the large game, for presentation purposes.[29]

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