Hi everyone and welcome to yet another episode of ancient warfare answers. Thanks to the more than 100 of you that have now joined us on Patreon and our patrons of this podcast. Did you know that if you wanted to be a patron, you could go on to patreon.com forward slash ancient warfare podcast and join us.

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And if you ask a question, we may well end up asking it, answering it.

That's what I'm answering like this.

So we have a question from Abram on Patreon. How fast could a legionary camp

respond to a surprise attack? How long would it take the average legionary to don his armor?

How quickly could commands be given and followed? And were certain people designated as firefighters?

Jasper. Well, Murray, I'm afraid we have no historians who had a stopwatch and recorded this all for us.

I could say that I've seen reenactors put on their equipment.

It can be pretty quick, I think, although they usually have a, you know, they have a lazy

Saturday afternoon.

Not a lazy Saturday afternoon, but they have a fun Saturday afternoon showing the punters what it's like to wear a Roman equipment.

And, you know, mail probably goes faster because it's like putting on a very heavy t-shirt.

While a segmentata would take a little longer because somebody has to sort of lace you up like a corset.

I was thinking about this.

Last time, one of the previous episodes, we talked about joining battle and how that seems to have been sort of either by mutual agreement or, you know, people are in their camps

across from a valley and then they sort of march out and pick a time to go to battle.

So there are actually not that many examples of a Roman legionary encampment being attacked.

And yet, you might argue that clearly the Romans worried about it because they build an encampment being attacked. And yet, you might argue that clearly the Romans

worried about it because they build an encampment with a stockade and with ditches in front of it

and sometimes even traps in front of the ditches or between the ditches or in the ditches

to prevent an attack on a camp.

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