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Nero's Killing Machine: The True Story of Rome's Remarkable Fourteenth Legion
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Nero's Killing Machine: The True Story of Rome's Remarkable Fourteenth Legion Hardcover - 2004

by Stephen Dando-Collins


From the publisher

The 14th Gemina Martia Victrix Legion was the most celebrated unit of the early Roman Empire, a force that had been wiped out under Julius Caesar, reformed, and almost wiped out again. After participating in the a.d. 43 invasion of Britain, the 14th Legion achieved its greatest glory when it put down the famous rebellion of the Britons under Boudicca. Numbering less than 10,000 men, the disciplined Roman killing machine defeated 230,000 rampaging rebels, slaughtering 80,000 with only 400 Roman losses, an accomplishment that led the emperor Nero to honor the legion with the title "Conqueror of Britain." In this gripping book, second in the author's definitive histories of the legions of ancient Rome, Stephen Dando-Collins brings the 14th Legion to life, offering military history aficionados a unique soldier's-eye view of their tactics, campaigns, and battles.

First line

The retreat was at an end.

From the rear cover

The 14th Gemina Martia Victrix Legion was the most celebrated military unit of the early Roman Empire. After participating in the A.D. 43 invasion of Britain, the legion achieved its greatest glory when it put down the famous rebellion led by Britain's Queen Boudicca. Numbering less than 10,000 men, the disciplined Roman soldiers defeated 230,000 rampaging British rebels, slaughtering 80,000 while incurring only 400 losses--an accomplishment that led the emperor Nero to honor the legion with the title "Conqueror of Britain."

In this gripping book, second in the author's definitive histories of the legions of ancient Rome, Stephen Dando-Collins brings the 14th Legion to life, offering a unique soldier's-eye view of their tactics, campaigns, and battles and exploring the gruesome realities of war in the Classical Age. Based on his thirty-two years of painstaking research into the Roman military, Nero's Killing Machine paints a striking portrait of daily life in the legion as it traces its storied history--beginning with the disastrous day in 54 B.C. when, led into a trap while serving under Julius Caesar, the legion was wiped from the face of the earth.

You'll see how, for decades, the legion struggled to regain its lost status, treading a blood-soaked path and slowly climbing back to glory by fighting first under Germanicus Caesar against Hermann the German, then under Gaius Suetonius Paulinus against Queen Boudicca--vastly outnumbered but determined to preserve honor if not life as it went down fighting. You'll also gain new insights into the lives of the legionnaires--men who, hardened by years of rigorous training and rigid Roman military discipline enforced by often brutal centurions, merged into a close-knit, chillingly efficient killing machine.

Filled with previously unknown details about Roman military practices, Nero's Killing Machine is a riveting, eye-opening history of the men who made Rome great.

From the jacket flap

The 14th Gemina Martia Victrix Legion was the most celebrated military unit of the early Roman Empire. After participating in the A.D. 43 invasion of Britain, the legion achieved its greatest glory when it put down the famous rebellion led by Britain's Queen Boudicca. Numbering less than 10,000 men, the disciplined Roman soldiers defeated 230,000 rampaging British rebels, slaughtering 80,000 while incurring only 400 losses--an accomplishment that led the emperor Nero to honor the legion with the title "Conqueror of Britain."

In this gripping book, second in the author's definitive histories of the legions of ancient Rome, Stephen Dando-Collins brings the 14th Legion to life, offering a unique soldier's-eye view of their tactics, campaigns, and battles and exploring the gruesome realities of war in the Classical Age. Based on his thirty-two years of painstaking research into the Roman military, Nero's Killing Machine paints a striking portrait of daily life in the legion as it traces its storied history--beginning with the disastrous day in 54 B.C. when, led into a trap while serving under Julius Caesar, the legion was wiped from the face of the earth.

You'll see how, for decades, the legion struggled to regain its lost status, treading a blood-soaked path and slowly climbing back to glory by fighting first under Germanicus Caesar against Hermann the German, then under Gaius Suetonius Paulinus against Queen Boudicca--vastly outnumbered but determined to preserve honor if not life as it went down fighting. You'll also gain new insights into the lives of the legionnaires--men who, hardened by years of rigorous training and rigid Roman military discipline enforced by often brutal centurions, merged into a close-knit, chillingly efficient killing machine.

Filled with previously unknown details about Roman military practices, Nero's Killing Machine is a riveting, eye-opening history of the men who made Rome great.

Details

  • Title Nero's Killing Machine: The True Story of Rome's Remarkable Fourteenth Legion
  • Author Stephen Dando-Collins
  • Binding Hardcover
  • Edition First Edition
  • Pages 322
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Wiley (TP), Somerset, New Jersey, U.S.A.
  • Date 2004-11-01
  • Features Bibliography, Dust Cover, Glossary, Index, Maps, Table of Contents
  • ISBN 9780471675013 / 0471675016
  • Weight 1.26 lbs (0.57 kg)
  • Dimensions 9.3 x 6.52 x 1.14 in (23.62 x 16.56 x 2.90 cm)
  • Themes
    • Chronological Period: Ancient (To 499 A.D.)
    • Cultural Region: British
    • Cultural Region: Italy
  • Library of Congress subjects Rome - History
  • Library of Congress Catalog Number 2004001728
  • Dewey Decimal Code 355.009

About the author

STEPHEN DANDO-COLLINS is the author of Caesar's Legion: The Epic Saga of Julius Caesar's Elite Tenth Legion and the Armies of Rome (Wiley). He is an Australian-born researcher, editor, and author who has spent the last three decades identifying and studying the individual legions of the Roman army of the late Republic and the empire of the Caesars.

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NERO'S KILLING MACHINE; The True Story of Rome's Remarkable Fourteenth Legion

by Dando-Collins, Stephen

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Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Son, Inc, 2005. First U.S. Edition, First Printing. Boards. Very Fine/Very Fine. maps. 8vo, brown boards with gold lettering on spine, illustrated with an Atlas consisting of 5 maps, archival mylar-protected pictorial dust jacket (price-clipped) by Corbis, xiv + 322 pages. EXCEPTIONAL CONDITION: tight, bright, clean in comparable sharp dust jacket. Rome's Fourteenth Legion, LEGIO XIV G M V [Gemina Martia Victrix, "Twinned Martial and Victorious"] was raised from defeat after being wiped out by an ambush in Gaul when led by none other than the great Julius Caesar. Thereafter, after being "raised" again (i.e., reconstituted), the legion was honored by receiving the cognomen Martia Victrix (martial and victorious) for their outstanding service in the Pannonian War c. AD 9. Under Germanicus, they retaliated against Arminius and the Germans who had destroyed 3 of Caesar Augustus's legions in the Teutoberg Forest. Never resting for… Read More
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