---
node: roman_legion
type: organization
slug: roman_legion
title: "Roman Legion"
lead: "The Roman legion was the main unit of the Roman army, a formation of several thousand heavy infantry citizens with attached cavalry and support, the backbone of Rome's military power."
published: 2026-07-11
updated: 2026-08-27
change: "Rewrote the opening body section so that it no longer restates the page's own lead."
previous_hash: "45ac360c2c8940f92eaebac3d16bd2cd9c941c95c70c388e58e0a824327e6a51"
requester: internal
reason: "The section repeated the lead, so the first thing under the first heading was text the reader had already read in the search result."
image_file: roman_legion.jpg
image_source: "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Split_-_City_wall_-_Roman_soldiers.JPG"
image_author: "JoJan"
image_license: "CC BY 3.0"
---

## What it was

From Marius's reforms onward it held about five thousand men in ten cohorts, each of six centuries of eighty — a century being eighty men and not a hundred, whatever its name says. Every legion carried a number, a name and a silver eagle whose loss was a disgrace no reorganisation could wipe out. Its soldiers were citizens serving twenty to twenty-five years for pay and a discharge grant, and the non-citizens who fought beside them in the auxiliaries earned citizenship at the end of their own service — which made the army one of the largest manufacturers of Romans the empire had.

## Role

Disciplined and drilled, organized into cohorts and centuries, legions conquered and held the empire and also built roads, forts, and frontiers, spreading Roman ways. Reforms associated with Marius (late 2nd century BC) opened recruitment and professionalized the army, and legions became power bases for ambitious generals.

## Fate

The legions evolved over centuries and declined with the Western Empire, increasingly relying on non-Roman troops. Roman military organization and engineering left a lasting mark on the art of war.

**This page was corrected.** Rewrote the opening body section so that it no longer restates the page's own lead.

**Why.** The section repeated the lead, so the first thing under the first heading was text the reader had already read in the search result.

**Who asked.** The Media Division itself.