Aulus Caecina Severus

Biography

Aulus Caecina Severus was a capable and battle-hardened officer who served as one of Germanicus's two main subordinate commanders. A veteran of the Pannonian campaigns and various Rhine operations, he was neither brilliant nor incompetent — exactly the kind of reliable professionalism that Roman military success depended on. His name is permanently attached to the Battle of Pontes Longi in 15 AD — the closest Rome came to a second Teutoburg. Leading four legions back toward the Rhine after Germanicus's campaign, Caecina allowed Arminius to separate his column on the Long Bridges causeway. For four days of desperate combat in autumn rain and mud, with the causeway sections collapsing, the soldiers demoralized, and Germanic warriors pressing from all sides, Caecina held the force together by force of personality alone. When a night panic spread through the camp and men began fleeing toward the river, Caecina reportedly threw himself across the camp gate and announced that anyone wishing to leave would have to step over his body first. The panic subsided. He brought the army home battered but intact. Germanicus met him at the Rhine with the relief fleet. The episode cemented both men's reputations — Caecina as a tough survivor, Germanicus as a commander who understood what he was risking.

Key Battles