While this book steps outside Britannia’s usual themes, the readers will nevertheless find it a useful offering in that it provides a convenient glance at recent research on the Roman army in the Danubian provinces. The volume covers the regions of Dacia and Moesia Inferior with one paper concerning Germania Inferior, and is derived from the proceedings of a 2018 conference held in Iaşi, Romania. The volume brings together a diverse range of contributions, featuring papers by both early-career researchers and established scholars. The volume consists of mixture of short papers, research notes on specific assemblages and individual buildings within sites, treatments of recently discovered material and several more substantial papers. The book aims to trace the impact of the Roman armies on the society, religious activity and economy of the provinces, including on local communities.

Almost half of the papers concern epigraphic material specifically, with several studies devoted to the footprint of veterans and their roles in the local societies. Among papers we find contributions on veteran patronage of construction, reconstruction and decoration of buildings in Dacia and Moesia Inferior (Odochiciuc) and Pázsint’s comprehensive overview of evidence of veterans in Moesia Inferior who settled from other provinces, which provides an interesting insight into immersion and interaction within the local society, including the veterans’ familial and wider societal networks. Particularly interesting is Spickermann’s contribution concerning the sanctuary of the Matronae and Matres at the canabae of the legio I Minervia in Bonn. This paper explores the varied religious local landscape, stressing the significance of the cult for the canabae’s para-military and civilian community, as well its connection to the Roman army and the cult of emperor Antoninus Pius. Other interesting contributions include a study of the epigraphic record of the praetorian guards of Danubian origin in Rome (Cenati) and two papers dealing with issues of linguistic diversity. Curcǎs’ paper zooms in on several epigraphic attestations of less common military functions linking them to ‘sermo castrensis’, although her observations regarding the potential local characteristic of confusing certain vowels in how these were spelt is perhaps the more interesting observation. Other papers include studies of prosopography of names on recently (re)discovered inscription from Troesmis (Mihilescu-Bîrliba) and a short study of the epigraphic presence of beneficarii consularis in Samum (Piso). Many of the papers in this block deal with military communities specifically, and either their religious and professional lives or their efforts to negotiate their intracommunal status through their epigraphic activity.

The second batch of papers in the volume concerns broadly various types of archaeological and small find material from the provinces. Two papers deserve special attention. Mihilescu-Bîrliba’s work on Roman salt exploitation in Dacia complements Piso’s contribution on beneficarii in that it drives home the level of state and military policing and oversight of the province’s resources as financial asset for the Roman state. This is one of the more robust papers in terms of the scope of the material under consideration, focusing both on the epigraphy and the archaeological record. The author first explores the evidence for a three-tier imperial estate lease system to focus then on the role of the army in overseeing the extraction of salt.

Varga’s and Crizbǎşan’s paper on changes to ceramic production and food practices at the base of ala I Batavorum milliaria at Rǎzboieni is another worthwhile contribution, as it traces the possible Batavian influence on pottery production and food practices on site, showing evidence for a gradual supplementation of imported luxury wares with locally produced cheaper imitations of wares associated with the Batavian heartland. Other archaeological papers are localised in scope, with a short note on the evidence for the existence of a timber fort at Sighişoara (Ardevan), recent work on the military baths at Capidava (Ratiu), both in Dacia, and treatments of pottery and glassware. A short contribution on the long-distance trade in goods transported in amphorae from Noviodunum is insightful, as the site was the headquarters of the classis Flavia Moesica (Honcu). Overall, this is a very varied volume offering a range of contributions that readers with an interest in the Roman military presence in the Danube region might find particularly interesting.