ABSTRACT
As Forni has shown (1953: 28-31), Augustus, after reducing the army to a reason able size after Actium, apparently expected that in future volunteers would supply all the recruits needed for the legions. Whether he expected that Italy would supply the total number required is more doubtful. The evidence for the eastern provinces shows that there the legions soon in fact ceased to receive any signifi cant number of Italian recruits, or of men from the western provinces, and it seems unlikely that any attempt was ever made to maintain the legions of the eastern provinces as an Italian force, or even as one of men born as Roman citizens. In stead, as had been done during the pressing days of the civil wars, peregrini were drawn from the east itself, particularly at first from Asia Minor, but also very soon from Egypt and Syria as well. Most of these peregrini were no doubt volun teers. In the western provinces, although the recruits were almost all born Roman citizens in the Julio-Claudian period, they were not all Italians. Men were also drawn from the Roman communities of Narbonensis, Spain and Africa.
