Thumbless Draft Dodging Romans

To avoid conscription into the Roman Army, some Romans adopted the practice of removing their own thumbs! In this short episode, we talk about this bizarre practice!

Remember in the movie Gladiator, when The Emperor, Commodus, played by Joaquin Phoenix, determines the fate of someone who’s been defeated in gladiator combat by either giving a thumbs up or a thumbs down. If he gives a thumbs up, the winner was to show mercy to the loser, but the thumbs down meant death. Well this was a real thing…kind of. The idea of the crowd, and ultimately the Emperor, deciding the ultimate fate of a conquered gladiator was a real thing known as “pollice verso,” or “with a turned thumb.” But historians can’t seem to agree on what the actual hand signals were. The most common thought among these scholars is that a thumbs up actually meant death for the defeated, but the sign for mercy was probably a closed fist with the thumb wrapping around. Others think that extending two fingers from a closed fist was the sign for mercy. There are pieces of art from the time that depict this practice and the entire reason I bring this up is because we’re talking today about the importance of thumbs. 

The reason the humans opposable thumb is so important is because of it’s length. It’s the longest thumb of any primate, and because of this, we’re able to grasp and manipulate items of many different shapes. According to German Paleoanthropologist Katerina Harvati, “Increased manual dexterity in the form of efficient thumb opposition was among the early defining characteristics of our lineage, providing a formidable adaptive advantage to our ancestors.” 

And in early war, the use of the thumb was essential in wielding the most popular weapon – the sword. If you didn’t have a thumb, you couldn’t hold a sword. This is why we see the removal of the thumbs as a hobbling punishment for enslaved romans, conquered enemies and prisoners. It was so they couldn’t rise up against their masters or captors. It’s a practice that’s even mentioned in the Bible. In Judges 1:7, it refers to the account of Adoni-Bezek, whose thumbs and big toes were removed. Now in this case, it was payback for him supposedly having carried out this same punishment to 70 kings. He had done this so they could no longer hold swords or run. So this dates the practice to at least the late 7th or early 6th century B.C.

So why then, in the late stages of the Roman Empire, do we see records of Roman men cutting off their own thumbs? 

In the late stages of the Roman Empire – starting somewhere in the 500 B.C. time period, Barbarian tribes began challenging the empire, and did so for the next several hundred years. Huns, Franks, Vandals, Saxons, and Goths all entered Rome and destroyed many cities. The Roman Empire was shrinking and needed all able-bodied Roman men to be conscripted into its Army. And it wasn’t like the conscription we know of here in America where if someone didn’t refused without a good excuse, they’d be punished with the legal system and jail. If you refused to fight in the Roman army, you’d be executed, with some of these men being burned at the stake in public. They needed men desperately as these attacking tribes became a serious threat. For example, in the year of 378 AD, the battle of Adrianople killed something like 20,000 Romans – a total of one-third of their Army. 

But the problem of conscription avoidance had already become a major issue in Rome. It’s been a problem in every army in every war. Soldiers in later wars who who wanted to avoid fighting during would sometimes shoot themselves in the second toe or other extremities in order to be sent home. Some would do it prior to being drafted. In ancient Rome, these men wanted to be home with their families. Some of them simply didn’t want to go through the grueling training and hard work. Claiming you had bone spurs or asthma wasn’t an option. So that’s why Romans began cutting off their own thumbs to avoid conscription. There are accounts of this happening in the aristocracy, where rich fathers would cut off their sons’ thumbs in order to avoid losing them in battle. There’s a historical record of Emperor Augustus learning about this practice and becoming furious. He was emperor from 27 BC to 14 AD, so that gives you an idea of when this was happening. Augustus was so angry when he learned that this rich father had removed the thumbs of his two sons, that he ordered the sons to be sold into slavery and took all of the father’s wealth and possessions. 

There’s a record of Ammianus Marcellinus, a Roman Soldier and Historian from 355 AD where he was disparaging people from Italy and comparing them with the Gauls, saying “no one here ever cuts off his thumb to escape military service, as happens in Italy, where they have a special name for such malingerers.” The word Ammianus is referring to is “Murci,” which meant coward. And it was believed at the time that this was becoming a big problem for the Roman Empire, particularly, within Italy. 

In 364 AD, Emperors Valentinan and Valens were brothers who were Co-Emporers of Rome. They started enforcing a law that had previously been established by Constantine, but one they decreed they would take seriously. “if a person cuts off his fingers to avoid military service he will be sentenced to death and if his master fails to prevent him from this he will be severely punished.” If the person committing the offense was poor, they’d enslave the person, making them work in the mines. If the person was rich, they’d confiscate their wealth. Emperor Theodosius had the same rule. 

This helped reduce the number of Roman draft dodgers, but by this point, it was probably too late. The fall of Rome which happened in the following century probably wasn’t because of men cutting off their own thumbs, but this strange self mutilation practice probably didn’t help, and can also be seen as a sign of the changing times in the attitudes of Romans fighting-age men. 

So next time you use your thumb to hold your iPhone, just think about this story and how glad you are to have your thumbs without needing to use them to hold a sword and go into battle. We’re living in good times, friends. The Internet Says it’s True. 

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