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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;singig, post: 4671938, member: 93672&quot;]I will try to answer your title question , <i>&#039;&#039;what took Rome so long to defeat them?</i>&#039;&#039; , one of the main reasons would have been that the Dacians had well-armed forces , not at the same level as the Roman legions for sure but much better than others foreign enemies of the empire. Researchers estimate that only ten percent of barbarians such as Spanish and Gallic warriors had access to swords, usually the nobility. By contrast Dacia had rich resources of iron and copper and were prolific metal workers. A large percentage of Dacians owned swords, greatly reducing Rome&#039;s military advantage.</p><p><br /></p><p>Another reason would be that they had an army large enough to counter the roman attacks. Dacia spotted 250,000 potential combatants and was allied to several of its neighbors and on friendly terms with others that Rome considered enemies.</p><p><br /></p><p>After the humiliating defeat of Domitian&#039;s army(5 or 6 legions) in 87 , for his dacian campaigns , Trajan gathered the biggest army used by Romans versus a foreign enemy , no less than 14-17 legions, draining troops from all over the empire. Wikipedia is indicating 150,000 soldiers in the first war – 200,000 in the second war. Was one of the few instances when Romans had numerical superiority on the battle field.&nbsp; Even if the Dacian capital, Sarmisegetuza, was at a distance of 125-150 km from the Trajan&#039;s bridge(main entry point to Dacia), Romans needed almost a year, each war, to reach there.......</p><p><br /></p><p>Dacia was mainly personified by Romans(sculpture or on coins) holding the Draco standard or a curved sword(Dacian falx). The story behind the Draco standard was already presented by [USER=75937]@Roman Collector[/USER] in very interesting thread(link above) , I will try in a few sentences to introduce you this Dacian falx and to find why it was so special to be declared as a symbol.</p><p><br /></p><p>This type of sword is well represented on the Trajan&#039;s column and also on many Trajan , Hadrian and Antoninus Pius coins :</p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1151482[/ATTACH] </p><p><a href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=453857" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=453857" rel="nofollow">https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=453857</a></p><p><br /></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1151483[/ATTACH] </p><p><a href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=67450" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=67450" rel="nofollow">https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=67450</a></p><p>[ATTACH=full]1151485[/ATTACH] </p><p>ebay.com</p><p><br /></p><p>The Dacian falx was a two handed shaped blade(used with a long handle then) , sharp on the inside edge as a sickle.. As a two handed weapon it could cut through Roman shields. It might go around the shield and strike the legionnaire head or its shoulders. The Romans adapted their helmets and added crossbars to the top of the helmets so that they could better defend the soldier’s head. It might even be used to disarm the legionnaire of his shield. Any weapon that mitigated the legionnaire’s shield put the legionnaire and his unit at a disadvantage. So fearsome was this weapon, the Romans developed additional armour to protect arms, legs and heads from it&#039;s devastating impact.</p><p>[ATTACH=full]1151486[/ATTACH] </p><p><br /></p><p>The most terrifying and effective Dacian troops were those armed with the lethal falx , the falxmen were probably very skilled warriors and formed just a fraction of the Dacian army , they were always the first line in battle.</p><p>[ATTACH=full]1151487[/ATTACH] </p><p>sources : wikipedia.org and <a href="https://www.romanarmytalk.com/" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="https://www.romanarmytalk.com/" rel="nofollow">romanarmytalk.com</a>[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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