the officers reject the idea of bludgeoning or slaughtering all the men involved. If ever these same things happen to occur among a large group of men.

Polybius gives one of the first descriptions of the practice in the early 3rd century BC: Julius Caesar threatened to decimate the 9th Legion during the war against Pompey, but never did. The amount of men killed through decimation is not known, but it varies between 1,000 (used on 10,000 men), or a cohort of around 480-500 men, meaning only 48-50 were killed. The practice was revived by Crassus in 71 BC during the Third Servile War against Spartacus, and some historical sources attribute part of Crassus' success to it. In an incident where his army had been scattered, consul Appius Claudius Sabinus Inregillensis had the culprits punished for desertion: Centurions, standard-bearers and soldiers who had cast away their weapons were individually scourged and beheaded, while of the remainder, one in ten were chosen by lot and executed. The earliest documented decimation occurred in 471 BC during the Roman Republic's early wars against the Volsci and is recorded by Livy. The leadership was usually executed independently of the one in ten deaths of the rank and file. īecause the punishment fell by lot, all soldiers in the group were eligible for execution, regardless of the individual degree of fault, or rank and distinction, unless rigged to eliminate the mutiny ringleaders.

The remaining soldiers were often given rations of barley instead of wheat for a few days, and required to camp outside the marching camp. A cohort selected for punishment by decimation was divided into groups of ten each group drew lots ( Sortition), and the soldier on whom the lot fell was executed by his nine comrades, often by stoning or clubbing.

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