User:Daizus/Drafts/DacianSoldiers

Before 1990 the evidence for the recruitment of Dacian soldiers in the Roman auxiliary units was scarce, limited to few mentions of alae and cohortes Dacorum, few soldiers of Dacian origin (natione Dacus) or having characteristic names (Decebalus). Recently the scholars identified more than 40 Roman military diplomas awarded to Dacian soldiers, obtained from the illicit trade of antiquities looted from archaeological sites. At the same time, in the Eastern Desert of Egypt, large corpora of ostraca were excavated, bearing further evidence on the Dacian soldiers recruited during the reign of Trajan and sent to guard this province.