A common critic we hear about an EU wide army is What language are they gonna speak but let’s forget Europe 2024,
Rome had a huge empire over the whole Europe, I may be wrong, but I don’t think that commoner spoke proper Latin in remote province. What happens when they join the legion ? Would the units be split by origin region (Dacian with Dacian, Lugdunumese with Lugdunemese) with only officer speaking latin ? Or would you merge legionaries from different province (So you have Tingitanian, a Lustitanian and a Thracian in the same unit) and give them a crash course in military latin (the way the french foreign legion does? ) Even going as far as Rome, Karl the great empire also spread over half of Europe, and modern European nation used to be way more multi-lingual than they are today, and most likely a random southerner/northerner in Britain, France or Germany couldn’t talk to each other.
So how did ancient armies managed the language question ?
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Emperor’s of Rome podcast addressed this in a Q&A episode.
From memory the answer is that top level generals would almost always speak Greek and Latin, mid level commanders would speak either Greek or Latin adequately as well as the local language of the troops they were commanding.
Found it
Emperors of Rome: Episode CVIII - A Lesson in Latin II Starting from: 00:08:02
Episode webpage: http://www.latrobe.edu.au/marketing/assets/podcasts/emperors/181128-latin02.mp3
Media file: http://www.latrobe.edu.au/marketing/assets/podcasts/emperors/181128-latin02.mp3#t=482
