Editing Decimation (punishment) (section)

{{short description|Ancient Roman military punishment killing a tenth of a unit}}
{{Use British English |date=March 2025}}
{{Use dmy dates |date=March 2025}}
[[File:Decimation by William Hogarth (Beaver's Roman Military Punishments, Chapter 4, 1725).jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|Decimation. Etching by [[William Hogarth]] in ''Beaver's Roman Military Punishments'' (1725)]]

In [[Military of ancient Rome|the military]] of [[ancient Rome]], '''decimation''' ({{ety|la|decimatio|destruction of a tenth}}<ref>{{cite book |editor-last=Hoad |editor-first=T F |chapter=decimate |title=The concise Oxford dictionary of English etymology |year=1996 |chapter-url=https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780192830982.001.0001/acref-9780192830982-e-3969 |isbn=978-0-19-283098-2 }}</ref>) was a form of [[military discipline]] in which every tenth man in a group was executed by members of his cohort. The discipline was used by senior commanders in the [[Roman army]] to punish units or large groups guilty of [[capital offence]]s, such as [[cowardice]], [[mutiny]], [[desertion]], and [[insubordination]], and for pacification of rebellious [[Roman legion|legion]]s.

The historicity of the punishment during the early and middle republic is questioned, and it may be an ahistorical rhetorical construct of the late republic. Regardless, the first well-attested instance was in 72&nbsp;BC during the [[Third Servile War|war against Spartacus]] under the command of [[Marcus Licinius Crassus]]. Further instances followed in the next century, mostly occurring during times of civil strife, before falling out of use after [[Year of the Four Emperors|AD&nbsp;69]]. There is evidence of the punishment's revival in the post-classical world, such as during the [[Thirty Years' War]] and [[World War I]].

In modern English, the word is used most commonly not to mean a destruction of a tenth but rather annihilation.