Turma

The turma, Latin for a swarm or squadron, was a cavalry unit of the Roman army of the Republic and the Empire, with plural turmae. In the Republican army of the Punic Wars period, a legion of 4,200 infantry was accompanied by 300 citizen horsemen divided into ten turmae, each electing three decuriones as officers, the first chosen acting as commander. After the army reforms of Augustus the turma became the basic cavalry sub-unit, roughly equal to the infantry century, in the auxiliaries that supplied most Roman cavalry as well as in the legions. The word is often translated squadron, as is the ala, which was made up of several turmae. In the Byzantine Empire the word was applied to larger, regiment-sized military and administrative divisions of a thema.