CAMP, in military use, the place and aggregate body of tents or huts for soldiers in the field. In modern times a difference is often made between camp, bivouac and cantonment, the first signifying the quarters of an army sheltered in tents; the bivouac the situation of one which dispenses with them, and remains either entirely in the open air, or, when time allows it, in huts built of branches, etc.; the cantonment when the troops occupy buildings in towns or villages. Camps, in a general .sense, are of very ancient origin, since almost all nations in their infancy lived as nomads, dwelling in tents, as is the case with many tribes in Asia and Africa at the present day, for example, the Arabs. Among the Greeks, the Lacedzmonians seem to have been the first who devoted atten tion to the art of forming military camps. The form which they adopted was the circular, that bang the form which was best calculated to enable the general, who had his tent in the centre, to have a view of the whole camp, and to dispatch 'assistance in the shortest possible time to any part of the camp that might be Th attacked. The Romans probably first tarried the art of encampment to a high degree of per fection, on account of their many wars in dis tant and thinly settled regions, where their large armies found no cities to quarter in. Cesar and several other Roman authors give us much information on their way of construct ing a camp, and in Polybius we have a detailed description of the consular camp as it was made in his time. This form of camp, with some modifications, continued to be the usual one during the whole period of the Roman domina tion, and down to the time of the invention of gunpowder. The site was chosen by the general himself, or by one of the military tribunes; a spot from which a view of the whole camp could be obtained. This spot was marked by a white pole as the point from which the rest of 'the camp was measured out, and the place where the general's tent (pretorium) was to be erected. The form of the camp was a square,
and it was divided into two parts by a street from 50 to 100 feet wide, called the principia or via principalis, which ran across it. One of these divisions occupied about one-third of the whole space, the other, the remaining two thirds ; and it was in the former of these that the prertorium was situated, with an open area around it extending 100 feet on all sides. On the right of the prcrtorium was the forum or market-place, and on the left the quastorium, where were the camp-stores under the superin tendence of the questor. Beyond these again on each side there were select bodies of horse and foot taken from the extraordinaries, and behind this whole line of the encampment, and separated from it by a street 100 feet broad, was the place reserved for the main body of the extraordinaries, and for foreigners and oc casional auxiliary troops. Immediately in front of the line of the encampment first described the tents of the military tribunes and of the prefecti, or officers of the allies, were erected, the former before and guestorium, the latter before the select bodies of horse and foot. These tents lined the principia on the side of the prertorium. On the other side of the principia the main body of the army was quartered, the allies being stationed on the right and left, the two Roman legions which be longed to every consular army in the middle. The whole was surrounded with a ditch (fossa) and a rampart (vallum) at the distance of 200 feet from the tents. On every side of the camp there was a gate. That behind the prtatorium was called ports pnztoria, the one on the opposite side Aorta decismana. The other two were at the ends of the principia, and were called respectively Aorta princspalis dextra and Aorta prmcipal>s smisera. The camp was im proved in strength and convenience according to the time that it was occupied, and in some cases, from the want of fortresses, it was made the basis of their military operations.