Decimation, from the Latin decimatio, meaning “removal of a tenth”. It was a severe form of punishment of a body of Roman troops that had behaved in a cowardly or treasonous fashion during combat. Because the body of troops that had misbehaved was too large to punish in its entirety, lots were drawn whereby every tenth man who drew a short straw or a dark tessera, would be designated for execution. These selected victims (10% of the unit) would be clubbed to death by the other 90% of the disgraced unit. The survivors would then be placed on barley (instead of wheat) rations. When in the field, such disgraced units were forced to bivouac outside the protective walls of a Roman camp.