According to Wikipedia, there are 17,600 archers within the Roman Army. This seems pretty accurate, since it seems too detailed of a number to be made up. There's also no motivation for anybody to put misinformation, since this isn't some controversial subject.
However, I was not able to find the source to the number.
I just would like to confirm: how many archers are in the Early Imperial (not Late Imperial) Roman Army?
Amount of Sagittarii In The Roman Army
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TheAzn
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osmiu
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jonR
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Go over to this site and ask. There is a huge amount of info and resources over there.
http://www.romanarmytalk.com/rat/index.php
http://www.romanarmytalk.com/rat/index.php
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Hyarmendacil
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The number 17,600 is an educated guess, and while it's probably a pretty good one (considering Goldsworthy's reputation as a scholar), even the Wikipedia article already lists some of the reservations that cautions any researcher against swallowing this number whole as the literal truth. Moreover, 17600 is just the full strength of all the cohortes known to have sagittarii appellations, and the real number of archers in the contemporary Roman army could have been smaller (since who the **** would expect military units to be anything but constantly understrength except for extremely prestigious guard units?) or larger (even the Wiki's very brief overview mentions the likely presence of archers in in non-sagittarii units, not counting allied armies and mercenaries not integrated into the Roman cohort structure).
But then, you're just asking about the source, right? If you had clicked on the citation link at the end of the paragraph, you would have been taken to footnote #127, which refers to "Goldsworthy (2003), p.137," which in turns refers to Adrian Goldsworthy's 2003 book, the Complete Roman Army. Then, once you've done that, get Goldsworthy's book, open page 137, and see what he has to say as well as the citations/footnotes/endnotes about the sources that led him to the "17600" conclusion. Wikipedia, at best, can only be a springboard for further research; if you want to learn serious details you'll eventually still have to go to journals and books.
But then, you're just asking about the source, right? If you had clicked on the citation link at the end of the paragraph, you would have been taken to footnote #127, which refers to "Goldsworthy (2003), p.137," which in turns refers to Adrian Goldsworthy's 2003 book, the Complete Roman Army. Then, once you've done that, get Goldsworthy's book, open page 137, and see what he has to say as well as the citations/footnotes/endnotes about the sources that led him to the "17600" conclusion. Wikipedia, at best, can only be a springboard for further research; if you want to learn serious details you'll eventually still have to go to journals and books.