This Legion was recruited by the Consul Gaius Vibius Pansa, together with Octavian, in 43 BC. Nothing is known about the early years of its existence, although it's likely that the V Urbana that had been garrisoning the city of Rome during the tumult following Caesar's murder is the same Legion that became the V Macedonica. The Legion served in Macedonia between 30-6 BC, and from this service does it get its surname. From then until 61 AD it guarded the Lower Danube frontier against Dacian tribes. From 66-68 it was active in Galilee and Emmaus, under the command of the future-Emperor Vespasian. When Emperor Domitian reorganized the Rhine and Danube frontiers in the mid-80's, the Legion was stationed in Moesia Inferior, and aided in defeating the Dacian King Decebalus at Tapae in 88. One of the Legion's officers in 98 was the future-Emperor Hadrian. The Legion served under Trajan in his Dacian Campaigns of101-06, and was later involved against the Parthians in 115 and at Judaea in 132, and in more Dacian campaigns in the 160's. During the reign of Commodus, the Legion was led by future-Emperors Pescennius Niger and Clodius Albinus against the Sarmatians. For most the the 3rd century AD, the Legion was at Potaissa (modern Turda), and was more than once given the surname Pia Fidelis (Loyal and Faithful to). In the late 3rd century, Emperor Diocletian took a subunit of cavalry from the Legion, and it became part of the mobile army that was the core of the Roman Army of late antiquity.