ROME AND ROMANIA,
27 BC-1453 AD

Emperors of the Roman and the so-called
Byzantine Empires; Princes, Kings, and
Tsars of Numidia, Judaea, Bulgaria,
Serbia, Wallachia, & Moldavia;
and the Sulṭāns of Rūm

Die Römer waren ja die Starken und Vornehmen,
wie sie stärker und vornehmer bisher auf Erden nie dagewesen,
selbst niemals geträumt worden sind.

The Romans were indeed the strong and noble,
just as those stronger and nobler hitherto on earth never existed,
never even would have been dreamt.

Friedrich Nietzsche, "The Genealogy of Morals," Zur Genealogie der Moral
[1887, Philipp Reclam Verlag, Stuttgart, 1988, p.42; editor's translation]

---

Ἡ Ῥωμανία πῶς σοι φαίνεται;
Στήκει ὡς τὸ ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς ἢ ἠλαττώθη;

How does Romania look to you?
Does it stand as from the beginning,
or has it diminished?

Doctrina Jacobi nuper baptizati, Διδασκαλία Ἰακώβου νεοβαπτίστου, 634 AD, A.H.M. Jones, The Later Roman Empire, 284-602 [The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986, p. 316, translation modified], Greek text, "Doctrina Jacobi Nuper Baptizati," Édition et traduction par Vincent Déroche, Travaux et Mémoires, 11 [Collège de France Centre de Recherche d'Histoire et Civilisation de Byzance, De Boccard, Paris, 1991, p.167, see]

---

Nec minore cura Graeca studia secutus est, amorem praestantiamque linguae occasione omni professus. Cuidam barbaro Graece ac Latine disserenti: "Cum utroque," inquit, "sermone nostro sis paratus"...

[Claudius] gave no less attention to Greek studies, taking every occasion to profess his regard for that language and its superiority. To a barbarian who held forth both in Greek and Latin he said: "Since you are prepared with both our languages"...

Suetonius, Volume II, translated by J.C. Rolfe, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, 1914, 1997, pp.74-75, translation modified.

---

Οἱ κράκται· „πολλὰ, πολλὰ, πολλά·”
ὁ λαός· „πολλὰ ἔτη εἰς πολλά·”
οἱ κράκται· „πολλοὶ ὑμῖν χρόνοι...
αὐτοκράτορες Ῥωμαίων·”
ὁ λαός· „πολλοὶ ὑμῖν χρόνοι.”

The criers, "Many, many, many,"
The people: "Many years upon many."
The criers, "Many years to you...
Emperors of the Romans!"
The people: "Many years to you!"

Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (913-959 AD), "Acclamation by the People at the Coronation of an Emperor," De Ceremoniis, Book I, Chapter 38 [Constantine Porphyrogennetos, The Book of Ceremonies, translated by Ann Moffatt and Maxeme Tall, with the Greek edition of the Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae, Bonn, 1829, Australian Association for Byzantine Studies, Byzantina Australiensia 18, Canberra, 2012, Volume I, p.195, translation modified, cf. Monarchical Acclamations]

---

If the United States were to last as long as the Roman Empire, it would have to continue as an independent country, with political and cultural continuity, until the year 2899.

Robert Spencer, The Empire of God, How the Byzantines Saved Civilization [Bombadier Books, 2023, p.xvi]. However, Spencer dates the Empire only from 330 AD, at the founding of Constantinople, for 1123 years. From 27 BC, with the reign of Augustus, the Empire lasted 1479 years until 1453. If we add that to 1776, we get 3255 AD. Spencer short changes the Roman Empire. Even so, the original Star Trek is only supposed to take place in 2265.

---

Caught in that sensual music all neglect
Monuments of unageing intellect.

William Butler Yeats (1865–1939), "Sailing to Byzantium"

Rome casts a long shadow. I am writing in the Latin alphabet -- albeit as modified by the Carolingians (with the "w" originally introduced just to write English). I am using the Roman calendar, with its names of the months. I use Roman names for the planets in the sky, which also get applied to the days of the week -- although with Germanic variations. Sentences I write contain borrowed Latin words with some frequency [e.g. sententia, continēre, Latinus, frequentia, for example -- exempli gratia], even though the English language and its antecedents never existed within the Roman Empire -- unlike the many modern languages directly descended from Latin, or even Welsh or Basque. The English would actually enter Roman history, dramatically for the first time, in the 11th century.

The Nietzsche quote above was translated by Francis Golffing as, "The Romans were the strongest and most noble people who ever lived." This took some gratuitous liberties with the translation but more succinctly conveys the essential idea.

But this is just the problem. What Nietzsche admired was unapologetic power, conquest, and domination. This no longer seems so admirable, and the Empire founded by Julius Caesar and Augustus, as a form of government, does not look like an advance in the course of human progress.

Marcus Aurelius, the Piazza del Campidoglio, Capitoline Hill, Rome, 2019

Even to Machiavelli, the despotism of Caesar was a grave retrogression in comparison to the Roman Republic.

While a thoughtful Emperor, like Marcus Aurelius, expressed ideals adopted from Stoic cosmopolitanism, the unity and universality of Rome soon expressed itself as the unity and universality of a state religion, Christianity, whose intrinsic exclusivism and intolerance became characteristic of the Middle Ages -- keeping in mind that there was already a state religion, with whose polytheistic requirements Jews and Christians clashed, resulting in the destruction of Judaea, the diaspora of the Jews, and multiple persecutions of Christians.

Thus, a state religion is also no longer to be regarded as admirable, despite its presence in many countries, particularly Islāmic ones, even today, with the attendant persecution or even prohibition of religious minorities [note].

Nevertheless, the very success of Rome, both pagan and Christian, makes everyone, like it or not, her heirs, in countless matters great and small -- like monogamy, which has no Biblical basis; or shaving, which only seems to have been previously popular among the Egyptians [note].

Indeed, the Romans were rather more successful than is usually thought. The corpus of Roman law, let alone (all of) Greek literature, was not preserved at Rome, but at Constantinople:  the "City of Constantine," ἡ Κωνσταντίνου Πόλις or Κωνσταντινούπολις, Constantinopolis -- alternatively New Rome, ἡ νέα Ῥώμη, Nova Roma, or by its original name, Βυζάντιον, Byzantium. The city could more briefly be called ἡ Κωνσταντίνου, "the of-Constantine," ἡ Πόλις, "the City," or just ἡ Ῥώμη, "Rome." Indeed, that is where the codes of Roman Law were actually compiled, by the Emperors Theodosius II and Justinian, and where Greek literature assumed the form in which we now read it, on the manuscripts -- gifted, sold, stolen, or rescued -- now preserved in various European libraries.

Nevertheless, when in the 3rd century Rome ceased to be the administrative capital of the Empire, or the seat of any Emperors, historians and Classicists tend to lose track, lose interest, or both -- sometimes with evidence of annoyance, or hostility and falsehoods -- and the public, including many scholars of the humanities, seem entirely unaware of the subsequent status of Rome or the structure and continuation of Roman history.

The unstated axiom that the City of Rome and its inhabitants always ruled and dominated the Roman Empire cannot be contradicted without the complacent being overtaken by confusion, disorientation, and anger. It cannot be. There is no way, in conventional understanding, to conceive of, let alone believe, a "Roman Empire" that is not centered on Rome and defined by its character. Without an Emperor passing on life and death at the Colosseum -- -- it just isn't "Rome." This is a staple of movies, where overbearing officials, arriving directly from Rome, may be lording it over distant provinces, even in the 5th Century. Even worse if their authority, by then, has something to do with the Pope, which is inconceivably anachronistic.

That Italy was governed from Ravenna, Ῥάβεννα, from 402 to 751, with no Emperors in the Colosseum at all, and no gladiators (who have been outlawed), is a fact that has simply dropped out of popular and even most academic consciousness. Even art historian Kenneth Clark, who knew about Ravenna and who extraordinarily visited the Church of San Vitale for his epic Civilisation [1969], was confused enough to think that the status of Ravenna was due to the Court of Justinian once being based there. No, only the Exarch of Italy and the Archbishop of Ravenna.

Nevertheless, Ravenna can turn up unexpectedly. At the beginning of Brideshead Revisited [1945], by Evelyn Waugh (1903-1966), the narrator, Charles Ryder, visits Ravenna to study the art -- an episode that would have been nice to see in the 1981 BBC version -- but we don't see it. And after visiting there and seeing the gold background of Justinian's mosaics, Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) began famously adding gold leaf to his paintings. Ravenna, indeed, seems to contain examples of Late Antique art, including unique images of Justinian and Theodora, whose equivalent the Iconoclasts may have destroyed in Constantinople itself.

That cities may have different names in different languages is something that for some reason has now become confusing to people. My favorite may be the Belgian city of Liège, for which there are at least seven different versions of its name in different languages, or sometimes even in the same language [note].

Constantinople is no different, where we have already seen the Greek, Latin, and English versions. It is then, for instance, Konstantinopel in German, Konštantínopol in Slovak, or Константинополь in Russian. Early on, we get an Arabic version, قُسْطَنْطِينِيَّة, Qusṭanṭīnīyah, which later also gets used in Turkish -- until perhaps as late as 1926, when the Turkish post office stopped recognizing "Constantinople," or 1928, when the Latin alphabet was introduced -- and the city then became "Kostantiniyye" (Ḳosṭanṭīniyye to indicate Arabic spelling). In Syriac, we see ܩܾܘܣܛܰܢܛܺܝܢܽܘܦܳܘܠܻܝܣ, Qusṭanṭīnūpōlīs (with the Western vowels), which looks like a transcription of the Greek name, with affinity or influence, to or from, Arabic.

Ecumenical Council I, Nicaea I, 325

The local name of Constantinople through most of its history was in Greek; but the Emperor Constantine I himself, the City's eponym and founder, spoke Latin, and he bore a Latin name, Constantinus (see here for discussion of related names of emperors). At the Council of Nicaea, whose proceedings were in Greek, Constantine needed a translator, since he only spoke Latin. Some documentaries, however, may show Constantine reading the Nicene Creed to the assembly, which he could not have done.

In the image, we see Constantine and Pope Sylvester I seated opposite each other (conspicuous with their crowns). Since this is a devotional image of Orthodox provenance, the figure in front is probably Alexander, the Archbishop, not yet the Patriarch, of Constantinople -- where the City had not yet actually been dedicated (to be in 330).

Recent confusions are over abbreviated names of the City, in Greek, Σταμβούλ, and, again, in Arabic, إِسْطَانْبُول, ʾIsṭānbūl, which also becomes "İstanbul" in Turkish, with all the stigmata of having been borrowed from Arabic. İstanbul became the official name of the City only in 1930. This muddle is discussed here and here.

We see Michael Psellus in the 11th Century contrasting "the ancient and lesser Rome, and the later, more powerful city" [Fourteen Byzantine Rulers, Penguin, 1966, p.177]. In Greek, the "ancient [or prior] and lesser" is πρώτη καὶ ἥττων; and the "later [and], more powerful" is μετ’ ἐκείνην καὶ κρείττων [Greek text, The History of Psellus, edited by Constantine Sathas, Methuen & Co., London, 1899, p.110].

It is striking that Psellus should have thought of Constantinople as "stronger" or "mightier," κρείττων, than the older Rome (see the use of this word in Plato's Republic and in the physics of John Philoponus). It certainly was in relation to the Rome of his day; but the implication of the statement is that Constantinople was stronger than Rome had ever been, which now seems odd -- the writ of Constantine ran from York (Eboracum) to ʾAswān, أَسْوَان (Egyptian , Συήνη in Greek, and Ⲥⲟⲩⲁⲛ in Coptic), while that of Basil II only from Belgrade (Singidunum, Σιγγιδών, Serbian Београд) to Antioch (Ἀντιόχεια, أَنْطَاكِيَة, ʾAnṭākiyah, Turkish Antakya). Yet the land area of the Empire of Basil II (c.1.25 million km²) was still greater than the combined area of modern France, Germany, and Italy (1,209,730 km²), which we could take as a proxy for the Empire of Charlemagne (c.1.20 million km²).

Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (d.959) had previously referred to old Rome as ἡ μεγάλη Ῥώμη, "Great Rome" [De Administrando Imperio, Greek text edited by Gy. Moravcsik, Dumbarton Oaks Texts, 1967, 2008, p.86]. The tenth century Patria begins the description of Constantinople thus:

When 362 years had passed since the sole reign of the Caesar Augustus in the elder Rome [ἡ πρεσβυτέρα Ῥώμη], and her fortunes were already coming to an end, Constantine the son of Constantius took over the scepters [σκῆπτρα] and established the new Rome [ἡ νέα Ῥώμη], ordering that it should be equal [ἴση] in rank to the first. [Accounts of Medieval Constantinople, the Patria, translated by Albrecht Berger, Dumbarton Oaks, Harvard, 2013, pp.2-3]

Since νέα (néa) in Greek means "young" as much as "new," the contrast with the "elder," πρεσβυτέρα (presbytéra) Rome is appropriate (see discussion here).

In the Middle Ages, the Greeks usually used the Classical word for "Greeks," Ἕλληνες (Hellēnes), to mean the ancient pagan Greeks, as the word is used in the New Testament -- sometimes the Latin word for Greeks would be borrowed, as Γραικοί (Graikoi), if this was needed for contemporary reference, as for the language -- a practice already found in the chronicler Theophanes Confessor (c.750-818 AD) [The Chronicle of Theophanes, edited by Harry Turtledove, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982, p.141] and noteworthy in De Administrando Imperio [op.cit. p.228].

Greek had become the dominant literary language of the Roman Empire during the Second Sophistic in the 2nd and 3rd centuries. This is little noted, except as merely a matter of oratory and rhetoric; but, of course, we see Marcus Aurelius keeping his diary in Greek, and the last pagan Emperor, Julian, wrote in nothing else. Classicist Latin scholars manifestly lose their enthuasism for Latin literature after the 2nd Century and sometimes seem unaware of Greek literature.

Shakespeare tells us that Caesar's last words were Et tu, Brute? Good Latin (he had to know that "Brute" is the vocative of "Brutus," not the word that we find in the classic English expression, "You brute!"). However, Suetonius says that either Caesar said nothing, or he said καὶ σὺ τέκνον; "And you, child?" Long before Marcus Aurelius. Shakespeare may have been more confident in Latin than in Greek, or expected that of his audience.

While Marcus wrote his diary, his friend Aelius Aristides delivered, at Rome, an oration, Εἰς Ῥώμην, "To Rome" (143 AD). This was much admired, for its style and its sentiment, in later centuries -- where Greek was read, of course, in Constantinople. Classicists ignore it, and it may only rate a footnote from Byzantinists, for whom the reign of Marcus Aurelius is rather off the table.

We can see Aelius as the moment when the Greeks take up and celebrate their own Roman identity, but then he does this in the Greek language. That cemented a connection that persisted until Modern Greek nationalism revised loyalties and identities (sometimes to the positive confusion of people still calling themselves Ῥωμαῖοι). While, in the Middle Ages, Roman identity was then tied to Christianity, and the Ἕλληνες were pagans (although Ἕλληνες had sometimes been used positively), Aelius identified the Greeks with Rome well before most Romans were even aware of Christianity. The change was complete well before Constantine.

The Emperor Justinian ruled:

Πᾶν δὲ μάθημα παρὰ τῶν νοσούντων τὴν τῶν ἀνοσίων Ἑλλήνων μανίαν διδάσκεσθαι κωλύομεν...

We moreover prohibit the teaching of any subject by those who suffer from the insanity of the unholy pagans... [The Codex of Justinian, A New Annotated Translation, with Parallel Latin and Greek Text, Volume I, Cambridge University Press, 2016, pp.244-245]

Here, where the translator says "unholy pagans," the Greek text says ἀνόσιοι Ἕλληνες, "unholy Greeks." The identity between pagans and Hellēnes cannot be stronger. This decree is what meant the closing of Plato's Academy in 529. Note that Socrates dicusses the pious and the "unholy" in the Euthyphro.

In 1354 Demetrius Cydones, Δημήτριος Κυδώνης (1324-1398), a convert to the Latin Church, even translated the Summa Contra Gentiles of St. Thomas Aquinas into Greek as the Θωμᾶ Ἀκινάτου Σοῦμμα κατὰ Ἑλλήνων, ἐξελληνισθεῖσα, Summa of Thomas Aquinas against the Hellenes, "made Greek" [note].

And in time, even the Greek language came to be called "Roman," i.e. Ῥωμαίικα ("Roman [things]") -- usage that persisted long after the Turkish conquest, even into the 20th Century -- in elevated language it was ἡ Ῥωμαϊκὴ γλῶσσα, "the Roman tongue."

Mediaeval Greek speakers, and other citizens of the Empire, whom we would now regard as different nationalities -- Armenians, Albanians, Franks, Vlachs, Slavs, ex-Muslims, etc. (who did, however, need to undergo sufficient naturalization, i.e. "Romanization" -- there are many arguments about who, even among Emperors, had Armenian backgrounds and who didn't) -- were themselves always Romans, Ῥωμαῖοι (Rhōmaîoi) -- Rome had always grown by the assimilation of people conquered, captured, or who defected. Greek speaking Jews, a distinct community in Romania, the Ottoman Empire, and Modern Greece (until the Germans got to them, killing 80%), and who might be said to have begun in Hellenistic Alexandria, were then the Ῥωμανιῶτες, Rhōmaniôtes.

The Empire was always ἡ Ῥωμαίων Ἀρχή (hē Rhōmaíōn Arkhḗ), ἡ Ῥωμαίων Βασιλεία (hē Rhōmaíōn Basileía), "the Empire of the Romans," the Οἰκουμένη (Oecuménē, "the inhabited world"), or even Ῥωμανία, Rhōmanía, as in Latin. I have often asked groups of college professors, for instance at academic conferences, if they knew the proper name of the Roman Empire. No one ever has known. "Romania" or Ῥωμανία is not part of general knowledge or public discourse because of long standing biases, among both Classicists and even Byzantinists, against the history and identity of the Late Antique and Mediaeval Roman Empire. See the Note on "Romania".

Confusions about the relation of a proper name to another description, as with the "French Republic" and "France," can be found with the Czech Republic -- Česká republika -- where a proper name was coined, "Czechia" -- Česko in Czech -- which many Czechs don't like, and also with the Ottoman Empire, whose identity as "Turkey" is sometimes questioned with foolish ideology. Calling the United States "America," of course, can be resented by other nations in the Americas.

Mediaeval Franks or Latins consistently called the Ῥωμαῖοι "Greeks," Graeci, or even Graeculi, "Little Greeks." The former was not always intended to be insulting -- certainly not when the Norsemen called the Empire Grikland -- but the latter was. Yet, German Emperors calling themselves "Romans" now seems no less than comical, as it did to Voltaire -- who of course famously said that the "Holy Roman Empire" was neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire: Ce corps qui s'appelait et qui s'appelle encore le saint empire romain n'était en aucune manière ni saint, ni romain, ni empire [1756].

It was not called "Byzantium"

It is then natural that Classicists, to whom the Romans were the last people who proudly weren't Christians, would prefer the hostile modern neologism "Byzantine" for the continuing Empire, rather than pollute the memory of Augustus and Trajan with that of Justinian, Heraclius, or Basil II. Yet even Justinian wore no beard and was still speaking Latin -- and what Classicist will dare, and I dare them, to fault the others for speaking Greek? The very people, as it happens, thanks to whom we possess Classical Greek and its literature.

In the diagram, we see how to progressively expand our perspective. The conventional "Roman Empire" runs from Augustus to 476, after which come the "Dark Ages." However, Peter Brown and others then enlarge the picture with an appreciation of "Late Antiquity" and a "Later Roman Empire" that encompasses events down to the Arab Conquest, if not to the fall of the Omayyads in 750, followed by "Byzantium." Finally, we understand that both "Late Antiquity" and "Byzantium" are what the Romans themselves, the people whose preferences political correctness requires us to respect, had simply called "Romania," Ῥωμανία. See the corrected periodization in the next time line below.

Anthony Kaldellis has pointed out that Classicists, who may ignore the Greek literature of the Middle Ages, still written in the language of Plato, regardless of its merits or importance, are nevertheless themselves already unconscious "Byzantinists," since they are absolutely dependent on the form, content, and language of Classicism created by Mediaeval scholars (starting with the Second Sophistic). Some Mediaeval literature, like magisterial The Greek Anthology, may slip in anyway, without its origin being acknowledged.

Indeed, even Edward Gibbon, who actually called Mediaeval Romans (and he does frequently call them this) "a degenerate people" [The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume III, Modern Library, p.299], nevertheless, when speaking of the replacement of Latin by Greek in the Law, Court, and Army, referred to "the Greek, whose intrinsic merit deserved indeed the preference" [p.295, boldface added]. So we find that Gibbon was a Hellenophile -- he just wanted pagan, not Christian, Greeks. And, of course, he regarded the spoken Greek of the Middle Ages (the "vulgar dialect of the city") as "gross and barbarous" [pp.298-299]. Perhaps he should have told his French friends that they were speaking "gross and barbarous" Latin.

Historians sometimes note the humiliation of the Greeks in being conquered by Rome, and sometimes the irony of the Romans admiring and adopting Greek thought, architecture, literature, etc. -- Horace said, Graecia capta ferum victorem cepit et artes intulit agresti Latio, "Captive Greece captured the wild victor, and brought the arts into rustic Latium." But I have never seen the stark truth put this way:  The Greeks then inherited the Roman Empire, without, however, ceasing to identify with it; and, what's more, under Roman law, in the unbroken jurisdiction of Roman Courts, they were Roman Citizens -- unlike, say, the illiterate Charlemagne.

Why does no one say that? They must be thinking that those Christian Greeks are no longer really Greeks, who by definition were pagans. Of course, Basil II and Alexius Comnenus would agree. They are no longer Hellēnes; they are Rhōmaîoi. But if, to historians, they are neither Greeks nor Romans, what can they be? Oh, let's make up a word. They are "Byzantines" -- according to Hieronymus Wolf (1516-1580) in 1557 -- and we all know how nasty that is. But the Romans, who were the last Classical people who were not Christians, were also, as it happens, the first who were.

In his classic A History of the Later Roman Empire from Arcadius to Irene [1889], J.B. (John Bagnell) Bury (1861-1927) rejected being himself regarded as a "Byzantinist."

Classicists, whose discipline exists because of the scholars of Constantinople, thinking in line with Gibbon's "triumph of barbarism and religion" [ibid. p.865], seem to choke on this simple truth. And since Constantinople was free of the "barbarians," it is the clearly the religion that they don't want. And since Enlightenment Reason, as Leszek Kołakowski says, died with the French Revolution, it is now Nietzschean nihilism that informs scholarship and loyalties, even if presented in Marxist jargon -- which is really only used as a means of pursuing the Nietzschean goal of absolute power, which is evident in all Marxist regimes, let alone at the modern totalitarian, anti-American, and anti-Semitic university.

Urbs et Orbis

A Western outpost of Constantinople like Venice long provided a pipeline of influence from Romania, even in little things, like the fork (the one for eating -- forgotten after the "Fall of Rome" -- they are said to have already been common by the 4th Century -- and unknown among the Franks), which arrived there in 1004 or 1005 with a Greek bride. The Latin conquest of Constantinople in 1204 (at the connivance, sadly, of Venice), and then refugees from the fall of the City to the Ottomans in 1453, rather crudely, but effectively, brought much of the heritage of the Roman East back into the hitherto poorer Mediaeval civilization of the West.

Much remaining from the Classical world was lost, nevertheless, not with the Germanic invasions, the "Fall," and the Dark Ages, but in these later disasters. Sometimes only pitiful fragments were salvaged from them -- even as we see the Parthenon surviving intact until 1687, when it was blown apart by Turkish gunpowder. Thus, half of the literature described by the Patriarch Photius in his 9th century Βιβλιοθήκη, Bibliotheca is now lost. That included things like A History of Events After Alexander by the historian Arrian of Nicomedia, which is now only preserved in the summary of Photius, an invaluable source for the obscure wars of the Diadochi.

Rome began as a City, grew into an Empire, Romania, in which the City lost its identity, and which then shrank down, in the end, to another City, that meanwhile had preserved and protected the heritage of the Empire. People find this confusing. What great state changes its metropolis, μητρόπολις? Well, quite a few. China has had many capitals, depending on the dynasty. The greatest Egyptian capitals were Memphis and Thebes, but there were many others, like Tanis and Sais. What was unusual about Constantinople is that, for a thousand years, it was the redoubt of an entire civilization, all of Greece and Rome, except for surviving Latin literature in Francia, and in the end was reduced to something much like a city-state, as Rome had begun.

When we realize how much was preserved, in literature, art, and institutions, at Constantinople from the soi disant "Fall of Rome," it helps us realize how much Mediaeval Romania was, indeed, still the Roman Empire, just as they tell us.

Rhōmânos	Romanus, Roman	Roma, Rome, Rom, Rím, Рим, Ῥώμη
	the City, Urbs
Rhōmaîos	Romanus, Romaeus, Romeus, Romeo, Romanius, Rímsky, Римский, Roman	Romania, Ῥωμανία, Romanie, Romagna
	the Empire, Orbis

At right, we see the nice differentiation in Greek between dedicated adjectives for the City of Rome, Ῥωμᾶνος, borrowed from Latin, and the Empire, Ῥωμαῖος (used since the Hellenistic Age), respectively. Ῥωμανός, differently accented, is reserved as a proper name, as we see with the Emperors named Romanus.

"Byzantine," Βυζαντινός or Βυζάντιος, in Mediaeval Greek, would simply mean an inhabitant or native of Byzantium, i.e. the City of Constantinople, or an adjective for the City. No one thought to call the whole Empire, the Οἰκουμένη, that.

The adjectives for "Roman" in the Slavic languages are almost irrecognizeable as such. We get Rímsky in Slovak, Rzymski in Polish, Římský in Czech, and then Римский in Russian. Little did I know, for years, that part of the surname of the composer Rimsky-Korsakov, Римский-Корсаков (1844-1908), simply meant "Roman."

In an age when the politically correct absurdly fall all over themselves to say "Beijing," for 北京, rather than "Peking" (Japanese Pekin, or Hokukyō), or "Mumbai," मुंबई, rather than "Bombay," बम्बई, probably without being able to pronounce "Běijīng" (try Korean 북경, Buk-gyeong, or Vietnamese Bắc Kinh), or say what language "Mumbai" is from (बम्बई is Hindi), it is extraordinary to find historians, even Byzantinists, who not only do not call the Mediaeval Roman Empire what it was, but who seem to have even forgotten that "Romania" was actually its name both in Latin and, as Ῥωμανία, in Greek.

Or, even worse, they have not forgotten, but they have actively chosen to suppress the name -- which is what we clearly see with Cyril Mango, whose respected status as a Byzantinist is in stark contrast to the contempt and dismissiveness we can discern in his attitude, which seems inexplicable. The Romans perhaps would not have been surprised at the hostile defensiveness of jumped-up Franks. Most of us Franks, Φράγγοι -- although not an Enklinobarangus like me -- still resent the cultural superiority expressed by Anna Comnena:

φύσει γὰρ οὖσα δεσπότις τῶν ἄλλων ἐθνῶν ἡ βασιλεία Ῥωμαίων ἐχθρωδῶς διακείμενον ἔχει τὸ δοῦλον.

For, being by nature the mistress [δεσπότις] of the other nations [ἐθνῶν], the empire [βασιλεία] of the Romans, holds them, hostilely, in a state of slavery [δοῦλον].

Annae Comnenae, Alexias, Pars Prior, Prolegomena et Textus, 14.7.2, Diether R. Reinsch and Athanasios Kambylis [Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co, Berlin, 2001, p.450]. [note]

In a different vein, not so much of superiority as of reciprocated contempt, Liutprand of Cremona reported in 968 of the conquering Emperor Nicephorus II Phocas:

Ex Francis, quo nomine tam Latinos quam Teutones comprehendit, ludum habuit.

[He] made fun of the Franks, under which name he understood both the Latins and the Germans.

"Liudprandi Legatio," XXXIII, Die Werke Liudprands von Cremona, herausgeben von Joseph Becker [Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum, Hahnsche Buchhandlung, Hannover und Leipzig, 1915; Reprint, University of Michigan Libraries, 2012, pp.25-26].

While we see "Franks" encompassing Latins and Germans, this overlooks the Slavic nations in Latinate Europe, which included Croatia, Bohemia, Poland, and Slovakia (held within Hungary, as Croatia would be after 1097). Nicephorus had less reason to include them with the often hostile forces from France, Italy, and Germany. And he would also be aware that many Slavs would not belong to Francia at all but would, like Bulgaria, be members of the Oecumene of Orthodox Romania.

At the same time, Nicephorus also overlooks anyone from Scandinavia, who in his time were still dangerous pagans, but who had learned to respect the forces of Romania, which had inflicted harsh defeats on them, as the Franks never did, and who would soon convert to Christianity and begin supplying recruits to the remarkable and durable Varangian Guard. In the end, it was the Franks, the Latins and Germans, who inflicted the most damage on Romania, while the Varangians remained loyal.

Conclusion

This is getting to be a large text file (1372.7KB, 1.341MB), the largest text file at The Proceedings of the Friesian School, and with older internet connections it may take a long time to load, especially because of all the maps and genealogical charts, which are large graphic files -- although with most modern Internet connections, including on cell-phones, this is no problem. There is also an audio file (827.1K), if anyone wants music:  This is the "Dance of the Knights" from the ballet Romeo and Juliet by Sergei Prokofiev -- I think it evokes the ponderous, ominous, majestic, and tragic character of the Empire -- although it is unlikely Prokofiev knew that "Romeo" was Romaeus, a Ῥωμαῖος. But I don't sense a lot of romance in the account of Roman history. The only genuine love story I can think of in Roman history is that between Justinian and Theodora. Justinian had to change Roman law so that he could marry a woman who had been an actress, and probably something worse.

Despite the overall size, Romania.htm has not been broken up, so as to preserve and emphasize the continuity of the history of Rome and Romania from Augustus all the way to Constantine XI. It is a long story -- Gibbon's version is now published in three large volumes [The Modern Library], and he only began with the Antonines.

Google describes this file as, "A thorough investigation into the Eastern Roman Empire." Somebody has not looked at it very carefully. We begin here with Augustus. But I have in fact never seen a book or treatment of the Roman Empire that addresses it as an institution with a continuous history from Augustus to Constantine XI. Classicist "Roman" historians lose interest in the 4th century and throw in the towel in the 5th, while "Byzantinists" generally begin with Constantine. This is a distortion due to modern prejudices, written by historians whom the Romans would have dismissed as barbarian Franks.

The Ῥωμαῖοι themselves possessed a strong sense of their identity and the continuity of their history, which is reflected in the popularity of continuous histories and chronicles written by Mediaeval historians in Constantinople. For instance, John Zonaras, writing in the 12th century, produced an Epitome, or abbreviated history, starting with the Creation, that was so popular that 79 partial or complete manuscripts survive today. Zonaras, drawing on sources that are now often lost, such as much of the history of Cassius Dio, divided his treatment in half, with Book II running from 106 BC down to his own day [cf. Warren Treadgold, "John Zonaras," The Middle Byzantine Historians, Palgrave Macmillan, 2013, pp.388-399].

Some modern historians, e.g. Peter Brown or A.H.M. Jones, tie together "Roman" and "Byzantine" time, as something like a new discipline emerges around "Late Antiquity"; but a general sense of the continuity of the history has not caught on, and neither Brown nor Jones produced a continuous narrative of Rome and Romania. The treatment that is appropriate would be the four imaginary volumes shown above right, where Roman history continues down through the Fall of Constantinople in 1453. Classicists need only buy the first volume and need not pretend to care about what follows. [note]

• Introduction
  • Confusion about Place Names
    • Confusion about Ethnic Names
      • The Eskimo
      • The Anasazi
      • The Bushmen
  • What is an Empire?
  • Norwich's Byzantium, Mary Beard's Anti-Semitism?
• Byzantium Unbound, by Anthony Kaldellis, 2019
• Animated History of Romania
• Consuls of the Roman Republic
• Sources
• Greek Transcription
  • Note on Transliteration
    • Mildly Offensive
      • The Purpose of Transcription
      • People Falsely Named "John"
      • People Falsely Named "Konsutanchinosu"
      • "Merry Christmas" in Hawaiian
      • Korean Phonology
      • "Spelled as Medieval Greek Names"
• Maps

• I. First Empire, "Rome," 27 BC-284 AD
  • A. "PRINCIPATE," 27 BC-235, 261 years
    • 1. JULIO-CLAUDIANS ("XXXIV" Dynasty of Egypt)
      • Nabonassaran Chronology
      • Augustus of Dendur
      • Consuls of the Roman Empire
      • The Roman Army in 14/24 AD
        • Legions of the Roman Army
      • Roman Coinage
    • 2. The Bosporan Kingdom
    • 3. Armenia, 401 BC-428 AD
      • The Alphabet and Phonology of Armenian
      • The Patriarchs of Armenia
    • 4. Numidia
    • 5. Judaea
    • 6. Nabataeans
    • 7. FLAVIANS & ANTONINES
      • Aelius Aristides, "To Rome"
      • The Roman Army in 74/79 AD
      • The Roman Army in 138/150 AD
      • Contact with Han Dynasty China, 166 AD
      • Sword-and-Sandals Epics
    • 8. SEVERANS
      • The Second Sophistic
        • The Children of Athena, Greek Intellectuals in the Age of Rome, by Charles Freeman, 2023
        • Atticism, Φάσις Ἠττικισμένη
          • How the World Made the West: A 4,000 Year History, by Josephine Quinn, 2024
      • The Roman Army in 230 AD
  • B. CRISIS OF THE THIRD CENTURY, 235-284, 49 Years
    • Changes in Religion and Philosophy
    • The Palmyrene Empire
      • Note on Palmyra
      • The Palmyra Greek Key
    • Crisis of the Third Century Chart

• II. Second Empire, Early Romania, 284 AD-610 AD
  • A. "DOMINATE," 284-379, 95 years
    • 1. TETRARCHS
      • Diocletian's Cabbages
      • Price Fixing & Bureaucrats
      • Chart of the Tetrarchy
      • Late Roman Capitals
    • 2. CONSTANTIANS
      • The Name "Constantine"
      • Monarchical Acclamations
      • The Approaches and Environs of Constantinople
      • The Theodosian Walls of Constantinople
        • Cross Section of the Walls
      • The Patriarchs of Jerusalem
        • Got Temple?
      • The Patriarchs of Antioch
      • The Patriarchs of Constantinople
    • 3. VALENTIANS
      • Downfall at Adrianople
        • The Downfall Icon
      • Flavius Vegetius Renatus
      • The Tsunami of 365
  • B. CRISIS OF THE FIFTH CENTURY, 379-476, 97 Years
    • 1. THEODOSIANS
      • Ravenna
      • Dante's Tomb
      • A Visigoth Explains Himself
      • The Toronto School
      • Aëtius and Valentinian III
      • The Empress Galla Placidia
      • St. Augustine of Hippo
      • The Seven Liberal Arts
      • The Roman Army, c.408 AD
      • Expeditions against the Vandals
      • The Venerable Bede
      • King Arthur
      • Britain in Procopius
      • Scotia: Picts, Britons, & Scots
        • The Celtic Languages
      • Bishops & Archbishops of Milan
      • Maronite Patriarchs of Lebanon
      • Syrian Orthodox Patriarchs of Antioch
      • Visigoths
      • Burgundians
      • Vandals
      • Western Provinces of the Notitia Dignitatum, c.400 AD
      • Eastern Provinces of the Notitia Dignitatum, c.400 AD
    • 2. LAST WESTERN EMPERORS
      • The "Last Emperor" of Rome
      • Odoacer the Barbarian
      • The End of Roman Gaul
  • C. THE EAST ALONE, 476-518, 42 Years
    • 1. LEONINES
      • The Expedition of 468 against the Vandals
      • The Northern and Southern Empires
      • The Disappearance of the Tria Nomina
      • Changing Architecture
      • Ostrogoths
        • The Later Meanings of "Gothic"
      • Roman Coinage
  • D. RETURNING TO THE WEST, 518-610, 92 years
    • 1. JUSTINIANS
      • The Grammar of Philoponus's Statement
      • Belisarius & the Duke of Marlborough
      • The Plague & Dark Ages Cooling
      • The Nika Revolt
        • The Grammar of Theodora's Statement
      • The Introduction of Sericulture
      • The Fortress of Monembasia
      • Exarchs of Ravenna
        • Archbishops of Ravenna
      • Exarchs of Carthage
      • Lombards
      • Provinces at the Death of Justinian, 565 AD
    • 2. Georgia, 588-1505
      • Patriarchs of Georgia
    • 3. Ghassanids, 220-638

• III. Third Empire, Middle Romania, Early "Byzantium," 610 AD-1059 AD
  • A. THE ADVENT OF ʾISLĀM, 610-802, 192 years
    • 1. HERACLIANS
      • Downfall at Yarmūk
      • The Letter of Muḥammad to Heraclius
      • Contact with T'ang Dynasty China, 643 AD
      • Greek Fire, Πῦρ Ῥωμαϊκόν
      • Justinian II Rhinotmetus
      • The Organization of the Themes and Exarchates, 668 AD
      • Monarchical Acclamations
      • Dukes of Naples, Amalfi, & Gaeta
    • 2. The Khazar Khagans & Beks, 618-1016
    • 3. Armenia, 628-806 AD
      • Armenian Patriarchs of Jerusalem
    • 4. ISAURIANS (SYRIANS)
      • Iconoclasm, 730 AD
      • The Eruption of Thera, 726 AD
      • Ravenna, 751 AD
      • The Tagmata, 743 AD
      • Empress Irene of Athens
    • 5. Doges (Dukes) of Venice, 727-1797
      • Patriarchs of Aquileia, Grado, and Venice
  • B. REVIVAL AND ASCENDENCY, 802-1059, 257 years
    • 1. NICEPHORANS
      • Christian Names
    • 2. AMORIANS (PHRYGIANS)
      • The Arrival of the Varangians, 839 AD
      • The Organization of the Themes and Tagmata, 840 AD
      • Frontier Fighters, Christian & Muslim
    • 3. Bulgaria before Roman Conquest
      • Old Church Slavonic
      • Macedonian Bulgaria
    • 4. MACEDONIANS
      • Nicephorus II Phocas
        • The Pale Death of the Saracens
      • The Bibliotheca of the Patriarch Photius
      • The Grammar of Constantine VII's Statement
        • The Word "Saracen"
      • Note on Liutprand of Cremona
      • the Varangian Guard
        • the Church of St. Olaf
        • Sources of the Varangian Guard
      • Mt. Athōs, The Holy Mountain
      • The Greek/Latin Schism of 1054
      • Macedonian Genealogy & Marriages
        • The Nieces of Basil II and Charles II
        • Macedonian Foreign Marriages
        • John Tzimisces and Christian Names
        • The Monomach Russian Marriage
      • The Russian Attack of 1043
        • Confusions about Events
      • Οὐ Νέμεσις
        • Mary Lefkowitz on Homer
    • 5. Armenia, 806-1064

• IV. Fourth Empire, Late Romania, Late "Byzantium," 1059 AD-1453 AD
  • A. THE ADVENT OF THE TURKS, 1059-1185, 126 years
    • 1. DUCASES
      • Downfall at Manzikert
      • The Return of Surnames
      • The English Varangians
    • 2. Seljuk Sulṭāns of Rūm
    • 3. COMNENI
      • The Chinese Embassies of 1081 and 1091
      • Varangians and Englishmen under the Comneni
      • Anna Comnena
        • Anna Komnene, by Leonore Neville, Oxford, 2016
          • The use of Πορφυρογέννητος
            • Demotic Bias in Kaldellis
          • Κομνηνή, Komnene, and Comnena
          • Those Germans
      • Genealogy of the Comneni
      • Marriages of the Comneni
      • Omens of Decline
    • 4. Lesser Armenia
      • Patriarchs of the Great House of Cilicia
    • 5. Kings of Jerusalem and Cyprus, 1099-1489
      • Latin Patriarchs of Jerusalem
      • County of Edessa
      • Principality of Antioch
      • County of Tripoli
      • Order of the Knights of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem
      • Order of the Poor Knights of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon
      • Order of the Knights of the Hospital of St. Mary of the Teutons in Jerusalem
  • B. THE LATIN EMPIRE, 1185-1261, 76 years
    • 1. ANGELI
      • Varangian Recuitment by the Angeli, 1195 AD
    • 2. Bulgaria, Asens
    • 3. LATINS
      • Latin Patriarchs of Constantinople
      • Kings of Thessalonica
      • Dukes of Athens
      • Princes of Achaea
    • 4. Epirus
    • 5. Trebizond
    • 6. LASCARIDS
  • C. THE LAST DAYS, 1261-1453, 192 years
    • 1. Serbia
    • 2. Bosnia
    • 3. Bulgaria, Terters
    • 4. The Oghullar of Rūm
      • Aydın Oghulları
      • Sarukhān Oghulları
      • Menteshe Oghulları
      • Germiyān Oghulları
      • Ḥamīd Oghulları
      • Tekke Oghulları
      • Jāndār Oghulları
      • Qaramān Oghulları
      • Eretna Oghulları
      • Dulghadır Oghulları
      • Osmanlı Oghulları
    • 5. PALAEOLOGI
      • The Letter of the Hung-wu Emperor
      • The Flag of Romania
      • The Cross of St. George
      • The Dicephalic Eagle
      • Skanderbeg, 1405-1468
      • The Morea & Mistra
      • The Fall of Constantinople
      • The End of the Hellenistic Age
      • The Fate of the Holy Icons
      • The Fate of the Palaeologi
    • 6. Românians
      • Valachi nunc se Romanos vocant
      • Wallachia and Moldavia
        • French Identity
        • British Identity
      • The Cognates of "Wallachia"
      • οἱ Βλάχοι
      • Vlad III, the Impaler
      • Romania Maior

• V. Fifth Empire, Ottomans, Islamic Byzantium, 1453 AD-1922 AD, 469 years
  • Animated History of Turkiya
  • The Occupation of Constantinople, 1918-1923
  • Ottoman Turkish
    • Perso-Turkish Backgammon Dice Combinations
  • Lawrence in Arabia, by Scott Anderson, Anchor Books, 2013, 2014
  • The Turkish Republic, Presidents
  • Armenian and Other Ethnic Suppression
  • Ranks of the Ottoman Empire
  • The Altaic and Uralic Languages
  • The Patriarchs of Constantinople since the Ottoman Conquest
  • The Shihābī Amīrs of Lebanon, 1697-1842 AD
    • Maronite Patriarchs of Lebanon
  • The House of Muḥammad ʿAlī in Egypt, 1805-1953 AD
    • Directors of Egyptian Antiquities, 1858-present
  • The Sanūsī Amīrs & Kings of Libya, 1837-1969 AD
    • The Dictator, 2012

• Modern Romania, Ottoman Successor States in the Balkans
  • Modern Romania Index
    • 1817, Serbian Autonomy
    • 1834, after Greek Independence
    • 1858, after the Crimean War
  • România, 1599-present
    • Phanariots
    • The Ghicas
    • 1875
    • Congress of Berlin, 1878
  • Montenegro, 1697-1918
    • 1908
  • Greece, 1821-present
    • Princes of Samos, 1833-1912
    • The Cretan Republic, 1889-1913
    • 1912, before the Balkan Wars
  • Serbia & Yugoslavia, 1817-present
    • 1913-1914, after the Balkan Wars, & before World War I
  • Bulgaria, 1879-present
    • 1925, after World War I
  • Albania, 1914-present
    • 1943, Axis Occupation in World War II
    • 1947, after World War II
  • Macedonia, 1991-present
    • 1999, Ethnic Cleansing
  • Kosovo, 2002-present
  • Armenia, 1991-present
  • Georgia, 1991-present
    • Culmen Europae

Philosophy of History

Home Page

Discussion of the period covered by this page, with sources on Roman and "Byzantine" history, upon which the actual tables and genealogies are based, may be found in "Decadence, Rome and Romania, the Emperors Who Weren't, and Other Reflections on Roman History." One Roman source not mentioned there is the handy Who Was Who In The Roman World, edited by Diana Bowder [1980, Washington Square Press, Pocket Books, 1984]. That was the first book I ever saw that organized Roman Emperors into logical dynastic or event centered groups. Another source I have recently enjoyed is Justinian's Flea by William Rosen [Viking, 2007], not the least because it cites this very webpage [note 2:36, p.331]. Otherwise, it is a fine book with a good appeciation of Late Antiquity, and with some details that I have already added here. Other sources are given here at the points where they are used. This page is continued and supplemented by the material in "Successors of Rome: Scotia", "Successors of Rome: Germania", "Successors of Rome: Francia", "Successors of Rome: The Periphery of Francia", "Successors of Rome: Russia", "The Ottoman Sulṭāns", and "Modern Romania". Related earlier history may be found at "Historical Background to Greek Philosophy" and "Hellenistic Monarchs", and the "Consuls of the Roman Republic".

Rome and Romania Index

My determination is that, since this page, and the English language, uses the Latin alphabet, and since the Roman Empire originally used Latin as its universal language, never forgotten in Greek Romania (however annoying or hostile contemporary "Latins," i.e. Franks, might become in the Middle Ages), Latinate forms -- or familiar Anglicized ones -- are the practice here. Some say that this is a "detour" through Latin, but that is the historic and customary route by which Greek words came into English, which is a historic language of Latin using Francia.

Indeed, my suspicion is, and we'll see some evidence on this page, that the practice of cutting Latin out of the loop was begun by German scholars, who have a long history of trying to eliminate Latinate forms from their language. This was for purely nationalistic reasons -- to trace modern Germany, not from the Roman identity claimed by the Mediaeval German Emperors, but to the ancient tribal Germanic enemies of Rome. Thus, in 1875 Kaiser Wilhelm I dedicated a memorial, the Hermannsdenkmal, to the German chief, Arminius, who wiped out three Roman legions at the Teutoburger Wald in 9 AD, which led Augustus to withdraw from the Elbe to the Rhine. This was a nationalistic project whose ideological and political development produced some of the ugliest episodes of tyranny and war crimes in world history -- some suspicion is warranted [note].

Because of the problems with transcribing Greek, and because of the need for a reference with actual Greek words, Greek names and words have now been added extensively to this page, including every Emperor with a Greek name, beginning with Philip the Arab and Diocletian. Since standard Greek lexicons, like Liddell and Scott, do not have proper names of persons, and probably would not have them for the Mediaeval period anyway, there is a serious lacuna in reference sources for the history of Romania -- the Greek form of proper names can usually be found in the three volume Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium [edited by Alexander P. Kazhdan, Alice-Mary Talbot, Anthony Cutler, Timothey E. Gregory, and Nancy P. Ševčenko; Oxford, 1991], or now at Wikipedia. Those who insist on transcribing rather than Latinizing Greek words and names must face the problem that transcription systems, including more than those discussed by Warren Treadgold, are ambiguous, especially in the absence of accents and other diacritics, and usually do not enable the reader to reconstruct the Greek writing. This tells us that the practice is symbolic and not the serious use of the Latin alphabet to represent the Greek language.

Exceptions to Latinization would be, (1) for Greek words that simply have Latin translations. Thus, Greek Rhōmaīoi, Ῥωμαῖοι, "Romans," corresponds to Latin Romani -- not "Rhomaeoe" (although Romaei and Romei apparently occur). Latinization will occur, however, when the Greek word is part of a compound. For instance Tsar Kalojan of Bulgaria was called the "Roman Killer," Ῥωμαιοκτόνος, Rhōmaioktónos. This would Latinize as Rhomaeoctonus. And (2) when Greek words are transcribed, not primarily for logical "use" in English (or even Latin) sentences, i.e. to indicate their referents, but to phonetically render Greek words from examples of Greek itself, as I have in fact just used Rhōmaîoi, and Rhōmaioktónos. The reference with the latter is thus first of all to the words themselves, where we want to represent the Greek language (some of whose characteristics may be lost in Latin), rather to what the word (in Greek, Latin, or English) is used for.

Transcription involves compromises. As I have remarked, the practice elsewhere usually doesn't include accents, even through they are a proper part of Greek orthography -- and indeed were originated in order to write Greek. With accents, the use of the circûmflex to distinguish ēta from epsilon and ōmega from omicron (where the macron is not available in basic HTML) introduces an ambiguity; and where ēta or ōmega may otherwise take an ácute or gràve accent (which here have priority), another ambiguity is introduced. Many of these problems can be remedied with Unicode, which is slowly being introduced here, as the occasion presents itself. Issues of actual Greek pronunciation, Ancient and Modern, and spelling are examined elsewhere.

One virtue of Latin, indeed, is that there are standard and customary ways of doing it, leaving few alternatives or ambiguities for the Latinate forms of Greek words. And since these have already been used for centuries, there is a guide in usage also. Nevertheless, sometimes choices must be made. Thus, for Ἐγκλινοβάραγγος, an English Varangian, this might be Enklinobarangus or Enklinovarangus, despending on whether we attend more to the Greek spelling or to the Mediaeval (and Modern) pronunciation, respectively.

Note on Transliteration

Rome and Romania Index

Rome and Romania Index

I. THE FIRST EMPIRE, "ROME," 27 BC-284 AD, 310 years

Trajan was most conspicuous for his justice, for his bravery, and for the simplicity of his habits. He was strong in body, being in his forty-second year when he began to rule, so that in every enterprise he toiled almost as much as the others; and his mental powers were at their highest, so that he had neither the recklessness of youth nor the sluggishness of old age. He did not envy nor slay any one, but honored and exalted all good men without exception, and hence he neither feared nor hated any one of them. To slanders he paid very little heed and he was no slave of anger. He refrained equally from the money of others and from unjust murders. He expended vast sums on wars and vast sums on works of peace; and while making very many urgently needed repairs to roads and harbors and public buildings he drained no one's blood for any of these undertakings... For these deeds, now, he took more pleasure in being loved than in being honoured. His association with the people was marked by affability and his intercourse with the senate by dignity, so that he was loved by all and dreaded by none save the enemy.

Dio Cassius (c.150-235 AD), Roman History, Book LXVIII, Translated by Earnest Cary, Loeb Classical Library, Dio Cassius, VIII, Harvard U. Press, 1925, 2005, p.369-371.

---

ὅπερ γάρ τις ἔφη τῶν λογοποιῶν περὶ τῆς Ἀσίας, λέγων ὅσην ὁ ἥλιος πορούεται, ταύτης πάσης ἄρχειν ἄνδρα ἕνα -- οὐκ ἀληθῆ λέγων, εἰ δὴ πᾶσαν Λιβύην καὶ τὴν Εὐρώπην ἐξαίρετον ἐποιεῖτο τῶν ἡλίου δυσμῶν τε καὶ ἀνατολῶν -- τοῦτο νῦν ἐξενίκησεν ἀληθὲς εἶναι, τὴν ἴσην τε ἡλίου πορείαν εἶναι κτῆσιν ὑμετέραν καὶ τὸν ἥλιου διὰ τῆς ὑμετέρας πορεύεσθαι.

Some chronicler, speaking of Asia, asserted that one man ruled as much land as the sun passed, and his statement was not true because he placed all Africa and Europe outside the limits where the sun rises in the East and sets in the West. It has now however turned out to be true. Your possession is equal to what the sun can pass, and the sun passes over your land.

Aelius Aristides, Εἰς Ῥώμην, "To Rome," 143 AD, The Ruling Power: A Study of the Roman Empire in the Second Century After Christ Through the Roman Oration of Aelius Aristides, James H. Oliver, The American Philosophical Society, 1953, p.896

---

In the second century of the Christian era, the Empire of Rome comprehended the fairest part of the earth, and the most civilised portion of mankind. The frontiers of that extensive monarchy were guarded by ancient renown and disciplined valour. The gentle but powerful influence of laws and manners had gradually cemented the union of the provinces. Their peaceful inhabitants enjoyed and abused the advantages of wealth and luxury.... During a happy period (A.D. 98-180) of more than fourscore years, the public administration was conducted by the virtue and abilities of Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, and the two Antonines.

Edward Gibbon (1737-1794), The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume I, Modern Library, p.1

---

Now what shall I say of this, that whereas so many have borne the name of Caesar, there have appeared among them so few good [paucos bonos] emperors? For the list of those who have worn the purple [purpuratorum] from Augustus to the Emperors Diocletian and Maximian is contained in the public records. Among them, however, the best were Augustus himself, Flavius Vespasian, Titus Flavius, Cocceius Nerva, the Deified Trajan, the Deified Hadrian, Antoninus Pius and Marcus Antoninus, Severus the African, Alexander the son of Mamaea, the Deified Claudius, and the Deified Aurelian.

The Scriptores Historiae Augustae (c.150-235 AD), Historia Augusta, Volume III, Translated by David Magie, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard U. Press, 1932, 1998, p.277-279.

The "First Empire" is what often would be considered the entire history of the "Roman Empire." It is definitely the end of the Ancient World. If "Rome" means paganism, bizarre Imperial sex crimes, and the Pax Romana, then this would indeed be it. A later Empire that is Christian, more somberly moralistic, and more beset with war, sounds like a different civilization, which it is, and isn't. That the earlier civilization didn't "fall" but merely became transformed is a truth that both academic and popular opinion still hasn't quite come to terms with. If the decadence of pagan religion and despotic emperors was going to be the cause of the "fall" of Rome, then it certainly should have fallen in the Crisis of the Third Century. That it didn't would seem almost like a disappointment to many. But the greatest of the 3rd century Emperors, like Aurelian, don't get popular books, movies, and BBC television epics made about them. They begin to pass into a kind of historical blind spot. The Pax Romana seems real enough in certain places, but there were not many reigns without some major military action. As long as these were remote from Rome, people would have thought of it as peace. Once Aurelian rebuilt the walls around Rome, things had obviously changed. Indeed, perhaps Rome did "fall" in the Third Century, if by the "Roman Empire" we mean a state ruled, controlled, and centered in the City of Rome. Somewhere between Decius and Diocletian, that was lost. The Emperors ceased to live at Rome, there was not much happening there that influenced events, and even the Army was mostly recruited elsewhere. The Empire decentered and turned inside out, something that popular discourse and even many historians have failed to either recognize or acknowledge.

Rome and Romania Index

1. JULIO-CLAUDIANS
Augustus C. (Octavius) Julius Caesar Octavianus Augustus	"XXXIV" DYNASTY 30 BC
	Augustus, 27 BC-14 AD
defeat of Varus by Arminius, destruction of three legions, abandonment of Germany, 9 AD; Alexandrian Year, 23 BC
Tiberius I Ti. Claudius Nero	14-37
Caligula C. (Julius) Caesar (Germanicus)	37-41
Claudius I Ti. Claudius Drusus	41-54
Invasion of Britain, 43; revolt of Boudicca, 61
Nero (L. Domitius Ahenobarbus) Nero Claudius Drusus	54-68
non-dynastic
Galba Ser. Sulpicius Galba	68-69
Otho M. Salvius Otho	69
Vitellius A. Vitellius	69

The Roman Empire "officially" begins by tradition in 27 BC when Octavian receives the title "Augustus" -- which then becomes the name by which we know him. We might think that the Empire, Imperium, begins with Augustus becoming Emperor, Imperator, but that is not the case. Imperator simply means "commander," and this had long been in use with a specific meaning. An imperator was someone with a military command and imperium, which meant both military and civil authority in the area of his command. This made Julius Caesar essentially the dictator of Gaul, once he had conquered it. That was dangerous, indeed fatal, for the Republic; but in those terms Julius Caesar began the creation of the Roman Empire already as an "emperor."

So, while we think of "Augustus" as the name of the first Emperor, it was simply a title, whose import was well remembered by subsequent Emperors. It accompanies the institutional changes that were effected or completed by Augustus. The institution thus created now gets called the "Principate," from Princeps, "Prince" (literally, "comes first"). The idea of the Principate is that the forms of the Republic are retained, and the Emperor superficially is simply still an official of the Republic.

Augustus was not a king. He did not even hold the Republican office of Dictator, as Julius Caesar had. But Augustus otherwise assembled offices and authority sufficient to explain the power that he had actually obtained by force. In principle, Rome is still SPQR, Senatus Populusque Romanus, "the Senate and the People of Rome." This institution continues for some centuries, and there never was a subsequent question that the Emperor might become a King, as had been widely feared, expected, or desired with Julius Caesar. In time, the Emperor came to be regarded as superior to any mere king, as the reach and authority of many Emperors was indeed great beyond precedent or (local) comparison.

While it seems natural and obvious to take Augustus as the successor to Julius Caesar and his new Imperial government as the successor to the Roman Republic, there was another way of looking at this. The astronomer Claudius Ptolemy (c.100-c.170 AD), who was concerned about the dating of astronomical observations, laid the foundation for all ancient chronology with the Canon of Kings, a list of rulers beginning with the Babylonian King Nabonassar in 747 BC. The Canon thus starts off with Babylonian Kings (and some Assyrians thrown in), jumps to Persian Kings in 538 BC, to Alexander in 332 BC, to the Ptolemies in Egypt in 305 BC, and finally to Augustus, at the death of Cleopatra, in 30 BC. It continues to the reign of Antoninus Pius.

These particular connections occur because (1) the Babylonians had the most advanced astronomy of their age, (2) Babylonian records continued seamlessly into the Persian and Hellenistic periods, (3) elements of this, including considerable data, had been translated into Greek, and (4) Ptolemy himself operated in Alexandria, where these translated Babylonian records were freely available, where Greek astronomy itself reached maturity, and where Ptolemy had at hand the simplest calendar of the Ancient World, the Egyptian 365 day year, which continued to be used in astronomy until the introduction of Julian Day Numbers.

So, we have the curious mixture of an astronomer whose name is in Latin and Greek, who lives in Egypt, and who uses the Era of a Babylonian King (Nabonassar) in conjunction with the Egyptian calendar. This all is striking for Ptolemy's willingness to use the best of all that was available to him -- though it may still surprise some, as we now know independently from Egyptian records, that the astronomy of the Egyptians themselves, except for (or perhaps because of) their year, had less to offer than the Babylonian.

Thus, Augustus may be seen as more than a Roman ruler, as, indeed, the successor to the universal equivalents of the eponymous archons (the Athenian officials used for purposes of dating) for all of Middle Eastern, Mediterranean, and European civilization. From Antoninus Pius, the Canon could easily be continued with Roman Emperors all the way to 1453, using a clue of the numbering given by the Venerable Bede, who has Maurice as the 54th Emperor. Even the presence of the Latin Emperors present no anomaly, since Assyrian Kings were interpolated with Babylonian Kings. The last ephemeral Western Emperors, so important for the mythology of the "Fall" of Rome, were, of course, simply ignored by Bede. The Canon can then obviously be continued from 1453 with the Ottomans, who make for a succession in Constantinople in an even more seamless fashion than Augustus takes over from Cleopatra -- the capital city doesn't even change.

The Canon of Kings, then, as a succession of Kings, will end in 1922, when no monarch conquers or replaces Meḥmed VI. It is a moment, indeed, in the aftermath of World War I, when the idea of monarchy alone as a legitimate form of government, without popular and parliamentary qualifications, pretty much ends -- although tyrants and dictators follow who were often worse than any monarch had ever been.

The abbreviations used in the full names of the Emperors can be found elsewhere with the discussion of the tria nomina. Emperors are commonly known by particular parts of their names, or by nicknames, e.g. Caligula, "little boot," or Caracalla, "little hood" -- both names given them as children in the army camps of their fathers (Germanicus and Septimius Severus, respectively).

The family of the Julio-Claudians seems like one of the most complicated in history. This chart eliminates many people in the family to focus on the descent and relation of the Emperors. Caligula and Nero are descendants of Augustus, through his daughter Julia (from his first marriage); but Claudius and Nero are also descendants of Mark Antony, who of course committed suicide, shortly before Cleopatra, rather than be captured after his defeat by Augustus.

The use of crowns to indicate the emperors is at this point anachronistic, but it is convenient. The crown for Christian Roman Emperors, which of course will not occur until Constantine, is shown with a nimbus, like deified earlier Emperors, because they are always portrayed with halos, like Saints, and are said to be the "Equal to the Apostles," ἰσαπόστολος, isapóstolos. Indeed, not just Christians Emperors, but Empresses and their children are shown with halos. This is not something that ones sees in Western Europe.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City contains the Temple of Dendur, which was relocated from Egypt and opened on display in 1978. The temple was a gift from Egypt in thanks for all the help that was contributed to rescue the monuments that would be submerged in the lake growing behind the new Aswan High Dam. For instance, since the temples on Philae Island were already being flooded because of the previous Aswan Low Dam, they were all simply moved to a nearby, higher island.

The Temple of Dendur was built in the reign of Augustus, around 15 BC. The cartouches on the temple mostly just contain the hieroglyphs , "Pharaoh," which seems like a very perfunctory way of representing the Roman Emperor as King of Egypt. High up on the gate, however, and around on the side, I have noticed more complete names, only parts of which I have been able to read, including , glyphs that clearly spell out "Caesar."

We might have hoped that the problem of reading these names would be clarified by Kevin L. Johnson & Bill Petty, whose The Names of the Kings of Egypt, The Serekhs and Cartouches of Egypt's Pharaohs, along with Selected Queens [Museum Tours Press, Littleton, Colorado, 2011, 2012] contains the names in Egyptian of a number of Roman Emperors, including those of Augustus comparable to the ones on the Temple of Dendur. Augustus is thus [p.83]. These do not exactly match the versions on the temple, and so perhaps only add to the confusion. Johnson and Petty provide no phonetic transcription or discussion for any of their names.

For a long time it was not clear to me exactly what the first name was transcribing. Finally, a correspondent, Shawn Rasmussen, pointed out that it looks like Αὐτοκράτωρ, "Autocrat," which becomes the Greek translation of Latin Imperator. An anomaly is that we get a "d" instead of the initial "t."

This is the key to the glyphs on the temple. The first cartouche there, , keeps the intial "t" but then substitutes another "t" for the "k," also leaving out two of the "w's" that had stood for vowels. These anomalies were confusing enough to me to prevent recognition of the word. And I was expecting an actual name, not another title. Since the result is "Emperor Caesar," perhaps "Caesar" itself is seen as a proper name, which it was [note].

I note that there is an extra "s" at the end of "Caesar," (written as a "z," which only had that value in Old Egyptian), both at Dendur and in Johnson & Petty. This is something I cannot account for. I wonder if the Egyptian scribe here thought that Greek words should end in "s," as Καῖσαρ, in the nominative singular, does not. Some help in this respect is in a very old book, The Rosetta Stone in Hieroglyphics and Greek, by Samuel Sharpe [John Russel Smith, London, 1871].

Sharp includes an "Appendix of King's Names," including Roman Emperors. Sharp provides phonetic transcriptions, although not to modern standards, and some discussion of the names. His font for the glyphs is not good enough for all of them to be identifiable. "Caesar," , occurs a lot in the Roman names, and we see it always with the final "s," transcribed by Sharpe as "Cæsaros." However, in Greek, Καίσαρος is the genitive of the word, which doesn't really fit the context. If Sharpe is aware of that, he doesn't say so; but at least he has noticed the "s," where Johnson & Petty are no help.

The names in Sharp also feature , Σεβαστός, the Greek translation of Augustus, in a cartouche for Antoninus Pius. The "egg" glyph here, used phonetically, "sꜢ," can mean "son" but is often used as a determinative for females or goddesses. In the Middle Ages, Σεβαστός as a title may stand a rank below a proper "Augustus." In 1042, we see it bestowed on the memorable Maria Scleraena.

The "Caesar" cartouche on the Temple of Dendur adds a formula often seen in royal names: , which we find Alan Gardiner rendering as, "May he live eternally!" [Egyptian Grammar, §313, Oxford, 1927, 1964, p.239].

For the titles with each name, see here. The last carthouche that Johnson & Petty give is of Diocletian, by which time the Egyptians were converting to Christianity and hieroglyphics would be forgotten. Sharpe's last name is for Commodus, except for a cartouche for "Candace," the title, not a name, of the Queens of Kush.

So there was an effort here, as with the Ptolemies, to Egyptianize foreign rule, and a final era of overlap between Ancient Egypt and the later civilizations that, through Christianity and then ʾIslām, erase the ancient religion, culture, and then language of Egypt. What remains of all of those, with the Christian Copts, is under physical assault by Islamists in modern Egypt even as I write.

This map, for the year of the death of Augustus, is the last in the series prepared for the Hellenistic Age, the period that Augustus himself had terminated in 30 BC. Noteworthy are the surviving vassal kingdoms under Roman control:  Armenia, the Bosporan Kingdom, Numidia, Judaea, Cappadocia, Emesa, Nabataean Petra, Commagene, Iberia, Thrace, and Palmyra. Edessa, at this point a Parthian vassal, will soon pass under Roman control. Palmyra will briefly play a signifiant role in Roman history in the Third Century. Armenia will often find itself pulled between Rome and Parthia, then Rome and Sassanid Persia, and subsequently several other larger political conflicts right down to our own day.

The Principate is the period that fits everybody's main idea of the "Roman Empire." Caligula and Nero, and Robert Graves's version of Claudius, are objects of endless fascination, moralizing, guilty pleasure, and not-so-guilty pleasure. Whatever these emperors were actually like, this approach began with the Romans themselves, with Suetonius's list of Tiberius's sexual perversions, lovingly reproduced in Bob Guccione's silly movie Caligula (1979, 1991). Whether Tiberius was really guilty of anything of the sort is anyone's guess, but we don't hear much in the way of such accusations about subsequent Emperors, except for a select few, like Caracalla and Elagabalus.

Meanwhile, Augustus had secured the Rhine-Danube frontier, and Claudius conquered most of Britain. Augustus originally wanted an Elbe-Danube frontier, but one of his armies (of three legions) was caught in a catastrophic ambush and destroyed. The Romans gave up on the Elbe permanently. Only Charlemagne, by the conquest of Saxony, would secure what Augustus had wanted. He did not have an easy time of it either.

The shadow of the Republic persisted during this period, and someone like Claudius could still dream of restoring full Republican government. He actually didn't do anything about it; and the year 69 pretty much ended these dreams, since the first free-for-all scramble for the throne revealed that the army, and only the army, would determine who would be Emperor. Strangely enough, despite the occasional anarchy, this would be a source of strength for the Empire, since the state always did the best with successful soldiers at its head. Unsuccessful soldiers faced the most merciless reality check (whether killed by the enemy or by their own troops); but purely civilian Emperors, like Honorius, could endure one disaster after another without their rule necessarily being endangered.

The Roman Army under Augustus contained 28 Legions (Legio, Legiones), not counting the Praetorian Guard. At some 5500 men each, this gives a full strength Army of 154,000 men. However, this does not count the Auxilia, units like cavalry and others that consisted of those who are not Roman citizens (though they gained citizenship from service). The entire Army, therefore, was more like 300,000 men, less than half of what it would number in the Late Empire.

In his attempt to extend Roman power to the Elbe, Augustus lost three Legions at the battle of the Teutoburger Wald in 9 AD. Suetonius reports that for months (menses) Augustus might beat his head against a door and exclaim, Quintili Vare, legiones redde!. This is usually translated, "Varus, give me back my legions!" but the Latin simply means "Return the legions!" The numbers of the lost Legions were never used again (likewise with the Legions later disbanded for rebellion).

All the Legions were originally simply numbered. Once they begin acquiring epithets (cognomen, cognomina), like Legio X Fretensis, we start getting more than one Legion with the same number, but with different epithets, e.g. Legio III Gallica, Legio III Cyrenaica, Legio III Augusta pia fidelis, Legio III Italica concors, and Legio III Parthica. This is a little confusing.

The logic of the matter is that eventually the legions begin to be numbered in relation to their cognomen, not in the absolute count of the Army. Thus, Septimius Severus raised legions for his attack on the Parthians (195 AD), which quite logically are numbered Legio I Parthica, Legio II Parthica, & Legio III Parthica. Eventually there would also be Legio IV Parthica, Legio V Parthica, & Legio VI Parthica, but these were not raised by Severans. We find all the numbers used up to XXII (Legio XXII Primigenia pia fidelis), but then Trajan raised Legio XXX Ulpia Victrix. I suspect that he used "XXX" because 29 Legions already existed, despite the numbers used. If that was the reasoning, we do not see that happen again.

Legions of the Roman Army

The office of the Roman Consuls, and dating by them, continues under the Empire until Justinian. They can be examined on a popup page.

4. KINGS OF NUMIDIA
Masinissa	c.215-149
Gulussa & Mastanabal	149-c.145
Micipsa	149-118
Adherbal & Hiempsal I	118-116
Jugurtha	118-105
War with Romans, 112-106
Gauda	105-?
Hiempsal II	c.88-c.50
Juba I	c.50-46
Killed in Caesar's Civil War
Juba II	c.30 BC-c.22 AD
Raised at Rome
Ptolemy	c.22 AD-40
Killed by Caligula; Numidia becomes Roman Province

No less that four foreign cultures have been planted into North Africa over the centuries. The Kingdom of Numidia was originally promoted by Rome as an ally against the Carthaginians. In the Second Punic War (218-201), Masinissa went from fighting effectively for Carthage to an alliance with Rome. His cavalry is largely what enabled Scipio Africanus to defeat Hannibal at Zama in 202. He was then supported by the Romans in eliminating his Numidian rivals. However, when he wanted to marry the wife of the great Numidian king Syphax, the Carthaginian princess Sophonisba, the Romans demanded that she be handed over to them. Masinissa enabled her to poison herself instead. Rome supported Masinissa the rest of his life. He died shortly before Carthage itself was exterminated in 146.

Numidian allies thus enabled Rome to overthrow the first foreign culture in North Africa, the Phoenician (or "Punic" to the Romans). The Numidians then, of course, discovered what being an "ally" of Rome really meant, and war resulted as later Kings tried to preserve their independence -- especially the War of Jugurtha (112-105).

In Caesar's Civil War, 49-45 BC, Juba I chose the wrong side and seems to have died in a suicide pact with Marcus Petreius. His son, Juba II, was then raised at Rome and eventually restored to Numidia as a client King. Extraordinarily, he married a daughter of Queen Cleopatra of Egypt and Marc Anthony. They had a son, Ptolemy who succeeded Juba. However, although supposedly a loyal Roman ally, and invited by Caligula to visit Rome, with full honors, Caligula then ordered him killed.

So, like the native kingdoms of Anatolia, Numidia was converted into a Roman province, opening the way for the introduction of a Latinate culture. If no other events had intervened, North Africa today would probably boast its own Romance language, like Spanish or French. This, however, was not to be.

A lot of the dating of the Numidian dynasty is uncertain. Thus, the dates in the genealogical diagram are a little different from those in the table.

The Vandals eventually interrupted Roman rule, but not long enough to make any lasting difference, if ʾIslām had not soon arrived. When it did, after a period of heroic resistance by the Berbers, this became the most durably planted foreign culture, with a large colonial element, as the Fatimid Caliphs of Egypt later directed an invasion of ethnic Arab tribes -- in revenge for North African defection from the Fatimids, and from the Shiʿite cause.

The last culture planted was that of France, beginning with the occupation of Algeria in 1830. After a century, something like 30% of the population of Algeria was French colonials, who began to fight as the era of de-colonization threatened their position. This brought about the fall of the French Fourth Republic in 1958. Interestingly, the two greatest French Existentialist writers and philosophers were on opposite sides of the issue. Jean Paul Sartre had become a dogmatic Marxist who demanded Algerian independence at any cost, while Albert Camus, whose most famous book, The Stranger, is set in Algeria, could not so easily dismiss the poor French farmers, the pied-noirs, "black feet," who had lived in Algeria for nearly a century -- Camus also suspected that Sartre's doctrinaire leftism concealed a bit of collaboration with the Germans in World War II.

The return of Charles de Gaulle to power in 1958 ushered in harsh medicine about Algeria. De Gaulle decided that France should cut her losses, and the colony was abruptly granted independence in 1962. This began a bitter exodus of the French colonials and the nauseating torture and massacre of all those Algerians who were associated with the colonial regime. The cycle of terrorism continues even today, as leftist ideology has collapsed into an unhappy civil conflict between military rule and Islamic fundamentalism, and frightened Algerians have increasingly fled....to France.

Unfortunately, the French economy, with stupefying labor law, has created national double digit unemployment, far higher in the heavily Moslem immigrant community, which is then supported by the French welfare state in public housing projects that have become virtual No Man's Lands outside many French cities. The idle and resentful unemployed then turn to....crime, Islamic fundamentalism, and Terrorism.

5. LEADERS & KINGS OF JUDAEA
Hasmoneans
Judas Maccabaeus	167-161
Jerusalem Occupied, 164
Jonathan	161-152
	King , 152-143
Simon	142-135
John Hyrcanus I	135-105
Aristobulus	104-103
Alexander Jannaeus	103-76
Salome Alexandra	76-67
Aristobulus II	67-63
Pompey captures Jerusalem, 63
Hyrcanus II	63-40
Antigonus	40-37
Herodians
Herod I the Great	King, 37-4 BC
Archelaus	Ethnarch, 4 BC-6 AD
Herod II Antipas	Tetrarch, 4 BC-39 AD
Philip	Tetrarch, 4 BC-37 AD
Herod Agrippa I	King, 37-44
Agrippa II	King, 50/53-100?
Jewish Revolt & War, 66-73: Destruction of Jerusalem, 70 AD; Fall of Masada, 73; Revolt of Bar Kokhba, 132-135

The success of the great struggle of the Maccabees to free the Jews from the Seleucid Kings is still commemorated in the holiday of Hanukkah, (חֲנוּכָּה), based on an incident when the Temple was reconsecrated after the liberation of Jerusalem. Little oil was available for the Temple lamps, but what there was burned miraculously for eight days. This sign of hope is particularly apt in 2023, after the savage fanatics of Ḥamās murdered hundreds of Jews on October 7th, and their supporters around the world, including in the United States, and alarmingly at institutions of "higher learning," have turned out for "Kill the Jews" demonstrations and riots.

The burning of candles for Hanukkah coincides, however, with similar fire rituals of many people at the darkest time of the year, in December, and Hanukkah has also taken on the gift-giving attributes of Christmas -- exemplifying the adaptation of religious rituals to several purposes. Some people object to this, but it is harmless.

Explanations of Hanukkah often awkwardly refer to the "Syrians" instead of to the Seleucid Greeks ( -- יְוָנִיִּם) as the source of the oppression of Judaea. There certainly seems little risk today in offending the Modern Greeks about this; but referring to "Syrians" evokes the modern state of Syria, which had nothing to do with the Seleucids. Instead of ancient tyranny, with modern Syria we have enough recent issues to deal with, including wars with Israel and a Syrian civil war, after the "Arab Spring," when the Syrian dictatorship, with the help of Russia, devastated a good part of the country and its population. Syrian refugees flooded into Europe, carrying with them a culture more violent and misogynistic than Europeans were used to. This has been a particular problem in Germany and Sweden. Political correctness inhibited the Germans and Swedes from saying what this was, but it has seriously changed local life, especially in Sweden.

The hard won independence of Judaea fell within a century to Rome, which for a time, as elsewhere, tolerated a fiction of local rule -- the Herodian dynasty owed its power entirely to Roman favor. This did not mollify the Messianic hotheads, who inevitably sparked a rebellion that led to the final destruction of the Temple, the end, in a sense, of ancient Judaism, massacres and mass suicides, as at Masada, and the increasing Diaspora of Jews into the Roman world. Out of this also came the story of a peaceful Messiah, who had been executed and resurrected, whose cult eventually overwhelmed Rome itself, transforming Hellenistic Romanism into a culture of both Athens and Jerusalem.

Jews themselves derived little enough benefit from this transformation, since Pauline Christianity had repudiated the ritual requirements of the Law and the new religion became increasingly estranged from the old. Once the new religion became the State Religion of Rome, the rigor with which Judaism had rejected the old gods now became public policy, to their own disability. Christianity never had the provision found in ʾIslām, however grudging, for the toleration, within limits, of kindred religionists.

The fate of Jews in Christendom, as of the basic attitude of Christianity to Judaism, thus became a matter of dispute. Where Christianity began as sect of Judaism, perhaps just a continuation of the Essenes described in detail by Josephus, some post-Pauline Christians wanted Judaism repudiated completely and the Hebrew Bible simply rejected.

The most elaborate version of this turned up in Gnosticism, where the God of the Old Testament was reduced to a minor and malevolent deity. The "Jealous" God of Judaism was not regarded as having the right attitude to be the true Father of Jesus. The popularity of this seems to be due to its appeal to people wanting a secularized, undemanding, and naturalistic religion, with perhaps a touch of anti-Semitism.

The Orthodox decision in the matter was that the God of the Old Testament was indeed the God of the New Testament, the Jews were indeed the Chosen People, and that the Covenants with Abraham, etc. were not only valid in their own right but essential links to the New Covenant established by Jesus. No less an authority than St. Augustine said that Jews must be tolerated so that the Biblical prophecies of the Coming of Christ would be preserved by a disinterested, or even hostile, source.

Augustine, interestingly, did not doubt that Jews could be trusted to faithfully preserve the Hebrew text of the Bible -- as they did. We might contrast this with the accusation in ʾIslām that both Jews and Christians have "falsified" their scriptures, on points that differ with the Qurʾān. While rulers like Philip IV of France might expel the Jews simply to seize their wealth, a lot of anti-Semitism seems to have grass-roots origins, while rulers opposed it, as we see with the Rothschilds.

Now, Christianity granting a role for Judaism in Christianity is very patronizing to Judaism, but it did provide a ground for the toleration of Judaism, which no other principle at the time did (no one having heard of Liberal society). There were shameful exceptions to this toleration, but through the Middle Ages the overwhelming majority of Church authorities staunchly condemned attacks on the Jews. The Popes themselves even refuted, twice, the "blood libel" that Jews used Christian blood for Passover matzos (which would have been a grotesque violation of Jewish dietary laws anyway).

The genealogy of the Hasmonaeans is from The Complete World of The Dead Sea Scrolls (Philip R. Davies, George J. Brooke, & Phillip R. Callaway, Thames & Hudson Ltd., 2002, p.42). The incestuous marriages of the children and grandchildren of Herod the Great, perhaps typical of a Hellenistic dynasty, like the Ptolemies, were very hard to understand. The chart in my edition of Josephus (The Jewish War, Penguin Classics, 1960, p.410) did not make things very clear, but then my colleague Don Smith helped straighten things out for me. There seems to be some question about the parentage of Herodias and Agrippa I -- with Davies, Brooke, & Callaway going for Aristobulus. Aristobulus and his brother Alexander, descendants of the Hasmonaeans through their mother, were both executed by Herod.

Since Mediaeval Jews shared in the continuing trade and commercial culture of the Middle East, and were often its only representatives in impoverished and ruralized Latin Europe, they became fatefully associated in European eyes with the commercial and financial practices that Europeans at once needed, wanted, misunderstood, and resented.

A similar problem later occurred all over again in Eastern Europe, where the Kings of Poland were eager to bring in a more sophisticated population, unwelcome in Western Europe, to develop the country and strengthen the throne.

Such resentments in time found theoretical expression in Marx's view that the Jews embodied the archetype of grasping and exploitive capitalism. This made them class enemies, but that was soon enough converted into race enemies when Marxism mutated into Fascism and Nazism.

Jews who thought they had escaped the class and race animus in the Soviet Union soon came to be suspected, purged, and, increasingly, murdered by Stalin, while Hitler, of course, decided to kill them all. This helped promote the idea, not surprisingly, that all Jews should return to Palestine and found a Jewish State, which is what happened.

After 2000 years, however, the Zionists found that they didn't have a lot in common with the modern Arabic speaking population of the place they returned to -- rather than learn Arabic, they even decided to revive Hebrew, which was already dying out as a spoken language in the days of the Hasmoneans, and which some Jews refused to speak as being a sacred language (they still speak Yiddish). After sixty years, this conflict between Israel and Arab Palestinians has still not been resolved.

The Menôrāh, מְנוֹרׇה, from Herod's Temple, in the Arch of Titus, Forum Romanum, Rome, 2019

By some estimates, e.g. Paul Johnson in his A History of the Jews [HarperPerennial, 1988], Jews constituted as much as 10% of the population of the Roman Empire. I am not familiar with the basis of this estimate, but I am familiar with the difficulty of estimating Roman population at all. I find so high a figure inherently improbable.

Judaea, although the "land of milk and honey" in the Bible, is a pretty barren place. This is not going to support a large population, especially on the basis of ancient agriculture. That there should be as many Jews there as, for instance, Egyptians is impossible.

Of course, a large part of the estimate is based on the Diaspora population. Even in the time of the Ptolemies, Alexandria already had a very large Jewish population. But that is a key point:  the Diaspora population is mostly going to be urban; but the urban population of the Roman Empire is unlikely to have been more than 20% of the whole. Even today, 85% of the population of Tanzania, whose growth was ruined by the socialism of its post-independence government, is still in agriculture. If the population of the Empire was as much as 20% urban, and Jews were 10% of the population, then Jews would have to constitute nearly half of the population of every city, especially including Rome itself (with a population of a million or more people). That is nothing like the impression we get from the records, where so large a group in Rome would be felt on a constant basis. So this "10%" seems like a gravely inflated figure, though we may never have a really accurate one.

I now see Lea Cline, of the American Academy in Rome (and formerly a graduate student in Classics from the University of Texas at Austin), and now at Illinois State University, saying that the Jewish population of Rome in the 1st century AD was probably about 30,000 people (I say literally saw her, on the "Naked Archaeologist"). The basis for this are records for the number of "synagogal communites" present in the city. Since, from records about numbers of bakeries, tenements, etc., the population of Rome can be estimated as at least a million people, this puts the Jewish population at no more than 3%. This sounds more like it, especially when the Jewish population of Rome is liable to reflect both an urban concentration of Roman Jews and the special concentration effected by the importance of the Roman capital itself -- Jews had been there since well into the Hellenistic Period. If it is impossible that the percentage of Jews in Rome could be lower than in the Empire as a whole, that gives us a good ground for evaluating the percentage given by Paul Johnson.

The Jewish Calendar

Got Temple?

The Flavian Amphitheater, or the Colosseum, 1970

The maps here begin with Rome at its height under Trajan. Trajan's occupation of lower Mesopotamia was impressive but brief. After taking Ctesiphon, the Parthian capital, "he conceived a desire to sail down to the Erythraean Sea" [i.e. the Persian Gulf -- Dio Cassius, Book LXVIII, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard U. Press, 1925, 2005, p.415]. Sailing down the Tigris to "the Ocean," he wished he were, like Alexander, on his way to India, "if I were still young" [p.417]. Indeed, he would die within the year (117 AD). Visiting Babylon in order to sacrifice to Alexander at the place of his death, "he mostly saw nothing but mounds and stones and ruins" [p.417]. It had been long since Babylon had been an important city.

Putting down revolts in Mesopotamia, it is not clear how much Trajan really intended to retain, since he installed his own candidiate for Parthian King (Parthamaspates) in Ctesiphon. In any case, Trajan had added upper Mesopotamia, Armenia, and Dacia to the Empire. This, as it happened, involved all the most organized states on the borders of Rome, excepting only Kush. The Pax Romana thus was often a matter of war on the frontiers in order to preserve the peace within. But when Hadrian withdrew from some of Trajan's conquests, he was then troubled by the revolt of Bar Kochba in Judaea.

7. FLAVIANS & ANTONINES
Vespasian T. Flavius Vespasianus	69-79
Jewish Revolt & War, 66-73; revolt of Civilis, four legions disbanded, 69-70; Destruction of Jerusalem, 70; Fall of Masada, 73
Titus T. Flavius Vespasianus	79-81
Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, 79; Colosseum dedicated, 80
Domitian T. Flavius Domitianus	81-96
Victory of Agricola at Mons Graupius in Caledonia, 83; Dacian Wars, 86-89
Nerva M. Cocceius Nerva	96-98
Trajan M. Ulpius Traianus	97-117
Dacia conquered, 101-102, 105-106; Nabataean Petra annexed, 106; Armenia & Mesopotamia annexed, 114; Jewish Revolt, 115-117
Hadrian P. Aelius Hadrianus	117-138
Pantheon rebuilt, c.126; Bar Kochba's Revolt in Judaea, 132-135
Antoninus Pius T. Aurelius Fulvus Boionius Arrius Antoninus	138-161
Lucius Verus L. Aurelius Verus	161-169
Parthian War, 162-168
Marcus Aurelius M. Aurelius Antoninus	161-180
Antonine Plague, possibly smallpox, 165; Embassy in China?, 166; German War, 168-175
Commodus M. Aurelius Commodus Antoninus	177-192
non-dynastic
Pertinax P. Helvius Pertinax	193
Didius Julianus M. Didius Severus Julianus	193
buys throne from Praetorian Guard for 25,000 sesterces per man
Niger C. Pescennius Niger Justus	in Syria, 193-194
Clodius Albinus Decimus Clodius Albinus	in Britain & Gaul, 193-197

The Flavians Vespasian and Titus were both great soldiers and, to the Roman historians, virtuous and admirable men. Unfortunately, Titus's brother Domitian was not quite of the same stamp, and then went on to reign longer than his father and brother. He was succeeded by a fraternity of soldiers who adopted each other to secure competent and peaceful succession. The "Five Good Emperors" (in boldface) became the ideal of generations, all the way to Edward Gibbon, for peaceful and benevolent government.

Left to Right, Marcus Aurelius, Antoninus Pius, Lucius Verus, Hadrian, face of Aelius Caesar; Ephesos Museum, Vienna, 2019

Trajan was the first Emperor born in the provinces (Spain) and briefly, with his Mesopotamian campaign, expanded the Empire to its greatest extent. In the Middle Ages, Trajan had such a powerful reputation for goodness that the story began to circulate that God had brought him back to life just so he could convert to Christianity. Dante even includes that in the Divine Comedy -- although the principle is forgotten in the movie Constantine [2005]. Antoninus Pius became the only Roman Emperor in 1500 years to be called "the Pious," but we really know precious little about his reign. This may simply illustrate the principle that goodness and peace, the height of the "Pax Romana," is boring.

Since "To Rome" is in Greek, as was the diary of Marcus, we see a growth in Greek literature which will flower in Second Sophistic and which will begin to overshadow secular literature in Latin. Classicists, of course, may ignore Aelius because, not only is it in the Attic Greek literature that some of them despise, but its popularity was mainly later in Constantinople, which to Classicists may be some horrible Mediaeval thing and not "Roman" at all.

Culturally, Rome is becoming increasingly Greek, a trend that will culminate in the Graecophone Romania of the Middle Ages, where "To Rome" will be much admired and studied both for its language and style and for its patriotic sentiments.

Neither of these is particularly appealing either to Classicists or to most Byzantinists, for the virtues of its language and its loyalties tend to leave both cold:  Classicists are disdainful of Attic Greek unless it was written in the 5th century BC, while Byzantinists are sometimes uncomfortable being reminded that "Byzantines" to themselves were still Ῥωμαῖοι, Rhōmaîoi, Romans. Aelius thus represents the sort of cultural and historical reality about Rome that does not quite fit in with the accustomed narratives and consequently is generally ignored.

The Pax Romana ended under Marcus Aurelius, the closest thing to a "philosopher king" until Thomas Jefferson, but also a very competent general, who smashed a major German invasion across the Danube, while consoling himself with Stoicism for the miseries of war, plague, and personal loss. Marcus's only real failure was to leave the Empire to his worthless son, Commodus -- dying in a place of modern note, Vienna (Vindobona).

Hereditary succession, although eventually stabilized in Constantinople, would prove a dangerous principle at many moments in Roman history. The incompetence and viciousness of Commodus then set off his assassination and the second great free-for-all fight for the throne, in 193.

Marcus Aurelius, the Piazza del Campidoglio, Capitoline Hill, Rome, 2019

This was not without its comic aspect, when the Praetorian Guard killed the disciplinarian Pertinax and literally put the throne up for sale. The wealthy Didius Julianus made the best bid but had no other ability to secure his rule. He was murdered as Septimius Severus, a notably humorless man, approached Rome -- and then also abolished (temporarily) the Guard.

When Jerusalem fell to Titus in 70 AD, the Temple and most of the city were demolished. The furniture and sacred vessels of the Temple, including, Josephus says, the red curtains of the Inner Sanctuary, were carried off to Rome -- portrayed on the Arch of Titus. Reportedly kept in the Temple of Peace (Templum Pacis) in the Roman Forum, they remained there until 455, when the Vandals sacked the city and removed their loot to Carthage. When Belisarius overthrew the Vandals for Justinian in 533 and found the items from the Temple in Carthage, they were sent back to Constantinople.

Since it has previously been noted that the Ark of the Covenant, despite Raiders of the Lost Ark [1981], was not carried off to Tanis, one might wonder what subsequently happened to it. Although Josephus speaks of Titus taking away "the Law," he describes nothing like the Ark. Later, Mediaeval sources (e.g. Mirabilia Urbis Romae, c.1143, The Marvels of Rome, Italica Press, New York, 1986, p.29) speak of the Ark having been in Rome, but this was long, long after the fact. It must not be forgotten, however, that the Temple had once before been destroyed, by Nebuchadnezzar, in 587 BC. It is not clear that anything of the Temple survived, and so the Ark could well have been destroyed then -- or concealed on the Temple Mount, where the Templars supposedly found it, or elsewhere.

Britain, of course, has now been added to the Empire. My sources disagree on the station and numbering of some of the Legions. The revolt of Civilis in 69-70 led to the disbanding in 70 AD of four legions that participated in the revolt:  Legio I Germana (or Germanica), Legio IV Macedonica, Legio XV Primigenia, and Legio XVI Gallica. These are indicated on the first map of the Army given above.

Of particular interest in the disposition of the Legions in the reign of Antoninus Pius is Legio VI Victrix. On the first map above, it is to be found in Spain. Next it is on the Rhine. Now it is in the North of Britain. In the reign of Marcus Aurelius the Prefect of Legio VI Victrix will be one Lucius Artorius Castus. As discussed below, this man and his name -- Artorius -- may figure in the legends of King Arthur. Otherwise, we see that Dacia has been added to the Empire.

The Pantheon, 1970

The concentration of Legions around Judaea again is in the aftermath of Bar Kochba's Revolt (132-135). This figures in the mystery about Legio IX Hispana. Previously attested in Britain, Legio IX Hispana has disappeared from the list of legions by 165 AD. Much of what we hear about it is speculation.

Since the legion had been posted in Britain, one notion is that it was wiped out by the Picts. We even see this in a recent movie, The Eagle [2011]. There is no evidence from the period, however, that any legion was wiped out in Britain. Equally speculative is the suggestion that Legio IX Hispana was among the units sent to suppress the Bar Kochba revolt and that it was wiped out there. Again, there is no evidence for either event. Instead, since the legion does disappear from the records and is never revived, which means that something bad must have happened to it, we might ask if there is any evidence that any legion was wiped out or disbanded during the period before 165 AD.

Well, yes. In 161, the Parthians occupied Armenia and defeated the governor of Cappadocia, Aelius (or Marcus Sedatius) Severianus, at Elegeia on the Euphrates, wiping out his legion. Severianus, who had been assured of victory by a shady "prophet," Alexander of Abonutichus, committed suicide. The Parthians then defeated the governor of Syria, Attidius Cornelianus. This set off a Parthian War (161-166), for which the Emperor Lucius Verus was present in the East, even though the campaign was prosecuted by other generals, resulting in the sack and burning of Ctesiphon in 166. The identity of the legion of Aelius Severianus is not specified in the sources; but if we know that a legion was destroyed, and we know that Legio IX Hispana disappears from the record, when that only happens if a legion is wiped out in battle or disbanded because of rebellion, the inference seems reasonable that this was the legion. What other legion would have been wiped out at Elegeia? So speculation about the Picts or Bar Kochba seems superfluous.

Legions of the Roman Army

A curious footnote to the period of the Antonines is an entry in the Chinese History of the Later Han Dynasty, the (後漢書, Hòu Hànshū). It is recorded that in the year 166 an embassy arrived in Lo-Yang from a ruler of (or 大秦國, Dà Qín Guó, or 犂鞬, Líjiān), "Great Ch'in." This name is explained in the history:

其人民皆長大平正有類中國故謂之大秦。

Qí rénmín jiē chángdà píngzhēng yǒu lèi Zhōngguó gù wèi zhī Dàqín.

The inhabitants of that country are tall and well-proportioned [or honest, right, just, fair], somewhat like the Chinese, whence they are alled Ta-ts'in. [i.e. "Ta-Ch'in"; China and the Roman Orient, by Friedrich Hirth, 1885, photostat by Legare Street Press, pp.41,100; Pinyin assembled by the editor]

The speculation is that this country was named after China and its inhabitants seen so positively because of a cosmological belief that in the Far West there should be a moral and cultural counterpart to China in the East. Lack of direct evidence until later allowed a mythological view to grow.

The embassy had come up from Vietnam (or Annam, 安南, or 日南, Rìnán) after, apparently, travelling by sea from the West.

The name of the ruler was given as 安敦, Āndūn. This looks like it might be "Antoninus," which could mean either Antoninus Pius or Marcus Aurelius, both of whom used the name. Thus, "Great Ch'in" is usually taken to mean Rome, and the embassy was sent to explore ways to redirect the silk trade around the route, the Silk Road through Central Asia, dominated by the Parthians -- "Parthia" in Chinese would be 安息, Ānxī, apparently derived from the name of the Dynasty, the Arsacids. If so, nothing came of it. Nevertheless, the Chinese always noted this as the first contact with "Great Ch'in." Thus, the 明史, Míngshǐ, dynastic history says Great Ch'in, "first communicated with China at the time of the emperor Huan-ti," 桓帝時始通中國, Huándì shí shǐ tōng Zhōngguó [Hirth, op.cit., pp.64,109]. Huan-ti (146-168), of course, was in the time of the Later Han Dynasty.

The possibility of any communication between the great contemporary Empires of Rome and the Han is tantalizing. My impression has been that Chinese attempts, like the embassy of 97 AD sent by Pan Ch'ao, 班超 (Bān Chāo), to establish some communication overland, were frustrated by the Parthians. The Chinese themselves knew that the Parthians were interfering with communication between Rome and China. The Hòu Hànshū itself says that the Parthians told Kan-ying, 甘英 (Gānyīng), Pan Ch'ao's emissary, that a sea crossing of three months, or even two years, was required to get to Dà Qín. So Kan-ying gave up.

However, we have a curious reference in the minor Roman historian Lucius Annaeus Florus (d.130), who reports that foreign envoys arriving at the Court of the Emperor Augustus included people called the Seres: Seres etiam habitantesque sub ipso sole Indi, "The Seres too and the Indians, who live immediately beneath the sun" [Florus, Epitome of Roman History, translated by Edward Seymour Forster, Harvard, 1929, 1984, pp.348-349]. If these are the same as Greek Σῆρες, "Sêres" (singular Σήρ), then they would be Chinese. Since we know in detail about the failure of the Chinese mission of Kan-ying, the speculation is that these "Seres" could have been Chinese merchants who had made their way to Rome, avoiding the Parthians, without any official status. Florus gives us no details about them so, evidently, they did not spread anything in the way of stories or information about China.

The Record of the Three Kingdoms, 三國志, Sānguózhì, says the Romans "always wished to send embassies to China, but the An-hsi wanted to make profit out of their trade with us, and would not allow them to pass their country" [translaton and Chinese text in Hirth, op.cit., pp.70,111]. However, as we often see, this statement in the Sānguózhì repeats a version of what is already in the Hòu Hànshū:

其王常欲通使於漢
Qí wáng cháng yù tōng shǐ yú Hàn

而安息欲以漢繒綵與之交市
Ér Ānxí yù yǐ Hàn zēngcǎi yǔ zhī jiāo shì

故遮閡不得自達。
Gù zhē ài bùdé zì dá

Their kings always desired to send embassies to the Han, but the Parthians wished to carry on trade with them in Chinese silks, and it is for this reason that they were cut off from communication. [Hirth, pp.42,100; translation modified].

Digraph 繒綵, zēngcǎi: 繒, zēng, is "silken fabrics," Mathews' character #6767; 彩 substituted for 綵 at Wikipedia, cǎi, "colored" or "colored silk."

Since we know that the Romans had knowledge of and trade with India and Ceylon, and that Chinese pilgrims like Fa-Hsien went by sea from India to China (399-414), it is not at all impossible or unlikely that some Romans, in the days of the Kushans in India, could have done what the Hòu Hànshū says.

Indeed, the Sānguózhì says of the Romans that "Formerly only the water-road was spoken of; they did not know there was an overland route" [Hirth, pp.75,113]. That sounds inconsistent with the previous statement; for, if you know that the Parthians are blocking communication, then that means there is an overland route. However, this may mean that there is another overland route, north of the Parthians, along the Steppe.

Indeed, when overland communication is established later in 643, this is after an alliance is made with the Khazars, who anchor the West end of the Steppe, and who themselves had come along from the East. From knowing the Khazars, the Romans could well learn how to travel around what then would be the interfering Sassanids. The Hòu Hànshū was actually written in the 5th century, and the Chinese were still aware that Iranians, which by then meant the Sassanids, were still frustrating attempts at direct trade with "Great Ch'in."

Roman historians do not mention an embassy like this in the days of the Antonines. A possibility, however, is that this was not an official embassy from the Emperor but Roman merchants who had made their way to China and who figured that, while they were there, they should negotiate about Roman interests -- perhaps not unlike the Seres reported in the Court of Augustus. In those terms, it could also be like the Nestorian monks in the days of Justinian who discovered the secrets of silk production. Returning to Constantinople, however, the monks turned their discovery into an official job of industrial espionage, to return to China and obtain silk worm eggs, which they did.

On the other hand, Chinese records of these contacts were preserved and written up in the Dynastic Histories, both in relation to specific events and as general surveys:

At the end of each of these dynastic histories, twenty-four in number, a chapter more or less extensive is found devoted to the foreign countries and peoples, who came in contact with the Chinese empire. They are generally termed 四夷 sze-yi [sìyí], "the four kinds of barbarians" (in allusion to the four quarters of the globe). [Notes on Chinese Mediæval Travellers to the West, E. Bretschneider, M.D., Shanghai, American Presbyterian Mission Press, 1875, p.1; we also hear about the "five barbarians," 五胡 wǔhú, which is an actual ethnographic, not geographic, division]

At the same time, all that is left of diplomatic and archival records in Constantinople are the thousands of lead seals (yes, thousands), the σφραγῖδες (singular σφραγίς), that remained to be excavated on site. How the archives of Constantinople were destroyed is a good question. They easily could have been burned in an accidental fire, or in the sacking of Constantinople by the Crusaders in 1204 or by the Ottomans in 1453. We have little sense of just how much damage was done on those occasions, although it was considerable -- looting and mere vandalism were widespread:

Constantinople [under the Palaeologi] still housed more classical texts than survive today. A complete Diodoros of Sicily was seen in the [grand] palace library in 1453. [Kaldellis, The New Roman Empire, op.cit., p.902]

Some fragment of the palace archives is certainly evident in the De Administrando Imperio by Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus. The Administrando is a survey of the states and peoples around Romania with whom an Emperor, and his generals, must deal. The Chinese histories did this kind of thing for every Dynasty, but Constantine's product was a one-off.

For our purpose here, the curious thing about the Administrando is that it contains no references to China, nothing about Σηρίνδα, "Sērínda," or the Σῆρες people. Yet we know that the Roman government was directly acquainted with China at least since the time of Justinian, and diplomatically since Constans II. Likely Constantine judged that China was too distant to be of any immediate concern. But we would have liked to know what he knew and thought about the place.

Under Constans II, official contact with China, overland, would be established between Constantinople and T'ang Dynasty China. This would continue for centuries, until the Hung-wu, 洪武, Emperor announced to John V the inception of the Ming Dynasty. The Chinese were always aware, however, that the embassy of 166 was the first time that China had contact with Rome. From the Romans, on the other hand, the whole business is missing from the historical records that we have, except for the account in Procopius of sericulture.

At the same time, China in general is not entirely missing from the records. Theophylact Simocatta, Θεοφύλακτος Σιμοκάτης (580?-630?), seems to have known a fair amount about Chinese recent history, politics, and geography -- even about the end of the Northern and Southern Empires period:

ὁ δὲ τῆς Ταυγὰστ κλιματάρχης Ταϊσὰν ὀνομάζεται, ὅπερ υἱὸς θεοῦ ταῖς Ἑλληνινικαῖς φωναῖς ἐνσημαίνεται. ἡ δὲ ἀρχὴ τῆς Ταυγὰστ οὐ στασιάζεται· γένος γὰρ αὐτοῖς τὴν χειροτονίαν τοῦ ἡγεμόνος παρέχεται. τούτῳ δὲ τῷ ἔθνει θρησκεία ἀγάλματα, νόμοι δὲ δίκαιοι, καὶ σωφροσύνης ἔμπλεος ὁ βίος αὐτοῖς... ταύτην τὴν Ταυγὰστ ποταμὸς διορίζει. πάλαι τοίνυν ποτὲ δύο μεγίστοις ἔθνεσιν ὁ ποταμὸς ἐμεσίτευεν ἀντιθέτοις ἀλλήλοις· ἐσθὴς δὲ τῷ μὲν ἑνὶ μέλαινα, τῷ δὲ ἑτέρῳ κοκκόβαφος. ἐν τοῖς χρόνοις τοίνυν τοῖς καθ᾽ ἡμᾶς, Μαυρικίου τὰ Ῥωμαίων σκῆπτρα ἐπέχοντος, καὶ τὸ ἔθνος τῶν μελαινοφόρων τοῖς τὴν ἐρυθρὰν περιβεβλημένοις ἐσθῆτα διαπεραιωσάμενον τὸν ποταμὸν συνίστησι πόλεμον, εἶτα νενικηκὸς τῆς ὅλης ἡγεμονίας γίνεται κύριον.

The ruler [κλιματάρχης] of Taugast [大漢, Dà Hàn?] is called Taisan, which signifies 'son of god' [天子, Tiānzǐ?] in the Greek tongue. The realm of Taugast is not troubled by discord, for lineage provides them with the selection of their leader. Statues are the religion of his nation, and laws are just, and their life is full of temperance... A river divides this Taugast [the Yangtze?]; now once long ago the river was interposed between two great nations who were mutually hostile; the dress of one was black, and the other scarlet-hued. Then in our times, while Maurice was in possession of the Roman scepters, the black-robed nation crossed the river and joined battle with those wearing the red clothing; next, having gained victory, it became lord of the whole dominion. [Greek Text, Theophylacti Simocattae Historiae, edited by Carlus De Boor, Lipsiae, 1837, photocopy Legare Street Press, pp.260-261; The History of Theophylact Simocatta, An English Translation with Introduction and Notes, by Michael and Mary Whitby, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1986, 1988, pp.191-192, translation modified]

The Sui Dynasty unified China by conquering the South in 589, which was indeed in the time of the Emperor Maurice. Theophytact's good information about this is then spoiled as he goes on to say that "Taugast," Ταυγάστ, is near Bactria and Sogdiana and was founded by Alexander the Great. Clearly he has confused China with something else, and he has also failed to make the connection between "Taugast" and Σηρίνδα or the Σῆρες people, which he could have read about in Procopius. On the other hand, it is striking that his understanding of the Chinese state is so positive, with "just laws," etc., which sounds like what the Chinese later report about "Great Ch'in."

We don't know how Theophylact learned about this. We might speculate, however, that the sources of his information exposed lines of communication to China, which in turn may have motivated the mission sent by Constans II in 643. Since Theophylact was living in the time of Heraclius, and relations were established with the Khazars, they can have been the source of information. Subsequently, despite many contacts attested in Chinese records, we don't find further accounts of China in Greek histories.

Contact with T'ang Dynasty China, 643 AD

Hollywood, and Italian cinema, used to turn out one Roman themed movie after another, frequently with religious overtones, called "sword-and-sandals" epics. A good representative would have been The Last Days of Pompeii [Gli ultimi giorni di Pompei, 1959], starring Steve Reeves (1926-2000) and mostly directed by Sergio Leone (1929-1989), who went on to be more famous for "Spaghetti Westerns."

Reeves was a professional bodybuilder who made a good career in Europe making such movies, and my feeling is that his physique would not really be seen again until Arnold Schwarzenegger, Sylvester Stallone, and others would feature large muscles in the 1980's. Both (the ill-omened) George Reeves (1914-1959) and Christopher Reeve (1952-2004), playing Superman on television and in movies, respectively, did not looked "pumped up" like the later bodybuilders and their emulators. At the time, I thought that the 80's muscle men were something new; but Steve Reeves was there first.

Ben Hur [1959], a lavish American production, starring Charlton Heston (1923-2008), not Steve Reeves, may well be the greatest and most characteristic of the Roman movies. I saw this with my parents at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood when it came out. At the time, I thought that the theater may have been built for that particular movie -- but then in 1980 I would see The Empire Strikes Back at the same place, which is still there.

However, the Roman genre all but died with a 1964 movie about Commodus, The Fall of the Roman Empire (a tad premature there on the "Fall"). Except for Fellini's strange Satyricon (1970), the pornographic Caligula (1979), and the comic Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979), the next Roman movie would not be released until 2000, with Ridley Scott's big budget and successful Gladiator.

This is also, as it happens, about Commodus. The closing implication of Gladiator is diametrically the opposite of the 1964 movie, with the good guys apparently having won and a hopeful future in the offing. Neither movie, of course, gets it quite right. The competition for the throne in 193 was not very edifying, and absolutely none of the players appears in Gladiator, not even Pertinax, the prefect of the city of Rome, who became the next Emperor. On the other hand, the story does not pretend to historical accuracy about the events.

Commodus did like to fight gladiators, but he was not killed that way, and certainly not by a wronged general. He was strangled in his bath by his "wrestling partner," named Narcissus, sent my his mistress Marcia, who had found her name on a list of people to be executed. There is no evidence that Commodus killed his father, or any hint that Marcus considered a non-hereditary succession. Even in the movie it is clear that his provision for such a thing came far too late to be effective.

Gladiator is a good movie and a good story, but it is not a serious attempt to present real Roman history. Because of its success, however, one can hope that other events in Roman history, however fictionalized, will have a chance to make it onto the screen. So far, 2023 has passed with no follow-up. On the other hand, a Gladiator II is in production by director Ridley Scott, set in the days of the later Severans, to be released in 2024.

What I am waiting for is King Harald's Saga, which would also continue Viking themed movies, which have also become rare -- except for Vikings, on the History Channel, 2013-2020. Indeed, I suspect one could watch years of television and movies without knowing who the Varangians, let alone the English Varangians, were.

8. SEVERANS
Septimius Severus L. Septimius Severus		193-211
defeat of Niger in Syria, 194, of Albinus in Gaul, 197; Parthian War, 198-199; prohibition of conversions to Judaism or Christianity, 202; British Campaign, 207-211
Caracalla M. Aurelius (Septimius Bassianus) Antoninus	198-217	Geta P. Lucius Septimius Geta	209-211
Constitutio Antoniniana, Roman Citizenship to all free persons, 212
Macrinus M. Opellius Macrinus	217-218	Diadumenian M. Oppellius Diadumenianus	218
Defeat by Parthians at Nisibis, buys peace, 217
Elagabalus M. Aurelius Antoninus		218-222
Alexander Severus M. Aurelius Alexander		222-235
Persian War, Roman defeats but mutual losses, 230-232

It took a little time for Septimius to put down all the would-be Emperors in the provinces, but he did so with determination and ferocity. The virtues of nobility reputed to Trajan, of culture to Hadrian, of piety to Antoninus, and of philosophy to Marcus Aurelius were all missing in Septimius Severus. Nevertheless, Severus was firm, competent, and sober and so postively remembered by posterity.

Born in North Africa, at Lepcis Magna, now أَلْخُمْس, ʾAl-Ḫums, in modern Libya, Punic (Phoenician) seems to have been the first language of Severus, and he never lost the accent. This makes it look like Severus was the first Roman Emperor who was not of ethnic Latin derivation, although his mother (Fulvia Pia) was. Indeed, if his background was Punic, then we might call him "Hannibal's Revenge." A child of the conquered now rules the conquerors.

In the racial politics we must deal with so often now, because Severus was born in Africa, and Africans are black, we hear sometimes that Severus was black. This sophistry gets applied to Cleopatra, of course, and to Hannibal. Its absurdity apparently escapes the notice of many academics, whose activism rarely takes elementary logic into consideration, or rejects logic as racist.

The marriage of Severus to the Syrian Julian Domna, of Emesa (Homs), also blew away previous Roman scruples about Roman rulers being associated with Eastern Princesses -- the memory of Cleopatra long put such unions in bad favor. Soon, few Emperors would be of demonstrable Latin derivation. Some scholars, as we have seen, find this disturbing, if not discrediting to the identity of Rome.

Arch of Septimius Severus, Forum Romanum, Rome, 2019

Severus also doesn't seem to have considered anything other than hereditary succession, despite having a particularly nasty son, Caracalla, as the candidate. His attempt to balance Carcalla with his brother Geta simply got Geta murdered. Another factor, however, was the loyalty inspired in the troops to the family.

Septimius had bluntly advised his sons, in the Greek we have from Dio Cassius:  ὁμονοεῖτε, τοὺς στρατιώτας πλουτίζετε, τῶν ἄλλων πάντων καταφρονεῖτε (Homonoeîte, toùs stratiôtas ploutízete, tôn allôn pántôn kataphroneîte), "Stick together [be of one mind]; enrich the soldiers; be contemptuous of [put out of mind] all the others" [Dio Cassius IX, Roman History, Books LXXI-LXXX, translated by Earnest Cary, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, 1927, 2001, pp.270-273].

Caracalla, although not sticking with his brother, maintained his popularity reasonably well, until he terrified enough soldiers, including Macrinus, to precipitate his inevitable murder. This led to the brief and unsuccessful reign of Macrinus.

Since Macrinus was also a North African, perhaps a Berber, he is a candidate for the "Africans are black" reasoning. We then find Denzel Washington playing a "Macrinus" in the new Gladiator II movie [2024]. It is not clear yet whether this person, a former gladiator in the movie, is supposed to be the historical Emperor Macrinus, who began as a lawyer. The movie seems largely fictional, with a number of historical characters mixed in. The Macrinus of the movie does not look like the sculpted head we see at left. Nothing like Denzel Washington.

Macrinus, who also made his son Emperor, tried patching up the frontiers, until loyalty to the Severan family prevailed. Macrinus was the first Roman Emperor who never visited Rome during his reign, although he was headed there when he was deposed, captured, and executed.

Meanwhile, the relatively successful campaign of Severus against Parthia, despite the subsequent Parthian defeat of Macrinus, may have weakened the regime enough to allow for the coup of the Sassanid Persians, who would be much more trouble for the Romans than the Parthians had ever been. Septimius Severus himself was one of the two Roman Emperors (Constantius Chlorus was the other) to die (a natural death) at York (Eboracum) in Britain.

While the reign of Caracalla does not have much to recommend it, a fateful step was taken with the Constitutio Antoniniana of 212, which extended Roman citizenship to all free inhabitants of the Roman Empire. This is sometimes said, starting at the time, to have been just a trick to collect more taxes, which did not make much difference in the rights of Roman subjects. However, it made one very serious difference:  Any Roman citizen could become Emperor. Perhaps it is not surprising that this was the work of an Emperor who may have had only partial Latin ancestry. Hannibal himself could now become a Roman Emperor, and Latin ancestry begins to fade into obscurity, let alone political irrelevance.

The principle of Roman citizenship endured through the Middle Ages in Romania, and we have a Greek version in the βασιλικά code of the Emperor Leo VI: Οἱ ἐν τῇ Ῥωμαϊκῇ γῇ ὄντες πολῖται Ῥωμαίων εἰσίν, "Those who are in the Roman land are citizens of the Romans."

The Severan "family" turned out to be the entirely matrilineal creation of Severus' sister-in-law, Julia Maesa, who brought her two grandsons, entirely unrelated to Severus, to the throne. The bizarre Elagabalus (sometimes "Heliogabalus"), styling himself the god of his grandmother's Emesan solar cult (and engaging gladiators in combats more amorous and carnal than Commodus had contemplated), and then the amiable and reasonably effective Alexander thus wrapped up the dynasty.

Alexander was killed after the overdue reality check of battle, against the newly aggressive Sassanids (224-651). He was not that bad, but evidently not good enough for his own troops, who killed him and his mother -- that his mother was along with him on a military campaign probably seemed no better to the soldiers then than it does now. Elagabalus and his mother were also killed together. Elagabalus, indeed, seems to have been the last truly "fun" Roman Emperor in terms of the pagan sexual antics otherwise fondly remembered from Caligula. The transvestism and bi-sexuality of Elagabalus, however, may have gone beyond even Caligula.

The Second Sophistic was actually named by Philostratus, Φιλόστρατος (d.247/250), in his The Lives of the Sophists -- hence the emphasis on sophists and oratory. The presence and influence of Philostratus at Court was a function of the interests of Julia Domna, his patron. He says that Julia attracted a circle of mathematicians and philosophers. However, this actually meant something more like "astrologers and sophists," as the Loeb Classical Library says, and the revival, as philosophy, was more of a retrospective on ancient philosophy than a movement that contributed much that was original or of interest to it. Nevertheless, such an inspiration and preoccupation has been compared to similar concerns in the Renaissance.

More importantly, in retrospect, the Second Sophistic on its literary side is dated to the previous century, where we see a surge of Greek literature and a decline in Latin authors. It is not an accident that Cassell's New Latin Dictionary, of which I have the 1959 edition [Funk & Wagnalls, New York], only gives the vocabulary of classical authors from "about 200 B.C. to A.D. 100." Frederic M. Wheelock's Latin [Barnes & Noble, 1956, 1966; revised as Wheelock's Latin by Richard A. LaFleur, HarperResource, 2000] lists Tactitus (d.117) and Juvenal (d.127) as the last secular Latin authors.

Wheelock's "Silver Age," 14 AD-c.138 (the death of Hadrian), for Latin is followed by "The Patristic Period," late 2nd Century-5th Century, which lists Latin Fathers of the Church but refers to no secular literature and no secular authors in Latin until Dante! [p.xxix]. This implies that authors like Ammianus Marcellinus (d.395), Orosius (c.418), Boethius (d.524), and Cassiodorus (d.585), and Jordanes (c.551), were insignificant -- likewise for Isidore of Seville (d.636), who nevertheless is quoted by Wheelock [pp.211-212]. Similarly, we must not forget the codification of Roman Law largely in Latin by Justinian in the 6th century. This is a supremely secular product of Roman civilization. When a copy of Justinian's Digest turned up in Italy around 1070, it was literally fought over and effected a kind of revolution, informing the law education at the University of Bologna, founded in 1088.

But secular Latin authors did become rare after 100 AD, and both Orosius and (St.) Isidore had concerns that were as much religious as secular. Ammianus, a Greek himself, wrote his history in Latin out of worry that the genre might die out -- as it would, indeed, in its most sophisticated form, as narrative and analysis, with him -- although invaluable chronicles continued being composed in Latin.

Meanwhile, Greek literature, in turn, flowers, as we get Dio Chrysostom (c.40-c.115), Plutarch (c.46-c.120), Arrian of Nicomedia (c.87-c.145 AD, Consul 129), Claudius Ptolemy (c.100-c.170), Herodes Atticus (101–177), Pausanias (c.110-c.180), Lucian of Samosata (c.125-d.180), Aelius Aristides (117-181), Galen (129-216), Dio Cassius (165-c.235), and others -- not to mention the long tradition of Neoplatonic philosophers, q.v. -- who are never confused with or obscured by the Greek Fathers (e.g. Clement of Alexandria, c.150-c.215) -- through the rest of the history of Rome and Romania.

Thus, the project here is well intentioned, but it falls far short of what Anthony Kaldellis, will call "Byzantium Unbound." It perpetuates the traditional truncation of Roman history, not just to the years before 476, but even to a period up to 400. As a division of Greek literature, this is even more arbitrary than the boundary at the traditional "Fall" of Rome. It looks like what Warren Treadgold says is something "to force acceptance of a sharp break between Rome and Byzantium."

The larger meaning of the Second Sophistic is that Greek becomes the principal literary language of the Roman Empire, an aspect of the matter rarely noted. Frederic M. Wheelock's "Patristic Period" (late 2nd Century-5th Century) conceals this under the implication that religion becomes the principal content of Roman literature, ignoring what is in Greek. From its new status, of course, in the 7th century Greek replaces Latin and becomes the language of the Roman Court, Army, and Law -- in Constantinople -- from which Classicists tend to flee as no longer "Roman" at all, although it's not what the Romans -- Roman citizens under Roman law -- thought themselves.

The sense that the Second Sophistic represents a time when Greek literature surges and Latin literature declines is unremarked by Freeman and concealed by the inception of his survey as far back as the Battle of Pydna (168 BC), where Rome deposes King Perseus, the last of the Antigonids, and conquers Macedonia. Thus, the first Greek writers that Freeman profiles are all in the Hellenistic Period:  Polybius (c.200-c.118 BC), Posidonius (136-51 BC), and Strabo (c.63 BC-c.25 AD). These are all important Greek writers, and they lived at a time of growing Roman dominance -- Polybius was a hostage at Rome for many years -- but they cannot be said to have derived from a Roman infused culture, much less a culture that, in its Latinophone expression, was declining. Freeman's principle is thus of Greek literature in contact with Rome, although this principle, again, fails if he does not follow Greek writers after 400 AD.

That Freeman's cuts off Greek literature at 400 AD is something he never explains. He clearly sees the "Byzantines" as something different from "Romans," and gives us little hint that there might be some kind of continuity there -- except that these "Byzantines" seem to have inherited the Greek texts. The clue we get is that the last author he profiles is Hypatia, even though no works by her survive and her death, in 415, is past his terminal date. Her role here, then, is symbolic rather than substantive. And the symbolism may be revealed by the last part of the last paragraph in the chapter:

The atrophy and eventual extinction of these schools [i.e. the Neoplatonic schools of Late Antiquity] was a major cultural loss. Edward Watts in his City and School in Late Antique Athens and Alexandria provides his own conclusion. 'By the seventh century, local conflicts about the role of pagan teachers had largely passed. There were few such teachers left and even fewer who taught Christian students. This slow fade into irrelevance represents pagan intellectual culture's final moment.' [p.320]

From this, we might infer that truly "Roman" Greek literature is that of the pagans, not the Christians, even though Freeman features Clement of Alexandria and Origen. He does not, however, feature the pagan Neoplatonists Simplicius or Damascius, with only one reference to each in the book, which merely cites them for historical facts, without discussion of their thought or lives, and with the reference to Damascius, the last Scholarch of the Academy, oddly calling him a "later historian." Hypatia was not the last pagan philosopher, or the most important one.

So perhaps we see what the principle is, with the implication that "pagan intellectual culture's final moment" means that the thought it represents is extinguished. That is, of course, quite false. We have the works of Simplicius and Damascius, let alone Plotinus, because they were cherished, copied, and taught through the Middle Ages in Constantinople -- which Freeman at least admits for Plotinus. Their translations into Arabic then formed the basis of philosophy in Islām -- though some people seem to think that philosophy miraculously appeared in Arabic after Justinian had burned all the original Greek texts.

Nor was the death of Hypatia the end of intellectual life in Alexandria, when the surviving works of John Philoponus from a century later were of serious importance and impact, not the least in Islām and in Renaissance Italy. To Freeman, as to much academic history of philosophy and science, Philoponus is invisible, probably because he falsifies the academic anti-Christian narrative -- which now we suspect influences Freeman also: The end of "pagan intellectual culture" means the end of real Roman culture as such.

Where Freeman does consider the Renaissance, in his chapter "Afterlives," the last chapter in the book [pp.321-344], it is only to consider the use of the texts by the authors he has already considered in the course of the book. Still no Simplicius, Damascius, Procopius, or Philoponus. So, much Greek literature of the Roman Empire, before we even get well into Mediaeval "Byzantium," continues to be ignored. Hypatia as the terminus ad quem, without surviving works, and speculation or hearsay (including from Damascius) about what she did write, may tell the tale.

Overlooked by Freeman and Throneman is another feature of this story. By some estimates, there is as much as ten times as much surviving Greek literature as Latin. Even the Loeb Classical Library publishes about twice as much Greek as Latin literature. But there are variables in these estimates that warrant consideration and discussion. Critical texts of much of Mediaeval Greek literature, such as the corpus of the Porphyrogenitus, are still only available in editions from the 19th century. But then we might wonder whether Classicists even consider how much of that, if any, properly belongs to Greek literature at all. My UCLA Greek professor seemed entirely unaware of the Porphyrogenitus. Similarly, we have Mediaeval Latin literature, such as all the works of Thomas Aquinas and the other Scholastics. To be sure, Classicists are not going to be reading the Summa Theologica for the beauty of the language or its subject matter. An authority was unable to explain to me the meaning of Aquinas's use of secundum.

On top of that, there is another variable. Modern academics continued to write in Latin until, at least, the 19th century. Newton's Principia and Kant's Disseration are both in Latin, as was still much of the science and philosophy of the 17th and 18th Centuries. Meanwhile, the Classical Greek language still used in the Middle Ages began to be replaced by Modern Greek, without the institutions, the universities, that perpetuated and expanded the use of Latin in the West. How does all that add up? I don't think there is a clear answer.

In any case, the Ancient Latin literature of the West was preserved in the religious and theological context of the universities and monasteries, while secular education and scholarship was a predominant proportion of literary life in Mediaeval Constantinople -- as we see actually detailed by Michael Psellus. As much Ancient Greek literature that we have, and as much Ancient Latin literature as was lost, may be a feature of the nature of those institutions, whose interests and emphasis was different. Greek scribes even copied anti-Christians like Julian and Porphyry.

Οὐ γὰρ ἐπίδειξιν καλλιγραφίας ἢ φάσεως ἠττικισμένης καὶ τὸ διηρμένον διογκούσης καὶ ὑψηλὸν ποιῆσαι ἐσπούδασα, ἀλλὰ μᾶλλον διὰ κιονῆς καὶ καθωμιλημένης ἀπαγγελίας διδάξαι σοι ἔσπευσα, ἅπερ οἴομαι δεῖν σε μὴ ἀγνοεῖν, καὶ ἃ τὴν ἐκ μακρᾶς ἐμπειρίας σύνεσίν τε καὶ φρόνησιν εὐμαρῶς σοι δύναται προξενεῖν.

For I have not been studious to make a display of fine writing or of an Atticizing style, swollen with the sublime and lofty, but rather have been eager by means of every-day and conversational narrative to teach you those things of which I think you should not be ignorant, and which may without difficulty provide that intelligence and prudence which are the fruit of long experience.

Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (913-959 AD), De Administrando Imperio, Greek text edited by Gy. Moravcsik, English translation by Romilly J.H. Jenkins [Dumbarton Oaks Texts, 1967, 2008, p.49, color added].

Atticism, Φάσις Ἠττικισμένη

A characteristic of the Second Sophistic, such as we see in Arrian of Nicomedia, the 2nd century historian, philosopher, and official (he repelled the Alans from Cappadocia; he transcribed the teachings of Epictetus the Stoic, c.50-c.135; and he is listed as an Eponymous Archon of Athens for the year 145 AD), and the others, is the movement to write in Attic Greek, rather than in the Κοινή (Koinḗ), of the Hellenistic Period. This is usually dismissed as an affectation and a frivolity. Perhaps it was, but it is also directly comparable to the concern of Renaissance writers to restore the "purity" of Ciceronian Latin over the received Mediaeval Latin that had survived to their time.

Renaissance writers are rarely belabored for affectation because of this. And indeed, where Greek and Latin are taught today, the student, as it happens, begins with Attic Greek and Ciceronian Latin. The focus on Attic Greek in education, which began with the Second Sophistic, thus continued straight through the Middle Ages and has been in full flood through all of modern education in Classical Greek. When Greek speaking refugees fled the Ottoman Conquest, they did not teach Italians the spoken Greek of their time, let alone the Κοινή, but the Attic Greek whose example and literature they respected. Indeed, Renaissance scholars could not have read Thucydides or Plato otherwise. The "purity" of the Greek language remains a political issue in Modern Greece.

Peter Thonemann, despite being an Oxford historian, joins in with the disparagement of the revival of Attic Greek and thus sins the sin of many fellow Classicists, to insult the literature by complaining about the revival of the Attic dialect:

For example, at some point in this period -- after Polybius but before, say, Aristides -- Greek intellectuals and politicians began to cultivate a highly artificial classicizing dialect, modeled on that of fifth-century Athens. This is a truly bizarre phenomenon, as if Bernie Sanders were to take to delivering his speeches in the style and vocabulary of Chaucer. When did this neoclassical revival take off, and what did people think they were playing at? Since none of his 20 heroes happens to have been the key figure, Mr. Freeman never has cause to tell us.

Unfortunately, we might begin to wonder how well Thonemann has read Freeman's book, since Freeman addresses all Thonemann's questions, including listing Aelius Aristides as a "key figure":

By AD 140, a number of the educated elite, notably those in mainland Greece or Asia Minor, were adopting Attic, the dialect of classical Athens, as a means of isolating themselves from koine, the Greek of the streets...

Aelius Aristides and Herodes Atticus... were probably the best exponents of Attic; others spiced up their texts with Attic words or avoided certain elements of koine as unworthy of an educated man. It was easy, as Lucian suggested, to be seen as pretentious. [The Children of Athena, op.cit., pp.16-17]

There is nothing "bizarre" about the use of an elevated language, Attic Greek, which is still what is taught in every class in Classical Greek at every school that teaches it. As a part of the Second Sophistic this is the influence under which much of the literature that Freeman and Thonemann are actually talking about was written. Since spoken Greek began to diverge greatly from the Classical language during the Middle Ages, reading and writing Attic Greek meant that all of Greek literature, from Plato to the historian Laonikos Chalkokondyles (c.1430-c.1470) would be equally accessible. But then Freeman, of course, misses that range by a thousand years. And we might begin to wonder how much Peter Thonemann actually knows about Mediaeval Greek literature himself.

But by effectively denigrating most of Mediaeval Greek literature, Thonemann does unintentionally give us one of the reasons why Roman and Mediaeval Greek literature is neglected, that Classicists consider themselves superior to Roman and "Byzantine" authors writing in Greek -- or even earlier works in the Κοινή, like the New Testament. Classicists will only dignify real Attic authors, from the Golden Age of Greece, and not those who, over 1500 years, simply read and wrote in that language. Since this also means that they shun the history of Anna Comnena, we could also add a charge of "sexism" against them, which is the standard procedure for the modern academy, isn't it?

Freeman above sees the growth of Atticism "as a means of isolating themselves from koine, the Greek of the streets," but this is part of the denigration, attributing to the Romans the same self-satisfied attitude as of the Classicists themselves. More than an affectation or self-exaltation, the Atticizing tradition accompanies the circumstance that the earliest and most interesting and some of the most important literature in these languages, especially for new scholars, is in the Attic and Ciceronian dialects -- from Thucydides and Plato to Caesar and Cicero himself. There never would be anyone again quite like Aeschylus, Sophocles, or Euripides. Preserving the archaic language meant that the authors could still be read in their own words. And Euripides would be a favorite in the Mediaeval theater in Constantinople, which is probably why many more of his plays have been preserved than of the other tragedians. What was spoken in "the streets," probably already diverging from the Κοινή, would not have helped.

Perhaps Classicists are somehow annoyed that the Ancient and Mediaeval authors in Greek actually agree with them that the supreme models of the Greek language are in Attic. But then they sneer, like Peter Thonemann, at those who actually continue to write in Attic. But the Classicists do not themselves write in Greek at all. Their Greek is a language they read, but not write, making it, at least, a "half-dead" language -- passive but not active -- making the modern Classicist a kind of necromancer.

But Procopius and Anna Comnena write a living language, which Herodotus himself might have read with pleasure, as we can now. And we can see how perilous the Classicist necromancy is, when modern "education" can so easily toss all of Greek and Latin aside. When a Princeton commencement speaker still gives a brief oration in Latin, it is, as Schopenhauer says, gleich einem Meteorstein, aus einer andern Ordnung der Dinge, als die hier herrschende ist, entsprungen, "like a meteorite, sprung from an order of things, different from that which prevails here."

Reviews

Philosophy of Science, Linguistics

Some of Frederic M. Wheelock's statements in this respect are of further interest. Thus, under his treatment of the "Patristic Period," he says:

The name of the Patristic Period comes from the fact that most of the vital literature was the work of the Christian leaders, or fathers (patrēs), among whom were Tertullian, Cyprian, Lactantius, Jerome, Ambrose, and Augustine. These men had been well educated; they were familiar with, and frequently fond of, the best classical authors; many of them had even been teachers or lawyers before going into the service of the Church. At times the classical style was deliberately employed to impress the pagans, but more and more the concern was to reach the common people (vulgus) with the Christian message. Consequently, it is not surprising to see vulgar [i.e. spoken] Latin re-emerging as an important influence in the literature of the period. St. Jerome in his letters is essentially Ciceronian, but in his Latin edition of the Bible, the Vulgate (383-405 A.D.), he uses the language of the people. Similarly, St. Augustine, though formerly a teacher and a great lover of the Roman classics, was willing to use any idiom that would reach the people (ad ūsum vulgī) and said that it did not matter if the barbarians conquered Rome provided they were Christians. [pp.xxviii-xxix]

This may puzzle the modern student, whose study will need to be far progressed before he notices that the language of Augustine, the most prolific Latin author, or Jerome is substantially different from that of Cicero. And when Wheelock features a quote from St. Isidore, writing in 7th century Visigothic Spain, without any caution that this may be a corrupted "Vulgar Latin," this tends to subvert the sense that earlier authors were writing anything suggestive of Mediaeval Latin or the proto-Romance languages that soon become attested. And when the modern student engaged with religion, or with philosophy, turns to the Vulgate or Augustine, why should Wheelock act as though these are estranged, by corruption or decadence, from the language he is teaching?

Perhaps his final comment here gives it away. Wheelock may have a secular distaste for the "Patristics." Augustine is more interested in the survival of his religion than of his nation or his civilization. Modern secularists, however, going far beyond Wheelock, reveling in their cynicism and Nietzschean nihilism, have gotten to the point where neither religion, nor nation, or nor civilization draws their loyalty. Their own Narcissism is the only explanation for their mentality.

These languages, Greek and Latin, are the languages, our Classical languages of Western civilization, and their literature, that we do not want forgotten, if the root values and experience of our civilization are not to be forgotten. But their existence is in greater danger in our time than ever before:  a Shakespeare, purportedly with "small Latin and less Greek," would be a scholar of Classics (as he actually was) compared to most graduates of modern universities. Latin used to be taught in my high school, but then it was not even offered at the college where I taught for 22 years.

One reason today for disparagement of the Second Sophistic, although this will not be an issue for Classicists, may in part be the antipathy in academic linguistics for written language and unconcern for the preservation of the literary heritage embodied in Classical Languages. This may accompany a self-hating, anti-Western, and generally anti-American bias that is often evident in both linguistics and other academic literature.

This animus curiously tends to be focused on Greek and Latin and not on Classical Arabic, Sanskrit, or Classical Chinese, whose preservation and use are generally exempted from criticism. The politically correct are happy to destroy their own tradition but sensitive (and cowardly) about doing this where accusations could be made against them of ethnocentrism, Eurocentrism, "Islamophobia," or racism.

Yet they usually have no real interest either in the civilizations of ʾIslām, India, China, or anywhere else, and may be shockingly ignorant about all of them, repeating clichés that usually owe more to Marxism than to real knowledge of other cultures or civilizations, whose language, literature, and history (excluded from "multicultural" education, whose emphasis is Marxism) are generally not honestly taught, or taught at all. And since translation as a specialty is now disparaged, the study of Classical languages, or any languages, correspondingly declines [note].

Legions of the Roman Army

So why the lacuna or the short shrift for the Severan Army? Well, it may be that Classicists are beginning to lose heart. Interest in the Empire declines, step by step, as we move away from the Julio-Claudians. The Antonines still draw a good bit of enthusiasm, with Marcus Aurelius and Commodus turning up in some Hollywood movies. But treatments like that are swamped by the popular representations of Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. And then, after Commodus, silence. Even the two hour History Channel special, "Roman Vice," ended with Nero, passing up the chance to treasure one of the most vicious Roman Emperors of all, Caracalla, and one of the bizarre, Elagabalus.

Earlier popularizing authors may have shied away from the extremes of the behavior of Elababalus, who did things that used to be taboo in polite conversation; but that is no excuse now, when that should be one of the most appealing things about him. It is as though there is a sense of unease. The closer we get to Constantine, about whom feelings are so mixed, confused, and generally hostile, it is as though a force field begins to be felt that inhibits movement. The great drama of the Tetrarchy, with the extraordinary personalities and events involved, leaves modern historical fiction, and Hollywood, cold. The most that the public gets for the period are the tendentious, preposterous, and ahistorical speculations and misrepresentations of The Da Vinci Code. Even the straight historical treatments on the cable networks, which do remind us that people like Aurelian, Diocletian, Majorian, and Justinian at least exist, are usually no less tendentious, as I have occasion to note here.

Rome and Romania Index

This map looks like it should be from the Fifth Century. The Goths, not yet divided, are here, but they come in part by boat, which we will not see with them later. The Franks here duplicate the later course of the Vandals, through Gaul, Spain, and North Africa, but without the same effects. Later, the Franks will not be a principal invader but will be the ultimate beneficiary of the invasions.

The Alemanni also will be less active later, remaining in Germany and leaving their name as the word for "German" in Romance languages. Rome is weakened by revolt in the West and a Palmyrene takeover in the East. But in this era Roman institutions prove resilient enough to restore the status quo ante (with troubling strategic withdrawals). But the Germans remain across the Rhine and Danube, growing in numbers and sophistication. One might even say that all this was a dress rehearsal for the later invasions. In the theater, if the dress rehearsal goes poorly, the opening will go well. This is what happened.

The Gallic Empire of Postumus began under Gallienus. Postumus, of course, probably would rather have overthrown the Emperor, but he was not able to defeat him and was otherwise involved with fighting Germans. In best Third Century tradition, he was killed by his troops. This form of succession continued until Tetricus and his son surrendered to Aurelian, on condition of their peaceful retirement. This episode echoes the attempt of the usurper Constantine "III" in the Fifth Century, though that failed to suppress the Germans in that era and merely served to absorb the attention of Roman forces that could have been better used, in conjunction with those of Constantine himself, against the common enemy.

Maximinus I Thrax the Thracian C. Julius Verus Maximinus	235-238	SONS, BROTHERS, etc.
Gordian I Africanus M. Antonius Gordianus Sempronianus	238	Gordian II M. Antonius Gordianus Sempronianus	238
Balbinus & Pupiens D. Caelius Calvinus Balbinus & M. Clodius Pupienus Maximus	238
Gordian III M. Antonius Gordianus	238-244
Philip I the Arab M. Julius Philippus	244-249	Philip II M. Julius Severus Philippus	247-249
Nile fails to flood, 244; Millennium of Rome, from 753 BC, observed, last celebration of Secular Games, Ludi Saeculares, 248
Decius C. Messius Quintus Decius	249-251	Herennius Q. Herennius Etruscus Messius Decius	251
Cyprian Plague, possibly a haemorrhagic fever, 249; River Thames frozen for 9 weeks, 250; Presecution of Christians, 250-251; Decius & Herennius killed by Goths at Abritta, 251
Trebonianus Gallus C. Vibius Trebonianus Gallus	251-253	Hostilianus C. Valens Hostilianus Gallus	251
		Volusian C. Vibius Afinius Gallus Veldumnianus Volusianus	253
Aemilian M. Aemilius Aemilianus	253
Valerian I P. Licinius Valerianus	253-260, d.?	Gallienus P. Licinius Egnatius Gallienus	253-268
German invasions, 257; defeated and captured by the Sassanid Shāh Shapur I, 260
Postumus M. Cassianius Latinius Postumus	in Gaul, 259-268	Valerian II P. Licinius Cornelius Valerianus	Caesar, 256-258
		Saloninus P. Licinius Cornelius Saloninus Valerianus	Caesar, 258-260; Emperor, 260
Saloninus killed by Postumus, 260; invasion by the Goths, 267
Claudius II Gothicus M. Aurelius Claudius	268-270	Quintillus M. Aurelius Quintillus	270
Defeat of Goths, 269
Victorianus M. Piavonius Victorinus	in Gaul, 268-270
Tetricus I C. Pius Esuvius Tetricus	in Gaul, 270-273	Tetricus II C. Pius Esuvius Tetricus	270-273
Zenobia Septimia Zenobia	Palmyra, 267-272	Vaballathus L. Julius Aurelius Septimius Vaballathus Athenodorus	270-273
Aurelian L. Domitius Aurelianus	270-275
Withdrawal from Dacia, 271
Tacitus M. Claudius Tacitus	275-276	Florian M. Annius Florianus	276
Probus M. Aurelius Probus	276-282
Carus M. Aurelius Carus	282-283	Numerian M. Aurelius Numerianus	283-284
		Carinus M. Aurelius Carinus	283-285
Mission to China? Killed by lightning?

The chaos that had threatened in some earlier successions (in 69 and 193) now arrived in 238, when we can say that there were five Emperors in one year. Maximinus Thrax may have been the second Emperor who never visited Rome. He was on his way there, because the Senate had recognized the usurpation of the Gordians in Africa, when the Praetorian Guard murdered him at Aquileia. Meanwhile, of course, Gordian II had been killed in battle by a Maximinus loyalist, the governor of Numidia. Gordian I committed suicide.

So neither Gordian made it to Rome either. The confused Senate elected the Senators Balbinus & Pupiens Co-Emperors. When the Guard murdered them in turn, only their nomination of Gordian III as Caesar provided for a reasonable succession. If only that were the end of problem.

The complexity of the following period can only be appreciated, or even understood, by reviewing the "Crisis of the Third Century" chart. Few Emperors reigned long or died natural deaths. Gordian III's six years would count as lengthy for the period, but his murder would prove all too typical. The musical chairs of murders did not help prepare the Empire for increased activity by the Germans and Persians.

Decius and Herennius were killed in battle by the Goths in 251 -- the only Roman Emperors to die in battle (against external enemies) besides Julian (against the Persians, 363), Valens (against the Goths again, 378), Nicephorus I (against the Bulgars, 811), and Constantine XI (with the fall of Constantinople to the Turks, 1453). These Emperors are now marked with a "killed in battle" icon -- . Valerian's relatively long and promising reign ended with the unparalleled ignominy of being captured by Shapur I -- the only Roman Emperor captured alive by a foreign enemy until Romanus IV in 1071.

These Emperors are now marked with a "captured by foreign enemy" icon -- -- which is the Egyptian hieroglyph of a bound prisoner, used in words for "rebel" and "enemy." Some other rulers were also captured by foreign enemies -- the Latin Emperor Baldwin I (by the Bulgarians), the Emperor of Thessalonica, Theodore Ducas (by the Bulgarians), and the Prince of Achaea, William II (although he was captured, not by a foreign enemy, but by the forces of Nicaea).

Valerian was kept prisoner and subject to various humiliations until executed. His skin was then flayed (unless he had been flayed alive), stuffed, and kept for later display to Roman emissaries. In any case, this is what we are told by later Romans, such as Lactantius, and questions have been raised about the reliability of these accounts, for which there is no contemporary or Persian evidence. Valerian, however, certainly never returned home.

Valerian's son Gallienus then endured one invasion and disaster after another, with the Empire actually beginning to break up. Nevertheless, Gallienus rebuilt the army and, excluding Senators from legionary commands, put in place the generals who, although his own murderers, conducted the reconstruction of the Empire. He thus now tends to get some credit, even with the apparent collapse around him.

Despite a short reign (and a natural death), Claudius II began to turn things around by defeating the Goths, commemorated with a column that still stands (but is rarely seen in history books) in İstanbul. His colleague Aurelian then substantially restores the Empire, only to suffer assassination, initiating a new round of revolving Emperors. This finally ended with Diocletian, who picked up reforming the Empire, militarily, politically, and religiously, where Aurelian had left off.

Amid all the other upheavals of this period, one that escapes the notice of popular culture, and often that of historians also, is how the Empire ceases to be a possession of the City of Rome. The political structure of the Roman State turns inside out, with the City becoming a backwater and the provinces and the frontiers becoming the centers of political life. We begin to get the phenomenon of Emperors who rarely, or never, even visit the City. They certainly do not live there.

The absence of Emperors from Rome interrupts one of our fixed images of what Rome was like. There would no longer always be an Emperor presiding over Games in the Colosseum. Was Philip the Arab even there for the celebration of the 1000th year of Rome in 248? I expect he was, considering the scale of the games he commissioned, but his presence was certainly becoming a little unusual.

A century later, in 348, when the 1,100 year anniversary of Rome was noted, there was no celebration and there were no festivities or games at Rome. The Emperor at the time, Constantius II, wasn't there. We do know that Constantius did visit Rome, once, in 353, but that was a little late for the anniversary. His neglect is then characteristic of the age.

But you can't make a movie about Rome without an Emperor judging whether the gladiators live or die. What we certainly have never seen in a movie is what happened in 402, when a Christian monk pushed in between fighting gladiators and was killed -- perhaps even stoned by the spectators.

This monk is remembered as St. Telemachus, and there are differing accounts about exactly what happened, or even when. One version we get now is that this happened during games in 401 that were put on by the one time Consul, the diehard pagan Quintus Aurelius Symmachus. However, this is modern speculation and is not attested in sources. Telemachus is also said to have done his intervention in 391, when Symmachus was actually Consul.

However, the early date seems unlikely considering the reaction of Honorius, off in Milan, since he was not yet Emperor in 391. And the reaction was then to prohibit gladiatorial combats, as Honorius had already closed the gladiatorial schools -- although animal fights and chariot races continued for many years, especially in Constantinople. Thus, not only was there no longer an Emperor in attendance at the Colosseum to rule on life or death, but there were no longer fights to the death between combatants at all. The Colosseum began to stand empty much of the time.

The reaction of historians is curious, something of the form "You're no fun anymore": If gladiators are no longer dying, then Rome is no longer Rome, even though, of course, we never approved of those bloody games in the first place. Yet, we cannot approve, either, of those Christians, such spoilsports, being the ones to stop cruel and fatal combats. It should have been socialists, or Gandhi, or something, doing it. Monks were also off killing Hypatia, so we know what they were like.

For the time being, the equivalent of an administrative Capital of the Empire simply moves with the military camps of the Emperors. Once things settle down a bit in the following years, we begin to see new seats for the Court(s) and new administrative centers, from Nicomedia and Milan, to Antioch and Trier, Sirmium and York -- each often called "Rome" while an Emperor was there -- all culminating in the founding of Constantinople, the fully New "Rome."

Yet it is rare to vanishing to see this profound truth of Roman history ever asserted in a public voice; and we usually find even the historically literate laboring under the impression that the fate of the Empire hangs on events in the City of Rome, right down to the day when the barbarians burst in on the Last Emperor in 476. Of course, as we shall see, nothing of the sort happened in 476, and in fact nothing of significance happened at all in the City of Rome during that year, even as it had already been a political backwater for a couple of centuries. If anybdy had broken in looking for an Emperor, they would have come up empty.

Not much in the way of dynasties in this period. Many Emperors, of course, wanted to associate their sons with them to arrange for their succession; but in the violent ends of most Emperors, the sons usually died with them. Gordian III, Gallienus, and Carinus are the principal exceptions, ruling in their own right after the death of fathers or, with Gordian, uncle and grandfather.

The invasions and political troubles of the Third Century shook the religious and philosophical certainties upon which Rome had previously thrived. Exotic religious cults, like Mithraism and Christianity, now began to exert wide appeal; and a profound shift occurred in philosophy. We no longer hear much of Stoics or Epicureans, but whole new perspectives and concerns are ushered in by the mystical Egyptian Plotinus, Πλωτῖνος (205-270 AD), who even enjoyed some Imperial patronage under Gordian III, Philip the Arab, and Gallienus. He makes the Second Sophistic look superficial indeed -- except that his works in Greek continued the trend of Greek literature dominating and replacing Latin.

With his return to the epistemology and metaphysics of Plato and Aristotle, Plotinus, as such the founder of Neoplatonism, picks up the mainstream of development of the Western philosophical tradition, which had somewhat detoured in the Hellenistic Period through revivals of Presocratic doctrine (Heraclitus for the Stoics, Atomism for the Epicureans). This prepared the inheritance that would pass to Mediaeval philosophy in ʾIslām. The tradition then, rationalistic with a touch of mysticism, produced a purified Aristotelianism that passed into Europe through Spain and Sicily. Meanwhile, Platonism and Neoplatonism themselves were treasured in Romania, to be passed into Italy during the Renaissance, especially after the Fall of Constantinople in 1453. Aristotle was fortified at the universities, but Platonism appealed more to the mathematicians, like Johannes Kepler, who were instrumental in formulating modern, mathematical science.

Plotinus's student, disciple, Boswell, and editor Porphyry, Πορφύριος (233-c.300), who first enjoyed patronage from Aurelian, promoted Neoplatonic principles, wrote an introduction to Aristotle's logical works, the Isagoge, Εἰσαγωγή, which became an indispensable text in the Middle Ages, and even began organizing the defense of traditional religion in his Against the Christians, whose arguments he gave in a presentation to the Emperor Diocletian, urging him to suppress the religion.

But the Neoplatonic version of traditional religion now looks much more of a piece with Christian sensibilities than with things like the peculiar and archaic practices examined by Frazer in The Golden Bough. Constantine would later order Against the Christians burned. The cultural and intellectual sea change of the period, soon followed by Diocletian's reforms and then Constantine, usher in the distinctive world of Late Antiquity. Classicists start to become nervous and irritable, sometimes betraying their hostility to Christianity.

The Oasis gave the city its importance as an essential link in the caravan short-cut across the desert from Mesopotamia to Syria. Nevertheless, this was not enough water for the desires of the city. As elsewhere in desert cities, like Petra, the Palmyrenes arranged to catch rain water in mountain cisterns and behind dams, which was then channeled through aqueducts to fountains in the city down below. The mountains were more distant and so the aqueducts were longer than at Petra, which was in the midst of mountains itself.

The columns on the central avenue of the city all contained plinths to hold statues. Although the statues are long gone, the columns themselves hold inscriptions, in both Greek and Palmyrene Aramaic, that inform us who they were of, not gods, but local dignitaries, including Zenobia herself. Even greater enemies of Rome have far less to show for themselves today.

Palmyra has now entered recent history in the ugliest way. In 2015, the savage forces of the "Islamic State" (ISIS or ISIL) captured the town from the Syrian government. They executed the lead archaeologist of the site along with dozens of other people, apparently including women and children. And, like their previous criminal actions in Iraq, following the precedent of the Tālibān in Afghanistan, they began to destroy ancient buildings, particularly temples.

The impressive ruin of the Temple of Bēl, which stands by the road into both the ancient and the modern town, is shown in the photographs above and below right. Its walls were all but intact. Above the recessed altar was a beautiful roseate ceiling. A stair within the walls led up to the top, affording an impressive view of the area.

But the (literally) bloody fanatics of ISIS blew up the building and reduced it to rubble, so that nothing, apart from the entrance pylon, remains -- at left. This was a United Nations World Heritage Site, and one of the most evocative jewels of ancient history. It tells us who these people, invoking ʾIslām, really are. To be sure, their eagerness to cut the heads off civilian hostages, on camera, stamps them as evil in a way whose like may not have been seen since Auschwitz, but their contempt for the past, for history, for art, and for beauty staggers the mind in a unique way. They are openly proud of it, as even the Nazis never were for their crimes, which they tried to conceal. This should be of concern to all Muslims, as an insult to ʾIslām; but the Muslim community has seemed relatively complacent about it.

Having visited Palmyra twice in 1970, my photographs are now perhaps significant historical records -- in a tradition going back to the Ruins of Palmyra, a survey by Robert Wood published in 1753. Since my photographs are all slides, they will need to be converted to digital format. I have begun to do this. Colors have often changed in the slides over the years, especially since I was using more than one kind of film. The two initial images above and the ones at right and below are from 1970. Only the image of the destroyed temple is recent.

The image at left is from the top of the walls of the Temple of Bēl. Visible on the wall at the right are two friends from the University of California group at the American University of Beirut that year. The difficulty of picking out the figures on the temple gives a sense of its scale. Also, we can see how robust is the stonework. To reduce this building to rubble, ISIS needed to use a lot of explosives. A testament to their malice.

By the gate is Alan Campbell, and on the wall behind him, wearing a white kūfiyyah, (كُوفِيَّة), is Dennis Anderson.

All of us were over six feet tall; and Dennis had very blond hair. This made him an object of intense curiosity from all the children wherever we went in Syria, so he began wearing the kūfiyyah to hide his hair. This worked. Later, traveling in Turkey, with hair long enough that it could have marked me as a hippie -- in Arabic a "beetle," , khunfus (خُنْفُس), but which we heard as khamfus in Beirut -- and become an object of vocal derision and perhaps even violence, I benefited from the same trick and actually drew no attention whatsoever for wearing an Arab headdress, which I wore draped as shown. The wisdom of this I saw in Turkey, where a whole bus load of passengers jeered at some European or American backpackers standing by the roadside at a bus stop, while I, on the bus, was ignored.

It is extraordinary to now have vandalism of the city by people who seem to actually hate the past, even while they vainly hope that a revived ʾIslām will give them the power that the Islamic world has otherwise been unable to achieve through conventional political and economic means. Or they may actually want nothing more than death and destruction, if this serves to bring on the Apocalypse. In those terms, they may have no positive goals at all [note].

Rome and Romania Index

II. THE SECOND EMPIRE, EARLY ROMANIA, 284 AD-610 AD, Era of Diocletian 1-327, 326 years

Thus Constantine, an emperor and son of an emperor, a religious man and son of a most religious man, most prudent in every way, as stated above -- and Licinius the next in rank, both of them honoured for their wise and religious outlook, two men dear to God -- were roused by the King of kings, God of the universe, and Saviour against the two most irreligious tyrants and declared war on them. God came to their aid in a most marvellous way, so that at Rome Maxentius fell at the hands of Constantine, and the ruler of the East [i.e. Maximinus Daia] survived him only a short time and himself came to a most shameful end at the hands of Licinius, who at that time was still sane.

Eusebius of Caesarea (c.260-c.339), The History of the Church [translated by G.A. Williamson, Penguin Books, 1965, p.368]

---

The Donation of Constantine, 1247, San Silvestro Chapel at Santi Quattro Coronati, Rome

L'altro che segue, con le leggi e meco,   sotto buona intenzion che fé mal frutto,   per cedre al pastor si fece greco:	The next who follows, with the laws and me, with a good intention which bore bad fruit, made himself Greek, to cede [the West] to the Pastor.
ora conosce come il mal dedutto   dal suo bene operar non li è nocivo,   avvegna che sia 'l mondo indi distrutto.	Now he knows how the evil derived from his good action does not harm him, though the world should be destroyed thereby.

Dante Alighieri (1265–1321), The Divine Comedy, Paradiso, XX:55-60 [Charles S. Singleton, Princeton, Bollingen, 1975, pp.224-225, translation modified], speaking of Constantine in the Heaven of Jupiter and of the "Donation of Constantine" (Constitutum Donatio Constantini) to the Pope -- a document later exposed (1440) by Lorenzo Valla (c.1407-1457) as a forgery, since its language was Mediaeval Latin, not that of Constantine's 4th century. It had previously been exposed by Macarius, Metropolitan of Ancyra (1397–1405), whose anti-Latin polemics, however, were not known in the West.

---

Ῥώμη παμβασίλεια, τὸ σὸν κλέος ὄυποτ᾽ ὀλεῖται·
Νίκη γάρ σε φυγεῖν ἄπτερος οὐ δύναται.

Rome, queen of the world, thy fame shall never perish,
for Victory, being wingless, cannot fly from thee.

Anonymous, "On [New] Rome," [The Greek Anthology, Volume III, Book 9, "The Declamatory Epigrams," Number 647, The Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, 1917, p.358-359]

The "Second Empire" is a period of transformation whose beginning and end seem worlds apart. Even at the beginning, however, Classicists find themselves becoming uncomfortable, in large part because they are now rubbing shoulders with Byzantinists, Mediaevalists, and, worse, historians of religion and, gasp, even of the Church. In the Middle Ages, this was regarded as a triumphant period, when the Roman Empire was redeemed and ennobled with its conversion to and transformation by Christianity -- becoming a "Romania" whose name is now not even familiar as the name of the Roman Empire.

In Modern thought, this construction tends to be reversed, with the superstition and dogmatism of Christianity dragging the Classical World down into the Dark Ages. At the same time, however, there is still a strong attraction to the idea of blaming the collapse of the Empire on the characteristics of pagan Roman society -- slavery, the Games, sexual license, corruption, etc. Since this is more or less the Christian critique of pagan society, we have the curious case of critics maintaining the perspective of Christian moralism even while rejecting Christianity as the appropriate response.

This not entirely coherent approach also results in the doublethink of moral satisfaction with the "fall" of the (Western) Empire in 476 while carefully ignoring the survival and resurgence of the Empire in the East. The truth, as it happens, is one of continuity. The very same institutions, both Roman and Christian in sum and detail, that failed in the West in the face of the German threat, did just fine in the East, long outlasting, and in two dramatic cases defeating, the German successor kingdoms. Nevertheless, these were hard times, and worse lay ahead. What neither Trajan nor Constantine nor Justinian could have anticipated were the blows that would fall next.

The confusion about his period means it is a kind of Rorschach test of historical biases. If the "Roman Empire" fell in 476, who were these people running around afterwards calling themselves "Romans"? Where did they get that? Can't somebody shut them up? Well, it is a little late for that. At least we know that what came afterwards was this ugly and stupid thing, "Byzantium," that no one takes seriously. Indeed, there are writers with published books who don't even remember that it existed.

Or the whole business can be reconceived. The Later Roman Empire, 284-602 by A.H.M. Jones [The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986] encompasses all of the "Second Empire" in this treatment, minus Phocas. Peter Brown treated the same period as something like a distinct civilization in The World of Late Antiquity, 150-750 [HBJ, 1971], expanding the boundaries a bit. Classicists didn't like most of that period anyway, but some Byzantinists felt like some centuries were being stolen from them. But the insult was more to Classicists than it was to Byzantanists. The latter were not the ones who often reduced the 4th century to a few pages in their books, stumbling in their haste to be done with it.

Of course, if we still end Ancient History in 476, this at least introduces a kind of speed bump into the period. But if the Goths began the Fall of the West at Adrianople, it is a little difficult not to finish the story with Justinian wiping out the Ostrogoths, and then the Arabs the Visigoths. So, the Goths appearing in history and then later disappearing looks like a good unified story. That the end of the Ostrogoths meant the recovery of Rome by the Romans sounds like a worthy story in its own right. It rarely gets told from beginning to end, with the pieces traditionally held in the hands of different scholars, in different disciplines. They might not even be in the same academic departments. From the Olympian heights of Classics, Classicists may deign to notice Adrianople, perhaps with contempt. But the name of Belisarius may go unheard among them, unless they watch the TV show NCIS. "Who is that guy?" they might say, noticing the producer's vanity card. But "Belisarius Productions" would have a special meaning for the Vandals and Ostrogoths.

Rome and Romania Index

A. "DOMINATE," 284-379, 95 years

1. TETRARCHS
Diocletian C. Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus	Augustus 284-305, 286-305 East	retired 305, died 311 or 313
Vincenalia, 20 year Jubilee, in Rome, only visit to City, seats at Circus collapse, 13,000 killed, populace hostile, 303
Maximian M. Aurelius Valerius Maximianus	Augustus 286-305 West	Usurper 306-308, 310 West
Constantius I Chlorus Fl. Valerius Constantius	Caesar 293-305 West	Augustus 305-306 West
Galerius C. Galerius Valerius Maximianus	Caesar 293-305 East	Augustus 305-311 East
Maximinus II Daia Galerius Valerius Maximinus	Caesar 305-309 East	Augustus 309-313 East
Severus Fl. Valerius Severus	Caesar 305-306 West	Augustus 306-307 West
St. Constantine I the Great Fl. Valerius Constantinus	Caesar 306-307 West, 308-309 West	Augustus 307-308 West, 309-337 West, 324-337 East
[Maxentius M. Aurelius Valerius Maxentius]	Usurper 306-312, Italy
Conference at Carnuntum, Diocletian offered Throne, declines, appointment of Licinius, 308
Licinius Valerius Licinianus Licinius	Augustus 308-324 East
[Domitius Alexander]	Usurper 308-311, Africa

Intrinsically one of the most interesting and important periods in Roman history, the Tetrarchy unfortunately suffers from the relative poverty of the sources we have for it. Despite the rich literature of the 4th century, Diocletian never got a Tacitus or Suetonius, and what Ammianus Marcellinus may have said about him is now lost.

Part of this may be because history moved so quickly after Diocletian. He could still have been alive when Constantine legalized Christianity, and it was, of course, Constantine whom subsequent Christian writers wanted to glorify. But Diocletian created a system that was the closest to a constitutional order than Rome ever had. Its enemy was hereditary succession, which had triumphed in Constantine, if imperfectly, by the end of the period. So here, not just in religion, we have a turning point.

The succession by appointment, adoption, or marriage of the Antonines is now seen for very nearly the last time. The complexity of this, and of events, can be seen, not just in the following genealogy, but in the Chart of the Tetrarchy.

As the first Emperor with a very clearly Greek name -- Διοκλῆς, Dioclēs, before being Latinized to Diocletianus (although we shouldn't forget the Greek name of Philip the Arab and his son) -- Diocletian foreshadows the later Greek character of the Empire. It is also from this point that the status of the Emperor is elevated far beyond that of a mere official to a being with semi-divine status, altering the form of government from the "Principate" to "Dominate," from Dominus, "Lord." The Roman Court now begins to adopt the structures and ritual of the Persian Court, where the Great King has always been semi-divine.

The symbolic accouterments of the Emperor, like the Purple (Porphyrius) robe and red shoes, become fixed until the Fall of Constantinople. The fiction that the Emperor is actually a kind of Republican official is now gone -- although the ultimate executive offices of the Republic, the Consulates, survive until Justinian. The Emperor is a Monarch in form and substance. This elevation was simply transformed, not rolled back or abolished, by the Christianization of the office. Yet, although Emperors always aimed for hereditary succession, that was never formally recognized in Roman law.

In a sense, Emperors were elected, and they were only legitimized by acclamation, ἀκτολογία, aktología, or εὐφημία, euphemía (cf. "euphemism"), either by the People or by the functional equivalent, the Army. This was the only formal basis of legitimacy, and it could be, and was, often withdrawn.

Christian Emperors, beginning with Constantine, would always be portrayed with halos, like saints, and were called the "Equal to the Apostles." This might help secure the status of an Emperor; but, from the frequency of rebellion or popular revolt, its effectiveness seems to have been limited. Sufficiently provoked, the people of Constantinople could express the oppositite of acclamation, namely disapprobation, δυσφημία, dysphemía, and condemn an Emperor as ἀνάξιος, anáxios, "unworthy!"

The frequency with which Emperors were deposed, or new dynasties enthroned, was in stark contrast to Western Europe, where popular revolt deposed no rulers until Modern times, and dynastic succession might continue for centuries. Modern historians and political philosophers have been of two minds about this. If the people of Constantinople were simply a wild mob, then Roman politics were chaotic and anarchic. But these have often been the same pundits with no love for absolute monarchy, who then turn around and condemn Mediaeval Constantinople for featuring a particularly irresponsible form of absolute monarchy. They need to get their story straight. We must say that an aroused populace whose battle cry is ἀνάξιος certainly has the right idea. Modern voters express this sentiment far too infrequently, despite frequent evidence of corrupt and mendacious politicians.

European monarchs never went so far as to adopt the iconography or ideology of saints. It doesn't look like they even needed to. On the other hand, the Popes did. They later began wearing the red shoes of the Emperors, commensurate with inflated claims of Papal authority, not just in spiritual matters, but over secular power also. That didn't work out very well for them,

Diocletian and the Tetrarchs, Corner of St. Mark's Cathedral, Venice, 2019; odd foot remained in Constantinople, found in situ

and recent Popes have actually been dispensing with the red shoes. They have not, however, renounced the level of authority that they usurped from Church Councils. Under Canon Law, the Popes are still absolute monarchs.

At right is an extraordinary group in porphyry of the Tetrarchs. This was looted from Constantinople in 1204 and placed at a corner of St. Mark's Cathedral in Venice. Its origin was subsequently forgotten, and Peter Brown says it "was long mistaken for Christian crusaders, and even worshipped as statues of St. George!" [The World of Late Antiquity 150-750, HBJ, 1971, p.22].

Where the statues came from was recently proven when the foot that is obviously missing from the figure on the right was discovered in situ in İstanbul, before the Bodrum Camii (Jami-i, "its mosque"), previously the Myrelaion Church, Ἐκκλησία τοῦ Μυρελαίου, in the original Philadelphion, Φιλαδέλφιον, Square [cf. Constantine, Roman Emperor, Christian Victor, by Paul Stephenson, The Overlook Press, New York, 2010, p.199]. The "Brotherly Love" probably refers to the relationship of the Tetrarchs, but there is also a tradition that there was a statue commemorating the rule of the three sons of Constantine I, with the idea that they had a reunion here, which they didn't. There is a nice touch in the portrayals, that the Augusti have beards but the Caesares do not.

In 305 Diocletian actually retired from office, going to live at his retirement villa (more like city) at Spalatum (Greek Ἀσπάλαθος, Croatian Split, or Spljet) near Salonae (Greek Σαλώνα, Croatian Solin) in Dalmatia (now Croatia) -- see J.J. Wilkes, Diocletian's Palace, Split:  Residence of a Retired Roman Emperor [Oxbow Books, Oxford, 1986, 1993]. This may have been at the urging of Galerius, who was eager for full power, and was taken with ill grace by Maximian, who tried to return to power twice and was finally killed (by Constantine).

Diocletian's joy at his retirement, and the famous celebration of his cabbages, I discuss elsewhere as a paradigm of Epicureanism. Although Constantius Chlorus became the senior Augustus, both of the new Caesares are appointed by Galerius from among his own supporters. This was improper and involved passing over the competent sons of Constantius and Maximian (Constantine and Maxentius), apparently because Galerius didn't like either of them. It is hard to know why Constantius consented to these proceedings, and they proved to be the source of fatal conflict in the Tetrarchy.

As it happened, Constantius died, and Constantine was presented by his troops as an Emperor fait accompli. Maxentius then revolted, dragged his father into it, and then at least co-opted Constantine to this development. By 308, Severus had been captured and killed moving against Maxentius, and Galerius had also failed to unseat him.

Galerius then called a conference at Carnuntum on the Danube in Upper (Superior) Pannonia, just down the river from Vindobona, modern Vienna (Wien) -- where, we have seen, Marcus Aurelius died. This is close to the border with Slovakia, where we immediately find Bratislava, the capital.

Carnuntum is now the Römerstadt "Archaeological Park Carnuntum." Vienna has an archaeological museum, with foundations of the Roman military camp exposed in the basement. At Carnuntum, this kind of thing is now the whole site, with some reconstructed buildings.

Diocletian was invited to the meeting was even offered the throne, but he declined it -- saying he would rather grow vegetables -- specifically his cabbages. This extraordinary forbearance on the part of Diocletian, especially his obvious determination to "cultivate his garden," ought to have made him a saint to Epicureans, especially later, modern ones. Curiously, it did not. Thus, Diocletian seems to have the approval of neither Christians nor non-Christians. Possibly, secularists dislike him for the forms of the Dominate that prepared the way for the later Christian Monarchy. No historian, ancient or modern, has found in Diocletian a particular hero. His job in restructuring the Empire would be overshadowed by Constantine; and anyone hostile to Constantine's Christianity might find the authoritarianism and price fixing of Diocletian off-putting.

The result of the conference was the demotion of Constantine to Caesar (again), the appointment of Licinius as Augustus, the second retirement of Maximian, and the condemnation of Maxentius as an outlaw. The appointment of Licinius, who had never been a Caesar, was again an improper proceeding and reflected the custom of Galerius to use his own supporters, despite the implicit rules governing succession in the Tetrarchy. Constantine and Maximinus Daia were soon calling themselves Augusti anyway, and so the Tetarchy became a system of four equals, with Galerius preserving some precedence until his death.

A noteworthy act at the conference at Carnuntum was the dedication of an altar to the god Mithras, as the fautor imperii, "protector of the Empire."

Foundation of a Mithraeum, City of London, reconstructed on Queen Victoria Street, 2005; after 2010, the Mithaeum was restored to its original site on Walbrook, in a basement exhibition space of the Bloomberg European headquarters, seven meters below the modern street level, joined to remains left from the original 1954 discovery and excavation.

Mithraism considered Mithras to be a sun god, associated and assimilated with Sol Invictus, the "Unconquered Sun," whose cult existed independently of Mithras and had been promoted since Aurelian.

Mithraism, although popular in the Army (only men were initiated), was not an Imperial or prestige cult, until this dedication, Deo Soli Invicto Mithrae, "to the god Mithras the Unconquered Sun." We might see this as one of the last acts in the development of state paganism, before Constantine becomes a patron of Christianity and gods like Mithras disappear.

Licinius was the presumptive Augustus of the West, but he never moved toward Italy or made any attempt to overthrow Maxentius. This was left for Constantine.

Meanwhile, Maxentius had whipped up enthusiasm at Rome with the promise that, after a century, he would return the seat of Government there and would restore the withering Praetorian Guard to its status and privileges as the Life Guard of the Emperor. Enthusiasm faded, however, as Maxentius' status as a rebel isolated Italy and compelled him to raise taxes -- the City had treasured, as we might imagine, its tax exempt status. So Constantine was not unwelcome when Maxentius was defeated and killed.

Constantine did, indeed, pay a bit more attention to Rome than the previous Tetrarchs; but then it would be Constantine (after Licinius had killed Maximinus Daia, and Constantine Licinius) who would found an entirely new Capital for the Empire at Constantinople. After 312, Constantine would never return to Rome, and the City itself itself would never be restored to its previous position. Italy would continue to be ruled, as under Maximian, from Milan (and then Ravenna) [note].

One of the most famous aspects of Diocletian's rule is the infamous "Edict on Maximum Prices" of 301 AD, which fixed prices of many basic commodities. Since Diocletian himself explains the law as needed to prevent some from profiteering off of the basic needs of others, this is turns out to be relevant to many modern debates. The "greed" of those who make a profit while prices rise is still a point of useful political appeal for many politicians and leftist activists -- who never understand that fixing prices below a market clearing price always results in shortages of the commodity -- as with the lines at gas stations under Jimmy Carter. It looks, however, like prices, especially agricultural prices, were rising under Diocletian because the tax burden had become so large that many people simply abandoned their farms -- Diocletian also tried forbidding this.

Since Diocletian himself was not a sympathetic person to Christian writers, the charge of "greed" tends to get turned around, as the contemporary writer Lactantius, appointed by Diocletian himself as a professor of Latin literature in Nicomedia, the capital, says, "...Diocletian with his insatiable greed..." Lactantius' account of bureaucratic excess and behavior could apply in many modern situations:

The number of recipients began to exceed the number of contributors by so much that, with farmers' resources exhausted by the enormous size of the requisitions, fields became deserted and cultivated land was turned into forest. To ensure that terror was universal, provinces too were cut into fragments; many governors and even more officials were imposed on individual regions, almost on individual cities, and to these were added numerous accountants, controllers and prefects' deputies. The activities of all these people were very rarely civil... [J.J. Wilkes, Diocletian's Palace, Split:  Residence of a Retired Roman Emperor, op. cit., p.5]

Not only now are there whole countries where the dependent classes exceed the numbers of the productive classes (e.g. Italy or France), but in the United States the fate of the Social Security system will probably be sealed when the number of beneficiaries exceeds the number of contributors.

These modern systems, although voted in by popular majorities who like "free lunch" welfare politics, are run by bureaucrats whose behavior, of course, is "very rarely civil" either to contributors or beneficiaries. And modern bureaucrats are protected from accountability by "Civil Service" status and their own politically active and powerful public employee labor unions.

While much public comment focuses on the attitudes of the United States Postal Service, I have generally found post office employees friendly and helpful. On the other hand, I have found the Social Security Administration unfriendly to hostile. Their offices look like some banks, with armed guards and agents behind thick glass, as though they are handing out money (which they aren't), but with waiting times much longer than at banks, while the agents themselves, in my experience, have been rude, unfriendly, and unhelpful, gleefully enforcing irrational, Catch 22-like regulations -- in Canada now, at least they offer assisted suicide. These are the "benefits" we gain from a lifetime of involuntary "contributions."

Yet politicians rarely characterize or criticize government agents and employees for their own self-interest or greed, although this phenomenon is now well understood and described in Public Choice economics. While the behavior of the bureaucrats is understandable, the harshest truth is that, with sovereignty no longer invested in a autocrat like Diocletian, the ultimate "greed" today is derived from the voters -- who sell their birthright for a "mess of pottage" -- נְזִיד עֲדָשִׁים, ἕψεμα φακοῦ, lentis edūliō [Genesis 25:34].

The map reflects some recent developments in scholarship. Previously, the Goths were regarded as already divided into the Visigoths and Ostrogoths, with the Ostrogoths developing an "empire" that was thought to have stretched all the way back to the Baltic Sea. This culminated under King Ermanaric (i.e. "King [riks] Herman," where "Herman" itself is from [h]er[i], "army," and man, "man"), who committed suicide when defeated and subjugated by the Huns around 370.

Now it looks like, for all their divisions, the Goths were not divided, or identified, in the terms that later became familiar for the Kingdoms in Spain and Italy. Ermanaric was King of the Greuthungi, and it is unlikely that he ruled a domain that stretched to the Baltic. Indeed, it doesn't even look like it even reached the Don in the east. The Goths who were granted asylum on Roman territory in 376 were the Tervingi, led by Alavivus and Fritigern. After their revolt, however, the Greuthungi joined the Tervingi. With some other Gothic groups, these all became the Visigoths.

The Ostrogoths developed later, around a core led by the Amal dynasty. These changes in view are now recently explained by Peter Heather in The Fall of the Roman Empire [Oxford, 2006]. Although the Huns subjugated all the Goths but the Visigoths, the Goths nevertheless exercised considerable cultural influence on them. Thus, we find Attila with a Gothic name, "Little Father." But while atta was the Gothic word for "father," it is curious that ata is still the Turkish word for "father." Indeed, adda was Sumerian for "father."

Winfred P. Lehmann explains these correspondences as a coincidence of "nursery words": "No need to assume borrowing in spite of earlier attestations, such as Hitt[ite] attas, which Puhvel [Hittite etymological dictionary, 1984] derives 'from infantile language'" [A Gothic Etymological Dictionary, E.J. Brill, Leiden, 1986, p.46]. This strikes me as totally speculative and more than a bit unsatisfactory, though perhaps no more than the alternative:  that this is another fragment of evidence for a connection between Indo-European and Altaic languages, and Sumerian.

2. CONSTANTIANS
Constantius I Chlorus Fl. Valerius Constantius	293-306 W
St. Constantine I the Great Fl. Valerius Constantinus	306-337 W+E
Christianity legalized, Edict of Milan, 313; Council of Arles, Donatists condemned, 314; Ecumenical Council I, Nicaea I, Nicene Creed, 325; Vicennalia, 20 year Jubilee, at Rome, Crispus & Flavia executed, 326; Constantinople, Roma Nova, founded, construction begun, 4 November 328; Constantinople dedicated, 11 May 330; Ulfilas consecrated Bishop to the Goths, 336
Constantine II Fl. Claudius Contantinus	337-340 W
Constans I Fl. Julius Constans	337-350 W
[Magnentius Fl. Magnus Magnentius]	350-353 W
Constantius II Fl. Julius Constantius	337-361 E+W
Altar of Victory removed from Roman Senate, 357; Amida on the Tigris falls to Persians, 359
Gallus Fl. Claudius Constantius Gallus	351-354 E, Caesar
Julian the Apostate Fl. Claudius Julianus	355-360 W, Caesar; 360-363, Augustus
Last Pagan Emperor; Restores Altar of Victory to Roman Senate; killed while invading Persia, 363
non-dynastic
Jovian Fl. Jovianus	363-364

If the Tetrarchy was a major turning point in Roman history, with Constantine we are right around the corner and looking down a very different avenue of time. Here is where the die-hard paganophile Romanists check out, and where the Byzantinists check in. But the changes that take place are mostly, as they had been for some time, gradual.

Even Constantine's Christianity was a gradual affair. He did not actually convert until on his deathbed; and although he outlawed pagan sacrifice, he did not close the temples or otherwise show disrespect or hostility to the old gods, and in fact seems to have long still invoked Sol Invictus, the "Unconquered Sun" of Aurelian and Diocletian. He may have imagined a sort of syncretism such as had been common in the old religions but that was not going to be tolerated in Christianity -- indeed, an element of syncretism remains in the name of the Holy Day of the week for Christianity, "Sunday," which Constantine himself called "the day celebrated by veneration of the sun itself" (diem solis veneratione sui celebrem).

Even if Constantine banned blood sacrifice (it is not clear that he did, but is often said to have), this reformed a practice of worship whose critique went back at least to Heraclitus, who marveled how spilled blood, otherwise polluting, could be thought clean and sacred.

When Constantinople was built, the old acropolis was left alone. Indeed, it may have been left alone for much of the Middle Ages -- I am only aware of a couple of Mediaeval institutions in the area. One was the Church and Monastery of St. George of Mangana, which had a hospital attached. Another was a complex built by Alexius Comnenus with an orphanage and a home for old soldiers, the blind, and other disabled persons. It sounds like there was room for Alexius to build these institutions.

It is now hard to tell what may have been on the acropolis all that time because the site was finally put to a new use by the Ottomans, who built the great Topkapı Palace there. It is certainly the right place for such a building, and so one is a little surprised to learn that no secular building, as far as we know, was put there all the years of Romania.

In the Eighth century there is a reference to the Kynegion, Κυνήγιον, an arena that survived from earlier Roman animal fighting shows. The comment in the Brief Historical Notes is that the ancient pagan statues in the arena still contain dangerous powers. A statue is supposed to have deliberately fallen on and killed a man named Himerios in the reign of Philippicus Bardanes [cf. Judith Herrin, Byzantium, The Surprising Life of a Medieval Empire, Princeton & Oxford, 2007, p.123]. The astonishing thing is that any such statues should still have been there almost four hundred years after Constantine.

In the same way, a statue of Athena is supposed to have still been standing on the acropolis when the Fourth Crusade arrived in 1203. Remarkably, this may have been the bronze statute of Athena Promachus, Ἀθηνᾶ/Ἀθήνη Πρόμαχος, which had stood in the open on the Acropolis at Athens, reportedly visible from out to sea, and was moved to the new city by Constantine.

Mosaic Floor, Great Palace, Constantinople; Eagle fighting with snake, as said to have been witnessed by Constantine at the founding of the City -- reminiscent of the legend of the Aztec arrival in the Valley of Mexico

Anthony Kaldellis denies this, but without explanation [The Christian Parthenon, Cambridge, 2009, p.106]. Other accounts are that the statue, about 30 feet tall, had been placed, not on the acropolis, but in the Forum of Constantine, with many other statues that we know of [Bettany Hughes, Istanbul, A Tale of Three Cities, Da Capo Press, 2017, p.163]. I have had trouble finding the primary sources for these conflicting accounts.

The conflicts continue about the fate of the statue. On one account, with the statue on the acropolis, it was finally only thrown down because some thought that, from its visible position, Athena by her outstretched hand was beckoning to the Crusaders. For the version with the Forum of Constantine, there is also more than one version. Again, we hear (from Bettany Hughes) that the statue seemed to be welcoming the Crusaders and was torn down by Constantinopolitan citizens. However, a statue in the Forum would not have been visible to Crusaders unless they were already in the City. Alternatively, it is supposed to have been vandalized by the Crusaders themselves, apparently after the restoration of Isaac II in 1203 but before his overthrow and the seizure and looting of the City. Why and how supposedly drunken Crusaders could go after anything of the sort is more than a bit mysterious, and unlikely; but on such an occasion, at least the statue would be visible to Crusaders already in the City.

Χριστιανοὶ γεγαῶτες Ὀλύμπια δώματ᾽ ἔχοντες ἐνθάδε ναιετάουσιν ἀπήμονες· οὐδὲ γὰρ αὐτοὺς χώνη φόλλιν ἄγουσα φερέσβιον ἐν πυρὶ θήσει.

Having become Christians, the inhabitants of Olympus live here undisturbed; for here they shall not be put on the fire in the melting-pot that produces necessary small change.

Palladas of Alexandria, Παλλαδᾶς ὁ Ἀλεξανδρεύς, The Greek Anthology, Volume III, Book IX, Epigram 528, translated by W.R. Paton, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard Univesity Press, 1917, p.223; translation modified; about statuary in "the House of Marina," but applicable to all the statuary in Constantinople; for small coinage, see here.

The impression is of much other Classical statuary in Constantinople. This is confirmed in a remarkable text, the Patria of Constantinople, according to Hesychios Illoustrios, from the 10th century, which details much in the way of the buildings, statues, and lore of Constantinople [Accounts of Medieval Constantinople, the Patria, translated by Albrecht Berger, Dumbarton Oaks, Harvard, 2013]. We learn from the Patria that a statue of Hera stood in the Forum of Constantine [p.51], and this is confirmed quite by accident. The matter comes up because the Latin Emperors pulled it down to melt it for the bronze. The source of our information, the contemporary historian Niketas Choniates, Νικήτας Χωνιάτης (c.1155-1217), who consequently called the Franks "these barbarians, haters of the beautiful." But they were just desperate for money, and they treated much other art the same way, even looting the metal roofs from many buildings.

Unfortunately, when the Emperor Constans II had visited Rome in 663, also needing money, he stripped the bronze roof and ornaments from the Pantheon and other buildings, unintentionally creating the precedent for the Crusaders! But it turns out that Constans didn't take all the bronze from the Pantheon. Later, looking for bronze to make the altar canopy, the baldacchino, for St. Peter's Basilica, the great sculptor Gian Lorzenzo Bernini was given permission by Pope Urban VIII to "strip the ancient bronze cladding from the portico" of the Pantheon [Robert Hughes, Rome, A Cultural, Visual, and Personal History, Vintage, 2012, p.285]. So Constans had left some.

Earlier, we get a similar revealing reference. Arethas of Patras, Archbishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia in the late 9th century (d.c.932), noted in the margin of his copy of the orations of Aristides (which we possess) that an ivory statue of Athena, mentioned by Aristides, must be the one still standing in the Forum of Constantine (like the statue of Hera) by the entrance to the Senate [cf. the Patria, p.51]. This reference both confirms the existence of an Athena in the Forum but also means that it cannot have been Athena Promachus, which was bronze, not ivory. Arethas adds that across the Forum from this statue is one of Thetis, with crabs decorating her hair [N.G. Wilson, Scholars of Byzantium, Duckworth, 1983, 1996, p.124 -- there is no reference to Thetis in the Patria]. We have no clue about the subsequent fate of most of these statues.

Even the beginning of Constantine's attachment to Christianity is obscure. The story that he saw a vision of the Cross in the sky with the inscription In Hōc Vinces ("By this [sign, signō] Conquer" -- Greek ἐν τούτῳ νίκα) before (or during) the battle of the Milvian Bridge, when he defeated Maxentius in 312, comes very much later in hagiography (in the biography by Eusebius). The earliest mention of anything of the sort, by Lactantius again, is that Constantine had a dream where he was shown the "cypher of Christ," the Greek letters Chi and Rho, which he caused to be put on the shields of his soldiers. Later versions thus increase the dramatic and miraculous elements of the event, using what later would become the most symbolic of Christianity, the Cross. Using a Christian symbol in any form, however, and for any reason, would have been dramatic enough.

What Constantine was like as a person and what his motives were in favoring Christianity is now a matter influenced more by modern debates than by the historical record.

The Arch of Constantine, Forum Romanum, Rome, 2019

In this, the evaluation of Constantine is much like that of the Egyptian "heretic" King Akhenaton, about whose real personality there is little historical information. Was Akhenaton a mystical dreamer? A fanatic? An earnest reformer? A cynical manipulator? Similar questions can be asked about Constantine.

Especially noteworthy are projections of Protestant anticlericalism back onto Akhenaton (good -- attacking the power of the priests of Amon) or Constantine (bad -- creating the power of Catholic priesthood!). Less strictly Protestant, but its ideological successor, is the New Age naturalism and rationalism that favors the Gnostics as true and proper Christians and views Constantine as an oppressor who built his oppressive patriarchal, supernaturalistic, and clericalist ideology into the structure of the Catholic Church. This leads off into farcical conspiracy theories such as we see in The Da Vinci Code [2003], where little effort is expended on historical accuracy.

In general, Mediaeval and Modern evaluations of Constantine are going to be broadly different. In the Middle Ages, Constantine, the initial great protector and patron of Christianity, was seen as one of the best of rulers, noble, good, wise, and pious. That he was made a Saint in the Eastern Church but not in the Western may have been due to a few too many murders in his resumé (his son Crispus, his wife Fausta, and his brother-in-law and co-ruler Licinius, who had been granted protection after his surrender) -- or to Papal disinclination to honor the founder of Constantinople, the seat of the Pope's Patriarchal rival.

Devotional image for the Feast of Sts. Constantine and Helena, Equal to the Apostles, May 21st; Mediaeval dress.

Nevertheless, we find Dante placing Constantine in favored glory in Heaven (The Divine Comedy, Paradiso, XX:55-60). His main complaint was that Constantine had made the Pope ruler of the Western Empire -- according to the fraudulent "Donation of Constantine " (Constitutum Donatio Constantini), a text used by the Papacy to bolster its claims to secular authority until exposed (1440) by Lorenzo Valla (c.1407-1457) as a forgery. Modern evaluations, in turn, may reflect the noted Protestant hostility towards the Catholic Church or the rationalistic critique of religion, and especially of its supernatural aspects, dating from the Enlightenment. Now it is just Nihilism.

The modern perspectives provided little reason to view Constantine either with admiration or even compacency, with the potential for real hostility to emerge. Thus, a recent British television series on Roman history dramatized Constantine in terms borrowed from the Godfather movies [1972, 1974, 1990]. As we see Constantine piously reading to the Ecumenical Council at Nicaea the new Creed (the Nicene) formulated there -- which he could not have done, since the Creed was in Greek, and Constantine only spoke Latin -- his men are off, in the best tradition of the Corleones, murdering Licinius (as they later would Licinius' young son, Constantine's own nephew). This seems to involve the judgment that Constantine was essentially a gangster, to whom religion was really no more than a cynical device in power politics.

Licinius; Ephesos Museum, Vienna

But before we get all weepy about Licinius, we should remember that in a bit of housecleaning he had murdered not only the wife, eight-year-old son, and seven-year-old daughter of Maximinus Daia, but also the widow, Prisca, of Diocletian, Valeria, the daughter of Diocletian and widow of Galerius (who, on his deathbed, had entrusted his old friend Licinius with her protection), her adopted son, and, just to be sure, the son of the hapless and probably otherwise forgotten Caesar and Augustus Severus.

If Constantine executed this man, we might not exactly want to congratulate him, but we certainly cannot see Constantine's behavior as any worse. If Constantine was at all like the Corleones, this is no more than the way the Tetarchy worked, as least in its final stages. Right from the beginning, however, when Constantine, inspired by Christianity, finds success in battle, the principle has more to do with the ideology of Sol Invictus, who presides over military victory, than with the particular non-violent teachings of the "Prince of Peace." This might not strike many as very good Christianity, but Constantine can hardly be expected to be drawn to Christianity for its pacifism; and it also true that Christianity never made pacifists or quietists of Christian rulers. Whether St. Louis or Abraham Lincoln, Christian rulers would always hope, like Joshua, for God's help in war.

Unlike Akhenaton we do have extensive contemporary comment about Constantine, as well as letters and decrees from his own hand. According to Diana Bowder [Who Was Who in the Roman World, Washington Square Press, 1980]:

Hot-tempered and generous, a man of action impatient with theological niceties or outraged by some flagrant example of oppression, superstitious like all his contemporaries but endowed with a grandiose sense of being God's vice-regent on earth, the founder of the Christian Empire is for us a vivid personality... A strong and effective ruler and reformer, he shares with Diocletian the main credit for the very existence of the later Roman Empire, and the long years of stable government in his reign made possible a genuine renaissance of civilian life and the fine arts. [pp.141-142]

Of course, his foundation of Constantinople made possible, not only the very existence of the later Roman Empire, but the survival of Romania there right through the Middle Ages, until 1453. Various details are noteworthy, such as the introduction of the gold solidus (called in the West the bezant), a coin that became the "dollar of the Middle Ages" and survived undebased from the year 310 until at least 1034 -- 724 years. This compares favorably with the durability of other historical coinage. The British Pound Sterling was fixed at 113 grains of pure gold from 1717 to 1931 -- 214 years. So Constantine's coin beats it in duration by 510 years. Not bad.

This is a tribute, of course, not so much to Constantine, but to the conscientiousness of his successors -- and to Constantine himself to the extent that he substantially founded their regime. With Constantine's personality, it seems of a piece with that of his fellow Tetrarchs, and the biggest mistake one could make is to construe it in terms of later theological controversies or with retrospecive ideals, whether Christian or rationalistic.

There is an interesting variation in the pronunciation in English of Constantine's name. British usage tends to render the "i" as the customary long English vowel "i" -- the equivalent of the word "eye" or the first person pronoun "I." We could represent this as the "Constanteyen" Constantine. American usage tends to use the "Continental" version of the vowel "i," i.e. as in French, Spanish, or Italian. We could represent this as the "Constanteen" Constantine.

Systems of Imperial Names
constō = "stand firm"	valeō = "be strong"	Maximus = "greatest"
Constans	Valens	*Maximens
Constantius	*Valentius	Maxentius
Constantinus, Constantine	Valentinus, St. Valentine	Maximinus, Maximin
*Constantinianus, *Constantinian	Valentinianus, Valentinian	Maximianus, Maximian
*forms that do not occur

Since in Latin "Constantine" is Constantinus (with all Continental vowels), we already have the French device of replacing the Latin case ending with a simple "e" which then becomes silent -- in contrast to the German version, Konstantin (and Russian Константин), where no final vowel is provided.

While there is obviously no "correct" English pronunciation in this respect, it does strike me as affected when Americans use the British pronunciation.

There is something else curious about Constantine's name. It is, as it happens, purely Latin in origin. The verb constō, "to stand firm... remain the same, unaltered," which gives us the English nouns "constant" and "constancy," underlies all the names of the dynasty:  Constantius, Constantinus, Constans. The latter is simply the active participle of the verb.

However, in Latin Europe, Francia, these names are only very rarely found -- except in variants, like "Constance," Constantia, for women, which may be used more as a virtue name ("Hope," "Prudence," etc.) than as a tribute to Constantine. In Orthodox countries, like România, Russia, and Modern Greece, "Constantine," Κωνσταντῖνος in Greek, is quite common. We tend to think of it as primarily a Greek, or even a Russian, name. To be sure, there were three Kings of Scotland named "Constantine," but this may have been based on the Gaelic element Conn, "chief," as in "Connor."

So why was "Constantine" in such disfavor as a given name in the West? Perhaps for the same reason that the Latin Church does not recognize Constantine as a Saint -- it represented a kind of challenge to the Papacy. Until the end of Romania, there were many Emperors still named Constantine in Constantinople (eventually eleven of them, and six Patriarchs of Constantinople --

Constantian Porphyry Sarcophagus, Vatican Museum, Rome, 2019

as well as two Patriarchs named "Constantius"), none of them happy to agree to claims of Papal supremacy and authority.

A Latin ("Roman Catholic") priest thus might not have favored the name of a child that might remind him, or anyone, of this conflict. There was only one Pope (708-715, and one anti-Pope, 767-768) named "Constantine," well before the age of exaggerated Papal claims. For the ruler who legitimized and institutionalized Christianity in the Roman Empire, the avoidance of his name should strike anyone as peculiar, if not petty and ungrateful. But, you know, that's politics.

Constantine's Empire went to his three sons, who might have shared it with their cousins, but killed most of them instead. The sons, however, ended up with no heirs themselves, and the last family member on the throne, Julian, was one of the cousins who had escaped the massacre. Julian, whose own writings have been preserved, is one of the better known but stranger figures of the century. Quixotically trying to restore paganism, he only seemed to demonstrate that the old gods were spent and nobody's heart was really in it anymore.

Although apparently a fine enough military commander against the Franks, Julian's short reign ended with another Quixotic effort, against Persia. It was not so much the war itself as the ill conceived scale of the invasion, which left Julian all but stranded with his army, deep in Mesopotamia, with the Persians avoiding battle but constantly harassing him. Somehow this had not happened to Alexander, Trajan, Heraclius, or the forces of the Caliph Omar. It cost Julian his life, and his religious cause, since the Christian Jovian was then chosen by the Army.

3. VALENTIANS
WEST				EAST
Valentinian I Fl. Valentinianus			364-375 W	Valens Fl. Valens	364-378 E
Gratian Fl. Gratianus	367-383 W	Commanders Magistri Militum		Procopius	365-366
Removes Altar of Victory from Roman Senate, 382		Merobaudes (a Frank)	375- 384 [384- 388]	great earthquakes in Galilee, 363, & in Crete, 365; defeats Goths, 369; defeated and killed by the Visigoths, Battle of Adrianople, attack on Constantinople, 378
Valentinian II Flavius Valentinianus	375-392 W			Theodosius I, the Great Fl. Theodosius	379-395 E
[Magnus Maximus, Macsen Wledig in Welsh]	383-388 Britain, Gaul
Revolt of Magnus Maximus, with Merobaudes, defeated by Theodosius I at Aquileia, 388
Valentinian II	again, 375-392 W	Bauto (a Frank)	384- 385/8
		Arbogast (a Frank)	385/8- 394
[Eugenius Fl. Eugenius]	392-394 W
Revolt by Arbogast with figurehead Eugenius; restores Altar of Victory to Roman Senate; defeated at Frigidus River, 394
394-395 W
Outlaws taking of auspices from entrails, 384; Closes pagan temples, including the Serapeum, the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, and the Temple of Vesta in Rome, 388-392; removes Altar of Victory from Roman Senate; divides Empire between Honorius & Arcadius

Jovian did not last long (apparently killed by carbon monoxide poisoning from a charcoal heater -- still a danger in the modern world), and the Army chose another Christian.

With Valentinian, and his brother Valens with whom he divided the Empire, the Christian nature of Romania was sealed. But the future seemed secure enough. Valentinian was vigorous and competent, even if his brother wasn't so much.

Unfortunately, Valentinian died, apparently of a heart attack (or perhaps a cerebral hemorrhage) in a fit of anger over the insolence of some representatives from the Huns, or some German tribe.

Since Adiranople is often remembered as hinging on the supposed superiority of German cavalry, which is a fiction, it is worth noting that Valens might well be said to have been defeated by wagons.

At this point I introduce a new icon, the "Downfall" (Untergang) icon for the three key battles that mark the most significant stages in the Decline of the Roman Empire. This is the Egyptian hieroglyph that is used for "fight" and related words. We see arms holding a shield and a mace. Here, the loss to the Goths at Adrianople opened the way for the ultimate collapse of the Western Empire. The Romans never totally defeated the Goths, who, nevertheless, often acted as allies, foederati, and sometimes came to the aid of the Roman Army. But they ended up independent in Spain, until overthrown by the Arabs.

The other two "Downfall" battles are Yarmūk, where the Arabs destroyed the defense of Syria and began the permanent occupation of Roman land, and Manzikert, where the Seljuk Turks destroyed the defense of Anatolia, leading to the demographic creation of Turkey as itself a land of the Turks, erasing the presence of its earlier inhabitants, including the Greeks, and applying a steady assault, including genocide, against the adjacent homeland of the Armenians.

The ultimate "Downfall," of course, was the Fall of Constantinople in 1453, but this was not a battle of apparently equal field armies, and its outcome was never really in doubt. It was the final and cumulative consequence of all the earlier defeats. By contrast, all three of the "Downfall" battles here quite easily could have gone the other way. Whether that would have really and substantially changed history, we can never know.

Gratian appointed Theodosius as the new Eastern Emperor to restore the situation (marrying him to his sister), which seems to have been about the most useful thing he accomplished, before his murder.

After Adrianople, the Goths appeared before Constantinople. This was the first time since the City was founded that a foreign invader approached its walls. This came to nothing, but there will be many such attacks, and serious sieges in the future. Thus, I begin using an icon for these attacks, the Egyptian hieroglyph for "wall" or "fortification." Beginning in 378, we can count 24 sieges of Constantinople. Some of these were part of rebellions and so did not involve foreign enemies. Two sieges led to the fall and the sacking of the City, first by the Fourth Crusade in 1204, and finally by the Ottoman Turks in 1453. A special icon is used for those to indicate what specifically happened.

Similarly, in the period we are approaching here, Rome is sacked on two, or three, historic occasions, first by the Visigoths in 410, then by the Vandals in 455. The third sack is when the Ostrogothic King Totila retakes the City in 546, after Belisarius had recovered it from the Ostrogoths in 536. Thus, for these events, a special "sack" icon is used. Subsequent sacks of Rome in the Middle Ages, like the attack of the Aghlabids in 846, are indicated under the treatment of the Papacy.

The Vandals didn't even need to put the City under siege. Coming up the Tiber, they just broke straight in.

"The Sack of Rome by the barbarians in 410," Le Sac de Rome par les barbares en 410, by Joseph-Noël Sylvestre (1847–1926), 1890; Musée Paul Valéry, Sète, France; an absurd fantasy of naked Visigoths pulling down statues, which is 21st century America, not 5th century Rome; title sometimes given as "par les Vandales," who didn't sack Rome until 455.

The entry of the Visigoths, however, although after a siege, followed a certain kind of negotiation, with Alaric presenting himself as Magister Militum under the puppet Emperor Priscus Attalus. It was not as ruthless a treatment as what the Vandals would administer, being, I suppose, vandals.

Although Rome endured sieges, changed hands five times, and suffered very rough treatment, in the course of being reclaimed from the Ostrogoths, it looks like there was only one real sack of the City as those events transpired. In 546, Totila considered actually demolishing the City, for which the silly painting at right would have been suitable. He did try to demolish the walls, but destroying the whole City probably would have been beyond the endurance and patience of the Ostrogoths, who were not used to manual labor. Looting was more their speed. Otherwise, the worst effect was probably just in loss of population, who mostly fled. When Totila recovered the City for the second time, in 549, he decided to make it his capital, for which the idea of carrying away loot didn't make much sense.

Meanwhile there was a fateful development in the governance of the West. When Valentinian died, Gratian had already been raised to the status of Augustus and clearly was the legitimate Emperor of the West. However, the Frankish Magister Militum Merobaudes raised Gratian's young brother Valentinian (II) to the Purple. There was no particular reason to repudiate this action, except that it was obviously a ploy by Merobaudes to create a puppet Emperor.

The success of this coup was a chilling precursor to the eventual Fall of the Western Empire, whose final Emperors became the futile playthings of Germanic commanders. Merobaudes confirmed his disloyal intentions at the death of Gratian, when he threw his support to the usurper Magnus Maximus. Theodosius defeated and killed both of them at Aquileia in 388. Valentinian II's own death drew Theodosius west (again) to put down the usurper Eugenius -- who, apparently for the first time now, was merely the hand-picked figurehead of the German Master of Soliders, Arbogast -- another death knell for the Western Empire.

At the Frigidus River in 394 Theodosius put his Visigothic allies, faithfully honoring their treaty with the Empire, in the forefront of the battle. The slaughter of the battle, on a scale with Waterloo or Gettysburg, soured the Visigoths, who may have lost 10,000 men themselves, on the value of their cooperation. They would soon become a loose cannon within the Empire, shattering essential supports of Roman power as the tribe rolled around.

Thus, things in the West went steadily down hill after Valentinian I, with a troubling weakness of the (Western) Throne in comparison to powerful Germanic soldiers. Although the Battle of Adrianople need not have fundamentally affected the strength of the Empire, it acquires great symbolic meaning in retrospect because of the more permanent damage subsequently done by the Visigoths and the profound weakening of the Empire that attended it. For the genealogy of the Valentinians, see that of the Theodosians below.

It is in the reign of Valentinian II that we find the classic De Re Militari of Flavius Vegetius Renatus, the most important study of military science for many centuries. This is often favorably compared to the Chinese strategist Sun Tzu, but Vegetius provides us with a much more thorough and discursive treatment.

Unlike Sun Tzu, however, Vegetius did not have the chance to direct armies himself, much less produce victories commensurate with the wisdom of his advice. He even seems unfamiliar with the use of some weapons, as though his actual military experience, of any sort, is limited. Nor does he give us a military historian's analysis of the battles of his era, which would have included the Battle of Adrianople. This is a grave loss to history and military science, especially as it allows false lessons to be drawn from Adrianople (as discussed above).

Renatus is particularly well remembered for two pieces of advice. One is succinctly stated in an aphorism:  Si vīs pacem, parā bellum, "If you wish for peace, prepare for war." If an enemy realizes that they might not do well against you, because you are prepared, then they will be relucant to start a war with you. The conventional wisdom among many, however, is that, if everyone is prepared for war, then a war is more likely. We might say this was born out with World War I, when an arms race did indeed lead to a great war.

However, in the aftermath, if the idea was to prevent wars like that from happening again, then a large body of opinion was that disarmament and arms limitation treaties were the things to do. Unfortunately, this put everyone at a disadvantage against Nazi Germany, which, largely disarmed after World War I, nevertheless was able to rapidly arm with parity in the 1930's, making World War II a desperate business, in which millions were killed. If Britain and France had not gotten sucked into disarmament in the 1920's, Hitler would have had no advantage.

The other piece of advice from Renatus we find him explaining:

THE FLIGHT OF AN ENEMY SHOULD NOT BE PREVENTED, BUT FACILITATED. Generals unskilled in war think a victory incomplete unless the enemy are so straightened in their ground or so entirely surrounded by numbers as to have no possibility of escape. But in such situations, where no hopes remain, fear itself will arm an enemy and despair inspires courage. When men find they must inevitably perish, they willingly resolve to die with their comrades and with their arms in their hands. The maxim of Scipio, that a golden bridge should be made for a flying enemy, has much been commended. For when they have free room to escape they think of nothing but how to save themselves by flight, and the confusion becoming general, great numbers are cut to pieces. The pursuers can be in no danger when the vanquished have thrown away their arms for greater haste. In this case the greater the number of the flying army, the greater the slaughter. [De Re Militari, Lieutenant John Clarke, Roots of Strategy, The 5 Greatest Military Classics of All Time, edited by Brig. Gen. Thomas R. Phillips, 1940, Stackpole Books, 1985, p.164, boldface added]

Sun Tzu gives identical advice: "[B]e sure to leave an opening for an army that is surrounded" [Victor H. Mair, The Art of the War, Sun Zi's Military Methods, Columbia University Press, 2007, p.104], or "When you surround an army leave an outlet free" [Lionel Giles, Roots of Strategy, The 5 Greatest Military Classics of All Time, op.cit.,p.40].

Sun Tzu does not explain why one should leave an opening. The effect of it, however, we can see in the Battle of the River Sajó (or Mohi), fought by the Mongols under the Khān Batu against King Bela IV of Hungary in 1241. After some Hungarian success, the Mongols surrounded the Hungarian camp. Leaving a gap in their encirclement, the Mongols tempted the Hungarians to flee, which they did, and could then be cut down on the run. Had the Mongols read Sun Tzu? Probably not. They certainly would not have read Scipio or Renatus.

The reference to Scipio's "golden bridge," however, has not always been understood in military history. Thus, the Marshal Maurice de Saxe of France (1696-1750) in his "My Reveries Upon the Art of War" says:

The words of the proverb: "A bridge of gold should be made for the enemy," is followed religiously. This is false. On the contrary, the pursuit should be pushed to the limit. And the retreat which had appeared such a satisfactory solution will be turned into a route [sic]. A detachment of ten thousand men can destroy an army of one hundred thousand in flight. Nothing inspires so much terror or occasions so much damage, for everything is lost. [Brig. Gen. Thomas R. Phillips, op.cit., p.299]

De Saxe apparently is thinking that the "bridge of gold" means that one should allow the enemy to escape. He cannot have recently read Vegetius if he believed such a thing. But he is clearly aware that a retreating enemy can well provide an opportunity for attack. He does not express, however, as Vegetius does, under what circumstances a retreating enemy can be fruitfully attacked.

We return to Sun Tzu again, who says, "Do not pursue an enemy who simulates flight" [Lionel Giles, op.cit., p.40]. An orderly retreat may be as difficult to attack as a resolute defense. Vegetius sees opportunity when the retreat of the enemy is a flight in panic, which can be induced by providing the "bridge of gold" to an army already demoralized, as at the River Sajó.

We must always guard, however, against deception by an enemy who wants us to think that they are fleeing in panic. This was how the Arabs often defeated their enemies; and we see the same tactic used decisively by the Turks at the Battle of Manzikert in 1071, delivering Anatolia to Turkish invasion and migration. The Turks gave way and appeared to flee, but then they turned on the pursuing Romans, who had become disorganized in their own enthusiasm. The Emperor Romanus suddenly understood his peril, but his orders then, at least, further confused his army, as we will see below.

This tactic came naturally to mounted armies of nomads, who were used to swift maneuvers on horseback. In more subtle fashion, Hannibal had given way before the Romans at Cannae, to lure them into a pocket, where they were slaughtered. On the other hand, while the Germans of Late Antiquity had become nomads, and the Goths had even come off the Steppe, they were not, despite the general impression, a mounted army; and the tactics at Adrianople, where a fortified camp helped decide the battle, did not resemble the tactics of Arabs, Turks, or Mongols.

Renatus thus stands as a valuable monument in military history. He was not the last military strategist in Mediaeval Romania, where personages no less than Emperors, beginning with Maurice, wrote books on strategy and tactics, none so significant as On Skirmishing in War by the Emperor Nicephorus Phocas, detailing how to defeat Arab raids into Anatolia.

A great earthquake on Crete in 365, which thrust up the coast some 20 feet, has recently become a matter of interest for modern geologists. An account of it by Ammianus Marcellinus includes what may be the first detailed description in Western history of the phenomenon of a tsunami, (津波, jīnbō):

...the solid frame of the earth shuddered and trembled, and the sea was moved from its bed and went rolling back. The abyss of the deep was laid open; various types of marine creatures could be seen stuck in the slime, and huge mountains and valleys which had been hidden since the creation in the depths of the waves then, one must suppose, saw the light of the sun for the first time. [Ammianus Marcellinus, The Later Roman Empire, (A.D.354-378), Penguin Classics, 1986, p.333]

Not realizing that the sea would come back, people wandered down to the revealed places. As the water "burst in fury" and surged up onto the land on its return, thousands were killed, towns were leveled, and "the whole face of the earth was changed" [ibid.]. As far away as Alexandria, the tidal wave tossed ships onto the tops of buildings; and Ammianus himself later inspected a decaying ship that had been carried inland ad secundum lapidem, "to the second milestone," near Mothone (or Methone) in the Peloponnesus.

Edward Gibbon, contemptuous of the Late Empire and its historian, and apparently never having heard of such phenomena, didn't believe Ammianus:

Such is the bad taste of Ammianus (xxvi.10), that it is not easy to distinguish his facts from his metaphors. Yet he positively affirms that he saw the rotten carcass of a ship, ad secundum lapidem, at Methone, or Modon, in Peloponnesus. [The Decline & Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume I, Modern Library, p.899].

While, we have no recorded tsunamis in the North Atlantic or North Sea, which might have attracted Gibbon's attention, they are not so rare elsewhere, however, that it is not in the living memory of many to have seen the seafloor bared or ships thrown about in just the manner described by Ammianus.

In the massive 1883 volcanic eruption of Karakatoa (Krakatoa, Krakatau) in Indonesia, the Dutch steamship Berouw was lifted by a tsunami from its harbor in Sumatra and swept inland 3.3 km, i.e. two miles (ad secundum lapidem), up the Koeripan River, where it was permanently deposited in the jungle, at an elevation of 30 feet.

Tsunamis of spectacular and deadly effect have occurred in recent memory in Indonesia, in 2004, and then in Japan in 2011 -- where, with live video from news helicopters, large ships were tossed some distance inland -- the 330 ton Kyotoku Maru No. 18, a tuna trawler, was swept 750 meters (half a mile) into a residential neighborhood, where otherwise the buildings were demolished. It remained there for two years, until residents of the city of Kesennuma voted to dismantle and remove it. The draw down of the ocean in 2011 was visible and photographed in Hawai'i and California.

The response of some people around the Indian Ocean in 2004 was to go out to collect the fish that were flopping around where the sea had left them stranded. In 2011, the Japanese knew to head to higher ground, if they could -- the official death toll is now neverthless 19,747 dead.

The earthquake of 365 also came hard on the heels of a massive earthquake in Galilee in 363, whose effects can still be seen in walls that were thrown down in Petra, which may have been abandoned about this time. Damage from the earthquakes of 363 and 365 would have overlapped in Anatolia and around the eastern Mediterranean. The modern historian might do well to consider how the death and destruction of these great earthquakes may have weakened the resources of the area on the crucial eve of the struggle with the Visigoths.

Rome and Romania Index

B. CRISIS OF THE FIFTH CENTURY, 379-476, 97 Years

The map shows the key incursions that would fatally undermine the Western Empire. After the death of Theodosius I, and the division of the Empire (for the last time) between Honorius in Milan (and then Ravenna, 402) and Arcadius in Constantinople, the Visigoths begin to roll around in the Balkans. This movement began to resemble the literal effects of a "lose cannon" to destroy the structure of the Roman Empire, revealing the failure of Theodosius to destroy, rather than temporarily coöpt, the tribe. He was manifestly unable to do so, which we must understand as revealing a fatal weakness of the Empire. The Visigoths would survive until the Islamic Conquest of Spain in 711.

In the course of dealing with the movement of the Visigoths, Stilicho evidently stripped the Rhine frontier of troops. When the Suevi, Alans, and Vandals crossed the frozen Rhine (or bridges) on New Year's Eve of 407, nothing, apart from the Franks (who inflicted some losses), stood in their way when they looted their way across Gaul and Spain. As they settled down in Spain, the Visigoths arrived in Italy. Later in 407, the usurper Constantine took his troops out of Britain, simultaneously to secure Gaul and to establish himself as Emperor. When Stilicho is murdered, his forces, largely German, disintegrate. Honorius, secure in Ravenna -- as Rome, after a fashion, burned -- was able to do nothing about the Visigoths or the other invaders, and he had to tell the British (410) they were on their own. Britain substantially drops out of history for a while.

[A]t that time [the Prefect] Anthemius [d.414] was fortifying Constantinople and the provinces. It was under his direction that the famous Theodosian land walls of the City were built, a project that lasted nine years (404-413). What he built was the inner (taller) circuit of what eventually became a triple line of defense (a moat and two lines of walls)... The new wall had 96 projecting towers, and owners of the land on which they were built were allowed to use them but required to maintain them; a later law billeted soldiers on the towers' ground floors. The wall stretched for 6 km [more like 6.5 km, 4 miles] from the Sea of Marmara, where it incorporated Theodoius I's Golden Gate, to the Golden Horn. It was beautiful, imposing, and impregnable; for centuries, the enemies of New Rome would fail to breach it. Henceforth, medieval cities would fall into three categories: unwalled, walled, and Constantinople.

Anthony Kaldellis, The New Roman Empire, a History of Byzantium, Oxford, 2024, p.166, boldface added.

1. THEODOSIANS, WEST		WESTERN COMMANDERS Magistri Militum		1. THEODOSIANS, EAST
394-395, West	Theodosius I, the Great Fl. Theodosius				379-395, East
Council II, Constantinople I, Arianism condemned, 381; Public penance for massacre at Thessalonica, ordered by St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, 390; Destruction of the Serapeum, 392; Abolition of the Olympic Games, 394 (?)
Honorius Fl. Honorius	395-423 W	Stilicho (half Vandal)	395-408	Arcadius Fl. Arcadius	395-408 E
		Suevi, Vandals, & Alans cross Rhine, 1 January 407
		[Priscus Attalus]	408-410, 414-415	Rebellion of Gaïnas suppressed, 400
		Constantius III Fl. Constantius	410-421	Theodosius II Fl. Theodosius	408-450 E Longest reign in Roman History to date
			jure uxoris 421 W
Gladiatorial schools closed, 399; Stilicho moves capital to Ravenna, 402; Gladiatorial combat ended in Colosseum, 404; Visigoth Alaric made Magister Militum for puppet Emperor Priscus, 408; Rome sacked by Alaric, 410; Gaul recovered by Constantius from Constantine "III," 411; Visigoths destroy Alans and Siling Vandals in Spain, 416
[Constantine "III"]	407-411 in Britain Gaul & Spain	Castinus	422-425
Galla Placidia	Regent, 423-437 W, d.450	defeated by Vandals in Spain, 422; backs usurper John, 423-425; both deposed by forces from the East, 425
[John Johannes]	423-425 W
Valentinian III Fl. Placius Valentinianus	425-455 W	Felix	425-430
		Aëtius Fl. Aëtius	430-432, 433-454	University of Constantinople founded, the Πανδιδακτήριον, Pandidacterium, "Place of All Learning," 425; Council III, Ephesus, Nestorianism condemned, 431; earthquake in Constantinople, 447
		Boniface Comes Bonifatius	432	Marcian	jure uxoris 450-457 E
[Petronius Maximus]	455 W
Vandals invade Africa, 428, take Hippo, 430, defeat Boniface, Count of Africa, and Aspar, capture (& release) Marcian, 432, repulsed from Carthage, treaty, 435; Boniface defeats Aëtius at Rimini, dies from wound, 432
Suevi defeat Andevotus, Count of Spain, at the Jenil River, 438, take Mérida, 439, Seville, 441
Vandals take Carthage, 439; Visigoths provide troops for expedition against Vandals, and fleet of 1100 cargo & troop ships arrives with Aspar from Constantinople in Sicily, but expedition cancelled, because of threat from Huns, 441-442
Council IV, Chalcedon, Monophysitism condemned, 451; Attila the Hun halted at Châlons, 451; Aëtius stabbed to death by Valentinian, 454; Valentinian assassinated, Petronius elevated, flees, and is killed, Rome sacked by Vandals, 455

Theodosius may have been called "Great" mainly for establishing Athanasian Orthodoxy and for actions against paganism like closing and sometimes destroying temples and ending the Olympic Games (which, however, seem to have continued in some form for another century). Otherwise, he did get the Goths under some kind of control and left the Empire, to all appearances, sound and prepared for the future.

Unfortunately, there were two very serious problems. One was that the Goths remained a unified and aggressive tribe within the Empire, ready to begin rampaging again at any time. Another was that Honorius and Arcadius, the two sons between whom Theodosius divided the Empire, were young and inexperienced.

Leaving the Army in the hands of the German Magister Militum Stilicho set the stage for all the evils of divided authority and palace intrigue. The result of this would be disaster. When the times called for a strong soldier Emperor, there wasn't one -- and there would not be one for some time, perhaps not until Heraclius -- who was overwhelmed when success with one military challenge, against the Persians, was followed, in his old age, by the extraordinary challenge of the Arabs.

An interesting misadventure in the reign of Theodosius was his massacre of rebellious citizens at Thessalonica, a city important enough that it was called the Συμβασιλεύουσα, "co-Imperial" city, with Constatinople. He was rebuked for this, and required to do penance, by St. Ambrose of Milan, whose standing as the Bishop of the Western Capital seems to have here overshadowed the Pope. But concessions that Theododius made to Ambrose are still used by the Papacy to claim its supreme authority in the Church.

In 401, Stilicho was away on the Danube, and Alaric, after a romp through the Balkans, led the Visigoths into Italy, putting Honorius under siege in Milan. Stilicho returned posthaste and lifted the siege. Alaric remained in the area, until Stilicho surprised and defeated him in 402 at Pollentia. Alaric was again defeated at Verona, and he finally withdrew from Italy. These defeats, unfortunately, where nowhere near the scale that would have eliminated the Gothic threat. After he no longer needed to face Stilicho, Alaric would return.

Feeling reasonably thus exposed to the Goths at Milan, Honorius, doubtlessly advised by Stilicho, moved his Court to Ravenna. This was a fateful step. It made Ravenna the administrative capital of Italy for the rest of the history of the Western Empire, for the course of the Kingdom of the Ostrogoths, and for the history of the "Byzantine" Exarchate in Italy,

Ravenna's Port of Classe, Civis Classis, Basilica di Sant'Apollinaire Nuovo, Ravenna, 2019

until its fall to the Lombards in 751. Ravenna was thus the capital of Italy for 349 years. This is usually overlooked in the tendentious narrative of the "Fall of Rome," as is the glorious art and architecture placed there, anomalously during what is represented as the "Dark Ages." The form of the Exarchate, after the Lombard invasion, with a corridor from Rome to Ravenna, roughly along the Via Flaminia (Flaminian Way) and the Via Amerina (Amerinian Way), subsequently became the Papal States, from 754 until 1870 -- 1116 years.

Ravenna thus possesses a important place in general history and art history that is rarely addressed in popular or general academic culture. Despite the role of Ravenna, several of the last Western Emperors, with their political horizon reduced to Italy, did spend significant time at Rome. Valentinian III seems to have been there for eight years, about a quarter of his reign, including its last five years. Petronius Maximus (455) spent his whole, brief reign in Rome; and Anthemius (467-472) was killed there.

Port of Classe, Civis Classis, Basilica di Sant'Apollinaire Nuovo, Ravenna, 2019

Some scholars think this means that too much emphasis has been placed on Ravenna; but considering how little awareness there is of the city, its monuments, and its history, certainly in popular culture and in scholarship outside the specialty of Late Antiquity, it is hardly possible to say that anything sensible is served by deliberately placing less emphasis on it. I might suspect that the "deemphasis" scholars resent the status of Ravenna and yearn for the centrality and dominance of Rome, now long gone.

Unfortunately, the military strength of Ravenna's position allowed Honorius to view the course of the Goths in Italy, and their sieges of Rome, with some complacency. On the other hand, the time spent by Valentinian III at Rome, especially in his last years, may reflect growing concern at the threat from the Vandals. Since the government had originally been drawn to the North of Italy because of the threat to the frontiers, it is not surprising that attention would be pulled back to Rome because of a threat from Carthage. If this was Valentianian's thinking, it was a good idea but ended up collapsing in chaos. Valentianian killed Aëtius, reportedly with his own hand, was himself assassinated, and then his ephemeral successor, Petronius Maximus, was killed while fleeing the City, leaving the Vandals unopposed. Having botched the defense of Rome, the government of Avitus, drawing on the power of the Visigoths, returned to Ravenna and the North -- until we find Anthemius again there, supervising the doomed 468 expedition against the Vandals.

Some uncertainty remains about exactly when Honorius moved to Ravenna. Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis says:

At the time of the Visigothic invasion of Italy of 402, Honorius and his advisors seem to have felt that Milan was too hard to defend, and so the emperor moved to Ravenna; the first imperial decree to have been issued at Ravenna is dated December 6, 402. The year 402 appears in almost every modern account as a pivotal date in Ravenna's history, even though no contemporary authors mention such a transfer in that year. [Ravenna in Late Antiquity, Cambridge, 2010, p.46]

In a footnote, Deliyannis cites Zosimus (d.circa 501), who "mentions Honorius's change of residence to Ravenna as happening in 408" [note 12, p.320]. However, although she leaves the impression that the date of 402 is based on the imperial edict (from the Theodosian Code), the Chronicle of Theophanes positively asserts that Honorious "moved to Ravenna, a coastal city in Italy" in the Annō Mundi year 5895, i.e. 402/403 AD [The Chronicle of Theophanes Confessor, Byzantine and Near Eastern History AD 284-813, Translated with Introduction and Commentary by Cyril Mango and Roger Scott with the assistance of Geoffrey Greatrex, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1997, 2006, p.117].

We do not know, of course, the basis of the assertion of Theophanes, writing in the 9th century. It may have been in the very same imperial edict, or in historical sources now lost. Nevertheless, the date of the edict is not consistent with the (perhaps corrupt) date from Zosimus. It is also, of course, consistent with the logic of the situation. If Honorius was alarmed by Alaric trapping him in Milan in 402, moving the Court in 408 seems like a casual and unconcerned response. Moving the Court immediately, to a city with the benefit of a seaport, seems more like it.

Tomb of Dante, Exterior; remodeled by Camillo Morigia 1780-1782; Ravenna, 2019
Tomb of Dante, Interior; relief by Pietro Lombardo, 1483; Ravenna, 2019

Honorius never displayed any qualities of statecraft beyond helplessness.

As it happens, we find Judith Herrin, in a new book about Ravenna, Ravenna, Capital of Empire, Crucible of Europe [Princeton University Press, 2020], treating the move of the Court to Ravenna in 402 as entirely unproblematic:

In December 402 the emperor's presence at Ravenna is confirmed by laws issued there and coins struck in his name at the new mint he established. [p.12]

The doubts of Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis about the date are not mentioned or discussed, not even in a footnote. Herrin adds that the decision to move the Court was probably that of Stilicho, since Honorius was still a child, and he would never display much prudent judgment anyway.

Dante's Tomb

I have been displaying, from an era long after the political and most of the cultural importance of Ravenna had faded,

Cenotaph of Dante, Basilica of Santa Croce; sculpted by Stefano Ricci, 1829; Florence, 2019

the exterior and the interior of the tomb of Dante Alighieri (1265-1321), who died here in exile from Florence, having previously found refuge at Verona and other places.

Florence would like him back, and at left I have displayed the elaborate tomb prepared for him, in the church of Santa Croce, which now only stands as a cenotaph, unveiled in 1830. In 1519, a delegation arrived from Florence, on the authority of Medici Pope Leo X -- Ravenna was in the Papal States -- to remove Dante's bones to Florence. They found the tomb empty.

The Franciscans, who had buried Dante, and who represented Dante's beloved St. Francis, had recently removed him for safe-keeping. Just in time. A crude chest, preserved by the Franciscans, is inscribed from 1677, but it was finally placed in a wall in 1810, as the monks were driven out on order of Napoleon. They never returned, and the bones evidently were forgotten, until accidently exposed in 1865.

Florence would still like to have him, but Ravenna still refuses to give him up. Frankly, I don't see why they should. Florence might have appreciated Dante while they had him. Instead, in the political revenge of the Black Guelfs against (Dante's) White Guelfs, he was condemned to death, twice, sentences only to be commuted under humiliating conditions. Dante refused, and he then wrote the entire Divine Comedy in exile. Now he adds to the fame of Ravenna, and visitors don't even need to buy tickets and wait in long lines, as they do to enter Santa Croce, to visit his tomb.

The Ghica at Ravenna

Archbishops of Ravenna

A Visigoth Explains Himself

With the Goths running wild, and an alliance of German tribes crossing the frozen Rhine on New Year's Eve of 407, the institutions were not prepared to bounce back the way Rome had in the 3rd Century. The center of Roman resistance was the Commander Stilicho, who had been entrusted with his office by Theodosius. But neither the Eastern Court nor Honorius liked the authority possessed by Stilicho, who had even married a niece of Theodosius, even as Honorius married Stilicho's daughter.

The result was, after being the only leader to resist the Germans, and keeping the Visigoths in check, Stilicho was tried and executed. As earlier with the rebellion of the Visigoths, the Romans turned on the Germans in the Army; but the purge did not strengthen the Army, as later it would in the East under Leo. Instead, the surviving Germans decamped to the Visigoths; and, unlike with the Isaurians under Leo, there was no one to replace them. Honorius, who didn't seem to possess any functioning army, never left Ravenna to seriously contest any action of the Goths, who only left Italy, after the death of Alaric, when they ran out of steam.

In 2023, Peter Sarris, Professor of History at Cambridge University (specializing in Late Antiquity, the Early Middle Ages and Byzantium), says some odd things about this period. Thus, we see:

But the Goths posed a growing threat to the western authorities, too, and as a result the western court relocated itself from Gaul into northern Italy, in part to keep an eye on the Goths. [Justinian, Emperor, Soldier, Saint, Basic Books, p.35]

It is hard to know what Sarris is talking about. The principal capital of the West, since Maximian, was Milan. Emperors certainly moved around. We know Constantine spent time at Arles and Trier; and we find Constantius Chlorus dying at York. But Honorius began his reign at Milan, where his father, Theodosius I, died in 395, well before the Visigoths were seen as any threat to Italy. Milan was well placed to back up the frontiers on the Danube, the Rhine, or Britain. When the Visigoths did become a threat to Italy, then Honorius moved, or was moved, to Ravenna. Unfortunately, this suggested retreat and defense rather than counterattack, which is how Honorius played it, never contesting Alaric's course through Italy.

With vague references to "individual military commanders and warlords," Sarris then says:

The military retinues and armies of these commanders felt little loyalty to the increasingly distant and ineffectual figure of a western emperor, whose court was now based at Ravenna. [p.37]

Again, it is hard to know what Sarris is talking about. Who were "these commanders and warlords"? We have the usurper Constantine taking his legions out of Britain in 407, and then Aegidius, loyal to Majorian, cut off in Gaul after 461. I especially don't know who we would classify as "warlords," unless it would be kings of German tribes, like Alaric.

The "commanders" who counted were the Magistrī Militum who commanded the core Western army; but none of them were "increasingly distant" from the Western Emperors, and the Emperors after Majorian were "ineffectual" because they were dominated by the Magistrī. If only Stilicho had resisted the coup and murder by Honorius, everything probably would have been in much better shape. So the problem was not some kind of "distance" between Magistrī and Emperors, but that they were right on top of each other, either in Milan or Ravenna.

By Bernie Wrightson (1948-2017), The National Lampoon (1970 to 1998), September 1980

Meanwhile, soon after Honorius excecuted Stlicho, Alaric had sacked Rome, in 410, an event that shook the Roman world. It was the result, however, of a long maneuvering and negotiation, beginning in 408. With Stilicho gone, and his troops deserting, Alaric saw his opportunity, not to conquer Rome, but to actually replace Stilicho as Magister Militum.

Alternatively sieging Rome and treating with Honorius, Alaric managed to nab Galla Placidia, the sister of Honorius, and then, after little cooperation from the Emperor, Alaric got the Roman Senate to appoint a rival Emperor, Priscus Attalus, who, of course, made Alaric Magister Militum.

They moved on Ravenna, where Honorius repulsed them, with Eastern reinforcements, 4000 troops sent from Constantinople, during a truce -- his only military action, as far as I can tell, against the Goths -- one that didn't require him to move off his fundament. So Alaric returned to Rome, which surrendered, allowing for the infamous three days of looting. But the churches were respected, and the spoils of the Temple of Herod were also left in place -- waiting for the Vandals. After moving towards a crossing to Sicily, Alarc died, and his successor, Athaulf, left for Gaul, with Priscus and Galla in tow -- in 414 he then married Galla, perhaps with some level of coercion, but with Roman rites. She even had a child by him, named "Theodosius," who soon died, along with Athaulf (415).

In recent decades, some historians [who Kaldellis identifies as the "Toronto School"] have denied that ethnic difference played a role and that these conflicts [involving Goths, Alaric, etc.], for all that they are described in the sources as between Romans and barbarians, were really only political struggles among rival Roman factions. This thesis must deny that Goths had their own identities and must recast them as regular Roman soldiers. Yet those armies had entered the empire from outside, spoke a separate language, and fought Theodosius I to preserve a quasi-autonomous status as foederati, a concession that the emperors would not have made if they had any other choice. Moreover, since our (Roman) sources consistently interpret events in light of ethnic differences between Romans and others, this school has to dismiss the sources for engaging in a purely rhetorical invention of ethnic identity. This strained approach is untenable and unnecessary. Romans were ready to accept barbarians who were settled on Roman terms. The empire possessed remarkably effective mechanisms for incorporating foreign peoples in this way. But quasi-autonomous armies from across the border that rampaged for decades through the provinces demanding money, land, supplies, and offices were a different matter. The armies of Alaric and the two Theoderics [Strabo and the Amal] were not treated by the authorities in Constantinople as regular Romans, even when they had to pretend that their barbarians leaders were magistri militum. For their part, the Goths had to stick together because the Romans were capable of massacring hostile foreigners who fell into their hands. This was done for example by officers (e.g., Julius in 378, with senatorial approval) and by the people of Constantinople in 400. Perceptions of ethnic difference mattered, and could even be fatal. [The New Roman Empire, a History of Byzantium, Oxford, 2024, p.245]

The "Toronto School" seems to go back to Walter Goffart, now at Yale, who was at the University of Toronto, 1960–1999. Part of the thesis in this seems to have been that the identification of the "Goths" as non-Roman was part of a Nazi ideological program to trace German identity back to the Roman period. Indeed, German nationalism of the 19th century, well before the Nazis, shifted from the Mediaeval ideology of the German Emperors identifying with the Romans (e.g. the "Holy Roman Emperors"), to a new nationalism identifying with the Germanic enemies of the Romans -- see below. While both the Kaiser Wilhelms and Hitler would get some mileage out of that, the misuse of history is no reason to deny the facts of history, which are that the Goths, Vandals, Saxons, etc. were an alien presence, speaking their own languages, that had invaded the Empire. The "Toronto" thesis seems to have as much a purely ideological motivation ("We'll fix those Nazis!") as would be any version of German nationalism.

As with the execution of Stilicho, a similar characteristic moment came with the commander Aëtius, sometimes called "the Last Roman" -- as is Belisarius. Aëtius had defeated the Huns at Châlons-sur-Marne (Campus Mauriacus or the Catalaunian Plains) in 451, with substantial help from the Visigoths, by then settled in Aquitaine, whose King Theodoric I was killed in the battle. But then Aëtius was murdered by the incompetent and jealous Emperor Valentinian III, with his own hand. Very personal.

When Honorius died in 423, his nephew Valentinian was only 4 years old. Because the usurper John seized the throne, Valentinian was taken by his mother, Galla Placidia, to Constantinople. Forces of his cousin, the Emperor Theodoius II, then defeated John and installed Valentinian in 425.

Peter Sarris says something odd about this:

Consequently, the eastern authorities had increasingly sought to secure the appointment there [in Italy] of more biddable, effectively 'puppet' rulers, often bound to the eastern Augustus by dynastic ties. They were even willing to see 'boy emperors' appointed to the western throne, knowing that they would be easier to manipulate and control. [Justinian, Emperor, Soldier, Saint, Basic Books, 2023, p.36]

This seems to me almost wholly false. By a "boy emperor" Sarris can really only mean Valentinian III, but with his mother Galla Placidia ruling as Regent in his minority, Constantinople had no chance to "manipulate and control" Valentinian. Sarris says that the Eastern Emperors wanted this control because they "did not want to have to worry about potential rivals and challengers from the West" [pp.35-36]. But there never were rivals or challengers to Constantinople from the West, and no Eastern Emperor ever, to my knowledge, displayed any concern about anything of the sort.

Sarris then says:

...the courts of these 'puppet', boy rulers were dominated by their courtiers, and particularly by 'overmighty subjects' (typically military commanders, themselves often men of barbarian origin who had been recruited into the Roman Army) [p.36]

Again, it is a little hard to know what Sarris is talking about. The one "boy emperor" with the Theodosians was governed by his mother and then by himself. The only "overmighty subjects" in this period, or the following, who dominated Emperors, were the Magistrī Militum, like Ricimer. They characterize the period after Valentinian, and they certainly controlled puppet emperors. But they were not "courtiers"; they were not controlled by Constantinople; and none of the Emperors were actually children (except Valentinian III and one other). The Emperors accepted by the West from Constantinople, Anthemius and Julius Nepos, were not children and were not intended to be puppets. The former was murdered by Ricimer (although at the hand of Gundobad) and the second chased out by Orestes. So Sarris seems to be describing a fantasy history, not what actually happened.

One other actual boy Emperor, Romulus Augustulus, was installed by his father, Orestes. This had nothing to do with Constantinople and in fact was in the face of the Eastern recognition, still, of Julius Nepos. So I would really like an explanation from Peter Sarris how he came up with his narrative here.

The murder of Aëtius by Valentinian was masterminded by the plotter Petronius Maximus, who then plotted to have Valentinian murdered, and Petronius himself declared Emperor. This is attested by the Chronicle of Hydatius, who says that Petronius "by treacherous plots contrived the deaths both of those men killed by Valentinian and of Valentinian himself" [The Chronicle of Hydatius and the Consularia Constantinopolitana, Two Contemporary Accounts of the Final Years of the Roman Empire, Edited with an English translation by Richard W. Burgess, Oxford Classical Monographs, Clarendon Press, p.105].

But Petronius only lasted two and a half months (Hydatius says "scarcely four months"). He cancelled a dynastic marriage to the Vandals, who then arrived to plunder Rome, in a systematic and thorough way, with Petronius murdered while trying to escape. Never was an ignominious end more deserved. The Vandal King Gaiseric made off with all the Imperial women, including the widow and two daughters of Valentinian III, one of whom, Eudocia, was married to Gaiseric's son, Huneric, and gave birth to Hilderic, who would be Vandal King (523-530), until deposed by his cousin Gelimer.

This fiasco then left the throne completely at the mercy of the next person to get control of the Army -- who effectively would be the German Ricimer. Ricimer could not himself, as a German, become Emperor, so he could only retain power by keeping the Emperors as figureheads, or killing them. This was not a formula for retrieving the situation, but it continued for the rest of the miserable history of the Western Empire, mostly dominated by Ricimer (456-472). The Theodosian dynasty thus ends in the West with a combination of triumph, betrayal, and chaos.

It seems that said children, holding a candle within the observation hole to look in, dropped it. It is remarkable that something of the sort had not happened earlier (as Howard Carter was lucky in 1922 that he did not drop the candle he held up, in the last days before electric flashlights, to first look into Tutankhamon's Tomb). The idea of an observation port into a tomb may seem strange, but there is even such a feature in the tomb of Sir Richard Burton and his wife.

Mosaics in the mausoleum, as we see at right and below (next to the gridiron on which St. Lawrence, at right, was martyred by grilling), already show the books of the Bible bound in codices (sing. codex), i.e. familiar bound books rather than scrolls. This could only be done with parchment, since papyrus is too brittle to be stitched. Scrolls continued to be current for some time -- mosaics at Ravenna include figures standing side by side where one holds a scroll, the other a codex -- and fragments of papyrus records are preserved from Ravenna of this period. But it is probably difficult for people to think of "Romans" using books rather than scrolls; and this is not the only case where general perceptions fail to keep up with the changing times of Late Antiquity.

Although the mausoleum and its decorations remain in excellent condition, it is now customary to question whether the Empress or any other Theodosians had ever been buried there. Deborah Mauskopf Deliyannis says, "When Galla Placidia died in Rome, she was probably [?!] buried in the imperial mausoleum at St. Peter's"; but she only cites a secondary source for this. I was otherwise unaware that there was an imperial mausoleum at St. Peter's; but Honorius had built one, nothing of which remains above ground, and no excavation has been done below ground. We have attested burials there of the infant son of Galla Placidia, Theodosius, and of Honorius himself; and the building latter became a shrine to St. Petronilla. Mediaeval sketches of it survive, but it was demolished when the "New" St. Peter's was built in the Renaissance. In 1544 a sarophagus was discovered on the site, that of Maria, wife of Honorius and daughter of Stilicho [cf. Mark J. Johnson, The Roman Imperial Mausoleum in Late Antiquity, Cambridge, 2009, pp.167,173]. However, no burial there of Galla Placidia or other Theodosians is attested, either at the time or later. Hence the "probably."

Mausoleum of Galla Placidia, Ravenna, 2019

Deliyannis does conclude that the sarcophagi in the "Mausoleum of Galla Placidia" (always given in quotes) were indeed fifth century products contemporary with the building, and were intended for Theodosian burials by Placidia herself. Exactly who was buried there, however, was a matter of later tradition and legend [op.cit. p.82]. Deliyannis does not even discuss Bury's assertions:

Into this charming chapel Placidia removed the remains of her brother Honorius and her husband Constantius, and it was her own resting place. The marble sarcophagus of Honorius is on the right, that of Constantius, in which the body of Valentinian III. was afterwards laid, on the left. [Bury, op.cit. p.263]

Bury, unfortunately, also only cites secondary sources; and indeed he seems to derive his entire description from Thomas Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, Volume I, The Visigothic Invasion, Part II [Oxford, 1892, pp.886-888]. Hodgkin himself cites no sources for his descriptions, or the story about the incendiary accident of 1577. Deliyannis denies that there is any contemporary information about the burials, providing various versions of traditional assignments [cf. note 247, p.334]. We are thus left with more questions than answers in this matter. There is a certain logic, however, that Placidia would be buried in the mausoleum that she arguably built herself.

Other sources claim that the mausoleum was intended as a chapel to St. Lawrence (or even someone else, despite the burning "gridiron," which is sometimes said to be for burning [invisible] heretical books, rather than the saint), and the sarcophagi introduced at some later, and unknown, date. However, there remain no features of the building that indicate use as a chapel, it is naturally dark with windows small and high up, featuring heavy, alabaster panes, and the space is identical in form and scale to the lower floor of the Mausoleum of Theodoric at Ravenna, which would have been more obviously intended for Theodoric's family members. Perhaps to bolster the case for Placidia's mausoleum, this later room, innocent of sarcophagi, is also rather weakly claimed to be a chapel, despite the absence of any appropriate features, and a small window directly behind where the altar furniture would have been, which would have blocked it.

When contemporary churches, like the nearby St. Vitale, let alone the distant, great Sancta Sophia, have many windows and are well lit, one wonders why these purported "chapels" should be left so dark. Since Theodoric's dynasty became disordered and fell soon after his death, the absence of sarophagi for further burials is not surprising. It puzzles me how sometimes historians seem to relish disputing the obvious. And with so many positive statements by Bury (from Hodgkin), it strikes me as negligent that Deliyannis would not even mention, let alone discuss them [note].

A stiking feature of the Mausoleum of Galla Pacidia is the Greek Key design found in the tomb, especially in color on one of the arches, as seen above. At the time I saw this, I was only aware of a similar form in the Temple of Bel at Palmyra, whose features are discussed there. Most extraordinarily, the design is enhanced with color to make it seem three-dimensional.

Equally influential in comparison to Pacidia, in the East was Empress St. Pulcheria Augusta, Πουλχερία Αὐγοῦστα, sister of Theodosius II and (apparently celibate) wife of Marcian. She is supposed to have requested the transfer of the Hodēgētria Icon from Jerusalem, although it is otherwise said to have actually been fetched by her sister-in-law, St. Aelia (Athenais) Eudocia Augusta, Αἰλία (Ἀθηναΐς) Εὐδοκία Αὐγοῦστα, with whom there was some rivalry and inversely varying fortunes of political influence.

Pulcheria was instrumental in the calling and conduct of both the Third Ecumenical Council at Ephesus (431), which condemned Nestorianism, and the Fourth at Chalcedon (451), which condemned Monophysitism. Her influence on subsequent Christian theology, and the problem of Schisms in the Church, was therefore immense. In conflict with the Patriarch Nestorius, soon to be exiled, she claimed the right to enter of the Holy of Holies of (the old) Sancta Sophia Church.

Pulcheria's chaste marriage to Marcian, Μαρκιανός, was the beginning of a tradition of a widowed Empress or Heiress marrying a candidate to be the next Emperor. Marcian's son-in-law Anthemius, Ἀνθέμιος, was also, with the help of this connection, installed as Western Emperor -- later to be assassinated. However, the real power behind Marcian's succession was the Magister Militum Aspar, who aspired to be a King Maker in the East the way colleagues like Ricimer were in the West. He got one more chance to do this, with Leo I, but he was then killed by Leo in a coup.

Later, there would be purer cases of an Empress legitimating a new Emperor by marriage. This also happened occasionally in Francia, where we have a term for it, that the new monarch was such jure uxoris, "by right of his wife." In the Kingdom of Navarre, which fell to heiresses no less than seven times, four Kings were provided by jure uxoris. We also see this in the County of Nevers, where there was a succession of six heiresses, one after another.

We might say this already happened with Constantius III, husband of Galla Placidia, but Constantius was no more than a coregent with Honorius, so he was not legitimated as a successor by the marriage. That would be his son, Valentinian III, who would already be legitimate as the son of his mother. Later, the most extensive use of jure uxoris would be under the Macedonians, where five Emperors by marriage, three with the Empress Zoë alone, would beat the record of Navarre. Note that the consorts of modern ruling English Queens -- Anne, Victoria, and Elizabeth II -- were not made Kings themselves. William III was a King because his claim to the Throne was considered equal to that of Queen Mary II.

This era of miserable collapse nevertheless contained instances of formidable intellectual development and important figures in the history of philosophy. St. Augustine of Hippo (395-430), whose name still evokes strong reactions even in our own day, and who died as the Vandals were besieging Hippo, still stands as the most prolific author in the Latin language, with 93 surviving works to his credit, not counting numerous sermons and letters.

This is a positive embarrassment for Classicists, who are usually not very interested in Latin literature after 100 AD and who would rather think that the writing from Augustine's era was all by half-literate, ignorant, and bigoted Patristic Fathers writing in Vulgar Latin. Unfortunately for this conceit, Augustine himself, inspired by Cicero, was a student of Classical Latin rhetoric and taught it at Carthage, Rome, and Milan (the Capital, remember) before he ever thought of converting to Christianity. The study of Latin without the study of Augustine involves a certain self-imposed blindness.

As with Constantine, there are curious alternatives in the pronunciation of Augustine's name. By analogy with Constantine, we might expect the alternatives "Augusteyen" and "Augusteen." I have never hear the former ever used. The later is the vulgar pronunciation, especially as used for the city of St. Augustine, Florida. Scholars, on the other hand, in both history and philosophy, seem to prefer "Augústĭn," with a short "i" and the accent on the second syllable, contrasting with the first syllable for "Aúgusteen." I find this perplexing, since the short "i" violates the ordinary rules of spelling in both British and American English, where a final "e" almost always indicates that the preceding vowel is long. If this is an affectation, I do not know how or when it got started. I don't see any difference between British and American usage in this respect.

Meanwhile, another North African author, far less accomplished as a writer, nevertheless made an epochal contribution to the character of education in the Middle Ages. This was the obscure Martianus Capella. Capella, a pagan and apparently a practicing lawyer at Carthage, seems to have died before the Vandal invasion. His seminal contribution to learning, The Marriage of Philology and Mercury, created the system of the Seven Liberal Arts:   the trivium (hence "trival"), of grammar, rhetoric, and logic, and the quadrivium, of arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and music -- each link there is to an allegorical painting of the art by Laurent de La Hyre.

Capella even included a system of astronomy in which Mercury and Venus orbited the sun. This later caught the attention of Copernicus. Capella was popularized by Cassiodorus and hence made his way into subsequent education, such as with Isidore of Seville -- who, like Capella, is often called an "Enyclopedist." Capella, however, may not have been entirely original. In the East, where versions of the Liberal Arts were also taught in Greek education, the tradition was that a similar list went back to the Sophist Hippias of Elis.

The idea of the Liberal Arts has now rather shrunk, and instead of including things like logic, mathematics, and astronomy, one might often think, given current academic practice, that only rhetoric, with its attendant sophistry, remains -- and grammar itself rejected as "elitist." So one is left with the question, "Which attitudes sound more like the ignorance of the Dark Ages?"

Diocletian had begun creating a very different kind of Army in the Late Empire. The old Legions actually still exist, but they largely have been settled on the land as fixed frontier forces, the Limitanei, and the old legionary establishment has been reduced to 1000 men, with the number of legions accordingly multiplied -- for instance, only one legion had previously been stationed in Egypt, the Legio II Traiana, but there are eight by the time of the Notitia Dignitatum (II Traiana, III Diocletiana, V Macedonica, XIII Gemina, II Flavia Constantia, I Maximiana, I Valentiniana, & II Valentiniana, though this is not always the full legion).

The frontier units are not shown on the map above, but their regional commanders are, the "Dukes" -- dux, "leader" (pl. duces). This is a title that will have a long history in the Middle Ages. The units that are shown on the map above are parts of the new Mobile Army, the Comitatenses, which were originally commanded by the Augusti and Caesares of the Tetrarchy -- hence, they "attend" or "accompany," comitor, the Emperors, as their "train, retinue," or "following," comitatus. An individual "companion" of an Emperor is a comes (pl. comites), or "Count," another title with a long history in the Middle Ages. In origin, however, a Roman Count has a higher station than a Duke, the opposite of what we see much later.

The sixth-century historian Agathias says that at one time the Army had a full strength of 645,000 men. This accords well with the data of the Notitia Dignitatum, which gives the whole establishment of the Army, apparently for the East in 395 AD and for the West circa 408 AD. Diocletian and Constantine, both accused of massively expanding the Army, thus produced a total force roughly twice as large as the Army of the Principate. There is no doubt that this was needed for the challenges of the Age -- indeed, it would prove inadequate to concentrate what would in fact be needed against the Visigoths and the other migrating German tribes.

In the map at right we see the Limitanei and the Comitatenses for the Western Army. It is noteworthy that some differences have developed between the organization of the Western and the Eastern Armies. In the West, the regional commanders of the Mobile Army are Counts. Britain features both a Duke of Britain, on the frontier, and a Count of Britain, with a unit of the Mobile Army. The Count of Illyricum is in the Western Mobile Army, but the Master of Soliders of Illyricum is in the Eastern. In the Western Army, above the Counts are the units commanded by the "Master of Soldiers," Magister Militum (or "Master of Foot," Magister Peditum), and the "Master of Horse," Magister Equitum, of Gaul. These are the commanders-in-chief of the Western Army (distiguished by purple color), with the Master of Soldiers becoming the effective "Generalissimo" of the Western Empire.

In the map at right for the East, we see the Limitanei and the Comitatenses for the Eastern Army. The units of the Eastern Mobile Army all are commanded by their own Master of Soldiers, with two units as "Soldiers of the Emperor's Presence." Since there are two of those, one might think there is one each for East and West. However, they apparently operated together and were part of the Eastern Army. Thus, the unity of the Eastern Army was focused more directly on the Emperor himself, which may have helped the Eastern Empire avoid the situation in the West where the Emperors became mere figureheads.

Recently, Anthony Kaldellis and Marion Kruse have argued, in The Field Armies of the East Roman Empire, 361–630 [Cambridge University Press, 2023], that the Notitia account of the Eastern Armies is not really about the way they were in 408 but dates from much later in the 5th Century. Thus, the inability of Theodosius to deal decisively with the Visogothic rebels and invaders was from lack of manpower. As the century progressed, however, the Armies were built up. Meanwhile, the Visigoths had moved West. But manpower remained a problem. Justinian created a new Field Army in the East, that of Armenia, and, of course, troops were required for the invasions and occuptions of North Africa and Italy. Many of the men for those forces were drawn from the two Armies of the Emperor's Presence, which whithered into nominal formations. This throws a lot of the history into a very different light; and the structural differences between the Western and Eastern Armies now look like developments in response to the decline, and the collapse, of the Western Armies, with their more traditional command structure under the Master of Soldiers. Thus, the subordination of the Eastern Armies directly under the Emperor is a response to the reducation of the Western Emperor to a figurehead and creature of his Master of Soldiers.

It is noteworthy that the Counts in the East, of Isauria and Egypt, are both in areas behind the actual frontiers. The Count of Egypt commands an army that from its size could easily have belonged to the Comitatenses. The Count of Isauria commands in an area known for rebellion. He has such a small force, however (Legio II Isaura & Legio III Isaura -- Legio I Isaura Sagittaria was with the Mobile Army of the East), the rebellions cannot have been too serious. Perhaps the problem was more like banditry. Nevertheless, this is where Leo I would draw recruits, including his future son-in-law and Emperor Zeno, to replace the Germans in the Eastern Army. The rebellion would get more serious when Anastasius came to the Throne, since Zeno's relatives, and others, thought they would be more important in the government. In 492 the Isaurians had to be defeated in pitched battle. The trouble peristed for six more years, after which the spirit of revolt seems to have been permanently quieted.

In the Notitia Dignitatum the Western Comitatenses have a slight numerical superiority over the Eastern, yet it was the Western Army that seems to evaporate after 407, especially in Gaul, which on paper was the greatest strength of any formation in the whole Army. Unfortunately, the Mobile Army as often was used for civil wars as for backing up the frontiers, and it was natural for Emperors to neglect the Limitanei and reinforce their own personal forces. This did not work out well, especially when the Western Army became the personal force, not of the Emperors, but of a Magister Militum who soon was usually a German, like Stilicho or Ricimer. Gradually, the Limitanei fade from historical view and hardly seem to exist at all by the time German tribes cross the borders en masse in the Fifth Century.

Legions of the Roman Army

On the map above, the Visigoths have actually become allies of the Romans. In return for cleaning (most of) the Germans out of Spain, they are legally settled in Aquitaine. Two German tribes, however, are left unmolested. The Suevi establish themselves, for centuries, in Galicia, and the Asding Vandals cross over into Africa. Indeed, there is some evidence that the Visigoths assisted the Vandals, playing a double game.

Of all the blows to Roman power, the latter would prove to be one of the worst. Rome could no longer draw grain from North Africa. Much worse, the crafty Vandal King Gaiseric ("King Caesar") built a fleet after securing Carthage in 439. He then did what the Carthaginians so many centuries earlier had not been able to do:  Secure control of the seas. In 455 they did what Hannibal could only have dreamed of, arriving at Rome by sea, breaking into and looting the city, and carrying the booty back to Carthage -- that would have saved Carthage.

The Vandal invasion was contested. In 432 the Magister Militum Aspar arrived with reinforcements from Constantinople; but he and Count Boniface were defeated by Gaiseric. The future Emperor Marcian, retainer of Aspar, was captured, but Gaiseric released him, supposedly after a vision of Marcian as Emperor. After the fall of Carthage, it would take four more Roman efforts to wipe out the Vandals and recover North Africa, not completed for a good century. The expeditions were:

1. That of Aspar, launched in 431. This was to assist Boniface (Bonifactius), who would briefly be the Western Magister Militum in 432. Aspar himself we later see at the Court of Leo I. As noted, Aspar and Boniface were defeated. However, Aspar was able to negotiate a treaty, in 434, to secure Carthage and its environs. That lasted until 439, when Gaiseric took Carthage.

2. That of Aëtius, in 441, staging in Sicily, a fleet of 1100 cargo & troop ships arrives from Constantinople, commanded by Aspar, cancelled in 442 because of the threat of the Huns.

   The Chronicle of Hydatius says that subsequently, in 456, a fleet of 60 Vandal ships was defeated by the Comes Ricimer and a "horde of Vandals" was slaughtered on Corsica, but this had no impact on the Vandal possession of Carthage.

3. That of Majorian, in 461, when his fleet was burned or "seized" while organizing in Spanish ports, which led to Majorian's murder. The Vandals clearly had either good intelligence or good reconaissance, or both. Hydatius says that the Vandals "had been given information by traitors."

4. The joint East/West expedition of Anthemius & Basiliscus, in 468, when the fleet reached Africa but then was burned by Vandal fireships, either because it was carelessly anchored (treachery?) or because the fleet was blown to a lee shore by adverse winds. This led to the murder of Anthemius and probably to the coup of Basiliscus in 475.

5. Finally, the successful and dramatic expedition of Belisarius in 533-534. This annihilated the Vandals in Africa, but the Vandal King Gelimer and many Vandal nobility were pensioned off onto estates in Anatolia. Ostrogoths would later join them. Very different from the way the Romans used to treat their enemies, like poor Vercingetorix.

The number of these efforts show the awareness of the Romans for the seriousness of this problem, but also their difficulty in staging and executing a recovery. The expedition of 468 was the last one that could have saved the Western Empire, which didn't even last ten years beyond that.

Meanwhile, around the same year, Hengest the Jute, followed by Angles and Saxons, founded the Kingdom of Kent.

It is noteworthy that the Venerable Bede (Venerabilis Baeda, 673-735) numbered Theodosius II as the 45th and Marcian as the 46th Emperors since Augustus. This is considerably less than the count we might make now and it interestingly implies that Bede is using a tradition of a numbered list from which many ephemeral Emperors were excluded [note].

After Roman Britain disappeared from history, when the usurper Constantine "III" took his troops to Gaul, Bede's History of the English Church and People is just about the first that we then hear of it, three hundred years later, with one exception:  St. Gildas "the Wise" (Gildas Sapiens, Breton Gweltaz; c.500-c.570), whose De Excitio et Conquestu Britanniae, "The Ruin and Conquest of Britain," is the only contemporary account of the Gemanic invasion of Britain. Since Gildas was one of the Britons who fled (from Cornwall) to Brittany, he may be more an illustration, rather than an exception, to the loss of literacy in Britain.

Gildas provides some key information, which we find repeated, sometimes word for word, in Bede. He says that Ambrosius Aurelius rallied the Britons against the Saxons. And the Saxons were stopped for a while, gaining a period of peace, after a defeat at Badon Hill, Badonicus Mons. Gildas says this was the year he was born, 44 years after the landing of the Saxons. Now, the first Germans to settle in Britain were the Jutes led by Hengest, in about 455. The Saxons came a little later, with Aelle & Cissa in 491. So if Gildas means Hengest, this puts Badon Hill in 499; but if he really means the Saxons, it would be more like 535. With various dates proposed for Badon Hill between 493 and 518, the 499 date looks more likely -- except for a consideration mentioned below. With Gildas living until 570, it was just a century before the birth of Bede in 673.

While the narrative of Gildas is of unqualified ruin, and historians were long left with the impression that the Germanic invaders had wiped out the Britons where they settled, there is now better information and a new perspective on this. From archaeology, we know that Britons continued to be buried alongside the new Germans, distinguished by their own burial customs. Also, the legislation of Saxon Kings deals with Britons, i.e. "Welsh," enough that it is clear there were many of them around. And now, the most decisive evidence is from DNA studies. Only 4% of modern male English DNA (from Y chromosomes) is traceable to a German migration -- little modern female DNA (from mitochondrial DNA, which is only passed on in egg cells). Thus, the invaders were almost entirely men, and there can have been no more than about 250,000 of them [John McWhorter, Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue, The Untold Story of English, Avery, Penguin Random House, 2008, 2009, pp.12-13].

Similar genetic results have been found about the later Viking invasions. Despite excitement over evidence of warrior women in Scandinavia, the long boats didn't have many women in them. One durable effect of the mixing of Britons with Germans are linguistic features, like the odd "do support" rules in English ("Did you have dinner?" "No, I didn't have dinner."), that are still prevalent in Welsh but found in few, if any, other languages. Also, the construction with participles (e.g. "is seeing"), by which English expresses the imperfect or progessive aspect, is also still characteristic of Welsh and, again, of few if any other languages. Thus, the modern English are substantially still the ancient British population, whose women were taken by Germans and Vikings, and they still use features of the ancient British languages.

The Life does say, interestingly, that Gildas was born in the Kingdom of Strathclyde to the royal family, a son of King Caunus. This does not clearly match any name I have for Strathclyde, although "Cinuit" is close, in the right time frame. But the brother of Gildas, "Cuillum," the next King, doesn't match at all. Gildas is even supposed to have sojourned in Ireland, working for the High King Ainmere macSátnai O'Néill (566-569), before going to Rome, Ravenna, and back to Brittany.

Arthur's name seems to first occur in the Historia Brittonum in the 9th century and then in the Annales Cambriae in the 10th. Most popular discussions of Arthur begin with the Historia Regum Britanniae [1136] by Geoffrey of Monmouth or Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur [1485]. Thus, in popular presentations, Gildas and Bede might not even be mentioned, which means that Ambrosius Aurelius may not be mentioned. This gravely detracts of the historical value of the treatments. The Historia Brittonum itself is more than 400 years after the events it chronicles.

Indeed, in the next Life of Gildas, in the 12th century, Ambrosius Aurelius is replaced by King Arthur, with elements filled in from the rest of Arthurian legend. Where this all comes from is what piques our interest. I suspect that the vividness of the Arthur stories, like that of the Greek epics and of the Mahābhārata in India, is an artifact of a literate society that for a time lost its literacy but remembered, after a fashion, what it was like. The literature on the problem of Arthur and Britain in this period is vast. The book that is of particular interest to me is From Scythia to Camelot, A Radical Reassessment of the Legends of King Arthur, the Knights of the Round Table, and the Holy Grail by C. Scott Littleton and Linda A. Malcor [Garland Publshing, Inc, New York, 1994, 2000].

Littleton and Malcor made the significant discovery that the scene of Arthur's death in Mallory's Morte d'Arthur [1485], where the sword Excalibur was thrown into a lake, occurs in almost identical terms in the legends of the Ossetians in the Caucasus -- the epic literature of the Ossetians had come in for particular study by the great historian of religion, Georges Dumézil (1898-1986). There is a possible connection, since the Ossetians are descendants of the Alans, and Marcus Aurelius had settled a tribe of Sarmatians, the Iazyges, cousins of the Alans, whom he had defeated in 175 and taken into Roman service, in the north of Britain, where many of them ended up at the evocatively named Bremetenacum Veteranorum, south of Lancaster.

The Prefect of the legion to which the Iazyges were assigned, the Legio VI Victrix, was one Lucius Artorius Castus. "Artorius" looks like the Latin source of the name "Arthur." Scott Littleton (who taught at Occidental College and, sadly, passed away in 2010) told me personally that we know about the career of Castus from his funeral stele that was discovered in Dalmatia. This intially gave me the impression that the stele was a recent discovery. However, Littleton and Malcor's book cites it from the Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, of 1873 [CIL: Inscriptiones Asiae Provinciarum Europae Graecarum Illyrici Latinae, Theodor Mommsen, #1919, Vol. 3, Part I: 303; Vol 3, Supplement: 2131, Reimer, Berlin].

A curious thing about this information is that a later book, The Complete Roman Legions, by Nigel Pollard and Joanne Berry [Thames & Hudson, 2012], which has detailed treatments of individual legions, lists known officers for some of them, and mentions one officer of Legio VI Victrix --the military tribune Marcus Pontius Laelianus -- nevertheless does not mention Castus in the same connection. Yet Pollard and Berry's reference for their knowledge of Laelianus is a funeral stele at Rome listed in the very same Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum [p.94]! So either they have overlooked the inscriptions about Castus or, for some reason that they do not discuss, they have discounted their validity. Littleton and Malcon mention no disputes of that nature.

So the vivid theory of Litteton and Malcor is that the legends of the Alans, brought by the Iazyges, are perpetuated by their descendants in the North of Roman Britain, folding in with their memory and reverence for their original Legionary commander, Lucius Artorius Castus, and eventually confused with the historical recollection of Ambrosius Aurelius and the Battle of Bandon Hill. For all we know, descendants of the Iazyges may have fought at Badon Hill. This all makes a nice picture; but there is nothing certain about the speculations and disputes over the Arthurian stories except that they will be endless [note].

From this, we may infer that Constantinople was in diplomatic contact with Kings in Britain. It would be nice to know if these were Germans, i.e. Angles, Saxons, or Jutes, or if there was contact with the remaining British kings in Wales or Cornwall. There has been extensive archaeology in Cornwall, in places associated with the Arthurian legends, that has uncovered manifold products of Roman trade from Justinian's day. This adds to the impression of intercourse.

Indeed, I have now seen assertions, purportedly from Irish chronicles, that the bubonic plague arrived in Cornwall in 547. This provides us relevant information on two issues. One, it reinforces the evidence of trade between the Romans and the Britons, since it would have been Roman ships carrying to the plague to Cornwall. Thus, Roman contact with the invading Germans is ruled out; and, as it happens, the Germans' own trade seems to have been back to Germany and Denmark. Next, at the same time, plague among the Britons, but not the Germans, adds an explanation how British defense against the Germans can have been damaged. The plague might have killed a large portion of the British population, limiting the manpower available for defense.

The link of Cornwall to the Arthurian legends is strong. Arthur was the son of Igraine (Ygrayne) who was the wife of Gorlois, Duke of Cornwall. Because of the lust of King Uther Pendragon for her, war is made on the Duke; and Igraine is stashed in Tintagel Castle, Cornwall. As the Duke is being killed in battle, Uther is disguised by Merlin as Gorlois with a glamour, and lies with Igraine, who thinks he is her husband. Arthur is conceived. Various accounts of her fate exist, including that she married Uther, or that she straightaway died. Either way, Arthur is Cornish by birth.

But Procopius may have been unfair about the "barbarians" part. If it is still the British in Cornwall, which it would have been for some time, then they could very well have a claim to still be Roman citizens. With contact back and forth to Constantinople, I wonder if that is how they thought of themselves. King Arthur the civis Romanus. If Badon Hill is dated to 535, this is actually during the reign of Justinian. It could have been Arthur himself receiving subsidies. Roman money could have paid for Camelot. This did not even occur to Littleton and Malcor, or work its way into any Arthur movies. We could have Arthur admiring images of Theodora -- distracting his attention away from Guinevere. Something to think about.

The Boundaries of the Romans, Britain, Spain, etc.

2. LAST WESTERN EMPERORS [names in brackets not recognized by East]		WESTERN COMMANDERS Magistri Militum
Avitus Eparchius Avitus	455-456 W, d.456/7	Remistus (a Visigoth)	456
Proclaimed by Visigoths, 455; Comes Ricimer defeats Vandals at Agrigentum & destroys their fleet off Corsica, Visigoths invade Spain, 456; deposed by Majorian & Ricimer, Bishop of Piacenza, 456		Ricimer (half Visigoth & half Suevic)	456-472
Majorian Julius Valerius Maiorianus	457-461 W
Vandals surprise & burn fleet organizing against them in Spanish ports, Majorian discredited, murdered, 461; Aegidius in Gaul never acknowledges subsequent Emperors
[Libius Severus]	461-465 W
interregnum	465-467 W
Anthemius Procopius Anthemius	jure uxoris 467-472 W
Joint E/W expedition against Vandals fails, 468; Anthemius captured in Rome & executed by Gundobad, 472
[Olybrius Anicius Olybrius]	472 W
interregnum	472-473 W	Gundobad	472-474
[Glycerius]	473-474 W, d.480?		King of Burgundy, 473-516
Julius Nepos	474-480 W	Ecdicius	474-475
		son of Avitus
	deposed in Ravenna, retreats to Dalmatia, 475	Orestes	475-476
	[Romulus "Augustulus"]
	475-476 W, d.507?
Odo(w)acer, Ὀδόακρος (a Scirus?)			476-493
deposes Orestes & Augustulus, 476; Nepos killed, 480; defeated, besieged, & killed by Theodoric, 489-493

The last twenty years of the Western Empire are mainly the story of the commander Ricimer. The last Western Emperor really worthy of the name was probably Majorian, who was a military man in his own right and operated with success in Gaul and Spain. The naval expedition he organized against the Vandals in 461 (one of some four attempts to put down the Vandals in this era) failed when Gaiseric, apparently with good intelligence, destroyed the Roman fleet in its ports in Spain. Majorian was murdered by Ricimer on returning to Italy.

Henceforth, the Emperors were mainly puppets and operations were confined to Italy or the area of Arles in southern Gaul. More than the coup of Odoacer, Ὀδόακρος, in 476, this signaled a real institutional change in the Western Empire. The German Ricimer would now hold the real power, with little better than figurehead Emperors.

With Ricimer either unconcerned or distracted, the rest of the Western Empire fell by default to the Vandals, Visigoths, and Burgundians. A detached Roman pocket, intially under a commander, Aegidius, appointed by Majorian, remained in the north of Gaul until the Frankish King Clovis subjugated it in 486. Britain had been abandoned to illiterate mythology. Ricimer was once perusaded to accept an Emperor from the East, Anthemius, and to participate in another assault on the Vandals; but this was a disaster, and he ended his "reign" with another figurehead on the throne.

Gundobad, a nephew of Ricimer, the killer of Anthemius, and shortly to be King of Burgundy (where he would outlive most of his contemporaries), succeeded Ricimer and briefly had his own figurehead on the throne. This was the Count Glycerius. Gundobad acquiesced in the installation of a new nominee of the Eastern Emperor -- Julius Nepos -- and decamped to Burgundy.

As with the previous Eastern nominee, it is obvious that such Emperors only would have been effective if they had brought their own army. The first commander of Nepos, Ecdicius, was a son of the former Emperor Avitus. Ecdicius, however, was soon followed by a new commander, Orestes, Ὀρέστης. There was now some difficulty, however, with the German troops of the Empire accepting a non-German commander. This problem reached a head when, rather than working together to get things organized again, Nepos was chased out to Dalmatia by Orestes, who assumed command and then put his own son, a child -- Romulus the "little Augustus" -- on the throne. The German troops wanted to be settled on the land in Italy, which Orestes resisted. So in 476, Orestes was killed and his son then deposed by the German Odoacer (who originally may have been in the guard of Anthemius), who decided to do without a figurehead Emperor.

This was the rather anticlimactic "Fall of Rome." Odoacer even returned the Western Regalia to Constantinople. Nepos, meanwhile, was still in Dalmatia. Odoacer was rid of him by 480, reportedly (in the historian Malchus) with the help of no less than Glycerius, who on his deposition had been appointed Bishop of Salonae -- hard by Nepos in Spalatum. This may be who assassinated Nepos, leaving the territory open to Odoacer, who could conveniently "avenge" Nepos.

We can see an example of the ways that the "Fall of Rome" can be misrepresnted in an on-line posting of Roman history by the Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York. Thus, the Museum says:

The Visigoth Alaric sacked Rome in 410 A.D. and, in 476 A.D., the German Odovacer advanced on the city and deposed Romulus Augustulus (r. 475–476 A.D.), commonly known as the last Roman emperor of the West. Odovacer became, in effect, king of Rome until 493 A.D., when Theodoric the Great established the Ostrogothic kingdom in Italy.

The principal falsehood here is the implication that Romulus Augustulus was in Rome, where he was overthrown by Odoacer. He was, of course, actually in Ravenna.

Not so much a falsehood as a deception is the statement that "German Odovacer advanced on the city." We are left to assume that Odoacer, like Alaric, was leading a force of tribal Germans who took the city. However, this conceals that fact that Odoacer was the Magister Militum, in command of the Roman Army, where he had deposed, in a coup, the father, Orestes, of Romulus Augustulus. As such, he then deposed an Emperor, one who was not even regarded as legitimate by Constantinople, as previous Magistri had done several times. Nothing unusual about it. That he did not then appoint his own puppet Emperor is what was unusual.

Thus, the author of this passage, given as Christopher Lightfoot, writes it to give the impression that in 476 some German tribe has seized Rome and deposed the Emperor. Which is probably what most people might believe already, but which a conscientious historian should be correcting, not reinforcing. Perhaps even worse, this seems to be part of a booklet sold by the Museum, “The Roman Empire (27 B.C.–393 A.D.),” in the Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History (New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000).

Having misrepresented the events of 476, Lightfood then adds that Odoacer "became, in effect, king of Rome." But, as we've seen, Odoacer remained, de jure, a faithful servant of the Emperor in Constantinople. He was recognized as a King, but of his own German soliders, not "of Rome," which would have meant something rather different. And, if so, why would not Theodoric then also have been "king of Rome"? None of this addresses the mores or claims at the time.

Since Odoacer, de jure, was a faithful officer of the Emperor in Constantinople, one could say that the last institutional existence of the Western Empire surived until Odoacer was overthrown by the Ostrogoths in 493. The real difference, however, had come in 456, when Ricimer gained control of the army. His long tenure structurally prepared the way for the demise of the Western Empire.

The pathetic and ephemeral "Little Augustus" Romulus, who wasn't even remembered as a Roman Emperor by later Mediaeval historians, such as the Venerable Bede, is now often dignified, with great portent and drama, as the "Last Emperor" (this would be -- 末帝, Mòdì -- in Chinese, where it could be used postumously for the last Emperor of a Dynasty, most notably the Ch'ing Dynasty). This is what we may get from writers who scrupulously, albeit fallaciously, remind us that the later Empire, when they are not calling it the "Byzantine Empire," was merely the "Eastern Roman Empire." They often forget the "Western" when talking about Augustulus as Emperor.

The narrative is clearly that the Eastern Empire wasn't really Roman because to be "Roman" you need Rome, and Rome was in the West. That Augustulus never "ruled" from Rome, but from Ravenna, may then be forgotten as well. It would confuse the picture. The Last Roman Emperor must have been clinging to the Eternal City like a shipwrecked sailor to a raft. The best that can be said for this approach is that it is ahistorical, since for judgments about the Empire and Roman-ness at the time, the City was irrelevant. And, as we see from the cases of Anthemius and Nepos, the Eastern Emperor always retained some authority over who would be his Western colleague.

The lapse of the Western Throne simply meant that authority over the Western Empire, however reduced or tenuous its existence, reverted entirely to Constantinople. The division of the Empire, which had never been more than a device and a convenience, despite the very different circumstances and institutional histories and fates of the two halves, lapsed and was completely forgotten -- until revived by Modern historians, who now don't understand what these f***ing Greeks were doing calling themselves "Romans." I fear that that is often about the level of their treatment.

This is the kind of attitude we actually see with Bryan Ward-Perkins, in his The Fall of Rome, and the End of Civilization:

The early Germanic Kings of Italy, and elsewhere, even minted their gold coins in the name of the reigning emperor in the East, as though the Roman empire was still in existence. [Oxford University Press, 2005, 2006, p.68]

The Germans knew that the unity of the Empire had been restored, under the authority of the Emperor in Constantinople; but that circumstance has still not quite sunk in with Ward-Perkins, despite the perspective of 1500 years.

Having disposed of Orestes in a coup, thereby becoming Magister Militum, Odoacer dethroned his son, Augustulus, in Ravenna. Odoacer in fact was eventually himself deposed, after a long siege of Ravenna, by Goths, the Ostrogoths under Theodoric -- who received Odoacer's surrender and then murdered him at a "friendship" banquet. The distortions in the movie are certainly made to preserve the image of Rome (the City) being conquered by barbarian hordes.

At the same time, we get the notion that Romulus Augustulus is somehow the descendant or heir of Julius Caesar. There is no evidence of this, Caesar himself had no descendants, and the other heirs were pretty much wiped out by 69 AD (though the movie actually says that the unrelated Tiberius was the last of the ruling Caesars!). The Eastern Empire does come in for mention in the movie, but only so that it can absurdly contribute a female warrior,

Conan (Odoacer?) the Barbarian

played by an actress from India (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan), to the defense of Rome. I didn't know that India was part of the Roman Empire.

Hollywood (or, in this case, the Euro Italian-French-British co-producers) should have saved this stuff for a remake of Arnold Schwarzenegger's Conan the Barbarian [1982]. Otherwise, in its absurdity, it would have been just the thing for Monty Python.

We did get a remake of Conan the Barbarian in 2011. It was not successful, with a plot unrelated to the earlier Conan, and failed to make back its budget even in the international market. It is noteworthy now simply as starring Jason Momoa, who has gone on to make a splash with "Aquaman" and other characters. Part Hawaiian and born in Hawai'i, Momoa qualifies for "Pacific Islander" characters, avoiding the controversies over actors who are the wrong ethnicity for certain parts. Dwayne Johnson, who is half black (with some Irish) and half Sāmoan, is similarly qualified, voicing the god Maui in the film Moana [2016]. It is not clear, of course, what ethnicity Conan would have been.

On Hollywood

Little is known about the Roman pocket in the north of Gaul. We hear about Aegidius, the magister militum per Gallias, apparently appointed by Majorian. In the Notitia Dignitatum, the commander of Roman forces in Gaul was the magister equitum, Master of Horses instead of Soldiers. Ordinarily, the Master of Horses would be a title inferior to Master of Soldiers, since cavalry was an auxiliary force to the infantry. The title of the Master of Horse of Gaul, however, may mean that he was second in command for entire Western Army, a serious position indeed.

Master of Horse of Gaul
Aegidius	c.458-464
Paul	464-?
Syagrius	?-486
defeated, killed by Clovis

Since the strength of the forces in Gaul was some 32,500 men, this reinforces that interpretation -- although we then wonder why such a force seems to have been so ineffective when the Alans, Vandals, and Suevi invaded on New Year's Day of 407. Bury speculates that Aegidius held both titles [J.B. Bury, History of the Later Roman Empire, Volume I, Dover Publications, 1958, p.333].

Aegidius did not accept the fall of Majorian or recognize Libius Severus, but he was preoccupied fighting the Visigoths until his death in 464. He was followed by someone we only know as the Count (comes) Paul. "Count" ("companion" of the Emperor) is actually a high title, but Bury supposes he must have also held the "Master" titles also. Ricimer appointed his own magister militum for Gaul, Gundioc, the King of Burgundy (434-473); but both Aegidius and Paul maintained their position with the help of the Franks, who remained loyal allies, against the Visigoths and Burgundians.

That changed when a new Frankish King, Clovis (Chlodwig), succeeded his father in 481. Meanwhile, Paul had been followed by the son of Aegidius, Syagrius. The Franks actually called him rex Romanorum, a good indication that his realm and authority were seen as quite independent -- indeed, there was no longer a Western Emperor at that point. It is not known what Syagrius called himself. Clovis defeated him at Soissons in 486. Syagrius fled to the Visigoths, who returned him for execution by Clovis.

Vercingetorix Throws Down His Arms at the Feet of Julius Caesar, Lionel-Noël Royer (1852-1926), 1899

This was the end of Roman Gaul, 546 years after Caesar had completed its conquest in 56 BC -- or perhaps 531 years since the defeat and capture of the rebel Vercingetorix in 52 BC. We see Vercingetorix surrendering in the 1899 painting by Lionel-Noël Royer at right. Caesar was less kind to Vercingetorix than he was to his defeated Roman enemies, or than later Emperors would be to enemies like Zenobia, since he kept him locked up for five years before parading him in Caesar's own Triumph, and executing him at the end of it. Now the dominance of the Franks would begin, and in time Gaul would take their name -- without forgeting, however, Vercingetorix, who was wholly unrelated to them.

Rome and Romania Index

Κύριε, ἐλέησον... ὀρθόδοξον βασιλέα τῇ οἰκουμένῃ...

ἡμεῖς δοῦλοι τῆς αὐγούστας· εὐσεβῆ Κύριε, ζωὴν αὐτῇ· πολλὰ τὰ ἔτη τῆς αὐγούστας· Ἀριάδνη αὐγούστα, σὺ νικᾷς· Ῥωμαίων βασιλέα τῇ οἰκουμένῃ.

Lord have mercy!... An orthodox Emperor for the Empire!...

We are the slaves of the Augusta! Holy Lord, [long] life to her! Many years for the Augusta! Ariadne Augusta, may you be victorious! An Emperor of the Romans for the Empire!

Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, "Proclamation of Anastasios (I) of divine memory as emperor," De Ceremoniis, Book I, Chapter 92, Constantine Porphyrogennetos, The Book of Ceremonies, translated by Ann Moffatt and Maxeme Tall, with the Greek edition of the Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae (Bonn, 1829), Australian Association for Byzantine Studies, Byzantina Australiensia 18, Canberra, 2012, Volume I, pp.418-419; the Empress Ariadne, daughter of Leo I and widow of Zeno, charged with chosing a new Emperor, who will be Anastasius I, 491 AD.

C. THE EAST ALONE, 476-518, 42 Years

1. LEONINES
Leo I the Thracian , the Great, , the Bessian, , the Butcher Flavius Valerius Leo Marcellus	457-474 E
First Emperor Crowned by Patriarch of Constantinople; Joint E/W expedition against Vandals fails, 468; Germans purged, Aspar executed, 471
Leo II Flavius Leo	473-474 E
Zeno the Isaurian (Tarasikodissa, Tarasis Kodisa, of Rusumblada) Flavius Zeno	jure uxoris 474-491 E+W
Attack on Constantinople by Theodoric Strabo the Goth, 481; Acacian Schism, 484-519
[ Basiliscus]	475-476 E
Fire in Constantinople, destroys Basilica or Imperial Stoa Library, founded by Julian, of 120,000 volumes, and statuary, including the great statue of Zeus from Olympia and the Aphrodite of Cnidus, at the Lauseion Palace, 475
Anastasius I Flavius Anastasius	jure uxoris 491-518
Revolt and pacification of the Isaurians, 492-498; reforms coinage, 498; Attack on Constantiniople by Vitalianus, nominal agent of the Pope, his fleet defeated at Golden Horn, army defeated at Sykai, 515

Leo I purged the Eastern Army of key Germans, bracing it up with Isaurians, previously distinguished for their banditry, and so turned the East away from the process of barbarization that had rendered the Western Army useless -- although the people of Constantinople regarded the Isaurians themselves as barbaric, and there was more than one instance of mob violence and massacre against them. Despite the death toll from the riots probably being greater, Leo's purge of the Army earned him the epithet Μακέλλης, "Butcher"; but this was butchery that finally broke the influence of Germans over the Roman Army and the Throne. Leo was also called a Βῆσσος, "Bessian," identifying his ethnic background from Thrace was with the Thracian Βῆσσοι, the Bessi.

The purge in particular involved the family of Aspar, of Alan and Gothic descent, with a Persian name. Aspar and his father, Ardaburius, had both been active and successful Roman soldiers. They had led the suppression of the rebellion by the Magister Militum Castinus, and his puppet Emperor John, in Italy, 423-425.

By 450, Aspar, disqualified from the Throne as both a barbarian and an Arian, would become a king-maker, putting forward Marcian, one of his staff, as Emperor. He did the same thing in 457, with Leo the Thracian. The failure of the expedition against the Vandals in 468, however, raised suspicions that Aspar might not have favored its success, while the failure itself gave him leverage over Leo.

Aspar began to aspire to putting his family on the Throne. In 470 he got Leo to make his son, Patricius, a Caesar, and to marry him to Leo's daughter, Leontia. This provoked the people of Constantinople, and the Church. The vow that Patricius would convert from Arian to Orthodox did not entirely quiet things down, and Leo began to plan his coup.

While Aspar and his son Ardaburius were killed, it is not clear what happened to Patricius, although we do not hear of him again; and soon we see Leontia with a different husband (as we see below). Aspar's Gothic followers tried to attack the palace, but Leo had previously prepared a defense, in the form of the Excubitors, one of the first of the Tagmata. The Goths were defeated and decamped to join their fellows in the Balkans. Leo and Zeno had to tolerate, and buy off, Goths in the Balkans for a few more years.

Whether or not Patricius survived the coup, this was not the absolute end of Aspar's family or of Germans in the Roman Army. Aspar's granddaughter Godisthea married into another Romanized Gothic family, that of Areobindus, who had shared the Consulship with Aspar in 434. Her son, also Areobindus, faithfully led armies for the Emperor Anastasius. He married actual Roman nobility, the daughter of the ephemeral Western Emperor Olybrius (of the venerable Anicia gens), whose own wife was a daughter of the Emperor Valentinian III. This was as close as any of the family got to the Throne in Constantinople, although their son, also Olybrius, did achieve the rank of Consul in 491. Obviously, the elder Areobindus was not considered part of the faction of Aspar, and Leo's coup was not just indiscriminately killing Germans.

Ricimer (like Aspar) may not have really wanted the expedition to succeed, and it wasn't long before he got rid of Anthemius -- who Leo had advised in 471 to assassinate Ricimer as Leo had just done Aspar. But Anthemius either hesitated or did not have the forces or the opportunity. The killer of Anthemius was the interesting Gundobad, who followed Ricimer as Magister Militum but then returned home to rule as a King of Burgundy (473-516).

Later, after Odoacer decided not to bother with a Western Emperor, Leo's Isaurian son-in-law, Zeno, found himself as the first Emperor of a "united" Empire since Theodosius I, but little was left of the West. Only Odoacer in Italy vaguely acknowledged the Emperor's suzerainty -- we don't know what allegiance to Constantinople, if any, remained in the Roman pocket in northern Gaul.

Nothing was done about this at the time, and Anastasius, by temperament or by wisdom, concentrated on allowing the East to rest and build up its strength. Part of that involved reforming the coinage, which is one of the benchmarks for the beginning of "Byzantine" history. The economies of Anastasius left the treasury full (to the delight of Justinian); but taxes, of course, are not always popular. In 512 rioters called for ἄλλον βασιλέα τῇ Ῥωμανίᾳ, "another emperor for Romania!" Anatasius rode this out; and its principal interest for us may be the use of the word Ῥωμανία, which is thus attested in popular language at the time. This is only important because of the practice of Classicists and Byzantinists to ignore the word.

Similarly, such Byzantinists continue to call Romania the "Eastern Roman Empire," or already "Byzantium," even when contemporaries understood that the unity of the Empire had been restored, a term such as "Eastern" was never used, and there was no institutional remant, or even claims, to a continued "Western" Empire. This simply bespeaks a bias and hostility of Western historians to the Emperors in Constantinople, not to mention the shadow of the absurd "Donation of Constantine," and all the claims and ideology of the Papacy and the German Emperors, and later of German nationalism, insensibly perpetuated by Western scholarship.

On the map we see the classic form of the German successor Kingdoms of the Western Empire. By 493 Theodoric the Ostrogoth, invited by the Emperor Anastasius, had taken out Odoacer in Italy. This was just in time to save the Visigoths, who were defeated by the Franks in 507 and pushed out of Gaul. The result has the look of a nice balance of power, but there is no telling how long that might have lasted. What upset things was not any internal development, but a most unexpected revival and return of Roman power. In the beloved story of the "Fall" of Rome, this sequel is usually what gets overlooked.

The title here looks odd, since the Roman state had divided into Eastern and Western Empires, not into Northern and Southern. However, this is a moment when Romania seems to have had an experience and a fate much like China of the Northern and Southern Empires Period. As German tribes have here overrun the entire Western Roman Empire, by 316 AD the "Five Barbarians," 五胡, wǔhú, had overrun the North of China, capturing and executing the last two Emperors of the Western Chin/Tsin Dynasty (266-316).

The further history of the two Empires would be rather different. The unity the China would be restored by the Sui Dynasty, but the impetus would be from the barbarian north, as though Charlemagne and the Franks had restored the Roman Empire. Instead, the partial restoration of Romania by Justinian would ultimately be undone by a new invasion from an entirely different direction, with the Arab Conquest of the Levant and North Africa.

While the unity of China was periodically sundered and restored again, the invasions were always from the North, and of the same generally related peoples, culminating with the Mongols and finally the Manchus. While China survived, Romania, with the old unity never restored, would ultimately be totally destroyed by a similarly related Central Asian people, the Turks -- the third group of speakers of Altaic languages. With Romania, it was "three strikes and you're out": The Germans (beginning at Adrianople), then the Arabs (at Yarmuk), and finally the Turks (at Manzikert). But even the Turks never restored the Empire of Trajan or Constantine. Yet today, Communist China has essential inherited the Empire of the Manchus, with Chinese revenge and genocide visited on the Uighurs and the Tibetans, while the world seems to yawn.

Also noteworthy as a benchmark for the beginning of "Byzantine" history in the time of the Leonines, besides the coinage, is the apparent final disappearance of the full, traditional Roman tria nomina, the three names of praenōmen, nōmen, and cognōmen, which have been given with previous Emperors. The last Emperor with three full names may have been Majorian, Julius Valerius Majorianus. In general, the Valentian and Theodosian Emperors only had two names (that I can find), e.g. Valens, Fl. Valens, and Theodosius I & II, both Fl. Theodosius. From Marcian onward there is no evidence of any traditional Roman nomenclature, apart from the perfunctory addition of "Flavius" (Greek Φλάβιος) and some other epithets to many names -- and occasonally, we get a blast, as with Justinian, of multiple names.

Amazing how well the Flavian gens survives over the centuries! Why is this happening? Well, even though it had been some time since the nōmen had any connection to the actual ancestral gentes (singular gens, the clan) of the early Republic, and all the names were becoming like titles or statements, the system of the tria nomina still bore a connection to the idea of the Roman family cult of ancestor worship. As it happens, the names became political titles linked to the purported ancestry of particular, formative Emperors. Thus, everyone who became a citizen in 212 could use the gens Aurelius, as Caracalla himself was "M. Aurelius Antoninus." Elagabalus and Alexander Severus used "Aurelius," and it turns up in Claudius II and, most significantly, as "Aurelianus" in the Emperor we then call "Aurelian."

In turn, Dioceletian was "C. Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus," using "Valerius," actually given as a cognōmen, as the defining name that he would establish for the Tetrarchs -- the Greek versions, Οὐαλέριος and Βαλέριος, may reflect Latin w/v phonology (the digraph ου was for "w," as in Coptic and, for that matter, French -- e.g. oui) and Greek b/v (changing to Mediaeval and Modern Greek phonology), respectively. Diocletian and Maximinus sported the double-barreled "Aurelius Valerius," but a telling development is that the women, as was traditional with the original gentes, used "Valeria" as their principal name. So Diocletian's daughter and granddaughter were each "Valeria," as the daughter of Augustus was "Julia." "Valerius" was used by all legitimate Tetrarchs.

This was also true with Constantius Chlorus, or "Fl. Valerius Constantius" (Φλάβιος Βαλέριος Κωνστάντιος) and Constantine, "Fl. Valerius Constantinus" (Φλάβιος Βαλέριος Κωνσταντῖνος). But that is also the beginning of something rather different. As the Constantian dynasty supplants the Tetrarchs, "Flavius" begins to be used to mark its adherents. But this originates as a praenōmen (traditionally no more than a random given name), not a nōmen, and it continues to be used that way, with the nōmen chosen to signify something else. Thus, Constantine II was "Fl. Claudius Contantinus" and Constans I was "Fl. Julius Constans," with wholly fictional invocations of the Claudian and Julian gentes. This continues through the dynasty, with subsequently Emperors reflexively, and certainly perfunctorily, adding the praenōmen "Flavius." Meanwhile, none of the Constantian women are "Flavia." The preference is for some version of the other names, like "Constantia," or wholly unrelated names, like "Helena." So the traditional pattern is entirely broken.

With the Severans, who, of course, were of Punic and Syrian ancestry, the original meaning of the gens was lost. No Confucian venerated ancestors in a household shrine more devoutly than the original pious Romans. But this could not survive the influx of Romanized foreigners, for whom the gens was meaningless, and especially with the adoption of Christianity, where a household ancestor shrine would be a shocking pagan practice. A Christian receives a single Christian name. Indeed, it is a while before we get names, like Michael or John, that look more Christian than Roman and Greek, as do Jovian, Leo, or Heraclius (still commemorating Heracles -- and so Hera); but the trend is obvious. Indeed, the names beginning with the Valentians aleady look like the pro forma addition of "Flavius" to the single basic name of the Emperors -- even of Aëtius, "Flavius Aëtius." Our Leo I here even used "Flavius Valerius" (Φλάβιος Βαλέριος Λέων), recalling both Constantine and the Tetrarchs. This is all it does. I'm not sure that anyone ever goes that far again.

Eventually we get the return of surnames, at first for nobility. The first Dynasty with a family name will be the Ducases in the 11th century. It took a few more centuries before surnames became common among European Christians of all classes, and then required by law.

Changing Architecture

Another momentous transition is in architecture. The lovely temples of Classical antiquity, like jewels in the landscape, disappear. Christian churches of the period often look like piles of bowls or dark fruitcakes. Or we simply get the basilica, a Roman courthouse. Churches often are not even visible from a distance, because they may be packed around with other buildings.

Why is this happening? Were Christians just anaesthetic? No. The aesthetic was certainly changing, but the most important difference was just the difference in purpose between a temple and a church. A temple was the house of a god, with little space inside but for the god and a few priests. It was not supposed to contain a body of worshipers. The public side of the temple was the exterior, the visible sign of the god's presence.

With a church, however, the purpose was not to house God, whose presence was ineffable, but to house the congregation, the ekklēsía, ἐκκλησία, the "assembly" that gave its name in many modern languages for "church," like French église or Spanish iglesia -- where "church" itself (and Scots "kirk" or German Kirche) seems to be from kyriakos, κυριακός, "of the Lord." The public side of a church is thus the interior, not the exterior, and the outwardly ugliest early churches often contain marvelous inner spaces, with rich decoration. These quickly become awesome spaces, as in Sancta Sophia, for centuries the greatest church of Christendom.

Above, at left, and below we see images from the "Red Monastery," , Dayr al-ʾAḥmar (دَيْرُ ٱلْأَحْمَر), in Upper Egypt -- also known as the , Dayr ʾAmbā Bišāy (دَيْرُ أَنْبَا بِشَاي), the "Monastery of Father Pishay," its founder. The monastery was established in the 4th century and densely decorated in the 5th and 6th. Neglected for centuries, the images were actually preserved by soot and the dry climate. They have now been cleaned and restored by the "Red Monastery Project," benefiting from multiple sources of funding.

The preservation of the colors is remarkable. Many frescoes in Italian churches, at half the age, have decayed or been damaged by flood beyond restoration or even recognition. Where colors are preserved tends to be with mosaics, as at the old churches of Ravenna. So this is a remarkable place. We can also imagine the interior as a refuge from the heat of Egypt. It is a refuge in many ways.

Roman domes could do what most Roman temples did not try to do. In the Red Monastery and San Vitale in Ravenna we see constructions of dome upon dome, or half dome upon half dome. As it happens there was a precedent for this. Hadrian's Pantheon in Rome is undistinguished and unremarkable from the outside yet contains a wonderful interior under the largest dome of pre-modern engineering. We do not see that repeated in Rome itself, but the device was taken up with gusto in later churches. The dome of Sancta Sophia is smaller than that of the Pantheon but used more dramatically. The Pantheon is essentially one large, really nice room. Sancta Sophia holds a vast space -- the 184 foot rise of the dome on its piers can easily contain the 151 foot Statue of Liberty. Centuries of visitors, often from places with no stone buildings, like Northern Europe, found themselves awestruck.

Eventually, a form of church evolved that transformed the basilica into a building with a monumental external face and a monumental internal space.

Ἅγια Σοφία, Sancta Sophia, Santa Sophia, Aya Sofya

These would be the Romanesque and Gothic cathedrals, but it would be centuries before the technology could handle the spidery supports, of walls pierced with windows and held by buttresses, that both size and relatively lightness required. Then the basilica and the dome would be combined, to produce in the Renaissance the new largest church in Christendom, St. Peter's in Rome. But this would happen as culturally Francia surpassed Romania.

The instructive comparison is with the practice in ʾIslām, where the purpose of a mosque -- جَامِع, jāmiʿ, "collector," and masjid, مَسْجِد, "place for prayer/prostration" -- was similar to that of a church. This can be seen in the Omayyad Mosque in Damascus, based on Syrian churches, which is all but invisible from the outside, hidden in the midst of the city, but contains two marvelous spaces, a courtyard and the lovely interior of the prayer hall, with mosaics as in churches of the time. On the other hand, a monument of the same era, the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, stands conspicuously like a pagan temple, high on the Temple Mount itself. But the purpose of the Dome is more like a temple. It was built less for a congregation than for the Rock itself, commemorating the Temple of Solomon and the site of the Prophet Muḥammad's "dream journey" to heaven. Finally, the Ottoman mosques of Sinan (c.1500-1588), based on the model of Sancta Sophia, produce the monumental Islāmic equivalent of the cathedral. At the same time, however, the Ottomans prohibited churches with domes. The style was seized as part of the looting of Constantinople. This may have helped motivate the form of St. Peter's.

Rome and Romania Index

Quod principi placuit, legis habet vigorem: utpote cum lege regia, quae de imperio eius lata est, populus ei et in eum omne suum imperium et potestatem conferat.

Whatever the Emperor has decreed [i.e. pleases the prince] has the force of law; since by a Royal ordinance which was passed concerning his sovereignty, the people conferred upon him all their own authority and power.

A decision given by the emperor has the force of a statute. This is because the populace commits to him and into him its own entire authority and power, doing this by the lex regia which is passed anent his authority.

Justinian, Digest, 1.4.1; S. P. Scott, The Civil Law, II, Cincinnati, 1932 [Alan Watson, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1985, Revised English-language edition, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1998]; noteworthy that the power of the Emperor, although absolute in principle, derives from the people, not from himself or from God -- there is no "Divine Right" in Roman law; and when the people pronounce an Emperor ἀνάξιος, "unworthy," that may be the end of him.

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The Franks [Φράγγοι] are not nomads, as some barbarians are, but their politeia [πολιτεία, res publica] and laws are modeled on the Roman pattern, apart from which they uphold similar standards with regard to contracts, marriage and religious observance. They are in fact all Christians and adhere to the strictest orthodoxy. They also have magistrates in their cities and priests and celebrate the feasts in the same way as we do; and, for a barbarian people, strike me as extremely well-bred and civilized and as practically the same as us except for their uncouth [βαρβαρικόν, barbarikòn] style of dress and peculiar [ἰδιάζον, idiázon] language. I admire them for their other attributes and especially for the spirit of justice and harmony which prevails amongst them.

Agathias of Myrina (c.532-c.582 AD), Histories, 1.2.3-5, quoted by Anthony Kaldellis, The Byzantine Republic, People and Power in New Rome [Harvard University Press, 2015, pp.67 & 222], cf. Gibbon on the "Greeks."

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ἡ δὲ κἀκ τριῶν τρυπημάτων ἐργαζομένη ἐνεκάλει τῇ φύσει, δυσφορουμένη ὅτι δὴ μὴ καὶ τοὺς τιτθοὺς αὐτῇ εὐρύτερον ἢ νῦν εἰσι τρυπώη, ὅπως καὶ ἄλλην ἐνταῦθα μίξιν ἐπιτεχνᾶσθαι δυνατὴ εἴη.

And though she made use of three openings, she used to take Nature [φύσις] to task, complaining that it had not pierced her breasts [τιτθοί] with larger holes so that it might be possible for her to contrive another method of copulation [μῖξις] there.

Procopius, Procopius VI, The Anecdota or Secret History, translated by H.B. Dewing [Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, 1935, pp.108-109], speaking of the Empress Theodora in her days as a courtesan (ἑταῖρα).

D. RETURNING TO THE WEST, 518-610, 92 years

1. JUSTINIANS
Justin I Flavius Iustinus	518-527
End of Acacian Schism, 519; earthquake at Antioch, 526
St. Justinian I Flavius Petrus Sabbatius Iustinianus, Peter Sabbataeus	527-565
Plato's Academy closed, 529; Nika Revolt, 532; North Africa regained from Vandals, 533-534; Rome regained (#1), "Year without Summer," 536; end of dating by Consuls, 537; Ostrogoths surrender, Belisarius occupies Ravenna, 540; Bubonic Plague, 541-545; Ostrogoths revive, 541; Rome lost, sacked, 546 (#2); Rome regained, 547 (#3); silkworm eggs arrive from China, 550; Rome lost, 549 (#4); Earthquake in Lebanon, Beirut devastated, tsunami destroys Κῶς, Kôs, on the island of Κῶς, 551; Ostrogoths defeated by Narses at Busta Gallorum or Taginae, Rome regained, 552 (#5); Council V, Constantinople II, Monophysitism condemned again, 553; Andalusia regained from Visigoths, 554; return of Plague, 558; defeat of Bulgars & Slavs by Belisarius, 559; Ponte Salario at Rome restored by Narses, 565
Justin II Flavius Justinus Junior	565-578
Lombards Invade Italy, 568; return of Plague, 573
Tiberius II Flavius Tiberius Constantinus	jure uxoris 574-578, Caesar; 578-582, Augustus
Sirmium besieged by Avars, Slavs invade Balkans, delegation from Rome to ask for help against Lombards, 579; Sirmium ceded to Avars, sack of Athens by Slavs, 582
Maurice Flavius Mauricius Tiberius	jure uxoris 582-602
Founding of Monembasia, , 583; Slavs attack Thessalonica, return of Plague, 586; Avars defeated four times north of Danube, return of Plague, 599; famine, troops on Danube mutiny, Maurice & family murdered, 602
non-dynastic
Phocas Flavius Phocas	602-610
Senate in Rome ceases to meet, 602; Column of Phocas, last Imperial monument in the Forum of Rome, 608; Revolt and Civil War, 608-610

Justinian, who had helped his stolid uncle Justin and then inherited the Empire from him, took the rested strength of the East and threw it, commanded by his great general Belisarius, against the Vandals and Ostrogoths.

Against the Vandals, the expedition consisted of 500 transport ships, conveying 10,000 infantry and 5,000 cavalry. Ninety-two warships, δρόμων galleys, escorted the fleet. The Vandals, caught off guard, collapsed quickly, although with some close battles.

Justinian, holding the panier of the Host (of the Eucharist), and Courtiers, with Maximianus, Archbishop of Ravenna (546-556), named
Theodora, holding the Chalice of the Eucharist (otherwise forbidden to women), and Courtiers
547 AD, Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna, 2019

After a more protracted campaign, including a siege of Naples, which Belisarius took by entering through an aqueduct, and a siege of Belisarius in Rome by the Ostrogoths, who cut the aqueducts, Belisarius moved on Ravenna. In 540 the Ostrogoths surrendered, in part with the (deceptive) understanding that Belisarius would rule them. But Belisarius then had to rush East to meet a Persian invasion. He was too late. Khusro I had already sacked Antioch (540).

Then in 541 the resistance of the Ostrogoths revived, and the plague hit the Empire. The campaign in Italy then took another 11 years, with men and money very short. Belisarius was sometimes down to operating with 2000 men. What he was able to do with his limited resources is a tribute to his genius -- very different from generals, like George McClellan (1826-1885), who, flush with troops, excuse their inaction with pleas for reinforcements.

Finally, with an overland invasion and a superior force, the Ostrogoths were defeated by Narses at Busta Gallorum in 552. Totila was killed in the pursuit of the fleeing Goths. Successful, if exhausted, the Romans were able to secure Italy and then part of southern Spain from the Visigoths.

Drawing by Nimphyrios in 1430, bronze equestrian victory statue of Justinian, on the Column of Justinian in the Augustaeum, Constantinople, 543; peacock feathered "toupha," τοῦφα, globus cruciger, called the "apple," symbolic of conquest to the Ottomans; statue removed by Ottomans, fragments examined by travelers, column destroyed, 1515, statue melted down.

The Vandal King Gelimer and the Gothic King Vitiges were both provided estates for quiet retirement in Anatolia.

However, this long fight did more damage to Italy and the City of Rome than the previous period of barbarian invasions. As noted, the Ostrogoths cut the aqueducts into Rome when they had put Belisarius under siege in their counterattack, where sometimes this is falsely presented or mentioned as part of the original barbarism of the original Gothic invasions. Belisarius, of course, held out, although Rome would end up changing hands no less than five times.

Although the Goths revived in 541, they never regained Ravenna; but under Totila they returned to Rome, and, with Belisarius absent in the East, the City was betrayed to them (by unpaid soliders) in 546. Totila, after some looting and mayhem, contemplated demolishing the City but thought better of it after an appeal from Belisarius and others (although it it hardly seems like a task, in size or toil, for tribal Ostrogoths). Nevertheless, the City was left all but depopulated.

After Totila left on campaign, Belisarius, back from the East, then regained Rome in 547, which was then again put under siege. Recalled finally to the East, Belisarius had to endure from a distance the second betrayal of the City (by unpaid soldiers again) and its recoccupation by Totila, in 549. With Ravenna unavailable, Totila settled on Rome as his capital; and so it remained until his defeat and death. This was the last time that Rome would be the capital of a secular state until 1870.

Historians tend to blame Justinian for the destruction to Rome and Italy, as though he should have left well enough alone, with the Goths in control, while somehow the passivity and incompetence of the previous defenders of the West draw little criticism --

Gate of the Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna, 2019

despite confabulations that barbarians broke into Rome in battle and overthrew the last Western Emperor -- in a scene like Constantinople in 1453 -- in 476. If Honorius and his successors had fought with the ferocity and brilliance of Belisarius and Narses, the Western Empire might not have collapsed in the first place. But that is not what someone like Honorius was.

One may begin to suspect that bias against "Byzantium" is operating in this with the idea that Justinian and Belisarius were not Romans, were "foreigners" -- Greeks (although Justinian wasn't) -- and so actually had no right or reason to be invading Italy for any reason. Like Liutprand of Cremona and Edward Gibbon, they may see the Goths as true "Romans" and all Germans, especially the German Emperors, as the proper heirs and successors of (pagan) Rome -- with the irony that those in Gibbon's own lineage, like William Smith (1813-1893), themselves despised the Papacy and the Catholic Church, which promoted these distortions, for its own self-interested reasons, in the first place.

With reduced resources, and with the Plague substantially reducing the population of the Empire, Justinian and his generals gave the Goths a fight that they had never gotten from any of the Last Western Emperors.

Column of Phocas, last monument in the Forum Romanum

And it was a fight indeed. After Totila's death, Goth holdouts massacred 300 Roman hostages of the Senatorial class, substantially contributing to the decline of local government in the City. The Goths, in turn, ended up all but annihilated, and their remnants disappear from history. This is what Theodosius I should have done originally to the Visigoths. Any cost would have been worth it. As it happened, when Rome was secured again to the Empire, its own story quickly becomes that of the Papacy, with the Exarch off in Ravenna and the Pope the principal public official left in the City.

Meanwhile, Justinian had built the greatest church in Christendom, Sancta Sophia, Ἅγια Σοφία, codified Roman Law, and driven the last pagans, at Plato's Academy, out of business. This all wore out the Empire, but it could easily have recovered to new strength if further blows had not fallen.

Ἅγια Σοφία, Sancta Sophia, Santa Sophia, Aya Sofya

The Lombards invaded Italy in 568; and although they were unable to secure the whole peninsula, or the major cities (except in the Po valley), they became a source of constant conflict for most of the next two hundred years. The fragmentation of Italy they effected persisted until the 19th century [note].

At the same time, the Danube frontier had become very insecure. As early as 540 (again) Bulgars and Slavs were raiding into the Balkans. Maurice not only restored the frontier but crossed it to apply the "forward defense" of the Early Empire. Unfortunately, this hard campaigning became unpopular with the troops; and in 602, and when Maurice decided to have the troops winter north of the Danube, they murdered Maurice and his whole family. Under Phocas, things began to unravel. The Persians began the campaign that would net them the Asiatic part of the Empire, recreating the Persia of the Achaeminids, and the Danube frontier collapsed so completely that it would not be restored for almost four hundred years. If only Maurice had been popular with the troops, history might have been much different.

Belisarius, Βελισάριος (d.565), was the Duke of Marlbourgh of the 6th Century. There are several points of comparison. First, for the military genius of both of them, although Marlbourgh may have been more consistently successful, as Belisarius suffered some defeats and inconclusive campaigns. Like Marlborough, Belisarius could patch together new strategies after setbacks and could accomplish much with reduced resources.

Second, just as Sarah Churchill was for long the close friend of Queen Anne, Belisarius's wife Antonina, Ἀντωνίνα, was similarly close to the Empress Theodora. Unlike Sarah, however, Antonina was rumored to be unfaithful to Belisarius, but her relationship with Theodora does not seem to have soured as did Sarah's with Anne. Third, as Anne eventually turned on Sarah and then the Duke, Justinian was sometimes suspicious of Belisarius and withdrew his support.

In the end, Justinian still needed Belisarius. He was recalled from retirement in 559 to stop an invading army of Bulgars. With few resources, he did.

In 562 Belisarius was tried and imprisoned for "corruption," in what was certainly a political prosecution. Justinian then pardoned him, but the legend arose later that Justinian had blinded Belisarius and reduced him to begging. This would have been more extreme than what happened to Malborough; but since it does not seem to have been true (and it was only later that blinding began to be used as a punishment), Malborough's prosecution and exile looks like the worse betrayal.

The story of Justinian, Belisarius, and their wives is confused by the spleen of Procopius, whose Secret History vents his inexplicable animus against them all. Perhaps more historians, writing about their patrons -- and Procopius followed Belisarius for many years as his personal secretary -- feel this way but never express it. Since Procopius says that Justinian and Theodora were demons who walked around at night carrying their detached heads, it is hard to know where the history ends and the fantasy begins.

All of this, however, provides considerable grist for historical fiction, in which Belisarius and the others have often figured. Nevertheless, Belisarius is still not as well known as other generals in history, and the drama and intrigues of Justinian's court, especially with strong and vivid women like Theodora, do not seem to have drawn the dramatic attention that one might expect, certainly not from Hollywood -- perhaps because of a general neglect and estrangement from the Mediaeval history of Romania. Even so, television viewers of the popular series NCIS see the name of Belisarius every week, in the "Belisarius Productions" title of creator Donald Bellisario, whose name, of course (in Italian), itself recalls that of the great general.

As noted above, when the treasures taken by Titus from Herod's Temple in Jerusalem were recovered from the Vandals in 533, they were sent back to Constantinople. According to Procopius, the treasures were being carried in the Triumph of Belisarius when a Jew recognized them and passed word to the Emperor that keeping them in Constantinople would be inauspicious.

Mosaics of the Basilica of San Vitale, including Abraham about to sacrifice Isaac, Ravenna, 2019

Their removal from Jerusalem had brought misfortune on Rome and then on the Vandals. So Justinian "became afraid and quickly sent everything to the sanctuaries of the Christians in Jerusalem" [Procopius, History of the Wars, II, Book IV, ix 5-10, translated by H.B. Dewing, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard U. Press, 1916, 2006, p.281].

There, if the treasures indeed arrived, they disappear from history. There is no reason not to think that they would have been safely kept, but the city was then captured, looted, and destroyed by the Persians in 614.

At that point many treasures, like the True Cross, were carried off to Ctesiphon (though returned after the victory of Heraclius in 628). There is no mention, however, of the fate of anything, generally or specifically, from the Temple in Jerusalem. Since the Jews of Jerusalem were said to have helped the Persians (some question this, since the Persians were persecuting their own Jews), it is possible they took charge of their own treasures, but there is no report of that, and no further historical report at all about the fate of the objects -- except perhaps for the fabulous stories about the Templars, who supposedly found many things in Jerusalem, though these reports are from much later and of an incredible character. The great M^enôrāh, מְנוֹרׇה, of the Temple, described in detail by Josephus and shown on the Arch of Titus, is certainly not something to be easily overlooked.

Mosaics of the Basilica of San Vitale, including Moses removing his sandals at the Burning Bush, Ravenna, 2019

Procopius, unfortunately, does not detail which items were among the treasures recovered by Belisarius. If the Menôrāh was there, any Jew of Constantinople certainly would have recognized it quickly and easily. We are thus left with a considerable mystery, and it is a little surprising that there are not, at least, legends about the fate of the Temple items.

One possibility concerns Procopius' reference to "the sanctuaries of the Christians." This could mean all sorts of things and generally has been interpreted at referring to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. However, Justinian himself was building a large new church in Jerusalem, which actually came to the called the "New," Nea, Church. This was later demolished by the Arabs, but its substructure survives under the Jewish Quarter of Jersualem. That substructure includes a vast cistern, such as Justinian also built in Constantinople. This has suggested to some that crypts of the church may also survive, possibly with items like Temple treasures, which might have been hidden from both Persian and Arab invasions.

By the time the Templars arrived in Jerusalem, they might not even have been aware that the Nea Church had existed -- the cistern was only discovered by Israeli archaeologists after 1967. It seems like a thin hope, but since the Arabs don't report finding any Temple treasures, and no Jewish source mentions taking possession of them, the Nea Church is the sole remaining lead.

While we are mostly still looking at Latin names here -- Justinus, Justinianus, Tiberius -- and Justinian's first language was still Latin, or at least the Proto-Romance language spoken in the Balkans at the time, these are Emperors whose names will primarily be remembered in Greek. So I give the Greek versions. Also, while Justinian is remembered as a Saint in the Orthodox Church, the Latin Church had less use for him, despite its dependance on the Latin Law that Justinian codified. So there is little warmth in Francia for Justinian, and no rulers there ever used his name.

The Plague & Dark Ages Cooling

The arrival of the Plague in Egypt in October 541 was the beginning of an epidemic that cost the City of Constantinople alone perhaps 200,000 citizens. The percentages of people who died in the Empire may compare with those of the Black Death in the 14th century, though by then the population of Europe had grown much larger. Justinian himself contracted the disease, but recovered.

Flying Buttress, later standard on Gothic Cathedrals, Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna, 2019

There is no doubt that this was the Bubonic plague. The historian Procopius describes it with clinical accuracy, especially the characteristic black swellings, the buboes -- a Greek word, βουβῶνες, that Procopius uses, perhaps for the first time for this disease. But the Plague was not the only problem.

The climate was changing -- this may indeed have precipitated the plague, driving rats and fleas out of the colder north down to more agreeable conditions around the Mediterranean. After what is now called the "Roman Warming," we get into the "Dark Ages Cooling." The tree ring record of 540 in Ireland is that "the trees stopped growing." Procopius said that, "For the sun gave forth its light without brightness, like the moon, during this whole year [536], and it seemed exceedingly like the sun in eclipse, for the beams it shed were not clear nor such as it is accustomed to shed" [translated by H.B. Dewing, Procopius, History of the Wars, II, Book IV, xiv 5-6, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard U. Press, 1916, 2006, p.329]. Other records give similar accounts.

The dimness of the sun may be from increased, thin cloud cover, from changes in solar output, volcanic debris, or other causes. Indeed, ice cores from Antarctica and Greenland show a sharp spike in volcanic gasses in 535. It is of such magnitude as to indicate a major eruption. Since the eruption of Mt. Tambora in 1815 resulted in a "year without summer," it is not hard to imagine the eruption of one of the major Indonesian volcanoes (or elsewhere) producing similar results for 535-536.

The source of the volcanic "Dark Age" signature was for long not identified, but it has now credibly been attributed to Mt. (or Lake) Ilopango in El Salvador, which seems to have experienced a cataclysmic eruption around 535 or 536. Thinking a lot about Indonesia, or the Aegean, for such eruptions, Ilopango is a bit startling. And now we learn that, not far away, the El Chichón volcano in Mexico seems to have erputed in 540 AD. A one-two punch. This all also throws some light on Mayan history, since all life would have been exterminated in at least the area of modern El Salvador, Southern Mexico, and more, which was part of Mayan civilization. There seems to have been a serious insult to the flourishing of the city of Tikal, at least, around this time. The eruption of Ilopango was at least as powerful as Krakatoa in 1883 or Pinatubo in 1991, but not as big as Tambora. The El Chicón eruption may have been comparable in magnitude to Ilopango.

It is not clear that the eruptions alone would produce the effects seen over many years, for the weather would be colder and the growing season shorter for some time (as noted for 540). The worst effects of weather on Mayan civilization also seem to occur later. The eruption may have reinforced (or initiated) what was already a cooling trend. Whatever the cause, the climate would adversely impact the population at a time, on top of the deaths from the Plague (whose movement of rats may have been caused by the cooling), when the lack would gravely affect the fate of the Empire.

Without the manpower to put down the Ostrogoths more swiftly and effectively, Justinian devastated Italy in a way that would not have otherwise been necessary and that had not been effected by the original "barbarian invasions" as such. Rome was briefly depopulated, not by the Visigoths in 410 or by the Vandals in 455, and certainly not by the Ostrogoths in 493, but by the more than decade of fighting that it took for the Roman reconquest, when the city changed hands five times and the aqueducts were cut in sieges.

If plague and climate change were not enough, there were also earthquakes. A particularly strong one was in 551, estimated to have had a magnitude of about 7.5, primarily affecting the coast of Lebanon. Beirut was hit hard enough that its prestigious law school had to be moved to Sidon. 30,000 people were said to have been killed. A tsunami also damaged, if not destroyed, other Lebanese cities; and, of course, it propagated to the West. There it is supposed to have destroyed the city of Κῶς, Cos, on the island of Κῶς. In the draw down for the tsunami, the sea is reported to have retreated as much as two miles. Some sunken ships were actually exposed; and, as in similar events, naive people wandered out to inspect or loot the wrecks, only be to helplessly caught in the returning flood.

Another earthquake, in 557, was centered near Constantinople, with a magnitude of perhaps 6.4, causing damage in the City, including a crack in the dome of Sancta Sophia, which led to its collapse a year later. The Northridge earthquake in Los Angeles, in 1994, which I experienced, was a 6.7 magnitude.

I have been a little confused about this word. "Victory" is actually νίκη, níkē, in Attic Greek, and the epithet of the goddess Ἀθήνη Νίκη, Athena Nike, whose small temple graces the Acropolis in Athens. But νίκα, níkā, is the word that was reportedly used. One possibility is that this is just νίκη in the Doric dialect that Byzantium inherited as a colony of the Doric city of Megara -- although the population by the 6th century must be far removed from the customs of the original colonists. The Doric word may have been retained as a local tradition. Or, νίκα may not be a noun at all, but the imperative of the verb νικάω, "to conquer, prevail, vanguish," so that the crowd shouts "conquer," or just "win" to their chariot driver. This now seems more likely to me.

There was considerable unhappiness about the efficiency with which Justinian's officials had been collecting taxes. The revolt and riots, through looting and fire, destroyed a good part of the city, including the old church of Sancta Sophia. Justinian was ready to flee, until Θεοδώρα, Theodora, put some spine into him. Excusing herself, a woman, for reminding the men of courage, she is supposed to have said, "the Purple makes the noblest shroud."

Unfortunately, like many other famous quotes in history, this is not quite right. According to Procopius, Theodora said, "Royalty [Βασιλεία, basileía] is a beautiful shroud" [Procopius, History of the Wars, I, Book I, xxiv 37-38, translated by H.B. Dewing, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard U. Press, 1914, 2001, p.232-233]. In the same speech however, she did say, "I will not be separated from this Purple" -- ἁλουργίς, halourgís, specifically a purple robe [p.230-231 -- see the grammar of this statement].

Ἅγια Σοφία, Sancta Sophia, Santa Sophia, Aya Sofya

The traditional misquotation thus deftly combines two actual quotations. This is one of the most famous statements ever about the "Purple" -- i.e. the Tyrian Purple, πορφύρα, porphýra, of Roman Imperial Robes -- although we also have the kind of stone, Porphyry, that was used in association with the Throne, both for statues of the Emperors and for structures like the lying-in pavillion for pregnant Empresses.

Justinian, thus encouraged, or shamed, put down the revolt. Belisarius surrounded the Hippodrome and massacred everyone in it (perhaps 30,000 people!). Justinian was remembered for these deaths, despite being recognized as a Saint by the Orthodox Church. Because of the damage done to the City, Justinian launched ambitious building projects, including that for the magnificient new Sancta Sophia -- which helped secure his sanctity -- as did the discovery of the looting Crusaders that his body was incorruptible.

Around the year 550 we hear that a couple of Nestorian monks arrive from China with an interesting cargo. For all the earlier centuries of the Roman Empire, Romans had sent gold East through Central Asia and received back silk, the nature of which they were entirely ignorant. The route of this trade has become known, in modern times, as the "Silk Road." From Roman authors we hear nothing about the destination of the gold or the source of the silk. From the Chinese history of the Later Han Dynasty, however, as noted above, we hear that a Roman embassy arrived in China in 166 AD, specifically to try and arrange an alternate route for the silk trade. This was not worked out until much later. We see China identified as Σηρίνδα, "Sērínda," its people as Σῆρες, "Sēres," and so the word for "silken" as σηρικός, "sērikós." Hence, "sericulture."

Eventually, Christian missionaries arrived in China. These were at first Nestorians, who had an advanced base as residents of Sassanid Persian, which monopolized the Western end of the trade. The first notice we have from the Chinese is the appearance of the Nestorians in the T'ang Court in 635 AD. This is in the century after the events of Justinian's reign, but it is possible, if not likely, that the missionaries were already in China, during the troubled Northern and Southern Empires period (266-589), before the T'ang Dynasty was consolidated and took note of them. In any case, the secrets of sericulture and the possession of the eggs of silkworms were closely guarded by the Chinese government.

As related by Procopius, the story we get is that the Nestorian missionaries arrived in Constantinople from India and told Justinian that they had visited China and had learned the secrets of silk making:

...certain worms are the manufacturers of silk [μέταξα], nature being their teacher and compelling them to work continually. [History of the Wars, Book VIII.vii.3, Loeb Classical Library, Procopius V, translated by H.B. Dewing, 1928, pp.228-299]

The silk worms could not be transported, but their eggs could. With the commission of Justinian, the monks were able to return to China and smuggle out eggs inside bamboo canes. Cultivating the eggs and harvesting the silk proved successful, feeding the worms with "the leaves of the mulberry [συναμίνου]." And so, at long last, Romania, despite the cultural decline of the Dark Ages, acquired its own domestic source of silk, μέταξα. Gold no longer needed to be sent to China.

The planting of mulberry trees for sericulture is supposed to have given the Peloponnesus its later Mediaeval name. The word used by Procopius for mulberry, συναμίνος, came to be replaced by μορέα. Hence, the Peloponnesus became ἡ Μωρέας, the Morea.

Kyle Harper seems to express some skepticism about all this:

Only chemical analysis of Byzantine silks will eventually reveal if this act of daring corporate espionage was really successful. [The Fate of Rome, Climate, Disease, & the End of an Empire, Princeton, 2017, 2019, p.216]

Since there is no doubt that the Peloponnesus was planted with mulberry trees, and that a Roman silk industry was created, it is not clear why Harper should wonder if this was "really successful." At the same time, the very information about silk worms and their diet of mulberry leaves carries the truth of the account on its face. If nothing else, a Chinese state secret had made its way to the Roman Court.

Not only is there an undoubted presence of sericulture in the Peloponnesus, but this spread West later on. We find a silk industry in Sicily in the 11th century. Perhaps Kyle Harper didn't know about this. That industry was expanded when the Norman King of Sicily, Roger II, attacked Corinth and Thebes in 1147. Silk workers were kidnapped and deported to Sicily and Calabria along with mulberry crops and production machinery. Silk weavers even arrived from Constantinople after the sack of the city in 1204. In the 15th Century, production in Sicily was improved when "white" mulberrry trees were introduced from China, which were better then the "black" trees already used. In short order, production and the silk industry spread to other locations in Italy.

The collapse of the Danube frontier against the Avars, substantively and symbolically beginning with the fall of Sirmium in 579, resulted, not only in Avar raids and conquests in the Balkans, but a flood of Slavic migration. This would permanently inundate the areas that would become Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, and Macedonia. At the time, however, Slavic incursions and settlements extended far down into Greece, over much of the Peloponnesus, and even, by 623, to Crete. Most of Greece was no longer Greek, something noted by travelers and historians for the next couple of centuries (589-807).

In the course of this, many Greeks were massacred or deported by the Avars, but others fled. The inhabitants of Patras (Πάτραι, Patrae; Πάτρας, Patras; Modern Greek Πάτρα, Patra -- where I took a ferry to Italy in 1970), on the north coast of the Peloponnesus relocated to Rhegium in Calabria. Many Laconians, from the ancient area around Sparta, actually moved to Sicily.

Fragments of Magna Graecia, Greek Italy, survive today. The village of Roghudi Vecchio in Calabria, Ῥοχούδι in Greek, built along a precipitous ridgeline between often dry riverbeds, was finally abandoned in 1973, after earthquakes and floods, and the inhabitants, the Griko, moved to Roghudi Nuovo, 40km away. The Calabrian dialect of Greek, or Grecanico, was spoken there, now dying out among the young.

Similarly, in Salento (Σαλέντο), the heel of Italy, another dialect of Greek, the Salentine, has been spoken at Grecìa Salentina, like Roghudi, well protected in the mountains. As we will see on the maps below, Calabria and Salento were often the last redoubts of Romania when her fortunes were lowest in the extreme South of Italy.

Argument continues whether these dialects of Greek go all the way back to the original, Ancient Greek colonization of Italy, or whether they only date to the Middle Ages, as with the migration of Greeks in the 7th century. It seems likely that what we get is a mixture of both.

In 583, other Laconians, led by their Bishop, fatefully sought refuge on a small formidable island on the south-eastern peninsula of Laconia, which ends at Cape Maleas (Ἀκρωτήριον Μαλέας, Καβομαλιάς, or Μαλέαι).

Connected by a small spit of land at low tide to the mainland, subsequently built into a causeway, this became Μονεμβασία, Monembasia (or Monemvasia), "One Way In," the "Gibraltar of the East."

The town and fortress would become a permanent Roman stronghold and naval base. Monembasia would change hands several times in the troubled times after the arrival of the Fourth Crusade and would finally survive as the last possession of the Despot, Δεσπότης, of the Morea, the last piece of Romania and the Roman Empire, after the Fall of Constantinople, until ceded to the Papacy in 1461, the rest of Romania having fallen to the Turks.

Above we see Monembasia at a later period, when it was under the control of the Venetians (1684). It remained a strategically important location until retaken by the Turks in 1715. Then it disappears from history. The modern site is a little out of the way but is still a striking location.

This became contested with the Lombard invasion of Italy in 568. The occupation of Spoleto by Lombard Dukes cut off the connection though the Via Flaminia. The Via Amerina remained open, and a Roman Duke was established at Perugia, which became the Ducatus (Duchy of) Perusiae. The Duke was sometimes even a Lombard defector, like Duke Maurisius under the Exarch Romanus -- but who was killed by the Lombard King Agilulf (591-615). Perugia finally fell to the Lombards in 752, after Ravenna itself had fallen in 751.

Mosaic of Christ above the Altar of the Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna, 2019

Justinian lavished classic artwork on the city which survives until today. Indeed, the most familiar portraits of Justinian and Theodora are from mosaics in the Church of San Vitale, featured above. I use some of the other images to illustrate Biblical stories, like Moses at the burning bush here, and the sacrifice of Isaac here. Centuries later, on a visit to Ravenna in 1903, the Austrian artist Gustav Klimt, whose father was a goldsmith, was so taken with the golden background of Justinian's mosaics that he began to lay gold leaf on many of his paintings, which remain distinctive today.

Another kind of monument to Ravenna is the anonymous Ravenna Cosmography, Ravennatis Anonymi Cosmographia, dated to around 700 AD. This is largely a catalogue of place names, from India to Ireland, centered on Ravenna (rather than Rome or Jerusalem). A noteworthy matter is that the author joins a few other writers, like Lactantius, in Constantine's day, and the voyager Cosmas Indicopleustes, in Justinian's day, and St. Isidore of Seville (c.560-636), in thinking that the Earth is flat. The author, however, was acute enough to realize that this created a puzzle about where the sun goes at night. That had been answered more than a thousand years earlier by Anaximander of Miletus, who first proposed that the Earth was a finite body floating in space, while evidence for a spherical Earth had been detailed by Aristotle. But the Ravenna Cosmographer must examine various pointless theories to the contrary, without, in the end, being sure what to say. But we see that all these clueless writers, from Lactantius to the Cosmographer, have nothing like a background in natural philosophy. Lactantius just could not wrap his mind around the idea that the sun remains in space but goes under the Earth. This still confuses some people. It's always noon somewhere. Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964) announced that India would become independent at midnight, "when the world sleeps," when, of course, most of the world was doing nothing of the sort.

The list of Exarchs, from the time of Maurice to the Lombard conquest, covers 167 years -- the time from George Washington to Dwight Einsenhower. I have seen unproblematic lists of Exarchs elsewhere, but we see a more complex picture, not unlike that of Carthage below, in Ravenna, Capital of Empire, Crucible of Europe, by Judith Herrin [Princeton, 2020, pp.xxv-xxvii]. There is considerable uncertainty in many dates, and uncertainty even about titles like Exarch and the subordinate Praetorian Prefect. Some names are only known from remains of official seals, and Herrin can only give these without dates.

I try to combine Herrin's treatment, which seems rather thorough, with alternative dates I have seen in other sources. Overlapping dates may be explained if one person is the Exarch and another the Praetorian Prefect; but this is not always clear. Also, others do not seem to think that John III and John Rizocopos are actually different persons; and it is odd that Herrin's "Stephanos" would have tenure until a year before the fall of the city. Perhaps he was only the Prefect, but Herrin does not clarify this.

The Fall of Ravenna to the Lombards, putting the Popes at their mercy, sets off formative events. The Pope appeals to the Franks, who come to the rescue. The rest of Western European history follows.

Archbishops of Ravenna

In Africa, the Exarchate was centered at Carthage, Greek Καρχηδών, Latin Carthago, which enters its last phase as a player in Roman history. With less to show for its life in this period, the city fell to the Arabs in 698 and 705. Afterwards, Carthage itself, although not deliberately destroyed as the Romans once did (but suffering greatly in the Arab attacks), simply fades from history. Nearby Tunis becomes the local metropolis -- perhaps in line with the Arab policy seen elsewhere of withdrawing capitals away from the immediate coast, although Tunis is nowhere near as removed as, for instance, Cairo (Fusṭāṭ).

Exarchs of Carthage
Gennadius I	Magister Militum of Africa, c.578
	Exarch, 585/592–598, d.600
Heraclius the Elder, Crispus	598/602–611
Innocentius?	600-602
Nicetas	Prefect, 611/619-627/629
Caesarius?	614-617
Gregory the Patrician	627629-633, 641-647/648
in Rebellion, 646/647; Omayyad Invasion, 647; Gregory killed at Sufetula, 647/648
Peter	633-641
Gennadius II	647/48–665
Overthrown in rebellion against Constans II, flees to Damascus
Eleutherius the Younger	655-695
Omayyad Invasion, 663/5-689; Qayrawān founded, 663/4, 670?; Arab army reaches the Atlantic, annihilated by Berber Kusayla, 683; Cyrenaica recovered, 688; Arabs return under Ḥassān ʾibn ʾal-Nuʿmān ʾal-Ghassānī, 692
John the Patrician	695-698/703
Carthage falls, 697; Berber al-Kāhina defeats Arabs, naval force of John the Patrician recaptures Carthage, 698
Count Julian	Ceuta, 698-709/711
Kāhina defeated, 702; Carthage desroyed, 705; Julian surrenders, collaborates with Arabs; Arab Conquest of North Africa, 711

Note that Tunisia was the Roman province of Africa, which subsequently became Arabic , ʾIfrīqiyā (إِفْرِيقِيَا). The application of the term to the whole continent, previously called "Libya," Λιβύη, since Herodotus, came later. See discussion of these names here.

I have not found anything like an authoritative list of the Exarchs of Carthage, although we know that the father of the Emperor Heraclius, called Heracltius the Elder, was Exarch when Heraclius sailed East to overthrow the Emperor Phocas in 610. He died soon after news arrived of his son's success. After Heraclius, the record gets very spotty. There are gaps and uncertainties in the list of Exarchs, and the dating is confused. I have included alternative dates, and Exarchs, from different sources.

It takes three invasions by forces of the Caliphs to subdue North Africa. The Exarch was not always well supported by Constantinople, and also was not always loyal. The Exarch Gennadius II, deposed in a tax revolt, fled, not to Constantinople, or to Syracuse, where the Emperor Constans II was in residence at the time (and was assassinated there in 668), but to Damascus, to enter the service of the Omayyad Caliph Muʿāwiya. It is not clear why he did this, or whether he became a Muslim, but he died on the way back to North Africa. So it hardly mattered.

Before that, the first Arab invasion was conducted by ʿAbdallah ibn Saʿad (d.656) in 647, on behalf of the Caliph ʿUθmān. The Exarch Gregory, who had been in rebellion against the Emperor, met him battle at Sufetula and was defeated and killed. ʾIbn Saʿad raided through Roman Africa but was not prepared to besiege any cities. He withdrew to Egypt after being bought off.

The Second invasion was led by ʿUqba ibn Nāfiʿ, beginning in 663, or a bit later (665), on behalf of the Caliph Muʿāwiya. By 670, he had founded a permanent Arab base at , ʾal-Qayrawān (أَلْقَيْرَوَان), in Tunisia -- one of the four "Fetters of ʾIslām." This appears to have been held through the period of conquest, except for an evacuation 683-688.

The setbacks began to come from the Berbers, who, not always happy with the Romans, nevertheless began to resist the Arabs -- perhaps remembering that helping the Romans against Carthage only earned them Roman subjugation, far worse than anything they had needed to tolerate from Carthage. An early triumph was in 683 at Vescera, where ʿUqba, after marching to the Atlantic and apparently subduing the land, was himself killed and his army wiped out, by Kusaila ibn Malzam, كُسَيلَة إِبْن مَلْزَم. The Arabs were unable to even recover his body. In the course of the Arab conquests, this is one of the worst defeats on record. Hence the evacuation of ʾal-Qayrawān.

The conquest was finally effected in a third invasion led by Ḥassān ibn al-Nuʿmān al-Ghassānī (i.e. a Ghassanid), who was back in Africa by 688, and, after 703, by Mūsā ibn Nuṣayr (d.c.716). While Roman Carthage fell in 695, a relief fleet from Constantinople, commanded by John the Patrician, retook the city in 697. This didn't last long, since in 698 the Arabs took Carthage again.

Then a Berber Queen, ʾal-Kāhina, , "the Diviner" (أَلْكَاهِنَة), (or Dahiyah, and variants), temporarily dominates the land. She defeats Ḥassān in the "Battle of the Camels," or the Battle of Meskiana, in 698, so thoroughly that he retreats all the way to Cyrenaica, with many Arabs taken prisoner. This may have allowed for the recovery of Carthage again, since ʾal-Kāhina is said to have then ruled the whole land.

These events are a little confusing. Judith Herrin and Anthony Kaldellis say that the Arabs recaptured Carthage from John and demolished it in 698. They say nothing about ʾal-Kāhina, her victory, or the retreat of the Arabs to Cyrenaica [Herrin, op.cit., p.291; Kaldellis, The New Roman Empire, Oxford, 2024, pp.427-428]. The question is perhaps whether the Arabs could have recaptured Carthage under those circumstances. Herrin cites the Chronicle of Theophanes Confessor, who also ignores ʾal-Kāhina and backs up Herrin's account [The Chronicle of Theophanes, Anni mundi 6095-6305 (A.D. 602-813), edited and translated by Harry Turtledove, U. Pennsylvania Press, 1982, pp.67-68].

Indeed, as with the Ghazzanids, our problem seems to be that ʾal-Kāhina is not mentioned in any Greek sources, while the historians may not trust the Arabic sources, whose surviving accounts are from a couple centuries later. According to Theophanes, after John is ejected from Carthage and then, as he is returning with reinforcements, his forces mutiny and chose their own Emperor, who they are able to install in Constantinople, as Tiberius III, in 698. Carthage was forgotten.

What we are to make of all this then depends on what ʾal-Kāhina was able to accomplish, regardless of the experience of John the Patrician. For all we know, she defeated the Arabs and recaptured Carthage again after John had been expelled from the city. Whatever was going on, we know what happened next.

The Arabs keep coming, and ʾal-Kāhina is finally defeated at Tabarka, perhaps in 702/703. The Berbers convert to ʾIslām. ʾAl-Kāhina's fate is uncertain, either death in battle or suicide -- near a well still called the Biʾr al-Kāhina, (بِئْر ٱلْكَاهِنَة). Since she then enters into legend, both favorable and hostile, most of the details given about her life and death, including that she was Jewish, are questionable. Her status as a national hero in Algeria is ironic, since she was a foe of ʾIslām.

So, Carthage was either destroyed in 698, or at some time soon after the defeat of ʾal-Kāhina, perhaps in 705. If that part of the story is all due to ʾal-Kāhina, then its absence from the Greek sources is explained. After her death, it doesn't take long for the Arabs to overrun the rest of North Africa.

Count Julian in Ceuta is the last Roman commander we know of. And we don't know much. Later Arab historians say that he surrendered to Mūsā ibn Nuṣayr because of a personal dispute with King Roderic of Visigothic Spain, to whom he may have owed more loyalty than to Constantinople, and that he then helped ferry Ṭāriq ibn Ziyād and his forces across the Strait of Gibraltar. After Roderic was killed in battle and Spain conquered, Julian was pensioned off but then, naturally, was shunned by Christians.

The office of the Roman Consuls, the chief executive officers of the Roman Republic, and dating by them, continued under the Empire until Justinian, who now replaces them with dating by Regal years. They can be examined on a popup page. As the end of an institution that began at the very beginning of the Republic, it is hard to exaggerate the symbolic importance of this event. The Roman state is now a monarchy in every detail -- although the Monarchs are overthrown with some frequency.

The Grammar of Philoponus's Statement

3. GHASSANIDS
Jafnah I ibn Amr			220-265
ʿAmr I ibn Jafnah			265-270
Tha'labah ibn Amr			270-287
al-Harith I ibn Th'alabah			287-307
Jabalah I ibn al-Harith I			307-317
al-Harith II ibn Jabalah "ibn Maria"			317-327
al-Mundhir I Senior ibn al-Harith II	327-330	al-Aiham ibn al-Harith II	327-330
al-Mundhir II Junior ibn al-Harith II	327-340	al-Nu'man I ibn al-Harith II	327-342
Jabalah II ibn al-Harith II	327-361	'Amr II ibn al-Harith II	330-356
Jafnah II ibn al-Mundhir I			361-391
al-Nu'man II ibn al-Mundhir I			361-362
al-Nu'man III ibn 'Amr ibn al-Mundhir I			391-418
Jabalah III ibn al-Nu'man			418-434
al-Nu'man IV ibn al-Aiham	434-455	al-Harith III ibn al-Aiham	434-456
al-Nu'man V ibn al-Harith			434-453
al-Mundhir II ibn al-Nu'man			453-472
'Amr III ibn al-Nu'man	453-486	Hijr ibn al-Nu'man	453-465
al-Harith IV ibn Hijr			486-512
Jabalah IV ibn al-Harith			512-529
al-Harith V ibn Jabalah			529-569
Roman subsidy, 529; nominates Jacob Baradaeus as Bishop of Edessa, 542; son captured and sacrificed by Lakhmids to the goddess al-ʿUzza, , 544; defeats Lakhmids, captures and executes al-Mundhir III , 554; end of Roman subsidies, 563
al-Mundhir III ibn al-Harith	569-581	Abu Kirab al-Nu'man ibn al-Harith	570-582
al-Nu'man VI ibn al-Mundhir			582-583
al-Harith VI ibn al-Harith	583	al-Nu'man VII ibn al-Harith Abu Kirab	583-?
direct Roman rule, 584-before 614; Persian invasion and occupation, 614-628
al-Aiham ibn Jabalah			?-614
al-Mundhir IV ibn Jabalah			614-?
Sharahil ibn Jabalah			?-618
Amr IV ibn Jabalah			618-628
Jabalah V ibn al-Harith			628-632
Jabalah VI ibn al-Aiham			632-636, d.645
Battle of Yarmūk, defects to ʾIslām, 636; returns to Romania, with 30,000 followers, founds family in Constantinople, 638

The Ghassanids, the , Banū Ghassān (بَنُو غَسَّان), were an Arab tribe occupying the hinterland behind Syria and Jordan, apparently as far back as the time of the Severans. This was the area that had previously seen rule by the Nabataeans and then by Palmyra. Evidently it was difficult for the Romans to maintain direct rule over an area whose inhabitants might largely be pastoral and nomadic. Indirect rule ended up accomplished by alliances with local Arab tribes, culminating in the Ghassanids. The Ghassanids, while not having a formal capital, did have a relatively permanent encampment, with some permanent buildings, at Al-Jabiyah on the Golan Heights. This therefore seems to have been less permanent than the corresponding Lakhmid capital at al-Ḥīrah.

In the time of Justinian the Ghassanids became organized enough to be called a "kingdom" by historians, and they become an important part of Roman frontier defense in 529 when Justinian replaces the earlier Roman clients, the Salihids, with the Ghassanid al-Harith V, now the official Roman phylarch, φύλαρχος, or ruler of the tribe (phylē, φυλή).

Such client kingdoms might be said to represent the first entry of the Arabs into Mediterranean history. If they constitute a pre-Islamic move north of Arab people, then both the Romans and the Persians converted the threat of nomadic encroachment into elements of the pre-existing balance of power between Romania and Persia. For the Persians, indeed, had their own client Arab tribe, the Lakhmids, who occupied the hinterland west of the Euphrates. The rivalry between Ghassanids and Lakhmids was not just as proxies for the Powers, but, as can be imagined, the two tribes had become rivals anyway, and there was also a religious dimension. The Ghassanids were Christians, and the Lakhmids had (largely) remained pagan.

The religious difference may be illustrated with one particularly ugly exchange. In 544 the Lakhmid king al-Mundhir III captured a son of al-Harith V and sacrificed him to the Arabian goddess al-ʿUzza, (أَلْعُزَّى). Ten years later, al-Harith defeats and captures al-Mundhir and then executes him:  The lex talionis at work in the traditional Arab fashion.

The move of the Ghassanids north is recounted in remarkable legendary accounts. The tribe of Azd in Yemen, with a sub-tribe of Ghassān, was troubled by prophecies of Tarifah, a , kāhinah (كَاهِنَة), or "seeress." This is an intriguing word, from the verb , kahana (كَهَنَ), "to predict the future, tell a fortune." Extraordinarily, it is a cognate to the Hebrew word , kōhēn, "Cohen" (כֹּהֵן), the word for "priest," which becomes a Jewish surname. We also see this as the name of the woman who led the Berber resistance to the Islamic Conquest of North Africa.

Tarifah had been having dreams and visions of disaster and destruction in Yemen, including the collapse of the great Ma'rib Dam -- , Sadd Maʾrib (سَدُّ مَأْرِب). Because of this, the tribe headed north. Arriving in Syria, few found Roman tax collectors a welcoming factor and returned (some distance) to the south again. However, around 490, a sub-tribe, the Jafnah signed on as Roman clients and settled into the future role of the Ghassanids [Arabs, A 3,000-Year History of Peoples, Tribes and Empires, by Tim Mackintosh-Smith, Yale, 2019, pp.74-79].

While the religion of the Ghassanids in general would be expected to be a unifying factor with respect to Rome, there developed a difficulty. The Ghassanids became Monophysites. Indeed, when al-Harith V nominated Jacob Baradaeus Bishop of Edessa, it led to the takeover of the Syrian Orthodox Church, henceforth the "Jacobite" Church, by Monophysites. This was not something that Justinian would let stand in the way of sensible policy, but he nevertheless made one crucial mistake. When al-Harith defeated the Lakhmids in 554, Justinian, chronically short of money, discontinued his subsidy to the Ghassanid ruler.

This may also have happened because Justinian had just obtained the means of growing Silk -- silkworm eggs smuggled out of the Central Asia. This rendered the Arabian border and Arabia less important for Rome as a means of circumventing Persian control of the silk trade. The discontent of the Ghassanids with this dismissal of their importance would be magnified when later Emperors began a harassment like that inflicted on the Monophysite Coptic and the Syrian Orthodox Churches. Since the Ghassanids were rather like the keystone in the defensive arch based on Egypt and Syria, the disaffection of these populations seriously weakened the Roman frontier. This was already evident during the Persian invasion of 614-628, and nothing had been done to heal it by the time of the Arab invasion of 636.

What happened to the Ghassanids is then a good question. Many would have converted to ʾIslām and disappeared from history. Others, however, and it is impossible to say how many, remained Christians and decamped to Lebanon or Anatolia, adhering to the Maronite or Syrian Orthodox Church. Thus, Ghassanids may well have been part of the Mardaïte "freebooters" who troubled the early Omayyad Caliphate and figure in the great statement of Theophanes Confessor, quoted by Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus. For all we know, descendants may still be living on Mount Lebanon.

For the last king of the Ghassanids, Jabalah VI, however, there is more specific information. He had been given command of the Roman vanguard at the Battle of Yarmūk, within sight of his own capital of Al-Jabiyah, but in the battle he realized that the Arab army contained tribesmen he would regard as kinsmen, saying "You are our brethren and the sons of our fathers." So he switched sides and accepted ʾIslām. However, while on Pilgrimage to Mecca, he slapped a man who had stepped on his robe, hitting him in the eye, and the Caliph Umar ruled that he should be hit in the eye in turn.

Granted postponment of the punishment, Jabalah slipped away and returned to the Roman and Christian fold, with the statement, "I will not remain in a land where others rule me." It is said that as many as 30,000 of his people went with him. One might think that his status would not have been that improved in Constantinople, where he would still be ruled by the Emperor, but apparently it was -- certainly he could get away with slapping clumsy commoners. We are told that his family eventually led to the Emperor Nicephorus I, whose fortunes in battle, unfortunately, were no better than those of the Romans at Yarmūk [Mackintosh-Smith, pp.188,226]. Meanwhile, the camp/capital of the Ghassanids at Al-Jabiyah soon became a camp for the Army of the Omayyad Caliphs; and there were Ghassanids, like Ḥassān ʾibn ʾal-Nuʿmān ʾal-Ghassānī, who became successful commanders for the Omayyads.

Kaldellis seems sceptical that the Saracens led by al-Harith V was even a single tribe. As it happens, this would feed my own suspicion that the word "Saracen," Σαρακηνός, is itself from a "calque," a translation in Arabic, as شَرِيك, šarīk, "partner, associate, companion, confederate, ally," of the Latin word foederatus, "confederate, allied." That would apply to the Ghassanids whether they were one tribe or not, especially when we realize that "saracen" is here applied to pre-Islamic Arabs and thus does not itself mean "Muslim," as it would later.

Since the names of the Ghassanids include the familiar Arabic patronynmic element, ibn, the genealogy of the dynasty could actually be constructed without too much difficulty. It will also be noted that brothers often rule simultaneously, as with the several sons of al-Harith II who begin ruling in 327. Al-Harith II himself, with the epithet "ibn Maria" and living in the time of Constantine, is likely to be the tribal chief who converted to Christianity.

Rome and Romania Index

III. THE THIRD EMPIRE, MIDDLE ROMANIA, EARLY "BYZANTIUM," 610 AD-1059 AD, Era of Diocletian 327-776, 449 years

ἄξιον, ὦ [Νέα] Ῥώμη μεγαλοκρατές, ἀντία σεῖο
κάλλος ἀπ᾽ Εὐρώπης δέρκεαι εἰς Ἀσίην.

O, great-ruling [New] Rome, thou lookest from Europe
on a prospect in Asia the beauty of which is worthy of thee.

Marianus Scholasticus, "On the Palace called Sophianae," [The Greek Anthology, Volume III, Book 9, "The Declamatory Epigrams," Number 657, The Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, 1917, p.364-365]

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Λέγει ὁ Ἰάκωβος· Ἡ Ῥωμανία πῶς σοι φαίνεται;
Στήκει ὡς τὸ ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς ἢ ἠλαττώθη;

Ἀποκρίνεται ὁ Ἰοῦστος· Καὶ ἐάν ἠλαττώθη μικρόν, ἐλπίζομεν ὅτι πάλιν ἀνίσταται· ὅτι δεῖ πρῶτον ἐλθεῖν τὸν Χριστόν, ἕως στήκει τὸ τέταρτον θηρίον τουτέστιν ἡ Ῥωμανία.

Jacob asked: What do you think of the state of Romania?
Does it stand as from the beginning, or has it been diminished?

Justus replied dubiously: Even if it has been diminished a little, we hope that it will rise again, because the Christ must come first, while the fourth beast, that is Romania, stands.

Doctrina Jacobi nuper baptizati, Διδασκαλία Ἰακώβου νεοβαπτίστου, 634 AD, A.H.M. Jones, The Later Roman Empire, 284-602 [The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1986, p. 316, translation modified], Greek text, "Doctrina Jacobi Nuper Baptizati," Édition et traduction par Vincent Déroche, Travaux et Mémoires, 11 [Collège de France Centre de Recherche d'Histoire et Civilisation de Byzance, De Boccard, Paris, 1991, p.167]; the "fourth beast" is a reference to the prophecies of Daniel. See.

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غُلِبَتِ ٱلرُّوم فِىٓ أَدْنَى ٱلْأَرْضِ
وَهُم مِن بَعْدِ غَلَبِهِمْ سَيَغْلِبُونَ

γulibati-r-Rūm, fī ʾadnā-l-ʾarḍi,
wahum min baʿdi γalabihim, sayaγlibūna.

The Romans have been defeated, in a nearby land;
but they, after their defeat, will be victorious.

ʾal-Qurʾān, Sūrah 30, أَلرُّوم, Verses 2-3; reference to defeats by the Persians, afterward defeated themselves by Heraclius, 628 AD; see discussion of Arabic collective nouns and other grammar.

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The Constantinopolitan city, which formerly was called Byzantium and now New Rome, is located amidst very savage nations. Indeed it has to its north the Hungarians, the Pizaceni, the Khazars, the Russians, whom we call Normans by another name, and the Bulgarians, all very close by; to the east lies Baghdad; between the east and the south the inhabitants of Egypt and Babylonia; to the south there is Africa and that island called Crete, very close to and dangerous for Constantinople. Other nations that are in the same region, that is, the Armenians, Persians, Chaldeans, and Avasgi, serve Constantinople. The inhabitants of this city surpass all these people in wealth as they do also in wisdom.

Constantinopolitana urbs, quae prius Bizantium, Nova nunc dicitur Roma, inter ferocissimas gentes est constituta. Habet quippe ab aquilone Hungarios, Pizenacos, Charzaros, Rusios, quos alio nos nomine Nordmannos appelamus, atque Bulgarios nimium sibi vicinos; ab oriente Bagdas; inter orientem et meridiem Aegipti Babiloniaeque incolas; a meridie vero Africam habet et nominatam illam nimium vicinam sibique contrariam insulam Crete. Ceterae vero, quae sunt sub eodem climate nationes, Armeni scilicent, Perses, Chaldei, Avasgi, huic deserviunt. Incolae denique civitatis huius, sicut memoratas gentes divitiis, ita etiam sapientia superexcellunt.

Liutprand of Cremona (c.920-972), 949 AD, "Retribution," XI, The Complete Works of Liudprand of Cremona, translated by Paolo Squatriti [The Catholic Press of America, 2007, p.50]; Latin text, "Liudprandi Antapodosis," Die Werke Liudprands von Cremona, herausgeben von Joseph Becker [Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum, Hahnsche Buchhandlung, Hannover und Leipzig, 1915, pp.9-10; Reprint, University of Michigan Libraries, 2012].

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Ex Francis, quo nomine tam Latinos quam Teutones
comprehendit, ludum habuit.

[Nicephorus II Phocas] made fun of the Franks, under which name he understood both the Latins and the Teutons.

Liutprand of Cremona, 968 AD ["Liudprandi Legatio," XXXIII, op.cit., 25-26].

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The annals [χρονογραφία] recognize the fratricidal Romulus, from whose name they are called Romans, was born to a whore [πορνογέννητος], that is, he was generated in defilement [adulterium]; and he made a refuge for himself where he welcomed debtors from foreign climes, runaway slaves, murderers, and people who deserved death for their crimes, and he attracted such a throng of such people that he called them Romans; from this nobility there arose those whom you call cosmocrators [κοσμοκράτορες, "world rulers"], or emperors. We, that means the Lombards, Saxons, Franks, Lotharingians, Bavarians, Swabians, Burgundians, so disdain them that we utter no other insult than 'Roman!' to our enemies when aroused, and we understand that single term, the name of the Romans, to include every baseness [ignobilitas], every cowardice, every kind of avarice, every kind of dissipation, every mendacity, indeed every vice.

Liutprand of Cremona, "The Embassy of Liudprand," The Complete Works of Liudprand of Cremona [op.cit. pp.246-247, translation modified]; addressed, certainly in Greek, to the Emperor Nicephorus II Phocas, who threw Liutprand into prison -- the irony here is that Liutprand represents the German King Otto I, who claims to be the "Roman Emperor," but Nicephorus, who has just called him a "Lombard," has provoked him into denouncing all the "Romans," ever since Romulus, and boasting of the many tribes of Germans, including Otto's Saxons, with the added irony that Liutprand records this in Latin, the language of the "Romans."

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ἀγάλλεται ἡ πόλις καὶ ὅλη ἡ Ῥωμανία, χαίρεται ὁ κόσμος.
The City and the whole of Romania is delighted, the world rejoices.

Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (d.959 AD), acclamation for Imperial banquet, De Ceremoniis, Book I, Chapter 65, "What it is necessary to observe at the dance, that is, at the banquet" [Constantine Porphyrogennetos, The Book of Ceremonies, translated by Ann Moffatt and Maxeme Tall, with the Greek edition of the Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae (Bonn, 1829), Australian Association for Byzantine Studies, Byzantina Australiensia 18, Canberra, 2012, Volume I, p.295]

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πάνδεινα κακὰ πέπονθεν ἡ Ῥωμανία ὑπὸ τῶν Ἀράβων μέχρι τοῦ νῦν.
All terrible evils has Romania suffered from the Arabs even until now.

Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (913-959 AD) quoting the Chronicle of Theophanes (c.815) [De Administrando Imperio, Greek text edited by Gy. Moravcsik, Dumbarton Oaks Texts, 1967, 2008, p.94]

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Ἀπορήσας οὖν ὁ ῥὴξ Πιπῖνος, εἶπεν πρὸς τοὺς Βενετίκους, ὅτι·
«Ὑπὸ τὴν ἐμὴν χεῖρα καὶ πρόνοιαν γίνεσθε,
ἐπειδὴ ἀπὸ τὴς ἐμῆς χώρας καὶ ἐξουσίας ἐστέ».
Οἱ δὲ Βενέτικοι ἀντέλεγον αὐτῷ, ὅτι·
«Ἡμεῖς δοῦλοι θέλομεν εἶναι τοῦ βασιλέως Ῥωμαίων καὶ οὐχὶ σοῦ».

So then King Pipin, at a loss, said to the Venetians:
«You are beneath my hand and my providence,
since you are of my country and domain.»
But the Venetians answered him:
«We want to be servants of the Emperor of Romans, and not of you.»

Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, "Story of the settlement of what is now called Venice" [ibid., pp.120-121], regarding the attempt of Pepin the Short, King of the Franks (751-768), to include Venice in his Kingdom; for the use of ῥὴξ for "king," see Feudal Hierarchy.

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Ὑμεῖς οὐχὶ Ῥωμαῖοι, ἀλλὰ Λαγούβαρδοι ἐστέ.
Vos non Romani, sed Longobardi estis!
You are not Romans, but Lombards!

Nicephorus II Phocas to Liutprand of Cremona (c.920-972), who represents the "Roman" Emperor Otto I, 968 AD; "Embassy," XII, The Complete Works of Liudprand of Cremona, translated by Paolo Squatriti [The Catholic Press of America, 2007, p.246]; Latin text, "Liudprandi Legatio," Die Werke Liudprands von Cremona, herausgeben von Joseph Becker [Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum, Hahnsche Buchhandlung, Hannover und Leipzig, 1915, p.182; Reprint, University of Michigan Libraries, 2012]; Liutprand, of course, was himself the Lombard, not the Saxon Otto; the Greek version here is a speculative back-translation from the Latin of Liutprand.

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Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enamelling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake;
Or set upon a golden bough to sing
To lords and ladies of Byzantium
Of what is past, or passing, or to come.

William Butler Yeats (1865-1939), "Sailing to Byzantium," alluding to the mechanical birds reported by Liutprand at the Macedonian court; mosaic of ship at Classe, port of Ravenna (mast of foreground ship edited out), from Basilica di Sant'Apollinaire Nuovo, Ravenna -- a ship that actually could well have sailed to "Byzantium," i.e. Constantinople.

To most people thinking of the "Roman Empire," we are well into terra incognita here. Yet in 610 the character and problems of the Roman Empire would not have been unfamiliar to Theodosius the Great. A Persian invasion was nothing new. How far it got, all the way to Egypt and the Bosporus, was. Meanwhile, the collapse of the Danube frontier was not now the doing of Germans but of Slavs and Steppe people -- the latter beginning with the Altaic Avars, whose kin would dominate Central Asia in the Middle Ages. The Persians were miraculously defeated; but before the Danube could be regained or the Lombards overcome in Italy, a Bolt from the Blue changed everything.

The Arabs, bringing a new religion, ʾIslām, created an entirely new world, which both broke the momentum of Roman recovery and divided the Mediterranean world in a way whose outlines persist until today. Nevertheless, the Empire, restricted to Greece and Anatolia, rode out the flood. It must have been a hard nut, since the Arab Empire otherwise flowed easily all the way to China and the Atlantic. It was hard enough, indeed, that by the end of the "Third Empire" it had been in better health than any Islamic state. The promise of new ascendency, however, was brief, both for internal and external reasons.

I had a professor at UCLA, a Turkicist or even a Turkophile, who had an explanation why the Arabs were unable to permanently conquer and occupy Anatolia. He said, "It's cold up there." So the Arabs needed a warmer climate, while the Turks, later, presumably, were tougher stuff. A problem with this explanation, however, is that the Arabs had no problem conquering and occupying Iran, much of which is higher and colder (in the winter) than Anatolia. So this was just a bit of a joke, by the professor, at the Arabs' expense.

Meanwhile, despite what was saved from the Arab conquests, there has been a cost paid, as we might expect, in prosperity and material culture. This is conspicuous in the coinage, where the previous style of low relief profile portraits is still typical in Justinian's day. However, we also start to get face on portraits, whose quality is less good. By the time of Heraclius, face on portraits are dominant, and soon exclusive, while their character ceases to be low relief and becomes cartoonish. This will improve again later, but the coinage will never have the photo-real quality that we expect in modern coinage and that was often present in the best work of the First Empire. That the gold coinage of the solidus still exists at all, however, is testimony to the fact that the prosperity and material culture of Romania never fell as far as it did in Francia, and that a paid, professional military survives, despite a period of retrenchment.

As Western Civilization found its fortress redoubt in Constantinople, the reality of the Dark Ages swept over much of the West. A decline in material culture, trade, cash exchange, and literacy passed over Europe in a kind of "rolling blackout." That began in Britain in the 5th century, after a garrison could not be restored in 410, then it reaches Gaul in the 6th century, Italy in the 7th, and then the Aegean in the 8th. We can trace the events that often precipitated these declines. Germanic invaders were destructive, illiterate, and uninterested in commerce or manufacture -- under them Britain dropped out of history altogether. Their modus vivendi, like socialists, was looting; and even in periods of revival, as under the Carolingians, an "aristocratic" disdain for money and labor persisted, in some ways even down to the present, celebrated, not just by socialists and aristocrats, but by philosophers like Friedrich Nietzsche, popular at parasitic institutions, like universities.

Justinian's reconquest of Italy, followed by the invasion of the Lombards, which fragmented the peninsula, inflicted damage and diseconomies that would not be properly remedied for centuries. Finally, the Arab invasions and conquests inflicted widespread damage, depopulation, and disruption of trade, which, again might not be properly restored for centuries. Trade did not disappear, but we see the quality and quantity of trade goods and manufacture catastrophically diminish, and a cash economy disappear in many places. Roman trade goods in Cornwall, and reports of Roman subsidies, are in stark contrast to the total absence of local contemporary accounts of either -- only the garbled shadow of events that appears in the King Arthur legends.

The Balkans were devastated by the raids and invasions of the Avars and Slavs; but this kind of thing also affected cities in Anatolia, which were subject to repeated Arab raids, often making it difficult to even maintain agriculture. While the Arab domain was not hostile, like the German, to commerce and industry, we nevertheless see declines from Roman levels of prosperity. Copper mining in the Wādī Faynān (وَادِي فَيْنَان), now in Jordan, which had continued for centuries, abruptly stopped with the Arab conquest. We also find that cashes of legal documents in Egypt, which bespeak rural prosperity (i.e. people who can afford lawyers), no longer occur after the Arab conquest.

Europa est omnis divisa in partes tres, quarum unam Romaniam, aliam Franciam, tertiam Russiam.
Europa	1. Romania	2. Constantinople
	2. Francia	1. Rome
	3. Russia	3. Moscow

It is in this period that Christendom begins to separate into distinct cultural spheres. When the Popes become free of Imperial supervision, and then Charlemagne is crowned "Roman Emperor" entirely on the novel authority of the Papacy, the Latin Church and Francia form themselves in opposition to Romania, its Emperors, and the Church legitimized by the Church Councils and four of the five Patriarchates. This was in the day of the extraordinary Empress Irene. Rather later, under the Macedonians, we have an extended period of missionaries to the Slavs, the conversion of Bulgaria, and then the conversion of Russia. The Slavic Churches, although autocephalous, were nevertheless in doctrinal communion with Constantinople -- as they still are.

This contrasts starkly with Francia, where tension and disputes ultimately came to a great Schism between Rome and Constantinople -- almost entirely over claims of Papal authority, besides which doctrinal issues were mere pretexts. Papal pretensions bloated and inflated until suddenly punctured by the ruthless and cynical Philip IV of France. After the humiliations of the Avignon Papacy and the Great Schism, the Popes had barely reestablished their status when the Reformation permanently divided the Western Church. Papal pretentions remained, but they only applied to a fragment of Francia; and although the Popes launched ideological and missionary attacks on the Eastern Churches, those Churches, often for long under the Ottoman thumb, or fully self-confident under the Tsars, who styled themselves the successors of Constantinople, mostly remained deeply hostile to the Latin West.

Meanwhile, the strength of Francia, overshadowing the Papacy, Romania, and Russia, lay in States that became aggressive, innovative, and powerful, beginning with Spain, then the Netherlands, France, Britain, and Germany. Spain, without a modern economy, fell behind; but full Modernity, with markets, banking, science, and technology began to flourish with the Dutch, French, British, and Germans. Mediaeval Romania, of course, had long been eclipsed, finally swamped by the Ottoman tide in 1453. The Third Empire is the last time of Roman flourishing before the shadow of Turkish conquest falls at Manzikert in 1071, and the Turkish threat provokes a Western response that deals a heavier blow to Romania than to any part of ʾIslām.

Rome and Romania Index

1. HERACLIANS
Heraclius Flavius Heraclius	610-641
conquest of Mesopotamia, 607-610, Syria, 611-613, Palestine & Jerusalem, 614, Egypt, 616, & invasion of Anatolia, 626, by Shāh Khusro II; end of Egyptian grain shipments to Constantinople, 618; return of Plague, 619?; defeat of Persians, 622-628; the iussio, Imperial confirmation of Papal election, delegated to Exarch of Ravenna, 620; Salona destroyed by Avars, residents move to Spalatum, 620; Cartagena falls to Visigoths, 624; Avar Siege of Constantinople, Aqueduct of Valens broken, Persians on Bosporus, 626; Battle of Nineveh, Persians defeated, 627; Βασιλεύς officially adopted as title of the Emperor, 629; True Cross returned to Jerusalem, 630; forced baptism of Jews, 632; occupation of Armenia, 633; Arab invasion, 634; Army of the East destroyed, Battle of Yarmūk, Syria evacuated, 636; fall of Gaza, Antioch, 637; Jerusalem surrendered to the Caliph ʿUmar, 638; proclamation of Monotheletism 638; Egypt invaded, 639; fall of Caesarea in Palestine, 640
Constantine III	3 months, 641
Heraclonas/ Heracleon	1 month, 641
deposed & mutilated
Constans II Pogonatus	641-668, last Emperor to visit Rome as a possession
Egypt lost, 641; Embassy to T'ang China, 643; Genoa (Liguria) lost to Lombards, 644; Alexandria reoccupied, army defeated, withdraws, 645; Roman army destroyed in North Africa, but Arabs withdraw, 647; Arab attack against Cyprus, 649; Armenia rejects Orthodoxy of Constantinople, 649; Arab attack, Cyprus abandoned, 650; Arab invasion of Sicily defeated, 652, 667; Armenians go over to Arabs, Romans defeated, 653; Navy, commanded by Constans, defeated by Arab fleet at Phoinikous, the "Battle of the Masts," Muʿāwiya, before becoming Caliph, attacks Constanintople, 654; but Arab forces thrown back from Constantinople & defeated in Cappadocia, 655; attack on Slavs in Balkans, prisoners settled in Anatolia or pressed into Army, 658; campaign against the Lombards, visit to Rome & Naples, strips bronze roof from the Pantheon, 663; the Caliph Muʿāwiya attacks Constanintople, 667/668-669; Constans assassinated at Syracuse, brief revolt put down, 668
Constantine IV	668-685
Arab fleet defeated, 672; Siege of Constantinople by Muʿāwiya, 674-677; Arab fleet defeated off Lebanon, 677/78; Army landed in Lebanon, joins Mardaïtes, 677; Bulgars occupy lower Danube, 680; Council VI, Constantinople III, Monotheletism condemned, 680-681; Revolt, Constantine's brothers mutilated, exiled, 681; Imperial ratification of Papal elections abolished, 684/685
Justinian II Rhinotmetus	685-695, 705-711
Negotiates withdrawl of Mardaïtes and the Roman Army from Lebanon, peace with ʿAbd al-Malik, 685; Romans defeated by Arabs at Sebastopolis, 20,000 Slav conscripts desert, 692; Loss of Armenia, 693; Roman governor in Ceuta (Morocco), last possession in North Africa, eliminated by Arabs, 711; Pope Constantine, last Pope to visit Constantinople, called by iussio, 710-711
non-dynastic
Leontius	695-698
Carthage falls to Arabs, 697; Berber al-Kāhina defeats Arabs in North Africa, Carthage recovered, 698; return of Plague, 698
Tiberius III Apsimar	698-705
al-Kāhina defeated, 702; Carthage destroyed, 705
Philippicus Bardanes (Vardan)	711-713
Anastasius II	713-715, d.719
Deposed after siege of Consantinople, 715; revolted, executed by Leo III, 719
Theodosius III	715-717
Pergamum destroyed by Arab fleet, city abandoned, 715

With Heraclius, seldom has fortune and ability so blessed a ruler only to turn so completely against him in the end. Heraclius and his father, also Heraclius, the Exarch of Carthage, started a revolt against Phocas in Africa. Troops were sent to Egypt, which defeated the garrison loyal to Phocas. Such fighting, and not just in Egypt, went on for two years, 608-610. This, of course, weakened all the Roman armies even as they would need to resist the Persians -- just as the Persian war would weaken the armies soon needed to resist the Arabs.

In 610, Heraclius sailed directly to Constantinople. He easily deposed Phocas, who had been slaughtering the family of Maurice and his loyalists; but then Heraclius had to almost helplessly watch the Persians conquer Syria and Egypt and raid through Anatolia as far as the Borporus (in 615). With Avars and Slavs pouring into the Balkans, the Roman Empire seemed doomed to complete collapse.

But then in one of the most brilliant, but far more desperate, campaigns since Alexander, in 624-625 Heraclius audaciously invaded Persia itself. He even wintered with the army in the field -- something that counts as an operational achievement far beyond the traditional division of tactics and strategy.

In 626 the Persians arrived at the Bosporus and their Avar allies at the walls of Constantinople, trying to draw Heraclius out of the field and with a chance of destroying his power at the source. Confident that Constantinople was impregnable, which it was, Heraclius was not distracted.

In 627-628 he devastated Persia and late in 627 defeated a Persian army at Nineveh, which precipitated the overthrow of Shāh Khusro II by his own son (628), who sued for peace. Meanwhile, the Avars had given up at the siege of Constantinople after only seven days -- although called back with the help of the Persians. It didn't do much good. Avar cavalry counted for nothing against the Land Walls.

At the height of his physical powers, at Nineveh Heraclius actually fought the Persian general, Razates, in single combat, μονομαχία. He had similarly fought and overthrown a Persian champion the year before. Naturally, the word got around that he was divinely protected, a new King David -- commemorated on a set of silver plates such as the one here..

Silver "David Plate," with the Battle of David and Goliath, 629–630, largest of a group of nine plates found at Karavas, Cyprus, 1902; Metropolitan Museum of Art; Click on plate for popup of six plates as displayed in the Museum.

Heraclius had received significant material aid from the Gök Turks, who were the parent of the Khazars, of long future Roman alliance. Heraclius betrothed his daughter Eudocia to the Khagan, who died (630) before the marriage could be effected. This seems to be the first of Roman relations with any Turks, and the first of at least three marriages that would be arranged with the Khazars.

The peace restored the status quo ante bellum. In 629 Heraclius began to use the title of the defeated monarch, the traditional Persian "Great King." Thus Basileus, Βασιλεύς, the Greek word for "King," became the mediaeval Greek word for "Emperor" (although, actually, Procopius was already using it that way in the days of Justinian) -- as Greek now (or hereabouts) replaces Latin as the Court language as well as the language of command in the Army. Similarly, Βασίλεια, Basíleia, "Queen," becomes "Empress." The adjective Βασίλειος, Basíleios, "Kingly," is also found as a proper name, especially of two Macedonian Emperors.

With Basileus for "Emperor," the Latin word rex is borrowed, as ῥήξ, to use for mere kings as such. Latin military terms are transcribed, for instance, δούξ for dux, "duke," and κόμης for comes, "count"; and they continued in use through the history of Romania -- they went their own semantic way, of course, in the feudalism of Francia. There was already a sense that Autokrátor, Αὐτοκράτωρ, translated imperator, "commander," and it was typically coupled with Basileus, although not exclusively.

Feudal Hierarchy Monarchical Acclamations

The use of Autokrátor in this way, continued down to Imperial Russia, where the Emperor until 1917 was formally "Tsar and Autocrat."

The Latin title Augustus was adopted into Greek as Αὔγουστος, but was used more frequently in the feminine as Αὐγοῦστα for Empresses; but Augustus had already been introduced in translation as Σεβαστός, sebastós. Nevertheless, Σεβαστός seems to have dropped out of usage for the Emperor and later became a lesser title, or part of titles for other officials, such as σεβαστοκράτωρ, sebastokrátōr, "August ruler" -- a title created by Alexius Comnenus, who himself was made a Σεβαστός while a general, which introduced a rank between Caesar (Καῖσαρ, a lesser title since the Tetrarchy) and Emperor. And we see Σεβαστή used for the mistress, Maria Scleraena, of the Emperor Constantine IX, at a time when there were already two Αὐγοῦσται (Zoë and Theodora).

But then, barely six years after this exhausting victory, the Arabs, united by ʾIslām, appeared out of the desert and quickly conquered Syria, Palestine, and Mesopotamia. Jerusalem would never be recovered, except temporarily by the Crusaders.

Old and ill, and after all his years campaigning in rugged mountains, Heraclius commanded none of the armies against the Arabs and had to watch his life's work largely melt away to an enemy whose advent no one could have predicted or even imagined, while people said it was the Judgment of God because he had married his niece -- although a core for the Empire would be preserved.

The decisive battle for Syria, which of course then opened the door to Egypt, was the Battle of the Yarmūk River, نَهْر اؐلْيَرْمُوك, a watercourse that now forms part of the border between Jordan and Syria, over six days,15-20 August 636. With Heraclius old and sick, the Roman command had been given to the Armenian prince Vahan, Վահան, against the gifted Arab general Khālid ibn Walīd, خَالِد ٱبْن ٱلْوَلِيد (585-642) -- someone who had already defeated the Persians several times and driven them from Mesopotamia.

Vahan, with superior forces, was not up to the challenge, a virtual General McClellan, stolid, unaggressive, unimaginative -- he had the advantage in combat for days and did not pursue it -- and placed himself before the gorge of a tributary of the Yarmūk, with only a single bridge left in case of retreat.

For days, Vahan ate away at the flanks of the Arab army, driving them back into the Arab camp more than once -- the women had to come out to fight in support of the men. But his aggressive flanks were often unsupported by the infrantry of the center, which did not advance. This opened gaps in the Roman line, which enabled the Arabs to recover their position with counter-attacks. This happened enough to make it look like Vahan was unconcerned about supporting his own attacks. Nevertheless, all this seriously degraded the Arab army, giving the Romans a continuing advantage.

Actually feeling a bit desperate, Khālid decided he needed a bold stroke. So he gathered much of his cavalry and sent it in a wide maneuver around the left of the Romans, capturing the key bridge in the Roman rear. This was worthy of Stonewall Jackson, and it led to the decisive last day of the battle. Vahan had arranged for the trap of his own army.

The worst thing, of course, was that Vahan seems to have been unaware of Khālid's maneuver, or unprepared to counter it. So Vahan was not even using his own cavalry to his advantage, either for reconaissance or for the wider security of his army. The battle was then lost, like Adrianople, with the adverse cavalry battle, which overlapped the Roman left flank and pressed the army up against the river gorge. Vahan himself was killed.

The Arabs, of course, unlike the Visigoths, were famous horsemen, but the failure of Roman cavalry was command, not ability. Procopius had already written how much the Romans had learned about cavalry tactics from the Huns, but here the lighter armed Arab horsemen used their mobility advantage over the heavier armed Romans, who perhaps had grown too accustomed to dealing with the corresponding Persian cavalry. The Persians had the same problems with the Arabs, to far more catastrophic results for them.

But, although the Arab horsemen may have had an advantage in effecting a quick and broad maneuver, the Romans did not need to keep up with them, only to meet them, which only required minimal movement. Riding directly into heavier Roman cavalry defending the bridge and the rear of the Roman army, the Arabs would have had no advantage. So the real problem was that Vahan did not have the imagination of Khālid, or the care of a competent general.

This is the second of the great "Downfall" battles recounted here. The loss to the Arabs soon leads to the permanent loss of Syria, Palestine, Egypt, and ultimately North Africa, not just to the Roman Empire, but to Christendom. The previous enemies of Rome who had effected similar losses, the Goths and other Germans, themselves became Christians and heirs of Roman civilization. ʾIslām created its own civilization.

There are reports of local Jews helping the Persians during the taking of Jerusalem and the Persian occupation of other locations. Since Persia had recently expelled their own Jews, this casts some doubt on the idea that Jews would help them. However, in the course of the Persian withdrawal, there certainly were riots and clashes involving Christians and Jews in several places. These may have been unmotivated attacks on the Jews, but it does mean that something else may have been going on. It is not inconveivable that local Jews helped the Persians, regardless of what policy had been to the Jews in Persia.

Then we have an order of 632 from Heraclius calling for the forced baptism of Jews in North Africa. But North Africa wasn't even occupied by the Persians, and we don't know if this order was even extended to the rest of the Empire. That it was may be indicated by Heraclius' efforts to get Dagobert I of Francia to apply it in his own lands, which evidently he did. Subsequently, we hear of Jews fleeing to the Muslims as they advanced. Even though Muḥammad, like the Persians, had expelled the Jews from his own jurisdiction in Medina, we know that Jews certainly could expect a more benign attitude from the Muslims than they had been receiving from the Christians. At that point, they would have owed no more loyalty to Heraclius and Romania than would the Monophysites. Under ʾIslām, their situation would be no worse, and perhaps better, than that of local Christians. We are left to wonder, then, what actually was going on with the Jewish population.

The Arab historian ʾAṭ-Ṭabarī reports that the Prophet Muḥammad had written a letter to the Emperor Heraclius, inviting him to convert to ʾIslām, much as Aśoka had written to Hellenistic monarchs for a similar purpose. Heraclius is addressed as هَرْقَل عَظِيم اؐلرُّوم, Harqal ʿAẓīm ar-Rūm. The word هَرْقَل, of course, is the Arabic rendering of "Heraclius." And we know about أَلرُّوم as "Romans," whose form is discussed in detail here, and from which we can construct بَلَادُ اؐلرُّوم, the Balād-ar-Rūm, the "Country of the Romans," i.e. Romania.

So the curious word is عَظِيم, ʿAẓīm. This can mean "great, big, large; strong, powerful, mighty; significant, important; grand, grandiose, imposing, stately, magnificent," but also "lofty, exalted, august, sublime, splendid, gorgeous, glorious, superb," etc. [Hans Wehr, A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, Cornell University Press, 1966, p.623]. In the midst of all that, if we pick out "august," we might conclude that it translates Augustus, which we see in Greek as (transcribed) Αὔγουστος or (translated) Σεβαστός (Sebastós).

ʾAṭ-Ṭabarī uses another word for "emperor" elsewhere, صَاحِب, Ṣāḥib, which is examined at his link above. Finally, we see another term used in the Thousand and One Nights. Heraclius is called هَرْقَل اؐلْقَيْصَر, Harqal al-Qaiṣar, with the word "Caesar," قَيْصَر, Qaiṣar, that becomes "emperor" in many languages ["Tales of Umar ibn al-Khattāb," The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, rendered into English from the Literal and Complete French Translation of Dr. J.C. Mardrus, by Powys Mathers, Volume IV, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1964, 1972, 1986, p.471; transcribed as "Harkal al-Kaisar," with "k" for "q" and no diacritic].

其王無常人簡賢者而立之。
Qí wáng wúcháng rén jiǎn xiánzhě érlì zhī.

國中灾異及風雨不時輙廢而更立。
Guózhōng zāiyì jí fēngyǔ bùshí zhéfèi ér gēng lì.

受放有甘黜不怨。
Shòu fàng yǒu gān chù bù yuàn.

(1) Their kings are not permanent rulers, but they select men of merit [賢, "virtuous, worthy, good"]. If an extraordinary calamity visits the country, or if wind and rain come at the wrong time, he is deposed and another man is put in his stead. The one relieved of his duties submits to his degradation without a murmur.

(2) Their kings are not men who last. They choose the most capable and they put him on the throne; but if a misfortune or something out of the ordinary happens in the Empire, or if the wind or the rain arrive at the wrong season, then they at once depose the emperor and put another in his place.

History of the Later Han Dynasty, the 後漢書, Hòu Hànshū. Chinese text and translation (1), Friedrich Hirth, China and the Roman Orient [Leipsic & Munich: Georg Hirth, Shanghai & HongKong: Kelly & Walsh, 1885; photostat by Legare Street Press, pp.41,100]; Pinyin assembled by the editor.

Translation (2), Gilbert Dagron, Emperor and Priest, the Imperial Office in Byzantium [Cambridge University Press, 2003, 2007, p.13]; based on the text of the Old History of the T'ang Dynasty, 舊唐書, Jiù Tángshū. The character 灾 in the Han history corresponds to 災 in the T'ang history. They are the same character. The T'ang text is missing the last clause.

Dagron has a confused citation, where he says it is from the "ancient history of the Tang," but then gives that as the Xin T'ang shu, which would mean the New History of the T'ang, as well as mixing a Wade-Giles "T'ang" in with Pinyin "Xin" (cf. Hirth, pp.52,104, for the Old T'ang text and translation).

Contact with T'ang Dynasty China, 643 AD

According to the Old History of the T'ang Dynasty, 舊唐書 [Jiù Tángshū], an embassy arrived at the Court of the Emperor T'ai Tsung in the year 643. This was from (or 拂菻國, Fúlǐn Guó), which apparently is now the Chinese version of "Constantinople," perhaps derived from "City" in the accusative, Πολίν -- a Mandarin syllable, of course, cannot end in an "s." This would have been in the time of Constans II, whose name we may see as 波多力, Bōduōlì, based on his sobriquet Pogonatus.

The Chinese were aware that their name of the country had changed. We have a positive statement in the New History of the T'ang Dynasty, 新唐書 [Xīn Tángshū], that, 拂菻古大秦也, Fúlǐn gǔ Dà Qín yě, "Fu-lin is the ancient Ta Ch'in." Grumpy Byzantinists can use this to switch between "Rome" and "Byzantium" for their own purposes. The Chinese were also aware that by now the name of Parthia had changed. In this time, south-east of Fúlǐn is 波斯, Bōsī, "Persia," the realm of the Sassanids.

Unlike the earlier record of contact in the time of the Antonines, this came overland and initiated regular trading relations. Roman solidi became prized in China, even to the point of imitation coins being produced. This finally completed the process of contact that resulted only in failure in the days of the Antonines and the Han. Now the Silk Road was fully open to commerce and contact, bypassing any impediments from hostile or predatory Middle Eastern states.

Official contact between Constantinople and China would continue until the last days of the Palaeologi, when we know that in 1371 the first Ming Emperor wrote a letter to John V, announcing the advent of the new dynasty. The Ming, of course, would outlast Romania -- by 191 years.

After the embassy of 643, the Chinese recorded further contact in 667, 701, 711, 719, and 742 -- by then in the time of Leo III and Constantine V. Despite these contacts, the information that the Chinese had about Romania remains garbled, with the same fractured descriptions repeated in subsequent histories. Thus, the capital of Dà Qín is early said to be 安都, Āndū. This looks like nothing so much as "Antioch," which would have been the largest Roman city close to Parthia, whose status could thus have been confused. But the confusion was never corrected, even when the name Fúlǐn itself looks like a reference to Constantinople. In fact, for all the embassies to China from Rome, we never hear of a corresponding one to the West, which could have clarified matters like this. In 1371, the letter of the Hung-wu Emperor was handed to a Roman traveler, not sent with an emissary.

However, we are told by the Old History of the T'ang Dynasty, 舊唐書, that direct contact was contemplated:

隋煬帝常將通拂菻竟不能致。

Suī Yangdì cháng jiāng tōng Fúlǐn jìng bùnéng zhì.

The emperor Yang-ti of the Sui dynasty always wished to open intercourse with Fu-lin, but did not [was not able, 不能, to] succeed. [Hirth, op.cit. pp.55,105]

We hear nothing of the sort about any Roman Emperor, despite the Chinese records of many Roman embassies to China, but none from China to Romania. Indeed, it would be nice to know why Yang-ti's wish "was not able to succeed."

Some of the information that got to China was such as to illuminate our own understanding of Romania. The epigraph above is that, "Their kings are not permanent rulers, but they select men of merit." This is not, of course, quite right; but it does tell us that, to outsiders, the frequent lack of hereditary succession of the 拂菻王 in Constantinople was novel. And we do know that, at times, new Emperors were chosen with some deliberation, as when, in 491, the Empress Ariadne announced the choice of Anastasius as her new husband and Emperor.

On the other hand, I have heard of no Emperors being deposed because the weather was bad. When the statue of Constantine was blown down in 1106, Alexius Comnenus was not blamed for it. Similarly, few deposed Emperors seem to have taken their loss in good grace -- 不怨, "without complaint." Usually, they were killed or blinded, although a few (very few) retired without harm. Justinian II was deposed and mutilated, but then restored, to be deposed again and killed (with his half-Khazar son) in turn.

At the same time, we would like to know how the Chinese knew about features of the Roman monarchy. Anthony Kaldellis refers to the same Chinese passage but says it was due to, "a Chinese traveler, who noted that the Romans chose the most capable man as their king but then deposed him if he failed" [The New Roman Empire, op.cit., p.520]. However, I do not see a Chinese reference to such a "traveler," although, as speculation, it is reasonable enough. We are not told that the Roman embassies to the T'ang Court were reciprocated in any formal way, despite the "wish" of Yangi-ti -- although the Chinese, 常將, cháng jiāng, is more like "frequently tried."

We can follow Kaldellis' citation to Gilbert Dagron and then through Dagron's somewhat confused citation to Friedrich Hirth. And we might wonder why Dagron chose to refer to the T'ang text rather than to the Han, which was more complete. Hirth himself has his own confusions in evaluating the Chinese sources, which I will consider below.

The Chinese Embassies of 1081 and 1091

Constans II was the last Emperor to campaign in Italy and visit Rome as an Imperial possession (later the Palaeologi went to beg for help). While driving the Lombards up to their capital, Pavia, his attempts to eliminate the Lombard Dukes of Benevento, whose possessions were disruptively lodged between Roman territory in the South, were nevertheless futile -- the Allies would have similar trouble in the same area in World War II. He was also the last Emperor to exert real control over the Popes, arresting Martin I (649-653, d.655) and exiling him to the Crimea -- which earned him martyrdom and sainthood in the Latin Church. Once in Italy, Constans stayed, apparently wishing to move the capital of the Empire to Syracuse in Sicily. After he was assassinated there (668), nothing further came of this.

Greek Fire, Πῦρ Ῥωμαϊκόν

Constantine IV had to deal with the second Arab siege of Constantinople, sent by Muʿāwiya, who previously had led his own attack on the City in 654. This went on for years, 674-677, after preliminary actions as early as 672. This is often called the "first" Arab siege of Constantinople, because of uncertainty about whether the attacks of 667/668-669 really settled down to an actual siege.

The climax of the siege was the destruction of the Arab fleet by a new super-weapon, the famous and mysterious "Greek Fire." This was an incendiary weapon developed by a Christian refugee, Callinicus, Καλλίνικος, from Heliopolis, or Baalbek, in the Beqaa Valley of Lebanon.

Callinicus arrived in Constantinople around 672. His invention now sounds like nothing so much as napalm, since it could burn under water. It could be sprayed onto enemy ships through a siphon, like a flame-thrower -- as we see in an illustration from the history of John Skylitzes (Joannis Scylitzae, d.after 1101) Ἰωάννης Σκυλίτζης [Codex Matritensis Graecus, the Madrid Skylitzis, Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid]. This would be no less impressive, frightening, and effective now as it would be in the 7th Century.

In Greek sources, the "fire" would be called "sea fire," πῦρ θαλάσσιον, "Roman fire," πῦρ ῥωμαϊκόν, "war fire," πολεμικὸν πῦρ, "fluid fire," ὑγρὸν πῦρ, "sticky fire," πῦρ κολλητικόν, and other things. This would serve the Romans well for many centuries; and new enemies, like the Vikings, arriving in the Bosporus, must have just been astonished, as well as terrified. In this case, burning the Arab fleet meant that the Empire would survive.

As dramatic as this battle would be on film, we are reminded that Hollywood has not been interested in the story of Mediaeval Romania.

Soon after Justinian II came to the throne, in 685, he negotiated a deal with the similarly new Caliph, ʿAbd al-Malik. This was in relation to the disposition of the Mardaïtes, Μαρδαῗται. According to Warren Treadgold, these were "Christian freebooters," i.e. something between bandits and guerrillas, who had been surrounded by the Arab conquest on Mt. Amanus between Syria and Cilicia [A History of the Byzantine State and Society, Stanford University Press, 1997, p.327].

Many of the Mardaïtes had then moved to Mt. Lebanon, where they, the Maronites, other Christian refugees, and escaped slaves began plundering the adjacent territories of the Omayyad Caliph Muʿāwiya. All these people were joined by an actual Roman Army in 677. After defeating an Arab fleet off Lebanon, the Army was landed in Lebanon, joining the Mardaïtes and raiding into the Caliphate. It sounds like Muʿāwiya and later Caliphs were much embarrassed by this activity.

So in 685 Justinian negotiated a settlement, by which the Mardaïtes and the Roman Army would be withdrawn in exchange for an annual tribute of 216,000 solidi and some slaves and horses -- a slave and a horse each day. Theophanes Confessor did not consider this a good deal:  "The Emperor sent messengers who seized 12,000 Mardaites, mutilating the Roman state... After they were transplanted, Romania has suffered all sorts of evils at the hands of the Arabs up until the present day" [cf. The Chronicle of Theophanes, Anno mundi 6095-6305, AD 602-813, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982, for the year 678 AD, p.61].

In other words, at a time of continued Roman reversals and Arab conquests, Justinian II voluntarily withdrew the autonomous forces of a successful guerilla counterattack against the heart of Omayyad power, in exchange for some nominal tribute that certainly the Omayyads soon ceased to pay. Indeed, it is difficult to understand the reasoning behind this agreement, or how it was supposed to benefit Romania.

At various places at this website I have featured a quotation from the De Administrando Imperio of the Emperor Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, by which he quotes Theophanes:

πάνδεινα κακὰ πέπονθεν ἡ Ῥωμανία ὑπὸ τῶν Ἀράβων μέχρι τοῦ νῦν.

All terrible evils has Romania suffered from the Arabs even until now [Greek text edited by Gy. Moravcsik, Dumbarton Oaks Texts, 1967, 2008, p.94, translation modified].

This was the quote I have given above as, "Romania has suffered all sorts of evils at the hands of the Arabs up until the present day," with a more literal translation.

The Grammar of Constantine VII's Statement

In this last member of the Heraclean dynasty, we have with Justinian II a curious experiment in humanity and an extraordinary story as the sequel. When Justinian was deposed in 695, instead of being killed, his nose and ears were cut off -- as had those of Heraclonas in 641. Hence his epithet, Ῥινότμητος, Rhinotmetus, "Cut Nose."

It was expected that this would disqualify him from attempts at restoration. It didn't. Justinian fled to the Khazars, where he arranged a marriage with the Khagan's sister, giving her the Christian name "Theodora." The Emperor Tiberius III, however, pressured the Khazars to expel Justinian, which before long they did. Justinian now fled to the Bulgars, who decided to support him and in 705 showed up with him and their army before Constantinople. Unable to enter the City, there was then not much the Bulgars could do. Justinian, however, was able to sneak inside; and he apparently had sufficient support to depose Tiberius and regain the Throne, a most unlikely Odyssey. His Khazar wife then joined him and gave birth to a son, curiously named Tiberius. After another unpopular reign, Justinian was then deposed again and, with his son, killed.

We don't hear how Justinian may have disguised the mutilation of his face. We know that the great astronomer, Tycho Brahe (1546-1601), who had lost his nose in a duel, wore a prosthetic nose of gold. People did not seem to find that odd. Perhaps Justinian used a similar recourse.

We also saw the same thing, much later, with some white women who were captured by the Comanches in Texas, and whose noses were burned off to signify that they had been passed around as sex slaves among the men. After escaping, they had recourse to prosthetic noses. The Comanche chief Quanah Parker (d.1911) was actually the son of a captured white woman, Cynthia Ann Parker (1827-1871), who, however, was captured young and not raped or tortured.

The curious experiment in humanity with Justinian, of course, was that when first deposed he was not killed but just mutilated. When it developed that this was not enough to bar him from being restored, henceforth deposed Emperors, or other politically threatening persons, would be blinded. This was more effective (although the blind Isaac II was restored by the Fourth Crusade), though now it may not seem particularly more humane than execution. Otherwise, the end of the dynasty demonstrates one drawback of the new themes:  They represented such military force that the strategus, their commander, was continually tempted to revolt. This problem was soon addressed simply by dividing the themes into smaller ones.

Another noteworthy aspect of the initial overthrow of Justinian II were the slogans that were voiced by popular protests. A very curious cry, repeated (with suitable substitutions) over the centuries was, ἀνασκαφῇ τὰ ὀστέα Ἰουστινιανοῦ, Anastaphē_i tà ostéa Ioustinianoū, "Let the bones of Justinian be dug up!" Since Justinian was not dead or buried, it is curious how people should be calling for his exhumation. The expression may have originated in earlier circumstances, now lost. As it happens, one Pope, Formosus (891-896), was actually exhumed and put on trial, in what was then aptly called the "Cadaver Synod." This does not seem to have happened with any Roman Emperors, but this "dig up his bones" expression caught on as a way to call for the overthrown of Emperors. Another call also became traditional, which was simply to shout ἀνάξιος, anaxíos, "Unworthy!" We can all understand that.

Under Constans the structure of the Roman Army was fundamentally changed to deal with the new circumstances of the Empire. As the traditional units, largely familiar from the 5th Century, fell back from the collapsing frontiers, they were settled on the land in Anatolia, to be paid directly from local revenues instead of from the Treasury, whose tax base from Syria and Egypt had disappeared. The areas set aside for particular units became the themes (θέμα, thema, "placement," plural, θέματα, themata, from the Greek verb τίθημι, tithēmi, "to put" -- related to thesis).

The Themes remained the military bedrock of Romania until the end of the 11th century and soon replaced the old Roman provinces as the administrative divisions of the Empire, with the commanding στρατηγός, stratēgos, "general," becoming the military governor of his theme. The commander of the Opsician Theme, Θέμα Ὀψικίου, however, was a κόμης, comes, "Count," in deference to the origin of the Theme from the Armies in the Emperor's Presence.

Thus, the Army of the East, driven out of Syria, was settled in the Anatolic Theme, where it would guard the obvious route for invasion or raids from Syria:  the Cilician Gates through the Taurus Mountains. Although invasions and raids there would be, the Arabs never did secure any conquests beyond the Gates. Where the Army of the East in the Late Empire numbered about 20,000 men, the forces of the Anatolic Theme varied from about 18,000 in 773 to 15,000 in 899 [Warren Treadgold, Byzantium and Its Army, 284-1081, Stanford, 1995, p.67].

As the remnants of the Late Roman Army were settled on the land (like the earlier Limitanei), there were also standing forces that accompanied the Emperor, like the old Comitatenses. There were already two such units in the Late Empire, the Scholae and the Excubitors -- the latter had been created by Leo I in 466 as a force of Isaurians to use, under its commander Zeno, against the Germans in the Eastern Army. These would be organized by Constantine V into the core of a new Standing or Mobile Army, the Tagmata (τάγματα, singular tagma, τάγμα, "regiment"), and would eventually grow into a large army in its own right. In 899, the Tagmata together numbered about 28,000 men, while the entire Army, Themes and Tagmata combined, added up to about 128,000 men [Treadgold, op.cit.].

This was less than half of the Augustan Army and not even a quarter of Constantine's; but considering that the Empire is reduced to the lower Balkans and Anatolia, about a quarter of its Late Antique size, it is proportionally still robust, especially in an Age when a paid military establishment was impossible in most of Europe.

As with the decline of the Limitanei, the late Macedonian Emperors began to neglect the Thematic forces and rely on the Tagmata, which soon filled with mercenaries. Some mercenaries could be quite faithful, like the Saxon refugees from Norman England who served in the Varangian Guard for more than three centuries (the Egklinovaraggoi). This worked reasonably well while there was money. But when the finances collapsed, loses could not be made good, or the more mercenary warriors retained. This led to fiascoes like the hire of the Catalan Company (1303), who mutinied (1305) and seized the Duchy of Athens (1311). Even under the Palaeologi, landed frontier forces (now the akritai, ἀκρίται) remained the best investment but were imprudently neglected, with disastrous consequences.

The maps of Romania now become much smaller. Egypt, Palestine, Spain, and North Africa are gone forever. Footholds in Italy and the Balkans remain. Greece and the Balkans would be recovered in time, but everything in Italy would eventually be lost also. For the time being, the heartland of the Empire will be Asia Minor. Although this would provide the resources for revival, even for colonization back into Greece, it was still open to Arab raids. They could not be precluded for a couple of centuries.

2. KHAZARS, Khagans & Beks
Ashina Khagans
Ziebel, Yabghu Xak'an(?)	618-630
allied with Heraclius, overruns Georgia, 627-628, takes Tiflis, 628
Interregnum, 630-650
Irbis (?)	c.650
Busir (Ibuzir Glavan)	c.690-715
Barjik	720's-731
Arabs defeated, 730; Barjik defeated & killed, 731
Bihar	c.732
Prisbit	Regent ?, 730's
To Omayyads, 737-c.740
Baghatur	c.760
Khan-Tuvan Dyggvi	c.825-830
"Tarkhan"	840's
Zachariah	c.860's

The Khazars are an extremely important part of Roman history, entering it with a bang, as allies of Heraclius against Persia and operating in conjunction with him in or near the Caucasus. Ziebel is supposed to have occupied Georgia, besieging Tiflis (Tbilisi) with Heraclius himself in 627 and then taking the city, with great massacre, in 628. The Khazars subsequently endured as Roman allies down to the height of the power of Middle Romania in the days of Nicephorus Phocas, but fading quickly thereafter. Four hundred years, however, is a considerable block of historical time.

The Khazars were of Turkic derivation, speaking a poorly attested Altaic language, apparently closely related to Hunnic, Bulgar (Bolghar), and the surviving modern Chuvash. Titles familiar from Bulgar, Mongolian, Persian, or Turkish as خَاقَان, Khagan, Qaghan, or خَان, Khān, and بَك, Beg or Bey, occur here as "Khagan" or "Xak'an" and "Bek." The Byzantine histories I know about do not give any lists of Khazar rulers, but Bruce R. Gordon's Regnal Chronologies came through with most of the information I am able to use here. A lot of this, on the other hand, is not present to what we would want to call "the light of history"; and many of the events involving the Khazars are very obscure.

The Khazar realm began as the westernmost reach of the Gök (or Kök) Turkiut Great Turkish Khanate, which extended across Central Asia. This vast but poorly documented realm broke up into Eastern and Western halves in 553/554.

Beks,
Tar'mach	c.730
Hazer Tarkhan	?-737
To Omayyads, 737-c.740
Bulanid Beks/Khagans?
Bulan Sabriel	c.740
Obadiah	c.786-809
Hezekiah
Manasseh I
Chanukkah
Isaac
Zebulun
Manasseh II
Nisi
Aaron I	c.900
Menahem
Benjamin	c.920
Aaron II	c.920's-940
Joseph	c.940-965
sovereignty broken by Sviatoslav I of Kiev, 965-969
David	in Taman, c.986-988
Georgius Tzul	in Kerch, ?-1016

The Khazars were a further fragment of this, at the Westernmost end, around the Lower Volga, ruled by a branch of the ruling Ashina Dynasty. Exactly when the Khazars become independent of the Western Khanate is obscure, and the Khagan Ziebel who helped Heraclius may or may not be identical to Tun[g] Yabgu (or Yabghu) Khagan (or Xak'an) of the Western Khanate.

This Khagan is reported by Moses Dasxuranci as delivering an ultimatum to the Shāh Khusro II circa 627:

If you will not retreat from the king of the Romans and surrender to him all the lands and cities which you have taken by force and return all of the prisoners of his country now in your hands, together with the wood of the Cross which all Christian nations worship and honor; if you will not recall your troops from his territory, the king of the north, the lord of the whole world, your king and the king of kings, says to you: "I shall turn against you, governor of Asorestan, and shall replay you twofold for each deed committed against him. I shall swoop upon your lands with my sword as you descended upon his with yours. I shall not spare you, nor shall I delay to do to you what I said I shall do." [Walter E. Kaegi, Heraclius, Emperor of Byzantium, Cambridge, 2003, p.158]

Substantial help was provided for Heraclius, but not to this degree, and without even Heraclius acknowledging pretentions that sound more like those of Genghis Khan.

In 695, Justinian II was deposed, mutilated, and exiled to the Crimea. Before long, however, he escaped to the Khazars, where he contracted to marry the sister, then baptised "Theodora," of the Khagan Busir. Although Theodora was soon pregnant, Busir had second thoughts about harboring Justinian and estranging the new Emperor, Tiberias III. Justinian was forced to flee again, this time to the Bulgar Qaghan Tervel. In 705 Tervel marched on Constantinople to restore Justinian. The Emperor was able to enter the City with a small number of men through the previously broken Aqueduct of Valens, and resistance collapsed. Tervel was given the rank of Caesar, and the Khazar Khagan obligingly sent his sister and her new son to Constantinople. Unfortunately, both Justinian and his Khazar son were killed in his second and final deposition in 711.

The Khagan Barjik defeated and destroyed an Arab army of the Caliph Hishām outside Ardebil in Iran in 730, but he was then defeated and killed at Mosul a year later. With the Arabs then raiding into the Khazar homeland, in 733 the Emperor Leo III cemented the Roman-Khazar alliance by marrying his son, the future Emperor Constantine V, to the daughter, Tzitazk, of the Khazar Khagan, named as "Bihar." Baptized "Irene," her son would be the Emperor Leo IV, "the Khazar." Justinian's Khazar son had not become Emperor, but now two Emperors of the Syrian dynasty would have Khazar blood.

The line of Ashina Khagans now becomes shrouded in an obscurity even greater than what we previously had to contend with -- the "Tarkhan" of the 840's may even be a confusion, since the name actually can be a military rank. Instead, we begin to get indications of leadership falling on generals, the "Beks," who gradually overshadow or even replace the Khagans. Thus, it is the Bek Hazer Tarkhan whose army was destroyed by the Omayyads at Itil in 737. This led to a short occupation and forced Islamization of the Khazar homeland -- forced Islamization because the Khazars were still pagan and thus had no rights as "People of the Book." Under Islamic Law, their choice was conversion or death.

The means and spirit of resistance not lacking among the Khazars, Arab control was thrown off around 740. This experience, however, led to one of the most significant events in all of Khazar history:  the Conversion of the nation to Judaism. This may have happened as early as 740, or at late as 861. The earlier date corresponds to the rule of the Bek Bulan Sabriel, while the later date involves association with St. Cyril. The story is that the Khazars entertained appeals and arguments from representatives of all the major religions, Judaism, Christianity, and ʾIslām, before making their decision. Choosing Judaism may have involved a desire to remain independent of both Christian and Islamic powers. St. Cyril's visit was probably a bit late.

The existence of the Jewish Khazars immediately suggests that the subsequent Jews of Russia may be their descendants, However, modern Russian Jews have spoken Yiddish and look to be immigrants from Germany into areas of Poland that were subsequently annexed to Russia. In the same way, genetic studies tend to link Russian Jews with Jews elsewhere. On the other hand, Russians Jews often have red hair, which does not look like something of Middle Eastern origin but has historically occurred in Central Asia. Genghis Khan himself is often said to have had red hair. Also, we know that in 529 the Sassanid Shāh (or Crown Prince; he wasn't Shāh until 531) Khusro I expelled Jews from Persia and that they fled north of the Caucasus.

It is therefore possible that the Khazars converted to Judaism in part because there were Jews among them, with whom they had been or were then actually intermarrying. Bruce Gordon says that Khazar Jews were known to be present in Kiev and to have emigrated to places as diverse as Spain, Egypt, Iraq, Hungary, Poland, and the Crimea, where they intermarried with other Jews. This would imply a Khazar element in much of World Jewry. With all these possibilities, the questions about the Khazars and their Judaism are certain to continue.

Palestinian nationalism now claims that all European Jews are actually Khazars and so have no connection to the Middle East or Palestine. However, the historical record and genetic studies contradict this; and, most significantly, most Jewish immigration into Israel since its independence have been Middle Eastern Jews, who often look just like Arabs (as did my Iraqi Jew Arabic instructor at UCLA), and who have no connection to European Jewry, and certainly not to the Khazars. Yemeni Jews, now mostly moved to Israel, were in Yemen before the advent of ʾIslām.

Gordon mentions that the list of Bulanid Beks, who may have become the Khazar Khagans, is derived from a list sent by the Bek Joseph to Hisdai ibn Shaprut, a Jewish Vizir to the Omayyad Caliph ʿAbdur-Raḥmān III (912-961) in Spain. Joseph refers to himself as the "King of the Khazars."

Joseph's state, however, was in its last days. Sviatoslav I of Kiev attacks the Khazars in 965 and by 969 took the capital, Itil, on the Volga. Sviatoslav's attack was no more than a raid -- he was unable to establish any control of the area. Meanwhile, however, new nomads had arrived, the Cumans, who push the Khazars off the Steppe, until they disappear in the obscure realms of the Caucasus. Gordon gives two rulers from Khazar successor states that survived in the area, which brings Khazar history down to 1016, in the reign of the Emperor Basil II -- although there are apparent references to them even later. The rise of Russia and new movements of nomads in Central Asia would soon give Romania new allies and new formidable and deadly enemies.

4. ISAURIANS (SYRIANS)
Leo III the Isaurian	717-741
Siege of Constantinople by the Caliphs Sulaymān & ʿUmar II, 717-718; Christian rowers escape, Arab fleet destroyed, 718; volcanic eruption of Thera (Santorini), 726; Tax Revolt in Italy, end of Imperial authority in Exarchate, Exarch Paulicius assassinated, 727; Edict establishing Iconoclasm, 730; Ravenna falls to Lombards, 739, soon recovered; Arab army destroyed at Akronion in Phrygia, ʿAbdallāh al-Baṭṭāl killed, 740; earthquakes in Constantinople, 740
Constantine V Copronymus	741-775
revolt of Artavasdus, 741-743; plague, 745-748; Arab fleet destroyed off Cyprus, return of Plague, 747; Ravenna Falls to Lombards, 751; Iconoclast Council, 754; defeat of Bulgars, 763; Aqueduct of Valens restored, 767; defeat of Bulgars, 774
Leo IV the Khazar	775-780
Constantine VI	780-797
Irene the Athenian	780-790, Regent
	792-802, d.803
Council VII, Nicaea II, Iconoclasm condemned, 787; Black Sea freezes, winter of 800-801

Leo III seized the Throne just in time to hold off another Arab siege of Constantinople. This one, besides the use of Greek Fire again, would be distinguished by two extraordinary circumstances. One was that many of the rowers in the Arab fleet were Egyptian Christians. They would defect en masse to the Romans, leaving the Arab fleet hopelessly undermanned. Next, the Arabs were to suffer from attacks by the Bulgar Qaghan Tervel. Whether this was from design and alliance, or just because the Arabs had annoyed the Bulgars, is a matter of some uncertainty.

The result, however, was, not only attacks on the Arabs in their rear, but the inability of the investing army to obtain supplies. Hunger and the cold, as well as harassment by the Roman fleet, took their toll; and finally the Arabs were instructed to withdraw. But that was not the end of their troubles. Their fleeing ships were hit by a storm in the Aegaean, and then many ships were set afire by volcanic ash from Thera. Few ships and little of the Army were able to return home. This turned out to be a serious blow against the strength of the Omayyad Dynasty itself; and the Arab Caliphates would not again attempt to seize Constantinople.

Meanwhile, the position of Romania in the West deteriorated. With Africa gone, it became harder to project authority into Italy and harder to resist the Lombards. John Julius Norwich (A History of Venice, Vintage, 1989) links the election of the first Doge of Venice with Leo's prohibition of images; but the election was in 727, during a tax revolt, not in 730, when Leo did prohibit images, alienating the Western Church.

So Leo, a sort of proto-Protestant, decided to clean up Christianity's act. This did not find any traction in the West, however. The Latin Church felt no sting from Islāmic ideology. Leo's successes against the Arabs, obvious evidence of the favor of God, became associated with Iconoclasm. After images were restored by Irene, and military reverses seemed to follow, the favor of God was apparently withdrawn. The final Iconoclast period (815-843) was of such mixed military fortunes, with a serious defeat in 838, that worries about the favor of God faded, as Papal support for images had never faltered. But meanwhile, a great deal of Late Antique art seems to have been lost.

At the same time, we notice that icons, not statuary, have since characterized Orthodox churches and worship. The Latin Church still favors statuary.

A geologically significant event occurred with the eruption of the volcanic island of Thera (Santorini) in 726. The volcano had been active since 718, but the eruption of 726 blew ash as far away as Macedonia. This may have been the largest eruption in Europe since Mt. Vesuvius in 79 AD. Such an event may have contributed to Leo's sense that the Wrath of God had been provoked and that something like Iconoclasm was the proper response.

In the longer view of history, the most striking thing about the event is its echo of the great eruption of Thera that is now dated to have been between 1627 and 1600 BC (right at the end of the Egyptian Second Intermediate Period). This wiped out what seems to have been a very large city of the Minoan Civilization on Thera. With ash, earthquakes, and tsunamis affecting Crete, the eruption may have delivered a devastating blow to that Civilization, which then limped on in part through its Greek, Mycenaean adaptation. Memory of the event may account for the stories of Atlantis related by Plato.

Today Thera is a popular tourist destination, though the bay of the caldera is too deep for ships to anchor. Recently (April 6, 2007), the cruise ship Sea Diamond sank in the bay, with the loss of two passengers.

The final fall of Ravenna to the Lombards in 751 led to the intervention of the Franks in Italy, at the urging of Pope Stephen III. Romania would never return to Central or Northern Italy.

Nevertheless, the form of the Exarchate of Ravenna across central Italy, a corridor held between the Lombards in the north and those in the south, survived as the "Donation" of the Frankish King Pepin to the Pope -- the Papal States, whose history ran from 754 to 1870, 1116 years.

This was not always under Papal control, and we note significant campaigns by Cesare Borgia and Pope Julius II to assert Papal suzerainty. Local princes could sometimes be characterized as "wolves," or cities could be under the enlightened rule of someone like Federico III Montefeltro (1444-1482) of Urbino, a jewel of Renaissance civilization.

Thus, although politically insignificant after 751, Ravenna nevertheless casts a kind of shadow deep into modern history -- including the name that, as a Roman capital, the city gives to the surrounding region, Romagna -- a word that looks like "Romania" where the "i" has patalalized the "n," the equivalent of Romaña, as we might write it in Spanish.

The German Emperors thought of themselves as "Romans" and of their state as the "Roman Empire," but "Romania" remained resereved for Ῥωμανία, although this was debated for a short while; and, since Ravenna for long had been an outpost of Constantinople, some form of "Romania" drifted around in the area, until settling on its modern application -- now reduced to only part of the modern district of Emilia-Romagna. So "Romagna" is indeed the Italian adaptation of "Romania."

Even as late as 1500 AD, as we see on the map at left (Historical Atlas of the World, Barnes & Noble, 1970, 1972, p.49), the Archbishop of Ravenna has jurisdiction over an area of Northern Italy still coextensive with the historic Romagna. But it was in Bologna, the largest city of the region, where the Pope last crowned a Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, in 1530. Note that Modena and Parma are separate states in the Renaissance.

In 1582 Bologna was raised to the status of an Archbishopric and removed from the jurisdiction of Ravenna. There had been some earlier shufflings like that, but this finally reduced Ravenna to its modern, limited status -- further compromised by the Archbishopric now named "Ravenna-Cervia." Nevertheless, the place occasionally attracts a certain kind of educated Romantic, like Lord Byron or a character in Brideshead Revisited, as I have noted above.

With roughly the area of the Archbishopric of Ravenna in 1582 is the modern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna, whose capital is, of course, Bologna, not Ravenna. Ravenna is reduced to one of nine provinces of Emilia-Romagna. The local pronunciation, in the Romagnol dialect, of "Romagna" is now Rumâgna, whose inhabitant is a Rumagnòl (mas.) or Rumagnàla (fem.) -- whose standard Italian equivalents are Romagnolo and Romagnola, respectively.

A bit off the beaten path for the modern tourist, I felt that my life could not be complete until I stood before the magnificent mosaics of Justinian and Theodora. For something 1500 years old, they look all but new. It is a magical place. No images like that survive in Constantinople.

Archbishops of Ravenna

The Fall of Ravenna was on the watch of Constantine V, who came to be called Κοπρώνυμος, "Copronymus," "Name of Dung" -- certainly one the harshest, crudest epithets in the history of royalty. Nevertheless, Constantine's reign may be regarded as generally successful, and the epithet is simply due to his persecution, including torture and execution, of those opposed to Iconoclasm. In another proto-Protestant move, Constantine began forcing monks and nuns, strong supporters of icons, to marry. Otherwise, there were military successes against the Bulgars and even Arabs, where the Abbasid Revolution disrupted the attention of the Caliphate.

Constantine also began developing mobile military units, the tagmata (τάγματα, singular, tagma, τάγμα, from tassein, τάσσειν, "to arrange, put in order" or "to draw up in order of battle" -- "regiment" would thus be an appropriate translation), in addition to the landed thematic forces that had become fundamental to Roman military power. The units were commanded by a Domestic (Domesticus, Δομέστικος), except the Watch, whose commander was a Drungarius, Δρουγγάριος τῆς Βίγλης. This represented the first steps back to a paid professional army and so is a sign of a reviving economy. The Empire, however, would never be able to remain strong without the themes, and their collapse at the end of the 11th century would be the end of Romania as a hegemonic power.

Eventually the Tagmata consisted of the Scholae, Σχολαί ("Schools"), the Numera, Νούμεροι ("Number," feminine of Latin Numerus, used for a military unit), the Walls (Τειχισταί, Teichistai, or τῶν Τειχέων, tôn Teicheôn, "of the Walls"), the Excubitors, Ἐξκουβίτορες ("Sentinels"), the Ὀπτιμάτοι, Optimates (Latin "the Best"), the Watch (Vigla, Βίγλα, familar from "Vigil" in English, or Ἀριθμός, Arithmos, equivalent to Numerus in meaning), the Ἱκανάτοι, Hicanati ("Able Ones"), the Immortals (Ἀθάνατοι, Athanatoi, named for the elite unit of Achaemenid Persia, whose members were replaced as soon as they fell), and, finally, the Varangian Guard.

The Scholae were Guard units founded by Constantine I. The Numera and Walls were garrison troops for Constantinople, doubtlessly dating from the foundation of the City. The Excubitors had been created by Leo I with Isaurian recruits as part of his plan to purge the Army of Germans. All these units had rather withered until Constantine V, who recreated them as his own personal force after the revolt of Count Artabasdos (741–743) of the Opsician Theme, Θέμα Ὀψικίου.

The status of the Optimates, which began as a fighting force with the other Tagmata, soon became a support unit, providing and supervising transport and logistics. Its commander remained a Domesticus, but it was settled on land, like a Thematic army, in the Ὀπτιμάκων, Optimakôn ("of the Optimates") Theme on the Asian side of the Bosporus, where other Tagmata units might be quartered. The Optimates thus are best regarded as a Thematic force that nevertheless is dedicated to the support of the Tagmata.

The next Tagma added to the Army was the Watch, created by the Empress Irene from drafts of Thematic soldiers because the Scholae and others were strongly Iconoclast in sentiment and were interfering with her plans to Restore the Icons.

There is some confusion about the names here. The Watch (Vigla) was also called the Arithmos, "Number," which was equivalent to Latin Numerus. A "Watch" should be a garrison force in Constantinople, and the coincidence of alternative names, like "Numera" and Arithmos, may have resulted in a mistaken switch between them. From its name, the Watch does sound like part of the garrison force of Constantinople, since it has always been the job of a Watch, before the existence of police forces, to patrol cities at night to enforce the law and the peace. In modern Tokyo, one might notice an actual Watch is still active, although its members may take their charge less seriously than the real police patrol, and one suspects some drinking has been involved. They get to go around, ring a gong, and loudly announce the Japanese equivalent of "All is well."

We find Odo of Deuil (1110-1162) with what seems to be a complaint about street crime in Constantinople: "There murder and robberies occur, as well as other sordid crimes which love the dark." This leaves us wondering whether Odo experienced this crime himself, and to what extent the Watch was effective at controlling such things. We don't get a lot of details about law enforcement from the historians.

Warren Treadgold says that under Constantine V the "senior tagmata, the Scholae, Excubitors, and Watch" were cavalry units, while the "junior tagmata, the Numera, Walls, and Optimates," were infantry [Byzantium and its Army, 284-1081, Sanford, 1995, p.28]. He also adds that the Hicanati, created by Nicephorus I, were "a fourth cavalry tagma" [p.29]. The idea that a "Watch" would be cavalry itself looks incongruous, so I think that Treadgold may be tangled in the potential confusion here. And there is another problem. If Irene created the "Watch," then it cannot have been among the "senior tagmata" at the time of Constantine V, as Treadgold says.

Irene may have transformed the (preexisting) Watch into a proper tagma, as Constantine V did with the original units he took in hand. Or we may be confused, and Irene introduces a new military unit whose name we have simply transposed with an alternative name for the Watch. The final tagmata, the Immortals and the Varangian Guard, would be added by the Macedonians.

My suspicion then is that we should arrange the tagmata as at right. The Walls and the Watch are both forces of infantry, originating with Constantine I, on foot patrol in Constantinople, the one, as we might imagine, on the walls and the gates, the other to keep order on the streets. The Scholae are the Emperor's personal cavalry unit. The Excubitors, Numera, and Hicanti then are all added as cavalry units under the Emperor's personal command, the first two at least under circumstances where the Emperor, or Empress, requires additional protection against disloyalty, opponents, or rebels. The Varangian Guard, with their large axes, could not easily be on horseback, and we do see them close around where the Emperor is on foot. Their presence was taken to signify the location of the Emperor.

While Charlemagne even offered to marry Irene, who could have regarded him as only the rudest of barbarians, this all signaled a fundamental parting of the ways between the Latin Europe of Pope and Franks (Francia) and the Orthodox Europe of Romania.

Irene constitutes an interesting case for feminism. We have seen elsewhere how Irene has been included among the "10 most despicable Romans" in a popular but irresponsible treatment. Irene had taken the throne exclusively for herself, the only Empress ever to do so. One problem with this was that she did it by deposing and blinding her own son, Constantine VI. He died from this treatment, which might not surprise us, but then blinding was done at this point without unusual danger of death. Michael V, blinded during the riot that deposed him, a situation where we would not expect much care to be taken, nevertheless did not die. So we might wonder if there was something unusual about the blinding of Constantine VI.

Note the parallels between the reign of Irene and that of the earlier Empress Wu (685-705) of T'ang Dynasty China. But Irene's actions went well beyond what was done by the Chinese Empress, who deposed not one but two sons. But the Empress Wu did not harm her sons and was succeeded by them (the Chung Tsung and Jui Tsung Emperors). When Irene was deposed (and sent to exile on Lesbos), it meant the end of the Isaurian dynasty.

Thus, Irene violated multiple "gender norms," more than Wu, not just by assuming the full power of a Roman Emperor but, in effect, killing her son. Some mother. Other Empresses left on the Throne by the death of a husband, or by inheritance, married or remarried to provide a man to run the government and army. The women were not expected to rule in their own right. Irene did, and even seized power on her own initiative.

So Irene must have been generally hated, yes? Actually, no. Calling the Seventh Ecumenical Council and having it Restore the Icons (787) earned Irene, not just the forgiveness of all her sins, but Canonization in the Orthodox Church. She was revered as far away as St. Catharine's monastery on Mt. Sinai, which had been under the rule of ʾIslām for a couple of centuries at that point. Although the Icons had to be Restored all over again later (in 843), the Church Doctrine, decided by Council VII, is the still the doctrinal law in the matter, for the Roman Catholic Church as well as the Orthodox ones (or at least those in communion with Constantinople). Irene gets no credit for this from the Catholic Church, but then Papal ideology will credit the Greek Church with little for anything.

The Empress Wu was not so lucky as Irene. Confucian misogynists found no reason to see any good in her, and they didn't like her Buddhism either. As with some other successful women rulers, hostile historians fantasized over her sexual appetities and practices. We actually don't get much of that about Irene.

The treatment of Irene contrasts in interesting ways with the ancient and modern treatment of Anna Comnena, who, we will see, seemed to earn a great deal of misogynistic dismissal and dislike just for being learned and writing a history. Since no crimes or misconduct could be attributed to her, a couple were invented. So why the hostility to Anna and the pass for Irene? Well, there may be a dynamic here where intellectuals, who condemn tyranny and oppression in the abstract, nevertheless become strangely attracted and enamored of ruthless people. In other words, to get intellectuals to love you, you need to exhibit a frightening potential for violence.

As Nietzsche would say, the powerless, the eunuchs, like intellectuals and priests, who denounce power, actually love power and will debase themselves before it -- something Julian Benda noted in La Trahison des Clercs [1927, The Treason of the Intellectuals, 1928], when he could see the reaction to living, contemporary Fascism and Communism. We have also seen the phenomenon whereby intellectuals, who become apologists for dictators, by denying that murders or massacres were taking place under them (the most appalling case being in poor Cambodia), only tend to be attracted to, and offer apologies for, such regimes while the murders and massacres actually are taking place, losing interest when their conduct moderates. Thus, the very thing they deny, in bad faith, is what they actually admire. This probably helps account for the popularity of Nietzsche himself, despite apologists disguising what he said. American "celebrities" and politicians making the pilgrimage to Cuba and kissing the ring (or nethers) of Fidel Castro tells the whole story.

Thus, it may well be that the obvious power and ruthlessness of Irene attracts rather than repells them. Feminists have a better excuse for this, since they are supposed to admire powerful women -- although their dislike of a powerful woman like Margaret Thatcher betrays their true ideological commitment (i.e. to communism). When it comes to Irene, the Restoration of the Icons means nothing either to feminists or to modern intellectuals in general. So they are going to admire her just for her power. On the other hand, the dislike for Anna may be for the extent she retained, and wanted to be seen to retain, womanly qualities. Today, it is nothing unusual for women to write history, but it is more unusual for them to wail and lament and weap as Anna allows herself to do in her history. So the feminists and others, who really seem to despise "womanly" ways, are turned off.

Anna Komnene, by Leonore Neville, Oxford, 2016

5. DOGES (DUKES) OF VENICE, 727-1797
Orso (Ursus) Ipato	727-738
Teodato (Deusdedit) Ipato	742, 744-736
Ravenna falls to Lombards, 751
Galla Gaulo	756
Domenico Monegaurio	756-765
Maurizio I Galbaio	765-787
Giovanni and Maurizio II Galbaio	787-802
Obelerio Antenorio	802-811
Venetia & Dalmatia submit to Franks, 806; Roman fleet reestablishes authority, 807
Beato	808-811
Angello Partecipazio	811-827
Giustiniano Partecipazio	827-829
Body of St. Mark (or is it Alexander the Great?) smuggled in from Alexanderia, 828
Giovanni (I) Partecipazio	829-836
Pietro Tradonico	836-864
Orso I Badoer (I Partecipazio)	864-881
Giovanni Badoer (II Partecipazio)	881-888
Venice effectively independent, 886
Pietro I Candiano	887
Pietro Tribuno	888-912
Orso II Badoer (II Partecipazio)	912-932
Pietro II Candiano	932-939
Pietro Badoer (Partecipazio)	939-942
Pietro III Candiano	942-959
Pietro IV Candiano	959-976
Pietro I Orseolo	976-978
Vitale Candiano	978-979
Tribuno Menio (Memmo)	979-991
Pietro II Orseolo	991-1008
Ottone Orseolo	1008-1026, 1030-1032
Pietro Centranico (Barbolano)	1026-1030
Domenico Flabianico	1032-1043
Domenico Contarini	1043-1070
Reconstruction of St. Mark's Cathedral begun, 1063
Domenico Silvio (Selvo)	1070-1084
Trade concession with Romania, 1082
Vitale Falier	1084-1096
St. Mark's Cathedral consecrated, relics of St. Mark deposited, 1094
Vitale I Michiel (Michel)	1096-1101
Ordelafo Falier	1101-1118
Domenico Michiel	1118-1129
Pietro Polani	1129-1148
Domenico Morosini	1148-1155
Vitale II Michiel	1155-1172
all Venetians arrested in Romania, Enrico Dandolo loses an eye, 1171; plague brought to Venice, Doge killed by mob, 1172
Sebastiano Ziani	1172-1178
Orio Mastropiero (Malipiero)	1178-1192
Enrico Dandolo	1192-1205
Fourth Crusade, 1202-1204; Constantinople falls to Crusaders & Venetians, 1204; Venice ceded 3/8 of Romania
Pietro Ziani	1205-1229
Giacomo Tiepolo	1229-1249
Marino Morosini	1249-1253
Reniero Zeno	1253-1268
Restoration of Greek rule in Constantinople, 1261
Lorenzo Tiepolo	1268-1275
Jacopo Contarini	1275-1280
Giovanni Dandolo	1280-1289
Venetians mint Ducats after Roman debasement, 1284
Pietro Gradenigo	1289-1311
Venetian fleet destroyed by Genoa at Curzola, Marco Polo captured, 1298
Marino Zorzi	1311-1312
Giovanni Soranzo	1312-1328
Francesco Dandolo	1328-1339
Bartolomeo Gradenigo	1339-1342
Andrea Dandolo	1343-1354
Crown Jewels of Romania pawned, 1343; Black Death arrives at Venice, 1347; War with Genoa, 1350-1355
Marino Falier	1354-1355
Giovanni Gradenigo	1355-1356
Giovanni Dolfin	1356-1361
Lorenzo Celsi	1361-1365
Marco Corner	1365-1368
Corfu acquired, 1368
Andrea Contarini	1368-1382
Michele Morosini	1382
Antonio Venier	1382-1400
Michele Steno	1400-1413
Mission from Ethiopia, 1402
Tommaso Mocenigo	1414-1423
Francesco Foscari	1423-1457
Thessalonica ceded by Romania, 1423, captured by Turks, 1430; reward offered for death of Skanderbeg, 1447; aids Ottomans in siege of Albanian fortress of Sfetigrad, Venetians defeated by Skanderbeg, Drin River, 1448; aids Ottoman siege of Croya, defeated by Skanderbeg; 1450; Patriarch of Grado becomes Patriarch of Venice, 1451; Constantinople falls to Turks, Venetian baillie executed, others executed, enslaved, ransomed, 1453
Pasquale Malipiero	1457-1462
Cristoforo Moro	1462-1471
possesion of the Monembasia fortress, 1463-1538; Euboia (Negroponte) falls to Turks, 1470
Nicolò Tron	1471-1473
Nicolò Marcello	1473-1474
Pietro Mocenigo	1474-1476
Andrea Vendramin	1476-1478
Giovanni Mocenigo	1478-1485
Marco Barbarigo	1485-1486
Agostino Barbarigo	1486-1501
Cyprus passes to Venice, 1489; inconclusive battles at Zonchio (Navarino), 1499, 1500; Lepanto, Modon, Corone & Zonchio fall to Turks, 1500
Leonardo Loredan	1501-1521
Antonio Grimani	1521-1523
Andrea Gritti	1523-1538
Monembasia falls to Turks, 1538
Pietro Lando	1539-1545
Francesco Donato	1545-1553
Marcantonio Trevisan	1553-1554
Francesco Venier	1554-1556
Lorenzo Priuli	1556-1559
Girolamo Priuli	1559-1567
Pietro Loredan	1567-1570
Alvise I Mocenigo	1570-1577
Turkish Conquest of Cyprus, 1571; Battle of Lepanto, naval defeat of Turkey by Spain, Venice, & Malta, Ottoman commander, Ali Pasha, captured & beheaded, 1571; Plague, 1575, 1577, quarter of population dies
Sebastiano Venier	1577-1578
Commander at Lepanto
Nicolò da Ponte	1578-1585
Pasquale Cicogna	1585-1595
Marino Grimani	1595-1605
Leonardo Donato	1606-1612
Marcantonio Memmo	1612-1615
Giovanni Bembo	1615-1618
Nicolò Donato	1618
Antonio Priuli	1618-1623
Francesco Contarini	1623-1624
Giovanni Corner	1625-1629
Nicolò Contarini	1630-1631
Francesco Erizzo	1631-1646
Francesco Molin	1646-1655
Carlo Contarini	1655-1656
Francesco Corner	1656
Bertucci (Albertuccio) Valier	1656-1658
Giovanni Pesaro	1658-1659
Domenico Contarini	1659-1675
Conquest of Crete by Turkey, 1669
Nicolò Sagredo	1675-1676
Luigi Contarini	1676-1684
Marcantonio Giustinian	1684-1688
possession of Monembasia fortress, 1684-1715; Parthenon destroyed in explosion under Venetian bombardment, 1687
Francesco Morosini	1688-1694
Silvestro Valier	1694-1700
Alvise II Mocenigo	1700-1709
French warships in Adriatic, "Wedding of the Sea" ritual cancelled, 1702
Giovanni II Corner	1709-1722
Monembasia falls to Turks, 1715; Turks repulsed from Corfu, 1716; neutral in European conflicts, 1718
Alvise III Mocenigo	1722-1732
Carlo Ruzzini	1732-1735
Alvise Pisani	1735-1741
Pietro Grimani	1741-1752
Francesco Loredan	1752-1762
Marco Foscarini	1762-1763
Alvise IV Mocenigo	1763-1778
Paolo Renier	1779-1789
Anti-piracy attack on Tunis, 1785
Lodovico Manin	1789-1797, d. 1802
Venice Falls to Napoleon Bonaparte, 1797

Venice was the "Most Serene Republic" (Serenissima Repubblica di Venezia), or the "Queen of the Adriatic." The title of Doge derives from that of a late Roman commander of a military frontier, Dux ("leader," δούξ in Greek, duce in Modern Italian). This is cognate to English "Duke." The Doges were always elected, from a variety of families, as their names indicate. Over time their powers were increasingly limited, as Venice evolved into an oligarchic Republic. The Duke of Venetia at first would have been like many other Roman officials in Italy, such as the Dukes of Naples, but Constantinople rarely had occasion or ability to exert direct rule over Venice, so over time the city drifted into independence, competition, and eventually belligerence.

The name "Venice" is derived from the name of the Roman province that embraced the whole area, Venetia. The principal city of Venetia was Aquileia. Although sacked by the Goths, the Huns, and the Lombards, Aquileia remained the most important city of the region for most of the Middle Ages. However, in the troubled times, people would flee the mainland to barrier islands along the coast or to islands in the lagoons behind them. Aquileia itself thus acquired a counterpart, Grado, on the nearby barrier island.

To the west, a community formed on Rialto Island in the much larger lagoon seaward from Padua. Farming or building on such islands was a challenge. Earth needed to be brought in or dredged up to fill plots created from woven grasses. Substantial buildings required foundations of logs driven down into the muddy soil. Eventually this allowed a large city to rise on the Rialto.

As its strength grew, the Rialto became powerful and preeminent and took on the name of the whole province -- Venetia, Venezia, Venice. The power of Aquileia was reduced by Austria, and finally the city itself was annexed by Venice in 1420. The Patriarchate that had been seated at Aquileia, and then had been divided with Grado, ultimately moved to Venice alone.

Venice was briefly in the power of Franks. According to Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus, the Venetians told King Pepin, "We want to be servants of the emperor of the Romans, and not of you" [De Administrando Imperio, Greek text edited by Gy. Moravcsik and translated by R.J.H. Jenkins, Dumbarton Oaks, Center for Byzantine Studies, 1967, p.121]. Eventually the Venetians agreed to pay tribute, but it steadily declined to a merely nominal sum.

Since 1451, Venice has been the seat of the Patriarchs of Venice, whose story can be examined in a separate popup. Although it is commonly thought that the mainland was abandoned in the 5th century and the whole population moved permanently to places like the Rialto, this does not seem to have been the case. It was a more gradual process, and the success of Venice may have been due to the realization that it provided defense, not against barbarian invasions, but in the face of the Frankish Emperors and other mainland powers.

Venice, indeed, would be immune to conquest until Napoleon, whose imposition of "republican" government on the Republic curiously coincided with the looting of artwork, some of which, like The Wedding Feast at Cana, by Paolo Veronese, was never returned.

While The Wedding Feast was supposed to be returned to Venice in 1815, the Louvre falsely claimed that it was too fragile to move. Nevertheless, it was moved many times to protect it from Nazi looting during World War II, until the liberation of Paris in 1944. In 2007, a full-sized computer-generated, digital facsimile of The Wedding Feast was donated and hung where the painting was originally sited, in the Palladian refectory of the Monastery of San Giorgio Maggiore in Venice. While nice, this still doesn't seem quite right. The original still hangs in the Louvre. People are still recovering art looted by the Nazis.