Constantine in the West; in the East, Gelerius, Maximin, and Licinius.
The second resignation of Maximian, and his renewed attempt to seize the
imperial power by seducing the soldiers of Constantine, and his
subsequent execution at Marseilles in February 310, reduced the number
to five. Galerius died of a lingering disorder in the following year,
and the civil war that broke out between Maxentius and Constantine,
culminating in a battle near Rome in 312, placed the sceptre of the West
in the hands of the son of Constantius. In the East, the alliance
between Licinius and Maximin dissolved into discord, and the defeat of
the latter on April 30, 313, ended in his death three or four months
later.
The empire was now divided between Constantine and Licinius, and the
ambition of the two princes rendered peace impossible. In the years 315
and 323 civil conflict broke out, ending, after the battle of Adrianople
and the siege of Byzantium, in a culminating victory for Constantine in
the field of Chrysopolis, in September. Licinius, taken prisoner, laid
himself and his purple at the feet of his lord and master, and was duly
executed.
By successive steps, from his first assuming the purple at York, to the
resignation of Licinius, Constantine had reached the undivided
sovereignty of the Roman world. His success contributed to the decline
of the empire by the expense of blood and treasure, and by the perpetual
increase as well of the taxes as of the military establishments. The
foundation of Constantinople and the establishment of the Christian
religion were the immediate and memorable consequences of this
revolution.
* * * * *
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire--II
_I.--Decay of the Empire under Constantine_
The unfortunate Licinius was the last rival who opposed the greatness of
Constantine. After a tranquil and prosperous reign, the conqueror
bequeathed to his family the inheritance of the Roman Empire; a new
capital, a new policy, and a new religion; and the innovations which he
established have been embraced, and consecrated, by succeeding
generations.
Byzantium, which, under the more august name of Constantinople, was
destined to preserve the shadow of the Roman power for nearly a thousand
years after it had been extinguished by Rome herself, was the site
selected for the new capital. Its boundary was traced by the emperor,
and its circumference measured some sixteen miles. In a general decay of
the arts no architect could be found worthy to decorate the new capital,
and the cities of Greece and Asia were despoiled of their most valuable
ornaments to supply this want of ability. In the course of eight or ten
years the city, with its beautiful forum, its circus, its imperial
palace, its theatres, baths, churches, and houses, was completed with
more haste than care. The dedication of the new Rome was performed with
all due pomp and ceremony, and a population was provided by the
expedient of summoning some of the wealthiest families in the empire to
take up their residence within its walls.
The gradual decay of Rome had eliminated that simplicity of manners
which was the just pride of the ancient republic. Under the autocratic
system of Diocletian, a hierarchy of dependents had sprung up. The rank
of each was marked with the most scrupulous exactness, and the purity of
the Latin language was debased by the invention of the deceitful titles
of your Sincerity, your Excellency, your Illustrious and Magnificent
Highness.
The officials of the empire were divided into three classes of the
Illustrious, Respectable, and Honourable. The consuls were still
annually elected, but obtained the semblance of their ancient authority,
not from the suffrages of the people, but from the whim of the emperor.
On the morning of January 1 they assumed the ensigns of their dignity,
and in the two capitals of the empire they celebrated their promotion to
office by the annual games. As soon as they had discharged these
customary duties, they retired into the shade of private life, to enjoy,
during the remainder of the year, the undisturbed contemplation of their
own greatness. Their names served only as the legal date of the year in
which they had filled the chair of Marius and of Cicero. The ancient
title of Patrician became now an empty honour bestowed by the emperor.
Four prefects held jurisdiction over as many divisions of the empire,
and two municipal prefects ruled Rome and Constantinople. The proconsuls
and vice-prefects belonged to the rank of Respectable, and the
provincial magistrates to the lower class of Honourable. In the military
system, eight master-generals exercised their jurisdiction over the
cavalry and the infantry, while thirty-five military commanders, with
the titles of counts and dukes, under their orders, held sway in the
provinces. The army itself was recruited with difficulty, for such was
the horror of the profession of a soldier which affected the minds of
the degenerate Romans that compulsory levies had frequently to be made.
The number of the barbarian auxiliaries enormously increased, and they
were included in the legions and the troops that surrounded the throne.
Seven ministers with the rank of Illustrious regulated the affairs of
the palace, and a host of official spies and torturers swelled the
number of the immediate followers of the sovereign.
The general tribute, or indiction, as it was called, was derived largely
from the taxation of landed property. Every fifteen years an accurate
census, or survey, was made of all lands, and the proprietor was
compelled to state the true facts of his affairs under oath, and paid
his contribution partly in gold and partly in kind. In addition to this
land tax there was a capitation tax on every branch of commercial
industry, and "free gifts" were exacted from the cities and provinces on
the occasion of any joyous event in the family of the emperor. The
peculiar "free gift" of the senate of Rome amounted to some $320,000.
Constantine celebrated the twentieth year of his reign at Rome in the
year 326. The glory of his triumph was marred by the execution, or
murder, of his son Crispus, whom he suspected of a conspiracy, and the
reputation of the emperor who established the Christian religion in the
Roman world was further stained by the death of his second wife, Fausta.
With a successful war against the Goths in 331, and the expulsion of the
Sarmatians in 334, his reign closed. He died at Nicomedia on May 22,
337.
_II.--The Division of East and West_
The unity of the empire was again destroyed by the three sons of
Constantine. A massacre of their kinsmen preceded the separation of the
Roman world between Constantius, Constans, and Constantine. Within three
years, civil war eliminated Constantine. The conflict among the emperors
resulted in a doubtful war with Persia, and the almost complete
extinction of the Christian monarchy which had been founded for
fifty-six years in Armenia.
Constantius was left sole emperor in 353. He associated with himself
successively as Cæsars the two nephews of the great Constantine, Gallus
and Julian. The first, being suspected, was destroyed in 354; the second
succeeded to the purple in 361.
Trained in the school of the philosophers, and proved as a commander in
a series of successful campaigns against the German hordes, Julian
brought to the throne a genius which, in other times, might have
effected the reformation of the empire. The sufferings of his youth had
associated in a mind susceptible of the most lively impressions the
names of Christ and of Constantius, the ideas of slavery and religion.
At the age of twenty he renounced the Christian faith, and boldly
asserted the doctrines of paganism. His accession to the supreme power
filled the minds of the Christians with horror and indignation. But
instructed by history and reflection, Julian extended to all the
inhabitants of the Roman world the benefits of a free and equal
toleration, and the only hardship which he inflicted on the Christians
was to deprive them of the power of tormenting their fellow subjects,
whom they stigmatised with the odious titles of idolaters and heretics.
While re-establishing and reforming the old pagan system and attempting
to subvert Christianity, he held out a hand of succour to the persecuted
Jews, asked to be permitted to pay his grateful vows in the holy city of
Jerusalem, and was only prevented from rebuilding the Temple by a
supposed preternatural interference. He suppressed the authority of
George, Archbishop of Alexandria, who had infamously persecuted and
betrayed the people under his spiritual care, and that odious priest,
who has been transformed by superstition into the renowned St. George of
England, the patron of arms, of chivalry, and of the Garter, fell a
victim to the just resentment of the Alexandrian multitude.
The Persian system of monarchy, introduced by Diocletian, was
distasteful to the philosophic mind of Julian; he refused the title of
lord and master, and attempted to restore in all its pristine simplicity
the ancient government of the republic. In a campaign against the
Persians he received a mortal wound, and died on June 26, 363.
The election of Jovian, the first of the domestics, by the acclamation
of the soldiers, resulted in a disgraceful peace with the Persians,
which aroused the anger and indignation of the Roman world, and the new
emperor hardly survived this act of weakness for nine months (February
17, 364). The throne of the Roman world remained ten days without a
master. At the end of that period the civil and military powers of the
empire solemnly elected Valentinian as emperor at Nice in Bithynia.
The new Augustus divided the vast empire with his brother Valens, and
this division marked the final separation of the western and eastern
empires. This arrangement continued, until the death of Valentinian in
375, when the western empire was divided between his sons, Gratian and
Valentinian II.
His reign had been notable for the stemming of the invasion of the
Alemanni of Gaul, the incursions of the Burgundians and the Saxons, the
restoration of Britain from the attacks of the Picts and Scots, the
recovery of Africa by the emperor's general, Theodosius, and the
diplomatic settlement with the approaching hordes of the Goths, who
already swarmed upon the frontiers of the empire.
Under the three emperors the Roman world began to feel more severely the
gradual pressure exerted by the hordes of barbarians that moved
westward. In 376 the Goths, pursued by the Huns, who had come from the
steppes of China into Europe, sought the protection of Valens, who
succoured them by transporting them over the Danube into Roman
territory. They repaid his clemency by uniting their arms with those of
the Huns, and defeating and killing him at the battle of Hadrianople in
378.
To save the provinces from the ravages of the barbarians, Gratian
appointed Theodosius, son of his father's general, emperor of the East,
and the wisdom of his choice was justified by the success of one who
added a new lustre to the title of Augustus. By prudent strategy,
Theodosius divided and defeated the Goths, and compelled them to submit.
The sons of Theodosius, Arcadius and Honorius succeeded respectively to
the government of the East and the West in 395. The symptoms of decay,
which not even the wise rule of Theodosius had been able to remove, had
grown more alarming. The luxury of the Romans was more shameless and
dissolute, and as the increasing depredations of the barbarians had
checked industry and diminished wealth, this profuse luxury must have
been the result of that indolent despair which enjoys the present hour
and declines the thoughts of futurity.
The secret and destructive poison of the age had affected the camps of
the legions. The infantry had laid aside their armour, and, discarding
their shields, advanced, trembling, to meet the cavalry of the Goths and
the arrows of the barbarians, who easily overwhelmed the naked soldiers,
no longer deserving the name of Romans. The enervated legionaries
abandoned their own and the public defence, and their pusillanimous
indolence may be considered the immediate cause of the downfall of the
empire.
_III.--Ruin by Goth, Vandal, and Hun_
The genius of Rome expired with Theodosius. His sons within three months
had once more sharply divided the empire. At a time when the only hope
of delaying its ruin depended on the firm union of the two sections, the
subject of Arcadius and Honorius were instructed by their respective
masters to view each other in a hostile light, to rejoice in their
mutual calamity, and to embrace as their faithful allies the barbarians,
whom they incited to invade the territories of their countrymen.
Alarmed at the insecurity of Rome, Honorius about this time fixed the
imperial residence within the naturally fortified city of Ravenna--an
example which was afterwards imitated by his feeble successors, the
Gothic kings and the Exarchs; and till the middle of the eighth century
Ravenna was considered as the seat of government and the capital of
Italy.
The reign of Arcadius in the East marked the complete division of the
Roman world. His subjects assumed the language and manners of Greeks,
and his form of government was a pure and simple monarchy. The name of
the Roman republic, which so long preserved a faint tradition of
freedom, was confined to the Latin provinces. A series of internal
disputes, both civil and religious, marked his career of power, and his
reign may be regarded as notable if only for the election of St. John
Chrysostom to the head of the church of Constantinople. Arcadius died in
May 408, and was succeeded by his supposed son, Theodosius, then a boy
of seven, the reins of power being first held by the prefect Anthemius,
and afterwards by his sister Pulcheria, who governed the eastern
empire--in fact, for nearly forty years.
The wisdom of Honorius, emperor of the West, in removing his capital to
Ravenna, was soon justified by events. Alaric, king of the Goths,
advanced in 408 to the gates of Rome, and completely blockaded the city.
In the course of a long siege, thousands of Romans died of plague and
famine, and only a heavy ransom, amounting to $1,575,000, relieved the
citizens from their terrible situation in the year 409. In the same year
Alaric again besieged Rome, after fruitless negotiations with Honorius,
and his attempt once more proving successful, he created Attilus,
prefect of the city, emperor. But the imprudent measures of his puppet
sovereign exasperated Alaric. Attilus was formally deposed in 410, and
the infuriated Goth besieged and sacked Rome, and ravaged Italy. The
spoil that the barbarians carried away with them comprised nearly all
the movable wealth of the city.
The ancient capital was devastated, the exquisite works of art
destroyed, and nearly all the monuments of a glorious past sacrificed to
the insatiate greed of the conquerors. Fire helped to complete the ruin
wrought by the Goths, and it is not easy to compute the multitude of
citizens who, from an honourable station and a prosperous fortune, were
suddenly reduced to the miserable condition of captives and exiles.
The complete ruin of Italy was prevented by the death of Alaric in 410.
During the reign of Honorius, the Goths, Burgundians, and Franks were
settled in Gaul. The maritime countries, between the Seine and the
Loire, followed the example of Britain in 409, and threw off the yoke of
the empire. Aquitaine, with its capital at Aries, received, under the
title of the seven provinces, the right of convening an annual assembly
for the management of its own affairs.
Honorius died in 423, and was succeeded by Valentinian III. His long
reign was marked by a series of disasters, which foretold the rapidly
approaching dissolution of the western empire.
Genseric, king of the Vandals, in 429 crossed into Africa, conquered the
province, and set up in the depopulated territory, with Carthage as his
capital, a new rule and government. Italy was filled with fugitives from
Africa, and a barbarian race, which had issued from the frozen regions
of the north, established their victorious reign over one of the fairest
provinces of the empire. Two years later, in 441, a new and even more
terrible danger threatened the empire.
The Goths and Vandals, flying before the Huns, had oppressed the western
World. The hordes of these barbarians, now gathering strength in their
union under their king, Attila, threatened an attack upon the eastern
empire. In appearance their chieftain was terrible in the extreme; his
portrait exhibits the genuine deformity of a modern Calmuck: a large
head, a swarthy complexion, small, deep-seated eyes, a flat nose, a few
hairs in the place of a beard, broad shoulders, and a short, square body
of nervous strength, though of a disproportionate form. He had a custom
of fiercely rolling his eyes, as if he wished to enjoy the terror which
he inspired.
This savage hero, who had subdued Germany and Scythia, and almost
exterminated the Burgundians of the Rhine, and had conquered
Scandinavia, was able to bring into the field 700,000 barbarians. An
unsuccessful raid into Persia induced him to turn his attention to the
eastern empire, and the enervated troops of Theodosius the Younger
dissolved before the fury of his onset. He ravaged up to the very gates
of Constantinople, and only a humiliating treaty preserved his dominion
to the "invincible Augustus" of the East.
After the death of Theodosius the Younger, and the accession of Marcian,
the husband of Pulcheria, Attila threatened, in 450, both empires. An
incursion of his hordes into Gaul was rendered abortive by the conduct
of the patrician, Ætius, who, uniting all the various troops of Gaul and
Germany, the Saxons, the Burgundians, the Franks, under their
Merovingian prince, and the Visigoths under their king, Theodoric, after
two important battles, induced the Huns to retreat from the field of
Chalons. Attila, diverted from his purpose, turned into Italy, and the
citizens of the various towns fled before the savage destroyer. Many
families of Aquileia, Padua, and the adjacent towns, found a safe refuge
in the neighbouring islands of the Adriatic, where their place of refuge
evolved, in time, into the famous Republic of Venice.
Valentinian fled from Ravenna to Rome, prepared to desert his people and
his empire. The fortitude of Ætius alone supported and preserved the
tottering state. Leo, Bishop of Rome, in his sacerdotal robes, dared to
demand the clemency of the savage king, and the intervention of St.
Peter and St. Paul is supposed to have induced Attila to retire beyond
the Danube, with the Princess Honoria as his bride. He did not long
survive this last campaign, and in 453 he died, and was buried amidst
all the savage pomp and grief of his subjects. His death resolved the
bonds that had united the various nations of which his subjects were
composed, and in a very few years domestic discord had extinguished the
empire of the Huns.
Genseric, king of the Vandals, sacked and pillaged the ancient capital
in June 455.
The vacant throne was filled by the nomination of Theodoric, king of the
Goths. The senate of Rome bitterly opposed the elevation of this
stranger, and though Avitus might have supported his title against the
votes of an unarmed assembly, he fell immediately he incurred the
resentment of Count Ricimer, one of the chief commanders of the
barbarian troops who formed the military defence of Italy. At a distance
from his Gothic allies, he was compelled to abdicate (October 16, 456),
and Majorian was raised to fill his place.
_IV.--The Last Emperor of the West_
The successor of Avitus was a great and heroic character, such as
sometimes arise in a degenerate age to vindicate the honour of the human
species. In the ruin of the Roman world he loved his people, sympathised
with their distress, and studied by judicial and effectual remedies to
allay their sufferings. He reformed the most intolerable grievances of
the taxes, attempted to restore and maintain the edifices of Rome, and
to establish a new and healthier moral code. His military abilities and
his fortune were not in proportion to his merits. An unsuccessful
attempt against the Vandals to recover the lost provinces of Africa
resulted in the loss of his fleet, and his return from this disastrous
campaign terminated his reign. He was deposed by Ricimer, and five days
later died of a reported dysentery, on August 7, 461.
At the command of Ricimer, the senate bestowed the imperial title on
Libius Severus, who reigned as long as it suited his patron. The
increasing difficulties, however, of the kingdom of Italy, due largely
to the naval depredation of the Vandals, compelled Ricimer to seek the
assistance of the emperor Leo, who had succeeded Marcian in the East in
457. Leo determined to extirpate the tyranny of the Vandals, and
solemnly invested Anthemius with the diadem and purple of the West
(467).
In 472, Ricimer raised the senator Olybrius to the purple, and,
advancing from Milan, entered and sacked Rome and murdered Anthemius
(July 11, 472). Forty days after this calamitous event, the tyrant
Ricimer died of a painful disease, and two months later death also
removed Olybrius.
The emperor Leo nominated Julius Nepos to the vacant throne. After
suppressing a rival in the person of Glycerius, Julius succumbed, in
475, to a furious sedition of the barbarian confederates, who, under the
command of the patrician Orestes, marched from Rome to Ravenna. The
troops would have made Orestes emperor, but when he declined they
consented to acknowledge his son Augustulus as emperor of the West.
The ambition of the patrician might have seemed satisfied, but he soon
discovered, before the end of the first year, that he must either be the
slave or the victim of his barbarian mercenaries. The soldiers demanded
a third part of the land of Italy. Orestes rejected the audacious
demand, and his refusal was favourable to the ambition of Odoacer, a
bold barbarian, who assured his fellow-soldiers that if they dared to
associate under his command they might extort the justice that had been
denied to their dutiful petition. Orestes was executed, and Odoacer,
resolving to abolish the useless and expensive office of the emperor of
the West, compelled the unfortunate Augustulus to resign.
So ended, in the year 476, the empire of the West, and the last Roman
emperor lived out his life in retirement in the Lucullan villa on the
promontory of Misenum.
* * * * *
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire--III
_I.--The Growth of the Christian Church_
The policy of the emperors and the senate, as far as it concerned
religion, was happily seconded by the reflections of the enlightened,
and by the habits of the superstitious part of their subjects. The
various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world were all
considered by the people as equally true; by the philosopher as equally
false; by the magistrate as equally useful. Under this spirit of
toleration the Christian church grew with great rapidity. Five main
causes effectually favoured and assisted this development.
1. The inflexible and intolerant zeal of the Christians, purified from
the narrow and unsocial spirit of the Jewish religion.
2. The doctrine of a future life, improved by every additional
circumstance which could give weight and efficacy to that important
theory.
3. The miraculous powers ascribed to the primitive Church.
4. The pure and austere morals of the early Christians.
5. The union and discipline of the Christian republic, which gradually
formed an independent and increasing state in the heart of the Roman
Empire.