known: but his laws, remarkable for an original cast of thought
and expression, faithfully represent the character of a sovereign
who loved his people, who sympathized in their distress, who had
studied the causes of the decline of the empire, and who was
capable of applying (as far as such reformation was practicable)
judicious and effectual remedies to the public disorders. 40 His
regulations concerning the finances manifestly tended to remove,
or at least to mitigate, the most intolerable grievances. I. From
the first hour of his reign, he was solicitous (I translate his
own words) to relieve the weary fortunes of the provincials,
oppressed by the accumulated weight of indictions and
superindictions. 41 With this view he granted a universal
amnesty, a final and absolute discharge of all arrears of
tribute, of all debts, which, under any pretence, the fiscal
officers might demand from the people. This wise dereliction of
obsolete, vexatious, and unprofitable claims, improved and
purified the sources of the public revenue; and the subject who
could now look back without despair, might labor with hope and
gratitude for himself and for his country. II. In the assessment
and collection of taxes, Majorian restored the ordinary
jurisdiction of the provincial magistrates; and suppressed the
extraordinary commissions which had been introduced, in the name
of the emperor himself, or of the Prætorian præfects. The
favorite servants, who obtained such irregular powers, were
insolent in their behavior, and arbitrary in their demands: they
affected to despise the subordinate tribunals, and they were
discontented, if their fees and profits did not twice exceed the
sum which they condescended to pay into the treasury. One
instance of their extortion would appear incredible, were it not
authenticated by the legislator himself. They exacted the whole
payment in gold: but they refused the current coin of the empire,
and would accept only such ancient pieces as were stamped with
the names of Faustina or the Antonines. The subject, who was
unprovided with these curious medals, had recourse to the
expedient of compounding with their rapacious demands; or if he
succeeded in the research, his imposition was doubled, according
to the weight and value of the money of former times. 42 III.
“The municipal corporations, (says the emperor,) the lesser
senates, (so antiquity has justly styled them,) deserve to be
considered as the heart of the cities, and the sinews of the
republic. And yet so low are they now reduced, by the injustice
of magistrates and the venality of collectors, that many of their
members, renouncing their dignity and their country, have taken
refuge in distant and obscure exile.” He urges, and even compels,
their return to their respective cities; but he removes the
grievance which had forced them to desert the exercise of their
municipal functions. They are directed, under the authority of
the provincial magistrates, to resume their office of levying the
tribute; but, instead of being made responsible for the whole sum
assessed on their district, they are only required to produce a
regular account of the payments which they have actually
received, and of the defaulters who are still indebted to the
public. IV. But Majorian was not ignorant that these corporate
bodies were too much inclined to retaliate the injustice and
oppression which they had suffered; and he therefore revives the
useful office of the defenders of cities. He exhorts the people
to elect, in a full and free assembly, some man of discretion and
integrity, who would dare to assert their privileges, to
represent their grievances, to protect the poor from the tyranny
of the rich, and to inform the emperor of the abuses that were
committed under the sanction of his name and authority.
40 (return) [ See the laws of Majorian (they are only nine in
number, but very long, and various) at the end of the Theodosian
Code, Novell. l. iv. p. 32-37. Godefroy has not given any
commentary on these additional pieces.]
41 (return) [ Fessas provincialium varia atque multiplici
tributorum exactione fortunas, et extraordinariis fiscalium
solutionum oneribus attritas, &c. Novell. Majorian. tit. iv. p.
34.]
42 (return) [ The learned Greaves (vol. i. p. 329, 330, 331) has
found, by a diligent inquiry, that aurei of the Antonines weighed
one hundred and eighteen, and those of the fifth century only
sixty-eight, English grains. Majorian gives currency to all gold
coin, excepting only the Gallic solidus, from its deficiency, not
in the weight, but in the standard.]
The spectator who casts a mournful view over the ruins of ancient
Rome, is tempted to accuse the memory of the Goths and Vandals,
for the mischief which they had neither leisure, nor power, nor
perhaps inclination, to perpetrate. The tempest of war might
strike some lofty turrets to the ground; but the destruction
which undermined the foundations of those massy fabrics was
prosecuted, slowly and silently, during a period of ten
centuries; and the motives of interest, that afterwards operated
without shame or control, were severely checked by the taste and
spirit of the emperor Majorian. The decay of the city had
gradually impaired the value of the public works. The circus and
theatres might still excite, but they seldom gratified, the
desires of the people: the temples, which had escaped the zeal of
the Christians, were no longer inhabited, either by gods or men;
the diminished crowds of the Romans were lost in the immense
space of their baths and porticos; and the stately libraries and
halls of justice became useless to an indolent generation, whose
repose was seldom disturbed, either by study or business. The
monuments of consular, or Imperial, greatness were no longer
revered, as the immortal glory of the capital: they were only
esteemed as an inexhaustible mine of materials, cheaper, and more
convenient than the distant quarry. Specious petitions were
continually addressed to the easy magistrates of Rome, which
stated the want of stones or bricks, for some necessary service:
the fairest forms of architecture were rudely defaced, for the
sake of some paltry, or pretended, repairs; and the degenerate
Romans, who converted the spoil to their own emolument,
demolished, with sacrilegious hands, the labors of their
ancestors. Majorian, who had often sighed over the desolation of
the city, applied a severe remedy to the growing evil. 43 He
reserved to the prince and senate the sole cognizance of the
extreme cases which might justify the destruction of an ancient
edifice; imposed a fine of fifty pounds of gold (two thousand
pounds sterling) on every magistrate who should presume to grant
such illegal and scandalous license, and threatened to chastise
the criminal obedience of their subordinate officers, by a severe
whipping, and the amputation of both their hands. In the last
instance, the legislator might seem to forget the proportion of
guilt and punishment; but his zeal arose from a generous
principle, and Majorian was anxious to protect the monuments of
those ages, in which he would have desired and deserved to live.
The emperor conceived, that it was his interest to increase the
number of his subjects; and that it was his duty to guard the
purity of the marriage-bed: but the means which he employed to
accomplish these salutary purposes are of an ambiguous, and
perhaps exceptionable, kind. The pious maids, who consecrated
their virginity to Christ, were restrained from taking the veil
till they had reached their fortieth year. Widows under that age
were compelled to form a second alliance within the term of five
years, by the forfeiture of half their wealth to their nearest
relations, or to the state. Unequal marriages were condemned or
annulled. The punishment of confiscation and exile was deemed so
inadequate to the guilt of adultery, that, if the criminal
returned to Italy, he might, by the express declaration of
Majorian, be slain with impunity. 44
43 (return) [ The whole edict (Novell. Majorian. tit. vi. p. 35)
is curious. “Antiquarum aedium dissipatur speciosa constructio;
et ut aliquid reparetur, magna diruuntur. Hinc jam occasio
nascitur, ut etiam unusquisque privatum aedificium construens,
per gratiam judicum..... praesumere de publicis locis necessaria,
et transferre non dubitet” &c. With equal zeal, but with less
power, Petrarch, in the fourteenth century, repeated the same
complaints. (Vie de Petrarque, tom. i. p. 326, 327.) If I
prosecute this history, I shall not be unmindful of the decline
and fall of the city of Rome; an interesting object to which any
plan was originally confined.]
44 (return) [ The emperor chides the lenity of Rogatian, consular
of Tuscany in a style of acrimonious reproof, which sounds almost
like personal resentment, (Novell. tit. ix. p. 47.) The law of
Majorian, which punished obstinate widows, was soon afterwards
repealed by his successor Severus, (Novell. Sever. tit. i. p.
37.)]
While the emperor Majorian assiduously labored to restore the
happiness and virtue of the Romans, he encountered the arms of
Genseric, from his character and situation their most formidable
enemy. A fleet of Vandals and Moors landed at the mouth of the
Liris, or Garigliano; but the Imperial troops surprised and
attacked the disorderly Barbarians, who were encumbered with the
spoils of Campania; they were chased with slaughter to their
ships, and their leader, the king’s brother-in-law, was found in
the number of the slain. 45 Such vigilance might announce the
character of the new reign; but the strictest vigilance, and the
most numerous forces, were insufficient to protect the
long-extended coast of Italy from the depredations of a naval
war. The public opinion had imposed a nobler and more arduous
task on the genius of Majorian. Rome expected from him alone the
restitution of Africa; and the design, which he formed, of
attacking the Vandals in their new settlements, was the result of
bold and judicious policy. If the intrepid emperor could have
infused his own spirit into the youth of Italy; if he could have
revived in the field of Mars, the manly exercises in which he had
always surpassed his equals; he might have marched against
Genseric at the head of a Roman army. Such a reformation of
national manners might be embraced by the rising generation; but
it is the misfortune of those princes who laboriously sustain a
declining monarchy, that, to obtain some immediate advantage, or
to avert some impending danger, they are forced to countenance,
and even to multiply, the most pernicious abuses. Majorian, like
the weakest of his predecessors, was reduced to the disgraceful
expedient of substituting Barbarian auxiliaries in the place of
his unwarlike subjects: and his superior abilities could only be
displayed in the vigor and dexterity with which he wielded a
dangerous instrument, so apt to recoil on the hand that used it.
Besides the confederates, who were already engaged in the service
of the empire, the fame of his liberality and valor attracted the
nations of the Danube, the Borysthenes, and perhaps of the
Tanais. Many thousands of the bravest subjects of Attila, the
Gepidae, the Ostrogoths, the Rugians, the Burgundians, the Suevi,
the Alani, assembled in the plains of Liguria; and their
formidable strength was balanced by their mutual animosities. 46
They passed the Alps in a severe winter. The emperor led the way,
on foot, and in complete armor; sounding, with his long staff,
the depth of the ice, or snow, and encouraging the Scythians, who
complained of the extreme cold, by the cheerful assurance, that
they should be satisfied with the heat of Africa. The citizens of
Lyons had presumed to shut their gates; they soon implored, and
experienced, the clemency of Majorian. He vanquished Theodoric in
the field; and admitted to his friendship and alliance a king
whom he had found not unworthy of his arms. The beneficial,
though precarious, reunion of the greater part of Gaul and Spain,
was the effect of persuasion, as well as of force; 47 and the
independent Bagaudae, who had escaped, or resisted, the
oppression, of former reigns, were disposed to confide in the
virtues of Majorian. His camp was filled with Barbarian allies;
his throne was supported by the zeal of an affectionate people;
but the emperor had foreseen, that it was impossible, without a
maritime power, to achieve the conquest of Africa. In the first
Punic war, the republic had exerted such incredible diligence,
that, within sixty days after the first stroke of the axe had
been given in the forest, a fleet of one hundred and sixty
galleys proudly rode at anchor in the sea. 48 Under circumstances
much less favorable, Majorian equalled the spirit and
perseverance of the ancient Romans. The woods of the Apennine
were felled; the arsenals and manufactures of Ravenna and Misenum
were restored; Italy and Gaul vied with each other in liberal
contributions to the public service; and the Imperial navy of
three hundred large galleys, with an adequate proportion of
transports and smaller vessels, was collected in the secure and
capacious harbor of Carthagena in Spain. 49 The intrepid
countenance of Majorian animated his troops with a confidence of
victory; and, if we might credit the historian Procopius, his
courage sometimes hurried him beyond the bounds of prudence.
Anxious to explore, with his own eyes, the state of the Vandals,
he ventured, after disguising the color of his hair, to visit
Carthage, in the character of his own ambassador: and Genseric
was afterwards mortified by the discovery, that he had
entertained and dismissed the emperor of the Romans. Such an
anecdote may be rejected as an improbable fiction; but it is a
fiction which would not have been imagined, unless in the life of
a hero. 50
45 (return) [ Sidon. Panegyr. Majorian, 385-440.]
46 (return) [ The review of the army, and passage of the Alps,
contain the most tolerable passages of the Panegyric, (470-552.)
M. de Buat (Hist. des Peuples, &c., tom. viii. p. 49-55) is a
more satisfactory commentator, than either Savaron or Sirmond.]
47 (return) [ It is the just and forcible distinction of Priscus,
(Excerpt. Legat. p. 42,) in a short fragment, which throws much
light on the history of Majorian. Jornandes has suppressed the
defeat and alliance of the Visigoths, which were solemnly
proclaimed in Gallicia; and are marked in the Chronicle of
Idatius.]
48 (return) [ Florus, l. ii. c. 2. He amuses himself with the
poetical fancy, that the trees had been transformed into ships;
and indeed the whole transaction, as it is related in the first
book of Polybius, deviates too much from the probable course of
human events.]
49 (return) [
Iterea duplici texis dum littore classem Inferno superoque mari,
cadit omnis in aequor Sylva tibi, &c. —-Sidon. Panegyr. Majorian,
441-461.
The number of ships, which Priscus fixed at 300, is magnified, by
an indefinite comparison with the fleets of Agamemnon, Xerxes,
and Augustus.]
50 (return) [ Procopius de Bell. Vandal. l. i. c. 8, p. 194. When
Genseric conducted his unknown guest into the arsenal of
Carthage, the arms clashed of their own accord. Majorian had
tinged his yellow locks with a black color.]
Chapter XXXVI: Total Extinction Of The Western Empire.—Part III.
Without the help of a personal interview, Genseric was
sufficiently acquainted with the genius and designs of his
adversary. He practiced his customary arts of fraud and delay,
but he practiced them without success. His applications for peace
became each hour more submissive, and perhaps more sincere; but
the inflexible Majorian had adopted the ancient maxim, that Rome
could not be safe, as long as Carthage existed in a hostile
state. The king of the Vandals distrusted the valor of his native
subjects, who were enervated by the luxury of the South; 51 he
suspected the fidelity of the vanquished people, who abhorred him
as an Arian tyrant; and the desperate measure, which he executed,
of reducing Mauritania into a desert, 52 could not defeat the
operations of the Roman emperor, who was at liberty to land his
troops on any part of the African coast. But Genseric was saved
from impending and inevitable ruin by the treachery of some
powerful subjects, envious, or apprehensive, of their master’s
success. Guided by their secret intelligence, he surprised the
unguarded fleet in the Bay of Carthagena: many of the ships were
sunk, or taken, or burnt; and the preparations of three years
were destroyed in a single day. 53 After this event, the behavior
of the two antagonists showed them superior to their fortune. The
Vandal, instead of being elated by this accidental victory,
immediately renewed his solicitations for peace. The emperor of
the West, who was capable of forming great designs, and of
supporting heavy disappointments, consented to a treaty, or
rather to a suspension of arms; in the full assurance that,
before he could restore his navy, he should be supplied with
provocations to justify a second war. Majorian returned to Italy,
to prosecute his labors for the public happiness; and, as he was
conscious of his own integrity, he might long remain ignorant of
the dark conspiracy which threatened his throne and his life. The
recent misfortune of Carthagena sullied the glory which had
dazzled the eyes of the multitude; almost every description of
civil and military officers were exasperated against the
Reformer, since they all derived some advantage from the abuses
which he endeavored to suppress; and the patrician Ricimer
impelled the inconstant passions of the Barbarians against a
prince whom he esteemed and hated. The virtues of Majorian could
not protect him from the impetuous sedition, which broke out in
the camp near Tortona, at the foot of the Alps. He was compelled
to abdicate the Imperial purple: five days after his abdication,
it was reported that he died of a dysentery; 54 and the humble
tomb, which covered his remains, was consecrated by the respect
and gratitude of succeeding generations. 55 The private character
of Majorian inspired love and respect. Malicious calumny and
satire excited his indignation, or, if he himself were the
object, his contempt; but he protected the freedom of wit, and,
in the hours which the emperor gave to the familiar society of
his friends, he could indulge his taste for pleasantry, without
degrading the majesty of his rank. 56
51 (return) [
Spoliisque potitus Immensis, robux luxu jam perdidit omne, Quo
valuit dum pauper erat. —Panegyr. Majorian, 330.
He afterwards applies to Genseric, unjustly, as it should seem,
the vices of his subjects.]
52 (return) [ He burnt the villages, and poisoned the springs,
(Priscus, p. 42.) Dubos (Hist. Critique, tom. i. p. 475)
observes, that the magazines which the Moors buried in the earth
might escape his destructive search. Two or three hundred pits
are sometimes dug in the same place; and each pit contains at
least four hundred bushels of corn Shaw’s Travels, p. 139.]
53 (return) [ Idatius, who was safe in Gallicia from the power of
Recimer boldly and honestly declares, Vandali per proditeres
admoniti, &c: i. e. dissembles, however, the name of the
traitor.]
54 (return) [ Procop. de Bell. Vandal. l. i. i. c. 8, p. 194. The
testimony of Idatius is fair and impartial: “Majorianum de
Galliis Romam redeuntem, et Romano imperio vel nomini res
necessarias ordinantem; Richimer livore percitus, et invidorum
consilio fultus, fraude interficit circumventum.” Some read
Suevorum, and I am unwilling to efface either of the words, as
they express the different accomplices who united in the
conspiracy against Majorian.]
55 (return) [ See the Epigrams of Ennodius, No. cxxxv. inter
Sirmond. Opera, tom. i. p. 1903. It is flat and obscure; but
Ennodius was made bishop of Pavia fifty years after the death of
Majorian, and his praise deserves credit and regard.]
56 (return) [ Sidonius gives a tedious account (l. i. epist. xi.
p. 25-31) of a supper at Arles, to which he was invited by
Majorian, a short time before his death. He had no intention of
praising a deceased emperor: but a casual disinterested remark,
“Subrisit Augustus; ut erat, auctoritate servata, cum se
communioni dedisset, joci plenus,” outweighs the six hundred
lines of his venal panegyric.]
It was not, perhaps, without some regret, that Ricimer sacrificed
his friend to the interest of his ambition: but he resolved, in a
second choice, to avoid the imprudent preference of superior
virtue and merit. At his command, the obsequious senate of Rome
bestowed the Imperial title on Libius Severus, who ascended the
throne of the West without emerging from the obscurity of a
private condition. History has scarcely deigned to notice his
birth, his elevation, his character, or his death. Severus
expired, as soon as his life became inconvenient to his patron;
57 and it would be useless to discriminate his nominal reign in
the vacant interval of six years, between the death of Majorian
and the elevation of Anthemius. During that period, the
government was in the hands of Ricimer alone; and, although the
modest Barbarian disclaimed the name of king, he accumulated
treasures, formed a separate army, negotiated private alliances,
and ruled Italy with the same independent and despotic authority,
which was afterwards exercised by Odoacer and Theodoric. But his
dominions were bounded by the Alps; and two Roman generals,
Marcellinus and Aegidius, maintained their allegiance to the
republic, by rejecting, with disdain, the phantom which he styled
an emperor. Marcellinus still adhered to the old religion; and
the devout Pagans, who secretly disobeyed the laws of the church
and state, applauded his profound skill in the science of
divination. But he possessed the more valuable qualifications of
learning, virtue, and courage; 58 the study of the Latin
literature had improved his taste; and his military talents had
recommended him to the esteem and confidence of the great Ætius,
in whose ruin he was involved. By a timely flight, Marcellinus
escaped the rage of Valentinian, and boldly asserted his liberty
amidst the convulsions of the Western empire. His voluntary, or
reluctant, submission to the authority of Majorian, was rewarded
by the government of Sicily, and the command of an army,
stationed in that island to oppose, or to attack, the Vandals;
but his Barbarian mercenaries, after the emperor’s death, were
tempted to revolt by the artful liberality of Ricimer. At the
head of a band of faithful followers, the intrepid Marcellinus
occupied the province of Dalmatia, assumed the title of patrician
of the West, secured the love of his subjects by a mild and
equitable reign, built a fleet which claimed the dominion of the
Adriatic, and alternately alarmed the coasts of Italy and of
Africa. 59 Aegidius, the master-general of Gaul, who equalled, or
at least who imitated, the heroes of ancient Rome, 60 proclaimed
his immortal resentment against the assassins of his beloved
master. A brave and numerous army was attached to his standard:
and, though he was prevented by the arts of Ricimer, and the arms
of the Visigoths, from marching to the gates of Rome, he
maintained his independent sovereignty beyond the Alps, and
rendered the name of Aegidius, respectable both in peace and war.
The Franks, who had punished with exile the youthful follies of
Childeric, elected the Roman general for their king: his vanity,
rather than his ambition, was gratified by that singular honor;
and when the nation, at the end of four years, repented of the
injury which they had offered to the Merovingian family, he
patiently acquiesced in the restoration of the lawful prince. The
authority of Aegidius ended only with his life, and the
suspicions of poison and secret violence, which derived some
countenance from the character of Ricimer, were eagerly
entertained by the passionate credulity of the Gauls. 61
57 (return) [ Sidonius (Panegyr. Anthem. 317) dismisses him to
heaven:—Auxerat Augustus naturae lege Severus—Divorum numerum.
And an old list of the emperors, composed about the time of
Justinian, praises his piety, and fixes his residence at Rome,
(Sirmond. Not. ad Sidon. p. 111, 112.)]
58 (return) [ Tillemont, who is always scandalized by the virtues
of infidels, attributes this advantageous portrait of Marcellinus
(which Suidas has preserved) to the partial zeal of some Pagan
historian, (Hist. des Empereurs. tom. vi. p. 330.)]
59 (return) [ Procopius de Bell. Vandal. l. i. c. 6, p. 191. In
various circumstances of the life of Marcellinus, it is not easy
to reconcile the Greek historian with the Latin Chronicles of the
times.]
60 (return) [ I must apply to Aegidius the praises which Sidonius
(Panegyr Majorian, 553) bestows on a nameless master-general, who
commanded the rear-guard of Majorian. Idatius, from public
report, commends his Christian piety; and Priscus mentions (p.
42) his military virtues.]
61 (return) [ Greg. Turon. l. ii. c. 12, in tom. ii. p. 168. The
Pere Daniel, whose ideas were superficial and modern, has started
some objections against the story of Childeric, (Hist. de France,
tom. i. Preface Historique, p. lxxvii., &c.:) but they have been
fairly satisfied by Dubos, (Hist. Critique, tom. i. p. 460-510,)
and by two authors who disputed the prize of the Academy of
Soissons, (p. 131-177, 310-339.) With regard to the term of
Childeric’s exile, it is necessary either to prolong the life of
Aegidius beyond the date assigned by the Chronicle of Idatius or
to correct the text of Gregory, by reading quarto anno, instead
of octavo.]
The kingdom of Italy, a name to which the Western empire was
gradually reduced, was afflicted, under the reign of Ricimer, by
the incessant depredations of the Vandal pirates. 62 In the
spring of each year, they equipped a formidable navy in the port
of Carthage; and Genseric himself, though in a very advanced age,
still commanded in person the most important expeditions. His
designs were concealed with impenetrable secrecy, till the moment
that he hoisted sail. When he was asked, by his pilot, what
course he should steer, “Leave the determination to the winds,
(replied the Barbarian, with pious arrogance;) they will
transport us to the guilty coast, whose inhabitants have provoked
the divine justice;” but if Genseric himself deigned to issue
more precise orders, he judged the most wealthy to be the most
criminal. The Vandals repeatedly visited the coasts of Spain,
Liguria, Tuscany, Campania, Lucania, Bruttium, Apulia, Calabria,
Venetia, Dalmatia, Epirus, Greece, and Sicily: they were tempted
to subdue the Island of Sardinia, so advantageously placed in the
centre of the Mediterranean; and their arms spread desolation, or
terror, from the columns of Hercules to the mouth of the Nile. As
they were more ambitious of spoil than of glory, they seldom
attacked any fortified cities, or engaged any regular troops in
the open field. But the celerity of their motions enabled them,
almost at the same time, to threaten and to attack the most
distant objects, which attracted their desires; and as they
always embarked a sufficient number of horses, they had no sooner
landed, than they swept the dismayed country with a body of light
cavalry. Yet, notwithstanding the example of their king, the
native Vandals and Alani insensibly declined this toilsome and
perilous warfare; the hardy generation of the first conquerors
was almost extinguished, and their sons, who were born in Africa,
enjoyed the delicious baths and gardens which had been acquired
by the valor of their fathers. Their place was readily supplied
by a various multitude of Moors and Romans, of captives and
outlaws; and those desperate wretches, who had already violated
the laws of their country, were the most eager to promote the
atrocious acts which disgrace the victories of Genseric. In the
treatment of his unhappy prisoners, he sometimes consulted his
avarice, and sometimes indulged his cruelty; and the massacre of
five hundred noble citizens of Zant or Zacynthus, whose mangled
bodies he cast into the Ionian Sea, was imputed, by the public
indignation, to his latest posterity.
62 (return) [ The naval war of Genseric is described by Priscus,
(Excerpta Legation. p. 42,) Procopius, (de Bell. Vandal. l. i. c.
5, p. 189, 190, and c. 22, p. 228,) Victor Vitensis, (de
Persecut. Vandal. l. i. c. 17, and Ruinart, p. 467-481,) and in
three panegyrics of Sidonius, whose chronological order is
absurdly transposed in the editions both of Savaron and Sirmond.
(Avit. Carm. vii. 441-451. Majorian. Carm. v. 327-350, 385-440.
Anthem. Carm. ii. 348-386) In one passage the poet seems inspired
by his subject, and expresses a strong idea by a lively image:—
Hinc Vandalus hostis Urget; et in nostrum numerosa classe
quotannis Militat excidium; conversoque ordine Fati Torrida
Caucaseos infert mihi Byrsa furores]
Such crimes could not be excused by any provocations; but the
war, which the king of the Vandals prosecuted against the Roman
empire was justified by a specious and reasonable motive. The
widow of Valentinian, Eudoxia, whom he had led captive from Rome
to Carthage, was the sole heiress of the Theodosian house; her
elder daughter, Eudocia, became the reluctant wife of Hunneric,
his eldest son; and the stern father, asserting a legal claim,
which could not easily be refuted or satisfied, demanded a just
proportion of the Imperial patrimony. An adequate, or at least a
valuable, compensation, was offered by the Eastern emperor, to
purchase a necessary peace. Eudoxia and her younger daughter,
Placidia, were honorably restored, and the fury of the Vandals
was confined to the limits of the Western empire. The Italians,
destitute of a naval force, which alone was capable of protecting
their coasts, implored the aid of the more fortunate nations of
the East; who had formerly acknowledged, in peace and war, the
supremacy of Rome. But the perpetual divisions of the two empires
had alienated their interest and their inclinations; the faith of
a recent treaty was alleged; and the Western Romans, instead of
arms and ships, could only obtain the assistance of a cold and
ineffectual mediation. The haughty Ricimer, who had long
struggled with the difficulties of his situation, was at length
reduced to address the throne of Constantinople, in the humble
language of a subject; and Italy submitted, as the price and
security of the alliance, to accept a master from the choice of
the emperor of the East. 63 It is not the purpose of the present
chapter, or even of the present volume, to continue the distinct
series of the Byzantine history; but a concise view of the reign
and character of the emperor Leo, may explain the last efforts
that were attempted to save the falling empire of the West. 64
63 (return) [ The poet himself is compelled to acknowledge the
distress of Ricimer:—
Præterea invictus Ricimer, quem publica fata Respiciunt, proprio
solas vix Marte repellit Piratam per rura vagum.
Italy addresses her complaint to the Tyber, and Rome, at the
solicitation of the river god, transports herself to
Constantinople, renounces her ancient claims, and implores the
friendship of Aurora, the goddess of the East. This fabulous
machinery, which the genius of Claudian had used and abused, is
the constant and miserable resource of the muse of Sidonius.]
64 (return) [ The original authors of the reigns of Marcian, Leo,
and Zeno, are reduced to some imperfect fragments, whose
deficiencies must be supplied from the more recent compilations
of Theophanes, Zonaras, and Cedrenus.]
Since the death of the younger Theodosius, the domestic repose of
Constantinople had never been interrupted by war or faction.
Pulcheria had bestowed her hand, and the sceptre of the East, on
the modest virtue of Marcian: he gratefully reverenced her august
rank and virgin chastity; and, after her death, he gave his
people the example of the religious worship that was due to the
memory of the Imperial saint. 65 Attentive to the prosperity of
his own dominions, Marcian seemed to behold, with indifference,
the misfortunes of Rome; and the obstinate refusal of a brave and
active prince, to draw his sword against the Vandals, was
ascribed to a secret promise, which had formerly been exacted
from him when he was a captive in the power of Genseric. 66 The
death of Marcian, after a reign of seven years, would have
exposed the East to the danger of a popular election; if the
superior weight of a single family had not been able to incline
the balance in favor of the candidate whose interest they
supported. The patrician Aspar might have placed the diadem on
his own head, if he would have subscribed the Nicene creed. 67
During three generations, the armies of the East were
successively commanded by his father, by himself, and by his son
Ardaburius; his Barbarian guards formed a military force that
overawed the palace and the capital; and the liberal distribution
of his immense treasures rendered Aspar as popular as he was
powerful. He recommended the obscure name of Leo of Thrace, a
military tribune, and the principal steward of his household. His
nomination was unanimously ratified by the senate; and the
servant of Aspar received the Imperial crown from the hands of
the patriarch or bishop, who was permitted to express, by this
unusual ceremony, the suffrage of the Deity. 68 This emperor, the
first of the name of Leo, has been distinguished by the title of
the Great; from a succession of princes, who gradually fixed in
the opinion of the Greeks a very humble standard of heroic, or at
least of royal, perfection. Yet the temperate firmness with which
Leo resisted the oppression of his benefactor, showed that he was
conscious of his duty and of his prerogative. Aspar was
astonished to find that his influence could no longer appoint a
præfect of Constantinople: he presumed to reproach his sovereign
with a breach of promise, and insolently shaking his purple, “It
is not proper, (said he,) that the man who is invested with this
garment, should be guilty of lying.” “Nor is it proper, (replied
Leo,) that a prince should be compelled to resign his own
judgment, and the public interest, to the will of a subject.”69
After this extraordinary scene, it was impossible that the
reconciliation of the emperor and the patrician could be sincere;
or, at least, that it could be solid and permanent. An army of
Isaurians 70 was secretly levied, and introduced into
Constantinople; and while Leo undermined the authority, and
prepared the disgrace, of the family of Aspar, his mild and
cautious behavior restrained them from any rash and desperate
attempts, which might have been fatal to themselves, or their
enemies. The measures of peace and war were affected by this
internal revolution. As long as Aspar degraded the majesty of the
throne, the secret correspondence of religion and interest
engaged him to favor the cause of Genseric. When Leo had
delivered himself from that ignominious servitude, he listened to
the complaints of the Italians; resolved to extirpate the tyranny
of the Vandals; and declared his alliance with his colleague,
Anthemius, whom he solemnly invested with the diadem and purple
of the West.
65 (return) [ St. Pulcheria died A.D. 453, four years before her
nominal husband; and her festival is celebrated on the 10th of
September by the modern Greeks: she bequeathed an immense
patrimony to pious, or, at least, to ecclesiastical, uses. See
Tillemont, Mémoires Eccles. tom. xv p. 181-184.]
66 (return) [ See Procopius, de Bell. Vandal. l. i. c. 4, p.
185.]
67 (return) [ From this disability of Aspar to ascend the throne,
it may be inferred that the stain of Heresy was perpetual and
indelible, while that of Barbarism disappeared in the second
generation.]
68 (return) [ Theophanes, p. 95. This appears to be the first
origin of a ceremony, which all the Christian princes of the
world have since adopted and from which the clergy have deduced
the most formidable consequences.]
69 (return) [ Cedrenus, (p. 345, 346,) who was conversant with
the writers of better days, has preserved the remarkable words of
Aspar.]
70 (return) [ The power of the Isaurians agitated the Eastern
empire in the two succeeding reigns of Zeno and Anastasius; but
it ended in the destruction of those Barbarians, who maintained
their fierce independences about two hundred and thirty years.]
The virtues of Anthemius have perhaps been magnified, since the
Imperial descent, which he could only deduce from the usurper
Procopius, has been swelled into a line of emperors. 71 But the
merit of his immediate parents, their honors, and their riches,
rendered Anthemius one of the most illustrious subjects of the
East. His father, Procopius, obtained, after his Persian embassy,
the rank of general and patrician; and the name of Anthemius was
derived from his maternal grandfather, the celebrated præfect,
who protected, with so much ability and success, the infant reign
of Theodosius. The grandson of the præfect was raised above the
condition of a private subject, by his marriage with Euphemia,
the daughter of the emperor Marcian. This splendid alliance,
which might supersede the necessity of merit, hastened the
promotion of Anthemius to the successive dignities of count, of
master-general, of consul, and of patrician; and his merit or
fortune claimed the honors of a victory, which was obtained on
the banks of the Danube, over the Huns. Without indulging an
extravagant ambition, the son-in-law of Marcian might hope to be
his successor; but Anthemius supported the disappointment with
courage and patience; and his subsequent elevation was
universally approved by the public, who esteemed him worthy to
reign, till he ascended the throne. 72 The emperor of the West
marched from Constantinople, attended by several counts of high
distinction, and a body of guards almost equal to the strength
and numbers of a regular army: he entered Rome in triumph, and
the choice of Leo was confirmed by the senate, the people, and
the Barbarian confederates of Italy. 73 The solemn inauguration
of Anthemius was followed by the nuptials of his daughter and the
patrician Ricimer; a fortunate event, which was considered as the
firmest security of the union and happiness of the state. The
wealth of two empires was ostentatiously displayed; and many
senators completed their ruin, by an expensive effort to disguise
their poverty. All serious business was suspended during this
festival; the courts of justice were shut; the streets of Rome,
the theatres, the places of public and private resort, resounded
with hymeneal songs and dances: and the royal bride, clothed in
silken robes, with a crown on her head, was conducted to the
palace of Ricimer, who had changed his military dress for the
habit of a consul and a senator. On this memorable occasion,
Sidonius, whose early ambition had been so fatally blasted,
appeared as the orator of Auvergne, among the provincial deputies
who addressed the throne with congratulations or complaints. 74
The calends of January were now approaching, and the venal poet,
who had loved Avitus, and esteemed Majorian, was persuaded by his
friends to celebrate, in heroic verse, the merit, the felicity,
the second consulship, and the future triumphs, of the emperor
Anthemius. Sidonius pronounced, with assurance and success, a
panegyric which is still extant; and whatever might be the
imperfections, either of the subject or of the composition, the
welcome flatterer was immediately rewarded with the præfecture
of Rome; a dignity which placed him among the illustrious
personages of the empire, till he wisely preferred the more
respectable character of a bishop and a saint. 75
71 (return) [
Tali tu civis ab urbe Procopio genitore micas; cui prisca propago
Augustis venit a proavis.
The poet (Sidon. Panegyr. Anthem. 67-306) then proceeds to relate
the private life and fortunes of the future emperor, with which
he must have been imperfectly acquainted.]
72 (return) [ Sidonius discovers, with tolerable ingenuity, that
this disappointment added new lustre to the virtues of Anthemius,
(210, &c.,) who declined one sceptre, and reluctantly accepted
another, (22, &c.)]
73 (return) [ The poet again celebrates the unanimity of all
orders of the state, (15-22;) and the Chronicle of Idatius
mentions the forces which attended his march.]
74 (return) [ Interveni autem nuptiis Patricii Ricimeris, cui
filia perennis Augusti in spem publicae securitatis copulabator.
The journey of Sidonius from Lyons, and the festival of Rome, are
described with some spirit. L. i. epist. 5, p. 9-13, epist. 9, p.
21.]
75 (return) [ Sidonius (l. i. epist. 9, p. 23, 24) very fairly
states his motive, his labor, and his reward. “Hic ipse
Panegyricus, si non judicium, certa eventum, boni operis,
accepit.” He was made bishop of Clermont, A.D. 471. Tillemont,
Mem. Eccles. tom. xvi. p. 750.]
The Greeks ambitiously commend the piety and catholic faith of
the emperor whom they gave to the West; nor do they forget to
observe, that when he left Constantinople, he converted his
palace into the pious foundation of a public bath, a church, and
a hospital for old men. 76 Yet some suspicious appearances are
found to sully the theological fame of Anthemius. From the
conversation of Philotheus, a Macedonian sectary, he had imbibed
the spirit of religious toleration; and the Heretics of Rome
would have assembled with impunity, if the bold and vehement
censure which Pope Hilary pronounced in the church of St. Peter,
had not obliged him to abjure the unpopular indulgence. 77 Even
the Pagans, a feeble and obscure remnant, conceived some vain
hopes, from the indifference, or partiality, of Anthemius; and
his singular friendship for the philosopher Severus, whom he
promoted to the consulship, was ascribed to a secret project, of
reviving the ancient worship of the gods. 78 These idols were
crumbled into dust: and the mythology which had once been the
creed of nations, was so universally disbelieved, that it might
be employed without scandal, or at least without suspicion, by
Christian poets. 79 Yet the vestiges of superstition were not
absolutely obliterated, and the festival of the Lupercalia, whose
origin had preceded the foundation of Rome, was still celebrated
under the reign of Anthemius. The savage and simple rites were
expressive of an early state of society before the invention of
arts and agriculture. The rustic deities who presided over the
toils and pleasures of the pastoral life, Pan, Faunus, and their
train of satyrs, were such as the fancy of shepherds might
create, sportive, petulant, and lascivious; whose power was
limited, and whose malice was inoffensive. A goat was the
offering the best adapted to their character and attributes; the
flesh of the victim was roasted on willow spits; and the riotous
youths, who crowded to the feast, ran naked about the fields,
with leather thongs in their hands, communicating, as it was
supposed, the blessing of fecundity to the women whom they
touched. 80 The altar of Pan was erected, perhaps by Evander the
Arcadian, in a dark recess in the side of the Palantine hill,
watered by a perpetual fountain, and shaded by a hanging grove. A
tradition, that, in the same place, Romulus and Remus were
suckled by the wolf, rendered it still more sacred and venerable
in the eyes of the Romans; and this sylvan spot was gradually
surrounded by the stately edifices of the Forum. 81 After the
conversion of the Imperial city, the Christians still continued,
in the month of February, the annual celebration of the
Lupercalia; to which they ascribed a secret and mysterious
influence on the genial powers of the animal and vegetable world.
The bishops of Rome were solicitous to abolish a profane custom,
so repugnant to the spirit of Christianity; but their zeal was
not supported by the authority of the civil magistrate: the
inveterate abuse subsisted till the end of the fifth century, and
Pope Gelasius, who purified the capital from the last stain of
idolatry, appeased by a formal apology, the murmurs of the senate
and people. 82
76 (return) [ The palace of Anthemius stood on the banks of the
Propontis. In the ninth century, Alexius, the son-in-law of the
emperor Theophilus, obtained permission to purchase the ground;
and ended his days in a monastery which he founded on that
delightful spot. Ducange Constantinopolis Christiana, p. 117,
152.]
77 (return) [ Papa Hilarius... apud beatum Petrum Apostolum,
palam ne id fieret, clara voce constrinxit, in tantum ut non ea
facienda cum interpositione juramenti idem promitteret Imperator.
Gelasius Epistol ad Andronicum, apud Baron. A.D. 467, No. 3. The
cardinal observes, with some complacency, that it was much easier
to plant heresies at Constantinople, than at Rome.]
78 (return) [ Damascius, in the life of the philosopher Isidore,
apud Photium, p. 1049. Damascius, who lived under Justinian,
composed another work, consisting of 570 praeternatural stories
of souls, daemons, apparitions, the dotage of Platonic Paganism.]
79 (return) [ In the poetical works of Sidonius, which he
afterwards condemned, (l. ix. epist. 16, p. 285,) the fabulous
deities are the principal actors. If Jerom was scourged by the
angels for only reading Virgil, the bishop of Clermont, for such
a vile imitation, deserved an additional whipping from the
Muses.]
80 (return) [ Ovid (Fast. l. ii. 267-452) has given an amusing
description of the follies of antiquity, which still inspired so
much respect, that a grave magistrate, running naked through the
streets, was not an object of astonishment or laughter.]
81 (return) [ See Dionys. Halicarn. l. i. p. 25, 65, edit.
Hudson. The Roman antiquaries Donatus (l. ii. c. 18, p. 173, 174)
and Nardini (p. 386, 387) have labored to ascertain the true
situation of the Lupercal.]
82 (return) [ Baronius published, from the MSS. of the Vatican,
this epistle of Pope Gelasius, (A.D. 496, No. 28-45,) which is
entitled Adversus Andromachum Senatorem, caeterosque Romanos, qui
Lupercalia secundum morem pristinum colenda constituebant.
Gelasius always supposes that his adversaries are nominal
Christians, and, that he may not yield to them in absurd
prejudice, he imputes to this harmless festival all the
calamities of the age.]
Chapter XXXVI: Total Extinction Of The Western Empire.—Part IV.
In all his public declarations, the emperor Leo assumes the
authority, and professes the affection, of a father, for his son
Anthemius, with whom he had divided the administration of the
universe. 83 The situation, and perhaps the character, of Leo,
dissuaded him from exposing his person to the toils and dangers
of an African war. But the powers of the Eastern empire were
strenuously exerted to deliver Italy and the Mediterranean from
the Vandals; and Genseric, who had so long oppressed both the
land and sea, was threatened from every side with a formidable
invasion. The campaign was opened by a bold and successful
enterprise of the præfect Heraclius. 84 The troops of Egypt,
Thebais, and Libya, were embarked, under his command; and the
Arabs, with a train of horses and camels, opened the roads of the
desert. Heraclius landed on the coast of Tripoli, surprised and
subdued the cities of that province, and prepared, by a laborious
march, which Cato had formerly executed, 85 to join the Imperial
army under the walls of Carthage. The intelligence of this loss
extorted from Genseric some insidious and ineffectual
propositions of peace; but he was still more seriously alarmed by
the reconciliation of Marcellinus with the two empires. The
independent patrician had been persuaded to acknowledge the
legitimate title of Anthemius, whom he accompanied in his journey
to Rome; the Dalmatian fleet was received into the harbors of
Italy; the active valor of Marcellinus expelled the Vandals from
the Island of Sardinia; and the languid efforts of the West added
some weight to the immense preparations of the Eastern Romans.
The expense of the naval armament, which Leo sent against the
Vandals, has been distinctly ascertained; and the curious and
instructive account displays the wealth of the declining empire.
The Royal demesnes, or private patrimony of the prince, supplied
seventeen thousand pounds of gold; forty-seven thousand pounds of
gold, and seven hundred thousand of silver, were levied and paid
into the treasury by the Prætorian præfects. But the cities
were reduced to extreme poverty; and the diligent calculation of
fines and forfeitures, as a valuable object of the revenue, does
not suggest the idea of a just or merciful administration. The
whole expense, by whatsoever means it was defrayed, of the
African campaign, amounted to the sum of one hundred and thirty
thousand pounds of gold, about five millions two hundred thousand
pounds sterling, at a time when the value of money appears, from
the comparative price of corn, to have been somewhat higher than
in the present age. 86 The fleet that sailed from Constantinople
to Carthage, consisted of eleven hundred and thirteen ships, and
the number of soldiers and mariners exceeded one hundred thousand
men. Basiliscus, the brother of the empress Vorina, was intrusted
with this important command. His sister, the wife of Leo, had
exaggerated the merit of his former exploits against the
Scythians. But the discovery of his guilt, or incapacity, was
reserved for the African war; and his friends could only save his
military reputation by asserting, that he had conspired with
Aspar to spare Genseric, and to betray the last hope of the
Western empire.
83 (return) [ Itaque nos quibus totius mundi regimen commisit
superna provisio.... Pius et triumphator semper Augustus filius
noster Anthemius, licet Divina Majestas et nostra creatio pietati
ejus plenam Imperii commiserit potestatem, &c..... Such is the
dignified style of Leo, whom Anthemius respectfully names,
Dominus et Pater meus Princeps sacratissimus Leo. See Novell.
Anthem. tit. ii. iii. p. 38, ad calcem Cod. Theod.]
84 (return) [ The expedition of Heraclius is clouded with
difficulties, (Tillemont, Hist. des Empereurs, tom. vi. p. 640,)
and it requires some dexterity to use the circumstances afforded
by Theophanes, without injury to the more respectable evidence of
Procopius.]
85 (return) [ The march of Cato from Berenice, in the province of
Cyrene, was much longer than that of Heraclius from Tripoli. He
passed the deep sandy desert in thirty days, and it was found
necessary to provide, besides the ordinary supplies, a great
number of skins filled with water, and several Psylli, who were
supposed to possess the art of sucking the wounds which had been
made by the serpents of their native country. See Plutarch in
Caton. Uticens. tom. iv. p. 275. Straben Geograph. l. xxii. p.
1193.]
86 (return) [ The principal sum is clearly expressed by
Procopius, (de Bell. Vandal. l. i. c. 6, p. 191;) the smaller
constituent parts, which Tillemont, (Hist. des Empereurs, tom.
vi. p. 396) has laboriously collected from the Byzantine writers,
are less certain, and less important. The historian Malchus
laments the public misery, (Excerpt. ex Suida in Corp. Hist.
Byzant. p. 58;) but he is surely unjust, when he charges Leo with
hoarding the treasures which he extorted from the people. * Note:
Compare likewise the newly-discovered work of Lydus, de
Magistratibus, ed. Hase, Paris, 1812, (and in the new collection
of the Byzantines,) l. iii. c. 43. Lydus states the expenditure
at 65,000 lbs. of gold, 700,000 of silver. But Lydus exaggerates
the fleet to the incredible number of 10,000 long ships,
(Liburnae,) and the troops to 400,000 men. Lydus describes this
fatal measure, of which he charges the blame on Basiliscus, as
the shipwreck of the state. From that time all the revenues of
the empire were anticipated; and the finances fell into
inextricable confusion.—M.]
Experience has shown, that the success of an invader most
commonly depends on the vigor and celerity of his operations. The
strength and sharpness of the first impression are blunted by
delay; the health and spirit of the troops insensibly languish in
a distant climate; the naval and military force, a mighty effort
which perhaps can never be repeated, is silently consumed; and
every hour that is wasted in negotiation, accustoms the enemy to
contemplate and examine those hostile terrors, which, on their
first appearance, he deemed irresistible. The formidable navy of
Basiliscus pursued its prosperous navigation from the Thracian
Bosphorus to the coast of Africa. He landed his troops at Cape
Bona, or the promontory of Mercury, about forty miles from
Carthage. 87 The army of Heraclius, and the fleet of Marcellinus,
either joined or seconded the Imperial lieutenant; and the
Vandals who opposed his progress by sea or land, were
successively vanquished. 88 If Basiliscus had seized the moment
of consternation, and boldly advanced to the capital, Carthage
must have surrendered, and the kingdom of the Vandals was
extinguished. Genseric beheld the danger with firmness, and
eluded it with his veteran dexterity. He protested, in the most
respectful language, that he was ready to submit his person, and
his dominions, to the will of the emperor; but he requested a
truce of five days to regulate the terms of his submission; and
it was universally believed, that his secret liberality
contributed to the success of this public negotiation. Instead of
obstinately refusing whatever indulgence his enemy so earnestly
solicited, the guilty, or the credulous, Basiliscus consented to
the fatal truce; and his imprudent security seemed to proclaim,
that he already considered himself as the conqueror of Africa.
During this short interval, the wind became favorable to the
designs of Genseric. He manned his largest ships of war with the
bravest of the Moors and Vandals; and they towed after them many
large barks, filled with combustible materials. In the obscurity
of the night, these destructive vessels were impelled against the
unguarded and unsuspecting fleet of the Romans, who were awakened
by the sense of their instant danger. Their close and crowded
order assisted the progress of the fire, which was communicated
with rapid and irresistible violence; and the noise of the wind,
the crackling of the flames, the dissonant cries of the soldiers
and mariners, who could neither command nor obey, increased the
horror of the nocturnal tumult. Whilst they labored to extricate
themselves from the fire-ships, and to save at least a part of
the navy, the galleys of Genseric assaulted them with temperate
and disciplined valor; and many of the Romans, who escaped the
fury of the flames, were destroyed or taken by the victorious
Vandals. Among the events of that disastrous night, the heroic,
or rather desperate, courage of John, one of the principal
officers of Basiliscus, has rescued his name from oblivion. When
the ship, which he had bravely defended, was almost consumed, he
threw himself in his armor into the sea, disdainfully rejected
the esteem and pity of Genso, the son of Genseric, who pressed
him to accept honorable quarter, and sunk under the waves;
exclaiming, with his last breath, that he would never fall alive
into the hands of those impious dogs. Actuated by a far different
spirit, Basiliscus, whose station was the most remote from
danger, disgracefully fled in the beginning of the engagement,
returned to Constantinople with the loss of more than half of his
fleet and army, and sheltered his guilty head in the sanctuary of
St. Sophia, till his sister, by her tears and entreaties, could
obtain his pardon from the indignant emperor. Heraclius effected
his retreat through the desert; Marcellinus retired to Sicily,
where he was assassinated, perhaps at the instigation of Ricimer,
by one of his own captains; and the king of the Vandals expressed
his surprise and satisfaction, that the Romans themselves should
remove from the world his most formidable antagonists. 89 After
the failure of this great expedition, 891 Genseric again became
the tyrant of the sea: the coasts of Italy, Greece, and Asia,
were again exposed to his revenge and avarice; Tripoli and
Sardinia returned to his obedience; he added Sicily to the number
of his provinces; and before he died, in the fulness of years and
of glory, he beheld the final extinction of the empire of the
West. 90
87 (return) [ This promontory is forty miles from Carthage,
(Procop. l. i. c. 6, p. 192,) and twenty leagues from Sicily,
(Shaw’s Travels, p. 89.) Scipio landed farther in the bay, at the
fair promontory; see the animated description of Livy, xxix. 26,
27.]
88 (return) [ Theophanes (p. 100) affirms that many ships of the
Vandals were sunk. The assertion of Jornandes, (de Successione
Regn.,) that Basiliscus attacked Carthage, must be understood in
a very qualified sense]
89 (return) [ Damascius in Vit. Isidor. apud Phot. p. 1048. It
will appear, by comparing the three short chronicles of the
times, that Marcellinus had fought near Carthage, and was killed
in Sicily.]
891 (return) [ According to Lydus, Leo, distracted by this and
the other calamities of his reign, particularly a dreadful fire
at Constantinople, abandoned the palace, like another Orestes,
and was preparing to quit Constantinople forever l iii. c. 44, p.
230.—M.]
90 (return) [ For the African war, see Procopius, de Bell.
(Vandal. l. i. c. 6, p. 191, 192, 193,) Theophanes, (p. 99, 100,
101,) Cedrenus, (p. 349, 350,) and Zonaras, (tom. ii. l. xiv. p.
50, 51.) Montesquieu (Considerations sur la Grandeur, &c., c. xx.
tom. iii. p. 497) has made a judicious observation on the failure
of these great naval armaments.]
During his long and active reign, the African monarch had
studiously cultivated the friendship of the Barbarians of Europe,
whose arms he might employ in a seasonable and effectual
diversion against the two empires. After the death of Attila, he
renewed his alliance with the Visigoths of Gaul; and the sons of
the elder Theodoric, who successively reigned over that warlike
nation, were easily persuaded, by the sense of interest, to
forget the cruel affront which Genseric had inflicted on their
sister. 91 The death of the emperor Majorian delivered Theodoric
the Second from the restraint of fear, and perhaps of honor; he
violated his recent treaty with the Romans; and the ample
territory of Narbonne, which he firmly united to his dominions,
became the immediate reward of his perfidy. The selfish policy of
Ricimer encouraged him to invade the provinces which were in the
possession of Aegidius, his rival; but the active count, by the
defence of Arles, and the victory of Orleans, saved Gaul, and
checked, during his lifetime, the progress of the Visigoths.
Their ambition was soon rekindled; and the design of
extinguishing the Roman empire in Spain and Gaul was conceived,
and almost completed, in the reign of Euric, who assassinated his
brother Theodoric, and displayed, with a more savage temper,
superior abilities, both in peace and war. He passed the Pyrenees
at the head of a numerous army, subdued the cities of Saragossa
and Pampeluna, vanquished in battle the martial nobles of the
Tarragonese province, carried his victorious arms into the heart
of Lusitania, and permitted the Suevi to hold the kingdom of
Gallicia under the Gothic monarchy of Spain. 92 The efforts of
Euric were not less vigorous, or less successful, in Gaul; and
throughout the country that extends from the Pyrenees to the
Rhone and the Loire, Berry and Auvergne were the only cities, or
dioceses, which refused to acknowledge him as their master. 93 In
the defence of Clermont, their principal town, the inhabitants of
Auvergne sustained, with inflexible resolution, the miseries of
war, pestilence, and famine; and the Visigoths, relinquishing the
fruitless siege, suspended the hopes of that important conquest.
The youth of the province were animated by the heroic, and almost
incredible, valor of Ecdicius, the son of the emperor Avitus, 94
who made a desperate sally with only eighteen horsemen, boldly
attacked the Gothic army, and, after maintaining a flying
skirmish, retired safe and victorious within the walls of
Clermont. His charity was equal to his courage: in a time of
extreme scarcity, four thousand poor were fed at his expense; and
his private influence levied an army of Burgundians for the
deliverance of Auvergne. From his virtues alone the faithful
citizens of Gaul derived any hopes of safety or freedom; and even
such virtues were insufficient to avert the impending ruin of
their country, since they were anxious to learn, from his
authority and example, whether they should prefer the alternative
of exile or servitude. 95 The public confidence was lost; the
resources of the state were exhausted; and the Gauls had too much
reason to believe, that Anthemius, who reigned in Italy, was
incapable of protecting his distressed subjects beyond the Alps.
The feeble emperor could only procure for their defence the
service of twelve thousand British auxiliaries. Riothamus, one of
the independent kings, or chieftains, of the island, was
persuaded to transport his troops to the continent of Gaul: he
sailed up the Loire, and established his quarters in Berry, where
the people complained of these oppressive allies, till they were
destroyed or dispersed by the arms of the Visigoths. 96
91 (return) [ Jornandes is our best guide through the reigns of
Theodoric II. and Euric, (de Rebus Geticis, c. 44, 45, 46, 47, p.
675-681.) Idatius ends too soon, and Isidore is too sparing of
the information which he might have given on the affairs of
Spain. The events that relate to Gaul are laboriously illustrated
in the third book of the Abbe Dubos, Hist. Critique, tom. i. p.
424-620.]
92 (return) [ See Mariana, Hist. Hispan. tom. i. l. v. c. 5. p.
162.]
93 (return) [ An imperfect, but original, picture of Gaul, more
especially of Auvergne, is shown by Sidonius; who, as a senator,
and afterwards as a bishop, was deeply interested in the fate of
his country. See l. v. epist. 1, 5, 9, &c.]
94 (return) [ Sidonius, l. iii. epist. 3, p. 65-68. Greg. Turon.
l. ii. c. 24, in tom. ii. p. 174. Jornandes, c. 45, p. 675.
Perhaps Ecdicius was only the son-in-law of Avitus, his wife’s
son by another husband.]
95 (return) [ Si nullae a republica vires, nulla praesidia; si
nullae, quantum rumor est, Anthemii principis opes; statuit, te
auctore, nobilitas, seu patriaca dimittere seu capillos, (Sidon.
l. ii. epist. 1, p. 33.) The last words Sirmond, (Not. p. 25) may
likewise denote the clerical tonsure, which was indeed the choice
of Sidonius himself.]
96 (return) [ The history of these Britons may be traced in
Jornandes, (c. 45, p. 678,) Sidonius, (l. iii. epistol. 9, p. 73,
74,) and Gregory of Tours, (l. ii. c. 18, in tom. ii. p. 170.)
Sidonius (who styles these mercenary troops argutos, armatos,
tumultuosos, virtute numero, contul ernio, contumaces) addresses
their general in a tone of friendship and familiarity.]
One of the last acts of jurisdiction, which the Roman senate
exercised over their subjects of Gaul, was the trial and
condemnation of Arvandus, the Prætorian præfect. Sidonius, who
rejoices that he lived under a reign in which he might pity and
assist a state criminal, has expressed, with tenderness and
freedom, the faults of his indiscreet and unfortunate friend. 97
From the perils which he had escaped, Arvandus imbibed confidence
rather than wisdom; and such was the various, though uniform,
imprudence of his behavior, that his prosperity must appear much
more surprising than his downfall. The second præfecture, which
he obtained within the term of five years, abolished the merit
and popularity of his preceding administration. His easy temper
was corrupted by flattery, and exasperated by opposition; he was
forced to satisfy his importunate creditors with the spoils of
the province; his capricious insolence offended the nobles of
Gaul, and he sunk under the weight of the public hatred. The
mandate of his disgrace summoned him to justify his conduct
before the senate; and he passed the Sea of Tuscany with a
favorable wind, the presage, as he vainly imagined, of his future
fortunes. A decent respect was still observed for the
Proefectorian rank; and on his arrival at Rome, Arvandus was
committed to the hospitality, rather than to the custody, of
Flavius Asellus, the count of the sacred largesses, who resided
in the Capitol. 98 He was eagerly pursued by his accusers, the
four deputies of Gaul, who were all distinguished by their birth,
their dignities, or their eloquence. In the name of a great
province, and according to the forms of Roman jurisprudence, they
instituted a civil and criminal action, requiring such
restitution as might compensate the losses of individuals, and
such punishment as might satisfy the justice of the state. Their
charges of corrupt oppression were numerous and weighty; but they
placed their secret dependence on a letter which they had
intercepted, and which they could prove, by the evidence of his
secretary, to have been dictated by Arvandus himself. The author
of this letter seemed to dissuade the king of the Goths from a
peace with the Greek emperor: he suggested the attack of the
Britons on the Loire; and he recommended a division of Gaul,
according to the law of nations, between the Visigoths and the
Burgundians. 99 These pernicious schemes, which a friend could
only palliate by the reproaches of vanity and indiscretion, were
susceptible of a treasonable interpretation; and the deputies had
artfully resolved not to produce their most formidable weapons
till the decisive moment of the contest. But their intentions
were discovered by the zeal of Sidonius. He immediately apprised
the unsuspecting criminal of his danger; and sincerely lamented,
without any mixture of anger, the haughty presumption of
Arvandus, who rejected, and even resented, the salutary advice of
his friends. Ignorant of his real situation, Arvandus showed
himself in the Capitol in the white robe of a candidate, accepted
indiscriminate salutations and offers of service, examined the
shops of the merchants, the silks and gems, sometimes with the
indifference of a spectator, and sometimes with the attention of
a purchaser; and complained of the times, of the senate, of the
prince, and of the delays of justice. His complaints were soon
removed. An early day was fixed for his trial; and Arvandus
appeared, with his accusers, before a numerous assembly of the
Roman senate. The mournful garb which they affected, excited the
compassion of the judges, who were scandalized by the gay and
splendid dress of their adversary: and when the præfect
Arvandus, with the first of the Gallic deputies, were directed to
take their places on the senatorial benches, the same contrast of
pride and modesty was observed in their behavior. In this
memorable judgment, which presented a lively image of the old
republic, the Gauls exposed, with force and freedom, the
grievances of the province; and as soon as the minds of the
audience were sufficiently inflamed, they recited the fatal
epistle. The obstinacy of Arvandus was founded on the strange
supposition, that a subject could not be convicted of treason,
unless he had actually conspired to assume the purple. As the
paper was read, he repeatedly, and with a loud voice,
acknowledged it for his genuine composition; and his astonishment
was equal to his dismay, when the unanimous voice of the senate
declared him guilty of a capital offence. By their decree, he was
degraded from the rank of a præfect to the obscure condition of
a plebeian, and ignominiously dragged by servile hands to the
public prison. After a fortnight’s adjournment, the senate was
again convened to pronounce the sentence of his death; but while
he expected, in the Island of Aesculapius, the expiration of the
thirty days allowed by an ancient law to the vilest malefactors,
100 his friends interposed, the emperor Anthemius relented, and
the præfect of Gaul obtained the milder punishment of exile and
confiscation. The faults of Arvandus might deserve compassion;
but the impunity of Seronatus accused the justice of the
republic, till he was condemned and executed, on the complaint of
the people of Auvergne. That flagitious minister, the Catiline of
his age and country, held a secret correspondence with the
Visigoths, to betray the province which he oppressed: his
industry was continually exercised in the discovery of new taxes
and obsolete offences; and his extravagant vices would have
inspired contempt, if they had not excited fear and abhorrence.
101
97 (return) [ See Sidonius, l. i. epist. 7, p. 15-20, with
Sirmond’s notes. This letter does honor to his heart, as well as
to his understanding. The prose of Sidonius, however vitiated by
a false and affected taste, is much superior to his insipid
verses.]
98 (return) [ When the Capitol ceased to be a temple, it was
appropriated to the use of the civil magistrate; and it is still
the residence of the Roman senator. The jewellers, &c., might be
allowed to expose then precious wares in the porticos.]
99 (return) [ Haec ad regem Gothorum, charta videbatur emitti,
pacem cum Graeco Imperatore dissuadens, Britannos super Ligerim
sitos impugnari oportere, demonstrans, cum Burgundionibus jure
gentium Gallias dividi debere confirmans.]
100 (return) [ Senatusconsultum Tiberianum, (Sirmond Not. p. 17;)
but that law allowed only ten days between the sentence and
execution; the remaining twenty were added in the reign of
Theodosius.]
101 (return) [ Catilina seculi nostri. Sidonius, l. ii. epist. 1,
p. 33; l. v. epist 13, p. 143; l. vii. epist. vii. p. 185. He
execrates the crimes, and applauds the punishment, of Seronatus,
perhaps with the indignation of a virtuous citizen, perhaps with
the resentment of a personal enemy.]
Such criminals were not beyond the reach of justice; but whatever
might be the guilt of Ricimer, that powerful Barbarian was able
to contend or to negotiate with the prince, whose alliance he had
condescended to accept. The peaceful and prosperous reign which
Anthemius had promised to the West, was soon clouded by
misfortune and discord. Ricimer, apprehensive, or impatient, of a
superior, retired from Rome, and fixed his residence at Milan; an
advantageous situation either to invite or to repel the warlike
tribes that were seated between the Alps and the Danube. 102
Italy was gradually divided into two independent and hostile
kingdoms; and the nobles of Liguria, who trembled at the near
approach of a civil war, fell prostrate at the feet of the
patrician, and conjured him to spare their unhappy country. “For
my own part,” replied Ricimer, in a tone of insolent moderation,
“I am still inclined to embrace the friendship of the Galatian;
103 but who will undertake to appease his anger, or to mitigate
the pride, which always rises in proportion to our submission?”
They informed him, that Epiphanius, bishop of Pavia, 104 united
the wisdom of the serpent with the innocence of the dove; and
appeared confident, that the eloquence of such an ambassador must
prevail against the strongest opposition, either of interest or
passion. Their recommendation was approved; and Epiphanius,
assuming the benevolent office of mediation, proceeded without
delay to Rome, where he was received with the honors due to his
merit and reputation. The oration of a bishop in favor of peace
may be easily supposed; he argued, that, in all possible
circumstances, the forgiveness of injuries must be an act of
mercy, or magnanimity, or prudence; and he seriously admonished
the emperor to avoid a contest with a fierce Barbarian, which
might be fatal to himself, and must be ruinous to his dominions.
Anthemius acknowledged the truth of his maxims; but he deeply
felt, with grief and indignation, the behavior of Ricimer, and
his passion gave eloquence and energy to his discourse. “What
favors,” he warmly exclaimed, “have we refused to this ungrateful
man? What provocations have we not endured! Regardless of the
majesty of the purple, I gave my daughter to a Goth; I sacrificed
my own blood to the safety of the republic. The liberality which
ought to have secured the eternal attachment of Ricimer has
exasperated him against his benefactor. What wars has he not
excited against the empire! How often has he instigated and
assisted the fury of hostile nations! Shall I now accept his
perfidious friendship? Can I hope that he will respect the
engagements of a treaty, who has already violated the duties of a
son?” But the anger of Anthemius evaporated in these passionate
exclamations: he insensibly yielded to the proposals of
Epiphanius; and the bishop returned to his diocese with the
satisfaction of restoring the peace of Italy, by a
reconciliation, 105 of which the sincerity and continuance might
be reasonably suspected. The clemency of the emperor was extorted
from his weakness; and Ricimer suspended his ambitious designs
till he had secretly prepared the engines with which he resolved
to subvert the throne of Anthemius. The mask of peace and
moderation was then thrown aside. The army of Ricimer was
fortified by a numerous reenforcement of Burgundians and Oriental
Suevi: he disclaimed all allegiance to the Greek emperor, marched
from Milan to the Gates of Rome, and fixing his camp on the banks
of the Anio, impatiently expected the arrival of Olybrius, his
Imperial candidate.
102 (return) [ Ricimer, under the reign of Anthemius, defeated
and slew in battle Beorgor, king of the Alani, (Jornandes, c. 45,
p. 678.) His sister had married the king of the Burgundians, and
he maintained an intimate connection with the Suevic colony
established in Pannonia and Noricum.]
103 (return) [ Galatam concitatum. Sirmond (in his notes to
Ennodius) applies this appellation to Anthemius himself. The
emperor was probably born in the province of Galatia, whose
inhabitants, the Gallo-Grecians, were supposed to unite the vices
of a savage and a corrupted people.]
104 (return) [ Epiphanius was thirty years bishop of Pavia, (A.D.
467-497;) see Tillemont, Mem. Eccles. tom. xvi. p. 788. His name
and actions would have been unknown to posterity, if Ennodius,
one of his successors, had not written his life; (Sirmond, Opera
tom. i. p. 1647-1692;) in which he represents him as one of the
greatest characters of the age]
105 (return) [ Ennodius (p. 1659-1664) has related this embassy
of Epiphanius; and his narrative, verbose and turgid as it must
appear, illustrates some curious passages in the fall of the
Western empire.]
The senator Olybrius, of the Anician family, might esteem himself
the lawful heir of the Western empire. He had married Placidia,
the younger daughter of Valentinian, after she was restored by
Genseric; who still detained her sister Eudoxia, as the wife, or
rather as the captive, of his son. The king of the Vandals
supported, by threats and solicitations, the fair pretensions of
his Roman ally; and assigned, as one of the motives of the war,
the refusal of the senate and people to acknowledge their lawful
prince, and the unworthy preference which they had given to a
stranger. 106 The friendship of the public enemy might render
Olybrius still more unpopular to the Italians; but when Ricimer
meditated the ruin of the emperor Anthemius, he tempted, with the
offer of a diadem, the candidate who could justify his rebellion
by an illustrious name and a royal alliance. The husband of
Placidia, who, like most of his ancestors, had been invested with
the consular dignity, might have continued to enjoy a secure and
splendid fortune in the peaceful residence of Constantinople; nor
does he appear to have been tormented by such a genius as cannot
be amused or occupied, unless by the administration of an empire.
Yet Olybrius yielded to the importunities of his friends, perhaps
of his wife; rashly plunged into the dangers and calamities of a
civil war; and, with the secret connivance of the emperor Leo,
accepted the Italian purple, which was bestowed, and resumed, at
the capricious will of a Barbarian. He landed without obstacle
(for Genseric was master of the sea) either at Ravenna, or the
port of Ostia, and immediately proceeded to the camp of Ricimer,
where he was received as the sovereign of the Western world. 107
106 (return) [ Priscus, Excerpt. Legation p. 74. Procopius de
Bell. Vandel l. i. c. 6, p. 191. Eudoxia and her daughter were
restored after the death of Majorian. Perhaps the consulship of
Olybrius (A.D. 464) was bestowed as a nuptial present.]
107 (return) [ The hostile appearance of Olybrius is fixed
(notwithstanding the opinion of Pagi) by the duration of his
reign. The secret connivance of Leo is acknowledged by Theophanes
and the Paschal Chronicle. We are ignorant of his motives; but in
this obscure period, our ignorance extends to the most public and
important facts.]
The patrician, who had extended his posts from the Anio to the
Melvian bridge, already possessed two quarters of Rome, the
Vatican and the Janiculum, which are separated by the Tyber from
the rest of the city; 108 and it may be conjectured, that an
assembly of seceding senators imitated, in the choice of
Olybrius, the forms of a legal election. But the body of the
senate and people firmly adhered to the cause of Anthemius; and
the more effectual support of a Gothic army enabled him to
prolong his reign, and the public distress, by a resistance of
three months, which produced the concomitant evils of famine and
pestilence. At length Ricimer made a furious assault on the
bridge of Hadrian, or St. Angelo; and the narrow pass was
defended with equal valor by the Goths, till the death of
Gilimer, their leader. The victorious troops, breaking down every
barrier, rushed with irresistible violence into the heart of the
city, and Rome (if we may use the language of a contemporary
pope) was subverted by the civil fury of Anthemius and Ricimer.
109 The unfortunate Anthemius was dragged from his concealment,
and inhumanly massacred by the command of his son-in-law; who
thus added a third, or perhaps a fourth, emperor to the number of
his victims. The soldiers, who united the rage of factious
citizens with the savage manners of Barbarians, were indulged,
without control, in the license of rapine and murder: the crowd
of slaves and plebeians, who were unconcerned in the event, could
only gain by the indiscriminate pillage; and the face of the city
exhibited the strange contrast of stern cruelty and dissolute
intemperance. 110 Forty days after this calamitous event, the
subject, not of glory, but of guilt, Italy was delivered, by a
painful disease, from the tyrant Ricimer, who bequeathed the
command of his army to his nephew Gundobald, one of the princes
of the Burgundians. In the same year all the principal actors in
this great revolution were removed from the stage; and the whole
reign of Olybrius, whose death does not betray any symptoms of
violence, is included within the term of seven months. He left
one daughter, the offspring of his marriage with Placidia; and
the family of the great Theodosius, transplanted from Spain to
Constantinople, was propagated in the female line as far as the
eighth generation. 111
108 (return) [ Of the fourteen regions, or quarters, into which
Rome was divided by Augustus, only one, the Janiculum, lay on the
Tuscan side of the Tyber. But, in the fifth century, the Vatican
suburb formed a considerable city; and in the ecclesiastical
distribution, which had been recently made by Simplicius, the
reigning pope, two of the seven regions, or parishes of Rome,
depended on the church of St. Peter. See Nardini Roma Antica, p.
67. It would require a tedious dissertation to mark the
circumstances, in which I am inclined to depart from the
topography of that learned Roman.]
109 (return) [ Nuper Anthemii et Ricimeris civili furore subversa
est. Gelasius in Epist. ad Andromach. apud Baron. A.D. 496, No.
42, Sigonius (tom. i. l. xiv. de Occidentali Imperio, p. 542,
543,) and Muratori (Annali d’Italia, tom. iv. p. 308, 309,) with
the aid of a less imperfect Ms. of the Historia Miscella., have
illustrated this dark and bloody transaction.]
110 (return) [ Such had been the saeva ac deformis urbe tota
facies, when Rome was assaulted and stormed by the troops of
Vespasian, (see Tacit. Hist. iii. 82, 83;) and every cause of
mischief had since acquired much additional energy. The
revolution of ages may bring round the same calamities; but ages
may revolve without producing a Tacitus to describe them.]
111 (return) [ See Ducange, Familiae Byzantin. p. 74, 75.
Areobindus, who appears to have married the niece of the emperor
Justinian, was the eighth descendant of the elder Theodosius.]
Chapter XXXVI: Total Extinction Of The Western Empire.—Part V.
Whilst the vacant throne of Italy was abandoned to lawless
Barbarians, 112 the election of a new colleague was seriously
agitated in the council of Leo. The empress Verina, studious to
promote the greatness of her own family, had married one of her
nieces to Julius Nepos, who succeeded his uncle Marcellinus in
the sovereignty of Dalmatia, a more solid possession than the
title which he was persuaded to accept, of Emperor of the West.
But the measures of the Byzantine court were so languid and
irresolute, that many months elapsed after the death of
Anthemius, and even of Olybrius, before their destined successor
could show himself, with a respectable force, to his Italian
subjects. During that interval, Glycerius, an obscure soldier,
was invested with the purple by his patron Gundobald; but the
Burgundian prince was unable, or unwilling, to support his
nomination by a civil war: the pursuits of domestic ambition
recalled him beyond the Alps, 113 and his client was permitted to
exchange the Roman sceptre for the bishopric of Salona. After
extinguishing such a competitor, the emperor Nepos was
acknowledged by the senate, by the Italians, and by the
provincials of Gaul; his moral virtues, and military talents,
were loudly celebrated; and those who derived any private benefit
from his government, announced, in prophetic strains, the
restoration of the public felicity. 114 Their hopes (if such
hopes had been entertained) were confounded within the term of a
single year, and the treaty of peace, which ceded Auvergue to the
Visigoths, is the only event of his short and inglorious reign.
The most faithful subjects of Gaul were sacrificed, by the
Italian emperor, to the hope of domestic security; 115 but his
repose was soon invaded by a furious sedition of the Barbarian
confederates, who, under the command of Orestes, their general,
were in full march from Rome to Ravenna. Nepos trembled at their
approach; and, instead of placing a just confidence in the
strength of Ravenna, he hastily escaped to his ships, and retired
to his Dalmatian principality, on the opposite coast of the
Adriatic. By this shameful abdication, he protracted his life
about five years, in a very ambiguous state, between an emperor
and an exile, till he was assassinated at Salona by the
ungrateful Glycerius, who was translated, perhaps as the reward
of his crime, to the archbishopric of Milan. 116
112 (return) [ The last revolutions of the Western empire are
faintly marked in Theophanes, (p. 102,) Jornandes, (c. 45, p.
679,) the Chronicle of Marcellinus, and the Fragments of an
anonymous writer, published by Valesius at the end of Ammianus,
(p. 716, 717.) If Photius had not been so wretchedly concise, we
should derive much information from the contemporary histories of
Malchus and Candidus. See his Extracts, p. 172-179.]
113 (return) [ See Greg. Turon. l. ii. c. 28, in tom. ii. p. 175.
Dubos, Hist. Critique, tom. i. p. 613. By the murder or death of
his two brothers, Gundobald acquired the sole possession of the
kingdom of Burgundy, whose ruin was hastened by their discord.]
114 (return) [ Julius Nepos armis pariter summus Augustus ac
moribus. Sidonius, l. v. ep. 16, p. 146. Nepos had given to
Ecdicius the title of Patrician, which Anthemius had promised,
decessoris Anthemii fidem absolvit. See l. viii. ep. 7, p. 224.]
115 (return) [ Epiphanius was sent ambassador from Nepos to the
Visigoths, for the purpose of ascertaining the fines Imperii
Italici, (Ennodius in Sirmond, tom. i. p. 1665-1669.) His
pathetic discourse concealed the disgraceful secret which soon
excited the just and bitter complaints of the bishop of
Clermont.]
116 (return) [ Malchus, apud Phot. p. 172. Ennod. Epigram.
lxxxii. in Sirmond. Oper. tom. i. p. 1879. Some doubt may,
however, be raised on the identity of the emperor and the
archbishop.]
The nations who had asserted their independence after the death
of Attila, were established, by the right of possession or
conquest, in the boundless countries to the north of the Danube;
or in the Roman provinces between the river and the Alps. But the
bravest of their youth enlisted in the army of confederates, who
formed the defence and the terror of Italy; 117 and in this
promiscuous multitude, the names of the Heruli, the Scyrri, the
Alani, the Turcilingi, and the Rugians, appear to have
predominated. The example of these warriors was imitated by
Orestes, 118 the son of Tatullus, and the father of the last
Roman emperor of the West. Orestes, who has been already
mentioned in this History, had never deserted his country. His
birth and fortunes rendered him one of the most illustrious
subjects of Pannonia. When that province was ceded to the Huns,
he entered into the service of Attila, his lawful sovereign,
obtained the office of his secretary, and was repeatedly sent
ambassador to Constantinople, to represent the person, and
signify the commands, of the imperious monarch. The death of that
conqueror restored him to his freedom; and Orestes might
honorably refuse either to follow the sons of Attila into the
Scythian desert, or to obey the Ostrogoths, who had usurped the
dominion of Pannonia. He preferred the service of the Italian
princes, the successors of Valentinian; and as he possessed the
qualifications of courage, industry, and experience, he advanced
with rapid steps in the military profession, till he was
elevated, by the favor of Nepos himself, to the dignities of
patrician, and master-general of the troops. These troops had
been long accustomed to reverence the character and authority of
Orestes, who affected their manners, conversed with them in their
own language, and was intimately connected with their national
chieftains, by long habits of familiarity and friendship. At his
solicitation they rose in arms against the obscure Greek, who
presumed to claim their obedience; and when Orestes, from some
secret motive, declined the purple, they consented, with the same
facility, to acknowledge his son Augustulus as the emperor of the
West. By the abdication of Nepos, Orestes had now attained the
summit of his ambitious hopes; but he soon discovered, before the
end of the first year, that the lessons of perjury and
ingratitude, which a rebel must inculcate, will be resorted to
against himself; and that the precarious sovereign of Italy was
only permitted to choose, whether he would be the slave, or the
victim, of his Barbarian mercenaries. The dangerous alliance of
these strangers had oppressed and insulted the last remains of
Roman freedom and dignity. At each revolution, their pay and
privileges were augmented; but their insolence increased in a
still more extravagant degree; they envied the fortune of their
brethren in Gaul, Spain, and Africa, whose victorious arms had
acquired an independent and perpetual inheritance; and they
insisted on their peremptory demand, that a third part of the
lands of Italy should be immediately divided among them. Orestes,
with a spirit, which, in another situation, might be entitled to
our esteem, chose rather to encounter the rage of an armed
multitude, than to subscribe the ruin of an innocent people. He
rejected the audacious demand; and his refusal was favorable to
the ambition of Odoacer; a bold Barbarian, who assured his
fellow-soldiers, that, if they dared to associate under his
command, they might soon extort the justice which had been denied
to their dutiful petitions. From all the camps and garrisons of
Italy, the confederates, actuated by the same resentment and the
same hopes, impatiently flocked to the standard of this popular
leader; and the unfortunate patrician, overwhelmed by the
torrent, hastily retreated to the strong city of Pavia, the
episcopal seat of the holy Epiphanites. Pavia was immediately
besieged, the fortifications were stormed, the town was pillaged;
and although the bishop might labor, with much zeal and some
success, to save the property of the church, and the chastity of
female captives, the tumult could only be appeased by the
execution of Orestes. 119 His brother Paul was slain in an action
near Ravenna; and the helpless Augustulus, who could no longer
command the respect, was reduced to implore the clemency, of
Odoacer.
117 (return) [ Our knowledge of these mercenaries, who subverted
the Western empire, is derived from Procopius, (de Bell. Gothico,
l. i. c. i. p. 308.) The popular opinion, and the recent
historians, represent Odoacer in the false light of a stranger,
and a king, who invaded Italy with an army of foreigners, his
native subjects.]
118 (return) [ Orestes, qui eo tempore quando Attila ad Italiam
venit, se illi unxit, ejus notarius factus fuerat. Anonym. Vales.
p. 716. He is mistaken in the date; but we may credit his
assertion, that the secretary of Attila was the father of
Augustulus]
119 (return) [ See Ennodius, (in Vit. Epiphan. Sirmond, tom. i.
p. 1669, 1670.) He adds weight to the narrative of Procopius,
though we may doubt whether the devil actually contrived the
siege of Pavia, to distress the bishop and his flock.]
That successful Barbarian was the son of Edecon; who, in some
remarkable transactions, particularly described in a preceding
chapter, had been the colleague of Orestes himself. 1191 The
honor of an ambassador should be exempt from suspicion; and
Edecon had listened to a conspiracy against the life of his
sovereign. But this apparent guilt was expiated by his merit or
repentance; his rank was eminent and conspicuous; he enjoyed the
favor of Attila; and the troops under his command, who guarded,
in their turn, the royal village, consisted of a tribe of Scyrri,
his immediate and hereditary subjects. In the revolt of the
nations, they still adhered to the Huns; and more than twelve
years afterwards, the name of Edecon is honorably mentioned, in
their unequal contests with the Ostrogoths; which was terminated,
after two bloody battles, by the defeat and dispersion of the
Scyrri. 120 Their gallant leader, who did not survive this
national calamity, left two sons, Onulf and Odoacer, to struggle
with adversity, and to maintain as they might, by rapine or
service, the faithful followers of their exile. Onulf directed
his steps towards Constantinople, where he sullied, by the
assassination of a generous benefactor, the fame which he had
acquired in arms. His brother Odoacer led a wandering life among
the Barbarians of Noricum, with a mind and a fortune suited to
the most desperate adventures; and when he had fixed his choice,
he piously visited the cell of Severinus, the popular saint of
the country, to solicit his approbation and blessing. The lowness
of the door would not admit the lofty stature of Odoacer: he was
obliged to stoop; but in that humble attitude the saint could
discern the symptoms of his future greatness; and addressing him
in a prophetic tone, “Pursue” (said he) “your design; proceed to
Italy; you will soon cast away this coarse garment of skins; and
your wealth will be adequate to the liberality of your mind.” 121
The Barbarian, whose daring spirit accepted and ratified the
prediction, was admitted into the service of the Western empire,
and soon obtained an honorable rank in the guards. His manners
were gradually polished, his military skill was improved, and the
confederates of Italy would not have elected him for their
general, unless the exploits of Odoacer had established a high
opinion of his courage and capacity. 122 Their military
acclamations saluted him with the title of king; but he
abstained, during his whole reign, from the use of the purple and
diadem, 123 lest he should offend those princes, whose subjects,
by their accidental mixture, had formed the victorious army,
which time and policy might insensibly unite into a great nation.
1191 (return) [ Manso observes that the evidence which identifies
Edecon, the father of Odoacer, with the colleague of Orestes, is
not conclusive. Geschichte des Ost-Gothischen Reiches, p. 32. But
St. Martin inclines to agree with Gibbon, note, vi. 75.—M.]
120 (return) [ Jornandes, c. 53, 54, p. 692-695. M. de Buat
(Hist. des Peuples de l’Europe, tom. viii. p. 221-228) has
clearly explained the origin and adventures of Odoacer. I am
almost inclined to believe that he was the same who pillaged
Angers, and commanded a fleet of Saxon pirates on the ocean.
Greg. Turon. l. ii. c. 18, in tom. ii. p. 170. 8 Note: According
to St. Martin there is no foundation for this conjecture, vii
5—M.]
121 (return) [ Vade ad Italiam, vade vilissimis nunc pellibus
coopertis: sed multis cito plurima largiturus. Anonym. Vales. p.
717. He quotes the life of St. Severinus, which is extant, and
contains much unknown and valuable history; it was composed by
his disciple Eugippius (A.D. 511) thirty years after his death.
See Tillemont, Mem. Eccles. tom. xvi. p. 168-181.]
122 (return) [ Theophanes, who calls him a Goth, affirms, that he
was educated, aursed in Italy, (p. 102;) and as this strong
expression will not bear a literal interpretation, it must be
explained by long service in the Imperial guards.]
123 (return) [ Nomen regis Odoacer assumpsit, cum tamen neque
purpura nee regalibus uteretur insignibus. Cassiodor. in Chron.
A.D. 476. He seems to have assumed the abstract title of a king,
without applying it to any particular nation or country. 8 Note:
Manso observes that Odoacer never called himself king of Italy,
assume the purple, and no coins are extant with his name.
Gescnichte Osi Goth. Reiches, p. 36—M.]
Royalty was familiar to the Barbarians, and the submissive people
of Italy was prepared to obey, without a murmur, the authority
which he should condescend to exercise as the vicegerent of the
emperor of the West. But Odoacer had resolved to abolish that
useless and expensive office; and such is the weight of antique
prejudice, that it required some boldness and penetration to
discover the extreme facility of the enterprise. The unfortunate
Augustulus was made the instrument of his own disgrace: he
signified his resignation to the senate; and that assembly, in
their last act of obedience to a Roman prince, still affected the
spirit of freedom, and the forms of the constitution. An epistle
was addressed, by their unanimous decree, to the emperor Zeno,
the son-in-law and successor of Leo; who had lately been
restored, after a short rebellion, to the Byzantine throne. They
solemnly “disclaim the necessity, or even the wish, of continuing
any longer the Imperial succession in Italy; since, in their
opinion, the majesty of a sole monarch is sufficient to pervade
and protect, at the same time, both the East and the West. In
their own name, and in the name of the people, they consent that
the seat of universal empire shall be transferred from Rome to
Constantinople; and they basely renounce the right of choosing
their master, the only vestige that yet remained of the authority
which had given laws to the world. The republic (they repeat that
name without a blush) might safely confide in the civil and
military virtues of Odoacer; and they humbly request, that the
emperor would invest him with the title of Patrician, and the
administration of the diocese of Italy.” The deputies of the
senate were received at Constantinople with some marks of
displeasure and indignation: and when they were admitted to the
audience of Zeno, he sternly reproached them with their treatment
of the two emperors, Anthemius and Nepos, whom the East had
successively granted to the prayers of Italy. “The first”
(continued he) “you have murdered; the second you have expelled;
but the second is still alive, and whilst he lives he is your
lawful sovereign.” But the prudent Zeno soon deserted the
hopeless cause of his abdicated colleague. His vanity was
gratified by the title of sole emperor, and by the statues
erected to his honor in the several quarters of Rome; he
entertained a friendly, though ambiguous, correspondence with the
patrician Odoacer; and he gratefully accepted the Imperial
ensigns, the sacred ornaments of the throne and palace, which the
Barbarian was not unwilling to remove from the sight of the
people. 124
124 (return) [ Malchus, whose loss excites our regret, has
preserved (in Excerpt. Legat. p. 93) this extraordinary embassy
from the senate to Zeno. The anonymous fragment, (p. 717,) and
the extract from Candidus, (apud Phot. p. 176,) are likewise of
some use.]
In the space of twenty years since the death of Valentinian, nine
emperors had successively disappeared; and the son of Orestes, a
youth recommended only by his beauty, would be the least entitled
to the notice of posterity, if his reign, which was marked by the
extinction of the Roman empire in the West, did not leave a
memorable era in the history of mankind. 125 The patrician
Orestes had married the daughter of Count Romulus, of Petovio in
Noricum: the name of Augustus, notwithstanding the jealousy of
power, was known at Aquileia as a familiar surname; and the
appellations of the two great founders, of the city and of the
monarchy, were thus strangely united in the last of their
successors. 126 The son of Orestes assumed and disgraced the
names of Romulus Augustus; but the first was corrupted into
Momyllus, by the Greeks, and the second has been changed by the
Latins into the contemptible diminutive Augustulus. The life of
this inoffensive youth was spared by the generous clemency of
Odoacer; who dismissed him, with his whole family, from the
Imperial palace, fixed his annual allowance at six thousand
pieces of gold, and assigned the castle of Lucullus, in Campania,
for the place of his exile or retirement. 127 As soon as the
Romans breathed from the toils of the Punic war, they were
attracted by the beauties and the pleasures of Campania; and the
country-house of the elder Scipio at Liternum exhibited a lasting
model of their rustic simplicity. 128 The delicious shores of the
Bay of Naples were crowded with villas; and Sylla applauded the
masterly skill of his rival, who had seated himself on the lofty
promontory of Misenum, that commands, on every side, the sea and
land, as far as the boundaries of the horizon. 129 The villa of
Marius was purchased, within a few years, by Lucullus, and the
price had increased from two thousand five hundred, to more than
fourscore thousand, pounds sterling. 130 It was adorned by the
new proprietor with Grecian arts and Asiatic treasures; and the
houses and gardens of Lucullus obtained a distinguished rank in
the list of Imperial palaces. 131 When the Vandals became
formidable to the sea-coast, the Lucullan villa, on the
promontory of Misenum, gradually assumed the strength and
appellation of a strong castle, the obscure retreat of the last
emperor of the West. About twenty years after that great
revolution, it was converted into a church and monastery, to
receive the bones of St. Severinus. They securely reposed, amidst
the the broken trophies of Cimbric and Armenian victories,till
the beginning of the tenth century; when the fortifications,
which might afford a dangerous shelter to the Saracens, were
demolished by the people of Naples. 132
125 (return) [ The precise year in which the Western empire was
extinguished, is not positively ascertained. The vulgar era of
A.D. 476 appears to have the sanction of authentic chronicles.
But the two dates assigned by Jornandes (c. 46, p. 680) would
delay that great event to the year 479; and though M. de Buat has
overlooked his evidence, he produces (tom. viii. p. 261-288) many
collateral circumstances in support of the same opinion.]
126 (return) [ See his medals in Ducange, (Fam. Byzantin. p. 81,)
Priscus, (Excerpt. Legat. p. 56,) Maffei, (Osservazioni
Letterarie, tom. ii p. 314.) We may allege a famous and similar
case. The meanest subjects of the Roman empire assumed the
illustrious name of Patricius, which, by the conversion of
Ireland has been communicated to a whole nation.]
127 (return) [ Ingrediens autem Ravennam deposuit Augustulum de
regno, cujus infantiam misertus concessit ei sanguinem; et quia
pulcher erat, tamen donavit ei reditum sex millia solidos, et
misit eum intra Campaniam cum parentibus suis libere vivere.
Anonym. Vales. p. 716. Jornandes says, (c 46, p. 680,) in
Lucullano Campaniae castello exilii poena damnavit.]
128 (return) [ See the eloquent Declamation of Seneca, (Epist.
lxxxvi.) The philosopher might have recollected, that all luxury
is relative; and that the elder Scipio, whose manners were
polished by study and conversation, was himself accused of that
vice by his ruder contemporaries, (Livy, xxix. 19.)]
129 (return) [ Sylla, in the language of a soldier, praised his
peritia castrametandi, (Plin. Hist. Natur. xviii. 7.) Phaedrus,
who makes its shady walks (loeta viridia) the scene of an insipid
fable, (ii. 5,) has thus described the situation:—
Caesar Tiberius quum petens Neapolim, In Misenensem villam
venissit suam; Quae monte summo posita Luculli manu Prospectat
Siculum et prospicit Tuscum mare.]
130 (return) [ From seven myriads and a half to two hundred and
fifty myriads of drachmae. Yet even in the possession of Marius,
it was a luxurious retirement. The Romans derided his indolence;
they soon bewailed his activity. See Plutarch, in Mario, tom. ii.
p. 524.]
131 (return) [ Lucullus had other villa of equal, though various,
magnificence, at Baiae, Naples, Tusculum, &c., He boasted that he
changed his climate with the storks and cranes. Plutarch, in
Lucull. tom. iii. p. 193.]
132 (return) [ Severinus died in Noricum, A.D. 482. Six years
afterwards, his body, which scattered miracles as it passed, was
transported by his disciples into Italy. The devotion of a
Neapolitan lady invited the saint to the Lucullan villa, in the
place of Augustulus, who was probably no more. See Baronius
(Annal. Eccles. A.D. 496, No. 50, 51) and Tillemont, (Mem.
Eccles. tom. xvi. p. 178-181,) from the original life by
Eugippius. The narrative of the last migration of Severinus to
Naples is likewise an authentic piece.]
Odoacer was the first Barbarian who reigned in Italy, over a
people who had once asserted their just superiority above the
rest of mankind. The disgrace of the Romans still excites our
respectful compassion, and we fondly sympathize with the
imaginary grief and indignation of their degenerate posterity.
But the calamities of Italy had gradually subdued the proud
consciousness of freedom and glory. In the age of Roman virtue
the provinces were subject to the arms, and the citizens to the
laws, of the republic; till those laws were subverted by civil
discord, and both the city and the province became the servile
property of a tyrant. The forms of the constitution, which
alleviated or disguised their abject slavery, were abolished by
time and violence; the Italians alternately lamented the presence
or the absence of the sovereign, whom they detested or despised;
and the succession of five centuries inflicted the various evils
of military license, capricious despotism, and elaborate
oppression. During the same period, the Barbarians had emerged
from obscurity and contempt, and the warriors of Germany and
Scythia were introduced into the provinces, as the servants, the
allies, and at length the masters, of the Romans, whom they
insulted or protected. The hatred of the people was suppressed by
fear; they respected the spirit and splendor of the martial
chiefs who were invested with the honors of the empire; and the
fate of Rome had long depended on the sword of those formidable
strangers. The stern Ricimer, who trampled on the ruins of Italy,
had exercised the power, without assuming the title, of a king;
and the patient Romans were insensibly prepared to acknowledge
the royalty of Odoacer and his Barbaric successors. The king of
Italy was not unworthy of the high station to which his valor and
fortune had exalted him: his savage manners were polished by the
habits of conversation; and he respected, though a conqueror and
a Barbarian, the institutions, and even the prejudices, of his
subjects. After an interval of seven years, Odoacer restored the
consulship of the West. For himself, he modestly, or proudly,
declined an honor which was still accepted by the emperors of the
East; but the curule chair was successively filled by eleven of
the most illustrious senators; 133 and the list is adorned by the
respectable name of Basilius, whose virtues claimed the
friendship and grateful applause of Sidonius, his client. 134 The
laws of the emperors were strictly enforced, and the civil
administration of Italy was still exercised by the Prætorian
præfect and his subordinate officers. Odoacer devolved on the
Roman magistrates the odious and oppressive task of collecting
the public revenue; but he reserved for himself the merit of
seasonable and popular indulgence. 135 Like the rest of the
Barbarians, he had been instructed in the Arian heresy; but he
revered the monastic and episcopal characters; and the silence of
the Catholics attest the toleration which they enjoyed. The peace
of the city required the interposition of his præfect Basilius
in the choice of a Roman pontiff: the decree which restrained the
clergy from alienating their lands was ultimately designed for
the benefit of the people, whose devotions would have been taxed
to repair the dilapidations of the church. 136 Italy was
protected by the arms of its conqueror; and its frontiers were
respected by the Barbarians of Gaul and Germany, who had so long
insulted the feeble race of Theodosius. Odoacer passed the
Adriatic, to chastise the assassins of the emperor Nepos, and to
acquire the maritime province of Dalmatia. He passed the Alps, to
rescue the remains of Noricum from Fava, or Feletheus, king of
the Rugians, who held his residence beyond the Danube. The king
was vanquished in battle, and led away prisoner; a numerous
colony of captives and subjects was transplanted into Italy; and
Rome, after a long period of defeat and disgrace, might claim the
triumph of her Barbarian master. 137
133 (return) [ The consular Fasti may be found in Pagi or
Muratori. The consuls named by Odoacer, or perhaps by the Roman
senate, appear to have been acknowledged in the Eastern empire.]
134 (return) [ Sidonius Apollinaris (l. i. epist. 9, p. 22, edit.
Sirmond) has compared the two leading senators of his time, (A.D.
468,) Gennadius Avienus and Caecina Basilius. To the former he
assigns the specious, to the latter the solid, virtues of public
and private life. A Basilius junior, possibly his son, was consul
in the year 480.]
135 (return) [ Epiphanius interceded for the people of Pavia; and
the king first granted an indulgence of five years, and
afterwards relieved them from the oppression of Pelagius, the
Prætorian præfect, (Ennodius in Vit St. Epiphan., in Sirmond,
Oper. tom. i. p. 1670-1672.)]
136 (return) [ See Baronius, Annal. Eccles. A.D. 483, No. 10-15.
Sixteen years afterwards the irregular proceedings of Basilius
were condemned by Pope Symmachus in a Roman synod.]
137 (return) [ The wars of Odoacer are concisely mentioned by
Paul the Deacon, (de Gest. Langobard. l. i. c. 19, p. 757, edit.
Grot.,) and in the two Chronicles of Cassiodorus and Cuspinian.
The life of St. Severinus by Eugippius, which the count de Buat
(Hist. des Peuples, &c., tom. viii. c. 1, 4, 8, 9) has diligently
studied, illustrates the ruin of Noricum and the Bavarian
antiquities]
Notwithstanding the prudence and success of Odoacer, his kingdom
exhibited the sad prospect of misery and desolation. Since the
age of Tiberius, the decay of agriculture had been felt in Italy;
and it was a just subject of complaint, that the life of the
Roman people depended on the accidents of the winds and waves.
138 In the division and the decline of the empire, the tributary
harvests of Egypt and Africa were withdrawn; the numbers of the
inhabitants continually diminished with the means of subsistence;
and the country was exhausted by the irretrievable losses of war,
famine, 139 and pestilence. St. Ambrose has deplored the ruin of
a populous district, which had been once adorned with the
flourishing cities of Bologna, Modena, Regium, and Placentia. 140
Pope Gelasius was a subject of Odoacer; and he affirms, with
strong exaggeration, that in Aemilia, Tuscany, and the adjacent
provinces, the human species was almost extirpated. 141 The
plebeians of Rome, who were fed by the hand of their master,
perished or disappeared, as soon as his liberality was
suppressed; the decline of the arts reduced the industrious
mechanic to idleness and want; and the senators, who might
support with patience the ruin of their country, bewailed their
private loss of wealth and luxury. 1411 One third of those ample
estates, to which the ruin of Italy is originally imputed, 142
was extorted for the use of the conquerors. Injuries were
aggravated by insults; the sense of actual sufferings was
imbittered by the fear of more dreadful evils; and as new lands
were allotted to the new swarms of Barbarians, each senator was
apprehensive lest the arbitrary surveyors should approach his
favorite villa, or his most profitable farm. The least
unfortunate were those who submitted without a murmur to the
power which it was impossible to resist. Since they desired to
live, they owed some gratitude to the tyrant who had spared their
lives; and since he was the absolute master of their fortunes,
the portion which he left must be accepted as his pure and
voluntary gift. 143 The distress of Italy 1431 was mitigated by
the prudence and humanity of Odoacer, who had bound himself, as
the price of his elevation, to satisfy the demands of a
licentious and turbulent multitude. The kings of the Barbarians
were frequently resisted, deposed, or murdered, by their native
subjects, and the various bands of Italian mercenaries, who
associated under the standard of an elective general, claimed a
larger privilege of freedom and rapine. A monarchy destitute of
national union, and hereditary right, hastened to its
dissolution. After a reign of fourteen years, Odoacer was
oppressed by the superior genius of Theodoric, king of the
Ostrogoths; a hero alike excellent in the arts of war and of
government, who restored an age of peace and prosperity, and
whose name still excites and deserves the attention of mankind.
138 (return) [ Tacit. Annal. iii. 53. The Recherches sur
l’Administration des Terres chez les Romains (p. 351-361) clearly
state the progress of internal decay.]
139 (return) [ A famine, which afflicted Italy at the time of the
irruption of Odoacer, king of the Heruli, is eloquently
described, in prose and verse, by a French poet, (Les Mois, tom.
ii. p. 174, 205, edit. in 12 mo.) I am ignorant from whence he
derives his information; but I am well assured that he relates
some facts incompatible with the truth of history]
140 (return) [ See the xxxixth epistle of St. Ambrose, as it is
quoted by Muratori, sopra le Antichita Italiane, tom. i. Dissert.
xxi. p. 354.]
141 (return) [ Aemilia, Tuscia, ceteraeque provinciae in quibus
hominum propenullus exsistit. Gelasius, Epist. ad Andromachum,
ap. Baronium, Annal. Eccles. A.D. 496, No. 36.]
1411 (return) [ Denina supposes that the Barbarians were
compelled by necessity to turn their attention to agriculture.
Italy, either imperfectly cultivated, or not at all, by the
indolent or ruined proprietors, not only could not furnish the
imposts, on which the pay of the soldiery depended, but not even
a certain supply of the necessaries of life. The neighboring
countries were now occupied by warlike nations; the supplies of
corn from Africa were cut off; foreign commerce nearly destroyed;
they could not look for supplies beyond the limits of Italy,
throughout which the agriculture had been long in a state of
progressive but rapid depression. (Denina, Rev. d’Italia t. v. c.
i.)—M.]
142 (return) [ Verumque confitentibus, latifundia perdidere
Italiam. Plin. Hist. Natur. xviii. 7.]
143 (return) [ Such are the topics of consolation, or rather of
patience, which Cicero (ad Familiares, lib. ix. Epist. 17)
suggests to his friend Papirius Paetus, under the military
despotism of Caesar. The argument, however, of “vivere
pulcherrimum duxi,” is more forcibly addressed to a Roman
philosopher, who possessed the free alternative of life or death]
1431 (return) [ Compare, on the desolation and change of property
in Italy, Manno des Ost-Gothischen Reiches, Part ii. p. 73, et
seq.—M.]