I make a pause in the middle of the third century, to give a general
view of some leading points. There is now a circumstance which begins
from this time to be strikingly seen. Most of the sepulchral
inscriptions which we have, are from the end of the first to the middle
of the third century; and of these the great majority are to the memory
of freedmen, there being about ten _libertini_ to one _ingenuus_. The
fine marble tombs of the great families were most of them destroyed
during the middle ages, and they are now very scarce: the stones were
used for building at the time of the restoration of the city. As the
names of free men were everywhere getting confused from the beginning of
the third century, there is indeed hardly a tomb, after the first half
of the third century, in which _libertini_ are to be met with. The
importation of slaves must have stopped, and therefore the custom of
having households of them must have immensely fallen off: the
development of the system of colonies must have absorbed the greater
part of them.
Moreover, at this time, the difference between imperial and senatorial
provinces is done away with. Severus is said to have taken the provinces
from the senate, thereby paving the way for the arrangements made by
Diocletian and Constantine.
In former days, before I had mooted the subject, the Roman literature of
the first half of the third century was thought to have been already
quite barbarous, which was indeed the case with the fine arts.
Historical plastic art, of which we have specimens in the bas reliefs on
the spiral columns, is at its height under Trajan, and still keeps up
even as late as the Antonines. Of Antoninus Pius, I know but one
historical bas relief, which, however, is wretched: under M. Antoninus,
this art had risen again. Architecture was already in its decline under
Hadrian, as this emperor had a corrupt taste, being fond of mannerism
and an artificial style. The statue of M. Antoninus on horseback is a
noble work: if the horse is less to our liking, this is perhaps because
the race itself to which it belongs does not seem to us at all
beautiful; for indeed the whole is full of spirit and life. But this is
also the last masterpiece: even as early as Trajan, art is merely
historical, nor is there any monument left in which the ideal of a grand
and creative style is to be seen. As for painting, it was now indeed
quite gone, as Petronius expressly remarks; some works of this class,
which are still to be found, are detestably bad: its decline became
complete owing to the rise of mosaic, which now began to be employed. Of
the age of Severus and Caracalla, there are still very fine busts; of
Severus also, there are still very fine statues; but the bas reliefs on
the triumphal arch of this emperor are already thoroughly bad: those on
the small arch which was erected by the _argentarii_, are quite
barbarously misdrawn, scientific skill and the eye for proportion are
lost. After the time of Caracalla, we have not one good bust: they are
all misshapen, though some of them may indeed be likenesses. The coins
also become more and more barbarous.
The literature of the great jurists has reached its height, and at the
same time its end, in Papinian and Ulpian, both of whom, _diversis
virtutibus_, are of transcendent greatness: Paullus ought never to be
spoken of in the same breath with them. They are both of them excellent
likewise with regard to language; for although some small mistakes may
be found in it here and there, it is truly Roman. It is remarkable that
they had no successors; just as with Demosthenes oratory is at its
height, and then dies away; just as after Thucydides, no historian of
the same spirit rose up again. A long while afterwards, there followed
Hermogenianus and others, who were mere compilers. The scientific
arrangement of the law gave rise to the legislation of the imperial
secretaries, whose statutes, however, are most detestably drawn up: we
may indeed thank our stars, that their verbosity is curtailed in the
code.—With regard to the _belles lettres_, I have shown, and I look upon
it as an established fact, that Curtius belongs to the time of Severus
and Caracalla: he is an author who already writes quite an artificial
style, an imitation of Livy. Still later, in the reign of Alexander
Severus, perhaps even in that of Gordian, lived the most witty, but most
profligate, Petronius Arbiter, in whom Mamæa is distinctly alluded to.
The excellent Hadrian Valesius was the first who drew attention to this:
the prelate Monsignor Stefano Gradi violently opposed him at first; but
he afterwards set an honourable example by giving up his own opinion,
and making the proof complete. I have added some further arguments,
which both of them had overlooked, such as the passage concerning Mamæa,
and likewise an epitaph which is evidently of the time of Severus.
Petronius’ language—leaving aside those passages in which he makes
people talk, as they really then spoke, in the _lingua rustica_—bears
the marks of the age of which it is the true living expression. He is
the greatest poetical genius of Rome since the days of Augustus; but one
sees how his talent was quite confined to the romance and the poetry of
every-day life.
In the middle of the third century, Rome was in everything already
sinking into a state of barbarism: even the characters on the
inscriptions are of a barbarous shape, and the lines are crooked and
slanting.
INVASION OF THE GOTHS. DEATH OF DECIUS. GALLUS TREBONIANUS ÆMILIAN.
VALERIAN. GALLIENUS. THE THIRTY TYRANTS.
Decius, although he may have been a very praiseworthy prince, bears the
stain of persecutions. His reign was the era of the great break up which
began with the Germans, who for seventy years had kept tolerably quiet.
The whole of the north of Germany was now in motion, and the Franks made
their appearance on the Lower Rhine. With regard to the origin of the
Franks, on which go much has been written, I think the opinion to be a
very likely one, that the Sigambri on the right banks of the Rhine, and
in Westphalia, called themselves Franks, and that they formed a state of
their own distinct from that of the Saxons. The Swabians, who are partly
called Sueves, and partly Alemanni, make their appearance on the Maine.
Yet the grand break up caused by the Goths, dates from the reign of
Decius. Over the whole subject of their migrations, hangs the greatest
uncertainty. Did they come, as the Icelandic traditions would make us
believe, from the South to the North; or the reverse, as the traditions
in Jormandes would show? I believe that the question cannot in any way
be decided. We can only say thus much, that a large Gothic empire
existed in the beginning of the third century, in the south-east of
Europe.
The invasion of the Goths was made partly by land through Dacia, partly
in skiffs across the Black sea; like the attacks of the Russians on
Constantinople in the tenth century. Of the detailed account of the
Athenian Dexippus, we have unfortunately nothing but fragments in the
_Excerpta de Sententiis_ and _de Legationibus_, besides a few in
Syncellus. It is impossible to analyse these invasions in detail: I
should not venture to divide them, like Gibbon, into three great
expeditions. They overpowered the kingdom of the Bosporus, and destroyed
the towns on the northern coast of Asia Minor: they advanced also as far
as Cappadocia. Another expedition subdued the Thracian Bosporus which
since the destruction of Byzantium lay quite open. It is a proof of the
utter lethargy of the Roman Empire, that no attempt was made to fit out
any ships of war, to destroy the vessels of the barbarians. The most
thriving Bithynian cities, Nicomedia, Prusa, Chalcedon, and others, were
destroyed after the death of Decius, and with far more cruelty than the
Goths displayed in later times.
We must, however, return to the history of Decius, and go on with it.
Even some time already before this, when the Goths made their inroad
across the Danube, they were met by Decius. Dexippus wrote this history
down to the reign of Claudius Gothicus. The Goths besieged Nicopolis;
and when Decius relieved this town, they crossed the ridges of the
Hæmus, and took Philippopolis. After they had taken it, Decius again met
them in mount Hæmus, and cut off their retreat, when they wanted to make
a treaty for a free departure, and even to return the booty and
prisoners; but Decius refused, and whilst they were thus driven to
despair, he fared as king Frederick did at Kunersdorf. The Goths were
drawn up in three lines, two of which were already broken; and if Decius
had properly followed up his advantage, and taken such a position that
he might have dispersed those who were already beaten, and surrounded
the rest, he might have destroyed the whole army. But the unlucky star
of Rome led him to attack the third line, which was drawn up behind a
marsh or narrow paths and dykes, in a position where all the bravery of
the legions was in vain. He met with a defeat in which he and his son
lost their lives. This overthrow was decisive; but the Goths likewise
had suffered considerable loss, and they were glad to conclude with
Gallus Trebonianus, who had been proclaimed emperor, a treaty by which
he paid to them a considerable sum to be allowed to march off free.
Whether he also granted them abodes in Dacia, is more than I will take
upon myself to decide.
Gallus went to Rome, where he took as his colleague Hostilianus, the
nephew or son of Decius, who, however, died soon afterwards. As Gallus
now reigned despised by every one for the disgraceful peace which he had
made; Æmilianus, the governor of Illyricum, rose against him in the
East, and leading his army into Italy, gained a victory on the borders
of Umbria and the Sabine country, in the neighbourhood of Spoletum, and
Gallus lost his life. The latter, in his turn, had an avenger in
Valerian; who had been called out of Germany to his aid, and who came
indeed too late to save, but soon enough to avenge him: Æmilianus was
deserted, and probably murdered by his own soldiers.
Valerian now ascended the throne. Great things were expected from him;
yet his reputation was wholly undeserved, and we behold nothing but
disaster in his reign. Decius had had the strange idea of restoring the
censorship to improve the public morals, and the senate with one voice
had named Valerian censor; but Decius’ death happened so soon, that
nothing followed from the appointment. Valerian took for his colleague
his own son P. Licinius Gallienus, from which name we are not to suppose
that there was any relationship to the old Licinii of the best times of
the republic. Rome was in those days already quite accustomed to the
system of having colleagues; for as the emperor was often at the
farthest end of the empire, it was necessary that some one should carry
on the government for him. From all sides, the Franks, Alemanni, and
Goths now broke in, each nation by itself; and at the same time, the
Persians also, under king Sapor, crossed the eastern frontier. The
history of Valerian is very obscure and scanty: whether his catastrophe
took place in the year 256 or 260, cannot be made out.
The Franks had established their kingdom on the Lower Rhine, and they
held both banks of the stream as far up as Coblentz; the Swabians had
broken through the entrenched barrier, and taken possession of what is
now Suabia, or rather the country from the neighbourhood of the Lahn
even to Switzerland. The Juthungi, who are mentioned in this time only,
are perhaps so called from the reigning dynasty of the Lombards, and
merely mean this people; for the names which end in _-ing_ and _-ung_,
are always names of dynasties. The Goths forced their way in swarms of
boats, either by the Danube or the Dniester, into the Roman seas,
without the Romans ever once opposing to them a fleet. These were
devastations like those of the Normans in the ninth and tenth centuries.
They plundered the whole of Achaia; they sacked and burned Corinth,
Argos, and Athens, which, after many ages, now distinguishes itself
again. A spirited band under the _strategus_ Dexippus, the same who
wrote this history, left the town for the mountains; and when it had
been taken, they came down from thence, and surprised the Gothic fleet
in the Piræeus, avenging their city in a manner which does one good to
hear. Dexippus must have been an able man, although his history is a
work of bad rhetoric.
Just as unhappily, and far more disgracefully besides, did things go on
in Mesopotamia and Syria. Valerian, who was opposed to Sapor himself,
was brought into a most disadvantageous position, where he met with the
fate of General Mack near Ulm: he capitulated and became a prisoner, and
he is said to have been very shockingly treated. Whether Asiatic
ruthlessness went to the length of having him flayed alive, cannot be
decided by us: it was also a disputed point, even among the ancients.
The Persians now burst like a flood over Syria and Cappadocia, and near
Cæsarea they all but fell in with the Goths: Antioch was taken and
sacked. Those who escaped from the sword, were led away into bondage,
with a barbarity like that of Soliman at the siege of Vienna, when two
hundred thousand men lost their life or their freedom: the city was then
get fire to. The same fate befel Cæsarea, after a noble defence. The
towns on the Persian frontier alone had preserved their walls; but in
the interior, in Greece, and in Asia Minor, no one had ever thought of
the possibility of an enemy, and therefore the walls had been allowed to
go to ruins, or had been pulled down.
The whole of Syria was overrun and conquered,—a few strong towns only
may have held out; but in the midst of the desert, Palmyra, unobserved
by the rest of the world, had risen by degrees into an important
commercial mart, and from this city, half Syrian and half Arab, there
had grown up a power which made head against Sapor. Under the lead of
Odenathus, who is justly reckoned among the great men of the East, it
was able to fight for its existence, and to hold its own. Odenathus
defeated the rear of Sapor, and was not afraid of facing him in the open
field. All the Arabs from the interior having joined him, as it seems,
he is called _Princeps Saracenorum_ (from شرق to rise, مشرق the
East; as Yemen, the right hand, reckoning from Mecca): the name of
Saracens is to be met with long before Mohammed. Odenathus must have got
together a great force. On the other side also of the Persian empire,
diversions must have been made of which, however, we know nothing: for
the relations of the Persians with their eastern neighbours are
altogether hidden from us.
Valerian died in captivity. Gallienus is reproached for having made no
attempt to ransom his father; but, ought he to have done so by giving up
provinces? This is the time of the so-called thirty tyrants, a term
which has been exploded long ago. Gallienus was a worthless prince,
living only for his lusts, and seeking to take his ease in the midst of
the most dreadful calamities. He always remained in possession of Italy
and of the Noric and Illyrian frontier, and, with hardly an exception,
of Greece and Africa: (for a short time only, his authority in Ægypt was
disputed). In the East, Syria and the eastern provinces of Asia Minor
remained under the rule of Odenathus, and after his death, under that of
his great widow Zenobia: these were in some measure acknowledged by the
senate and by Gallienus, so that the latter even had a triumph for the
victories of Odenathus. From 256, or 260, to 268, Gallienus reigned
alone; but in the meanwhile Gaul, Britain, and Spain, even the whole of
what was afterwards the _Præfectura Gallica_, were torn away by
Postumus, and became a compact territory having its own princes: these
may be called emperors with as much right as Gallienus himself, although
this would be contrary to Roman orthodoxy. Postumus was a very eminent
man: he ruled over this great empire nearly ten years, and, if we may
rely on his coins, gained a succession of brilliant victories over the
Barbarians, particularly the Alemanni, and the Franks. The Alemanni must
at that time have undertaken a wide wasting expedition as far as Spain,
perhaps in the service of one of the then Emperors. The real name of
Postumus is M. Cassianus[60] Latinius Postumus. He has left behind him a
noble reputation; but the misfortunes of Gaul already now begin, as is
proved by the destruction of Autun, which from that time lay in ruins
until the reign of Diocletian: Spain also was devastated by the
Barbarians. At Mentz, Ælianus[61] had usurped the imperial title; but he
was conquered by Postumus, who in his turn lost his life when he would
not let his soldiers pillage that city. He was succeeded by Victorinus,
(his full name is M. Piavvonius Victorinus,) a brave but profligate
general, whose outrages brought upon himself death from the hands of a
deeply injured man. Then followed Marius, a common armourer, and after
him a great Gallic lord, C. Pesuvius Tetricus, who was acknowledged
throughout the whole of what was afterwards called the Gallic
Prefecture, and maintained himself there until the reign of Aurelian.
Here it is plainly to be seen how the division into prefectures was
altogether founded upon circumstances, and by no means an arbitrary one.
The nation now consists of Latinized Celts and Latinized Iberians, who
were distinguished from the Italians by very decided peculiarities of
their own.
The empire of Palmyra, as Eckhel justly remarks in opposition to Gibbon,
did not reach beyond Egypt and the countries of the Levant: Egypt
perhaps it only comprised in the last years, under Claudius Gothicus.
From coins especially, one may learn much, although they are often
enigmatical, that is to say, they give us enigmas to solve which but for
them would have never come to us at all. In Illyricum, Africa, Egypt,
even in peaceful Achaia, pretenders now arose, whose rule indeed lasted
but a short time, yet they most sadly distracted the empire. The whole
of the state, in fact, now consisted of three distinct masses. In the
first place, there was the empire of Rome; secondly, there was the West
or Gallic empire; and thirdly, that of the East. In Gaul, even very far
back indeed, as early as the days of Augustus and Tiberius, a marked
spirit of independence might have been observed, whereas Spain was much
more sincerely united to Rome: in the East, it was quite the reverse,
just as in Gaul. Treves was even at that time the seat of government, as
perhaps it was also under Postumus and Victorinus, although they often
lived at Cologne: Neuwied is called on the inscriptions _Victoriensis_,
which may have some connexion with Victorinus and his mother Victoria.
The _Porta Nigra_ at Treves belongs to this time. It is a Roman gate, on
each side of which there are basilicas: the whole building is of no
older date. The capital of such an empire might well have had large
structures. Taste had already fallen to a very low ebb.