Justinian.—Part IV.
Chapter XLIV: Idea Of The Roman Jurisprudence.—Part I.
Idea Of The Roman Jurisprudence.—The Laws Of The Kings—The Twelve Of
The Decemvirs.—The Laws Of The People.—The Decrees Of The Senate.—The
Edicts Of The Magistrates And Emperors—Authority Of The
Civilians.—Code, Pandects, Novels, And Institutes Of Justinian:—I.
Rights Of Persons.—II. Rights Of Things.—III. Private Injuries And
Actions.—IV. Crimes And Punishments.
Chapter XLIV: Idea Of The Roman Jurisprudence.—Part II.
Chapter XLIV: Idea Of The Roman Jurisprudence.—Part III.
Chapter XLIV: Idea Of The Roman Jurisprudence.—Part IV.
Chapter XLIV: Idea Of The Roman Jurisprudence.—Part V.
Chapter XLIV: Idea Of The Roman Jurisprudence.—Part VI.
Chapter XLIV: Idea Of The Roman Jurisprudence.—Part VII.
Chapter XLIV: Idea Of The Roman Jurisprudence.—Part VIII.
Chapter XLV: State Of Italy Under The Lombards.—Part I.
Reign Of The Younger Justin.—Embassy Of The Avars.—Their Settlement On
The Danube.—Conquest Of Italy By The Lombards.—Adoption And Reign Of
Tiberius.—Of Maurice.—State Of Italy Under The Lombards And The
Exarchs.—Of Ravenna.—Distress Of Rome.—Character And Pontificate Of
Gregory The First.
Chapter XLV: State Of Italy Under The Lombards.—Part II.
Chapter XLV: State Of Italy Under The Lombards.—Part III.
Chapter XLVI: Troubles In Persia.—Part I.
Revolutions On Persia After The Death Of Chosroes On Nushirvan.—His Son
Hormouz, A Tyrant, Is Deposed.—Usurpation Of Baharam.—Flight And
Restoration Of Chosroes II.—His Gratitude To The Romans.—The Chagan Of
The Avars.—Revolt Of The Army Against Maurice.—His Death.—Tyranny Of
Phocas.—Elevation Of Heraclius.—The Persian War.—Chosroes Subdues
Syria, Egypt, And Asia Minor.—Siege Of Constantinople By The Persians
And Avars.—Persian Expeditions.—Victories And Triumph Of Heraclius.
Chapter XLVI: Troubles In Persia.—Part II.
Chapter XLVI: Troubles In Persia.—Part III.
Chapter XLVI: Troubles In Persia.—Part IV.
Chapter XLVII: Ecclesiastical Discord.—Part I.
Theological History Of The Doctrine Of The Incarnation.—The Human And
Divine Nature Of Christ.—Enmity Of The Patriarchs Of Alexandria And
Constantinople.—St. Cyril And Nestorius. —Third General Council Of
Ephesus.—Heresy Of Eutyches.—Fourth General Council Of Chalcedon.—Civil
And Ecclesiastical Discord.—Intolerance Of Justinian.—The Three
Chapters.—The Monothelite Controversy.—State Of The Oriental Sects:—I.
The Nestorians.—II. The Jacobites.—III. The Maronites.—IV. The
Armenians.—V. The Copts And Abyssinians.
Chapter XLVII: Ecclesiastical Discord.—Part II.
Chapter XLVII: Ecclesiastical Discord.—Part III.
Chapter XLVII: Ecclesiastical Discord.—Part IV.
Chapter XLVII: Ecclesiastical Discord.—Part V.
Chapter XLVII: Ecclesiastical Discord.—Part VI.
Chapter XLVIII: Succession And Characters Of The Greek Emperors.—Part
I.
Plan Of The Two Last Volumes.—Succession And Characters Of The Greek
Emperors Of Constantinople, From The Time Of Heraclius To The Latin
Conquest.
Chapter XLVIII: Succession And Characters Of The Greek Emperors.—Part
II.
Chapter XLVIII: Succession And Characters Of The Greek Emperors.—Part
III.
Chapter XLVIII: Succession And Characters Of The Greek Emperors.—Part
IV.
Chapter XLVIII: Succession And Characters Of The Greek Emperors.—Part
V.
Chapter XXXIX: Gothic Kingdom Of Italy.—Part I.
Zeno And Anastasius, Emperors Of The East.—Birth, Education, And First
Exploits Of Theodoric The Ostrogoth.—His Invasion And Conquest Of
Italy.—The Gothic Kingdom Of Italy.—State Of The West.—Military And
Civil Government.—The Senator Boethius.—Last Acts And Death Of
Theodoric.
After the fall of the Roman empire in the West, an interval of
fifty years, till the memorable reign of Justinian, is faintly
marked by the obscure names and imperfect annals of Zeno,
Anastasius, and Justin, who successively ascended to the throne
of Constantinople. During the same period, Italy revived and
flourished under the government of a Gothic king, who might have
deserved a statue among the best and bravest of the ancient
Romans.
Theodoric the Ostrogoth, the fourteenth in lineal descent of the
royal line of the Amali, 1 was born in the neighborhood of Vienna
2 two years after the death of Attila. 2111 A recent victory had
restored the independence of the Ostrogoths; and the three
brothers, Walamir, Theodemir, and Widimir, who ruled that warlike
nation with united counsels, had separately pitched their
habitations in the fertile though desolate province of Pannonia.
The Huns still threatened their revolted subjects, but their
hasty attack was repelled by the single forces of Walamir, and
the news of his victory reached the distant camp of his brother
in the same auspicious moment that the favorite concubine of
Theodemir was delivered of a son and heir. In the eighth year of
his age, Theodoric was reluctantly yielded by his father to the
public interest, as the pledge of an alliance which Leo, emperor
of the East, had consented to purchase by an annual subsidy of
three hundred pounds of gold. The royal hostage was educated at
Constantinople with care and tenderness. His body was formed to
all the exercises of war, his mind was expanded by the habits of
liberal conversation; he frequented the schools of the most
skilful masters; but he disdained or neglected the arts of
Greece, and so ignorant did he always remain of the first
elements of science, that a rude mark was contrived to represent
the signature of the illiterate king of Italy. 3 As soon as he
had attained the age of eighteen, he was restored to the wishes
of the Ostrogoths, whom the emperor aspired to gain by liberality
and confidence. Walamir had fallen in battle; the youngest of the
brothers, Widimir, had led away into Italy and Gaul an army of
Barbarians, and the whole nation acknowledged for their king the
father of Theodoric. His ferocious subjects admired the strength
and stature of their young prince; 4 and he soon convinced them
that he had not degenerated from the valor of his ancestors. At
the head of six thousand volunteers, he secretly left the camp in
quest of adventures, descended the Danube as far as Singidunum,
or Belgrade, and soon returned to his father with the spoils of a
Sarmatian king whom he had vanquished and slain. Such triumphs,
however, were productive only of fame, and the invincible
Ostrogoths were reduced to extreme distress by the want of
clothing and food. They unanimously resolved to desert their
Pannonian encampments, and boldly to advance into the warm and
wealthy neighborhood of the Byzantine court, which already
maintained in pride and luxury so many bands of confederate
Goths. After proving, by some acts of hostility, that they could
be dangerous, or at least troublesome, enemies, the Ostrogoths
sold at a high price their reconciliation and fidelity, accepted
a donative of lands and money, and were intrusted with the
defence of the Lower Danube, under the command of Theodoric, who
succeeded after his father’s death to the hereditary throne of
the Amali. 5
1 (return) [ Jornandes (de Rebus Geticis, c. 13, 14, p. 629, 630,
edit. Grot.) has drawn the pedigree of Theodoric from Gapt, one
of the Anses or Demigods, who lived about the time of Domitian.
Cassiodorus, the first who celebrates the royal race of the
Amali, (Viriar. viii. 5, ix. 25, x. 2, xi. 1,) reckons the
grandson of Theodoric as the xviith in descent. Peringsciold (the
Swedish commentator of Cochloeus, Vit. Theodoric. p. 271, &c.,
Stockholm, 1699) labors to connect this genealogy with the
legends or traditions of his native country. * Note: Amala was a
name of hereditary sanctity and honor among the Visigoths. It
enters into the names of Amalaberga, Amala suintha, (swinther
means strength,) Amalafred, Amalarich. In the poem of the
Nibelungen written three hundred years later, the Ostrogoths are
called the Amilungen. According to Wachter it means, unstained,
from the privative a, and malo a stain. It is pure Sanscrit,
Amala, immaculatus. Schlegel. Indische Bibliothek, 1. p. 233.—M.]
2 (return) [ More correctly on the banks of the Lake Pelso,
(Nieusiedler-see,) near Carnuntum, almost on the same spot where
Marcus Antoninus composed his meditations, Jornandes, c. 52, p.
659. Severin. Pannonia Illustrata, p. 22. Cellarius, Geograph.
Antiq. (tom. i. p. 350.)]
2111 (return) [ The date of Theodoric’s birth is not accurately
determined. We can hardly err, observes Manso, in placing it
between the years 453 and 455, Manso, Geschichte des Ost
Gothischen Reichs, p. 14.—M.]
3 (return) [ The four first letters of his name were inscribed on
a gold plate, and when it was fixed on the paper, the king drew
his pen through the intervals (Anonym. Valesian. ad calcem Amm.
Marcellin p. 722.) This authentic fact, with the testimony of
Procopius, or at least of the contemporary Goths, (Gothic. 1. i.
c. 2, p. 311,) far outweighs the vague praises of Ennodius
(Sirmond Opera, tom. i. p. 1596) and Theophanes, (Chronograph. p.
112.) * Note: Le Beau and his Commentator, M. St. Martin,
support, though with no very satisfactory evidence, the opposite
opinion. But Lord Mahon (Life of Belisarius, p. 19) urges the
much stronger argument, the Byzantine education of Theodroic.—M.]
4 (return) [ Statura est quae resignet proceritate regnantem,
(Ennodius, p. 1614.) The bishop of Pavia (I mean the ecclesiastic
who wished to be a bishop) then proceeds to celebrate the
complexion, eyes, hands, &c, of his sovereign.]
5 (return) [ The state of the Ostrogoths, and the first years of
Theodoric, are found in Jornandes, (c. 52—56, p. 689—696) and
Malchus, (Excerpt. Legat. p. 78—80,) who erroneously styles him
the son of Walamir.]
A hero, descended from a race of kings, must have despised the
base Isaurian who was invested with the Roman purple, without any
endowment of mind or body, without any advantages of royal birth,
or superior qualifications. After the failure of the Theodosian
line, the choice of Pulcheria and of the senate might be
justified in some measure by the characters of Martin and Leo,
but the latter of these princes confirmed and dishonored his
reign by the perfidious murder of Aspar and his sons, who too
rigorously exacted the debt of gratitude and obedience. The
inheritance of Leo and of the East was peaceably devolved on his
infant grandson, the son of his daughter Ariadne; and her
Isaurian husband, the fortunate Trascalisseus, exchanged that
barbarous sound for the Grecian appellation of Zeno. After the
decease of the elder Leo, he approached with unnatural respect
the throne of his son, humbly received, as a gift, the second
rank in the empire, and soon excited the public suspicion on the
sudden and premature death of his young colleague, whose life
could no longer promote the success of his ambition. But the
palace of Constantinople was ruled by female influence, and
agitated by female passions: and Verina, the widow of Leo,
claiming his empire as her own, pronounced a sentence of
deposition against the worthless and ungrateful servant on whom
she alone had bestowed the sceptre of the East. 6 As soon as she
sounded a revolt in the ears of Zeno, he fled with precipitation
into the mountains of Isauria, and her brother Basiliscus,
already infamous by his African expedition, 7 was unanimously
proclaimed by the servile senate. But the reign of the usurper
was short and turbulent. Basiliscus presumed to assassinate the
lover of his sister; he dared to offend the lover of his wife,
the vain and insolent Harmatius, who, in the midst of Asiatic
luxury, affected the dress, the demeanor, and the surname of
Achilles. 8 By the conspiracy of the malcontents, Zeno was
recalled from exile; the armies, the capital, the person, of
Basiliscus, were betrayed; and his whole family was condemned to
the long agony of cold and hunger by the inhuman conqueror, who
wanted courage to encounter or to forgive his enemies. 811 The
haughty spirit of Verina was still incapable of submission or
repose. She provoked the enmity of a favorite general, embraced
his cause as soon as he was disgraced, created a new emperor in
Syria and Egypt, 812 raised an army of seventy thousand men, and
persisted to the last moment of her life in a fruitless
rebellion, which, according to the fashion of the age, had been
predicted by Christian hermits and Pagan magicians. While the
East was afflicted by the passions of Verina, her daughter
Ariadne was distinguished by the female virtues of mildness and
fidelity; she followed her husband in his exile, and after his
restoration, she implored his clemency in favor of her mother. On
the decease of Zeno, Ariadne, the daughter, the mother, and the
widow of an emperor, gave her hand and the Imperial title to
Anastasius, an aged domestic of the palace, who survived his
elevation above twenty-seven years, and whose character is
attested by the acclamation of the people, “Reign as you have
lived!” 9 912
6 (return) [ Theophanes (p. 111) inserts a copy of her sacred
letters to the provinces. Such female pretensions would have
astonished the slaves of the first Caesars.]
7 (return) [ Vol. iii. p. 504—508.]
8 (return) [ Suidas, tom. i. p. 332, 333, edit. Kuster.]
811 (return) [ Joannes Lydus accuses Zeno of timidity, or,
rather, of cowardice; he purchased an ignominious peace from the
enemies of the empire, whom he dared not meet in battle; and
employed his whole time at home in confiscations and executions.
Lydus, de Magist. iii. 45, p. 230.—M.]
812 (return) [ Named Illus.—M.]
9 (return) [ The contemporary histories of Malchus and Candidus
are lost; but some extracts or fragments have been saved by
Photius, (lxxviii. lxxix. p. 100—102,) Constantine
Porphyrogenitus, (Excerpt. Leg. p. 78—97,) and in various
articles of the Lexicon of Suidas. The Chronicles of Marcellinus
(Imago Historiae) are originals for the reigns of Zeno and
Anastasius; and I must acknowledge, almost for the last time, my
obligations to the large and accurate collections of Tillemont,
(Hist. des Emp. tom. vi. p. 472—652).]
912 (return) [ The Panegyric of Procopius of Gaza, (edited by
Villoison in his Anecdota Graeca, and reprinted in the new
edition of the Byzantine historians by Niebuhr, in the same vol.
with Dexippus and Eunapius, viii. p. 488 516,) was unknown to
Gibbon. It is vague and pedantic, and contains few facts. The
same criticism will apply to the poetical panegyric of Priscian
edited from the Ms. of Bobbio by Ang. Mai. Priscian, the gram
marian, Niebuhr argues from this work, must have been born in the
African, not in either of the Asiatic Caesareas. Pref. p. xi.—M.]
Whatever fear or affection could bestow, was profusely lavished
by Zeno on the king of the Ostrogoths; the rank of patrician and
consul, the command of the Palatine troops, an equestrian statue,
a treasure in gold and silver of many thousand pounds, the name
of son, and the promise of a rich and honorable wife. As long as
Theodoric condescended to serve, he supported with courage and
fidelity the cause of his benefactor; his rapid march contributed
to the restoration of Zeno; and in the second revolt, the
Walamirs, as they were called, pursued and pressed the Asiatic
rebels, till they left an easy victory to the Imperial troops. 10
But the faithful servant was suddenly converted into a formidable
enemy, who spread the flames of war from Constantinople to the
Adriatic; many flourishing cities were reduced to ashes, and the
agriculture of Thrace was almost extirpated by the wanton cruelty
of the Goths, who deprived their captive peasants of the right
hand that guided the plough. 11 On such occasions, Theodoric
sustained the loud and specious reproach of disloyalty, of
ingratitude, and of insatiate avarice, which could be only
excused by the hard necessity of his situation. He reigned, not
as the monarch, but as the minister of a ferocious people, whose
spirit was unbroken by slavery, and impatient of real or
imaginary insults. Their poverty was incurable; since the most
liberal donatives were soon dissipated in wasteful luxury, and
the most fertile estates became barren in their hands; they
despised, but they envied, the laborious provincials; and when
their subsistence had failed, the Ostrogoths embraced the
familiar resources of war and rapine. It had been the wish of
Theodoric (such at least was his declaration) to lead a peaceful,
obscure, obedient life on the confines of Scythia, till the
Byzantine court, by splendid and fallacious promises, seduced him
to attack a confederate tribe of Goths, who had been engaged in
the party of Basiliscus. He marched from his station in Maesia,
on the solemn assurance that before he reached Adrianople, he
should meet a plentiful convoy of provisions, and a reenforcement
of eight thousand horse and thirty thousand foot, while the
legions of Asia were encamped at Heraclea to second his
operations. These measures were disappointed by mutual jealousy.
As he advanced into Thrace, the son of Theodemir found an
inhospitable solitude, and his Gothic followers, with a heavy
train of horses, of mules, and of wagons, were betrayed by their
guides among the rocks and precipices of Mount Sondis, where he
was assaulted by the arms and invectives of Theodoric the son of
Triarius. From a neighboring height, his artful rival harangued
the camp of the Walamirs, and branded their leader with the
opprobrious names of child, of madman, of perjured traitor, the
enemy of his blood and nation. “Are you ignorant,” exclaimed the
son of Triarius, “that it is the constant policy of the Romans to
destroy the Goths by each other’s swords? Are you insensible that
the victor in this unnatural contest will be exposed, and justly
exposed, to their implacable revenge? Where are those warriors,
my kinsmen and thy own, whose widows now lament that their lives
were sacrificed to thy rash ambition? Where is the wealth which
thy soldiers possessed when they were first allured from their
native homes to enlist under thy standard? Each of them was then
master of three or four horses; they now follow thee on foot,
like slaves, through the deserts of Thrace; those men who were
tempted by the hope of measuring gold with a bushel, those brave
men who are as free and as noble as thyself.” A language so well
suited to the temper of the Goths excited clamor and discontent;
and the son of Theodemir, apprehensive of being left alone, was
compelled to embrace his brethren, and to imitate the example of
Roman perfidy. 12 1211
10 (return) [ In ipsis congressionis tuae foribus cessit invasor,
cum profugo per te sceptra redderentur de salute dubitanti.
Ennodius then proceeds (p. 1596, 1597, tom. i. Sirmond.) to
transport his hero (on a flying dragon?) into Aethiopia, beyond
the tropic of Cancer. The evidence of the Valesian Fragment, (p.
717,) Liberatus, (Brev. Eutych. c. 25 p. 118,) and Theophanes,
(p. 112,) is more sober and rational.]
11 (return) [ This cruel practice is specially imputed to the
Triarian Goths, less barbarous, as it should seem, than the
Walamirs; but the son of Theodemir is charged with the ruin of
many Roman cities, (Malchus, Excerpt. Leg. p. 95.)]
12 (return) [ Jornandes (c. 56, 57, p. 696) displays the services
of Theodoric, confesses his rewards, but dissembles his revolt,
of which such curious details have been preserved by Malchus,
(Excerpt. Legat. p. 78—97.) Marcellinus, a domestic of Justinian,
under whose ivth consulship (A.D. 534) he composed his Chronicle,
(Scaliger, Thesaurus Temporum, P. ii, p. 34—57,) betrays his
prejudice and passion: in Graeciam debacchantem ...Zenonis
munificentia pene pacatus...beneficiis nunquam satiatus, &c.]
1211 (return) [ Gibbon has omitted much of the complicated
intrigues of the Byzantine court with the two Theodorics. The
weak emperor attempted to play them one against the other, and
was himself in turn insulted, and the empire ravaged, by both.
The details of the successive alliance and revolt, of hostility
and of union, between the two Gothic chieftains, to dictate terms
to the emperor, may be found in Malchus.—M.]
In every state of his fortune, the prudence and firmness of
Theodoric were equally conspicuous; whether he threatened
Constantinople at the head of the confederate Goths, or retreated
with a faithful band to the mountains and sea-coast of Epirus. At
length the accidental death of the son of Triarius 13 destroyed
the balance which the Romans had been so anxious to preserve, the
whole nation acknowledged the supremacy of the Amali, and the
Byzantine court subscribed an ignominious and oppressive treaty.
14 The senate had already declared, that it was necessary to
choose a party among the Goths, since the public was unequal to
the support of their united forces; a subsidy of two thousand
pounds of gold, with the ample pay of thirteen thousand men, were
required for the least considerable of their armies; 15 and the
Isaurians, who guarded not the empire but the emperor, enjoyed,
besides the privilege of rapine, an annual pension of five
thousand pounds. The sagacious mind of Theodoric soon perceived
that he was odious to the Romans, and suspected by the
Barbarians: he understood the popular murmur, that his subjects
were exposed in their frozen huts to intolerable hardships, while
their king was dissolved in the luxury of Greece, and he
prevented the painful alternative of encountering the Goths, as
the champion, or of leading them to the field, as the enemy, of
Zeno. Embracing an enterprise worthy of his courage and ambition,
Theodoric addressed the emperor in the following words: “Although
your servant is maintained in affluence by your liberality,
graciously listen to the wishes of my heart! Italy, the
inheritance of your predecessors, and Rome itself, the head and
mistress of the world, now fluctuate under the violence and
oppression of Odoacer the mercenary. Direct me, with my national
troops, to march against the tyrant. If I fall, you will be
relieved from an expensive and troublesome friend: if, with the
divine permission, I succeed, I shall govern in your name, and to
your glory, the Roman senate, and the part of the republic
delivered from slavery by my victorious arms.” The proposal of
Theodoric was accepted, and perhaps had been suggested, by the
Byzantine court. But the forms of the commission, or grant,
appear to have been expressed with a prudent ambiguity, which
might be explained by the event; and it was left doubtful,
whether the conqueror of Italy should reign as the lieutenant,
the vassal, or the ally, of the emperor of the East.16
13 (return) [ As he was riding in his own camp, an unruly horse
threw him against the point of a spear which hung before a tent,
or was fixed on a wagon, (Marcellin. in Chron. Evagrius, l. iii.
c. 25.)]
14 (return) [ See Malchus (p. 91) and Evagrius, (l. iii. c. 35.)]
15 (return) [ Malchus, p. 85. In a single action, which was
decided by the skill and discipline of Sabinian, Theodoric could
lose 5000 men.] [Footnote 16: Jornandes (c. 57, p. 696, 697) has
abridged the great history of Cassiodorus. See, compare, and
reconcile Procopius, (Gothic. l. i. c. i.,) the Valesian
Fragment, (p. 718,) Theophanes, (p. 113,) and Marcellinus, (in
Chron.)]
16 (return) [ Jordanes (c. 57, p. 696, 697) has abridged the
great history of Cassiodorus. See, compare, and reconcile,
Procopius (Gothic. 1. i. c. i.), the Valesian Fragment (p.718),
Theophanes (p. 113), and Marcellinus (in Chron.).]
The reputation both of the leader and of the war diffused a
universal ardor; the Walamirs were multiplied by the Gothic
swarms already engaged in the service, or seated in the
provinces, of the empire; and each bold Barbarian, who had heard
of the wealth and beauty of Italy, was impatient to seek, through
the most perilous adventures, the possession of such enchanting
objects. The march of Theodoric must be considered as the
emigration of an entire people; the wives and children of the
Goths, their aged parents, and most precious effects, were
carefully transported; and some idea may be formed of the heavy
baggage that now followed the camp, by the loss of two thousand
wagons, which had been sustained in a single action in the war of
Epirus. For their subsistence, the Goths depended on the
magazines of corn which was ground in portable mills by the hands
of their women; on the milk and flesh of their flocks and herds;
on the casual produce of the chase, and upon the contributions
which they might impose on all who should presume to dispute the
passage, or to refuse their friendly assistance. Notwithstanding
these precautions, they were exposed to the danger, and almost to
the distress, of famine, in a march of seven hundred miles, which
had been undertaken in the depth of a rigorous winter. Since the
fall of the Roman power, Dacia and Pannonia no longer exhibited
the rich prospect of populous cities, well-cultivated fields, and
convenient highways: the reign of barbarism and desolation was
restored, and the tribes of Bulgarians, Gepidae, and Sarmatians,
who had occupied the vacant province, were prompted by their
native fierceness, or the solicitations of Odoacer, to resist the
progress of his enemy. In many obscure though bloody battles,
Theodoric fought and vanquished; till at length, surmounting
every obstacle by skilful conduct and persevering courage, he
descended from the Julian Alps, and displayed his invincible
banners on the confines of Italy. 17
17 (return) [ Theodoric’s march is supplied and illustrated by
Ennodius, (p. 1598—1602,) when the bombast of the oration is
translated into the language of common sense.]
Odoacer, a rival not unworthy of his arms, had already occupied
the advantageous and well-known post of the River Sontius, near
the ruins of Aquileia, at the head of a powerful host, whose
independent kings 18 or leaders disdained the duties of
subordination and the prudence of delays. No sooner had Theodoric
gained a short repose and refreshment to his wearied cavalry,
than he boldly attacked the fortifications of the enemy; the
Ostrogoths showed more ardor to acquire, than the mercenaries to
defend, the lands of Italy; and the reward of the first victory
was the possession of the Venetian province as far as the walls
of Verona. In the neighborhood of that city, on the steep banks
of the rapid Adige, he was opposed by a new army, reenforced in
its numbers, and not impaired in its courage: the contest was
more obstinate, but the event was still more decisive; Odoacer
fled to Ravenna, Theodoric advanced to Milan, and the vanquished
troops saluted their conqueror with loud acclamations of respect
and fidelity. But their want either of constancy or of faith soon
exposed him to the most imminent danger; his vanguard, with
several Gothic counts, which had been rashly intrusted to a
deserter, was betrayed and destroyed near Faenza by his double
treachery; Odoacer again appeared master of the field, and the
invader, strongly intrenched in his camp of Pavia, was reduced to
solicit the aid of a kindred nation, the Visigoths of Gaul. In
the course of this History, the most voracious appetite for war
will be abundantly satiated; nor can I much lament that our dark
and imperfect materials do not afford a more ample narrative of
the distress of Italy, and of the fierce conflict, which was
finally decided by the abilities, experience, and valor of the
Gothic king. Immediately before the battle of Verona, he visited
the tent of his mother 19 and sister, and requested, that on a
day, the most illustrious festival of his life, they would adorn
him with the rich garments which they had worked with their own
hands. “Our glory,” said he, “is mutual and inseparable. You are
known to the world as the mother of Theodoric; and it becomes me
to prove, that I am the genuine offspring of those heroes from
whom I claim my descent.” The wife or concubine of Theodemir was
inspired with the spirit of the German matrons, who esteemed
their sons’ honor far above their safety; and it is reported,
that in a desperate action, when Theodoric himself was hurried
along by the torrent of a flying crowd, she boldly met them at
the entrance of the camp, and, by her generous reproaches, drove
them back on the swords of the enemy. 20
18 (return) [ Tot reges, &c., (Ennodius, p. 1602.) We must
recollect how much the royal title was multiplied and degraded,
and that the mercenaries of Italy were the fragments of many
tribes and nations.]
19 (return) [ See Ennodius, p. 1603, 1604. Since the orator, in
the king’s presence, could mention and praise his mother, we may
conclude that the magnanimity of Theodoric was not hurt by the
vulgar reproaches of concubine and bastard. * Note: Gibbon here
assumes that the mother of Theodoric was the concubine of
Theodemir, which he leaves doubtful in the text.—M.]
20 (return) [ This anecdote is related on the modern but
respectable authority of Sigonius, (Op. tom. i. p. 580. De
Occident. Impl. l. xv.:) his words are curious: “Would you
return?” &c. She presented and almost displayed the original
recess. * Note: The authority of Sigonius would scarcely have
weighed with Gibbon except for an indecent anecdote. I have a
recollection of a similar story in some of the Italian wars.—M.]
From the Alps to the extremity of Calabria, Theodoric reigned by
the right of conquest; the Vandal ambassadors surrendered the
Island of Sicily, as a lawful appendage of his kingdom; and he
was accepted as the deliverer of Rome by the senate and people,
who had shut their gates against the flying usurper. 21 Ravenna
alone, secure in the fortifications of art and nature, still
sustained a siege of almost three years; and the daring sallies
of Odoacer carried slaughter and dismay into the Gothic camp. At
length, destitute of provisions and hopeless of relief, that
unfortunate monarch yielded to the groans of his subjects and the
clamors of his soldiers. A treaty of peace was negotiated by the
bishop of Ravenna; the Ostrogoths were admitted into the city,
and the hostile kings consented, under the sanction of an oath,
to rule with equal and undivided authority the provinces of
Italy. The event of such an agreement may be easily foreseen.
After some days had been devoted to the semblance of joy and
friendship, Odoacer, in the midst of a solemn banquet, was
stabbed by the hand, or at least by the command, of his rival.
Secret and effectual orders had been previously despatched; the
faithless and rapacious mercenaries, at the same moment, and
without resistance, were universally massacred; and the royalty
of Theodoric was proclaimed by the Goths, with the tardy,
reluctant, ambiguous consent of the emperor of the East. The
design of a conspiracy was imputed, according to the usual forms,
to the prostrate tyrant; but his innocence, and the guilt of his
conqueror, 22 are sufficiently proved by the advantageous treaty
which force would not sincerely have granted, nor weakness have
rashly infringed. The jealousy of power, and the mischiefs of
discord, may suggest a more decent apology, and a sentence less
rigorous may be pronounced against a crime which was necessary to
introduce into Italy a generation of public felicity. The living
author of this felicity was audaciously praised in his own
presence by sacred and profane orators; 23 but history (in his
time she was mute and inglorious) has not left any just
representation of the events which displayed, or of the defects
which clouded, the virtues of Theodoric. 24 One record of his
fame, the volume of public epistles composed by Cassiodorus in
the royal name, is still extant, and has obtained more implicit
credit than it seems to deserve. 25 They exhibit the forms,
rather than the substance, of his government; and we should
vainly search for the pure and spontaneous sentiments of the
Barbarian amidst the declamation and learning of a sophist, the
wishes of a Roman senator, the precedents of office, and the
vague professions, which, in every court, and on every occasion,
compose the language of discreet ministers. The reputation of
Theodoric may repose with more confidence on the visible peace
and prosperity of a reign of thirty-three years; the unanimous
esteem of his own times, and the memory of his wisdom and
courage, his justice and humanity, which was deeply impressed on
the minds of the Goths and Italians.
21 (return) [ Hist. Miscell. l. xv., a Roman history from Janus
to the ixth century, an Epitome of Eutropius, Paulus Diaconus,
and Theophanes which Muratori has published from a Ms. in the
Ambrosian library, (Script. Rerum Italicarum, tom. i. p. 100.)]
22 (return) [ Procopius (Gothic. l. i. c. i.) approves himself an
impartial sceptic. Cassiodorus (in Chron.) and Ennodius (p. 1604)
are loyal and credulous, and the testimony of the Valesian
Fragment (p. 718) may justify their belief. Marcellinus spits the
venom of a Greek subject—perjuriis illectus, interfectusque est,
(in Chron.)]
23 (return) [ The sonorous and servile oration of Ennodius was
pronounced at Milan or Ravenna in the years 507 or 508, (Sirmond,
tom. i. p. 615.) Two or three years afterwards, the orator was
rewarded with the bishopric of Pavia, which he held till his
death in the year 521. (Dupin, Bibliot. Eccles. tom. v. p. 11-14.
See Saxii Onomasticon, tom. ii. p. 12.)]
24 (return) [ Our best materials are occasional hints from
Procopius and the Valesian Fragment, which was discovered by
Sirmond, and is published at the end of Ammianus Marcellinus. The
author’s name is unknown, and his style is barbarous; but in his
various facts he exhibits the knowledge, without the passions, of
a contemporary. The president Montesquieu had formed the plan of
a history of Theodoric, which at a distance might appear a rich
and interesting subject.]
25 (return) [ The best edition of the Variarum Libri xii. is that
of Joh. Garretius, (Rotomagi, 1679, in Opp. Cassiodor. 2 vols. in
fol.;) but they deserved and required such an editor as the
Marquis Scipio Maffei, who thought of publishing them at Verona.
The Barbara Eleganza (as it is ingeniously named by Tiraboschi)
is never simple, and seldom perspicuous]
The partition of the lands of Italy, of which Theodoric assigned
the third part to his soldiers, is honorably arraigned as the
sole injustice of his life. 2511 And even this act may be fairly
justified by the example of Odoacer, the rights of conquest, the
true interest of the Italians, and the sacred duty of subsisting
a whole people, who, on the faith of his promises, had
transported themselves into a distant land. 26 Under the reign of
Theodoric, and in the happy climate of Italy, the Goths soon
multiplied to a formidable host of two hundred thousand men, 27
and the whole amount of their families may be computed by the
ordinary addition of women and children. Their invasion of
property, a part of which must have been already vacant, was
disguised by the generous but improper name of hospitality; these
unwelcome guests were irregularly dispersed over the face of
Italy, and the lot of each Barbarian was adequate to his birth
and office, the number of his followers, and the rustic wealth
which he possessed in slaves and cattle. The distinction of noble
and plebeian were acknowledged; 28 but the lands of every freeman
were exempt from taxes, 2811 and he enjoyed the inestimable
privilege of being subject only to the laws of his country. 29
Fashion, and even convenience, soon persuaded the conquerors to
assume the more elegant dress of the natives, but they still
persisted in the use of their mother-tongue; and their contempt
for the Latin schools was applauded by Theodoric himself, who
gratified their prejudices, or his own, by declaring, that the
child who had trembled at a rod, would never dare to look upon a
sword. 30 Distress might sometimes provoke the indigent Roman to
assume the ferocious manners which were insensibly relinquished
by the rich and luxurious Barbarian; 31 but these mutual
conversions were not encouraged by the policy of a monarch who
perpetuated the separation of the Italians and Goths; reserving
the former for the arts of peace, and the latter for the service
of war. To accomplish this design, he studied to protect his
industrious subjects, and to moderate the violence, without
enervating the valor, of his soldiers, who were maintained for
the public defence. They held their lands and benefices as a
military stipend: at the sound of the trumpet, they were prepared
to march under the conduct of their provincial officers; and the
whole extent of Italy was distributed into the several quarters
of a well-regulated camp. The service of the palace and of the
frontiers was performed by choice or by rotation; and each
extraordinary fatigue was recompensed by an increase of pay and
occasional donatives. Theodoric had convinced his brave
companions, that empire must be acquired and defended by the same
arts. After his example, they strove to excel in the use, not
only of the lance and sword, the instruments of their victories,
but of the missile weapons, which they were too much inclined to
neglect; and the lively image of war was displayed in the daily
exercise and annual reviews of the Gothic cavalry. A firm though
gentle discipline imposed the habits of modesty, obedience, and
temperance; and the Goths were instructed to spare the people, to
reverence the laws, to understand the duties of civil society,
and to disclaim the barbarous license of judicial combat and
private revenge. 32
2511 (return) [ Compare Gibbon, ch. xxxvi. vol. iii. p. 459,
&c.—Manso observes that this division was conducted not in a
violent and irregular, but in a legal and orderly, manner. The
Barbarian, who could not show a title of grant from the officers
of Theodoric appointed for the purpose, or a prescriptive right
of thirty years, in case he had obtained the property before the
Ostrogothic conquest, was ejected from the estate. He conceives
that estates too small to bear division paid a third of their
produce.—Geschichte des Os Gothischen Reiches, p. 82.—M.]
26 (return) [ Procopius, Gothic, l. i. c. i. Variarum, ii. Maffei
(Verona Illustrata, P. i. p. 228) exaggerates the injustice of
the Goths, whom he hated as an Italian noble. The plebeian
Muratori crouches under their oppression.]
27 (return) [ Procopius, Goth. l. iii. c. 421. Ennodius describes
(p. 1612, 1613) the military arts and increasing numbers of the
Goths.]
28 (return) [ When Theodoric gave his sister to the king of the
Vandals she sailed for Africa with a guard of 1000 noble Goths,
each of whom was attended by five armed followers, (Procop.
Vandal. l. i. c. 8.) The Gothic nobility must have been as
numerous as brave.]
2811 (return) [ Manso (p. 100) quotes two passages from
Cassiodorus to show that the Goths were not exempt from the
fiscal claims.—Cassiodor, i. 19, iv. 14—M.]
29 (return) [ See the acknowledgment of Gothic liberty, (Var. v.
30.)]
30 (return) [ Procopius, Goth. l. i. c. 2. The Roman boys learnt
the language (Var. viii. 21) of the Goths. Their general
ignorance is not destroyed by the exceptions of Amalasuntha, a
female, who might study without shame, or of Theodatus, whose
learning provoked the indignation and contempt of his
countrymen.]
31 (return) [ A saying of Theodoric was founded on experience:
“Romanus miser imitatur Gothum; ut utilis (dives) Gothus imitatur
Romanum.” (See the Fragment and Notes of Valesius, p. 719.)]
32 (return) [ The view of the military establishment of the Goths
in Italy is collected from the Epistles of Cassiodorus (Var. i.
24, 40; iii. 3, 24, 48; iv. 13, 14; v. 26, 27; viii. 3, 4, 25.)
They are illustrated by the learned Mascou, (Hist. of the
Germans, l. xi. 40—44, Annotation xiv.) Note: Compare Manso,
Geschichte des Ost Gothischen Reiches, p. 114.—M.]
Chapter XXXIX: Gothic Kingdom Of Italy.—Part II.
Among the Barbarians of the West, the victory of Theodoric had
spread a general alarm. But as soon as it appeared that he was
satisfied with conquest and desirous of peace, terror was changed
into respect, and they submitted to a powerful mediation, which
was uniformly employed for the best purposes of reconciling their
quarrels and civilizing their manners. 33 The ambassadors who
resorted to Ravenna from the most distant countries of Europe,
admired his wisdom, magnificence, 34 and courtesy; and if he
sometimes accepted either slaves or arms, white horses or strange
animals, the gift of a sun-dial, a water-clock, or a musician,
admonished even the princes of Gaul of the superior art and
industry of his Italian subjects. His domestic alliances, 35 a
wife, two daughters, a sister, and a niece, united the family of
Theodoric with the kings of the Franks, the Burgundians, the
Visigoths, the Vandals, and the Thuringians, and contributed to
maintain the harmony, or at least the balance, of the great
republic of the West. 36 It is difficult in the dark forests of
Germany and Poland to pursue the emigrations of the Heruli, a
fierce people who disdained the use of armor, and who condemned
their widows and aged parents not to survive the loss of their
husbands, or the decay of their strength. 37 The king of these
savage warriors solicited the friendship of Theodoric, and was
elevated to the rank of his son, according to the barbaric rites
of a military adoption. 38 From the shores of the Baltic, the
Aestians or Livonians laid their offerings of native amber 39 at
the feet of a prince, whose fame had excited them to undertake an
unknown and dangerous journey of fifteen hundred miles. With the
country 40 from whence the Gothic nation derived their origin, he
maintained a frequent and friendly correspondence: the Italians
were clothed in the rich sables 41 of Sweden; and one of its
sovereigns, after a voluntary or reluctant abdication, found a
hospitable retreat in the palace of Ravenna. He had reigned over
one of the thirteen populous tribes who cultivated a small
portion of the great island or peninsula of Scandinavia, to which
the vague appellation of Thule has been sometimes applied. That
northern region was peopled, or had been explored, as high as the
sixty-eighth degree of latitude, where the natives of the polar
circle enjoy and lose the presence of the sun at each summer and
winter solstice during an equal period of forty days. 42 The long
night of his absence or death was the mournful season of distress
and anxiety, till the messengers, who had been sent to the
mountain tops, descried the first rays of returning light, and
proclaimed to the plain below the festival of his resurrection.
43
33 (return) [ See the clearness and vigor of his negotiations in
Ennodius, (p. 1607,) and Cassiodorus, (Var. iii. 1, 2, 3, 4; iv.
13; v. 43, 44,) who gives the different styles of friendship,
counsel expostulation, &c.]
34 (return) [ Even of his table (Var. vi. 9) and palace, (vii.
5.) The admiration of strangers is represented as the most
rational motive to justify these vain expenses, and to stimulate
the diligence of the officers to whom these provinces were
intrusted.]
35 (return) [ See the public and private alliances of the Gothic
monarch, with the Burgundians, (Var. i. 45, 46,) with the Franks,
(ii. 40,) with the Thuringians, (iv. 1,) and with the Vandals,
(v. 1;) each of these epistles affords some curious knowledge of
the policy and manners of the Barbarians.]
36 (return) [ His political system may be observed in
Cassiodorus, (Var. iv. l ix. l,) Jornandes, (c. 58, p. 698, 699,)
and the Valesian Fragment, (p. 720, 721.) Peace, honorable peace,
was the constant aim of Theodoric.]
37 (return) [ The curious reader may contemplate the Heruli of
Procopius, (Goth. l. ii. c. 14,) and the patient reader may
plunge into the dark and minute researches of M. de Buat, (Hist.
des Peuples Anciens, tom. ix. p. 348—396. * Note: Compare Manso,
Ost Gothische Reich. Beylage, vi. Malte-Brun brings them from
Scandinavia: their names, the only remains of their language, are
Gothic. “They fought almost naked, like the Icelandic Berserkirs
their bravery was like madness: few in number, they were mostly
of royal blood. What ferocity, what unrestrained license, sullied
their victories! The Goth respects the church, the priests, the
senate; the Heruli mangle all in a general massacre: there is no
pity for age, no refuge for chastity. Among themselves there is
the same ferocity: the sick and the aged are put to death. at
their own request, during a solemn festival; the widow ends her
days by hanging herself upon the tree which shadows her husband’s
tomb. All these circumstances, so striking to a mind familiar
with Scandinavian history, lead us to discover among the Heruli
not so much a nation as a confederacy of princes and nobles,
bound by an oath to live and die together with their arms in
their hands. Their name, sometimes written Heruli or Eruli.
sometimes Aeruli, signified, according to an ancient author,
(Isid. Hispal. in gloss. p. 24, ad calc. Lex. Philolog. Martini,
ll,) nobles, and appears to correspond better with the
Scandinavian word iarl or earl, than with any of those numerous
derivations proposed by etymologists.” Malte-Brun, vol. i. p.
400, (edit. 1831.) Of all the Barbarians who threw themselves on
the ruins of the Roman empire, it is most difficult to trace the
origin of the Heruli. They seem never to have been very powerful
as a nation, and branches of them are found in countries very
remote from each other. In my opinion they belong to the Gothic
race, and have a close affinity with the Scyrri or Hirri. They
were, possibly, a division of that nation. They are often mingled
and confounded with the Alani. Though brave and formidable. they
were never numerous. nor did they found any state.—St. Martin,
vol. vi. p. 375.—M. Schafarck considers them descendants of the
Hirri. of which Heruli is a diminutive,—Slawische Alter
thinner—M. 1845.]
38 (return) [ Variarum, iv. 2. The spirit and forms of this
martial institution are noticed by Cassiodorus; but he seems to
have only translated the sentiments of the Gothic king into the
language of Roman eloquence.]
39 (return) [ Cassiodorus, who quotes Tacitus to the Aestians,
the unlettered savages of the Baltic, (Var. v. 2,) describes the
amber for which their shores have ever been famous, as the gum of
a tree, hardened by the sun, and purified and wafted by the
waves. When that singular substance is analyzed by the chemists,
it yields a vegetable oil and a mineral acid.]
40 (return) [ Scanzia, or Thule, is described by Jornandes (c. 3,
p. 610—613) and Procopius, (Goth. l. ii. c. 15.) Neither the Goth
nor the Greek had visited the country: both had conversed with
the natives in their exile at Ravenna or Constantinople.]
41 (return) [ Sapherinas pelles. In the time of Jornandes they
inhabited Suethans, the proper Sweden; but that beautiful race of
animals has gradually been driven into the eastern parts of
Siberia. See Buffon, (Hist. Nat. tom. xiii. p. 309—313, quarto
edition;) Pennant, (System of Quadrupeds, vol. i. p. 322—328;)
Gmelin, (Hist. Gen des. Voyages, tom. xviii. p. 257, 258;) and
Levesque, (Hist. de Russie, tom. v. p. 165, 166, 514, 515.)]
42 (return) [ In the system or romance of Mr. Bailly, (Lettres
sur les Sciences et sur l’Atlantide, tom. i. p. 249—256, tom. ii.
p. 114—139,) the phoenix of the Edda, and the annual death and
revival of Adonis and Osiris, are the allegorical symbols of the
absence and return of the sun in the Arctic regions. This
ingenious writer is a worthy disciple of the great Buffon; nor is
it easy for the coldest reason to withstand the magic of their
philosophy.]
43 (return) [ Says Procopius. At present a rude Manicheism
(generous enough) prevails among the Samoyedes in Greenland and
in Lapland, (Hist. des Voyages, tom. xviii. p. 508, 509, tom.
xix. p. 105, 106, 527, 528;) yet, according to Orotius Samojutae
coelum atque astra adorant, numina haud aliis iniquiora, (de
Rebus Belgicis, l. iv. p. 338, folio edition) a sentence which
Tacitus would not have disowned.]
The life of Theodoric represents the rare and meritorious example
of a Barbarian, who sheathed his sword in the pride of victory
and the vigor of his age. A reign of three and thirty years was
consecrated to the duties of civil government, and the
hostilities, in which he was sometimes involved, were speedily
terminated by the conduct of his lieutenants, the discipline of
his troops, the arms of his allies, and even by the terror of his
name. He reduced, under a strong and regular government, the
unprofitable countries of Rhaetia, Noricum, Dalmatia, and
Pannonia, from the source of the Danube and the territory of the
Bavarians, 44 to the petty kingdom erected by the Gepidae on the
ruins of Sirmium. His prudence could not safely intrust the
bulwark of Italy to such feeble and turbulent neighbors; and his
justice might claim the lands which they oppressed, either as a
part of his kingdom, or as the inheritance of his father. The
greatness of a servant, who was named perfidious because he was
successful, awakened the jealousy of the emperor Anastasius; and
a war was kindled on the Dacian frontier, by the protection which
the Gothic king, in the vicissitude of human affairs, had granted
to one of the descendants of Attila. Sabinian, a general
illustrious by his own and father’s merit, advanced at the head
of ten thousand Romans; and the provisions and arms, which filled
a long train of wagons, were distributed to the fiercest of the
Bulgarian tribes. But in the fields of Margus, the eastern powers
were defeated by the inferior forces of the Goths and Huns; the
flower and even the hope of the Roman armies was irretrievably
destroyed; and such was the temperance with which Theodoric had
inspired his victorious troops, that, as their leader had not
given the signal of pillage, the rich spoils of the enemy lay
untouched at their feet. 45 Exasperated by this disgrace, the
Byzantine court despatched two hundred ships and eight thousand
men to plunder the sea-coast of Calabria and Apulia: they
assaulted the ancient city of Tarentum, interrupted the trade and
agriculture of a happy country, and sailed back to the
Hellespont, proud of their piratical victory over a people whom
they still presumed to consider as their Roman brethren. 46 Their
retreat was possibly hastened by the activity of Theodoric; Italy
was covered by a fleet of a thousand light vessels, 47 which he
constructed with incredible despatch; and his firm moderation was
soon rewarded by a solid and honorable peace. He maintained, with
a powerful hand, the balance of the West, till it was at length
overthrown by the ambition of Clovis; and although unable to
assist his rash and unfortunate kinsman, the king of the
Visigoths, he saved the remains of his family and people, and
checked the Franks in the midst of their victorious career. I am
not desirous to prolong or repeat 48 this narrative of military
events, the least interesting of the reign of Theodoric; and
shall be content to add, that the Alemanni were protected, 49
that an inroad of the Burgundians was severely chastised, and
that the conquest of Arles and Marseilles opened a free
communication with the Visigoths, who revered him as their
national protector, and as the guardian of his grandchild, the
infant son of Alaric. Under this respectable character, the king
of Italy restored the praetorian præfecture of the Gauls,
reformed some abuses in the civil government of Spain, and
accepted the annual tribute and apparent submission of its
military governor, who wisely refused to trust his person in the
palace of Ravenna. 50 The Gothic sovereignty was established from
Sicily to the Danube, from Sirmium or Belgrade to the Atlantic
Ocean; and the Greeks themselves have acknowledged that Theodoric
reigned over the fairest portion of the Western empire. 51
44 (return) [ See the Hist. des Peuples Anciens, &c., tom. ix. p.
255—273, 396—501. The count de Buat was French minister at the
court of Bavaria: a liberal curiosity prompted his inquiries into
the antiquities of the country, and that curiosity was the germ
of twelve respectable volumes.]
45 (return) [ See the Gothic transactions on the Danube and the
Illyricum, in Jornandes, (c. 58, p. 699;) Ennodius, (p.
1607-1610;) Marcellmus (in Chron. p. 44, 47, 48;) and
Cassiodorus, in (in Chron and Var. iii. 29 50, iv. 13, vii. 4 24,
viii. 9, 10, 11, 21, ix. 8, 9.)]
46 (return) [ I cannot forbear transcribing the liberal and
classic style of Count Marcellinus: Romanus comes domesticorum,
et Rusticus comes scholariorum cum centum armatis navibus,
totidemque dromonibus, octo millia militum armatorum secum
ferentibus, ad devastanda Italiae littora processerunt, ut usque
ad Tarentum antiquissimam civitatem aggressi sunt; remensoque
mari in honestam victoriam quam piratico ausu Romani ex Romanis
rapuerunt, Anastasio Caesari reportarunt, (in Chron. p. 48.) See
Variar. i. 16, ii. 38.]
47 (return) [ See the royal orders and instructions, (Var. iv.
15, v. 16—20.) These armed boats should be still smaller than the
thousand vessels of Agamemnon at the siege of Troy. (Manso, p.
121.)]
48 (return) [ Vol. iii. p. 581—585.]
49 (return) [ Ennodius (p. 1610) and Cassiodorus, in the royal
name, (Var. ii 41,) record his salutary protection of the
Alemanni.]
50 (return) [ The Gothic transactions in Gaul and Spain are
represented with some perplexity in Cassiodorus, (Var. iii. 32,
38, 41, 43, 44, v. 39.) Jornandes, (c. 58, p. 698, 699,) and
Procopius, (Goth. l. i. c. 12.) I will neither hear nor reconcile
the long and contradictory arguments of the Abbe Dubos and the
Count de Buat, about the wars of Burgundy.]
51 (return) [ Theophanes, p. 113.]
The union of the Goths and Romans might have fixed for ages the
transient happiness of Italy; and the first of nations, a new
people of free subjects and enlightened soldiers, might have
gradually arisen from the mutual emulation of their respective
virtues. But the sublime merit of guiding or seconding such a
revolution was not reserved for the reign of Theodoric: he wanted
either the genius or the opportunities of a legislator; 52 and
while he indulged the Goths in the enjoyment of rude liberty, he
servilely copied the institutions, and even the abuses, of the
political system which had been framed by Constantine and his
successors. From a tender regard to the expiring prejudices of
Rome, the Barbarian declined the name, the purple, and the
diadem, of the emperors; but he assumed, under the hereditary
title of king, the whole substance and plenitude of Imperial
prerogative. 53 His addresses to the eastern throne were
respectful and ambiguous: he celebrated, in pompous style, the
harmony of the two republics, applauded his own government as the
perfect similitude of a sole and undivided empire, and claimed
above the kings of the earth the same preeminence which he
modestly allowed to the person or rank of Anastasius. The
alliance of the East and West was annually declared by the
unanimous choice of two consuls; but it should seem that the
Italian candidate who was named by Theodoric accepted a formal
confirmation from the sovereign of Constantinople. 54 The Gothic
palace of Ravenna reflected the image of the court of Theodosius
or Valentinian. The Praetorian præfect, the præfect of Rome, the
quaestor, the master of the offices, with the public and
patrimonial treasurers, 5411 whose functions are painted in gaudy
colors by the rhetoric of Cassiodorus, still continued to act as
the ministers of state. And the subordinate care of justice and
the revenue was delegated to seven consulars, three correctors,
and five presidents, who governed the fifteen regions of Italy
according to the principles, and even the forms, of Roman
jurisprudence. 55 The violence of the conquerors was abated or
eluded by the slow artifice of judicial proceedings; the civil
administration, with its honors and emoluments, was confined to
the Italians; and the people still preserved their dress and
language, their laws and customs, their personal freedom, and two
thirds of their landed property. 5511 It had been the object of
Augustus to conceal the introduction of monarchy; it was the
policy of Theodoric to disguise the reign of a Barbarian. 56 If
his subjects were sometimes awakened from this pleasing vision of
a Roman government, they derived more substantial comfort from
the character of a Gothic prince, who had penetration to discern,
and firmness to pursue, his own and the public interest.
Theodoric loved the virtues which he possessed, and the talents
of which he was destitute. Liberius was promoted to the office of
Praetorian præfect for his unshaken fidelity to the unfortunate
cause of Odoacer. The ministers of Theodoric, Cassiodorus, 57 and
Boethius, have reflected on his reign the lustre of their genius
and learning. More prudent or more fortunate than his colleague,
Cassiodorus preserved his own esteem without forfeiting the royal
favor; and after passing thirty years in the honors of the world,
he was blessed with an equal term of repose in the devout and
studious solitude of Squillace. 5711
52 (return) [ Procopius affirms that no laws whatsoever were
promulgated by Theodoric and the succeeding kings of Italy,
(Goth. l. ii. c. 6.) He must mean in the Gothic language. A Latin
edict of Theodoric is still extant, in one hundred and fifty-four
articles. * Note: See Manso, 92. Savigny, vol. ii. p. 164, et
seq.—M.]
53 (return) [ The image of Theodoric is engraved on his coins:
his modest successors were satisfied with adding their own name
to the head of the reigning emperor, (Muratori, Antiquitat.
Italiae Medii Aevi, tom. ii. dissert. xxvii. p. 577—579.
Giannone, Istoria Civile di Napoli tom. i. p. 166.)]
54 (return) [ The alliance of the emperor and the king of Italy
are represented by Cassiodorus (Var. i. l, ii. 1, 2, 3, vi. l)
and Procopius, (Goth. l. ii. c. 6, l. iii. c. 21,) who celebrate
the friendship of Anastasius and Theodoric; but the figurative
style of compliment was interpreted in a very different sense at
Constantinople and Ravenna.]
5411 (return) [ All causes between Roman and Roman were judged by
the old Roman courts. The comes Gothorum judged between Goth and
Goth; between Goths and Romans, (without considering which was
the plaintiff.) the comes Gothorum, with a Roman jurist as his
assessor, making a kind of mixed jurisdiction, but with a natural
predominance to the side of the Goth Savigny, vol. i. p. 290.—M.]
55 (return) [ To the xvii. provinces of the Notitia, Paul
Warnefrid the deacon (De Reb. Longobard. l. ii. c. 14—22) has
subjoined an xviiith, the Apennine, (Muratori, Script. Rerum
Italicarum, tom. i. p. 431—443.) But of these Sardinia and
Corsica were possessed by the Vandals, and the two Rhaetias, as
well as the Cottian Alps, seem to have been abandoned to a
military government. The state of the four provinces that now
form the kingdom of Naples is labored by Giannone (tom. i. p.
172, 178) with patriotic diligence.]
5511 (return) [ Manso enumerates and develops at some length the
following sources of the royal revenue of Theodoric: 1. A domain,
either by succession to that of Odoacer, or a part of the third
of the lands was reserved for the royal patrimony. 1. Regalia,
including mines, unclaimed estates, treasure-trove, and
confiscations. 3. Land tax. 4. Aurarium, like the Chrysargyrum, a
tax on certain branches of trade. 5. Grant of Monopolies. 6.
Siliquaticum, a small tax on the sale of all kinds of
commodities. 7. Portoria, customs Manso, 96, 111. Savigny (i.
285) supposes that in many cases the property remained in the
original owner, who paid his tertia, a third of the produce to
the crown, vol. i. p. 285.—M.]
56 (return) [ See the Gothic history of Procopius, (l. i. c. 1,
l. ii. c. 6,) the Epistles of Cassiodorus, passim, but especially
the vth and vith books, which contain the formulae, or patents of
offices,) and the Civil History of Giannone, (tom. i. l. ii.
iii.) The Gothic counts, which he places in every Italian city,
are annihilated, however, by Maffei, (Verona Illustrata, P. i. l.
viii. p. 227; for those of Syracuse and Naples (Var vi. 22, 23)
were special and temporary commissions.]
57 (return) [ Two Italians of the name of Cassiodorus, the father
(Var. i. 24, 40) and the son, (ix. 24, 25,) were successively
employed in the administration of Theodoric. The son was born in
the year 479: his various epistles as quaestor, master of the
offices, and Praetorian præfect, extend from 509 to 539, and he
lived as a monk about thirty years, (Tiraboschi Storia della
Letteratura Italiana, tom. iii. p. 7—24. Fabricius, Bibliot. Lat.
Med. Aevi, tom. i. p. 357, 358, edit. Mansi.)]
5711 (return) [ Cassiodorus was of an ancient and honorable
family; his grandfather had distinguished himself in the defence
of Sicily against the ravages of Genseric; his father held a high
rank at the court of Valentinian III., enjoyed the friendship of
Aetius, and was one of the ambassadors sent to arrest the
progress of Attila. Cassiodorus himself was first the treasurer
of the private expenditure to Odoacer, afterwards “count of the
sacred largesses.” Yielding with the rest of the Romans to the
dominion of Theodoric, he was instrumental in the peaceable
submission of Sicily; was successively governor of his native
provinces of Bruttium and Lucania, quaestor, magister, palatii,
Praetorian præfect, patrician, consul, and private secretary,
and, in fact, first minister of the king. He was five times
Praetorian præfect under different sovereigns, the last time in
the reign of Vitiges. This is the theory of Manso, which is not
unencumbered with difficulties. M. Buat had supposed that it was
the father of Cassiodorus who held the office first named.
Compare Manso, p. 85, &c., and Beylage, vii. It certainly appears
improbable that Cassiodorus should have been count of the sacred
largesses at twenty years old.—M.]
As the patron of the republic, it was the interest and duty of
the Gothic king to cultivate the affections of the senate 58 and
people. The nobles of Rome were flattered by sonorous epithets
and formal professions of respect, which had been more justly
applied to the merit and authority of their ancestors. The people
enjoyed, without fear or danger, the three blessings of a
capital, order, plenty, and public amusements. A visible
diminution of their numbers may be found even in the measure of
liberality; 59 yet Apulia, Calabria, and Sicily, poured their
tribute of corn into the granaries of Rome; an allowance of bread
and meat was distributed to the indigent citizens; and every
office was deemed honorable which was consecrated to the care of
their health and happiness. The public games, such as the Greek
ambassador might politely applaud, exhibited a faint and feeble
copy of the magnificence of the Caesars: yet the musical, the
gymnastic, and the pantomime arts, had not totally sunk in
oblivion; the wild beasts of Africa still exercised in the
amphitheatre the courage and dexterity of the hunters; and the
indulgent Goth either patiently tolerated or gently restrained
the blue and green factions, whose contests so often filled the
circus with clamor and even with blood. 60 In the seventh year of
his peaceful reign, Theodoric visited the old capital of the
world; the senate and people advanced in solemn procession to
salute a second Trajan, a new Valentinian; and he nobly supported
that character by the assurance of a just and legal government,
61 in a discourse which he was not afraid to pronounce in public,
and to inscribe on a tablet of brass. Rome, in this august
ceremony, shot a last ray of declining glory; and a saint, the
spectator of this pompous scene, could only hope, in his pious
fancy, that it was excelled by the celestial splendor of the new
Jerusalem. 62 During a residence of six months, the fame, the
person, and the courteous demeanor of the Gothic king, excited
the admiration of the Romans, and he contemplated, with equal
curiosity and surprise, the monuments that remained of their
ancient greatness. He imprinted the footsteps of a conqueror on
the Capitoline hill, and frankly confessed that each day he
viewed with fresh wonder the forum of Trajan and his lofty
column. The theatre of Pompey appeared, even in its decay, as a
huge mountain artificially hollowed, and polished, and adorned by
human industry; and he vaguely computed, that a river of gold
must have been drained to erect the colossal amphitheatre of
Titus. 63 From the mouths of fourteen aqueducts, a pure and
copious stream was diffused into every part of the city; among
these the Claudian water, which arose at the distance of
thirty-eight miles in the Sabine mountains, was conveyed along a
gentle though constant declivity of solid arches, till it
descended on the summit of the Aventine hill. The long and
spacious vaults which had been constructed for the purpose of
common sewers, subsisted, after twelve centuries, in their
pristine strength; and these subterraneous channels have been
preferred to all the visible wonders of Rome. 64 The Gothic
kings, so injuriously accused of the ruin of antiquity, were
anxious to preserve the monuments of the nation whom they had
subdued. 65 The royal edicts were framed to prevent the abuses,
the neglect, or the depredations of the citizens themselves; and
a professed architect, the annual sum of two hundred pounds of
gold, twenty-five thousand tiles, and the receipt of customs from
the Lucrine port, were assigned for the ordinary repairs of the
walls and public edifices. A similar care was extended to the
statues of metal or marble of men or animals. The spirit of the
horses, which have given a modern name to the Quirinal, was
applauded by the Barbarians; 66 the brazen elephants of the Via
sacra were diligently restored; 67 the famous heifer of Myron
deceived the cattle, as they were driven through the forum of
peace; 68 and an officer was created to protect those works of
art, which Theodoric considered as the noblest ornament of his
kingdom.
58 (return) [ See his regard for the senate in Cochlaeus, (Vit.
Theod. viii. p. 72—80.)]
59 (return) [ No more than 120,000 modii, or four thousand
quarters, (Anonym. Valesian. p. 721, and Var. i. 35, vi. 18, xi.
5, 39.)]
60 (return) [ See his regard and indulgence for the spectacles of
the circus, the amphitheatre, and the theatre, in the Chronicle
and Epistles of Cassiodorus, (Var. i. 20, 27, 30, 31, 32, iii.
51, iv. 51, illustrated by the xivth Annotation of Mascou’s
History), who has contrived to sprinkle the subject with
ostentatious, though agreeable, learning.]
61 (return) [ Anonym. Vales. p. 721. Marius Aventicensis in
Chron. In the scale of public and personal merit, the Gothic
conqueror is at least as much above Valentinian, as he may seem
inferior to Trajan.]
62 (return) [ Vit. Fulgentii in Baron. Annal. Eccles. A.D. 500,
No. 10.]
63 (return) [ Cassiodorus describes in his pompous style the
Forum of Trajan (Var. vii. 6,) the theatre of Marcellus, (iv.
51,) and the amphitheatre of Titus, (v. 42;) and his descriptions
are not unworthy of the reader’s perusal. According to the modern
prices, the Abbe Barthelemy computes that the brick work and
masonry of the Coliseum would now cost twenty millions of French
livres, (Mem. de l’Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xxviii. p.
585, 586.) How small a part of that stupendous fabric!]
64 (return) [ For the aqueducts and cloacae, see Strabo, (l. v.
p. 360;) Pliny, (Hist. Natur. xxxvi. 24; Cassiodorus, Var. iii.
30, 31, vi. 6;) Procopius, (Goth. l. i. c. 19;) and Nardini,
(Roma Antica, p. 514—522.) How such works could be executed by a
king of Rome, is yet a problem. Note: See Niebuhr, vol. i. p.
402. These stupendous works are among the most striking
confirmations of Niebuhr’s views of the early Roman history; at
least they appear to justify his strong sentence—“These works and
the building of the Capitol attest with unquestionable evidence
that this Rome of the later kings was the chief city of a great
state.”—Page 110—M.]
65 (return) [ For the Gothic care of the buildings and statues,
see Cassiodorus (Var. i. 21, 25, ii. 34, iv. 30, vii. 6, 13, 15)
and the Valesian Fragment, (p. 721.)]
66 (return) [ Var. vii. 15. These horses of Monte Cavallo had
been transported from Alexandria to the baths of Constantine,
(Nardini, p. 188.) Their sculpture is disdained by the Abbe
Dubos, (Reflexions sur la Poesie et sur la Peinture, tom. i.
section 39,) and admired by Winkelman, (Hist. de l’Art, tom. ii.
p. 159.)]
67 (return) [ Var. x. 10. They were probably a fragment of some
triumphal car, (Cuper de Elephantis, ii. 10.)]
68 (return) [ Procopius (Goth. l. iv. c. 21) relates a foolish
story of Myron’s cow, which is celebrated by the false wit of
thirty-six Greek epigrams, (Antholog. l. iv. p. 302—306, edit.
Hen. Steph.; Auson. Epigram. xiii.—lxviii.)]
Chapter XXXIX: Gothic Kingdom Of Italy.—Part III.
After the example of the last emperors, Theodoric preferred the
residence of Ravenna, where he cultivated an orchard with his own
hands. 69 As often as the peace of his kingdom was threatened
(for it was never invaded) by the Barbarians, he removed his
court to Verona 70 on the northern frontier, and the image of his
palace, still extant on a coin, represents the oldest and most
authentic model of Gothic architecture. These two capitals, as
well as Pavia, Spoleto, Naples, and the rest of the Italian
cities, acquired under his reign the useful or splendid
decorations of churches, aqueducts, baths, porticos, and palaces.
71 But the happiness of the subject was more truly conspicuous in
the busy scene of labor and luxury, in the rapid increase and
bold enjoyment of national wealth. From the shades of Tibur and
Praeneste, the Roman senators still retired in the winter season
to the warm sun, and salubrious springs of Baiae; and their
villas, which advanced on solid moles into the Bay of Naples,
commanded the various prospect of the sky, the earth, and the
water. On the eastern side of the Adriatic, a new Campania was
formed in the fair and fruitful province of Istria, which
communicated with the palace of Ravenna by an easy navigation of
one hundred miles. The rich productions of Lucania and the
adjacent provinces were exchanged at the Marcilian fountain, in a
populous fair annually dedicated to trade, intemperance, and
superstition. In the solitude of Comum, which had once been
animated by the mild genius of Pliny, a transparent basin above
sixty miles in length still reflected the rural seats which
encompassed the margin of the Larian lake; and the gradual ascent
of the hills was covered by a triple plantation of olives, of
vines, and of chestnut trees. 72 Agriculture revived under the
shadow of peace, and the number of husbandmen was multiplied by
the redemption of captives. 73 The iron mines of Dalmatia, a gold
mine in Bruttium, were carefully explored, and the Pomptine
marshes, as well as those of Spoleto, were drained and cultivated
by private undertakers, whose distant reward must depend on the
continuance of the public prosperity. 74 Whenever the seasons
were less propitious, the doubtful precautions of forming
magazines of corn, fixing the price, and prohibiting the
exportation, attested at least the benevolence of the state; but
such was the extraordinary plenty which an industrious people
produced from a grateful soil, that a gallon of wine was
sometimes sold in Italy for less than three farthings, and a
quarter of wheat at about five shillings and sixpence. 75 A
country possessed of so many valuable objects of exchange soon
attracted the merchants of the world, whose beneficial traffic
was encouraged and protected by the liberal spirit of Theodoric.
The free intercourse of the provinces by land and water was
restored and extended; the city gates were never shut either by
day or by night; and the common saying, that a purse of gold
might be safely left in the fields, was expressive of the
conscious security of the inhabitants.
69 (return) [See an epigram of Ennodius (ii. 3, p. 1893, 1894) on
this garden and the royal gardener.]
70 (return) [ His affection for that city is proved by the
epithet of “Verona tua,” and the legend of the hero; under the
barbarous name of Dietrich of Bern, (Peringsciold and Cochloeum,
p. 240,) Maffei traces him with knowledge and pleasure in his
native country, (l. ix. p. 230—236.)]
71 (return) [ See Maffei, (Verona Illustrata, Part i. p. 231,
232, 308, &c.) His amputes Gothic architecture, like the
corruption of language, writing &c., not to the Barbarians, but
to the Italians themselves. Compare his sentiments with those of
Tiraboschi, (tom. iii. p. 61.) * Note: Mr. Hallam (vol. iii. p.
432) observes that “the image of Theodoric’s palace” is
represented in Maffei, not from a coin, but from a seal. Compare
D’Agincourt (Storia dell’arte, Italian Transl., Arcitecttura,
Plate xvii. No. 2, and Pittura, Plate xvi. No. 15,) where there
is likewise an engraving from a mosaic in the church of St.
Apollinaris in Ravenna, representing a building ascribed to
Theodoric in that city. Neither of these, as Mr. Hallam justly
observes, in the least approximates to what is called the Gothic
style. They are evidently the degenerate Roman architecture, and
more resemble the early attempts of our architects to get back
from our national Gothic into a classical Greek style. One of
them calls to mind Inigo Jones inner quadrangle in St. John’s
College Oxford. Compare Hallam and D’Agincon vol. i. p.
140—145.—M]
72 (return) [ The villas, climate, and landscape of Baiae, (Var.
ix. 6; see Cluver Italia Antiq. l. iv. c. 2, p. 1119, &c.,)
Istria, (Var. xii. 22, 26,) and Comum, (Var. xi. 14; compare with
Pliny’s two villas, ix. 7,) are agreeably painted in the Epistles
of Cassiodorus.]
73 (return) [ In Liguria numerosa agricolarum progenies,
(Ennodius, p. 1678, 1679, 1680.) St. Epiphanius of Pavia redeemed
by prayer or ransom 6000 captives from the Burgundians of Lyons
and Savoy. Such deeds are the best of miracles.]
74 (return) [ The political economy of Theodoric (see Anonym.
Vales. p. 721, and Cassiodorus, in Chron.) may be distinctly
traced under the following heads: iron mine, (Var. iii. 23;) gold
mine, (ix. 3;) Pomptine marshes, (ii. 32, 33;) Spoleto, (ii. 21;)
corn, (i. 34, x. 27, 28, xi. 11, 12;) trade, (vi. 7, vii. 9, 23;)
fair of Leucothoe or St. Cyprian in Lucania, (viii. 33;) plenty,
(xii. 4;) the cursus, or public post, (i. 29, ii. 31, iv. 47, v.
5, vi 6, vii. 33;) the Flaminian way, (xii. 18.) * Note: The
inscription commemorative of the draining of the Pomptine marshes
may be found in many works; in Gruter, Inscript. Ant. Heidelberg,
p. 152, No. 8. With variations, in Nicolai De’ bonificamenti
delle terre Pontine, p. 103. In Sartorius, in his prize essay on
the reign of Theodoric, and Manse Beylage, xi.—M.]
75 (return) [ LX modii tritici in solidum ipsius tempore fuerunt,
et vinum xxx amphoras in solidum, (Fragment. Vales.) Corn was
distributed from the granaries at xv or xxv modii for a piece of
gold, and the price was still moderate.]
A difference of religion is always pernicious, and often fatal,
to the harmony of the prince and people: the Gothic conqueror had
been educated in the profession of Arianism, and Italy was
devoutly attached to the Nicene faith. But the persuasion of
Theodoric was not infected by zeal; and he piously adhered to the
heresy of his fathers, without condescending to balance the
subtile arguments of theological metaphysics. Satisfied with the
private toleration of his Arian sectaries, he justly conceived
himself to be the guardian of the public worship, and his
external reverence for a superstition which he despised, may have
nourished in his mind the salutary indifference of a statesman or
philosopher. The Catholics of his dominions acknowledged, perhaps
with reluctance, the peace of the church; their clergy, according
to the degrees of rank or merit, were honorably entertained in
the palace of Theodoric; he esteemed the living sanctity of
Caesarius 76 and Epiphanius, 77 the orthodox bishops of Arles and
Pavia; and presented a decent offering on the tomb of St. Peter,
without any scrupulous inquiry into the creed of the apostle. 78
His favorite Goths, and even his mother, were permitted to retain
or embrace the Athanasian faith, and his long reign could not
afford the example of an Italian Catholic, who, either from
choice or compulsion, had deviated into the religion of the
conqueror. 79 The people, and the Barbarians themselves, were
edified by the pomp and order of religious worship; the
magistrates were instructed to defend the just immunities of
ecclesiastical persons and possessions; the bishops held their
synods, the metropolitans exercised their jurisdiction, and the
privileges of sanctuary were maintained or moderated according to
the spirit of the Roman jurisprudence. 80 With the protection,
Theodoric assumed the legal supremacy, of the church; and his
firm administration restored or extended some useful prerogatives
which had been neglected by the feeble emperors of the West. He
was not ignorant of the dignity and importance of the Roman
pontiff, to whom the venerable name of Pope was now appropriated.
The peace or the revolt of Italy might depend on the character of
a wealthy and popular bishop, who claimed such ample dominion
both in heaven and earth; who had been declared in a numerous
synod to be pure from all sin, and exempt from all judgment. 81
When the chair of St. Peter was disputed by Symmachus and
Laurence, they appeared at his summons before the tribunal of an
Arian monarch, and he confirmed the election of the most worthy
or the most obsequious candidate. At the end of his life, in a
moment of jealousy and resentment, he prevented the choice of the
Romans, by nominating a pope in the palace of Ravenna. The danger
and furious contests of a schism were mildly restrained, and the
last decree of the senate was enacted to extinguish, if it were
possible, the scandalous venality of the papal elections. 82
76 (return) [ See the life of St. Caesarius in Baronius, (A.D.
508, No. 12, 13, 14.) The king presented him with 300 gold
solidi, and a discus of silver of the weight of sixty pounds.]
77 (return) [ Ennodius in Vit. St. Epiphanii, in Sirmond, Op.
tom. i. p. 1672—1690. Theodoric bestowed some important favors on
this bishop, whom he used as a counsellor in peace and war.]
78 (return) [ Devotissimus ac si Catholicus, (Anonym. Vales. p.
720;) yet his offering was no more than two silver candlesticks
(cerostrata) of the weight of seventy pounds, far inferior to the
gold and gems of Constantinople and France, (Anastasius in Vit.
Pont. in Hormisda, p. 34, edit. Paris.)]
79 (return) [ The tolerating system of his reign (Ennodius, p.
1612. Anonym. Vales. p. 719. Procop. Goth. l. i. c. 1, l. ii. c.
6) may be studied in the Epistles of Cassiodorous, under the
following heads: bishops, (Var. i. 9, vii. 15, 24, xi. 23;)
immunities, (i. 26, ii. 29, 30;) church lands (iv. 17, 20;)
sanctuaries, (ii. 11, iii. 47;) church plate, (xii. 20;)
discipline, (iv. 44;) which prove, at the same time, that he was
the head of the church as well as of the state. * Note: He
recommended the same toleration to the emperor Justin.—M.]
80 (return) [ We may reject a foolish tale of his beheading a
Catholic deacon who turned Arian, (Theodor. Lector. No. 17.) Why
is Theodoric surnamed After? From Vafer? (Vales. ad loc.) A light
conjecture.]
81 (return) [ Ennodius, p. 1621, 1622, 1636, 1638. His libel was
approved and registered (synodaliter) by a Roman council,
(Baronius, A.D. 503, No. 6, Franciscus Pagi in Breviar. Pont.
Rom. tom. i. p. 242.)]
82 (return) [ See Cassiodorus, (Var. viii. 15, ix. 15, 16,)
Anastasius, (in Symmacho, p. 31,) and the xviith Annotation of
Mascou. Baronius, Pagi, and most of the Catholic doctors,
confess, with an angry growl, this Gothic usurpation.]
I have descanted with pleasure on the fortunate condition of
Italy; but our fancy must not hastily conceive that the golden
age of the poets, a race of men without vice or misery, was
realized under the Gothic conquest. The fair prospect was
sometimes overcast with clouds; the wisdom of Theodoric might be
deceived, his power might be resisted and the declining age of
the monarch was sullied with popular hatred and patrician blood.
In the first insolence of victory, he had been tempted to deprive
the whole party of Odoacer of the civil and even the natural
rights of society; 83 a tax unseasonably imposed after the
calamities of war, would have crushed the rising agriculture of
Liguria; a rigid preemption of corn, which was intended for the
public relief, must have aggravated the distress of Campania.
These dangerous projects were defeated by the virtue and
eloquence of Epiphanius and Boethius, who, in the presence of
Theodoric himself, successfully pleaded the cause of the people:
84 but if the royal ear was open to the voice of truth, a saint
and a philosopher are not always to be found at the ear of kings.
The privileges of rank, or office, or favor, were too frequently
abused by Italian fraud and Gothic violence, and the avarice of
the king’s nephew was publicly exposed, at first by the
usurpation, and afterwards by the restitution of the estates
which he had unjustly extorted from his Tuscan neighbors. Two
hundred thousand Barbarians, formidable even to their master,
were seated in the heart of Italy; they indignantly supported the
restraints of peace and discipline; the disorders of their march
were always felt and sometimes compensated; and where it was
dangerous to punish, it might be prudent to dissemble, the
sallies of their native fierceness. When the indulgence of
Theodoric had remitted two thirds of the Ligurian tribute, he
condescended to explain the difficulties of his situation, and to
lament the heavy though inevitable burdens which he imposed on
his subjects for their own defence. 85 These ungrateful subjects
could never be cordially reconciled to the origin, the religion,
or even the virtues of the Gothic conqueror; past calamities were
forgotten, and the sense or suspicion of injuries was rendered
still more exquisite by the present felicity of the times.
83 (return) [ He disabled them—alicentia testandi; and all Italy
mourned—lamentabili justitio. I wish to believe, that these
penalties were enacted against the rebels who had violated their
oath of allegiance; but the testimony of Ennodius (p. 1675-1678)
is the more weighty, as he lived and died under the reign of
Theodoric.]
84 (return) [ Ennodius, in Vit. Epiphan. p. 1589, 1690. Boethius
de Consolatione Philosphiae, l. i. pros. iv. p. 45, 46, 47.
Respect, but weigh the passions of the saint and the senator; and
fortify and alleviate their complaints by the various hints of
Cassiodorus, (ii. 8, iv. 36, viii. 5.)]
85 (return) [ Immanium expensarum pondus...pro ipsorum salute,
&c.; yet these are no more than words.]
Even the religious toleration which Theodoric had the glory of
introducing into the Christian world, was painful and offensive
to the orthodox zeal of the Italians. They respected the armed
heresy of the Goths; but their pious rage was safely pointed
against the rich and defenceless Jews, who had formed their
establishments at Naples, Rome, Ravenna, Milan, and Genoa, for
the benefit of trade, and under the sanction of the laws. 86
Their persons were insulted, their effects were pillaged, and
their synagogues were burned by the mad populace of Ravenna and
Rome, inflamed, as it should seem, by the most frivolous or
extravagant pretences. The government which could neglect, would
have deserved such an outrage. A legal inquiry was instantly
directed; and as the authors of the tumult had escaped in the
crowd, the whole community was condemned to repair the damage;
and the obstinate bigots, who refused their contributions, were
whipped through the streets by the hand of the executioner. 8611
This simple act of justice exasperated the discontent of the
Catholics, who applauded the merit and patience of these holy
confessors. Three hundred pulpits deplored the persecution of the
church; and if the chapel of St. Stephen at Verona was demolished
by the command of Theodoric, it is probable that some miracle
hostile to his name and dignity had been performed on that sacred
theatre. At the close of a glorious life, the king of Italy
discovered that he had excited the hatred of a people whose
happiness he had so assiduously labored to promote; and his mind
was soured by indignation, jealousy, and the bitterness of
unrequited love. The Gothic conqueror condescended to disarm the
unwarlike natives of Italy, interdicting all weapons of offence,
and excepting only a small knife for domestic use. The deliverer
of Rome was accused of conspiring with the vilest informers
against the lives of senators whom he suspected of a secret and
treasonable correspondence with the Byzantine court. 87 After the
death of Anastasius, the diadem had been placed on the head of a
feeble old man; but the powers of government were assumed by his
nephew Justinian, who already meditated the extirpation of
heresy, and the conquest of Italy and Africa. A rigorous law,
which was published at Constantinople, to reduce the Arians by
the dread of punishment within the pale of the church, awakened
the just resentment of Theodoric, who claimed for his distressed
brethren of the East the same indulgence which he had so long
granted to the Catholics of his dominions. 8711 At his stern
command, the Roman pontiff, with four illustrious senators,
embarked on an embassy, of which he must have alike dreaded the
failure or the success. The singular veneration shown to the
first pope who had visited Constantinople was punished as a crime
by his jealous monarch; the artful or peremptory refusal of the
Byzantine court might excuse an equal, and would provoke a
larger, measure of retaliation; and a mandate was prepared in
Italy, to prohibit, after a stated day, the exercise of the
Catholic worship. By the bigotry of his subjects and enemies, the
most tolerant of princes was driven to the brink of persecution;
and the life of Theodoric was too long, since he lived to condemn
the virtue of Boethius and Symmachus. 88
86 (return) [ The Jews were settled at Naples, (Procopius, Goth.
l. i. c. 8,) at Genoa, (Var. ii. 28, iv. 33,) Milan, (v. 37,)
Rome, (iv. 43.) See likewise Basnage, Hist. des Juifs, tom. viii.
c. 7, p. 254.]
8611 (return) [ See History of the Jews vol. iii. p. 217.—M.]
87 (return) [ Rex avidus communis exitii, &c., (Boethius, l. i.
p. 59:) rex colum Romanis tendebat, (Anonym. Vales. p. 723.)
These are hard words: they speak the passions of the Italians and
those (I fear) of Theodoric himself.]
8711 (return) [ Gibbon should not have omitted the golden words
of Theodoric in a letter which he addressed to Justin: That to
pretend to a dominion over the conscience is to usurp the
prerogative of God; that by the nature of things the power of
sovereigns is confined to external government; that they have no
right of punishment but over those who disturb the public peace,
of which they are the guardians; that the most dangerous heresy
is that of a sovereign who separates from himself a part of his
subjects because they believe not according to his belief.
Compare Le Beau, vol viii. p. 68.—M]
88 (return) [ I have labored to extract a rational narrative from
the dark, concise, and various hints of the Valesian Fragment,
(p. 722, 723, 724,) Theophanes, (p. 145,) Anastasius, (in
Johanne, p. 35,) and the Hist Miscella, (p. 103, edit. Muratori.)
A gentle pressure and paraphrase of their words is no violence.
Consult likewise Muratori (Annali d’ Italia, tom. iv. p.
471-478,) with the Annals and Breviary (tom. i. p. 259—263) of
the two Pagis, the uncle and the nephew.]
The senator Boethius 89 is the last of the Romans whom Cato or
Tully could have acknowledged for their countryman. As a wealthy
orphan, he inherited the patrimony and honors of the Anician
family, a name ambitiously assumed by the kings and emperors of
the age; and the appellation of Manlius asserted his genuine or
fabulous descent from a race of consuls and dictators, who had
repulsed the Gauls from the Capitol, and sacrificed their sons to
the discipline of the republic. In the youth of Boethius the
studies of Rome were not totally abandoned; a Virgil 90 is now
extant, corrected by the hand of a consul; and the professors of
grammar, rhetoric, and jurisprudence, were maintained in their
privileges and pensions by the liberality of the Goths. But the
erudition of the Latin language was insufficient to satiate his
ardent curiosity: and Boethius is said to have employed eighteen
laborious years in the schools of Athens, 91 which were supported
by the zeal, the learning, and the diligence of Proclus and his
disciples. The reason and piety of their Roman pupil were
fortunately saved from the contagion of mystery and magic, which
polluted the groves of the academy; but he imbibed the spirit,
and imitated the method, of his dead and living masters, who
attempted to reconcile the strong and subtile sense of Aristotle
with the devout contemplation and sublime fancy of Plato. After
his return to Rome, and his marriage with the daughter of his
friend, the patrician Symmachus, Boethius still continued, in a
palace of ivory and marble, to prosecute the same studies. 92 The
church was edified by his profound defence of the orthodox creed
against the Arian, the Eutychian, and the Nestorian heresies; and
the Catholic unity was explained or exposed in a formal treatise
by the indifference of three distinct though consubstantial
persons. For the benefit of his Latin readers, his genius
submitted to teach the first elements of the arts and sciences of
Greece. The geometry of Euclid, the music of Pythagoras, the
arithmetic of Nicomachus, the mechanics of Archimedes, the
astronomy of Ptolemy, the theology of Plato, and the logic of
Aristotle, with the commentary of Porphyry, were translated and
illustrated by the indefatigable pen of the Roman senator. And he
alone was esteemed capable of describing the wonders of art, a
sun-dial, a water-clock, or a sphere which represented the
motions of the planets. From these abstruse speculations,
Boethius stooped, or, to speak more truly, he rose to the social
duties of public and private life: the indigent were relieved by
his liberality; and his eloquence, which flattery might compare
to the voice of Demosthenes or Cicero, was uniformly exerted in
the cause of innocence and humanity. Such conspicuous merit was
felt and rewarded by a discerning prince: the dignity of Boethius
was adorned with the titles of consul and patrician, and his
talents were usefully employed in the important station of master
of the offices. Notwithstanding the equal claims of the East and
West, his two sons were created, in their tender youth, the
consuls of the same year. 93 On the memorable day of their
inauguration, they proceeded in solemn pomp from their palace to
the forum amidst the applause of the senate and people; and their
joyful father, the true consul of Rome, after pronouncing an
oration in the praise of his royal benefactor, distributed a
triumphal largess in the games of the circus. Prosperous in his
fame and fortunes, in his public honors and private alliances, in
the cultivation of science and the consciousness of virtue,
Boethius might have been styled happy, if that precarious epithet
could be safely applied before the last term of the life of man.
89 (return) [ Le Clerc has composed a critical and philosophical
life of Anicius Manlius Severinus Boetius, (Bibliot. Choisie,
tom. xvi. p. 168—275;) and both Tiraboschi (tom. iii.) and
Fabricius (Bibliot Latin.) may be usefully consulted. The date of
his birth may be placed about the year 470, and his death in 524,
in a premature old age, (Consol. Phil. Metrica. i. p. 5.)]
90 (return) [ For the age and value of this Ms., now in the
Medicean library at Florence, see the Cenotaphia Pisana (p.
430-447) of Cardinal Noris.]
91 (return) [ The Athenian studies of Boethius are doubtful,
(Baronius, A.D. 510, No. 3, from a spurious tract, De Disciplina
Scholarum,) and the term of eighteen years is doubtless too long:
but the simple fact of a visit to Athens is justified by much
internal evidence, (Brucker, Hist. Crit. Philosoph. tom. iii. p.
524—527,) and by an expression (though vague and ambiguous) of
his friend Cassiodorus, (Var. i. 45,) “longe positas Athenas
intrioisti.”]
92 (return) [ Bibliothecae comptos ebore ac vitro * parietes,
&c., (Consol. Phil. l. i. pros. v. p. 74.) The Epistles of
Ennodius (vi. 6, vii. 13, viii. 1 31, 37, 40) and Cassiodorus
(Var. i. 39, iv. 6, ix. 21) afford many proofs of the high
reputation which he enjoyed in his own times. It is true, that
the bishop of Pavia wanted to purchase of him an old house at
Milan, and praise might be tendered and accepted in part of
payment. * Note: Gibbon translated vitro, marble; under the
impression, no doubt that glass was unknown.—M.]
93 (return) [ Pagi, Muratori, &c., are agreed that Boethius
himself was consul in the year 510, his two sons in 522, and in
487, perhaps, his father. A desire of ascribing the last of these
consulships to the philosopher had perplexed the chronology of
his life. In his honors, alliances, children, he celebrates his
own felicity—his past felicity, (p. 109 110)]
A philosopher, liberal of his wealth and parsimonious of his
time, might be insensible to the common allurements of ambition,
the thirst of gold and employment. And some credit may be due to
the asseveration of Boethius, that he had reluctantly obeyed the
divine Plato, who enjoins every virtuous citizen to rescue the
state from the usurpation of vice and ignorance. For the
integrity of his public conduct he appeals to the memory of his
country. His authority had restrained the pride and oppression of
the royal officers, and his eloquence had delivered Paulianus
from the dogs of the palace. He had always pitied, and often
relieved, the distress of the provincials, whose fortunes were
exhausted by public and private rapine; and Boethius alone had
courage to oppose the tyranny of the Barbarians, elated by
conquest, excited by avarice, and, as he complains, encouraged by
impunity. In these honorable contests his spirit soared above the
consideration of danger, and perhaps of prudence; and we may
learn from the example of Cato, that a character of pure and
inflexible virtue is the most apt to be misled by prejudice, to
be heated by enthusiasm, and to confound private enmities with
public justice. The disciple of Plato might exaggerate the
infirmities of nature, and the imperfections of society; and the
mildest form of a Gothic kingdom, even the weight of allegiance
and gratitude, must be insupportable to the free spirit of a
Roman patriot. But the favor and fidelity of Boethius declined in
just proportion with the public happiness; and an unworthy
colleague was imposed to divide and control the power of the
master of the offices. In the last gloomy season of Theodoric, he
indignantly felt that he was a slave; but as his master had only
power over his life, he stood without arms and without fear
against the face of an angry Barbarian, who had been provoked to
believe that the safety of the senate was incompatible with his
own. The senator Albinus was accused and already convicted on the
presumption of hoping, as it was said, the liberty of Rome. “If
Albinus be criminal,” exclaimed the orator, “the senate and
myself are all guilty of the same crime. If we are innocent,
Albinus is equally entitled to the protection of the laws.” These
laws might not have punished the simple and barren wish of an
unattainable blessing; but they would have shown less indulgence
to the rash confession of Boethius, that, had he known of a
conspiracy, the tyrant never should. 94 The advocate of Albinus
was soon involved in the danger and perhaps the guilt of his
client; their signature (which they denied as a forgery) was
affixed to the original address, inviting the emperor to deliver
Italy from the Goths; and three witnesses of honorable rank,
perhaps of infamous reputation, attested the treasonable designs
of the Roman patrician. 95 Yet his innocence must be presumed,
since he was deprived by Theodoric of the means of justification,
and rigorously confined in the tower of Pavia, while the senate,
at the distance of five hundred miles, pronounced a sentence of
confiscation and death against the most illustrious of its
members. At the command of the Barbarians, the occult science of
a philosopher was stigmatized with the names of sacrilege and
magic. 96 A devout and dutiful attachment to the senate was
condemned as criminal by the trembling voices of the senators
themselves; and their ingratitude deserved the wish or prediction
of Boethius, that, after him, none should be found guilty of the
same offence. 97
94 (return) [ Si ego scissem tu nescisses. Beothius adopts this
answer (l. i. pros. 4, p. 53) of Julius Canus, whose philosophic
death is described by Seneca, (De Tranquillitate Animi, c. 14.)]
95 (return) [ The characters of his two delators, Basilius (Var.
ii. 10, 11, iv. 22) and Opilio, (v. 41, viii. 16,) are
illustrated, not much to their honor, in the Epistles of
Cassiodorus, which likewise mention Decoratus, (v. 31,) the
worthless colleague of Beothius, (l. iii. pros. 4, p. 193.)]
96 (return) [ A severe inquiry was instituted into the crime of
magic, (Var. iv 22, 23, ix. 18;) and it was believed that many
necromancers had escaped by making their jailers mad: for mad I
should read drunk.]
97 (return) [ Boethius had composed his own Apology, (p. 53,)
perhaps more interesting than his Consolation. We must be content
with the general view of his honors, principles, persecution,
&c., (l. i. pros. 4, p. 42—62,) which may be compared with the
short and weighty words of the Valesian Fragment, (p. 723.) An
anonymous writer (Sinner, Catalog. Mss. Bibliot. Bern. tom. i. p.
287) charges him home with honorable and patriotic treason.]
While Boethius, oppressed with fetters, expected each moment the
sentence or the stroke of death, he composed, in the tower of
Pavia, the Consolation of Philosophy; a golden volume not
unworthy of the leisure of Plato or Tully, but which claims
incomparable merit from the barbarism of the times and the
situation of the author. The celestial guide, whom he had so long
invoked at Rome and Athens, now condescended to illumine his
dungeon, to revive his courage, and to pour into his wounds her
salutary balm. She taught him to compare his long prosperity and
his recent distress, and to conceive new hopes from the
inconstancy of fortune. Reason had informed him of the precarious
condition of her gifts; experience had satisfied him of their
real value; he had enjoyed them without guilt; he might resign
them without a sigh, and calmly disdain the impotent malice of
his enemies, who had left him happiness, since they had left him
virtue. From the earth, Boethius ascended to heaven in search of
the Supreme Good; explored the metaphysical labyrinth of chance
and destiny, of prescience and free will, of time and eternity;
and generously attempted to reconcile the perfect attributes of
the Deity with the apparent disorders of his moral and physical
government. Such topics of consolation so obvious, so vague, or
so abstruse, are ineffectual to subdue the feelings of human
nature. Yet the sense of misfortune may be diverted by the labor
of thought; and the sage who could artfully combine in the same
work the various riches of philosophy, poetry, and eloquence,
must already have possessed the intrepid calmness which he
affected to seek. Suspense, the worst of evils, was at length
determined by the ministers of death, who executed, and perhaps
exceeded, the inhuman mandate of Theodoric. A strong cord was
fastened round the head of Boethius, and forcibly tightened, till
his eyes almost started from their sockets; and some mercy may be
discovered in the milder torture of beating him with clubs till
he expired. 98 But his genius survived to diffuse a ray of
knowledge over the darkest ages of the Latin world; the writings
of the philosopher were translated by the most glorious of the
English kings, 99 and the third emperor of the name of Otho
removed to a more honorable tomb the bones of a Catholic saint,
who, from his Arian persecutors, had acquired the honors of
martyrdom, and the fame of miracles. 100 In the last hours of
Boethius, he derived some comfort from the safety of his two
sons, of his wife, and of his father-in-law, the venerable
Symmachus. But the grief of Symmachus was indiscreet, and perhaps
disrespectful: he had presumed to lament, he might dare to
revenge, the death of an injured friend. He was dragged in chains
from Rome to the palace of Ravenna; and the suspicions of
Theodoric could only be appeased by the blood of an innocent and
aged senator. 101
98 (return) [ He was executed in Agro Calventiano, (Calvenzano,
between Marignano and Pavia,) Anonym. Vales. p. 723, by order of
Eusebius, count of Ticinum or Pavia. This place of confinement is
styled the baptistery, an edifice and name peculiar to
cathedrals. It is claimed by the perpetual tradition of the
church of Pavia. The tower of Boethius subsisted till the year
1584, and the draught is yet preserved, (Tiraboschi, tom. iii. p.
47, 48.)]
99 (return) [ See the Biographia Britannica, Alfred, tom. i. p.
80, 2d edition. The work is still more honorable if performed
under the learned eye of Alfred by his foreign and domestic
doctors. For the reputation of Boethius in the middle ages,
consult Brucker, (Hist. Crit. Philosoph. tom. iii. p. 565, 566.)]