THE FINAL DIVISION OF THE EMPIRE.
§ 1. _The Reunion of the Empire._
♦Continuity of Roman rule.♦
The main point to be always borne in mind in the history, and
therefore in the historical geography, of the sixth, seventh, and
eighth centuries, is the continued existence of the Roman Empire. It
was still the Roman Empire, although the seat of its dominion was no
longer at the Old Rome, although for a while the Old Rome was actually
separated from the Roman dominion. Gaul, Spain, Africa, Italy itself,
had been lopped away. Britain had fallen away by another process. But
the Roman rule went on undisturbed in the Eastern part of the Empire,
and even in the West the memory of that rule had by no means wholly
died out. ♦Position of the Teutonic kings.♦ Teutonic kings ruled in
all the countries of the West; but nowhere on the continent had they
become national sovereigns. They were still simply the chiefs of their
own people reigning in the midst of a Roman population. The Romans
meanwhile everywhere looked to the Cæsar of the New Rome as their
lawful sovereign, from whose rule they had been unwillingly torn away.
Both in Spain and in Italy the Gothic kings had settled in the country
as Imperial lieutenants with an Imperial commission. The formal aspect
of the event of 476 had been the reunion of the Western Empire with
the Eastern. ♦Recovery of territory by the Empire.♦ It was perfectly
natural therefore that the sole Roman Emperor reigning in the New Rome
should strive, whenever he had a chance, to win back territories which
he had never formally surrendered, and that the Roman inhabitants of
those territories should welcome him as a deliverer from barbarian
masters. The geographical limits within which, at the beginning of the
sixth century, the Roman power was practically confined, the phænomena
of race and language within those limits, might have suggested another
course. But considerations of that kind are seldom felt at the time;
they are the reflexions of thoughtful men long after. ♦Extent of the
Roman dominion at the accession of Justinian, 527.♦ The Roman dominion,
at the accession of Justinian, was shut up within the Greek and
Oriental provinces of the Empire; its enemies were already beginning
to speak of its subjects as Greeks. Its truest policy would have been
to have anticipated several centuries of history, to have taken up the
position of a Greek state, defending its borders against the Persian,
withstanding or inviting the settlement of the Slave, but leaving the
now Teutonic West to develope itself undisturbed. But in such cases
the known past is always more powerful than the unknown future, and it
seemed the first duty of the Roman Emperor to restore the Roman Empire
to its ancient extent.
♦Conquests of Justinian.♦
It was during the reign of Justinian that this work was carried out
through a large part of the Western Empire. Lost provinces were won
back in two continents. The growth of independent Teutonic powers was
for ever stopped in Africa, and it received no small check in Europe.
The Emperor was enabled, through the weakness and internal dissensions
of the Vandal and Gothic kingdoms, to win back Africa and Italy to the
Empire. The work was done by the swords of Belisarius and Narses—the
Slave and the Persian being now used to win back the Old Rome to the
dominion of the New. ♦Vandal war. 533-535.♦ The short _Vandal_ war
restored Africa in the Roman sense, and a large part of Mauritania,
to the Empire. ♦Gothic war. 537-554.♦ The long _Gothic_ war won back
Illyricum, Italy, and the Old Rome. Italy and Africa were still ruled
from Ravenna and from Carthage; but they were now ruled not by Teutonic
kings, but by Byzantine exarchs. ♦Conquest of southern Spain. 550.♦
Meanwhile, while the war with the East-Goths was going on in Italy,
a large part of southern Spain was won back from the West-Goths. Two
Teutonic kingdoms were thus wiped out; a third was weakened, and the
acquisition of so great a line of sea-coast, together with the great
islands, Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, and the Balearic Islands, gave
the Empire an undisputed supremacy by sea. In one corner only did the
Imperial frontier even nominally go back, or any Teutonic power advance
at its expense. ♦Provence ceded to the Franks, 548.♦ The sea-board of
Provence, which had long been practically lost to the Empire, was now
formally ceded to the Franks. In this one corner the Roman Terminus
withdrew.
♦Geographical changes under Justinian.♦
In a geographical aspect the map of Europe has seldom been so
completely changed within a single generation as it was during the
reign of Justinian. At his accession his dominion was bounded to the
west by the Hadriatic, and he was far from possessing the whole of the
Hadriatic coast. Under his reign the power of the Roman arms and the
Roman law were again extended to the Ocean. The Roman dominion was
indeed no longer spread round the whole shore of the Mediterranean;
the Imperial territories were no longer continuous as of old: but,
if the Empire was not still, as it had once been, the only power in
the Mediterranean lands, it had again become beyond all comparison
the greatest power. ♦Effects of Justinian’s conquests.♦ Moreover, by
the recovery of so large an extent of Latin-speaking territory, the
tendency of the Empire to change into a Greek or Oriental state was
checked for several centuries. We are here concerned only with the
geographical, not with the political or moral aspect of the conquests
of Justinian. Some of those conquests, like those of Trajan, were
hardly more than momentary. But the changes which they made for the
time were some of the most remarkable on record, and the effect of
those changes remained, both in history and geography, long after their
immediate results were again undone.
§ 2. _Settlement of the Lombards in Italy._
The conquests of Justinian hindered the growth of a national Teutonic
kingdom in Italy, such as grew up in Gaul and Spain, and they
practically made the cradle of the Empire, Rome herself, an outlying
dependency of her great colony by the Bosporos. But the reunion of all
Italy with the Empire lasted only for a moment. The conquest was only
just over when a new set of Teutonic conquerors appeared in Italy.
♦Pannonian kingdom of the Lombards.♦ These were the _Lombards_, who,
in the great wandering, had made their way into the ancient Pannonia
about the time that the East Goths passed into Italy. They were thus
settled within the ancient boundaries of the Western Empire. But the
Roman power had now quite passed away from those regions, and the
Lombard kingdom in Pannonia was practically altogether beyond the
Imperial borders; it had not even that Roman tinge which affected the
Frankish and Gothic kingdoms. ♦Gepidæ.♦ To the east of the Lombards,
in the ancient Dacia, another Teutonic kingdom had arisen; that of the
_Gepidæ_, a people seemingly closely akin to the Goths. ♦Avars.♦ The
process of wandering had brought the Turanian _Avars_ into those parts,
and their presence seriously affected all later history and geography.
♦Teutonic powers on the Lower Danube.♦ With the Gepidæ in Dacia and
the Lombards in Pannonia, there was a chance of two Teutonic states
growing up on the borders of East and West. These might possibly have
played the same part in the East which the Franks and Goths played in
the West, and they might thus have altogether changed the later course
of history. But the Lombards allied themselves with the Avars. ♦The
Gepidæ overthrown by the Lombards and Avars. 566. | The Lombards pass
into Italy. 567.♦ In partnership with their barbarian allies, they
overthrew the kingdom of the Gepidæ, and they themselves passed into
Italy. Thus the growth of Teutonic powers in those regions was stopped.
A new and far more dangerous enemy was brought into the neighbourhood
of the Empire, and the way was opened for the Slavonic races to play in
some degree the same part in the East which the Teutons played in the
West. But while the East lost this chance of renovation, for such it
would have been, the Lombard settlement in Italy was the beginning of a
new Teutonic power in that country. ♦Character of the Lombard kingdom.♦
But it was not a power which could possibly grow up into a national
Teutonic kingdom of all Italy, as the dominion of the East-Goths might
well have done. ♦Incomplete conquest of Italy.♦ The Lombard conquest
of Italy was at no time a complete conquest; part of the land was won
by the Lombards; part was kept by the Emperors; and the Imperial and
Lombard possessions intersected one another in a way which hindered
the growth of any kind of national unity under either power. ♦Lombard
duchies.♦ The new settlers founded the great Lombard kingdom in the
North of Italy, which has kept the Lombard name to this day, and the
smaller Lombard states of _Spoleto_ and _Beneventum_. But a large part
of Italy still remained to the Empire. ♦Imperial possessions in Italy.♦
Ravenna, the dwelling-place of the Exarchs, Rome itself, Naples, and
the island city of Venice were all centres of districts which still
acknowledged the Imperial rule. The Emperors also kept the extreme
southern points of both the peninsulas of Southern Italy, and, for the
present, the three great islands. The Lombard Kings were constantly
threatening Rome and Ravenna. ♦Ravenna taken by the Lombards. c. 753.♦
Rome never fell into their hands, but in the middle of the eighth
century Ravenna was taken, and with it the district specially known as
the _Exarchate_ was annexed to the Lombard dominion. But this greatest
extent of the Lombard power caused its overthrow: for it led to a chain
of events which, as we shall presently see, ended in transferring not
only the Lombard kingdom, but the Imperial crown of the West to the
hands of the Franks.
§ 3. _Rise of the Saracens._
But, before we give any account of the revolutions which took place
among the already existing powers of Western Europe, it will be well to
describe the geographical changes which were caused by the appearance
of absolutely new actors on two sides of the Empire. ♦Roman province
in Spain recovered by the Goths. 534-572.♦ One point however may be
noticed here, as standing apart from the general course of events,
namely, that the Roman province in Spain was won gradually back by the
West-Goths. ♦616-624.♦ The inland cities, as Cordova, were hardly kept
forty years, and the whole of the Imperial possessions in Spain were
lost during the reign of Heraclius. Thus the great dominion which
Justinian had won back in the West, important as were its historical
results, was itself of very short duration; a large part of Italy was
lost almost as soon as it was won, and the recovered dominion in Spain
did not abide more than ninety years.
But meanwhile, in the course of the seventh century, nations which
had hitherto been unknown or unimportant began to play a great part
in history and greatly to change the face of the map. These new
powers fall under two heads; those who appeared on the northern and
those who appeared on the eastern frontier of the Empire. The nations
who appeared on the North were, like the early Teutonic invaders of
the Empire, ready to act, if partly as conquerors, partly also as
disciples; those who appeared on the East were the champions of an
utterly different system in religion and everything else. In short, the
old rivalry of the East and West now takes a distinctly aggressive form
on the part of the East. ♦Wars between Rome and Persia.♦ As long as
the Sassanid dynasty lasted, Rome and Persia still continued their old
rivalry on nearly equal terms. The long wars between the two Empires
made little difference in their boundaries. ♦Wars of Chosroes and
Heraclius, 603-628.♦ In the last stage of their warfare Chosroes took
Jerusalem and Antioch, and encamped at Chalkêdôn. Heraclius pressed his
eastern victories beyond the boundaries of the Empire under Trajan.
But even these great campaigns made no lasting difference in the map,
except so far as, by weakening Rome and Persia alike, they paved the
way for the greatest change of all. ♦Extension of the Roman power on
the Euxine.♦ More important to geography was a change which took place
at somewhat earlier time when, during the reign of Justinian, the
Roman power was extended on the Eastern side of the Euxine in _Colchis_
or _Lazica_. ♦The Arabian vassals of Rome and Persia.♦ The southern
borders of each Empire were to some extent protected by the dominion
of dependent Arabian kings, the _Ghassanides_ being vassals of Rome,
and the _Lachmites_ to the east of them being vassals of Persia. But a
change came presently which altogether overthrew the Persian kingdom,
which deprived the Roman Empire of its Eastern, Egyptian, and African
provinces, and which gave both the Empire and the Teutonic kingdoms of
the West an enemy of a kind altogether different from any against whom
they hitherto had to strive.
♦Rise of the Saracens.♦
The cause which wrought such abiding changes was the rise of the
_Saracens_ under Mahomet and his first followers. A new nation, that
of the Arabs, now became dominant in a large part of the lands which
had been part of the Roman Empire, as well as in lands far beyond its
boundaries. ♦Arabia united under Mahomet, 622-632.♦ The scattered
tribes of Arabia were first gathered together into a single power by
Mahomet himself, and under his successors they undertook to spread the
Mahometan religion wherever their swords could carry it. And, with the
Mahometan religion, they carried also the Arabic language, and what
we may call Eastern civilization as opposed to Western. A strife, in
short, now begins between Aryan and Semitic man. Rome and Persia, with
all their differences, were both of them Aryan powers. ♦Conquests of
the Saracens.♦ The most amazing thing is the extraordinary speed with
which the Saracens pressed their conquests at the expense of both Rome
and Persia, forming a marked contrast to the slow advance both of Roman
conquest and of Teutonic settlement. In the course of less than eighty
years, the Mahometan conquerors formed a dominion greater than that of
Rome, and, for a short time, the will of the Caliph of the Prophet was
obeyed from the Ocean to lands beyond the Indus. ♦Loss of the Eastern
provinces of Rome. 632-639.♦ In a few campaigns the Empire lost all
its possessions beyond Mount Tauros; that is, it lost one of the three
great divisions of the Empire, that namely in which neither Greek nor
Roman civilization had ever thoroughly taken root.
While the Roman Empire was thus dismembered, the rival power of Persia
was not merely dismembered, but utterly overwhelmed. ♦Saracen conquest
of Persia. 632-651.♦ The Persian nationality was again, as in the
days of the Parthians, held down under a foreign power, to revive
yet again ages later. But the Saracen power was very far from merely
taking the place of its Parthian and Persian predecessors. The mission
of the followers of Mahomet was a mission of universal conquest,
and that mission they so far carried out as altogether to overthrow
the exclusive dominion of Rome in her own Mediterranean. Under
Justinian, if the Imperial possession of the Mediterranean coast was
not absolutely continuous, the small exceptions in Africa, Spain, and
Gaul in no way interfered with the maritime supremacy of the Empire,
and Gaul and Spain, even where they were not Roman, were at least
Christian. ♦Saracen conquest of Africa. 647-711.♦ But now a gradual
advance of sixty-four years annexed the Roman dominions in Africa to
the Mahometan dominion. ♦Of Spain. 711-714.♦ Thence the Saracens passed
into Spain, and found the West-Gothic kingdom an easier prey than the
Roman provinces. Within three years after the final conquest of Africa,
the whole peninsula was conquered, save where the Christian still held
out in the inaccessible mountain fastnesses. ♦Saracen provinces in
Gaul, 713-755.♦ The Saracen power was even carried beyond the Pyrenees
into the province of Septimania, the remnant of the Gaulish dominion of
the West-Gothic kings. Narbonne, Arles, Nîmes, all became for a while
Saracen cities.
♦Effects of Saracen conquest.♦
In this way, of the three continents round the Mediterranean, Rome
lost all her possessions in Africa, while both in Europe and Asia
she had now a neighbour and an enemy of quite another kind from any
which she had had before. The Teutonic conquerors, if conquerors,
had been also disciples; they became part of the Latin world. The
Persian, though his rivalry was religious as well as political, was
still merely a rival, fighting along a single line of frontier. But
every province that was conquered by the Saracens was utterly lopped
away; it became the possession of men altogether alien and hostile in
race, language, manners, and religion. A large part of the Roman world
passed from Aryan and Christian to Semitic and Mahometan dominion.
♦Different fates of the Eastern, Latin, and Greek provinces.♦ But the
essential differences among the three main parts of the Empire now
showed themselves very clearly. The Eastern provinces, where either
Roman or Greek life was always an exotic, fell away at the first touch.
♦647-709.♦ Africa, as being so greatly Romanized, held out for sixty
years. The provinces of Asia Minor, now thoroughly Greek, were often
ravaged, but never conquered. Spain and Septimania were far more easily
conquered than Africa—a sign perhaps that the West-Gothic rule was
still felt as foreign by the Roman inhabitants.
♦Greatest extent of Saracen provinces.♦
With the conquest of Spain the undivided Saracenic Empire, the dominion
of the single Caliph, reached its greatest extent in the three
continents. Detached conquests in Europe were made long after, but on
the whole the Saracen power went back. ♦750.♦ Forty years later they
lost _Sind_, their furthest possession to the East. ♦Separation of
Spain. 755.♦ Five years later Spain became the seat of a rival dynasty,
which after a while grew into a rival Caliphate. In the same year the
Saracen dominion for the first time went back in Europe. ♦Battle of
Tours. 732. | Frankish conquest of Septimania. 755.♦ The battle of
Tours answers to the repulse of Attila at Châlons; it did not make
changes, but hindered them; but before long the one province which the
Saracens held beyond the Pyrenees, that of _Septimania_ or _Gothia_,
was won from them by the Franks.
§ 4. _Settlements of the Slavonic Nations._
The movements of the sixth century began to bring into notice a
branch of the Aryan family of nations which was to play an important
part in the affairs both of the East and of the West. ♦Movements of
the Slaves.♦ These nations were the _Slaves_. It is needless for our
purpose to attempt to trace their earlier history; but the movements
of the _Avars_ in the sixth century seem to have had much the same
effect upon the Slaves which the movements of the Huns in the fourth
century had upon the Teutons. The inroads of the Avars had, as we have
seen, checked the growth of Teutonic powers on the Lower Danube, and
had led to the Lombard settlement in Italy. But the Avars only formed
the vanguard of a number of Turanian nations, some at least of them
Turkish, which were now pressing westward. ♦Kingdom of the Avars. |
Magyars, &c.♦ The Avars formed a great kingdom in the lands north of
the Danube; to the east of these, along the northern coasts of the
Euxine, bordering on the outlying possessions and allies of the Empire
in those regions, lay _Magyars_, _Patzinaks_, and the greater dominion
of the _Chazars_. All these play a part in Byzantine history; and
the Avars were in the seventh century the most dangerous invaders
and ravagers of the Roman territory. But south of the Danube they
appeared mainly as ravagers; geography knows them only in their settled
kingdom to the north of that river. Even that kingdom lasted no very
great time; the real importance of all these migrations consists in
the effect which they had on the great Aryan race which now begins to
take its part in history. ♦North-western and South-western Slaves.♦
The Slaves seem to have been driven by the Turanian incursions in two
directions; to the North-west and to the South-west. The North-western
division gave rise to more than one European state, and their relations
with Germany form an important part of the history of the Western
Empire. These North-western Slaves do not become of importance till a
little later. But the South-western division plays a great part in the
history of the sixth and seventh centuries. ♦Analogy between Teutons
and Slaves.♦ Their position with regard to the Eastern Empire is a kind
of shadow of the position held by the Teutonic nations with regard to
the Western Empire. The Slaves play in the East, though less thoroughly
and less brilliantly, the same part, half conquerors, half disciples,
which the Teutons played in the West. During the sixth century they
appear only as ravagers; in the seventh they appear as settlers.
♦Slavonic settlements under Heraclius. c. 620.♦ There seems no doubt
that Heraclius encouraged Slavonic settlements south of the Danube,
doubtless with a view to defence against the more dangerous Avars. Much
like the Teutonic settlers in the West, the Slaves came in at first as
colonists under Imperial authority, and presently became practically
independent. A number of Slavonic states thus arose in the lands north
and east of the Hadriatic, as _Servia_, _Chrobatia_ or _Croatia_,
_Carinthia_, of which the first two are historically connected with
the Eastern, and the third with the Western Empire. _Istria_ and
_Dalmatia_ now became Slavonic, with the exception of the maritime
cities, which, among many vicissitudes, clave to the Empire. And even
among them considerable revolutions took place. ♦Destruction of Salona,
639.♦ Thus _Salona_ was destroyed, and out of Diocletian’s palace in
its neighbourhood arose the new city of _Spalato_. ♦Origin of Spalato
and Ragusa.♦ The Dalmatian _Epidauros_ was also destroyed, and _Ragusa_
took its place. In many of these inroads Slaves and Avars were mixed up
together; but the lasting settlements were all Slavonic. And the state
of things which thus began has been lasting; the north-eastern coast of
the Hadriatic is still a Slavonic land with an Italian fringe.
♦Displacement of the Illyrians.♦
In these migrations the Slaves displaced whatever remnants were left
of the old Illyrian race in the lands near the Danube. They have
themselves to some extent taken the Illyrian name, a change which has
sometimes led to confusion. But at the time the movement went much
further south than this. ♦Extent of Slavonic settlement.♦ The Slaves
pressed on into a large part of Macedonia and Greece, and, during the
seventh and eighth centuries, the whole of those countries, except the
fortified cities and a fringe along the coast, were practically cut
off from the Empire. The name of _Slavinia_ reached from the Danube
to Peloponnêsos, leaving to the Empire only islands and detached
points of coast from Venice round to Thessalonica. Their settlements
in these regions gave a new meaning to an ancient name, and the
word _Macedonian_ now began to mean _Slavonic_. ♦Albanians.♦ And it
must have been at this time that the Illyrians, the _Skipetar_ or
_Albanians_, pressed southward and formed those colonies in Greece,
some of which still keep the Albanian language, while the Slavonic
language has vanished from those lands for ages. ♦Nature of Slavonic
settlement in Greece.♦ The Slavonic occupation of Greece is a fact
which must neither be forgotten nor exaggerated. It certainly did not
amount to an extirpation of the Greek nation; but it certainly did
amount to an occupation of a large part of the country, which was
Hellenized afresh from those cities and districts which remained Greek
or Roman. While these changes were going on in the Hadriatic and Ægæan
lands, another immigration later in the seventh century took place
in the lands south of the lower Danube, and drove back the Imperial
frontier to Haimos. ♦Settlement of the Bulgarians, c. 679.♦ This was
the incursion of the _Bulgarians_, another Turanian people, but one
whose history has been different from that of most of the Turanian
immigrants. By mixture with Slavonic subjects and neighbours they
became practically Slavonic, and they still remain a people speaking a
Slavonic language. ♦The Eastern Empire cut short in its own peninsula.♦
Thus the Empire, though it still kept its possessions in Italy with the
great Mediterranean islands, though its hold on Western Africa lasted
on into the eighth century, though it still kept outlying possessions
on the northern and eastern coasts of the Euxine, was cut short in that
great peninsula which seems made to be the immediate possession of the
New Rome.
♦Moral influence of Constantinople.♦
But, exactly as happened in the West, the loss of political dominion
carried with it the growth of moral dominion. The nations which pressed
into these provinces gradually accepted Christianity in its Eastern
form, and they have always looked up to the New Rome with a feeling
the same in kind, but less strong in degree, as that with which the
West has looked up to the Old Rome. ♦Extent of the Eastern Empire.♦
But, at the beginning of the eighth century, though the Imperial power
still held posts here and there from the pillars of Hêraklês to the
Kimmerian Bosporos, Saracens on the one side and Slaves on the other
had cut short the continuous Roman dominion to a comparatively narrow
space. The unbroken possessions of Cæsar were now confined to Thrace
and that solid peninsula of Asia Minor which the Saracens constantly
ravaged, but never conquered. Mountains had taken place of rivers as
the great boundaries of the Empire: instead of the Danube and the
Euphrates, the Roman Terminus had fallen back to Haimos and Tauros.
§ 5. _The Transfer of the Western Empire to the Franks._
♦Growth of the Franks.♦
Meanwhile we must go back to the West, and trace the growth of the
great power which was there growing up, a power which, while the elder
Empire was thus cut short in the East, was in the end to supplant it in
the West by the creation of a rival Empire. For a while the _Franks_
and the Empire had only occasional dealings with each other. Next to
Britain, which had altogether ceased to be part of the Roman world, the
part of the Western Empire which was least affected by the re-awakening
of the Roman power in the East was the former province of Transalpine
Gaul. The power of the Franks was fast spreading, both in their old
home in Germany and in their new home in Gaul. ♦Frankish conquest
of the Alemanni, 496;♦ The victory of Chlodwig over the _Alemanni_
made the Franks the leading people of Germany. The two German powers
which had so long been the chief enemies of the Roman power along
the Rhine were now united. Throughout the sixth century the German
dominion of the Franks was growing. ♦of the Thuringians, c. 530; | of
Bavaria.♦ The Frankish supremacy was extended over _Thuringia_, and
later in the century over _Bavaria_. The Bavaria of this age, it must
be remembered, has a much wider extent than the name has in modern
geography, reaching to the northern borders of Italy. The Bavarians
seem to have been themselves but recent settlers in the land between
the Alps and the Danube; but their immigration and their reduction
under Frankish supremacy made the lands immediately south of the Danube
thoroughly Teutonic, as the earlier Frankish conquests had done by
the lands immediately west of the Rhine. Long before this time, the
Franks had greatly extended their dominions in Gaul also. ♦Conquest
of Aquitaine [507-511] and Burgundy. 532-534.♦ In the later years of
Chlodwig the greater part of _Aquitaine_ was won from the West-Goths.
Further conquests at their expense were afterwards made, and about the
same time Burgundy came under Frankish supremacy.
The Franks now held, either in possession or dependence, the whole
oceanic coast of Gaul; but they were still shut out from the
Mediterranean. The West-Goths still kept the land from the Pyrenees to
the Rhone, the land of _Septimania_ or _Gothia_, to which the last name
clave as being now the only Gothic part of Gaul. The land which was
specially _Provincia_, the first Roman possession in Transalpine Gaul,
the coast from the Rhone to the Alps, formed part of the East-Gothic
dominions of Theodoric. An invasion of Italy during the long wars
between the Goths and Romans failed to establish a Frankish dominion on
the Italian side of the Alps. But as the Franks, by their conquest of
Burgundy, were now neighbours of Italy, it led to a further enlargement
of their Gaulish dominions, and to their first acquisition of a
Mediterranean sea-board. ♦Cession of Provence. 536.♦ It was now that
Massalia, Arelate, and the rest of the Province were, by an Imperial
grant, one of the last exercises of Imperial power in those regions,
added to the kingdom of the Franks. ♦Extent of the Frankish dominions.♦
By the time that the Roman reconquest of Italy was completed, the
Frankish dominion, united for a moment under a single head, took in
the whole of Gaul, except the small remaining West-Gothic territory,
together with central Germany and a supremacy over the Southern German
lands. To the north lay the still independent tribes of the Low-Dutch
stock, Frisian and Saxon.
♦Position of the Franks.♦
As the Frankish dominion plays so great a part in European history and
geography, a part in truth second only to that played by the Roman
dominion, it will be needful to consider the historical position of
the Franks. Their dominion was that of a German people who had made
themselves dominant alike in Germany and in Gaul. But it was only in
a small part of the Frankish territory that the Frankish people had
actually settled. ♦The cession of Gaulish possessions.♦ It was only
in northern Gaul and central Germany, in the countries to which they
have permanently given their name, that the Franks can be looked on as
really occupying the land. In their German territory they of course
remained German; in northern Gaul their position answered to that of
the other Teutonic nations which had formed settlements within the
Empire. They were a dominant Teutonic race in a Roman land. Gradually
they adopted the speech of the conquered, while the conquered in the
end adopted the name of the conquerors. ♦Slow fusion of Franks and
Romans.♦ But the fusion of German and Roman was slower in the Frankish
part of Gaul than elsewhere, doubtless because elsewhere the Teutonic
settlements were cut off from their older Teutonic homes, while the
Franks in Gaul had their older Teutonic home as a background. ♦German
and Gaulish dependencies of the Franks.♦ Beyond the bounds of these
more strictly Frankish lands, German and Gaulish, the dominion of the
Franks was at most a political supremacy, and in no sense a national
settlement. In Germany Bavaria was ruled by its vassal princes; in Gaul
south of the Loire the Frank was at most an external ruler. Aquitaine
had to be practically conquered over and over again, and new dynasties
of native princes were constantly rising up. ♦Ethnology of Southern
Gaul.♦ The Teutonic element in these lands, an element much slighter
than the Teutonic element in Northern Gaul, is not Frankish, but Gothic
and Burgundian. The native Romance speech of those lands is wholly
different from the Romance speech of Northern Gaul. In short, there was
really nothing in common between the two great parts of Gaul, the lands
south and the lands north of the Loire, except their union, first under
Roman and then under Frankish dominion. And in Armorica the old Celtic
population, strengthened by the settlers from Britain, formed another
and a yet more distinct element.
♦Divisions of the Frankish dominions.♦
Thus there were within the Frankish dominions wide national
diversities, containing the germs of future divisions. It needed a
strong hand even to keep the Teutonic and the Latin _Francia_ together,
much less to keep together all the dependent lands, German and Gaulish.
During the ages while the Empire was being cut short by Lombards,
Goths, Slaves, and Saracens, the Frankish dominion was never in the
like sort cut short by foreign settlements; but its whole history
under the Merowingian dynasty is a history of divisions and reunions.
The tendencies to division which were inherent in the condition of
the country were strengthened by endless partitions among the members
of the reigning house. ♦_Austria_ and _Neustria_.♦ Speaking roughly,
it may be said that the more strictly Frankish territory showed a
tendency to divide itself into two parts, the Eastern or Teutonic
land, _Austria_ or _Austrasia_, and _Neustria_, the Western or Romance
land. These were severally the germs which grew into the kingdoms of
Germany and France. ♦Use of the name _Francia_.♦ As for the mere name
of _Francia_, like other names of the kind, it shifted its geographical
use according to the wanderings of the people from whom it was derived.
After many such changes of meaning, it gradually settled down as the
name for those parts of Germany and Gaul where it still abides. There
are the Teutonic or Austrian _Francia_, part of which still keeps
the name of _Franken_ or _Franconia_, and the Romance or Neustrian
_Francia_, which by various annexations has grown into modern _France_.
♦The Karlings. Dukes, 687-752; Kings, 752-987.♦
At last, after endless divisions, reconquests, and reunions of the
different parts of the Frankish territory, the whole Frankish dominion
was again, in the second half of the eighth century, joined together
under the Austrasian, the purely German, house of the _Karlings_. The
Dukes and Kings of that house consolidated and extended the Frankish
dominion in every direction. Under Pippin and Charles the Great, the
power of the ruling race was more firmly established over the dependent
states, such as Bavaria and Aquitaine. ♦Pippin conquers Septimania.
752. | Conquests of Charles the Great. 768-814.♦ Under Pippin the
conquest of the Saracen province of Septimania extended the Frankish
power over the whole of Gaul; and under Charles the Great, the Frankish
dominion was extended by a series of conquests in every direction. Of
these, his Italian conquests were rather the winning of a new crown for
the Frankish king than the extension of the Frankish kingdom. But the
conquest of _Saxony_ at the one end and of the _Spanish March_ at the
other, as well as the overthrow of the Pannonian kingdom of the Avars,
were in the strictest sense extensions of the Frankish dominions.
♦German character of the Frankish power.♦ The Frankish power which now
plays so great a part in the world was a power essentially German. The
Franks and their kings, the kings who reigned from the Elbe to the
Ebro, were German in blood, speech, and feeling; but they bore rule
over other lands, German, Latin, and Celtic, in many various degrees of
incorporation and subjection.
♦The three great powers of the eighth century; Romans, Franks,
Saracens.♦
Thus the effect of the Saracen conquests was to leave in Europe one
purely European power, namely the kingdom of the Franks, one power
both European and Asiatic, namely the Roman Empire with its seat at
Constantinople, and one power at once Asiatic, African, and European,
namely the Saracen Caliphate. Through the eighth century these three
are the great powers of the world, to which the other nations of
Europe and Asia form, as far as we are concerned, a mere background.
♦Character of the Caliphate.♦ But the Caliphate, as a Semitic and
Mahometan power, could be European only in a geographical sense.
♦The Saracen dominion in Spain.♦ Even after the establishment of the
independent Saracen dominion in Spain, the new power still remained
an exotic. A great country of Western Europe was no longer ruled from
Damascus or Bagdad; but the emirate, afterwards Caliphate, of Cordova,
and the kingdoms into which it afterwards broke up, still remained only
geographically European. They were portions of Asia—in after times
rather of Africa—thrusting themselves into Europe, like the Spanish
dominion of Carthage in earlier times. The two great Christian powers,
the two great really European powers, are the Roman and the Frankish.
We now come to the process which for a while caused the Roman and
Frankish names to have the same meaning within a large part of Europe,
and by which the two seats of Roman dominion were again parted asunder,
never to be reunited.
♦Relations of the Franks and the Empire.♦
The way by which the Roman and Frankish powers came to affect one
another was through the affairs of Italy. ♦The Imperial possessions in
Italy.♦ The steps by which the Imperial power was, during the eighth
century, weakened step by step in the territories which still remained
to the Empire in central Italy are, either from an ecclesiastical or
from a strictly historical point of view, of surpassing interest. But,
as long as the authority of the Emperor was not openly thrown off,
no change was made on the map. ♦Lombard conquest of the Exarchate.
| Overthrow of the Lombards by Charles. 774.♦ The events of those times
which did make a change on the map were, first the conquest of the
Exarchate by the Lombards, and secondly, the overthrow of the Lombard
kingdom itself by the Frank king Charles the Great. The Frankish power
was thus at last established on the Italian side of the Alps, but it
must be remarked that the new conquest was not incorporated with the
Frankish dominion. ♦Lombardy a separate kingdom.♦ Charles held his
Italian dominion as a separate dominion, and called himself King of
the Franks and Lombards. He also bore the title of Patrician of the
Romans; but, though the assumption of that title was of great political
significance, it did not affect geography. ♦Title of Patrician.♦ The
title of Patrician of itself implied a commission from the Emperor,
and, though it was bestowed by the Bishop and people of Rome without
the Imperial consent, the very choice of the title showed that the
Imperial authority was not formally thrown off. Charles, as Patrician,
was virtually sovereign of Rome, and his acquisition of the patriciate
practically extended his dominion from the Ocean to the frontiers
of Beneventum. ♦Nominal authority of the Empire.♦ But, down to his
Imperial coronation in the last week of the eighth century, the Emperor
who reigned in the New Rome was still the nominal sovereign of the old.
The event of the year 800, with all its weighty significance, did not
practically either extend the territories of Charles or increase his
powers.
♦Effect of the Imperial coronation of Charles. 800.♦
Still the Imperial coronation of Charles is one of the great landmarks
both of history and of historical geography. The whole political
system of Europe was changed when the Old Rome cast off its formal
allegiance to the New, and chose the King of the Franks and Lombards
to be Emperor of the Romans. Though the powers of Charles were not
increased nor his dominions extended, he held everything by a new
title. ♦Final division of the Empire.♦ The Roman Empire was divided,
never to be joined together again. But its Western half now took in,
not only the greatest of its lost provinces, but vast regions which
had never formed part of the Empire in the days of Trajan himself.
Again, the distinctive character of the older Roman Empire had been
the absence of nationality. The whole civilized world had become Rome,
and all its free inhabitants had become Romans. ♦Growing nationality
of the two Empires, German and Greek.♦ But from this time each of the
two divisions of the Empire begins to assume something like a national
character. East and West alike remained Roman in name and in political
traditions. The Old Rome was the nominal centre of one; the New Rome
was both the nominal and the real centre of the other. But there was
a sense in which both alike ceased from this time to be Roman. The
Western Empire has passed to a German king, and later changes tended
to make his Empire more and more German. The Eastern Empire meanwhile,
by the successive loss of the Eastern provinces, of Latin Africa, and
of Latin Italy, became nearly conterminous with those parts of Europe
and Asia where the Greek speech and Greek civilization prevailed. From
one point of view, both Empires are still Roman; from another point of
view, one is fast becoming German, the other is fast becoming Greek.
♦Rivalry of the two Empires.♦ And the two powers into which the old
Roman Empire is thus split are in the strictest sense two Empires.
They are no longer mere divisions of an Empire which has been found
to be too great for the rule of one man. The Emperors of the East and
West are no longer Imperial colleagues dividing the administration
of a single Empire between them. They are now rival potentates, each
claiming to be exclusively the one true Roman Emperor, the one true
representative of the common predecessors of both in the days when the
Empire was still undivided.
♦The two Caliphates.♦
It is further to be noted that the same kind of change which now
happened to the Christian Empire, had happened earlier in the century
to the Mahometan Empire. The establishment of a rival dynasty at
Cordova, even though the assumption of the actual title of Caliph
did not follow at once, was exactly analogous to the establishment
of a rival Empire in the Old Rome. The Mediterranean world has now
four great powers, the two rival Christian Empires, and the two rival
Mahometan Caliphates. Among these, it naturally follows that each
is hostile to its neighbour of the opposite religion, and friendly
to its neighbour’s rival. The Western Emperor is the enemy of the
Western Caliph, the friend of the Eastern. ♦Rivalry of the Empires and
Caliphates.♦ The Eastern Emperor is the enemy of the Eastern Caliph,
the friend of the Western. Thus the four great powers stood at the
beginning of the ninth century. And it was out of the dismemberments of
the two great Christian and the great Mahometan powers that the later
states, Christian and Mahometan, of the Mediterranean world took their
rise.
♦Extent of the Carolingian Empire.♦
It is a point of geographical as well as of historical importance that
Charles the Great, after he was crowned Emperor, caused all those who
had been hitherto bound by allegiance to him as King of the Franks
to swear allegiance to him afresh as Roman Emperor. This marks that
all his dominions, Frankish, Lombard, and strictly Roman, are to be
looked on as forming part of the Western Empire. Thus the Western
Empire now took in all those German lands which the old Roman Emperors
never could conquer. Germany became part of the Roman Empire, not by
Rome conquering Germany, but by Rome choosing the German king as her
Emperor. ♦Contrast of its boundaries with those of the elder Empire.♦
The boundaries of the Empire thus became different from what they had
ever been before. Of the old provinces of the Western Empire, Britain,
Africa, and all Spain save one corner, remained foreign to the new
Roman Empire of the Franks. But, on the other hand, the Empire now took
in all the lands in Germany and beyond Germany over which the Frankish
power now reached, but which had never formed part of the elder Empire.
♦Conquest of Saxony. 772-804.♦ The long wars of Charles with the Saxons
led to their final conquest, to the incorporation of _Saxony_ with the
Frankish kingdom, and, after the Imperial coronation of the Frankish
king, to its incorporation with the Western Empire.
The conquests of Charles had thus, among their other results, welded
Germany into a single whole. For though the Franks had long been the
greatest power in Germany, yet Germany could not be said to form a
single whole as long as the Saxons, the greatest people of Northern
Germany, remained independent. The conquest of Saxony brought the
Frankish power for the first time in contact with the _Danes_ and the
other people of _Scandinavia_. ♦Boundary of the Eider.♦ The dominions
of Charles took in what was then called Saxony beyond the Elbe, that is
the modern Holstein, and the _Eider_ was fixed as the northern boundary
of the Empire. More than one Danish king did homage to Charles and to
some of the Emperors after him; but Denmark was never incorporated with
the Empire or even made permanently dependent. ♦Slavonic allies and
neighbours.♦ To the east, the immediate dominions of Charles stretched
but a little way beyond the Elbe; but here the Western Empire came in
contact, as the Eastern had done at an earlier time and by a different
process, with the widely spread nations of the Slavonic race. The same
movements which had driven one branch of that race to the south-west
had driven another branch to the north-west, and the wars of Charles
in those regions gave his Empire a fringe of Slavonic allies and
dependents along both sides of the Elbe, forming a barrier between
the immediate dominions of the Empire and the independent Slaves to
the east. ♦Overthrow of the Avar kingdom. 796.♦ To the south Charles
overthrew the kingdom of the _Avars_; he thus extended his dominions
on the side of south-eastern Germany, and here he came in contact with
the southern branch of the Slaves, a portion of whom, in _Carinthia_
and the neighbouring lands, became subjects of his Empire. ♦The Spanish
March. 778.♦ In Spain he acquired the north-eastern corner as far as
the Ebro, forming the Spanish March, afterwards the county of Barcelona.
♦Divisions of the Empire.♦
Thus the new Western Empire took in all Gaul, all that was then
Germany, the greater part of Italy, and a small part of Spain.[7] It
thus took in both Teutonic and Romance lands, and contained in it the
germs of the chief nations of modern Europe. It was a step towards
their formation when Charles, following the example both of earlier
Roman Emperors and of earlier Frankish kings, planned several divisions
of his dominions among his sons. Owing to the deaths of all his sons
but one, none of these divisions took effect. And it should be noticed
that as yet none of these schemes of division agreed with any great
natural or national boundary. They did not as yet foreshadow the
division which afterwards took place, and out of which the chief states
of Western Europe grew. In two cases only was anything like a national
kingdom thought of. ♦Kingdom of Aquitaine.♦ Charles’s son Lewis reigned
under him as king in _Aquitaine_, a kingdom which took in all Southern
Gaul and the Spanish March, answering pretty nearly to the lands of
the Provençal tongue or tongue of _Oc_. ♦Death of Charles. 814.♦ And
when Charles died, and was succeeded in the Empire by Lewis, Charles’s
grandson Bernard still went on reigning under his uncle as King of
Italy. ♦Kingdom of Italy.♦ The _Kingdom of Italy_ must be understood
as taking in the Italian mainland, except the lands in the south which
were held by the dependent princes of Beneventum and by the rival
Emperors of the East. ♦Use of the name _Francia_.♦ During this period
_Francia_ commonly means the strictly Frankish kingdoms, Gaulish
and German. The words _Gallia_ and _Germania_ are used in a strictly
geographical sense.
§ 6. _Northern Europe._
♦Scandinavians and English.♦
Meanwhile other nations were beginning to show themselves in those
parts of Europe which lay beyond the Empire. In north-western Europe
two branches of the Teutonic race were fast growing into importance;
the one in lands which had never formed part of the Empire, the other
in a land which had been part of it, but which had been so utterly
severed from it as to be all one as if it had never belonged to it.
These were the _Scandinavian_ nations in the two great peninsulas of
Northern Europe, and the _English_ in the Isle of Britain. The history
of these two races is closely connected, and it has an important
bearing on the history of Europe in general.
♦Stages of the English conquest of Britain.♦
In Britain itself the progress of the English arms had been gradual.
Sometimes conquests from the Britons were made with great speed:
sometimes the English advance was checked by successes on the British
side, by mere inaction, or by wars between the different English
kingdoms. The fluctuations of victory, and consequently of boundaries,
between the English kingdoms were quite as marked as the warfare
between the English and the Britons. ♦The English kingdoms.♦ Among the
many Teutonic settlements in Britain, small and great, seven kingdoms
stand out as of special importance, and three of these, _Wessex_,
_Mercia_, and _Northumberland_, again stand out as candidates for a
general supremacy over the whole English name. ♦Britain at the end of
the eighth century.♦ At the end of the eighth century a large part
of Britain remained, as it still remains, in the hands of the elder
Celtic inhabitants; but the parts which they still kept were now cut
off from each other. ♦Celtic states.♦ _Cornwall_ or _West-Wales_,
_North-Wales_ (answering nearly to the modern principality), and
_Strathclyde_ or _Cumberland_ (a much larger district than the modern
county so called) were all the seats of separate, though fluctuating,
British states. Beyond the Forth lay the independent kingdoms of the
_Picts_ and _Scots_, which, in the course of the ninth century, became
one.
♦West-Saxon supremacy under Ecgberht. 802-837.♦
It was the West-Saxon kingdom to which the supremacy over all the
kingdoms of Britain, Teutonic and Celtic, came in the end. Ecgberht,
its king, had been a friend and guest of Charles the Great, and he had
most likely been stirred up by his example to do in his own island
what Charles had done on the mainland. In the course of his reign,
West-Wales was completely conquered; the other English kingdoms,
together with North-Wales, were brought into a greater or less
degree of dependence. But both in North-Wales and also in Mercia,
Northumberland, and East-Anglia, the local kings went on reigning under
the supremacy of the King of the West-Saxons, who now began sometimes
to call himself _King of the English_. In the north both Scotland and
Strathclyde remained quite independent.
♦The Scandinavian nations.♦
That part also of the Teutonic race which lay altogether beyond the
bounds of the Empire now begins to be of importance. ♦The Danes.♦ The
_Danes_ are heard of as early as the days of Justinian; but neither
they nor the other Scandinavian nations play any great part in history
before the time of Charles the Great. A great number of small states
gradually settled down into three great kingdoms, which remain still,
though their boundaries have greatly changed. The boundary between
Denmark and the Empire was, as we have seen, fixed at the Eider.
♦Extent of Denmark and Norway.♦ Besides the peninsula of Jutland
and the islands which still belong to it, Denmark took in _Scania_
and other lands in the south of the great peninsula that now forms
_Sweden_ and _Norway_. Norway, on the other hand, ran much further
inland, and came down much further south than it does now. These points
are of importance, because they show the causes of the later history
of the three Scandinavian states. ♦Sweden.♦ Both Denmark and Norway
had a great front to the Ocean, while _Swithiod_ and _Gauthiod_, the
districts which formed the beginning of the kingdom of Sweden, had no
opening that way, but were altogether turned towards the Baltic. It
thus came about that for some centuries both Denmark and Norway played
a much greater part in the general affairs of Europe than Sweden did.
♦Danish and Norwegian settlements.♦ Denmark was an immediate neighbour
of the Empire, and from both Denmark and Norway men went out to conquer
and settle in various parts of Britain, Ireland and Gaul, besides
colonizing the more distant and uninhabited lands of _Iceland_ and
_Greenland_. ♦Pressure of Swedes to the East.♦ Meanwhile, the Swedes
pressed eastward on the Finnish and Slavonic people beyond the Baltic.
In this last way they had a great effect on the history of the Eastern
Empire; but in Western history Sweden counts for very little till a
much later time.
* * * * *
♦Summary.♦
During the period which has been dealt with in this chapter, taking in
the sixth, seventh, and eighth centuries, we thus see, first of all the
reunion of the greater part of the Roman Empire under Justinian—then
the lopping away of the Eastern and African provinces by the conquests
of the Saracens—then the gradual separation of all Italy except the
south, ending in the re-establishment of a separate Western Empire
under Charles the Great. We thus get two great Christian powers, the
Eastern and Western Empires, balanced by two great Mahometan powers,
the Eastern and Western Caliphates. All the older Teutonic kingdoms
have either vanished or have grown into something wholly different.
The Vandal kingdom of Africa and the East-Gothic kingdom have wholly
vanished. The West-Gothic kingdom, cut short by Franks on one side and
Saracens on the other, survives only in the form of the small Christian
principalities which still held their ground in Northern Spain. The
Frankish kingdom, by swallowing up the Gothic and Burgundian dominions
in Gaul, the independent nations of Germany, the Lombard kingdom, and
the more part of the possessions of the Empire in Italy, has grown
into a new Western Empire. The two Empires, both still politically
Roman, are fast becoming, one German and the other Greek. Meanwhile,
nations beyond the bounds of the Empire are growing into importance.
The process has begun by which the many small Teutonic settlements in
Britain grew in the end into the one kingdom of England. The three
Scandinavian nations, Danes, Swedes, and Norwegians or Northmen, now
begin to grow into importance. In a religious point of view, if Syria,
Egypt, Africa, and the more part of Spain were lost to Christendom,
the loss was in some degree made up by the conversion to Christianity
of the Angles and Saxons in Britain, of the Old-Saxons in Germany, and
of the other German tribes which at the beginning of the sixth century
had still been heathen. At no time in the world’s history did the map
undergo greater changes. This period is the time of real transition
from the older state of things represented by the undivided Roman
Empire to the newer state of things in which Europe is made up of a
great number of independent states. The modern kingdoms outside the
Empire, in Britain and Scandinavia, were already forming. The great
continental nations of Western Europe had as yet hardly begun to form.
They were to grow out of the break-up of the Carolingian Empire, the
Roman Empire of the Franks.[8]
FOOTNOTES:
[7] The geographical extent of the Frankish dominion before and after
the conquest of Charles is most fully marked by Einhard, Vita Karoli,
c. 15.
[8] While I was revising this chapter, I became acquainted with C. J.
Jireček’s _Geschichte der Bulgaren_ (Prag, 1876), the third chapter
of which is devoted to an examination of the early settlements of
the Slaves in the Eastern peninsula. He makes it probable that they
were there earlier than is generally thought. They seem, exactly
like the Teutons, to have first entered the Empire as captives and
colonists, a process which may have begun as early as the second and
third centuries. He shows also that the march of Theodoric into Italy
had the effect of laying a large region open to their settlements.
But he leaves my general propositions untouched. It is not till the
sixth century that those Slavonic movements began which are of real
importance to historical geography.