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Transcriber’s Note:
This version of the text cannot represent certain typographical effects.
Italics are delimited with the ‘_’ character as _italic_.
Footnotes have been moved to follow the paragraphs in which they are
referenced.
Minor errors, attributable to the printer, have been corrected. Please
see the transcriber’s note at the end of this text for details regarding
the handling of any textual issues encountered during its preparation.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Heroes of the Nations
EDITED BY
=H. W. Carless Davis, M.A.=
FELLOW OF BALLIOL COLLEGE, OXFORD
FACTA DUCIS VIVENT OPEROSAQUE
GLORIA RERUM.—OVID, IN LIVIAM, 265.
THE HERO’S DEEDS AND HARD-WON
FAME SHALL LIVE.
CONSTANTINE
[Illustration:
CONSTANTINE THE GREAT.
FROM THE BRITISH MUSEUM PRINT ROOM. _Frontispiece._
]
CONSTANTINE
THE GREAT
THE REORGANISATION OF THE EMPIRE AND
THE TRIUMPH OF THE CHURCH
BY
JOHN B. FIRTH
(SOMETIME SCHOLAR OF QUEEN’S COLLEGE, OXFORD)
AUTHOR OF “AUGUSTUS CÆSAR,” “A TRANSLATION OF PLINY’S LETTERS,” ETC.
---
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
NEW YORK
27 WEST TWENTY-THIRD STREET
LONDON
24 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND
=The Knickerbocker Press=
1905
------------------------------------------------------------------------
COPYRIGHT, 1904
BY
G. P. PUTNAM’S SONS
----------
Published, January, 1905
=The Knickerbocker Press, New York=
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Illustration]
PREFACE
In the following chapters, my object has been to tell the story of the
Life and Times of Constantine the Great. Whether he deserves the epithet
my readers will judge for themselves; certainly his place in the select
list of the immortals is not among the highest. But whether he himself
was “great” or not, under his auspices one of the most momentous changes
in the history of the world was accomplished, and it is the first
conversion of a Roman Emperor to Christianity, with all that such
conversion entailed, which makes his period so important and so well
worth studying.
I have tried to write with impartiality—a virtue which one admires the
more after a close reading of original authorities who, practically
without exception, were bitter and malevolent partisans. The truth,
therefore, is not always easily recognised, nor has recognition been
made the easier by the polemical writers of succeeding centuries who
have dealt with that side of Constantine’s career which belongs more
particularly to ecclesiastical history. In narrating the course of the
Arian Controversy and the proceedings of the Council of Nicæa I have
been content to record facts—as I have seen them—and to explain the
causes of quarrel rather than act as judge between the disputants. And
though in this branch of my subject I have consulted all the original
authorities who describe the growth of the controversy, I have not
deemed it necessary to read, still less to add to, the endless strife of
words to which the discussion of the theological and metaphysical issues
involved has given rise. On this point I am greatly indebted to, and
have made liberal use of, the admirable chapters in the late Canon
Bright’s _The Age of the Fathers_.
Other authorities, which have been most useful to me, are Boissier’s _La
Fin du Paganisme_, Allard’s _La Persécution de Dioclétien et le Triomphe
de l’Eglise_, Duruy’s _Histoire Romaine_, and Grosvenor’s
_Constantinople_.
J. B. FIRTH.
LONDON, October, 1904.
[Illustration]
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.
PAGE
THE EMPIRE UNDER DIOCLETIAN 1
CHAPTER II.
THE PERSECUTION OF THE CHURCH 12
CHAPTER III.
THE ABDICATION OF DIOCLETIAN AND THE SUCCESSION OF 39
CONSTANTINE
CHAPTER IV.
CONSTANTINE AND HIS COLLEAGUES 56
CHAPTER V.
THE INVASION OF ITALY 73
CHAPTER VI.
THE VISION OF THE CROSS AND THE EDICT OF MILAN 92
CHAPTER VII.
THE DOWNFALL OF LICINIUS 115
CHAPTER VIII.
LAST DAYS OF PERSECUTION 134
CHAPTER IX.
CONSTANTINE AND THE DONATISTS 159
CHAPTER X.
THE ARIAN CONTROVERSY 189
CHAPTER XI.
THE COUNCIL OF NICÆA 211
CHAPTER XII.
THE MURDERS OF CRISPUS AND FAUSTA 237
CHAPTER XIII.
THE FOUNDATION OF CONSTANTINOPLE 257
CHAPTER XIV.
ARIUS AND ATHANASIUS 285
CHAPTER XV.
CONSTANTINE’S DEATH AND CHARACTER 301
CHAPTER XVI.
THE EMPIRE AND CHRISTIANITY 330
INDEX 357
[Illustration]
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
CONSTANTINE THE GREAT _Frontispiece_
From the British Museum Print Room.
BUST OF DIOCLETIAN 22
CONSTANTINE THE GREAT 40
From Grosvenor’s _Constantinople_.
THE GOLDEN GATE OF DIOCLETIAN’S PALACE AT SALONA 60
(SPALATO)
BUST OF MAXIMIAN AT ROME 62
Photograph by Alinari.
FRAGMENT OF 4TH CENTURY EGYPTIAN POTTERY BOWL 70
Showing an early portrait of Christ, with
busts of the Emperor Constantine and the
Empress Fausta. From the British Museum.
THE BATTLE OF THE MILVIAN BRIDGE, BY RAPHAEL 86
In the Vatican. Photograph by Alinari.
THE ARCH OF CONSTANTINE AT ROME 90
Photograph by Alinari.
CONSTANTINE’S VISION OF THE CROSS, BY RAPHAEL 94
In the Vatican. Photograph by Alinari.
THE WESTERN SIDE OF A PEDESTAL, SHOWING THE HOMAGE OF 126
THE VANQUISHED GOTHS
From Grosvenor’s _Constantinople_.
THE AMPHITHEATRE AT ARLES 168
Exterior view. Present day.
THE AMPHITHEATRE AT ARLES AS IT APPEARED IN 1686 172
From an old print.
STATUE OF CONSTANTINE FROM THE PORCH OF SAN GIOVANNI 188
IN LATERAN, AT ROME
GATE OF ST. ANDREW AT AUTUN 212
“CONSTANTINE THE GREAT AND HIS MOTHER, ST. HELENA, 238
HOLY, EQUAL TO THE APOSTLES”
From a picture discovered 1845, in an old
church of Mesembria. From Grosvenor’s
_Constantinople_.
THE DONATION OF CONSTANTINE 248
From the painting by Raphael in the Vatican.
Photograph by Alinari.
ST. HELENA’S VISION OF THE CROSS 250
By Paul Veronese. National Gallery, London.
CHART OF THE EASTERN SECTION OF MEDIÆVAL 258
CONSTANTINOPLE
From Grosvenor’s _Constantinople_.
BAPTISTERY OF SAN GIOVANNI IN LATERAN, ROME 262
Photograph by Alinari.
ST. HELENA AND THE CROSS 268
By Cranach. Lichtenstein Gallery, Vienna.
COLUMN OF CONSTANTINE THE GREAT 270
From Grosvenor’s _Constantinople_.
THE THREE EXISTING MONUMENTS OF THE HIPPODROME 276
From Grosvenor’s _Constantinople_.
PLAN OF THE HIPPODROME 278
From Grosvenor’s _Constantinople_.
THE SERPENT OF DELPHI 280
From Grosvenor’s _Constantinople_.
ST. ATHANASIUS 288
From the British Museum Print Room.
BASILICA OF CONSTANTINE AT ROME 302
From _Rome of To-Day and Yesterday_, by John
Dennie.
THE SUPPOSED SARCOPHAGI OF CONSTANTINE THE GREAT AND 314
THEODOSIUS THE GREAT
From Grosvenor’s _Constantinople_.
LIST OF COINS
COPPER DENARIUS OF CONSTANTINE THE GREAT, SHOWING THE 324
LABARUM
DOUBLE SOLIDUS OF CONSTANTIUS II., WITH THE LABARUM 324
DOUBLE SOLIDUS OF DIOCLETIAN 324
SOLIDUS OF MAXIMIAN 324
AUREUS OF CARAUSIUS 332
AUREUS OF ALLECTUS 332
SOLIDUS OF HELENA 332
SOLIDUS OF GALERIUS 332
SOLIDUS OF SEVERUS II. 332
SOLIDUS OF MAXIMIN DAZA 340
SOLIDUS OF LICINIUS I. 340
SOLIDUS OF LICINIUS II. 340
DOUBLE SOLIDUS OF CONSTANTINE THE GREAT 340
DOUBLE SOLIDUS OF CONSTANTINE THE GREAT 348
DOUBLE SOLIDUS OF FAUSTA 348
DOUBLE SOLIDUS OF CRISPUS 348
DOUBLE SOLIDUS OF CONSTANTIUS II. AS CÆSAR 348
[Illustration]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONSTANTIUS CHLORUS
m. (1) Helena
(2) Theodora (d. of Emperor Maximian)
(1) Constantius = Helena (2) Constantius = Theodora
| |
Constantine the Great |
m. (1) Minervina |
(2) Fausta (d. of Emperor Maximian) |
|
(1) Constantine = Minervina (2) Constantine = Fausta |
| | |
Crispus | |
(killed in 326) | |
| |
+--------------+-------------+----------+--------+ |
| | | | | |
| Constantius II. | Constantina | |
Constantine II. (d. 361) Constans Helena |
(killed in 340) | (killed in 350) m. |
A daughter Julian |
|
+---------+----------+---------------+---------+-------+
| | | | | |
Constantine | Constantius | | |
(killed in 337) | (killed, 337) | Anastasia |
Dalmatius m. (1) Galla Constantia m. Eutropia
Annibalianus (2) Basilina m. Bassianus m.
| | Emperor (Cæsar) Nepotianus
+--------+------+ | Licinius |
| | | |
Dalmatius Annibalianus | Licinianus Flavius Popilius
(Cæsar in 335; (King of Pontus; | killed in 326) Nepotianus
killed in 337) killed in 337) | (killed in 390)
|
(1) Constantius = Galla (2) Constantius = Basilina
| |
+--------+-------+ |
| | |
A son, Gallus Julian
(killed in 337) (killed in 354) (Emperor, 361)
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Illustration]
Constantine
----------
CHAPTER I
THE EMPIRE UNDER DIOCLETIAN
The catastrophe of the fall of Rome, with all that its fall signified to
the fifth century, came very near to accomplishment in the third. There
was a long period when it seemed as though nothing could save the
Empire. Her prestige sank to the vanishing point. Her armies had
forgotten what it was to win a victory over a foreign enemy. Her
Emperors were worthless and incapable. On every side the frontiers were
being pierced and the barriers were giving way.
The Franks swept over Gaul and laid it waste. They penetrated into
Spain; besieged Toledo; and, seizing the galleys which they found in the
Spanish ports, boldly crossed into Mauretanian Africa. Other
confederations of free barbarians from southern Germany had burst
through the wall of Hadrian which protected the Tithe Lands (_Decumates
agri_), and had followed the ancient route of invasion over the Alps.
Pannonia had been ravaged by the Sarmatæ and the Quadi. In successive
invasions the Goths had overrun Dacia; had poured round the Black Sea or
crossed it on shipboard; had sacked Trebizond and Chalcedon, and, after
traversing Bithynia, had reached the coast at Ephesus. Others had
advanced into Greece and Macedonia and challenged the Roman navies for
the possession of Crete.
Not only was Armenia lost, but the Parthians had passed the Euphrates,
vanquished and taken prisoner the Emperor Valerian, and surprised the
city of Antioch while the inhabitants were idly gathered in the theatre.
Valerian, chained and robed in purple, was kept alive to act as Sapor’s
footstool; when he died his skin was tanned and stuffed with straw and
set to grace a Parthian temple. Egypt was in the hands of a rebel who
had cut off the grain supply. And as if such misfortunes were not
enough, there was a succession of terrifying and destructive
earthquakes, which wrought their worst havoc in Asia, though they were
felt in Rome and Egypt. These too were followed by a pestilence which
raged for fifteen years and, according to Eutropius, claimed, when at
its height, as many as five thousand victims in a single day.
It looked, indeed, as though the Roman Empire were past praying for and
its destruction certain.[1] The armies were in wide-spread revolt. Rebel
usurpers succeeded one another so fast that the period came to be known
as that of the Thirty Tyrants, many of whom were elected, worshipped,
and murdered by their soldiers within the space of a few weeks or
months. “You little know, my friends,” said Saturninus, one of the more
candid of these phantom monarchs, when his troops a few years later
insisted that he should pit himself against Aurelian, “you little know
what a poor thing it is to be an Emperor. Swords hang over our necks; on
every side is the menace of spear and dart. We go in fear of our guards,
in terror of our household troops. We cannot eat what we like, fight
when we would, or take up arms for our pleasure. Moreover, whatever an
Emperor’s age, it is never what it should be. Is he a grey beard? Then
he is past his prime. Is he young? He has the mad recklessness of youth.
You insist on making me Emperor; you are dragging me to inevitable
death. But I have at least this consolation in dying, that I shall not
be able to die alone.”[2] In that celebrated speech, vibrating with
bitter irony, we have the middle of the third century in epitome.
-----
Footnote 1:
_Jam desperatis rebus et deleto pæne imperio Romano_ (Eutropius, iv.,
c. 9).
Footnote 2:
_Nescitis, amici, quid mali sit imperare_ (Vopiscus, Saturninus, c.
10).
-----
But then the usual miracle of good fortune intervened to save Rome from
herself. The Empire fell into the strong hands of Claudius, who in two
years smote the Goths by land and sea, and of Aurelian, who recovered
Britain and Gaul, restored the northern frontiers, and threw to the
ground the kingdom over which Zenobia ruled from Palmyra. The Empire was
thus restored once more by the genius of two Pannonian peasants, who had
found in the army a career open to talent. The murder of Aurelian, in
275, was followed by an interregnum of seven months, during which the
army seemed to repent of having slain its general and paid to the Senate
a deference which effectually turned the head—never strong—of that
assembly. Vopiscus quotes a letter written by one senator to another at
this period, begging him to return to Rome and tear himself away from
the amusements of Baiæ and Puteoli. “The Senate,” he says,[3] “has
returned to its ancient status. It is we who make Emperors; it is our
order which has the distribution of offices. Come back to the city and
the Senate House. Rome is flourishing; the whole State is flourishing.
We give Emperors; we make Princes; and we who have begun to create, can
also restrain.” The pleasant delusion was soon dispelled. The legions
speedily re-assumed the rôle of king-makers. Tacitus, the senatorial
nominee, ruled only for a year, and another series of soldier Emperors
succeeded. Probus, in six years of incessant fighting, repeated the
triumphs of Aurelian, and carried his successful arms east, west, and
north. Carus, despite his sixty years, crossed the Tigris and made
good—at any rate in part—his threat to render Persia as naked of trees
as his own bald head was bare of hairs. But Carus’s reign was brief, and
at his death the Empire was divided between his two sons, Carinus and
Numerian. The former was a voluptuary; the latter, a youth of retiring
and scholarly disposition, quite unfitted for a soldier’s life, was soon
slain by his Prætorian præfect, Arrius Aper. But the choice of the army
fell upon Diocletian, and he, after stabbing to the heart the man who
had cleared his way to the throne, gathered up into his strong hands the
reins of power in the autumn of 284. He met in battle the army of
Carinus at Margus, in Moesia, during the spring of 285. Carinus was
slain by his officers and Diocletian reigned alone.
-----
Footnote 3:
Vopiscus, Florianus, c. 6.
-----
But he soon found that he needed a colleague to halve with him the
dangers and the responsibilities of empire. He, therefore, raised his
lieutenant, Maximian, to the purple, with the title of Cæsar, and a
twelvemonth later gave him the full name and honours of Augustus. There
were thus two armies, two sets of court officials, and two palaces, but
the edicts ran in the joint name of both Augusti. Then, when still
further division seemed advisable, the principle of imperial partnership
was extended, and it was decided that each Augustus should have a Cæsar
attached to him. Galerius was promoted to be the Cæsar of Diocletian;
Constantius to be the Cæsar of Maximian. Each married the daughter of
his patron, and looked forward to becoming Augustus as soon as his
superior should die. The plan was by no means perfect, but there was
much to be said in its favour. An Emperor like Diocletian, the nominee
of the eastern army alone and the son of a Dalmatian slave, had few, if
any, claims upon the natural loyalty of his subjects. Himself a
successful adventurer, he knew that other adventurers would rise to
challenge his position, if they could find an army to back them. By
entrusting Maximian with the sovereignty of the West, he forestalled
Maximian’s almost certain rivalry, and the four great frontiers each
required the presence of a powerful army and an able commander-in-chief.
By having three colleagues, each of whom might hope in time to become
the senior Augustus, Diocletian secured himself, so far as security was
possible, against military rebellion.
Unquestionably, too, this decentralisation tended towards general
efficiency. It was more than one man’s task, whatever his capacity, to
hold together the Empire as Diocletian found it. Gaul was ablaze from
end to end with a peasants’ war. Carausius ruled for eight years in
Britain, which he temporarily detached from the Empire, and, secure in
his naval strength, forced Diocletian and Maximian, much to their
disgust, to recognise him as a brother Augustus. This archpirate, as
they called him, was crushed at last, but whenever Constantius crossed
into Britain it was necessary for Maximian to move up to the vacant
frontier of the Rhine and mount guard in his place. We hear, too, of
Maximian fighting the Moors in Mauretania. War was thus incessant in the
West. In the East, Diocletian recovered Armenia for Roman influence in
287 by placing his nominee, Tiridates, on the throne. This was done
without a breach with Parthia, but in 296 Tiridates was expelled and war
ensued. Diocletian summoned Galerius from the Danube and entrusted him
with the command. But Galerius committed the same blunder which Crassus
had made three centuries and a half before. He led his troops into the
wastes of the Mesopotamian desert and suffered the inevitable disaster.
When he returned with the survivors of his army to Antioch, Diocletian,
it is said, rode forth to meet him; received him with cold displeasure;
and, instead of taking him up into his chariot, compelled him to march
alongside on foot, in spite of his purple robe. However, in the
following year, 297, Galerius faced the Parthian with a new army, took
the longer but less hazardous route through Armenia, and utterly
overwhelmed the enemy in a night attack. The victory was so complete
that Narses sued for peace, paying for the boon no less a price than the
whole of Mesopotamia and five provinces in the valley of the Tigris, and
renouncing all claim to the sovereignty of Armenia.
This was the greatest victory which Rome had won in the East since the
campaigns of Trajan and Vespasian. It was followed by fifty years of
profound peace; and the ancient feud between Rome and Parthia was not
renewed until the closing days of the reign of Constantine. Lactantius,
of whose credibility as a historian we shall speak later on, sneers at
the victory of Galerius, which he says was “easily won”[4] over an enemy
encumbered by baggage, and he represents him as being so elated with his
success that when Diocletian addressed him in a letter of congratulation
by the name of Cæsar, he exclaimed,[5] with glowing eyes and a voice of
thunder, “How long shall I be merely Cæsar?” But there is no word of
corroboration from any other source. On the contrary, we can see that
Diocletian, whose forte was diplomacy rather than generalship, was on
the best of terms with his son-in-law, Galerius, who regarded him not
with contempt, but with the most profound respect. Diocletian and
Galerius, for their lifetime at any rate, had settled the Eastern
question on a footing entirely satisfactory and honourable to Rome. A
long line of fortresses was established on the new frontier, within
which there was perfect security for trade and commerce, and the result
was a rapid recovery from the havoc caused by the Gothic and Parthian
irruptions.
-----
Footnote 4:
_De Mort. Persec._, c. 9: _Non difficiliter oppressit._
Footnote 5:
_Truci vultu ac voce terribili, Quousque tandem Cæsar?_
-----
Though Diocletian had divided the supreme power, he was still the moving
and controlling spirit, by whose nod all things were governed.[6] He had
chosen for his own special domain Asia, Syria, and Egypt, fixing his
capital at Nicomedia, which he had filled with stately palaces, temples,
and public buildings, for he indulged the dream of making his city the
rival of Rome. Galerius ruled the Danubian provinces with Greece and
Illyricum from his capital at Sirmium. Maximian, the Augustus of the
West, ruled over Italy, Africa, and Spain from Milan; Constantius
watched over Gaul and Britain, with headquarters at Treves and at York.
But everywhere the writ of Diocletian ran. He took the majestic name of
Jovius, while Maximian styled himself Herculius; and it stands as a
marvellous tribute to his commanding influence that we hear of no
friction between the four masters of the world.
-----
Footnote 6:
_Cujus nutu omnia gubernabantur._
-----
Diocletian profoundly modified the character of the Roman Principate. He
orientalised it, adopting frankly and openly the symbols and
paraphernalia of royalty which had been so repugnant to the Roman
temper. Hitherto the Roman Emperors had been, first and foremost,
Imperators, heads of the army, soldiers in the purple. Diocletian became
a King, clad in sumptuous robes, stiff with embroidery and jewels.
Instead of approaching with the old military salute, those who came into
his presence bent the knee and prostrated themselves in adoration. The
monarch surrounded himself, not with military præfects, but with
chamberlains and court officials, the hierarchy of the palace, not of
the camp. We cannot wholly impute this change to vanity or to that
littleness of mind which is pleased with pomp and elaborate ceremonial.
Diocletian was too great a man to be swayed by paltry motives. It was
rather that his subjects had abdicated their old claim to be called a
free and sovereign people, and were ready to be slaves. The whole
senatorial order had been debarred by Gallienus from entering the army,
and had acquiesced without apparent protest in an edict which closed to
its members the profession of arms. Diocletian thought that his throne
would be safer by removing it from the ken of the outside world, by
screening it from vulgar approach, by deepening the mystery and
impressiveness attaching to palaces, by elaborating the court
ceremonial, and exalting even the simplest of domestic services into the
dignity of a liturgy. It may be that these changes intensified the
servility of the subject, and sapped still further the manhood and
self-respect of the race. Let it not be forgotten, however, that the
ceremonial of the modern courts of Europe may be traced directly back to
the changes introduced by Diocletian, and also that the ceremonial,
which the older school of Romans would have thought degrading and
effeminate, was, perhaps, calculated to impress by its stateliness,
beauty, and dignity the barbarous nations which were supplying the Roman
armies with troops.
We will reserve to a later chapter some account of the remodelled
administration, which Constantine for the most part accepted without
demur. Here we may briefly mention the decentralisation which Diocletian
carried out in the provinces. Lactantius[7] says that “he carved the
provinces up into little fragments that he might fill the earth with
terror,” and suggests that he multiplied officials in order to wring
more money out of his subjects. That is an enemy’s perversion of a wise
statesman’s plan for securing efficiency by lessening the administrative
areas, and bringing them within working limits. Diocletian split up the
Empire into twelve great dioceses. Each diocese again was subdivided
into provinces. There were fifty-seven of these when he came to the
throne; when he quitted it there were ninety-six. The system had grave
faults, for the principles on which the finances of the Empire rested
were thoroughly mischievous and unsound. But the reign of Diocletian was
one of rapid recuperation and great prosperity, such as the Roman world
had not enjoyed since the days of the Antonines.
-----
Footnote 7:
_Et, ut omnia terrore complerentur, provinciæ quoque in frusta
concisæ_ (_De Mort. Persec._, c. 7).
-----
[Illustration]
[Illustration]