Part 27

In former days, before I had mooted the subject, the Roman literature of the first half of the third century was thought to have been already quite barbarous, which was indeed the case with the fine arts. Historical plastic art, of which we have specimens in the bas reliefs on the spiral columns, is at its height under Trajan, and still keeps up even as late as the Antonines. Of Antoninus Pius, I know but one historical bas relief, which, however, is wretched: under M. Antoninus, this art had risen again. Architecture was already in its decline under Hadrian, as this emperor had a corrupt taste, being fond of mannerism and an artificial style. The statue of M. Antoninus on horseback is a noble work: if the horse is less to our liking, this is perhaps because the race itself to which it belongs does not seem to us at all beautiful; for indeed the whole is full of spirit and life. But this is also the last masterpiece: even as early as Trajan, art is merely historical, nor is there any monument left in which the ideal of a grand and creative style is to be seen. As for painting, it was now indeed quite gone, as Petronius expressly remarks; some works of this class, which are still to be found, are detestably bad: its decline became complete owing to the rise of mosaic, which now began to be employed. Of the age of Severus and Caracalla, there are still very fine busts; of Severus also, there are still very fine statues; but the bas reliefs on the triumphal arch of this emperor are already thoroughly bad: those on the small arch which was erected by the _argentarii_, are quite barbarously misdrawn, scientific skill and the eye for proportion are lost. After the time of Caracalla, we have not one good bust: they are all misshapen, though some of them may indeed be likenesses. The coins also become more and more barbarous.

The literature of the great jurists has reached its height, and at the same time its end, in Papinian and Ulpian, both of whom, _diversis virtutibus_, are of transcendent greatness: Paullus ought never to be spoken of in the same breath with them. They are both of them excellent likewise with regard to language; for although some small mistakes may be found in it here and there, it is truly Roman. It is remarkable that they had no successors; just as with Demosthenes oratory is at its height, and then dies away; just as after Thucydides, no historian of the same spirit rose up again. A long while afterwards, there followed Hermogenianus and others, who were mere compilers. The scientific arrangement of the law gave rise to the legislation of the imperial secretaries, whose statutes, however, are most detestably drawn up: we may indeed thank our stars, that their verbosity is curtailed in the code.—With regard to the _belles lettres_, I have shown, and I look upon it as an established fact, that Curtius belongs to the time of Severus and Caracalla: he is an author who already writes quite an artificial style, an imitation of Livy. Still later, in the reign of Alexander Severus, perhaps even in that of Gordian, lived the most witty, but most profligate, Petronius Arbiter, in whom Mamæa is distinctly alluded to. The excellent Hadrian Valesius was the first who drew attention to this: the prelate Monsignor Stefano Gradi violently opposed him at first; but he afterwards set an honourable example by giving up his own opinion, and making the proof complete. I have added some further arguments, which both of them had overlooked, such as the passage concerning Mamæa, and likewise an epitaph which is evidently of the time of Severus. Petronius’ language—leaving aside those passages in which he makes people talk, as they really then spoke, in the _lingua rustica_—bears the marks of the age of which it is the true living expression. He is the greatest poetical genius of Rome since the days of Augustus; but one sees how his talent was quite confined to the romance and the poetry of every-day life.

In the middle of the third century, Rome was in everything already sinking into a state of barbarism: even the characters on the inscriptions are of a barbarous shape, and the lines are crooked and slanting.

INVASION OF THE GOTHS. DEATH OF DECIUS. GALLUS TREBONIANUS ÆMILIAN. VALERIAN. GALLIENUS. THE THIRTY TYRANTS.

Decius, although he may have been a very praiseworthy prince, bears the stain of persecutions. His reign was the era of the great break up which began with the Germans, who for seventy years had kept tolerably quiet. The whole of the north of Germany was now in motion, and the Franks made their appearance on the Lower Rhine. With regard to the origin of the Franks, on which go much has been written, I think the opinion to be a very likely one, that the Sigambri on the right banks of the Rhine, and in Westphalia, called themselves Franks, and that they formed a state of their own distinct from that of the Saxons. The Swabians, who are partly called Sueves, and partly Alemanni, make their appearance on the Maine. Yet the grand break up caused by the Goths, dates from the reign of Decius. Over the whole subject of their migrations, hangs the greatest uncertainty. Did they come, as the Icelandic traditions would make us believe, from the South to the North; or the reverse, as the traditions in Jormandes would show? I believe that the question cannot in any way be decided. We can only say thus much, that a large Gothic empire existed in the beginning of the third century, in the south-east of Europe.

The invasion of the Goths was made partly by land through Dacia, partly in skiffs across the Black sea; like the attacks of the Russians on Constantinople in the tenth century. Of the detailed account of the Athenian Dexippus, we have unfortunately nothing but fragments in the _Excerpta de Sententiis_ and _de Legationibus_, besides a few in Syncellus. It is impossible to analyse these invasions in detail: I should not venture to divide them, like Gibbon, into three great expeditions. They overpowered the kingdom of the Bosporus, and destroyed the towns on the northern coast of Asia Minor: they advanced also as far as Cappadocia. Another expedition subdued the Thracian Bosporus which since the destruction of Byzantium lay quite open. It is a proof of the utter lethargy of the Roman Empire, that no attempt was made to fit out any ships of war, to destroy the vessels of the barbarians. The most thriving Bithynian cities, Nicomedia, Prusa, Chalcedon, and others, were destroyed after the death of Decius, and with far more cruelty than the Goths displayed in later times.

We must, however, return to the history of Decius, and go on with it. Even some time already before this, when the Goths made their inroad across the Danube, they were met by Decius. Dexippus wrote this history down to the reign of Claudius Gothicus. The Goths besieged Nicopolis; and when Decius relieved this town, they crossed the ridges of the Hæmus, and took Philippopolis. After they had taken it, Decius again met them in mount Hæmus, and cut off their retreat, when they wanted to make a treaty for a free departure, and even to return the booty and prisoners; but Decius refused, and whilst they were thus driven to despair, he fared as king Frederick did at Kunersdorf. The Goths were drawn up in three lines, two of which were already broken; and if Decius had properly followed up his advantage, and taken such a position that he might have dispersed those who were already beaten, and surrounded the rest, he might have destroyed the whole army. But the unlucky star of Rome led him to attack the third line, which was drawn up behind a marsh or narrow paths and dykes, in a position where all the bravery of the legions was in vain. He met with a defeat in which he and his son lost their lives. This overthrow was decisive; but the Goths likewise had suffered considerable loss, and they were glad to conclude with Gallus Trebonianus, who had been proclaimed emperor, a treaty by which he paid to them a considerable sum to be allowed to march off free. Whether he also granted them abodes in Dacia, is more than I will take upon myself to decide.

Gallus went to Rome, where he took as his colleague Hostilianus, the nephew or son of Decius, who, however, died soon afterwards. As Gallus now reigned despised by every one for the disgraceful peace which he had made; Æmilianus, the governor of Illyricum, rose against him in the East, and leading his army into Italy, gained a victory on the borders of Umbria and the Sabine country, in the neighbourhood of Spoletum, and Gallus lost his life. The latter, in his turn, had an avenger in Valerian; who had been called out of Germany to his aid, and who came indeed too late to save, but soon enough to avenge him: Æmilianus was deserted, and probably murdered by his own soldiers.

Valerian now ascended the throne. Great things were expected from him; yet his reputation was wholly undeserved, and we behold nothing but disaster in his reign. Decius had had the strange idea of restoring the censorship to improve the public morals, and the senate with one voice had named Valerian censor; but Decius’ death happened so soon, that nothing followed from the appointment. Valerian took for his colleague his own son P. Licinius Gallienus, from which name we are not to suppose that there was any relationship to the old Licinii of the best times of the republic. Rome was in those days already quite accustomed to the system of having colleagues; for as the emperor was often at the farthest end of the empire, it was necessary that some one should carry on the government for him. From all sides, the Franks, Alemanni, and Goths now broke in, each nation by itself; and at the same time, the Persians also, under king Sapor, crossed the eastern frontier. The history of Valerian is very obscure and scanty: whether his catastrophe took place in the year 256 or 260, cannot be made out.

The Franks had established their kingdom on the Lower Rhine, and they held both banks of the stream as far up as Coblentz; the Swabians had broken through the entrenched barrier, and taken possession of what is now Suabia, or rather the country from the neighbourhood of the Lahn even to Switzerland. The Juthungi, who are mentioned in this time only, are perhaps so called from the reigning dynasty of the Lombards, and merely mean this people; for the names which end in _-ing_ and _-ung_, are always names of dynasties. The Goths forced their way in swarms of boats, either by the Danube or the Dniester, into the Roman seas, without the Romans ever once opposing to them a fleet. These were devastations like those of the Normans in the ninth and tenth centuries. They plundered the whole of Achaia; they sacked and burned Corinth, Argos, and Athens, which, after many ages, now distinguishes itself again. A spirited band under the _strategus_ Dexippus, the same who wrote this history, left the town for the mountains; and when it had been taken, they came down from thence, and surprised the Gothic fleet in the Piræeus, avenging their city in a manner which does one good to hear. Dexippus must have been an able man, although his history is a work of bad rhetoric.

Just as unhappily, and far more disgracefully besides, did things go on in Mesopotamia and Syria. Valerian, who was opposed to Sapor himself, was brought into a most disadvantageous position, where he met with the fate of General Mack near Ulm: he capitulated and became a prisoner, and he is said to have been very shockingly treated. Whether Asiatic ruthlessness went to the length of having him flayed alive, cannot be decided by us: it was also a disputed point, even among the ancients. The Persians now burst like a flood over Syria and Cappadocia, and near Cæsarea they all but fell in with the Goths: Antioch was taken and sacked. Those who escaped from the sword, were led away into bondage, with a barbarity like that of Soliman at the siege of Vienna, when two hundred thousand men lost their life or their freedom: the city was then get fire to. The same fate befel Cæsarea, after a noble defence. The towns on the Persian frontier alone had preserved their walls; but in the interior, in Greece, and in Asia Minor, no one had ever thought of the possibility of an enemy, and therefore the walls had been allowed to go to ruins, or had been pulled down.

The whole of Syria was overrun and conquered,—a few strong towns only may have held out; but in the midst of the desert, Palmyra, unobserved by the rest of the world, had risen by degrees into an important commercial mart, and from this city, half Syrian and half Arab, there had grown up a power which made head against Sapor. Under the lead of Odenathus, who is justly reckoned among the great men of the East, it was able to fight for its existence, and to hold its own. Odenathus defeated the rear of Sapor, and was not afraid of facing him in the open field. All the Arabs from the interior having joined him, as it seems, he is called _Princeps Saracenorum_ (from ‏شرق‎ to rise, ‏مشرق‎ the East; as Yemen, the right hand, reckoning from Mecca): the name of Saracens is to be met with long before Mohammed. Odenathus must have got together a great force. On the other side also of the Persian empire, diversions must have been made of which, however, we know nothing: for the relations of the Persians with their eastern neighbours are altogether hidden from us.

Valerian died in captivity. Gallienus is reproached for having made no attempt to ransom his father; but, ought he to have done so by giving up provinces? This is the time of the so-called thirty tyrants, a term which has been exploded long ago. Gallienus was a worthless prince, living only for his lusts, and seeking to take his ease in the midst of the most dreadful calamities. He always remained in possession of Italy and of the Noric and Illyrian frontier, and, with hardly an exception, of Greece and Africa: (for a short time only, his authority in Ægypt was disputed). In the East, Syria and the eastern provinces of Asia Minor remained under the rule of Odenathus, and after his death, under that of his great widow Zenobia: these were in some measure acknowledged by the senate and by Gallienus, so that the latter even had a triumph for the victories of Odenathus. From 256, or 260, to 268, Gallienus reigned alone; but in the meanwhile Gaul, Britain, and Spain, even the whole of what was afterwards the _Præfectura Gallica_, were torn away by Postumus, and became a compact territory having its own princes: these may be called emperors with as much right as Gallienus himself, although this would be contrary to Roman orthodoxy. Postumus was a very eminent man: he ruled over this great empire nearly ten years, and, if we may rely on his coins, gained a succession of brilliant victories over the Barbarians, particularly the Alemanni, and the Franks. The Alemanni must at that time have undertaken a wide wasting expedition as far as Spain, perhaps in the service of one of the then Emperors. The real name of Postumus is M. Cassianus[60] Latinius Postumus. He has left behind him a noble reputation; but the misfortunes of Gaul already now begin, as is proved by the destruction of Autun, which from that time lay in ruins until the reign of Diocletian: Spain also was devastated by the Barbarians. At Mentz, Ælianus[61] had usurped the imperial title; but he was conquered by Postumus, who in his turn lost his life when he would not let his soldiers pillage that city. He was succeeded by Victorinus, (his full name is M. Piavvonius Victorinus,) a brave but profligate general, whose outrages brought upon himself death from the hands of a deeply injured man. Then followed Marius, a common armourer, and after him a great Gallic lord, C. Pesuvius Tetricus, who was acknowledged throughout the whole of what was afterwards called the Gallic Prefecture, and maintained himself there until the reign of Aurelian. Here it is plainly to be seen how the division into prefectures was altogether founded upon circumstances, and by no means an arbitrary one. The nation now consists of Latinized Celts and Latinized Iberians, who were distinguished from the Italians by very decided peculiarities of their own.

The empire of Palmyra, as Eckhel justly remarks in opposition to Gibbon, did not reach beyond Egypt and the countries of the Levant: Egypt perhaps it only comprised in the last years, under Claudius Gothicus. From coins especially, one may learn much, although they are often enigmatical, that is to say, they give us enigmas to solve which but for them would have never come to us at all. In Illyricum, Africa, Egypt, even in peaceful Achaia, pretenders now arose, whose rule indeed lasted but a short time, yet they most sadly distracted the empire. The whole of the state, in fact, now consisted of three distinct masses. In the first place, there was the empire of Rome; secondly, there was the West or Gallic empire; and thirdly, that of the East. In Gaul, even very far back indeed, as early as the days of Augustus and Tiberius, a marked spirit of independence might have been observed, whereas Spain was much more sincerely united to Rome: in the East, it was quite the reverse, just as in Gaul. Treves was even at that time the seat of government, as perhaps it was also under Postumus and Victorinus, although they often lived at Cologne: Neuwied is called on the inscriptions _Victoriensis_, which may have some connexion with Victorinus and his mother Victoria. The _Porta Nigra_ at Treves belongs to this time. It is a Roman gate, on each side of which there are basilicas: the whole building is of no older date. The capital of such an empire might well have had large structures. Taste had already fallen to a very low ebb.

CLAUDIUS GOTHICUS. AURELIAN. TACITUS. PROBUS. CARUS.

A northern pretender, Aureolus, having marched from Rhætia against Milan, Gallienus fell during the siege of this town, most likely by the hands of his own men. He was a curse to the Roman empire, and his death was its deliverance. After him came a great man, M. Aurelius Claudius, who received the well-earned name of Gothicus. This emperor had to face a new invasion of the Goths, who burst in by the Propontis, and once more destroyed Cyzicus. These now made their appearance in Macedon, besieged even Thessalonica, and from thence marched into the interior of the country. There they met with Claudius, and they wished to retreat back again to the Danube; but Claudius defeated them near Nissa, on the borders of Bulgaria and Servia, in a great battle in which they were all but annihilated. New hordes, however, were always pouring in, the East and West Goths being now joined by the Vandals; and Claudius, while going on with the war against them, died at Sirmium in the middle of his career, either of the plague or of an epidemic caused by the war. The seat of the disease seems to have been in Mœsia, where it did great havoc, both among the Romans and among the Goths. He was succeeded by Aurelian.

The victory of Claudius over the Goths had ensured the safety of the Roman empire, although he still left much undone. The empire of Palmyra evidently was friendly, and it protected the eastern frontier: with Tetricus, the relations were at least perfectly peaceful. Claudius himself had recommended Aurelian as the ablest of his generals, and the senate and the army swore allegiance to him. Aurelian did great things during the five years of his reign (until 273): he restored the empire. One might be tempted to apply to him the remarkable passage in Curtius;[62] but it is not to be believed that such pure Latin should have still been written in his reign. Gibbon must have thought this less unlikely, as far at least as regards the time of Gordian, for which he decides; but the passage on Tyre,[63] to have any meaning at all, must be referred to the times of Septimius Severus and Caracalla. Although Aurelian is no ideal of a character, yet there is much in his reign which gives one pleasure, like every age in which anything that has fallen into ruin has been restored. But unhappily there are also here no sufficient sources; all is obscure: the imperial history, on the whole, is much more so than that of the republic; we are much better able to reconstruct the history of the twelfth and thirteenth century from the chronicles. The accounts we have of Aurelian, although they may be strung together, form no history: the coins are far safer authorities for this time, and with these the statements of our wretched historians cannot be made to agree. Gibbon has done everything that was possible, nor will his work ever be surpassed.

Aurelian passed the five years of his reign in an activity which beggars belief, going from one frontier to another, and from war to war. At first, he wisely made peace with the Goths, to whom he gave up the claims of Rome on Dacia. This country may have been in a condition like that of Gaul in the fifth century. The Romans may have kept their ground only in the impassable places of Transylvania, which he now evacuated, there being no hope left of driving back the Goths who had made inroads almost everywhere. The population of Dacia had been so much weakened by the wars, that the country could not be kept: those who wished to leave it, now settled in Bulgaria which thereby gained strength.—The war against the great Zenobia, who was already dreaming of nothing less than an Asiatic empire, was decided by two battles, at Antioch and at Emesa. As Zenobia could stand her ground against the Persians, but not against the Roman legions, her infantry must have been bad: it may be that she had formed in Syria a militia which overawed the Persians, whereas the Romans, who did not wish to give arms into the hands of the borderers, carried on the war with the aid of mercenaries. Zenobia’s defence of Palmyra did not answer the expectation which was entertained of her courage; for she fled and was taken prisoner. In her captivity, she showed herself to be an Asiatic woman, by sacrificing her best advisers as having beguiled her into bad policy: among these was the ingenious Longinus. As without doubt, even at that time, there was in many minds the idea of a Greek Asiatic Empire, an intellectual Greek like Longinus may indeed have suggested such a thought to his princess. It was one of the acts which have stained Aurelian’s purple, that he had this distinguished man put to death; and still worse was his giving up Palmyra to destruction on account of a rebellion of its inhabitants.