SPRING 2014
Department of History
Ancient/Medieval History until 14th c.
AD
Instructor: Maria Antoniou, PhD
The Roman Empire: history and
cultural achievements
PART A
The Republic (509-27 B.C.)
Model of the city of Rome during the early fourth century CE. Museo della Civiltà Romana. 1)
Temple of Portunus,, 2) Circus Maximus. 3) Palatine Hill, 4) Temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, 5)
Pantheon, 6) Column of Trajan, 7) Forum of Trajan, 8) Markets of Trajan, 9) Forum of Julius
Ceasar, 10) Forum of Augustus, 11) Forum Romanum, 12) Basilica Nova, 13) Arch of Titus, 14)
Temple of Venus and Roma, 15) Arch of Constantine, 16) Colossus of Nero, 17) Colosseum.
Princeps - the democratic-evoking title
adopted by Octavian, meaning “first
citizen,” which somewhat mitigated the
monarchial analogue of his position.
In 27 B.C.E., the Senate, at Octavian’s
bequest, granted him imperium maius,
the greatest proconsular power, and the
tribunician power, which allowed him to
conduct business in the Senate and veto
Senate decisions. He also gained the
semireligious title Augustus, implying
veneration, holiness, and majesty.
Augustus brought prosperity to Rome by
reforming its administration.
Augustus purged the Senate of undesirable
members and set its limit at 600.
Augustus controlled the Senate elections
to ensure that promising young men would
join the Senate after a period of
magistracy.
Installed the first Roman police
department, fire department, controlled
grain distribution, and monitored aquatics.
After a barbarian defeat in 9 B.C.E., Augustus
abandoned defense of the northern frontier.
Augustus reformed the Army to include
twenty year enlistments, good pay, occasional
bonuses and a pension.
Over time, Romanized provinces became
buffers against the barbarians outside the
provinces.
The Roman
Empire, 14 C.E
Introduced laws curbing divorce,
encouraging early marriage, and
encouraging procreation.
Augustus built many temples, revived old
cults, and banned the worship of new,
foreign gods.
The high point of Roman culture came in
the last century of the Republic, and
during the Principate of Augustus.
The periods evidence both dominant Greek
influence and uniquely Roman qualities.
Cicero was a famous orator who believed
in a world governed by natural laws that
humans could interpret. His writings were
an important legacy in the Middle Ages
and were reinterpreted in the Renaissance.
Much of the work of the great Roman
historian Sallust is lost, but the military
accounts of Julius Caesar survive.
The Roman legal code was developed by
praetors and eventually adopted the view
that law was natural.
The poetry of Lucretius aimed to save
society from fear and superstition. The
aristocratic Catullus wrote personal,
sometimes autobiographical, poetry.
Mosaic from Tunisia
shows the poet Vergil
reading from his
Aeneid to the Muses
of Epic and Tragedy
Vergil’s poetry glorified the civil
greatness, peace, and prosperity that
Augustus brought to Rome. Horace was a
great lyric poet. Ovid wrote about the
sexual licentiousness of the Roman
aristocracy, which prompted his exile by
Augustus.
Livy gathered a host of sources into an
impressive narrative of Rome’s birth to the
present.
Architecture in the Augustan period was
influenced by the Greek classical style.
Augustus beautified Rome with many new
buildings, rebuilt the Roman forum, and
built a forum of his own.
The successors of Augustus were known
by the title imperator, or emperor.
Tiberius, Gaius,
Claudius, and Nero
succeeded Augustus
and were descended
from either him or
Livia, his wife.
The Praetorian Guard
assassinated the unruly
Gaius, commonly
remembered as
Caligula, and
established Claudius as
imperator.
Nero’s unpopularity led to rebellion in 68
C.E. and military conflict ensued from
which Vespasian emerged victorious.
After the death of Vespasian’s two sons,
who succeeded him as emperor, the “five
good Emperors” ruled, each was appointed
by the Senate.
The death of Marcus Aurelius and the
elevation of his son Commodus to emperor
ended the reign of the “five good
Emperors” and had unfortunate results.
Marcus Aurelius, emperor of Rome from
161 to 180 C.E., was one of the five “good
emperors” who brought a period of relative
peace and prosperity to the empire. This is
the only Roman bronze equestrian statue
that has survived.
Capitoline Museums, Rome, Italy/Canali
PhotoBank, Milan/Superstock
Romans left towns in charge of councils of
citizens who gained Roman citizenship by
serving in the government.
Jews found their religion incompatible with
Roman demands and were savagely
repressed.
Trajan initiated alimenta, a welfare
program for the children of the poor.
As cities prospered, the countryside
suffered from lack of resources and
attention.
Trajan captured Dacia (between the
Danube and the Carpathian mountains),
Hadrian fortified Roman holdings, and
Marcus Aurelius spent much of his time
fighting barbarians in the east and on the
Danube.
Eventually coloni, lower class tenant
farmers, replaced slaves as the source of
Roman agricultural labor.
Provinces of
the Roman
Empire to 117
CE.
Women conducted salons, took part in literary
groups, and, sometimes, conducted free
sexual lives.
Several women close to emperors had great
influence on their policies, lives, and,
sometimes, deaths.
Rome had at least 500,000 and perhaps as
many as one million people.
Living space was cramped, so residents lived
in five- or six-story apartments.
The wooden buildings were fire hazards and
sanitary conditions were not pleasant.
The literary period between the death of
Augustus and the time of Marcus Aurelius is
known as the Silver Age; writers were known
for their gloom, negativity, and pessimism.
The Romans designed two new buildings: the
large public bath and the amphitheatre.
During this time, the Pantheon was built.
Gladiator battles were a popular pastime as
people increasingly turned away from public
service and the Roman population declined.
39
40
41
42
Roman Wall
Painting
43
44
45
Primaporta, Italy, ca. 30–20 bce. Fresco, 6′ 7″ high. Museo Nazionale
Romano—Palazzo Massimo alle Terme, Rome.
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
Pax Romana and
Augustus
53
54
Female personification (Tellus?), panel on the east facade of the Ara Pacis
Augustae, Rome, Italy, 13–9 bce. Marble, 5′ 3″ high.
55
Procession of the imperial family, detail of the south frieze of the Ara Pacis
Augustae, Rome, Italy, 13–9 bce. Marble, 5′ 3″ high.
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
Model of an insula, Ostia, Italy, second century ce. Museo della Civiltà
Romana, Rome.
63
64
65
Late Roman
Sculpture and
Painting
66
67
68
69
70
71
Battle of Romans and barbarians (Ludovisi Battle Sarcophagus), from
Rome, Italy, ca. 250–260 ce. Marble, 5′ high. Museo Nazionale Romano—
Palazzo Altemps, Rome.
72
73
74
75
76
SPRING 2014
Department of History
Ancient/Medieval History until 14th c.
AD
Instructor: Maria Antoniou, PhD
Late Antiquity and The Emergence of
the Medieval World
PART 1
By the third century the Roman Empire was experiencing a number of
problems and the growth of a new religion – Christianity
The emperors Diocletian and Constantine initiated reforms that created
the “Late Empire”.
Constantine converted to Christianity.
In the west invasions of Germanic tribes. Therefore, in the mid-5th c. the
old imperial structure collapsed and a series of Germanik kingdoms
emerged.
Christian church played a role as it converted these Germanic tribes to its
faith.
While the Germanic kingdoms were putting down roots in the west, the
eastern part of the old Roman Empire, increasingly Greek in culture,
continued as the Byzantine Empire.
At the same time a new culture centered on Islam emerged in the east.
Late Antiquity and The Emergence of the Medieval World
Focus Question: What reforms did Diocletian and Constantine institute,
and to what extent were the reforms successful?
At the end of the troubled third century, a new emperor—Diocletian
(284–305)—began the process of restoring the strength of the Roman
Empire.
Diocletian had risen through the ranks to become a prominent military
leader, and after the murder of the emperor Numerian by his praetorian
prefect, Diocletian executed the prefect and was then hailed as emperor
by his soldiers.
Diocletian created a new administrative system for a restructured empire.
The number of provinces was increased to almost one hundred by
creating smaller districts superintended by more officials.
The provinces were in turn grouped into twelve dioceses, each headed by
an official called a vicar.
The twelve dioceses were grouped into four prefectures, and the entire
Roman Empire was divided into two parts, east and west.
Divisions of the late Roman
Empire, c. 300.
Each part contained two prefectures and was ruled by an ‘‘Augustus.’’
Diocletian ruled the east and Maximian (mak-SIM-ee-un), a strong
military commander, the west.
Each Augustus was assisted by a chief lieutenant or ‘‘vice-emperor’’ called
a ‘‘Caesar,’’ who theoretically would eventually succeed to the position of
Augustus.
This new system was called the tetrarchy (rule by four).
Diocletian had obviously come to believe that one man was not capable of ruling
such an enormous empire, especially in view of the barbarian invasions of the
third century.
Each of the four tetrarchs—two Augusti and two Caesars—resided in a different
administrative capital. Diocletian, for example, established his base at
Nicomedia in Bithynia.
Despite the appearance of four-man rule, however, it is important to note that
Diocletian’s military seniority enabled him to claim a higher status and hold the
ultimate authority.
10
Soon after Diocletian’s retirement in 305, a new struggle for power ensued.
Constantine continued and even expanded the autocratic policies of
Diocletian. Under these two rulers, the Roman Empire was transformed into a
system in which the emperor had far more personal power than Augustus,
Trajan, or any of the other emperors had had during the Pax Romana.
The emperor, now clothed in jewel-bedecked robes of gold and blue, was seen
as a divinely sanctioned monarch whose will was law. Government officials were
humble servants required to kneel before the emperor and kiss his robe.
The Roman senate was stripped of any power and became merely the city
council for Rome.
The army was enlarged to 400,000 men, including units filled with
Germans.
By the end of Constantine’s reign, the army also had a new organization.
Military forces were divided between:
A) garrison troops, which were located on the frontiers to serve as a first
line of defense against invaders, and B) mobile units, which were based
behind the frontier but could be quickly moved to support frontier troops
when the borders were threatened.
This system gave the empire greater flexibility in responding to invasion.
The political and military reforms of Diocletian and Constantine greatly
enlarged two institutions—the army and the civil service —that drained
most of the public funds.
Although more revenues were needed to pay for the military and the
bureaucracy, the population was not growing, so the tax base could not be
expanded.
Diocletian and Constantine devised new economic and social policies to deal
with these financial burdens. Like their political policies, these economic and
social policies were all based on coercion and loss of individual freedom.
To fight inflation, in 301 Diocletian resorted to issuing an edict that
established maximum wages and prices for the entire empire. It was
applied mostly in the east, but despite severe penalties, like most wage
and price controls, it was largely unenforceable.
The decline in the coins in circulation forced Diocletian to collect taxes
and make government payments in produce. Constantine, however,
managed to introduce a new gold coin, the solidus, and new silver coins
that remained in circulation during his reign.
In the third century, the city councils, which had formed one of the most
important administrative units of the empire, had begun to decline. Since the
curiales (KUR-ee-all-ayss) (the city councillors) were forced to pay expenses out
of their own pockets when the taxes they collected were insufficient, the wealthy
no longer wanted to serve in these positions.
Diocletian and Constantine responded by issuing edicts that forced the rich to
continue in their posts as curiales, making the positions virtually hereditary.
Some curiales realized that their fortunes would be wiped out and fled the
cities to escape the clutches of the imperial bureaucracy. If caught, however,
they were returned to their cities like runaway slaves and forced to resume their
duties.
Coercion also came to form the underlying basis for numerous
occupations in the Late Roman Empire.
To maintain the tax base and keep the empire going despite the shortage
of labor, the emperors issued edicts that forced people to remain in their
designated vocations. Hence, basic jobs, such as bakers and shippers,
became hereditary.
Free tenant farmers—the coloni— continued to decline and increasingly
found themselves bound to the land as large landowners took advantage
of the depressed agricultural conditions to enlarge their landed estates.
To guarantee their supply of
labor, the landlords obtained the
government’s co-operation in attaching the tenant farmers to the estates.
In addition to facing increased restrictions on their freedom, the lower
classes were burdened with enormous taxes, since the wealthiest classes in
the Late Roman Empire were either exempt from paying taxes or evaded
them by bribing the tax collectors. These tax pressures undermined lowerclass support for the regime.
A fifth-century writer reported that the Roman peasants welcomed the
Visigothic invaders of southern Gaul as liberators because the enemy was
more lenient to them than the tax collectors.
Constantine engaged in extensive building programs despite the strain
they placed on the budget. Many of them took place in the provinces, as
Rome had become merely a symbolic capital. It was considered too far
from the frontiers to serve as an imperial administrative center.
Between 324 and 330, Constantine carried out his biggest project, the
construction of a new capital city in the east, on the site of the Greek
city of Byzantium (bih-ZAN-tee-um), on the shores of the Bosporus.
Named the ‘‘city of Constantine,’’ or Constantinople (modern Istanbul),
it was developed for defensive reasons; it had an excellent strategic location.
Calling it his ‘‘New Rome,’’ Constantine endowed the city with a forum,
large palaces, and a vast amphitheater.
• It was officially dedicated on May 11, 330, ‘‘by the commandment of God,’’
and in the following years, many Christian churches were built there.
Constantine did not entirely forget Rome. Earlier he was responsible for
building public baths and the triumphal Arch of Constantine, erected
between 312 and 315.
Constantine was also the first emperor to build churches for the Christian
faith in Rome, including the first basilica dedicated to Saint Peter, built on
the supposed site of Saint Peter’s burial.
These acts by Constantine are a reminder of the new role Christianity was
beginning to play in the Late Empire.
• The Emperor Constantine. This marble
head of Constantine, which is 8 feet 6
inches high, was part of an enormous 30
foot-taIl seated statue of the emperor in the
New Basilica in Rome.
• Constantine used these awe-inspiring
statues throughout the empire to build
support for imperial policies by
reminding his subjects of his position as
an absolute ruler with immense power.
Being depicted with his eyes cast up
toward
heaven
also
emphasized
Constantine’s special relationship with
God.
Constantine’s support for Christianity supposedly began in 312, when his army
was about to fight a crucial battle against the forces of Maxentius (mak-SENshuss) at the Milvian Bridge, which crossed the Tiber River just north of Rome.
According to the traditional story, before the battle, Constantine saw a vision of
a Christian cross with the words, ‘‘In this sign you will conquer.’’ Having won the
battle, the story goes, Constantine was convinced of the power of the Christian
God.
Although he was probably not baptized until the end of his life, in 313 he issued
the famous Edict of Milan, which officially tolerated the existence of
Christianity.
After Constantine, all of the emperors were Christian with the exception
of Julian (360–363), who tried briefly to restore the traditional GrecoRoman polytheistic religion. But he died in battle, and his reign was too
short to make a difference.
Under
Theodosius (thee-uh-DOH-shuss) I ‘‘the Great’’ (379–395)
Christianity was made the official religion of the Roman Empire. Once in
control, Christian leaders used their influence and power to outlaw pagan
religious practices. Christianity had triumphed.
By the fourth century, the Christian church had developed a system of
government based on a territorial plan borrowed from Roman
administration. The Christian community in each city was headed by a
bishop, whose area of jurisdiction was known as a bishopric or diocese.
The bishoprics of each Roman province were clustered together under the
direction of an archbishop. The bishops of four great cities, Rome,
Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch, held positions of special power in
church affairs because the churches in these cities all asserted that they
had been founded by the original apostles sent out by Jesus.
One reason the church needed a more formal organization was the
problem of heresy. As Christianity developed and spread, contradictory
interpretations of important doctrines emerged. Heresy came to be
viewed as a teaching different from the official ‘‘catholic’’ or universal
beliefs of the church.
For people deeply concerned about salvation, the question of whether
Jesus’s nature is divine or human took on great significance. These
doctrinal differences also became political issues, creating political
factions that actually warred with one another. It is unlikely that ordinary
people understood the issues in these debates.
One of the major heresies of the fourth century was Arianism (AR-ee-uh-
niz-um), which was a product of the followers of Arius (AR-ee-uss), a
priest from Alexandria in Egypt.
Arius postulated that Jesus had been human and thus not truly God.
Arius was opposed by Athanasius (ath-uh-NAY-shuss), a bishop of
Alexandria, who argued that Jesus was human but also truly God.
Emperor Constantine, disturbed by the controversy, called the first
ecumenical council of the church, a meeting
representatives from the entire Christian community.
composed
of
The Council of Nicaea (ny-SEE-uh), held in 325, condemned Arianism
and stated that Jesus was of ‘‘the same substance’’ as God: ‘‘We believe in
one God the Father All-sovereign, maker of all things visible and invisible;
And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father,
only-begotten, that is, of the substance of the Father, God of God, Light of
Light, true God of true God, begotten not made, of one substance with the
Father.’
The Council of Nicaea did not end the controversy, however; not only did
Arianism persist in some parts of the Roman Empire for many years, but
even more important, many of the Germanic Goths who established states
in the west converted to Arian Christianity.
As a result of these fourth-century religious controversies, the Roman
emperor came to play an increasingly important role in church affairs,
especially by taking responsibility for calling church councils.
After Constantine’s death, the empire began to divide into western and
eastern parts as fighting erupted on a regular basis between elements of
the Roman army backing the claims of rival emperors.
By 395, the western and eastern parts of the empire had become virtually
two independent states.
In the course of the fifth century, while the empire in the east remained
intact under the Roman emperor in Constantinople the administrative
structure of the empire in the west collapsed and was replaced by an
assortment of Germanic kingdoms.
The process was a gradual one, involving the movement of Germans into
the empire, military failures, struggles for power on the part of both
Roman and German military leaders, and the efforts of wealthy
aristocrats to support whichever side seemed to offer them greater
security.
During the first and second centuries C.E., the Romans had established
the Rhine and Danube Rivers as the empire’s northern boundary. The
Romans called all the peoples to the north of the rivers ‘‘Germans’’ and
regarded them as uncivilized barbarians.
In fact, the Germans comprised several different groups with their own
customs and identities, but these constantly changed as tribes broke up
and came together in new configurations. At times they formed larger
confederations under strong warrior leaders.
The Germans lived by herding and farming and also traded with people
living along the northern frontiers of the Roman Empire. Their proximity
to the Romans also led to some Romanization of the tribes.
They were familiar with the Roman use of coins rather than barter and
also gained some knowledge of both the Latin language and Roman
military matters.
Contacts between Romans and Germans were common across
the
boundaries established along the Rhine and Danube Rivers. In fact, for
some time, the Romans had hired Germanic tribes to fight other
Germanic tribes that threatened Rome and enlisted groups of Germans to
fight for Rome.
Until the fourth century, the empire had proved capable of absorbing
these people without harm to its political structure. As that century wore
on, however, the situation began to change as the Germanic tribes came
under new pressures from invaders.
In the late fourth century, the Huns, a fierce tribe of nomads from Asia
began moving into the Black Sea region and forced the Germanic
inhabitants westward.
In 376, one of the largest groups, which came to be known as the
Visigoths (VlZ-uh-gahthz), asked the Roman emperor Valens (VAY-linz)
(364–378) to allow them to cross the Danube and farm in the Balkans in
return for providing troops for the Roman military. But the Roman
military commanders mistreated them, as one ancient German historian
recounted:
“ Soon famine and want came upon them. . .. Their leaders ….. begged the
Roman commanders to open a market. But to what will not the ‘‘cursed lust
for gold’’ compel men to assent? The generals, swayed by greed, sold them
at a high price not only the flesh of sheep and oxen, but even the carcasses
of dogs and unclean animals. . .. When their goods and chattels failed, the
greedy traders demanded their sons in return for the necessities of life. And
the parents consented even to this”.
Outraged at this treatment, the Visigoths revolted. In 378, Emperor Valens
and an army of 40,000 soldiers confronted the Visigoths at Adrianople.
The emperor was killed, and two-thirds of the Roman soldiers were left
dead on the battlefield.
The loss was not fatal, although the new emperor, Theodosius I,
resettled the Visigoths and incorporated many of their soldiers into the
Roman army. Some of the Visigoths even became army leaders. By the
second half of the fourth century, Roman policy allowed Roman army
units to be composed entirely of Germanic tribes, known as federates, or
allies of Rome.
SPRING 2014
Department of History
Ancient/Medieval History until 14th c.
AD
Instructor: Maria Antoniou, PhD
Late Antiquity and The Emergence of
the Medieval World
PART 2
The existence of
such military groups proved dangerous to the Late
Empire. This was especially evident after Alaric (AL-uh-rik) became the
leader of the Visigoths. Between 395 and 401, Alaric and his soldiers
moved through the Balkans and then into Italy, seeking food and cash
payments from Roman officials.
When the city of Rome refused his demands in 408, Alaric marched to the
gates and besieged the city, causing the senate of Rome to agree to pay
5,000 pounds of gold and 30,000 pounds of silver for his withdrawal.
Two years later, frustrated in his demand that the Visigoths be given part
of northern Italy, Alaric and his forces sacked Rome for three days. Alaric
died soon after, and his Visigothic followers left Italy, crossed the Alps,
and moved into Spain and southern Gaul as Roman allies.
By this time, other Germanic tribes were also entering the Roman Empire
and settling down. As one contemporary observer noted, ‘‘the barbarians,
detesting their swords, turned to their plows and now cherish the Romans
as comrades and friends.’’
In the early fifth century, the Burgundians arrived in southern Gaul, while
the Franks moved into northern Gaul. Another group, the Vandals, under
their leader Gaiseric (GY-zuh-rik), moved through Gaul and Spain,
crossed the Strait of Gibraltar into North Africa, and seized Carthage, the
capital city, in 439.
As the Germanic tribes moved into the empire and settled down, Roman
forces were often withdrawn from the provinces, effectively reducing the
central authority of the emperors. In 410, for example, the emperor
Honorius (hoh-NOR-ee-uss) recalled the last Roman legions from
Britain.
As one ancient commentator remarked, ‘‘Honorius sent letters to the cities
in Britain, urging them to fend for themselves.’’ With the withdrawal, the
Saxons, who had arrived earlier as Roman allies, now expanded their
control in Britain. Within another decade, both Spain and Gaul had also
become free of imperial authority.
German Migration Routes. In the fifth
century, various groups of Germans
migrated throughout the Western
Roman Empire. Pressure from Huns in
the east forced some tribes to move
west into the empire, and many tribes
already in the empire became involved
in conflicts. Some
fought the Roman forces, while others
were induced to move to the empire’s
far regions.
By the middle of the fifth century, the western provinces of the Roman
Empire had been taken over by Germanic peoples who were in the process
of creating independent kingdoms. At the same time, a semblance of
imperial authority remained in Rome, although the real power behind the
throne tended to rest in the hands of important military officials known as
Masters of the Soldiers.
These military commanders controlled the government and dominated
the imperial court. The three most prominent in the fifth century were
Stilicho (STIL-i-koh), Aetius (ay-EE-shuss), and Ricimer (RISS-uhmur).
Stilicho and Ricimer were both Germans, whereas Aetius was a Roman.
Although all three propped up emperors to maintain the fiction of
imperial rule, they were also willing to cooperate with the Germans to
maintain their power.
But even the Masters of the Soldiers were never safe in the bloody world
of fifth-century Roman political life. Stilicho was executed by the guards
of Emperor Honorius. Aetius was killed by Emperor Valentinian (val-enTIN-ee-un) III, who was in turn assassinated by two of Aetius’s German
bodyguards, who sought to avenge their betrayed leader.
Ricimer died a natural death, an unusual event in fifth-century Rome. No
doubt, the constant infighting at the center of the Western Empire added
to the instability of imperial rule.
By the mid-fifth century, imperial authority in the west was still operating
only in Italy and small parts of Gaul. Even Rome itself was not safe. In 455,
after the Romans broke a treaty that they had made with Gaiseric, leader
of the Vandals, Gaiseric sent a Vandal fleet to Italy and sacked the
undefended city of Rome.
Twenty-one years later, in 476, Odoacer (oh-doh-AY-sur), a new Master of
the Soldiers, himself of German origin, deposed the Roman emperor, the
boy Romulus Augustulus (RAHM-yuh-luss ow-GOOS-chuh-luss).
To many historians, the deposition of Romulus signaled the end of the
Roman Empire. Of course, this is only a symbolic date, since much of
direct imperial rule had already been lost in the course of the fifth century.
Even then the empire remained, as Odoacer presented himself as a
German king obedient in theory to the Roman emperor Zeno (ZEE-noh)
in Constantinople.
By the end of the fifth century, Roman imperial authority in the west had
ceased. Nevertheless, the intellectual, governmental, and cultural
traditions of the Late Roman Empire continued to live on in the new
Germanic kingdoms.
Stilicho, a German Master of the Soldiers. HalfVandal and half-Roman, Stilicho was the power
behind the imperial throne from 395 to 408.
Emperor Honorius ordered his execution in 408.
These ivory panels show Stilicho at the right, in
Vandal clothing, with his wife and son at the left.
FOCUS QUESTIONS: What changes did the Germanic peoples make to
the political, economic, and social conditions of the Western Roman
Empire? What were the main features of Germanic law and society, and
how did they differ from those of the Romans?
By 500, the Western Roman Empire was being replaced politically by a
series of kingdoms ruled by German kings. Although the Germans now
ruled, they were greatly outnumbered by the Romans, who still controlled
most of the economic resources.
Both were Christian, but many of the Germans were Arian Christians,
considered heretics by Romans who belonged to the Christian church in
Rome, which had become known as the Roman Catholic Church.
Gradually, the two groups merged into a common culture, although the
pattern of settlement and the fusion of the Romans and Germans took
different forms in the various Germanic kingdoms.
Zeno, the Roman emperor in Constantinople, was not pleased with Odoacer’s
actions and plotted to unseat him. In his desire to act against the German
leader, Zeno brought another German tribe, the Ostrogoths (AHSS-truhgahthss), into Italy.
The Ostrogoths had recovered from a defeat by the Huns in the fourth century
and under their king Theodoric (thee-AHD-uh-rik) (493–526) had attacked
Constantinople. To divert them, Emperor Zeno invited Theodoric to act as his
deputy to defeat Odoacer and bring Italy back into the empire.
Theodoric accepted the challenge, marched into Italy, killed Odoacer, and then,
contrary to Zeno’s wishes, established himself as ruler of Italy in 493.
More than any other Germanic state, the Ostrogothic kingdom of Italy
managed to maintain the Roman tradition of government. The
Ostrogothic king, Theodoric, had received a Roman education while a
hostage in Constantinople.
After taking control of Italy, he was eager to create a synthesis of
Ostrogothic and Roman practices. In addition to maintaining the entire
structure of Roman imperial government, he established separate systems
of rule for the Ostrogoths and Romans.
The Italian population lived under Roman law administered by Roman
officials. The Ostrogoths were governed by their own customs and their
own officials. Nevertheless, although the Roman administrative system
was kept intact, it was the Ostrogoths alone who controlled the army.
Despite the apparent success of this ‘‘dual approach,’’ Theodoric’s system
was unable to keep friction from developing between the Italian
population and their Germanic overlords.
Religion proved to be a major source of trouble between Ostrogoths and
Romans. The Ostrogoths had been converted earlier to Christianity, but to
Arian Christianity, and consequently were viewed by western Christians
and the Italians as heretics. Theodoric’s rule grew ever harsher as
discontent with Ostrogothic rule deepened.
After Theodoric’s death in 526, it quickly became apparent that much of
his success had been due to the force of his own personality. His
successors soon found themselves facing opposition from the imperial
forces of the Byzantine or Eastern Roman Empire.
Under Emperor Justinian (juh-STIN-ee-un) (527–565) , Eastern Roman
armies reconquered Italy between 535 and 552, devastating much of the
peninsula in the process and destroying Rome as one of the great urban
centers of the Mediterranean world.
The Eastern Roman reconquest proved ephemeral, however. Another
German tribe, the Lombards, invaded Italy in 568 and conquered much of
northern and central Italy. Unlike the Ostrogoths, the Lombards were
harsh rulers and cared little for Roman structures and traditions.
The Lombards’ fondness for fighting each other enabled the Eastern
Romans to retain control of some parts of Italy, especially the area around
Ravenna, which became the capital of imperial government in the west.
The Germanic Kingdoms of
the Old Western Empire. The Germanic
tribes filled the power vacuum created
by the demise of the Roman Empire,
building states that blended elements
of Germanic customs and laws with
those of Roman culture, including largescale conversions to Christianity. The
Franks established the most durable of
these Germanic states.
The Visigothic kingdom in Spain demonstrated a number of parallels to the
Ostrogothic kingdom of Italy. Both favored coexistence between the Roman and
German populations, both featured a warrior caste dominating a larger native
population, and both continued to maintain much of the Roman structure of
government while largely excluding Romans from power.
There were also noticeable differences, however. Perceiving that their Arianism
was a stumbling block to good relations, in the late sixth century the Visigothic
rulers converted to Latin or Catholic Christianity and ended the tension caused
by this heresy. Laws preventing intermarriage were dropped, and the Visigothic
and Hispano-Roman peoples began to fuse together. A new body of law
common to both peoples also developed.
The kingdom possessed one fatal weakness, however—the Visigoths fought
constantly over the kingship. The Visigoths did not have a hereditary monarchy
and lacked any established procedure for choosing new rulers.
Church officials tried to help develop a sense of order, as this canon from the
Fourth Council of Toledo in 633 illustrates: ‘‘No one of us shall dare to seize the
kingdom; no one shall arouse sedition among the citizenry; no one shall think of
killing the king.’’
Church decrees failed to stop the feuds, however, and assassinations remained a
way of life in Visigothic Spain.
In 711, Muslim invaders destroyed the Visigothic kingdom itself.
Only one of the German states on the European continent proved long-
lasting—the kingdom of the Franks. The establishment of a Frankish
kingdom was the work of Clovis (c. 482–511), the leader of one group of
Franks who eventually became king of them all.
Around 500, Clovis became a Catholic Christian. He was not the first
German king to convert to Christianity, but the others had joined the
Arian sect of Christianity. The Roman Catholic Church regarded the
Arians as heretics, people who believed in teachings that departed from
the official church doctrine.
Clovis found that his conversion to Catholic Christianity gained him the
support of the Roman Catholic Church, which was only too eager to
obtain the friendship of a major Germanic ruler who was a Catholic
Christian.
The conversion of the king also paved the way for the conversion of the
Frankish peoples. Finally, Clovis could pose as a defender of the orthodox
Catholic faith in order to justify his expansion at the beginning of the
sixth century.
He defeated the Alemanni (al-uh-MAH-nee) in southwest Germany
and the Visigoths in southern Gaul. By 510, Clovis had established a
powerful new Frankish kingdom stretching from the Pyrenees in the west
to German lands in the east (modern-day France and western Germany).
Clovis was thus responsible for establishing a Frankish kingdom under
the Merovingian (meh-ruh-VIN-jee-un) dynasty, a name derived from
Merovech, their semi-legendary ancestor. Clovis came to rely on his
Frankish followers to rule in the old Roman city-states under the title of
count.
Often these officials were forced to share power with the Gallo-Roman
Catholic bishops, producing a gradual fusion of Latin and German
cultures, with the church serving to preserve the Latin culture. Clovis
spent the last years of his life ensuring the survival of his dynasty by
killing off relatives who were leaders of other groups of Franks.
After the death of Clovis, his sons divided the newly created kingdom, as
was the Frankish custom. During the sixth and seventh centuries, the
once united Frankish kingdom came to be partitioned into three major
areas: Neustria in northern Gaul; Austrasia, consisting of the ancient
Frankish lands on both sides of the Rhine; and the former kingdom of
Burgundy.
All three were ruled by members of the Merovingian dynasty. Within
the three territories, members of the dynasty were assisted by powerful
nobles. Frankish society possessed a ruling class that gradually
intermarried with the old Gallo-Roman senatorial class to form a new
nobility.
These noble families took advantage of their position to expand their own
land and wealth at the expense of the monarchy. Within the royal
household, the position of major domus, or mayor of the palace, the
chief officer of the king’s household, began to overshadow the king.
Essentially, both nobles and mayors of the palace were expanding their
power at the expense of the kings.
At the beginning of the eighth century, the most important political
development in the Frankish kingdom was the rise of Charles Martel,
who served as mayor of the palace of Austrasia beginning in 714.
Charles Martel led troops that defeated the Muslims near Poitiers in 732
and by the time of his death in 741 had become virtual ruler of the three
Merovingian kingdoms. Though he was not king, Charles Martel’s
dynamic efforts put his family on the verge of creating a new dynasty that
would establish an even more powerful Frankish state.
During the sixth and seventh centuries, the Frankish kingdom witnessed a
process of fusion between Gallo-Roman and Frankish cultures and
peoples, a process accompanied by a significant decline in Roman
standards of civilization and commercial activity.
The Franks were warriors and did little to encourage either urban life or
trade. Commerce declined in the interior, though seacoast towns
maintained some activity. By 750, Frankish Gaul was basically an
agricultural society in which the old Roman estates of the Late Empire
continued unimpeded. Institutionally, however, Germanic concepts of
kingship and customary law replaced the Roman governmental structure.
The barbarian pressures on the Western Roman Empire had forced the
emperors to withdraw the Roman armies and abandon Britain by the
beginning of the fifth century. This opened the door to the Angles and
Saxons, Germanic tribes from Denmark and northern Germany.
Although these same peoples had made plundering raids for a century, the
withdrawal of the Roman armies enabled them to make settlements
instead. They met with resistance from the Celtic Britons, however, who
still controlled the western regions of Cornwall, Wales, and Cumberland
at the beginning of the seventh century.
The
German invaders eventually succeeded in carving out small
kingdoms throughout the island, such as Mercia, Northumberland, and
Kent.
This wave of German invaders would eventually be converted to
Christianity by new groups of Christian missionaries.
As the Germans infiltrated the Roman Empire, they were influenced by
the Roman society they encountered. Consequently, the Germanic
peoples of the fifth, sixth, and seventh centuries were probably quite
different from the Germans that the forces of Augustus encountered in
the first century C.E.
Moreover, there was a meaningful fusion of Roman and German upper
classes in the new kingdoms. In Merovingian Frankish lands, upper-class
Gallo-Romans intermarried with Frankish nobles to produce a new
ruling class. Each influenced the other. Franks constructed Roman-style
villas; Gallo-Romans adopted Frankish weapons.
The crucial social bond among the Germanic peoples was the family,
especially the extended or patriarchal family of husbands, wives,
children, brothers, sisters, cousins, and grandparents. In addition to
working the land together and passing it down to succeeding generations,
the extended family provided protection, which was sorely needed in the
violent atmosphere of Merovingian times.
The German conception of family and kinship affected the way Germanic
law treated the problem of crime and punishment. In the Roman system,
as in our own, a crime such as murder was considered an offense against
society or the state and was handled by a court that heard evidence and
arrived at a decision. Germanic law tended to be personal.
An injury by one person against another could lead to a blood feud in
which the family of the injured party took revenge on the kin of the
wrongdoer. Feuds could result in savage acts of revenge—hands or feet
might be hacked off, eyes gouged out, or ears and noses sliced off.
Since this system had a tendency to get out of control and allow mayhem
to multiply, an alternative system arose that made use of a fine called
wergeld.
This was the amount paid by a wrongdoer to the family of the person who
had been injured or killed. Wergeld, which means ‘‘money for a man,’’ was
the value of a person in monetary terms. That value varied considerably
according to social status. The law of the Salic Franks, which was first
written down under Roman influence at the beginning of the sixth
century, stated:
‘‘If any one shall have killed a free Frank, or a barbarian living under the
Salic law, and it have been proved on him, he shall be sentenced to 8,000
denars.... But if any one has slain a man who is in the service of the king, he
shall be sentenced to 24,000 denars.’’ An offense against a noble obviously
cost considerably more than one against a free person or a slave”.
Under German customary law, compurgation and the ordeal were the
two most commonly used procedures for determining whether
accused person was guilty and should have to pay wergeld.
an
Compurgation was the swearing of an oath by the accused person, backed
up by a group of ‘‘oathhelpers,’’ numbering twelve or twenty-five, who
would also swear that the accused person should be believed.
The ordeal functioned in a variety of ways, all of which were based on the
principle of divine intervention; divine forces (whether pagan or
Christian) would not allow an innocent person to be harmed.
For the Franks, like other Germanic peoples of the Early Middle Ages, the
extended family was at the center of social organization. The Frankish
family structure was quite simple. Males were dominant and made all
the important decisions.
A woman obeyed her father until she married and then fell under the
legal domination of her husband.
A widow however, could hold property without a male guardian.
In Frankish law, the
wergeld of a wife of childbearing age—of value because she
could produce children—was considerably higher than that
of a man. The Salic law stated: ‘‘If any one killed a free
woman after she had begun bearing children, he shall be
sentenced to 24,000 denars.... After she can have no more
children, he who kills her shall be sentenced to 8,000
denars.’’
Since marriage affected the extended family group, fathers
or uncles could arrange marriages for the good of the family
without considering their children’s wishes. Most important
was the engagement ceremony in which a prospective son in-law made a payment symbolizing the purchase of paternal
authority over the bride. The essential feature of the marriage
itself involved placing the married couple in bed to achieve
their physical union. In first marriages, it was considered
important that the wife be a virgin so as to ensure that any
children would be the husband’s.
A virgin symbolized the
ability of the bloodline to continue. For this reason, adultery
was viewed as pollution of the woman and her offspring, poi soning the future. Adulterous wives were severely punished
(an adulterous woman could be strangled or even burned
alive); adulterous husbands were not. Divorce was relatively
simple and was initiated primarily by the husband. Divorced
wives simply returned to their families.
For most women in the new Germanic kingdoms, their legal status
reflected the material conditions of their lives.
Archaeological evidence suggests that most women had life expectancies
of only thirty or forty years and that about 10 to 15 percent of women died
in their childbearing years, no doubt due to complications associated with
childbirth.
For most women, life consisted of domestic labor: providing food and
clothing for the household, caring for the children, and assisting with
numerous farming chores.
This labor was crucial to the family economy. In addition to clothing and
feeding their own families, women could sell or barter clothes and food for
additional goods. Of all the duties of women, the most important was
childbearing because it was crucial to the maintenance of the family and
its Properties.
FOCUS QUESTIONS: How and why did the organization of the Christian
church and its relations with the state change during the fourth and fifth
centuries?
What were the chief characteristics of Benedictine monasticism, and what
role did monks play in both the conversion of Europe to Christianity and
the intellectual life of the Germanic kingdoms?
A number of intellectuals in the early church who wrote in Latin
profoundly influenced the development of Christian thought in the west.
They came to be known as the Latin Fathers of the Catholic Church.
They include Augustine, Jerome, Ambrose, and Gregory the Great.
Saint Augustine (354–430) was the most prominent of the Latin
Fathers. His work provides one of the best examples of how Christian
theologians used pagan culture in the service of Christianity.
Born in North Africa, Augustine was reared by his mother, an ardent
Christian. He eventually became a professor of rhetoric at Milan in 384.
But two years later, after experiencing a profound and moving religious
experience, Augustine gave up his teaching position and went back to North
Africa, where he served as bishop of Hippo from 396 until his death in 430.
Augustine’s two most famous works are the Confessions and The City of God.
Written in 397, the Confessions was a self-portrait not of Augustine’s worldly
activities but of the ‘‘history of a heart,’’ an account of his own personal and
spiritual experiences, written to help others with their search. Augustine
describes how he struggled throughout his early life to find God until in his
thirty-second year he experienced a miraculous conversion.
The City of God, Augustine’s other major work, was a profound expression
of a Christian philosophy of government and history. In it, Augustine
theorized on the ideal relations between two kinds of societies existing
throughout time—the City of God and the City of the World.
Those who loved God would be loyal to the City of God, whose ultimate
location was the kingdom of heaven. Earthly society would always be
insecure because of human beings’ imperfect nature and inclination to
violate God’s commandments.
And yet the City of the World was still necessary, for it was the duty of
rulers to curb the depraved instincts of sinful humans and maintain the
peace necessary for Christians to live in the world.
Hence, Augustine posited that secular government and authority were
necessary for the pursuit of the true Christian life on earth; in doing so, he
provided a justification for secular political authority that would play an
important role in medieval thought.
Augustine was also important in establishing the Christian church’s views
on sexual desire. Many early Christians had seen celibacy, or complete
abstinence from sexual activity, as the surest way to holiness.
Augustine, too, believed Christians should reject sex, but he maintained
that many Christians were unable to do so. For them, marriage was a good
alternative, but with the understanding that even in marriage, sex
between a man and woman had to serve a purpose—the procreation of
children. It was left to the clergy of the church to uphold the high ideal of
celibacy.
Another Latin Father was Jerome (345–420), who pursued literary
studies in Rome and became a master of Latin prose. Jerome had mixed
feelings about his love for liberal studies, however, and like Augustine, he
experienced a spiritual conversion, after which he tried to dedicate
himself more fully to Jesus. He had a dream in which Jesus appeared as his
judge:
“Asked who and what I was, I replied: ‘‘I am a Christian.’’ But He who
presided said: ‘‘You lie, you are a follower of Cicero, not of Christ. For where
your treasure is, there will your heart be also.’’ Instantly, I became dumb. .. .
Accordingly I made oath and called upon His name, saying: ‘‘Lord, if ever
again I possess worldly books [the classics], or if ever again I read such, I
have denied You.’’
After this dream, Jerome determined to ‘‘read the books of God with a zeal
greater than I had previously given to the books of men.’’ Ultimately, Jerome
found a compromise by purifying the literature of the pagan world and then
using it to further the Christian faith.
Jerome was the greatest scholar among the Latin Fathers, and his extensive
knowledge of both Hebrew and Greek enabled him to translate the Old and
New Testaments into Latin.
In the process, he created the so-called Latin Vulgate, or common text, of the
Scriptures that became the standard edition for the Catholic Church in the
Middle Ages.
In the early centuries of Christianity, the churches in the larger cities had great
influence in the administration of the church. It was only natural, then, that the
bishops of those cities would also exercise considerable power.
One of the far reaching developments in the history of the Christian church was
the emergence of one bishop—that of Rome—as the recognized leader of the
western Christian church.
The doctrine of Petrine supremacy, based on the belief that the bishops of
Rome occupied a preeminent position in the church, was grounded in Scripture.
According to the Gospel of Matthew, when Jesus asked his disciples, ‘‘Who do
you say I am?’’ Simon Peter answered:
“You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. Jesus replied, Blessed are
you, Simon, son of Jonah, for this was not revealed by man, but by my
Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will
build my church, and the gates of hell will not overcome it. I will give you
the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be
bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven”.
According to church tradition, Jesus had given the keys to the kingdom of
heaven to Peter, who was considered the chief apostle and the first bishop
of Rome.
Subsequent bishops of Rome were considered Peter’s successors and later
the ‘‘vicars of Christ’’ on earth. Though this exalted view of the bishops of
Rome was by no means accepted by all early Christians, Rome’s position
as the traditional capital of the Roman Empire served to buttress this
claim.
By the end of the fourth century, the bishops of Rome were using the title
of “papa”, ‘‘father’’ (which became the English pope). Pope Leo I (440–461)
was especially energetic in systematically expounding the doctrine of
Petrine supremacy.
He portrayed himself as the heir of Peter, whom Jesus had chosen to be
head of the Christian church. But state authorities were also claiming
some power over the church.
SPRING 2014
Department of History
Ancient/Medieval History
until 14th c. AD
Instructor: Maria Antoniou,
PhD
Late Antiquity and The Emergence of
the Medieval World
PART 3
FOCUS
QUESTIONS: How and why did the
organization of the Christian church and its relations
with the state change during the fourth and fifth
centuries?
What were the chief characteristics of Benedictine
monasticism, and what role did monks play in both
the conversion of Europe to Christianity and the
intellectual life of the Germanic kingdoms?
A number of intellectuals in the early church who
wrote in Latin profoundly influenced the development
of Christian thought in the west.
They came to be known as the Latin Fathers of the
Catholic Church. They include Augustine, Jerome,
Ambrose, and Gregory the Great.
Saint Augustine (354–430) was the most prominent
of the Latin Fathers. His work provides one of the
best examples of how Christian theologians used
pagan culture in the service of Christianity.
Born in North Africa, Augustine was reared by his
mother, an ardent Christian. He eventually became a
professor of rhetoric at Milan in 384.
But two years later, after experiencing a profound and moving
religious experience, Augustine gave up his teaching position
and went back to North Africa, where he served as bishop of
Hippo from 396 until his death in 430.
Augustine’s two most famous works are the Confessions and The
City of God.
Written in 397, the Confessions was a self-portrait not of
Augustine’s worldly activities but of the ‘‘history of a heart,’’ an
account of his own personal and spiritual experiences, written to
help others with their search. Augustine describes how he
struggled throughout his early life to find God until in his thirtysecond year he experienced a miraculous conversion.
The City of God, Augustine’s other major work, was a
profound expression of a Christian philosophy of
government and history. In it, Augustine theorized on
the ideal relations between two kinds of societies
existing throughout time—the City of God and the
City of the World.
Those who loved God would be loyal to the City of
God, whose ultimate location was the kingdom of
heaven. Earthly society would always be insecure
because of human beings’ imperfect nature and
inclination to violate God’s commandments.
And yet the City of the World was still necessary, for it
was the duty of rulers to curb the depraved instincts of
sinful humans and maintain the peace necessary for
Christians to live in the world.
Hence, Augustine posited that secular government and
authority were necessary for the pursuit of the true
Christian life on earth; in doing so, he provided a
justification for secular political authority that would
play an important role in medieval thought.
Augustine was also important in establishing the
Christian church’s views on sexual desire. Many early
Christians had seen celibacy, or complete abstinence
from sexual activity, as the surest way to holiness.
Augustine, too, believed Christians should reject sex,
but he maintained that many Christians were unable
to do so. For them, marriage was a good alternative,
but with the understanding that even in marriage, sex
between a man and woman had to serve a purpose—
the procreation of children. It was left to the clergy of
the church to uphold the high ideal of celibacy.
Another Latin Father was Jerome (345–420), who
pursued literary studies in Rome and became a master
of Latin prose. Jerome had mixed feelings about his
love for liberal studies, however, and like Augustine, he
experienced a spiritual conversion, after which he tried
to dedicate himself more fully to Jesus. He had a
dream in which Jesus appeared as his judge:
“Asked who and what I was, I replied: ‘‘I am a
Christian.’’ But He who presided said: ‘‘You lie, you are
a follower of Cicero, not of Christ. For where your
treasure is, there will your heart be also.’’ Instantly, I
became dumb. .. . Accordingly I made oath and called
upon His name, saying: ‘‘Lord, if ever again I possess
worldly books [the classics], or if ever again I read such,
I have denied You.’’
After this dream, Jerome determined to ‘‘read the books of
God with a zeal greater than I had previously given to the
books of men.’’ Ultimately, Jerome found a compromise by
purifying the literature of the pagan world and then using
it to further the Christian faith.
Jerome was the greatest scholar among the Latin Fathers,
and his extensive knowledge of both Hebrew and Greek
enabled him to translate the Old and New Testaments into
Latin.
In the process, he created the so-called Latin Vulgate, or
common text, of the Scriptures that became the standard
edition for the Catholic Church in the Middle Ages.
In the early centuries of Christianity, the churches in the larger cities
had great influence in the administration of the church. It was only
natural, then, that the bishops of those cities would also exercise
considerable power.
One of the far reaching developments in the history of the Christian
church was the emergence of one bishop—that of Rome—as the
recognized leader of the western Christian church.
The doctrine of Petrine supremacy, based on the belief that the
bishops of Rome occupied a preeminent position in the church, was
grounded in Scripture.
According to the Gospel of Matthew, when Jesus asked his disciples,
‘‘Who do you say I am?’’ Simon Peter answered:
“You are the Christ, the Son of the living God. Jesus
replied, Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah, for
this was not revealed by man, but by my Father in
heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this
rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell will
not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom
of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in
heaven; and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed
in heaven”.
According to church tradition, Jesus had given the keys
to the kingdom of heaven to Peter, who was considered
the chief apostle and the first bishop of Rome.
Subsequent bishops of Rome were considered Peter’s
successors and later the ‘‘vicars of Christ’’ on earth.
Though this exalted view of the bishops of Rome was
by no means accepted by all early Christians, Rome’s
position as the traditional capital of the Roman
Empire served to buttress this claim.
By the end of the fourth century, the bishops of Rome
were using the title of “papa”, ‘‘father’’ (which became
the English pope). Pope Leo I (440–461) was especially
energetic in systematically expounding the doctrine of
Petrine supremacy.
He portrayed himself as the heir of Peter, whom Jesus
had chosen to be head of the Christian church. But
state authorities were also claiming some power over
the church.
Once the Roman emperors became Christians, they came
to play a significant role in the affairs of the church.
Christian emperors viewed themselves as God’s
representatives on earth. They not only built churches and
influenced the structure of the church’s organization but
also became involved in church government and doctrinal
controversies.
While emperors were busying themselves in church
affairs, the spiritual and political vacuum left by the
disintegration of the Roman state allowed bishops to play a
more active role in imperial government.
Increasingly, they served as advisers to Christian
Roman emperors. Moreover, as imperial authority
declined, bishops often played a noticeably
independent political role.
Ambrose (c. 339–397) of Milan was an early example
of a strong and independent bishop. Through his
activities and writings, which brought him recognition
as another of the four Latin Fathers of the Catholic
Church.
Ambrose created an image of the ideal Christian bishop. Among
other things, this ideal bishop would defend the independence
of the church against the tendency of imperial officials to oversee
church policy: ‘‘Exalt not yourself, but if you would reign the
longer, be subject to God. It is written, God’s to God and Caesar’s
to Caesar. The palace is the Emperor’s, the Churches are the
Bishop’s.’’
When Emperor Theodosius I ordered the massacre of many
citizens of Thessalonika for refusing to obey his commands,
Ambrose denounced the massacre and refused to allow the
emperor to take part in church ceremonies. Theodosius finally
agreed to do public penance in the cathedral of Milan for his
dastardly deed. Ambrose proved himself a formidable advocate
of the position that spiritual authority should take precedence
over temporal power, at least in spiritual matters.
The weakness of the political authorities on the Italian
peninsula also contributed to the church’s independence in
that area. In the Germanic kingdoms, the kings controlled
both churches and bishops. But in Italy, a different
tradition prevailed, fed by semi legendary accounts of
papal deeds. Pope Leo I, for example, supposedly caused
Attila the Hun to turn away from Rome in 452.
Although Attila’s withdrawal was probably due more to
plague than to papal persuasion, the pope got the credit.
Popes, then, played significant political roles in Italy, which
only added to their claims of power vis-a`-vis the secular
authorities. Pope Gelasius (juh-LAY-shuss) I (492–496)
could write to the emperor at Constantinople:
“There are two powers, august Emperor, by which this
world is ruled from the beginning: the consecrated
authority of the bishops, and the royal power. In these
matters the priests bear the heavier burden because
they will render account, even for rulers of men, at the
divine judgment.
Besides, most gracious son, you are aware that,
although you in your office are the ruler of the human
race nevertheless you devoutly bow your head before
those who are leaders in things divine and look to them
for the means of your salvation.”
Pope
Pope Gregory I. Pope Gregory the
Great became one of the most
important popes of the Early Middle
Ages. As a result of his numerous
writings, he is considered the last of
the Latin Fathers of the church. This
ninth-century manuscript illustration
shows Gregory working on a
manuscript, assisted by a monk. Above
Gregory’s head is a dove, symbol of
the Holy Spirit, which is providing
divine inspiration for what he is
writing.
• Although eventually western Christians came to accept the
bishop of Rome as head of the church, there was no unanimity
on the extent of the powers the pope possessed as a result of
his position.
• Nevertheless, the emergence in the sixth century of a strong
pope, Gregory I, known as Gregory the Great, the last of the
Latin Fathers, set the papacy and the Roman Catholic
Church on an energetic path that enabled the church in the
seventh and eighth centuries to play an increasingly
prominent role in civilizing the Germans and aiding the
emergence of a distinctly new European civilization.
As pope, Gregory I (590–604) assumed direction of Rome
and its surrounding territories, which had suffered
enormously from the Ostrogothic-Byzantine struggle
and the Lombard invasion of the sixth century. Gregory
described the conditions in a sermon to the people of
Rome:
“What Rome herself, once deemed the Mistress of the
World, has now become, we see—wasted away with
afflictions grievous and many, with the loss of citizens, the
assaults of enemies, the frequent fall of ruined buildings....
Where is the Senate? Where is the people? The bones are all
dissolved, the flesh is consumed, all the pomp of the
dignities of this world is gone”.
Gregory took charge and made Rome and its surrounding
area into an administrative unit that eventually came to be
known as the Papal States. Although historians disagree
about Gregory’s motives in establishing papal temporal
power, no doubt Gregory was probably only doing what he
felt needed to be done: provide for the defense of Rome
against the Lombards, establish a government for Rome,
and feed the people.
Gregory remained loyal to the empire and continued to
address the Byzantine emperor as the rightful ruler of Italy.
Gregory also pursued a policy of extending papal authority
over the Christian church in the west, although few people
in Europe at this time looked to the pope as the church’s
ruler.
He intervened in ecclesiastical conflicts throughout Italy
and corresponded with the Frankish rulers, urging them to
reform the church in Gaul. He successfully initiated the
efforts of missionaries to convert England to Christianity
and was especially active in converting the pagan peoples
of Germanic Europe.
His primary instrument was the monastic movement.
A monk (Latin monachus, meaning ‘‘someone who lives
alone’’) was a man who sought to live a life divorced from the
world, cut off from ordinary human society, in order to pursue an
ideal of godliness or total dedication to the will of God.
Christian monasticism, which developed first in Egypt, was
initially based on the model of the solitary hermit who forsakes
all civilized society to pursue spirituality.
Saint Anthony (c. 250–350) was a prosperous Egyptian peasant
who decided to follow Jesus’s injunction in the Gospel of Mark:
‘‘Go your way, sell whatsoever you have, and give to the poor, and
you shall have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross,
and follow me.’’
Anthony gave his 300 acres of land to the poor and went
into the desert to pursue his ideal of holiness. Others did
likewise, often to extremes.
Saint Simeon the Stylite lived for three decades in a basket
atop a pillar more than 60 feet high. These spiritual
gymnastics established a new ideal for Christianity.
Whereas the early Christian model had been the martyr
who died for the faith and achieved eternal life in the
process, the new ideal was the monk who died to the world
and achieved spiritual life through denial, asceticism, and
mystical experience of God.
These
early monks, however, soon found
themselves unable to live in solitude. Their feats of
holiness attracted followers on a wide scale, and as the
monastic ideal spread throughout the east, a new form
of monasticism, based on the practice of communal
life, soon became the dominant form.
Monastic communities soon came to be seen as the
ideal Christian society that could provide a moral
example to the wider society around them.
Saint Benedict of Nursia (c. 480–c. 543), who founded
a monastic house and wrote a set of rules for it sometime
between 520 and 530, established the fundamental form of
monastic life in the western Christian church.
Benedict’s rules largely rejected the ascetic ideals of eastern
monasticism, which had tended to emphasize such
practices as fasting and self-inflicted torments (such as
living atop pillars for thirty years), in favor of an ideal of
moderation.
In Chapter 40 of the rules, on the amount of drink a monk
should imbibe, this sense of moderation becomes
apparent:
‘‘Every man has his proper gift from God, one after this manner,
another after that. And therefore it is with some misgiving that
we determine the amount of food for someone else.
Still, having regard for the weakness of some brothers, we believe
that a hemina [a quarter liter] of wine per day will suffice for all.
Let those, however, to whom God gives the gift of abstinence,
know that they shall have their proper reward.
But if either the circumstances of the place, the work, or the heat
of summer necessitates more, let it lie in the discretion of the
abbot to grant it. But let him take care in all things lest satiety or
drunkenness supervene”.
At the same time, moderation did not preclude a hard
and disciplined existence based on the ideals of
stability (staying in the monastery for life), fidelity
(accepting the routine of the monastery), and
obedience (to the abbot as head of the monastery).
Benedict’s rules divided each day into a series of activities
with primary emphasis on prayer and manual labor.
Physical work of some kind was required of all monks for
several hours a day because ‘‘idleness is the enemy of the
soul.’’
At the very heart of community practice was prayer, the
proper ‘‘work of God.’’ While this included private
meditation and reading, all monks gathered together seven
times during the day for common prayer and chanting of
psalms. A Benedictine life was a communal one; monks ate,
worked, slept, and worshiped together.
Each Benedictine monastery was strictly ruled by an abbot,
or ‘‘father’’ of the monastery, who had complete authority
over the monks, who bent unquestioningly to the will of
the abbot.
Each Benedictine monastery owned lands that enabled it
to be a self-sustaining community, isolated from and
independent of the world surrounding it.
Within the monastery, however, monks were to fulfill an
ideal of poverty: ‘‘Let all things be common to all, as it is
written, lest anyone should say that anything is his own or
arrogate it to himself.’’ By the eighth century, Benedictine
monasticism had spread throughout the west.
Women, too, sought to withdraw from the world to dedicate
themselves to God. Already in the third century, groups of women
abandoned the cities to form communities in the deserts of Egypt and
Syria.
The first monastic rules for western women were produced by
Caesarius of Arles for his sister in the fifth century. They strongly
emphasized a rigid cloistering of female religious, known as nuns, to
preserve them from dangers.
Later in the west, in the seventh and eighth centuries, the growth of
double monasteries allowed monks and nuns to reside close by and
follow a common set of rules. Not all women pursued the celibate life
in the desert, however. In a number of cities in the fourth century,
women organized religious communities in their own homes.
Monasticism played an indispensable role in early
medieval civilization. Monks became the new heroes
of Christian civilization. Their dedication to God
became the highest ideal of Christian life. Moreover,
the monks played an increasingly significant role in
spreading Christianity to all of Europe.
Ireland had remained a Celtic outpost beyond the reach of
the Roman Empire and the Germanic invaders. The most
famous of the Christian missionaries to Ireland in the fifth
century was Saint Patrick (c. 390–461).
Son of a Romano-British Christian, Patrick was kidnapped
as a young man by Irish raiders and kept as a slave in
Ireland. After his escape to Gaul, he became a monk and
chose to return to Ireland to convert the Irish to
Christianity. Irish tradition ascribes to Patrick the title of
‘‘founder of Irish Christianity,’’ a testament to his apparent
success.
Since Ireland had not been part of the Roman world and
was fairly isolated from the European continent even after
its conversion, Irish Christianity tended to develop along
lines somewhat different from Roman Christianity.
Whereas Catholic ecclesiastical structure had followed
Roman government models, the absence of these models in
Ireland led to a different pattern of church organization.
Rather than bishoprics, monasteries became the
fundamental units of church organization, and abbots, the
heads of the monasteries, exercised far more control over
the Irish church than bishops did.
Since Ireland had not been part of the Roman world and
was fairly isolated from the European continent even after
its conversion, Irish Christianity tended to develop along
lines somewhat different from Roman Christianity.
Whereas Catholic ecclesiastical structure had followed
Roman government models, the absence of these models in
Ireland led to a different pattern of church organization.
Rather than bishoprics, monasteries became the
fundamental units of church organization, and abbots, the
heads of the monasteries, exercised far more control over
the Irish church than bishops did.
By the sixth century,
Irish monasticism was a
flourishing institution with its own striking
characteristics. It was strongly ascetic. Monks
performed strenuous fasts, prayed and meditated
frequently under extreme privations, and confessed
their sins on a regular basis to their superiors.
In fact, Irish monasticism gave rise to the use of
penitentials or manuals that provided a guide for
examining one’s life to see what offenses against the
will of God had been committed.
A
great love of learning also characterized Irish
monasticism. The Irish eagerly absorbed both Latin and
Greek culture and fostered education as a major part of
their monastic life.
Irish monks were preserving Classical Latin at the same
time spoken Latin was being corrupted on the Continent
into new dialects that eventually became the Romance
languages, such as Italian, French, and Spanish.
Irish monasteries produced extraordinary illuminated
manuscripts illustrated with abstract geometric patterns.
The emphasis on asceticism led many Irish monks to go into voluntary exile.
This ‘‘exile for the love of God’’ was not into isolation, however, but into
missionary activity.
Irish monks became fervid missionaries. Saint Columba (521–597) left Ireland
in 565 as a ‘‘pilgrim for Christ’’ and founded a highly influential monastic
community off the coast of Scotland on the island of Iona. From there Irish
missionaries went to northern England to begin the process of converting the
Angles and Saxons.
Aidan of lona, for example, founded the island monastery of Lindisfarne (LIN-
dis-farn) in the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Northumbria. Lindisfarne in turn
became a training center for monks who spread out to different parts of AngloSaxon England.
Meanwhile, other Irish monks traveled to the European mainland. New
monasteries founded by the Irish became centers of learning wherever they
were located.
At the same time the Irish monks were busy bringing their version of
Christianity to the Anglo-Saxons of Britain, Pope Gregory the Great
had set in motion his own effort to convert England to Roman
Christianity.
His most important agent was Augustine, a monk from a monastery in
Rome, who arrived in England in 597. England at that time had a
number of Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. Augustine went first to Kent, where
he converted King Ethelbert, whereupon most of the king’s subjects
followed suit.
Pope Gregory’s conversion techniques emphasized persuasion rather
than force, and as seen in this excerpt from one of his letters, he was
willing to assimilate old pagan practices in order to coax the pagans
into the new faith:
“We wish you [Abbot Mellitus] to inform him [Augustine] that we
have been giving careful thought to the affairs of the English, and
have come to the conclusion that the temples of the idols among
that people should on no account be destroyed.
The idols are to be destroyed, but the temples themselves are to be
sprinkled with holy water, altars set up in them, and relics
deposited there. For if these temples are well-built, they must be
purified from the worship of demons and dedicated to the service
of the true God. In this way, we hope that the people, seeing that
their temples are not destroyed, may abandon their error and
flocking more readily to their accustomed resorts, may come to
know and adore the true God”.
Freed of their pagan past, temples became churches, as one
Christian commentator noted with joy: ‘‘The dwelling place
of demons has become a house of God. The saving light has
come to shine, where shadows covered all. Where sacrifices
once took place and idols stood, angelic choirs now dance.
Where God was angered once, now God is made content.’’
Likewise, old pagan feasts were given new names and
incorporated into the Christian calendar. No doubt Gregory
was aware that early Christians had done the same. The
Christian feast of Christmas, for example, was held on
December 25, the day of the pagan celebration of the
winter solstice.
The Book of Kells. Art historians use the term
Hiberno-Saxon (Hibernia was the ancient name
for Ireland) or Insular to refer to works produced
primarily in the monasteries of the British Isles,
especially Ireland. The best example of HibernoSaxon art is The Book of Kells, a richly decorated
illuminated manuscript of the Christian gospels.
Though owned by the monastery of Kells, the
work was produced by the monks of lona, who
combined Celtic and Anglo-Saxon abstract
designs with elaborate portrayals of human
figures and animals. A twelfth-century priest who
viewed it observed: ‘‘Look ... keenly at it and you ...
Will make out intricacies, so delicate and subtle, so
exact and compact, so full
of knots and links, with colors so fresh and vivid,
that you might say that all this was the work of an
angel, and not of a man.’’ This introductory
page from the Gospel of Matthew shows Jesus
with four angels.
As Roman Christianity spread northward in Britain, it encountered
Irish Christianity moving southward. Soon arguments arose over the
differences between Irish and Roman Christianity, especially over
different calendar days for the feast of Easter and matters of discipline.
At the Synod of Whitby, held in the kingdom of Northumbria in 664,
the king of Northumbria accepted the arguments of the representatives
of Roman Christianity and decided the issue in favor of Roman
practices.
A gradual fusion of Irish and Roman Christianity now ensued. Despite
its newfound unity and loyalty to Rome, the English church retained
some Irish features. Most important was the concentration on
monastic culture with special emphasis on learning and missionary
work. By 700, the English clergy had become the best trained and most
learned in western Europe.
Following the Irish example, English monks journeyed to
the European continent to carry on the work of conversion.
Most important was Boniface (c. 675–754), who undertook
the conversion of pagan Germans in Frisia, Bavaria, and
Saxony. By 740, Saint Boniface, the ‘‘Apostle of the
Germans,’’ had become the most famous churchman in
Europe. Fourteen years later, he was killed while trying to
convert the pagan Frisians. Boniface was a brilliant example
of the numerous Irish and English monks whose tireless
efforts made Europe the bastion of the Roman Catholic
faith.
Women, too, played an important role in the monastic
missionary movement and the conversion of the Germanic
kingdoms. Double monasteries, where monks and nuns lived in
separate houses but attended church services together, were
found in both the English and Frankish kingdoms. The monks
and nuns followed common rules under a common head—
frequently an abbess rather than an abbot.
Many of these abbesses belonged to royal houses, especially in
Anglo-Saxon England. In the kingdom of Northumbria, for
example, Saint Hilda founded the monastery of Whitby in 657.
As abbess, she was responsible for giving learning an important
role in the life of the monastery; five future bishops were
educated under her tutelage . For female intellectuals,
monasteries offered opportunities for learning not found
elsewhere in the society of their day.
Nuns of the seventh and eighth centuries were not
always as heavily cloistered as they once had been and
were there- fore able to play an important role in the
spread of Christianity.
The great English missionary Boniface relied on nuns
in England for books and money. He also asked the
abbess of Wimborne to send groups of nuns to
establish convents in newly converted German lands.
A nun named Leoba established the first convent in
Germany at Bischofsheim.
The monastic movement enabled some women to pursue a
new path to holiness. Cloisters for both men and women
offered the ideal place to practice the new Christian ideal
of celibacy. This newfound emphasis on abstaining from
sexual relations, especially evident in the emphasis on
virginity, created a new image of the human body in late
antiquity.
To many Greeks and Romans, the human body had been a
source of beauty, joy, and pleasure, an attitude evident in
numerous works of art. Many Christians, however, viewed
the body as a hindrance to a spiritual connection with God.
The refusal to have sex was a victory over the desires of the
flesh and thus an avenue to holiness.
In the fourth and fifth centuries, a cult of virginity also
moved beyond the walls of monasteries and
convents. Throughout the Mediterranean world,
groups of women met together to study the
importance and benefits of celibacy.
In Rome, a woman named Marcella supported a group
of aristocratic women who studied the teachings abou
celibacy and also aided Jerome, the church father, with
his work in translating the Bible into Latin.
Beginning in the sixth century, monasteries and local
churches became the beneficiaries of grants of land from
kings, bishops, and aristocrats. These gifts reached a high
point in the eight century.
In fact, one historian has estimated that by the end of the
eighth century, one-third of the land of Italy and the
kingdom of the Franks was owned by church
establishments. Those who gave these gifts did so in large
part for religious favors, such as prayers and assurances of
salvation. As a result of the gifts, however, individual
monasteries sometimes became as wealthy as landed
aristocrats and thus also served as instruments of political
power.
The Spread of Christianity, 400–800. The Christian church had penetrated much of the
Roman Empire by the end of the fifth century. After the fall of the empire, the church emerged as a
major base of power and pushed its influence into new areas through the activities of missionaries.
Although
the Christian church came to accept
Classical culture, it was not easy to do so in the new
Germanic kingdoms. Nevertheless, some Christian
scholars managed to keep learning alive.
CASSIODORUS Most prominent was Cassiodorus (c.
490–585), who came from an aristocratic Roman
family and served as an official of the Ostrogothic king
Theodoric.
The conflicts that erupted after the death of Theodoric
led Cassiodorus to withdraw from public life and retire
to his landed estates in southern Italy, where he wrote
his final work, Divine and Human Readings, a
compendium of the literature of both Christian and
pagan antiquity.
Cassiodorus accepted the advice of earlier Christian
intellectuals to make use of Classical works while
treasuring the Scriptures above all else.
Cassiodorus continued the tradition of late antiquity
of classifying knowledge according to certain subjects.
In assembling his compendium of authors, he followed
the works of late ancient authors in placing all secular
knowledge into the categories of the seven liberal
arts, which were divided into two major groups:
the trivium, consisting of grammar, rhetoric, and
dialectic or logic, and the quadrivium
consisting of arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, and
music. The seven liberal arts would remain the
cornerstone of Western education for nearly twelve
hundred years.
BEDE:
The Venerable Bede (BEED) (c. 672–735) was a scholar and product of
Christian Anglo-Saxon England. He entered a monastery at Jarrow as a
small boy and remained there most of the rest of his life.
His Ecclesiastical History of the English People, completed in 731, was a
product of the remarkable flowering of English ecclesiastical and
monastic culture in the eighth century. His history of England begins
with the coming of Christianity to Britain. Although Bede shared the
credulity of his age in regard to stories of miracles, he had a remarkable
sense of history. He used his sources so judiciously that they remain
our chief source of information about early Anglo-Saxon England.
His work was a remarkable accomplishment for a monk from a small
corner of England and reflects the high degree of intellectual
achievement in England in the eighth century.
Choose and answer five of the eight questions below; each answer should be
approximately 10-15 lines. Each answer is worth 20 points.
1. What are the characteristics, achievements and main reforms of Octavian
Augustus?
2. What political, military, economic and social problems did the Roman
Empire face during the third century?
3. Describe briefly the most popular mystery religions of the Roman Empire.
What advantages did they offer unavailable to Roman religion?
4. What were the most important divisions of the Jewish people? Describe
briefly the characteristics of each group.
5. Describe the organization, structure and characteristics of the Early
Christian communities.
6. Why was Christianity able to attract so many followers?
7. What were the main reforms of Diocletian and Constantine?
8. What was Arianism, when did it appear, what was its content and how did
the church deal with it?
9. Describe the appearance and development of Monasticism in Medieval
Europe. Organization, characteristics, importance. Refer to specific examples
of such monastic organizations and their founders.
10.What do you know about the Germanic Law? What were its fundamental
principles regarding punishment?
Purchase answer to see full
attachment