Section: 3D2 - The Barbarians: Alaric, Clovis, etc.
Number of quotes: 262
An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine
John Henry Newman
Book ID: 324 Page: 184
Section: 3D2
No heresy has started with greater violence or more sudden success than the Arian….
Quote ID: 7768
Time Periods: 345
An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine
John Henry Newman
Book ID: 324 Page: 184
Section: 3D2
But such is the fact, however it was brought about, that the success in arms and the conversion to Arianism, of Ostrogoths, Alani, Suevi, Vandals, and Burgundians stand as concurrent events in the history of the times; and by the end of the fifth century the heresy had been established by the Visigoths in France and Spain, in Portugal by the Suvei, in Africa by the Vandals, and by the Ostrogoths in Italy. For a while, the title of Catholic as applied to the Church seemed a misnomer; for not only was she buried beneath these populations of heresy, but that heresy was one, and maintained the same distinctive tenet, whether at Carthage, Seville, Toulouse, or Ravenna.
Quote ID: 7769
Time Periods: 5
An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine
John Henry Newman
Book ID: 324 Page: 185
Section: 3D2
It must be added that, whatever was their cruelty or tyranny, both Goths and Vandals were a moral people, and put to shame the Catholics whom they dispossessed. “What can the prerogative of a religious name profit us,”says Salvian, “that we call ourselves Catholic, boast of being the faithful, taunt Goths and Vandals with the reproach of an heretical appellation, while we live in heretical wickedness?” The barbarians were chaste, temperate, just, and devout….
Quote ID: 7770
Time Periods: 5
Augustine, NPNF1 Vol. 2, St. Augustine’s City of God and Christian Doctrine
Edited by Philip Schaff
Book ID: 653 Page: 2
Section: 3D2
Are not those very Romans, who were spared by the barbarians through their respect for Christ, become enemies to the name of Christ? The reliquaries of the martyrs and the churches of the apostles bear witness to this; for in the sack of the city they were open sanctuary for all who fled to them, whether Christian or Pagan.PJ book footnote reference: Augustine, The City of God, I.1.
Quote ID: 9427
Time Periods: ?
Barbarian Migrations and the Roman West 376-568
Guy Halsall
Book ID: 36 Page: 57
Section: 3D2
By the late Roman period the barbarian peoples had been neighbours of a mighty world power for three or four centuries. The Empire habitually interfered in their politics, setting up and knocking down kings, paying gifts and so on. {79} Not surprisingly, any ideas of power and prestige that we can perceive in barbaricum had by this time come to be entirely based upon the Roman Empire.
Quote ID: 732
Time Periods: 5
Barbarian Migrations and the Roman West 376-568
Guy Halsall
Book ID: 36 Page: 58
Section: 3D2
Roman ideas of power, mediated through objects associated with the Empire, saturated barbarian life. {83}
Quote ID: 733
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 165/167
Section: 3D2
Stripped of the charges of ravaging and murdering, Alaric’s actions in Epirus, however decried by Claudian, only seem bad by association and, in fact, were just what Alaric ought to have been doing if magister: fighting and rendering justice.. . . .
If Illyricum, by then a new Western diocese, was not then within his sphere, how could Honorius appoint Alaric to command the Roman troops there, as comes rei militaris, and name Iovius as praetorian prefect of Illyricum?
Quote ID: 754
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 172
Section: 3D2
On 12 July 400, the citizens of Constantinople rose.Being barbarian did not inhibit the imperial guard. Seven thousand of Gainas’s followers are said to have sought asylum in a church near the palace. Arcadius himself ordered their deaths.
No one in authority made any effort to stop the massacre. Patriarch Chrysostom never condemned it.
Quote ID: 755
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 176
Section: 3D2
A more distant consideration was Alaric, who was unpredictable, usually loyal but always restless.According to Jordanes, Alaric was first king in the consulship of Stilicho and Aurelianus, that is in 400. . .
Just prior to this, the customary payments to Alaric’s force as Roman auxiliaries ceased.
Quote ID: 756
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 178
Section: 3D2
Alaric had always known that his position was precarious. But he had fared well under Rufinus and Eutropius. The collapse of Eutropius’s regime, however, was disastrous for him. Rome had set him and his men adrift. As far as he was concerned the emperor had dismissed him without cause. The massacre of the Goths in Constantinople in July 400 must have led Alaric to ponder his own fate. He bided his time.
Quote ID: 757
Time Periods: 45
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 179
Section: 3D2
Why Alaric destroyed the peace in 401 and risked all troubled Jordanes in the sixth century and virtually every commentator since. Look again at the circumstances from Alaric’s perspective. He was dismissed from Roman service. He had been deprived of his command. He stood at the head of a body of armed men in a diocese that until recently he had defended against Stilicho but over which he now held no authority whatsoever. That he and his men were as far away as Pannonia had made it relatively safe for the Eastern court to renounce him, but he was well placed to invade Italy. This would explain why he was able to strike so quickly and at the most opportune moment in 401. No one other than he himself was providing for his men. Since he had no command, Alaric had no way to requisition supplies legally. He still had an army but no way to pay it. His claims to kingship were recent and dependent upon his ability to take care of his followers. He was in a tight spot. Rather than accept himself as nothing more than an outlaw, Alaric had fallen back upon Gothic concepts of leadership, knowing that in Roman eyes there could be no such thing as a “king” inside the Empire. Alaric took what circumstances allowed. To the Romans he may have been an outlaw leading armed men without legal right to do so, but to his Gothic followers he was a tribal leader.
Quote ID: 758
Time Periods: 56
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 179
Section: 3D2
He evidently was seeking a secure base from which to bargain his way back into Roman office, for that is exactly what he soon succeeded in doing.
Quote ID: 759
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 181
Section: 3D2
No, Claudian’s Alaric is still a Roman general, but in revolt.Claudian cannot, despite himself, envision him otherwise. Alaric could not do so either. Alaric was a Roman soldier, a general, claiming to be legally able to requisition supplies from the grateful population in a blighted diocese.
Quote ID: 760
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 181
Section: 3D2
Four men of barbarian blood emerged as Rome’s senior generals: Stilicho, Gainas, Alaric, and Fravitta. Each found himself with no alternative to getting involved in court politics. In the case of the later three this was directly linked to their need to guarantee supplies and replacements for their armies. All personally identifiable barbarians in the Roman army held traditional Roman commands. They acted out their lives inside the Empires’s military and political structures.Gainas and Aurelianus decided to transfer the diocese of Pannonia to the West in late 399. They acted with full knowledge that their decision would cast Alaric into limbo. Confronted with the loss of his command and its right to draw Roman supplies, Alaric fell back upon Gothic traditions of leadership. His followers declared him rex Gothorum, a completely illegal position in Roman eyes. There was no concept of a king within the Roman Empire in 400.
Quote ID: 761
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 188
Section: 3D2
Alaric was only primus inter pares before his war council. His fame is mainly posthumous. It is inextricably linked to the capture of Rome in 410, an event of little military or policy-making consequence but one fraught with emotional, intellectual, and religious significance.
Quote ID: 763
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 220
Section: 3D2
Alaric may have been a heretic, but he was at least a Christian who had spared the holy places and holy virgins in Rome.Yet the Goths were fellow Christians, even if Arians.
Quote ID: 768
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 221
Section: 3D2
In his peculiar late-Roman Christian manner, Orosius tells us that Stilicho died because he wanted to go down in history as the father of an emperor, but that he deserved to die because as the man on watch he had allowed Alaric, symbolizing all barbarians, to enter forever the gates of Rome.Anti-barbarian slogans were rallying cries for some members of the aristocracy, Christian and pagan, mostly outside Stilicho’s circle.
Quote ID: 769
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 222
Section: 3D2
Roman authors cast stereotypical barbarians in the role of underminers of the very Empire that in fact real barbarians were dying to defend against other, equally real barbarians and roman usurpers.
Quote ID: 770
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 224
Section: 3D2
The new regime moved swiftly to replace Stilicho’s men at court.The purge of Stilicho’s appointees quickly gathered steam. Heliocrates, appointed comes rerum privatarum at Olympius’s request, received an imperial decree ordering that all property of Stilicho’s supporters be confiscated. Stilicho’s chief household officer and his head secretary were tortured and then killed when they refused to supply names to their tormentors. Honorius ordered the eunuchs Terentius and Arsachius to return Stilicho’s daughter Thermantia to her mother, Serena, in Rome and to execute her brother, Eucherius. Serena moved quickly to protect her son, however, and Honorius’s assassins found Eucherius in asylum in a church in Rome, having been rushed to safety by some of Stilicho’s barbarian troops.
Quote ID: 772
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 225
Section: 3D2
One of Stilicho’s last acts had been to order those towns providing billets for his barbarian troops to shut their gates against them. These men, supposedly his “supporters”, had drifted home in confusion after Sarus rebelled and killed Stilicho’s Hunnic bodyguard. When the towns barred their gates they made it impossible for these barbarian soldiers to be reunited with their wives and families. Their helpless dependents now bore the weight of Olympius’s wrath. The regular Roman garrison troops slaughtered them and seized their property throughout all the towns in which they were resident, “as if on one command, when told of Stilicho’s death.”. . . .
Such focused cruelty clearly rallied these barbarians to a new standard of mutual interest . . .
What would these barbarian auxiliaries have thought beyond their justifiable outrage? Unspeakable betrayal. In their passion for vengeance, they decided to flee to Alaric and join forces with him. Alaric had yet to march on Italy, but remained in Noricum where he received the barbarian refugees.
Quote ID: 773
Time Periods: 45
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 225/227
Section: 3D2
At any rate, Alaric did not jump to attack Italy. Instead, he reportedly offered to exchange a few hostages, specifically Gaudentius’s son Aetius and Jovius’s son Jason, sought a modest sum of money, and requested permission to move his troops to Pannonia. If true, this means that Alaric had offered to return to his status as a mere comes in Illyricum provided that the state pay his relocation expenses.The ancient hostage was a far cry from the ancient prisoner - a distinction that modern events make it difficult to recall. Aetius, for one, never regretted his several occasions as a hostage to Alaric and later with the Huns.
. . . .
When this overture was rebuffed, only war could follow. Alaric, typically concerned with troop strength, ordered his brother-in-law Athaulf to bring up his army of Huns and Goths from Pannonia I. This force too was Roman but was made up exclusively of auxiliaries. . .
Quote ID: 774
Time Periods: 45
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 227
Section: 3D2
Only six weeks or so had elapsed between the death of Stilicho on 22 August and Alaric’s drive into Italy in October. Furthermore, the towns and garrisons opened their gates in welcome, just as they should have done to a Roman general marching along a planned route. Zosimus says that Alaric proceeded as if it were a festival.
Quote ID: 775
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 228
Section: 3D2
Until the death of Stilicho and Honorius’s rejection of him in favor of Olympius’s men, Alaric was a commander in the Roman army, legitimate, a Roman. Olympius’s palace coup had removed those whom Alaric regarded as also legitimate. Still convinced of his own legitimacy, Alaric was determined not to share their fate.Unlike some, particularly Generidus, Alaric was Christian, albeit an Arian, so that even allegations of paganism were inappropriate.
There was no way to drive out men of “barbarian ancestry” from the army or its command. Roman society had long ago abandoned that as an anachronism. Rome had by now a well established pattern of favoring Christianity, and Christianity had lent its strong support to dynastic succession. In this one respect, at least, blood mattered. Alaric was beyond redemption for one reason only: his late role as a key lieutenant of Stilicho. He was the last important Stilicho supporter left capable of realigning military and political power by his personal affiliations, and that is why he could not remain alive.
Orosius saw him as a pagan, virtually an Antichrist at the head of pagan armies seeking to plunder Christian churches and bring down the pious emperor. He had offended man and God. Jerome saw Stilicho as a semi-barbarian traitor, who deliberately armed the enemies of Rome against it. His crimes put good Christians to the test.
[My note: the word "semi-barbarian" fell where at the end of" semi"... there was a hypen to get to the next line "barbarian." Is is supposed to have a hyphen anyway?]
Quote ID: 776
Time Periods: 45
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 229
Section: 3D2
Pagans too regarded Stilicho as a betrayer of Rome and its gods.For Rutilius Namatianus, Stilicho’s treason included letting the barbarians into the heart of the Empire, there to learn its true weakness. And “nor was it only through Gothic arms that the traitor made his attack: ere this he burned the fateful books which brought the Sibyl’s aid.” Stilicho replaced Nero in Tartarus, for “Stilicho’s victim was immortal, Nero’s mortal; the one destroyed the world’s mother, the other his own.” The burning of the Sibylline Books is mentioned only in Rutilius,. . .
Orosius seems to have forgotten that none other than Augustine had once praised Stilicho for his Christian zeal.
Quote ID: 777
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 229/230
Section: 3D2
For his part, Alaric seems to have appreciated the religious energy of his age and acted to accommodate or even exploit it. For example, he was apparently the first to use bishops as envoys and to observe holy asylum for the Christian women when he sacked Rome.. . . .
His new religious sensitivity was in keeping with his political foresight.
Quote ID: 778
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 230
Section: 3D2
Eucherius secretly left the safety of the Church and attempted to link up with Alaric, en route to Rome, but imperial troops caught up with him and took him back to Rome, where he was executed. His barbarian guards only now left for Alaric’s camp. Here, as near Ravenna, Stilicho’s former soldiers did not want to join Alaric until they had no choice.Assertions that Stilicho and his elite circle were worshipers of the ancient gods cannot be dismissed as a quirk of Zosimus’s later pagan longings. The family of Stilicho was eradicated with the ardor of Christian zealotry that was a hallmark of the dynasty.
In the age of Theodosian Christianity, austere and punishing, false accusations that he (Stilicho) had favored the ancient gods were sufficient grounds for the extinction of his line. For others he was later condemned as a traitor for opening the Empire to barbarians. Among pagans, he and his wife were denounced for slandering the ancient gods. Rumors were not facts or even consistent.
Pastor John’s Note: He pleased no one as he attempted to navigate the narrow channel between old and new.
Quote ID: 779
Time Periods: 45
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 231
Section: 3D2
The barbarians of the late fourth century practiced various mixtures of paganism and Arian Christianity.
Quote ID: 780
Time Periods: 4
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 232
Section: 3D2
The imaginary Alaric ultimately was much more important than Alaric the general.Olympius and his fellow conspirators, by branding Alaric an enemy of Rome once again, provided him with recruits and left him no choice but to strengthen his position as rex by denying him access to comparable Roman command, the magistership.
Quote ID: 781
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 233
Section: 3D2
The events of 408-10 underscore the point that even during this famous clash the terms barbarian and Roman were largely rhetorical. Barbarians and Romans, to the extent that such terms still had any clear meaning, served on both sides during the struggles.
Quote ID: 782
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 234
Section: 3D2
The first crisis passed once the senators, after much discussion, finally agreed upon a payment to be given to Alaric . . .At the height of the siege Pompeianus, urban prefect, seriously considered trying a few pagan incantations to bring on thunder and lightning, reportedly effective elsewhere against Alaric’s men. He even convinced Pope Innocent I to go along. Innocent, however, agreed only on the condition that the sacrifices be conducted in private. Nothing came of this after visiting Tuscan priests declared that the Senate had to perform the rites in the Forum. The essential point is that everyone, including ordinary Roman townsmen and barbarian soldiers, was caught up in the spiritual struggle going on around them. Money rather than gods resolved the impasse. Alaric made peace and pledged to fight alongside the emperor against any foe. No treaty was signed.
There was no public display of Rome coming to terms with a foreign people, as might have happened with a new group of barbarians recruited to serve as auxiliaries. Alaric saw himself as still a general in the Roman army and simply pledged his personal loyalty as a soldier to fight for the emperor. He withdrew his forces from Rome to regroup and allowed supplies to enter the city without harassment. While Alaric remained in Tuscany, slaves flocked to his standards.
Quote ID: 783
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 235
Section: 3D2
The year 409 opened with unexpected good news for Honorius from an unlikely source, Constantine III. The usurper sent an embassy of eunuchs (note, in contrast, Alaric’s use of bishops) to seek pardon for his “unanticipated” elevation at the hands of his soldiers.
Quote ID: 784
Time Periods: ?
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 236
Section: 3D2
Alaric’s men captured Maximillianus and held him for ransom. The Senate sent a second embassy to Ravenna led by Pope Innocent I and escorted by a barbarian guard.
Quote ID: 785
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 240
Section: 3D2
Rather than take Rome, Alaric decided to give diplomacy another chance, and sent Orthodox bishops from all the towns under his control to Ravenna with a new set of conditions.These conditions when met would secure his friendship and an alliance with the Romans to defend the Empire against anyone who took up arms against it.
Quote ID: 786
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 241
Section: 3D2
This time Alaric abandoned working with Honorius’s government and in late 409 set up Priscus Attalus, then urban prefect, as emperor. Attalus, a pagan, accepted Arian Christian baptism.Attalus dreamed of restoring the Senate to its rightful place and bringing Egypt and the East under Rome once again.
Quote ID: 787
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 244
Section: 3D2
Alaric struck camp and marched on Rome once again. This time he was determined to force the Senate to its knees. There was no need for a prolonged siege, for Heraclianus’s stranglehold had created a continuous famine. Some of our sources duly offer treachery as an explanation for the sudden collapse of Rome’s defense, but the facts are otherwise. Rome opened its gates in desperation. There was no need for a “third siege”. Alaric gave orders to respect those who had sought asylum in holy places, especially the basilicas of Saints Peter and Paul, then turned his men loose. And so on 24 August 410 began a three-day-long Sack of Rome.
Quote ID: 788
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 245
Section: 3D2
Alaric, the sole surviving general from the days of Stilicho, King of the Goths, Sacker of Rome, died of sickness at Consentia in Bruttium.His followers diverted the course of the Busentius River and there committed the body of their leader, Alaricus rex Gothorum but not magister militum, to the afterlife. The captives who dug the graves were slain and the river returned to its channel. Despite recent bogus announcements to the contrary, Alaric and his share of the spoils of Rome still lie there undiscovered. The “Sack of Rome” in 410 was not the victory of barbarism any more than had been Constantine the Great’s “Sack of Rome” after his victory at the Mulvian Bridge in 312. From the perspective of the Roman Army, both were the predictable consequences of civil war.
Alaric steadfastly demanded a Roman generalship and thereby recognition of his followers as Roman soldiers, but Honorius always refused.
On 24 August 410 a very frustrated Alaric seized Rome a final time and gave his troops free rein. By sparing some Christians seeking asylum, he secured for himself a special place in history.
Quote ID: 789
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 256/257/260
Section: 3D2
Athaulf had acted completely within the law, handing Jovinus over to Dardanus for execution.. . . .
From his victory over Jovinus until his death in 415, Athaulf fought both for and against Rome, but most notably for Rome against the Vandals left behind in Spain by Gerontius.
. . . .
Until the end Athaulf remained committed to gaining Roman acceptance.
PJ note: a reason for the victory of trinitarianism
Quote ID: 790
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 263
Section: 3D2
Those Goths following Alaric and Athualf in Italy, Gaul, and Spain, however, had rediscovered an identity. Honorius had given them no choice. The settlement of 418 allowed this identity to evolve along with other new identities that were emerging during the transformation of the Christian-Roman world.
Quote ID: 791
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 276
Section: 3D2
Paulinus makes it clear that, to his surprise, the Goths had maintained the rule of law - Roman law - including that governing the sale of land. Little by little, more swiftly with the reign of Euric, Gothic modifications and overt direction replaced the regular functioning of Roman institutions.By 456-57, They constituted part of still another new type of auxiliary force. The Visigoths preserved a great deal of Roman administrative procedure. They were now a large and fairly unified group living under their own king and legally accepted within the Empire. Let me stress: Wallia and Theodoric were accepted as kings within the Roman Empire.
Since Wallia died so soon, Theodoric I was really the first of a new breed of reges Gothorum. Theodoric’s problem was no longer Roman supplies but civil administration. He had to define the Goths, his rule over them, and - a new thing under the sun - his rule over the Romans in Aquitaine.
Quote ID: 792
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 278
Section: 3D2
For Hydatius the early fifth century Goths were essentially soldiers, often fighting alongside the Romans. The archaeological record suggests that these two populations had become virtually indistinguishable. The term foederati was equally well known in the East at this time but was evolving in a peculiar direction.
Quote ID: 793
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 282
Section: 3D2
Because Alaric and Athaulf were unable to gain recognition of their commands inside the Empire, the decade 408 to 418 witnessed the forced birth of a new Gothic self-awareness as they and their followers were repeatedly forced back upon their own resources and traditions.Roman strength kept the Goths at bay; Roman weakness allowed them to remain together. From this limbo state arose a new Gothic identity that was more newly created than remembered.
Quote ID: 795
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 283
Section: 3D2
In the case of the “Visigoths”, their territory was within the province, or the two provinces, of Aquitaine.By establishing the Goths in Aquitaine under their own king, the Roman authorities for the first time recognized and supported “kingship” within the Empire. King Wallia (415-18) never held a Roman command, nor did his successor Theodoric I (418-51). They were kings of those Goths under them, rex Gothorum. They were now acknowledged and supported by Roman authority as the rulers, both civilian and military, over their peoples.
Quote ID: 796
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 299
Section: 3D2
Some scholars tend to forget that a great number of barbarian soldiers, almost certainly a decided majority, were volunteers.
Quote ID: 798
Time Periods: 45
Barbarians within the Gates of Rome
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 37 Page: 314
Section: 3D2
Orosius, 7.34. The special position of Theodosius as a Christian hero as seen in the early ecclesiastical writers was even more pronounced in Orosius, who saw him as the model Christian ruler and did much to pass this image on to the medieval West. This image of Theodosius affected all historiography concerning him until modern times. For the diocese of Illyricum and the exceedingly complex problems concerning its creation ca. 400, see chpt 6.
Quote ID: 799
Time Periods: 45
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 10
Section: 3D2
In 476 a barbarian leader named Odovacar took control of the Italian peninsula, sending the symbols of the empire to Constantinople. He would not last long, In 488 the emperor in Constantinople gave Theodoric, the leader of the Amals, an Ostrogothic tribe, permission to enter Italy and remove Odovacar from the throne. Five years later the Amal chieftain defeated Odovacar and later killed him with his own hands.So by 500 the Roman Empire of the West had disappeared (Figure I.I)
Quote ID: 801
Time Periods: 56
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 11
Section: 3D2
Figure I.I Byzantines and Barbarian Peoples in the Early Sixth CenturyPastor John’s Note: Donna {See Map[1]}
Quote ID: 802
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 14
Section: 3D2
Unlike Roman society, based on the concept of peace at home and defense or aggression at the frontier, the barbarian kingdoms – the Franks, for instance – lived in an endemic state of war both internally and externally. Normally the original inhabitants of the barbarian kingdoms were, more likely than not, to be excluded from war participation. This was the case in Ostrogothic Italy, where the Goths were the warriors. Yet in that case the “Romans” – that is, the former citizens of the vanished empire – still kept important positions in the administration of the kingdom and monopolized the Catholic hierarchy because the Goths subscribed to the Arian heresy.
Quote ID: 803
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 14
Section: 3D2
The Italian population did not consider Odovacar’s rule as oppressive when he deposed the last Roman emperor of the West in 476. True, they were despoiled of one-third of their lands, or of the shares of tax assessment of those lands, which were distributed among Odovacar’s followers.4 But Odovacar revealed himself to be a strong defender of the old Roman Senate and a guardian of the basis on which the empire had rested.
Quote ID: 804
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 15
Section: 3D2
The new ruler brought no meaningful changes to the Italian peninsula. As the contemporary Greek historian Procopius writes, Theodoric enforced just laws, kept Italy safe from invasions, and did not change the old customs or abuse his power over the subjects. Even the lands that he distributed among his population were only those that already had been taken over by Odovacar’s men. “Theodoric was a tyrant i.e., an illegitimate ruler by name, but in fact he was a true and real emperor.”
Quote ID: 805
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 15
Section: 3D2
What he tried to do was to keep the two people divided, each under their own laws. The “Romans” kept the civilian posts of the kingdom’s administration, while the Goths formed its army. What existed was the creation of a state in which Goths and Italians were “distinct” but “codependent.”8 Generally the ruling groups in Italy accepted their new ruler because he defended their interests, even those of the Church, in spite of the fact that the Ostrogoths were not Catholics but Arians.
Quote ID: 806
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 16
Section: 3D2
the Goths had assimilated many of the values that we associate with either Rome or Constantinople. Yet they still differed on matters of religion; they were Arian Christians and, as such, a threat to the Christianism of the empire. This would be an element of conflict for two reasons: the empire looked at Christianity as a state religion, and thus all dissenters were considered potential internal enemies.
Quote ID: 807
Time Periods: 5
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 48
Section: 3D2
Now that the original Italian upper classes had been either destroyed or rendered powerless like the Catholic clergy, the invaders organized a state in which the local populations were “servants” of a warrior class, their “master” being Longobards [PJ: Lombards, or "longbeards"] or those who had come with them from Pannonia. Probably for the Italian lower classes this did not mean a radical change from the past. The only different thing was that the masters looked physically different.37 When the upper clergy began to regain social primacy, they too were different from the past. Mostly of Longobardic origin, eventually accepting Catholic orthodoxy, they were tied in kinship and ideology with a worldview based on war.38The Longobards, like all Germanic peoples during the early medieval period, were a nation in a constant state of war. The kings were ultimate warriors,
Quote ID: 808
Time Periods: 6
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 49
Section: 3D2
The Longobard invasion represented a crucial break in the history of the peninsula.52 The newcomers were ferocious defenders of their ethnic primacy and constituted the basis of the aristocracy for future generations, at least for a few centuries.53 Even during the Renaissance, nearly 800 years later, it was not unusual for some of the leading Italian families to claim distant origins to Germanic ancestors.
Quote ID: 809
Time Periods: 6
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 50
Section: 3D2
In 774 the Longobard domination of most of Italy came to an end before the army of Charlemagne.
Quote ID: 810
Time Periods: 7
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 51
Section: 3D2
Over about two centuries, the Franks had already become accustomed to the landscape when they finally moved to what is modern France in larger and permanent numbers during the fifth century. They would establish the most successful of all barbarian kingdoms, France, that in succeeding centuries would become one of the playmakers in Western civilization. The key was that the Franks, unlike the Ostrogoths and the Longobards in Italy or the Visigoths in Spain, assimilated easily into the existing Gallo-Roman aristocracy and became champions of the religion that would become the trademark of the Middle Ages: Christianity as interpreted by Rome.
Quote ID: 811
Time Periods: 67
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 53
Section: 3D2
Figure 4.I The Kingdoms of the Merovingian Franks in 561Pastor John’s Note: Donna {see Map[2]}
Quote ID: 812
Time Periods: 7
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 53
Section: 3D2
Clovis was the son of Childeric I, a shady man who at one time had been forced from his throne for his intimacy with the daughters of the kingdom’s magnates (so says Gregory of Tours). He became a symbol of all the ethnic groups living in Gallia.
Quote ID: 813
Time Periods: 56
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 62
Section: 3D2
The Merovingian Dynasty, which had ruled France from 481 to 747, faded. Childeric III, the last Merovingian king, was shut inside a monastery, his flowing hair, the symbol of royalty, shorn.
Quote ID: 814
Time Periods: 7
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 62
Section: 3D2
At the time of Childerich’s deposition in 751, Pepin the Short was mayor, an office that his grandfather and father had held. And to him, on the authority of the Bishop of Rome, was granted the title of king.
Quote ID: 815
Time Periods: 7
Barbarians, Marauders, and Infidels
Antonio Santosuosso
Book ID: 38 Page: 65/66
Section: 3D2
Unlike in Longobard Italy, technically all able-bodied freemen age twelve and above, of any ethnic background, had the duty to serve in the army when the Frankish kingdom was under threat.
Quote ID: 816
Time Periods: 7
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 82
Section: 3D2
Upon the death of Childeric the leadership of the Salian Franks passed to his son Clovis, who followed the policies of his father.….
... although a pagan, he was expected to serve the Christian Roman community...
"A great rumor has reached us that you have undertaken the command of Belgica Secunda. It is no surprise that you have begun just as your forefathers had always done . . . the bestowal of your favor must be pure and honest, you must honor your bishops and must always incline yourself to their advice. As soon as you are in agreement with them your territory [provincia] will prosper." {4}
This advice to a pagan chieftain to administer fairly and to seek out the advice of the bishops did not reflect any new state of affairs but described the tradition of imperial Germanic commanders in the service now Christian Romanitas.
Quote ID: 851
Time Periods: 7
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 83
Section: 3D2
Clovis’s absorption of the kingdom of Soissons was, from one perspective, a coup d’etat: the replacement of the barbarized Roman rex by a Romanized barbarian one.
Quote ID: 852
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 84
Section: 3D2
Clovis, like his father before him, cemented relationships with the Gothic kingdoms through marriage alliances. Clovis may even have adopted their religious beliefs.
Quote ID: 853
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 85
Section: 3D2
To what he was converted is equally problematic. Given the syncretistic nature of late antique religion, one need not suppose that his conversion to Christianity was a conversion to radical monotheism—Clovis may have viewed Christ as a powerful, victory-giving ally to enlist on his behalf.….
According to Gregory, it was Clovis’s orthodox Burgundian wife Clotild who first urged Clovis to embrace her religion. However, the decisive moment came, as it had two centuries earlier for another ambitious pagan commander, Constantine, in battle. Pressed by Alemani at Tolbac, he vowed baptism in return for victory. The parallel with Constantine, explicitly developed by Gregory, was unmistakable.
….
The conversion of the king necessarily meant the conversion of his followers. Small wonder, then, that Gregory tells that before his baptism Clovis consulted with his “people” —presumably his most important supporters. And small wonder that not only was he baptized but at the same time were baptized “more than three thousand of his army”. However many Franks followed their king into the font, the conversion was clearly a military affair—the adoption by the commander and his army of a new and powerful victory-giver.
Quote ID: 854
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 86
Section: 3D2
Now no cult barrier separated the army from the indigenous inhabitants of Gaul—the peasants, artisans, and most importantly the Gallo-Roman aristocracy and its leaders, the bishops, ...
Quote ID: 855
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 86
Section: 3D2
Instead, as a ruler bent on expansion, his orthodoxy increased the likelihood that the Gallo-Roman aristocracies within these neighboring kingdoms would be inclined to collaborate with him.
Quote ID: 856
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 87
Section: 3D2
On his victorious journey homewards, Clovis was met in Tours by emissaries from Emperor Anastasius who presented him with an official document recognizing him as an honorary consul. Clovis used his honor, which apparently included imperial recognition of Clovis’s kingdom or at least the symbolic adoption of Clovis into the imperial family, to strengthen his authority over the newly-won Gallo-Romans. He appeared in the basilica of St. Martin of Tours dressed in a purple tunic and a chlamys, or military mantle, and placed a diadem on his head. None of this was part of consular tradition, but he probably wished to enhance his kingship by associating with the Roman imperial tradition. In a famous but ambiguous passage, Gregory says that “from this time forward he was acclaimed ‘consul or augustus’.….
Now he began eliminating other Frankish chieftains, his own kinsmen for the most part, in order to consolidate his power over the Franks as he had done over the Gallo-Romans.
Quote ID: 857
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 88
Section: 3D2
By the end of his reign, Gregory tells us, he was wont to complain, “How sad a thing it is that I live among strangers like some solitary traveller, and that I have none of my own relations left to help me when disaster threatens!” {8} This comment was made, Gregory assures us, not because he grieved for them, but in the hope of finding some relative still alive whom he could kill.
Quote ID: 858
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 89
Section: 3D2
Clovis’s kingdom from the beginning experienced a much more thorough mixture of Frankish and Roman traditions.….
More important for the establishment of continuity and effectiveness in rule was the dual Roman heritage of both conquerors and conquered.
The indigenous population....had preserved the late Roman infrastructure virtually intact.
Quote ID: 859
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 90
Section: 3D2
After their victory, Clovis Franks, accustomed to working closely with Romans, were in an ideal position to absorb them into the administration.The Franks themselves were likewise deeply Romanized. Even prior to the victory at Soissons, Clovis and the Franks had been accustomed to the discipline of Rome. Generations of Roman service had taught the Franks much about Roman organization and control. This heritage is even visible in that supposedly most Frankish tradition, the Salic Law. Sometime between 508 and 511 Clovis issued what is known as the Pactus Legis Salicae....
Quote ID: 860
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 90
Section: 3D2
In issuing the text, Clovis was acting not as a barbarian king but as the legitimate ruler of a section of the romanized world. Moreover, the Pactus, applies not simply to Franks. It is intended for all the barbari in his realm.
Quote ID: 861
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 93
Section: 3D2
As long as provincial governors or barbarian kings allowed the Gallo-Roman elite autonomy, with control over their local dependents, these aristocrats were accustomed to providing assistance to the state.
Quote ID: 862
Time Periods: 67
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 93
Section: 3D2,1A
As deeply Romanized as Franks were in terms of military discipline...they were, except for a small elite, as untouched by Roman social and cultural traditions as the Gallo-Roman aristocracy was by military tradition. The unique achievement of Clovis and his successors was that, through his conquest and conversion, he was able to begin to reunite these two splintered halves of the Roman heritage. The process was a long one and not without difficulty, but in time it created a new world.3D2
Quote ID: 864
Time Periods: 46
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 115/116
Section: 3D2
A new kind of Christian barbarian kingdom had been established north of the Alps—one which changed forever the face of the West. With the exception of the Burgundians (whose kingdom would be destroyed and integrated into the Frankish realm by Clovis’s sons), the core of the Frankish kingdom had been constituted; a loose confederation of barbarian chieftains had been replaced by a single ruler whose wealth was matched only by his capacity for violence; an uneasy alliance of pagan and Arian barbarians and Christian Romans had been replaced by a kingdom unified culticly under a Christian king recognized by the emperor in Constantinople and supported by orthodox bishops, the representatives of the Gallo-Roman elite. In spite of the disunity and internecine violence that characterized the reigns of Clovis’s sons and grandsons, the transformation of the West would continue along the lines he had begun.
Quote ID: 869
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 117
Section: 3D2
Within this divided kingdom his successors continued the main lines of his policies. In terms of internal affairs, it often meant the attempt to eliminate each other as he had eliminated his cousins. The result is a complex and violent political narrative, perhaps more reminiscent of late Roman imperial history than of early Germanic tradition. In their internecine struggles the Merovingians had obviously absorbed much from Romans.
Quote ID: 870
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 221
Section: 3D2
The glorious brutality and faithless cruelty of Clovis and his successors was seen to have been followed by the impotence, passivity, and incompetence of his last heirs.
Quote ID: 889
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 221
Section: 3D2
While every country in the West seems eager to claim Charles the Great (Charlemagne, Karl der Grosse, Carlo magno) as their own, and pan-Europeanists term him the “Father of Europe,” Clovis and even Dagobert are largely unclaimed.
Quote ID: 890
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 222
Section: 3D2
In France, national memory jumps from Gallo-Roman period of Syagrius (or perhaps even before, from the time of Asterix) to the glory of Charlemagne. A long tradition, nourished by three disastrous Franco-German wars, has encouraged the French to forget that before there was a “douce France” there was a “Frankono lant,” and that this Frankish land was centered in the lower Seine.
Quote ID: 891
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 224
Section: 3D2
This tradition, which culminated in Einhard, dismisses the Merovingians as ridiculous anachronisms. They are not so much troublesome as they are useless.
Quote ID: 892
Time Periods: ?
Before France and Germany: The Creation and Transformation of the Merovingian World
Patrick J. Geary
Book ID: 40 Page: 225
Section: 3D2
The Carolingian historiographers were extremely successful in creating an image of the preceding dynasty that has been accepted for centuries. Subsequent political apologists could use the image of a dynasty that lost power through incompetence. If a Merovingian could be deposed and sent to a monastery, and a new king elected and consecrated in his place, so too could a Carolingian. In less than a century, this happened to Louis the Pious, Charlemagne’s son.
Quote ID: 893
Time Periods: ?
Birth of Europe, The
Jacques Le Goff
Book ID: 199 Page: 28
Section: 3D2
We should not be misled by the presence of these laws, for they were of an extremely rudimentary nature even in the case of the edict produced by the last true heir to the Roman tradition in the West, the Ostrogoth Theodoric the Great. The Salic law of the Franks, written in Latin under Clovis, was particularly basic.. . . .
Rudimentary though it was, this barbarian legislation resting upon the ruins of Roman law did ensure that the Europe of the Early Middle Ages continued to be based on law.
Quote ID: 4504
Time Periods: ?
Birth of Europe, The
Jacques Le Goff
Book ID: 199 Page: 77
Section: 3D2
The Virgin thus seems to me to have acquired a quite exceptional status, almost becoming a fourth element in the Trinity.
Quote ID: 4513
Time Periods: ?
Bishops, Barbarians, and the Battle for Gaul
Matthew E. Bunson
Book ID: 41 Page: 2
Section: 3D2
Clovis the CatholicSoon after his accession at the age of 15, Clovis received a letter from Bishop Remigius with advice on how to rule, a communication that forecast the interest of the bishops in the new pagan ruler. In his History of the Franks, Gregory of Tours recorded the process of Clovis’ eventual conversion, placing the chief impetus for his embrace of Christianity with his wife. Clotilde was a Burgundian princess and a Catholic who had insisted that the first of their children be baptized. Clovis embraced orthodox Christianity also through the influence and examples of the bishops and Catholic subjects, but Clotilde had the major role. Bishop Nicetus of Trier confirmed her decisive role in a letter dated around 565 to Clovis’ granddaughter, Chlodoswintha. In it he wrote that Clotilde led her husband to the faith, although, “because he was a very shrewd man, he was unwilling to accept it until he knew it was true” (J.N. Hilgarth, Christianity and Paganism, 350-750. The Conversion of Western Europe, 76-78). It is also likely that Clovis wished to identify himself with the Roman provincials—the Catholics—who were his subjects. Their faith was seen as the repository of Romanitas in a way that the Arianism of the Goths was not.
The baptism of Clovis took place either at Rheims or Tours in 496 or 498. Aside from the report that he was baptized with 3,000 of his warriors—he did not compel his followers to do so—what made the baptism so significant for the Church in Gaul was that he had converted to orthodox Christianity. The Church in Gaul henceforth had a patron and champion. The royal baptism began a steady conversion of the Frankish people, hastening their fusion with the Gallo-Roman Catholics. At the same time, the numerous bishops of Gaul celebrated Clovis as their own son, and what had been reluctant and cautious cooperation with the Franks grew rapidly into open and enthusiastic support. In addition, Frankish sentiment increased among the Catholics of southern Gaul and gave them encouragement to begin working toward the defeat of the Arian kingdoms.
In 507, Clovis defeated the Arian Visigoths at Vogladensis (Vouillé), near Poitiers, shattered Visigothic power in southern Gaul, and drove them out of Aquitania beyond the Pyrenees. He then established Lutetia (Paris) as his capital, and in 507-08 received the title of consul with the right to use the imperial insignia from the Eastern Emperor Anastasius in Constantinople. Bishop Avitus expressed what Clovis’ campaigns meant to the orthodox Christians: “Your faith is our triumph. Every battle you fight is a victory for us” (Avitus, Epistulae ad Diversos, 46).
The inevitable success of orthodox Christianity in Gaul under the Merovingian Dynasty was assured through Clovis, who took as his model Emperor Constantine the Great. Clovis was generous to the Church and, like Constantine, crafted for himself a position as protector, convoking a council for Gaul in 511 that hastened the conversion of the Arian clergy, especially in Aquitania. He also specifically mentioned his conversion in the prologue to the Pactus Legis Salicae, the law code for the regnum Francorum that had been drafted with the close consultation of the bishops.
After Rome, Renewal
After the death of Clovis in 511, the succeeding Merovingian kings continued to favor the Frankish Church, which enjoyed tax exemption, with the right to taxes and tithes of its own. Other gifts included massive land grants, so that by the start of the eighth century the Church owned almost one-third of the Frankish kingdom. The Franks, unlike the Goths, willingly intermarried with the peoples they governed. So, as heirs to the Roman authority, they created a mixed culture, with vulgar Latin as the common tongue and Catholic Christianity as the unifying faith.
Quote ID: 899
Time Periods: ?
Breviary of Alaric
Wikipedia
Book ID: 42 Page: 1
Section: 1A,3D2
The chief value of the Visigothic code consists in the fact that it is the only collection of Roman Law in which the five first books of the Theodosian code and five books of the Sententiae Receptae of Julius Paulus have been preserved, and until the discovery of a manuscript in the chapter library in Verona, which contained the greater part of the Institutes of Gaius, it was the only work in which any portion of the institutional writings of that great jurist had come down to us.The Breviary had the effect of preserving the traditions of Roman law in Aquitania and Gallia Narbonensis, which became both Provence and Septimania, thus reinforcing their sense of enduring continuity, broken in the Frankish north.
Quote ID: 900
Time Periods: 456
Christian Liturgy: Catholic and Evangelical
Frank C. Senn
Book ID: 54 Page: 174
Section: 3D2
Independent kingdoms were carved out of Italy by Odoacer (476-493) and Theodoric (493-526). In spite of their glorification of the warrior, it seems that the Ostrogoths were content to live in peace with the Romans and even assimilate Roman ways and institutions. Theodoric the Great sought accommodation between Catholic Romans and Arian Goths, and even a better relationship between the Roman pope and the Byzantine emperor, since he craved the recognition of both. After the deposition of Romulus Augustulus in 476, there was no further emperor in the West until Charlemagne in 800. But the Germanic commanders and kings still regarded themselves as nominal subjects of the Roman Emperor enthroned in Constantinople.
Quote ID: 1216
Time Periods: ?
Christian Liturgy: Catholic and Evangelical
Frank C. Senn
Book ID: 54 Page: 175
Section: 3D2
The Franks, originating in the Lower Rhineland, were able to carve out a vast kingdom that included the present-day Low Countries, the Rhineland, and France. The Roman church had looked favorable on the Franks since the conversion of King Clovis (481-511) to Catholic Christianity (whether from Arianism or paganism is not clear). The Carolingian dynasty of Charles Martel, Pippin the Short, and Charlemagne succeeded, step by step, in consolidating power and commanding the loyalty of chieftans.
Quote ID: 1218
Time Periods: 6
Cults of the Roman Empire, The
Robert Turcan
Book ID: 209 Page: 337
Section: 3D2
. . . repealed the edict of persecution, the Christians continued to explain the misfortunes of the Roman world as a punishment from God. Around the middle of the century, Commodian (Apologetic Poem, 805ff) prophesied: {9}“There will be a number of signs to mark the end of this immense ruin. The beginning of the end will be the seventh persecution directed against us. Lo, he is already knocking at our gate, and he is urged on by the sword, he who will swiftly cross the river with a stampede of Goths. They will have with them the Destroyer king [Apollyon] ... He marches on Rome with thousands of men and by the will of God he makes prisoners among the Romans. Then many senators will bewail their captivity. Defeated by the barbarians, they blaspheme against the God of Heaven!”
Quote ID: 5180
Time Periods: 234
Europe after Rome: A New Cultural History 500-1000
Julia M. H. Smith
Book ID: 83 Page: 217/218
Section: 3A1,3D2
By the early eleventh century, Europe had evolved a culture distinctive for its integration of sacred and profane power, characterized by kings who ruled in close association with the personnel and institutions of the Christian religion, identified themselves as ‘Christ’s own deputy’,{3} and presided over efforts to promote their own particular vision of a Christian society.
Quote ID: 2180
Time Periods: 7
Europe after Rome: A New Cultural History 500-1000
Julia M. H. Smith
Book ID: 83 Page: 275
Section: 3D2
Centuries earlier, the warlords who established kingdoms within the provinces of the crumbling western Roman Empire had legitimized their position by eagerly appropriating symbols of Roman rule—portraits on coins, seals, dress, insignia of office, flattering epithets. As Theoderic had said to Anastasius: ‘Our kingship is an imitation of yours, modeled on your good design, a copy of the only Empire. By as much as we follow you, so much we precede all other peoples.’{38}
Quote ID: 2201
Time Periods: 56
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 20
Section: 3D2
Others will take the clean contrary line and make out a despicable Roman Empire to have fallen before the advent of numerous and vigorous barbarians (Germans, of course) possessing all manner of splendid pagan qualities—which usually turn out to be nineteenth century Protestant qualities.
Quote ID: 2226
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 58
Section: 3D2
They did not desire, attempt, or even dream, the destruction of the Imperial power: that misfortune—which was gradual and never complete—insofar as it come about at all, came about in spite of the barbarians and not by their conscious effort.. . . .
They did not introduce any new institutions or any new ideas.
Quote ID: 2242
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 58/59
Section: 3D2
There is no link between barbaric society and the feudalism of the Middle Ages; there is no trace of such a link. There is, on the contrary, a very definite and clearly marked historical sequence between Roman civilization and the feudal system, attested by innumerable documents which, once read and compared in their order, leave no sort of doubt that feudalism and the mediaeval civilization repose on purely Roman origins.In a word, the gradual cessation of central Imperial rule in Western Europe, the failure of the power and habit of one united organization seated in Rome to color, define and administrate the lives of men, was an internal revolution; it did not come from without. It was a change from within; it was nothing remotely resembling an external, still less a barbaric, conquest from without.
Quote ID: 2243
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 64
Section: 3D2
In the third stage, which is the stage that saw the great convulsion of the fifth century, the army, though not yet wholly barbaric, had already become in its most vital part, barbaric. It took its orders, of course, wholly from the Roman State, but great groups within it were only partly even Latin-speaking or Greek-speaking, and were certainly regarded both by themselves and by their Roman masters as non-Roman in manners and in blood.It must most clearly be emphasized that not only no such thought as an attack upon the Empire entered the heads of these soldiers, but that the very idea of it would have been inconceivable to them. Had you proposed it they would not even have known what you meant.
Quote ID: 2246
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 65
Section: 3D2
…the tendency of pillaging bands to break in past the frontiers into the cultivated lands and the wealth of the cities grew greater and greater; but it never occurred to them to attack the Empire as such. All they wanted was permission to enjoy the life which was led within it, and to abandon the wretched conditions to which they were compelled outside its boundaries.
Quote ID: 2247
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 67/68
Section: 3D2
Alaric was a young noble of Gothic blood, but from birth a Roman; at eighteen years of age he was put by the Court in command of a small Roman auxiliary force originally recruited from the Goths. He was as much a Roman officer, as incapable of thinking of himself in any other terms than those of the Roman Army, as any other one of his colleagues about the throne. He had his commission from the Emperor Theodosius, and when Theodosius marched into Gaul against the usurper Eugenius, he counted Alaric’s division as among the most faithful of his Army.. . . .
Alaric, after this service to the Emperor, was rewarded by further military dignities in the Roman military hierarchy. He was ambitious of military titles and of important command, as are all soldiers.
Though still under twenty years of age and only a commander of auxiliaries, he asks for the title of Magister Militum, with the dignity which accompanied that highest of military posts. The Emperor refuses it. One of the Ministers thereupon begins to plot with Alaric, …
. . . .
The whole thing is a civil war between various branches of the Roman service, and is motive, like all the Roman civil wars for hundreds of years before, by the ambitions of generals.
Quote ID: 2248
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 69
Section: 3D2
The total number of Alaric’s men was at this moment very small; they were perhaps 30,000. There was no trace of nationality about them. They were simply a body of discontented soldiers; they had not come from across the frontier; they were not invaders; they were part of the long established and regular garrisons of the Empire; and, for that matter, many garrisons and troops of equally barbaric origin sided with the regular authorities in the quarrel.
Quote ID: 2249
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 71
Section: 3D2
Odoacer held a regular Roman commission; he was a Roman soldier: Theodoric supplanted him by leave of, and actually under orders from, the Emperor.
Quote ID: 2250
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 71
Section: 3D2
Clovis, the Belgian Fleming, fights no imperial Army. His forebears were Roman officials: his little band of perhaps 8,000 men was victorious in a small and private civil war which made him Master in the North over other rival generals. He defended the Empire against the Eastern barbaric German tribes. He rejoiced in the titles of Consul and Patrician.
Quote ID: 2251
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 71
Section: 3D2
But in the course of this transformation in the fifth and sixth centuries local government did fall into the hands of those who happened to command the main local forces of the Roman Army, and these were by descent barbarian because the Army had become barbarian in its recruitment.
Quote ID: 2252
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 73
Section: 3D2
Dreadful as the irruption of barbarians into civilized places must always be, even on a small scale, the conquest of civilization by barbarians is always and necessarily impossible. Barbarians may have the weight to destroy the civilization they enter, and in so doing to destroy themselves with it. But it is inconceivable that they should impose their view and manner upon civilized men. Now to impose one’s view and manner, dare leges (to give laws), is to conquer.
Quote ID: 2253
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 77
Section: 3D2
They still thought of themselves, in 550, say, as mere provincial powers within the one great Empire of Roe. But there was now no positive central power remaining in Rome to control them. The central power was far off in Constantinople. It was universally accepted, but it made no attempt to act.
Quote ID: 2256
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 83
Section: 3D2
But no Rex ever tried to emancipate himself from the Empire or warred for independence against the Emperor. The Rex, the local man, undertook all government simply because the old Government above him, the central Government, had failed. No Rex ever called himself a local Imperator or dreamed of calling himself so; and that is the most significant thing in all the transition between the full civilization of the old Empire and the Dark Ages.
Quote ID: 2259
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 83/85
Section: 3A1A,3D2
Clovis, in the north of France, the Burgundian chieftain at Arles, Theodoric in Italy, Athanagild later at Toledo in Spain, were all of them men who had stepped into the shoes of an unbroken local Roman administration, who worked entirely by it, and whose machinery of administration wherever they went was called by the Roman and official name of Palatium.. . . .
This governmental world of clerks and civil servants lived its own life and was only in theory dependent upon the Rex, and the Rex was no more than the successor of the chief local Roman official. {8}
The Rex, by the way, called himself always by some definite inferior Roman title, such as Vir Illuster, as an Englishman today might be called “Sir Charles So and So” or “Lord So and So,” never anything more; and often (as in the case of Clovis), he not only accepted directly from the Roman Emperor a particular office, but observed the old popular Roan customs, such as largesse and procession, upon his induction into that office.
Quote ID: 2260
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 89/90
Section: 3D2
Now it so happened that of these local administration or governors who were rapidly becoming independent, and who were surrounded by a powerful court, one only was not Arian.That one was the Rex Francorum or chieftain of the little barbaric auxiliary force of “Franks” which had been drawn into the Roman system from Belgium and the banks of the lower Rhine.
. . . .
A lad whose Roman name was Clodovicus, and whom his parents probably called by some such sound as Clodovig (they had no written language), succeeded his father, a Roman officer, (9) in the generalship of this small body of troops at the end of the fifth century. Unlike the other auxiliary generals, he was pagan.
. . . .
…he could not but assimilate himself with the civilization wherein he was mixed, and he and most of his small command were baptized. He had already married a Christian wife, the daughter of the Burgundian Rex; but in any case such a conclusion was inevitable.
The important historical point is not that he was baptized; for an auxiliary general to be baptized was, by the end of the fifth century, as much a matter of course as for an Oriental trader from Bombay, who has become an English Lord or Baronet in London in our time, to wear trousers and a coat. The important thing is that he was received and baptized by Catholics and not by Arians—in the midst of that enormous struggle.
Clodovicus—known in history as Clovis—came from a remote corner of civilization. His men were untouched by the worldly attraction of Arianism; they had no tradition that it was “the thing” or “smart” to adopt the old court heresy which was offensive to the poorer mass of Europeans. When, therefore, this Rex Francorum was settled in Paris—about the year 500—and was beginning to administer local government in Northern Gaul, the weight of his influence was thrown with the popular feeling and against the Arian Reges in Italy and Spain.
The new armed forces of the Rex Francorum, a general levy continuing the old Roman tradition, settling things once and for all by battle, carried orthodox Catholic administration all over Gaul.
Quote ID: 2264
Time Periods: ?
Europe and the Faith
Hilaire Belloc
Book ID: 84 Page: 130
Section: 3D2
We have seen that there was no considerable infiltration of barbarian blood, no “invasions” in our modern sense of the term (or rather, no successful ones); no blotting out of civilization, still less any introduction of new institutions or ideas drawn from barbarism.
Quote ID: 2267
Time Periods: ?
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 9
Section: 1A,3D2
For instance, a recent European volume about the first post-Roman states is entitled Kingdoms of the Empire: The Integration of Barbarians in Late Antiquity. {19}There is no hint here of invasion or force, nor even that the Roman empire came to an end; instead there is a strong suggestion that the incomers fitted easily into a continuing and evolving Roman world.
Quote ID: 5471
Time Periods: 156
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 10
Section: 3D2
As someone who is convinced that the coming of the Germanic peoples was very unpleasant for the Roman population, and that the long-term effects of the dissolution of the empire were dramatic, I feel obliged to challenge such views.
Quote ID: 5472
Time Periods: 56
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 13
Section: 3D2
In 446 LEO, bishop of Rome, wrote to his colleagues in the North African province of Mauretania Caesariensis. In this letter Leo grabbled with the problem of how the Church should treat nuns raped by the Vandals some fifteen years earlier, ….. . . .
Leo advised the raped women that ‘they will be more praiseworthy in their humility and sense of shame, if they do not dare to compare themselves to uncontaminated virgins’. {1} These unfortunate nuns and Bishop Leo would be very surprised, and not a little shocked, to learn that it is now fashionable to play down the violence and unpleasantness of the invasions that brought down the empire in the West.
Quote ID: 5473
Time Periods: 56
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 13
Section: 3D2
The Germanic invaders of the western empire seized or extorted through the threat of force the vast majority of the territories in which they settled, without any formal agreement on how to share resources with their new Roman subjects. The impression given by some recent historians that most Roman territory was formally ceded to them as part of treaty arrangements is quite simply wrong.
Quote ID: 5474
Time Periods: 56
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 21
Section: 3D2
The Christian apologist Orosius, for instance, wrote a History against the Pagans in 417-18, in which he set himself the unenviable task of proving that, despite the disasters of the early fifth century, the pagan past had actually been worse than the troubled Christian present. In describing the Gothic sack of Rome in 410, Orosius did not wholly deny its unpleasantness (which he attributed to the wrath of God on Rome’s sinful inhabitants). But he also dwelt at length on the respect shown by the Goths for the Christian shrines and saints of the city; …
Quote ID: 5475
Time Periods: 5
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 23
Section: 3D2
Fortunately for the Romans, invading Germanic peoples did not despise them, and had entered the empire in the hope of enjoying the fruits of Roman material comfort—but, equally, the invaders were not angels who have simply been badly maligned (or ‘problematized’, to use modern jargon) by prejudiced Roman observers.
Quote ID: 5476
Time Periods: 156
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 25
Section: 3D2
Salvian’s true feelings towards barbarians are revealed in a passage where he writes of Romans driven by oppression to join them—despite sharing neither their religious beliefs, nor their language, ‘nor indeed . . . the stench that barbarian bodies and clothes give off’. {27}These dismissive and hostile sentiments were not kept quietly under wraps, for discussion only amongst Romans. The monuments of the empire were covered in representations of barbarians being brutally killed (Fig. 2.3); and one of the commonest designs of copper coin of the fourth century shows Rome’s view of the correct ordering of things—a barbarian being speared to death by a victorious Roman soldier (Fig. 2.4).
Quote ID: 5477
Time Periods: 56
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 27
Section: 3D2
When news of Stilicho’s death spread, a murderous pogrom was launched in the cities of northern Italy against the defenceless wives and children of Germanic soldiers serving in the Roman army. Unsurprisingly, on hearing of this atrocity, the husbands immediately deserted the Roman army and joined the invading Goths. Later in the same year, as the Goths were camped outside Rome, they were joined by more recruits with no cause to love the Romans, a host of slaves who had escaped from the city. {30}
Quote ID: 5478
Time Periods: 56
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 66
Section: 3D2
….the foundation of the new kingdoms certainly restored a degree of stability to the West, allowing normal life to resume its course, though under new masters. The Ostrogoths in Italy very explicitly presented their rule in this light: ‘While the army of Goths wages war, let the Roman live in peace.’ {7}
Quote ID: 5485
Time Periods: ?
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 68/69
Section: 3D2
When they did brutal things to their subjects, as they sometimes did, Germanic kings often chose to do them in a very Roman way and for very Roman reasons. The Vandal king Huneric (477-84)—an Arian Christian, like the rest of his people—was, according to one’s point of view, either a heretic and a savage persecutor of the native Catholic majority of Africa, or a caring and orthodox ruler who wished to lift his subjects from the appalling doctrinal errors in which they wallowed. He instituted his attacks on Catholicism in a purely Roman style, issuing edicts in Latin, which spelled out his own titles to rule, the errors of the ‘homo-ousian’ heretics (as he termed the Catholics), and the divine justice of his own position: ‘In this matter our Clemency has followed the will of divine judgement…’.. . . .
The king was apparently particularly concerned to stamp out any possibility of Vandal conversions to Catholicism; to this end he ordered that no one in Vandal dress should be allowed to enter a Catholic church, and posted men to enforce the rule with considerable brutality.
Quote ID: 5486
Time Periods: ?
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 70
Section: 3D2
On the Continent, the examples of cooperation between local Roman aristocrats and Germanic kings are myriad.. . . .
The disintegration of the unified empire, and its replacement by a scatter of Germanic courts, indeed gave provincial Romans readier access to influence and power than they had held in the fourth century, when there was only one imperial court, often at a great distance.
Quote ID: 5487
Time Periods: ?
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 72
Section: 3D2
Eventually, of course, the distinction between Germanic rulers and Roman subjects became blurred, and finally disappeared altogether.
Quote ID: 5488
Time Periods: 56
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 74
Section: 3D2
The Goths are presented in most contemporary texts as upholders of Roman culture, and as a force for spreading it to other, less civilized peoples. For instance, Theoderic, in a letter penned by Cassiodorus, hoped that a lyre-player sent to Clovis, king of the Franks, would ‘perform a feat like that of Orpheus, when his sweet sound tames the savage hearts of the barbarians’. Sentiments like these, of course, implied that the Goths themselves were not barbarians.
Quote ID: 5490
Time Periods: 56
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 74
Section: 3D2
Ostrogothic propaganda even extended this patronizing treatment of other Germanic peoples to their own ‘cousins’, the Visigoths of Gaul and Spain. In about 510, soon after he had taken over control of a large part of southern Gaul from the Visigoths, Theoderic wrote to his new Gallic subjects, describing his own rule as ‘Roman’ and regulated by law, and contrasting it explicitly with the unregulated ‘barbarian’ rule of the Visigoths: ‘You who have been restored to it after many years should gladly obey Roman custom . . . And therefore, as men by God’s favour recalled to ancient liberty, clothe yourself in the morals of the toga, cast off barbarism, throw aside savagery of mind, for it is wrong for you, in my just times, to live by alien ways.’ Only very rarely, as with Theoderic’s moustache, does a different reality show through—one that reveals the survival of a Gothic identity, which, of course, the Romans would have had no hesitation in branding as ‘barbarian’. {21}
Quote ID: 5491
Time Periods: 56
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 75
Section: 3D2
By the start of the sixth century, the Visigoths had ruled parts of Gaul for over eighty years. As far as we can tell, after an initial seizure of resources, they had not been particularly oppressive masters; certainly they had not attempted to encourage the spread of their own Arian Christian beliefs in the brutal manner that the Vandals had occasionally used in Africa. There is also evidence of a degree of integration between Goths and natives.
Quote ID: 5492
Time Periods: ?
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 76
Section: 3A1,3D2
However, in the very early sixth century, probably in the face of an ever-increasing threat from the Franks, the Visigothic king did two interesting things. First, he issued a solemn compendium of Roman law (known as the Breviarium of Alaric), to be used in the judging of Romans living under Visigothic rule. This, we are told in its preamble, was produced after extensive consultation, with all departures in wording from original imperial texts being approved by a group of bishops and ‘selected men amongst our provincials’.
Quote ID: 5493
Time Periods: 6
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 76
Section: 3D2
The Breviarium and the Council of Agde show Visigothic rule in Gaul at its most benign; but they also show that, right up to its final defeat in 507, it was still alien rule, over Roman subject who were readily identifiable as different from the Visigoths through their adherence to Roman law and to Catholic Christianity. {24} Indeed, it was not until 587, over 200 years after their first arrival in the empire in 376, that the Visigoths finally abandoned their Arianism and converted to Catholic Christianity.
Quote ID: 5494
Time Periods: ?
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 78/79
Section: 3D2
People in Frankish Gaul, whatever their ancestry, were apparently slowly adopting a common identity; indeed, by the end of the seventh century there were no ‘Romans’ left in northern Gaul, only people who considered themselves ‘Franks’. {28}
Quote ID: 5495
Time Periods: 56
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 79
Section: 3D2
However, there were problems for Romans who wanted to adopt Germanic culture—in particular, a centuries-old, deeply ingrained certainty that their own ways were immeasurably superior to those of the barbarians. In Ostrogothic Italy, the learned Ennodius mocked Jovinianus, a Roman who sported both a Roman cloak and a ‘Gothic beard’ (very possibly a moustache in the style of Theoderic and Theodahad). Jovinianus’ Roman dress and Gothic facial hair are to us a fascinating example of two ethnic groups beginning to fuse into one; but, for Ennodius, Jovinianus was ‘mixing discordant offspring in a hostile alliance’, and his beard gave him a ‘barbarian appearance’. Ennodius’ scorn illustrates the barriers that still defended Roman ways.
Quote ID: 5496
Time Periods: ?
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 80
Section: 1A,3D2
Faith in the superiority of Roman culture was, to some extent, shared by the Germanic peoples themselves. Their presentation of their rule in a very Roman guise was partly aimed at their Roman subjects, but it almost certainly also pleased the rulers themselves. In Ostrogothic Italy, as we have seen, Theoderic and his successors were happy to present themselves as the upholders of Roman culture, and to see this as a vital difference between themselves and the true barbarians beyond.
Quote ID: 5497
Time Periods: 156
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 80
Section: 1A,3D2
If we look at the two large Germanic kingdoms that survived to the end of the sixth century, those of the Visigoths and of the Franks, what seems to have happened is that the indigenous Roman population eventually adopted the identity of their masters, and became ‘Visigoths’ or ‘Franks’ (from which ‘Français’ and ‘French’ derive); but at the same time these masters adopted the culture of their subjects—in particular dropping their native language and religion in favour of those of their subjects. The explanation, I think, is that both groups moved ‘upwards’: the Romans into the political identity of their Germanic masters; the Germanic peoples into the more sophisticated cultural framework of their Roman subjects. {32}
Quote ID: 5498
Time Periods: 156
Fall of Rome: And The End of Civilization, The
Bryan Ward-Perkins
Book ID: 222 Page: 81
Section: 4B,3D2
….in the 480s the bishop of Reims, Remigius, wrote to Clovis, the new Frankish king of the region in which his see lay. Remigius, of course, also wrote in Latin, the language of high culture and history, and he congratulated Clovis on taking over ‘the governance of Belgica Secunda’. This was not strictly true: the Roman province of Belgica Secunda had long ceased to exist. {34} But Remigius was not only flattering Clovis; by presenting him in a Roman light, he was also gently steering him towards a particular view of his command—later in the same letter he encouraged the king (at this date a pagan) to heed the advice of his bishops. The tactic worked; later in his reign Clovis was baptized into the Catholic faith by Remigius himself.
Quote ID: 5499
Time Periods: 56
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 58
Section: 3D2,4B
As a result, the defended Roman frontier came by the mid-first century AD to be established broadly along a line marked by the Rivers Rhine and Danube. Some minor adjustments apart, it was still there three hundred years later. The consequences were profound. West and south of these riverine frontiers, European populations, whether Jastorf or La Tene, found themselves sucked into a trajectory towards Latin, togas, towns and, eventually, Christianity.
Quote ID: 5541
Time Periods: 56
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 94
Section: 3D2
Germanic successor states to the western Roman Empire produced large numbers of legal texts. These consistently portray Germanic (and Germanic-dominated) societies at this late date as comprising essentially three castes: freemen, freedmen, and slaves. Unlike its Roman counterpart, where the offspring of freedmen were completely free – and thus freemen – freedmen status in the Germanic was hereditary.
Quote ID: 5550
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 182
Section: 3D2
The Goths faced three overwhelming disadvantages that made it impossible for them to defeat the Roman Empire outright. First, even if, taking the maximum conceivable figure, we reckon that there were 200,000 of them in all, with the capacity to produce an army of 40-50,000 men - although I do think this figure too high - this would still have been rather paltry compared with the grand sum of imperial resources. The Empire’s army totalled, as we’ve seen, 300-600,000, and its population was in excess of 70 million (a minimum figure). In a fight to the death, there could be only one winner.Pastor John notes: John’s note: The empire was just too big
Quote ID: 5588
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 191
Section: 3D2
On a hot August day in 410, the unthinkable happened. A large force of Goths entered Rome by the Salarian Gate and for three days helped themselves to the cities wealth. The sources, without being specific, speak clearly of rape and pillage. There was, of course, much loot to be had, and the Goths had a field day. By the time they left, they had cleaned out many of the rich senatorial houses as well as all the temples, and had taken ancient Jewish treasures that had resided in Rome since the destruction of Solomon’s temples in Jerusalem over three hundred years before.-------------
The Roman world was shaken to its foundations. After centuries as mistress of the known world, the great imperial capital had been subjected to a smash-and-grab raid of epic proportions. In the Holy Land, St Jerome, an émigré from Rome, put it succinctly: ‘In one city, the whole world perished.’ Pagan reactions were more pointed: ‘If Rome hasn’t been saved by its guardian deities, it’s because they are no longer there; for as long as they were present, they preserved the City.’ {1} The adoption of Christianity, in other words, had led to this devastation.
Quote ID: 5590
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 213
Section: 3D2
One thing the Goths wanted, in any new deal, was that the Romans recognized their right to a leader by granting him official status as a fully fledged Roman general (magister militum).--------------
The Goths had had enough of their half-baked political autonomy within the Roman state, ground-breaking though it had been when instituted a quarter of a century earlier.
Quote ID: 5591
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 214
Section: 3D2
Frustrated in his desire for a political deal, Alaric set his men loose.
Quote ID: 5592
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 214
Section: 3D2
Theodosius’ older son, the eastern emperor Arcadius, though twenty years older in 397 never actually ruled, but was always surrounded by a swarm of ambitious politicians seeking power through his favour. By 397, currently the most powerful of these courtiers the eunuch Chamberlain Eutropius, was ready to negotiate. He made Alaric a Roman general and granted the Goths the better terms and extra guarantees they required. He allowed them to settle in Dacia and Macedonia, and probably arranged for local produce, levied as tax in kind, to be diverted to their subsistence. Eutropius’ fate is highly instructive. Eunuchs were generally figures of ridicule in the Roman world, portrayed as immoral and greedy: just the sort of go soft on barbarians demanding money and menaces. As both a eunuch and a Goth appeaser, Eutropius’ position was vulnerable, and was brilliantly exploited by his opponents. He was duly toppled in the summer of 399. {49} His successors tore up the agreement with Alaric and refused to negotiate further.
Quote ID: 5593
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 226
Section: 3D2
Alaric stormed out – but then, fascinating, changed his mind. This time he recruited some Roman bishops to serve as his ambassadors. The message they delivered was this:Alaric did not now want office or honour, nor did he now wish to settle in the provinces previously specified, but only the two Noricums, which are on the far reaches of the Danube, are subject to continual incursions, and pay little tax to the treasury. Moreover he would be satisfied with a much corn each year as the emperor thought sufficient, and forget the gold . . .
-----------------
Alaric’s moderation may astonish, but it reveals his vision of the big picture. Currently he had the military power to take pretty much whatever he wanted, but was willing to trade it in for a stable peace agreement with the Roman state.
Quote ID: 5594
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 227/229
Section: 3D2
A meeting was arranged, and Alaric moved to within 60 stadia (about 12 kilometres) of Ravenna. Rogue elements in Honorius’ military, meanwhile, were against all negotiation. As Alaric awaited Honorius, he was attacked by a small Roman force...------------
Alaric was outraged......Giving up on the idea of negotiating with Ravenna, the Goths turned on their heels and returned to Rome a fourth time. There they mounted their third siege. No doubt by this time Rome’s suburban landladies had their old rooms waiting for them. There was a brief halt outside the walls, but then the Salarian Gate opened. {62}
--------------
By all accounts, there followed one of the most civilized sacks of a city ever witnessed. Alaric’s Goths were Christian, and treated many of Rome’s holiest places with great respect. The two main basilicas of St. Peter and St. Paul were nominated places of sanctuary. Those who fled there were left in peace, and refugees to Africa later reported with astonishment how the Goths had even conducted certain holy ladies there, particularly one Marcella, before methodically ransacking their houses. Not that everyone, not even all the city’s nuns, fared so well, but the Christian Goths did keep their religious affiliation firmly in view. One huge silver ciborium, 2,025 pounds in weight and the gift of the emperor Constantine, was lifted from the Lateran Palace, but the liturgical vessels of St Peter’s were left in situ. Structural damage, too, was largely limited to the area of the Salarian Gate and the old Senate house. All in all, even after three days of Gothic attentions, the vast majority of the city’s monuments and buildings remained intact, even stripped of their movable valuables.
The contrast with the last time the city had been sacked, by Celtic tribes in 390 BC, could not have been marked.
------------------------
In 390 BC, only the fortress on the Capitol survived the burning of the city; in AD 410 only the Senate house was set on fire. {63}
------------------------
The inescapable conclusion to be drawn from a close exploration of the sequence of events between 408 and 410, however, is that Alaric did not want the sack to happen. His Goths had been outside the city on and off since late autumn 408, and, had they wanted to, could have taken it at any point in the twenty months since their arrival. Alaric could probably not have cared less about possible banner headlines in the historical press and a few dozen wagons‘ worth of booty. His concerns were of a different order altogether. Since 395, he had been struggling to force the Roman state to rewrite its relationship with the Goths as it had been defined in the treaty of 382. His bottom line, as we know, was the grant of recognized status by a legitimate Roman regime.
---------------------
Ultimately, therefore, Honorius could ignore its fate without the Empire suffering major damage. Alaric’s letting his troops loose there for three days was an admission that his whole policy, since entering Italy in the autumn of 408, had been misconceived. It had not delivered the kind of deal with the Roman state that he was looking for. The sack of Rome was not much a symbolic blow to the Roman Empire as an admission of Gothic failure.
Quote ID: 5595
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 340
Section: 3D2
But, as in Gaul the previous year, Attila’s Italian campaign failed to go entirely to plan. Papal sources and Hollywood scriptwriters love to focus on one incident in particular when, after the capture of Milan, Pope Leo, as part of a peace embassy that included the Perfect Trygetius and ex-consul Avienus, met Attila to try to persuade him not to attack the city of Rome. In the end, the Huns did turn back, retreating to Hungary once again.In some circles this went down as a great personal triumph for the Pope in face-to-face diplomacy. Reality was more prosaic. Other forces apart from God-guided Leo were at work.
Quote ID: 5597
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 379/381
Section: 3D2
Since time immemorial, the traditional education had portrayed barbarians - including Visigoths - as the ‘other’, the irrational, the uneducated; the destructive force constantly threatening the Roman Empire.-------------------
Theoderic II was not your run-of-the-mill barbarian, driven by his senses, addicted to alcohol and the next adrenalin rush. He was, in fact, a ‘Roman’ in the proper sense, one who had learned reason and self-discipline, who ran his court, his life - indeed, himself - in the time-hallowed Roman manner.
Pastor John notes: John’s note: Life of Severinus
Quote ID: 5598
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 379/380/381
Section: 3D2
Since time immemorial, the traditional education had portrayed barbarians—including Visigoths—as the ‘other’, the irrational, the uneducated; the destructive force constantly threatening the Roman Empire.….
Theoderic II was not your run-of-the-mill barbarian, driven by his senses, addicted to alcohol and the next adrenalin rush. He was, in fact, a ‘Roman’ in the proper sense, one who had learned reason and self-discipline, who ran his court, his life—indeed, himself—in the time-hallowed Roman manner.
Quote ID: 8472
Time Periods: ?
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 429
Section: 3D2
By early autumn 476, most loose ends have been tied up. The changes brought on by Odovacar’s regime were pushing Italy towards a new political stability, even if no land distributions had yet taken place. One anomaly remained. At the moment, Italy still had an emperor in Romulus Augustulus, but Odovacar had no interest in preserving the position of this notional ruler who controlled nothing beyond the Italian peninsula. Consulting friends in the Senate, he came up with the solution. A senatorial embassy was sent to Constantinople, now presided over by Leo’s successor the emperor Zeno, proposing that there was no need of a divided rule and that one, shared Emperor was sufficient for both territories. They said, moreover, that they had chosen Odovacar, a man of military and political experience, to safeguard their own affairs, and that Zeno should confer upon him the rank of Patrician and entrust him with the government of Italy. {76}In the kind of language that accompanied the outbreak of the Falklands war in the 1980s, Zeno was to have sovereignty over Italy as Roman emperor, but Odovacar would control the administration. In practice, this meant merely that by promoting him to the rank of Patrician Zeno should legitimize Odovacar’s seizure of power; it was the title that the effective rulers of Italy such as Stilicho and Aetius had been holding now for the best part of a century.
--------------------
Here was Zeno’s chance [Eastern Emperor] to put the power of the east behind a last attempt to restore the western Empire. He weighed up the situation carefully, then wrote a sympathetic note to Nepos [Western Emperor]. The conclusion he had come to was what everyone else already knew. The western Empire was over.
Quote ID: 5604
Time Periods: 5
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: 430
Section: 3D2
Odovacar took the hint. He deposed Romulus, pensioning him off with a charity rare in imperial politics to an estate in Campania. He then sent the western imperial vestments, including, of course the diadem and cloak which only an emperor could wear, back to Constantinople. This momentous act brought half a millennium of empire to a close.
Quote ID: 5605
Time Periods: 05
Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians, The
Peter Heather
Book ID: 223 Page: xiii
Section: 3D2
...recent trends in historical writing which have sought to challenge the unspoken prejudices which inform the ‘great narratives’ of traditional history. The image of the ‘civilized’ but ever declining Romans implacably at war with ‘barbarian’ outsiders is a prime example of one such narrative at work.
Quote ID: 5526
Time Periods: ?
Formation of Christendom, The
Judith Herrin
Book ID: 225 Page: 34
Section: 3D2
By 431, Geneseric, a vandal general had captured Hippo. Eight years later, Carthage. This damaged the western empire more than the prolonged warfare in Italy and Gaul. It was an “aggressive Arian power that persecuted orthodox Xty and pagans alike.” Sicily fell in 468. And when Geneseric sacked Rome (in 455, 45 years after Alaric), he inflicted a destruction commemorated in western vocabulary as “vandalism”.
Quote ID: 5636
Time Periods: ?
Formation of Christendom, The
Judith Herrin
Book ID: 225 Page: 36
Section: 3D2
“In Italy, Gaul, Burgundy, Spain, and central North Africa, barbarian kings ruled, sometimes in the name of Rome, but with unrestricted independence in fact.”
Quote ID: 5637
Time Periods: ?
Formation of Christendom, The
Judith Herrin
Book ID: 225 Page: 36/37
Section: 3D2
“They pursued what has been called a “sub-Roman” way of life.” This was a continuation of elements of their own native cultures, the use of Latin as the official language, and the adoption of Xty. “Paradoxically, alien forces . . . were perpetuating many ancient Roman traditions . . . The most striking feature of their settlement in the West became its Roman nature.”
Quote ID: 5638
Time Periods: ?
Formation of Christendom, The
Judith Herrin
Book ID: 225 Page: 45
Section: 3D2
“All those who successfully set up their States in the West” had successfully passed through “the essential stages of acquiring Latin and adopting Xty.”
Quote ID: 5639
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 33
Section: 3D2
39. Alaric appeared before trembling Rome, laid siege, spread confusion, and broke into the City 24 August 410. He first, however, gave orders that all those who had taken refuge in sacred places, especially in the basilicas of holy Apostles Peter and Paul, should be permitted to remain inviolate and unmolested; he allowed his men to devote themselves to plunder as much as they wished, but he gave orders that they should refrain from bloodshed.
Quote ID: 2382
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 33/34
Section: 3D2
While the barbarians were roaming through the City, one of the Goths, a powerful man and a Christian, chanced to find in a church building a virgin advanced in years who had dedicated herself to God. When he respectfully asked her for gold and silver, she declared with the firmness of her faith that she had a large amount in her possession and that she would bring it forth at once. She did so. Observing that the barbarian was astonished at the size, weight, and beauty of the riches displayed, even though he did not know the nature of the vessels, the virgin of Christ then said to him: “These are the sacred plate of the Apostle Peter. Presume, if you dare! You will have to answer for the deed. As for me, since I cannot protect them, I dare not keep them.” The barbarian, stirred to religious awe through the fear of God and by the virgin’s faith, sent word of the incident to Alaric. He ordered that all the vessels, just as they were, should be brought back immediately to the basilica of the Apostle, and that the virgin also, together with all Christians who might join the procession, should be conducted thither under escort.
Quote ID: 2383
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 259
Section: 3D2
Clovis’s descendants, called the ‘Merovingians’ - a family name derived from the king’s grandfather Merovech (see 78-80) - ruled until 751.
Quote ID: 2402
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 259
Section: 3D2
For example, a problem recurrent in the modern literature on Clovis is the date of the king’s baptism in the Catholic faith, an event often seen as a watershed in European history. Gregory connects Clovis’s conversion, and subsequent baptism, to the persuasive efforts of his wife Chlothild, and then to the king’s battlefield victory against Alamanni in 496. The dates of his baptism suggested by modern scholars on the basis of earlier sources range from 496, Gregory’s date, to 508, the year after the famous battle of Vouille, in which Clovis, whom Gregory portrayed as a champion of Catholicism, defeated the Arian king of the Visigoths, Alaric.
Quote ID: 2403
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 261
Section: 3D2
Bishop Avitus to King ClovisThe followers of all kinds of sects have cast the shadow of the name Christian over your keen intelligence with their views, diverse in their conjecture, various in their great number, and empty as far as truth is concerned. While we consign those views to Eternity and, while we reserve to a future investigation anything each person thinks is right, still, the radiant ray of truth shines forth at the present time. Indeed, divine providence finds in our day a certain arbiter. Though you choose on your own behalf, you make a judgement for us all: your faith is your victory.
Pastor John notes: John’s note: Encourages him to continue to deny his ancestors’ faith
Quote ID: 2404
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 262
Section: 3D2
Thus in fitting fashion the regenerating waters brought you forth to salvation on the day when the world received the Lord of heaven, who was born for its redemption. The day renowned as the Lord’s birthday is also yours - when you were born to Christ and when Christ was born to the world. On this day you have consecrated your soul to God, your life to the present generation, and your fame to posterity.
Quote ID: 2405
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 262
Section: 3D2
There is one matter I would have improved. Since God through you makes your people completely His own, I would have you extend from the good treasury of your heart the seed of faith to more remote peoples whom none of the sprouts of perverse dogma has corrupted, because they are still situated in a state of natural ignorance.
Quote ID: 2406
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 267
Section: 3D2
42. LETTER OF CLOVIS TO AQUITANIAN BISHOPS ON THE KING’S PEACE AND APOSTOLIC LETTERS, a. 507/08This interesting letter is probably the closest we will ever come to the ‘real’ Clovis. It should not be read as a personal letter, however, but rather as an official expression of royal policy at a particular moment, when an invasion of Visigothic territory was underway. It is usually dated to 507.
. . . .
In the first place, we have commanded with respect to the rights of all churches, that no one is to try to seize any kind of property, neither from religious women nor from widows who can be shown to be dedicated to the service of the Lord; likewise, from clerics and the children of both clerics and widows staying in the homes of their parents. So too, with regard to slaves of the churches, who are established by the oaths of bishops to have been taken from the churches, the command has been given that none of them are to suffer any violence or injury.
Quote ID: 2407
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 270
Section: 3D2
1. LETTER OF NICETIUS, BISHOP, OF TRIER, TO CHLODOSWINTHA, QUEEN OF THE LOMBARDS, ca. 564Chlodoswintha was the daughter of Chlothar I and granddaughter of Clovis. This letter sent to her by Nicetius, bishop of Trier (a. 525/6-post 561), was an exhortation for her to win over her husband Alboin to Catholicism; Alboin was king of the Lombards in Pannonia and an Arian Christian. The first part of the letter, omitted here, gives doctrinal arguments for the superiority of orthodoxy over Arianism and then emphasizes the miraculous power of Gallic, Catholic Saints, especially that of Saint Martin of Tours. The letter is, among other things, evidence for traditions about Clovis’s conversion and baptism before Gregory of Tours wrote his Histories
Pastor John notes: John’s note: Find this!!!!
. . . .
When he was baptized, you have heard all he accomplished against the heretic
king Alaric [II] and Gundobad; you are not aware of what he and his sons were given to possess in this world.
Pastor John notes: John’s note: War
Quote ID: 2408
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 275/276
Section: 3D2
Then the king, acknowledging almighty God in the Trinity, was baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the holy Spirit, and anointed with holy chrism under the sign of the cross of Christ.As for his army, more than three thousand men were baptized.
. . . .
Another sister of the king was also converted. Her name was Lantechildis, and, though she had fallen into heresy of the Arians, she acknowledged the Son and the holy Spirit as equal to the Father and received the holy chrism.
Quote ID: 2409
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 279
Section: 3D2
...This argument confounded Gundobad, but he persisted in this madness to his dying day and would not acknowledge in public the equality of the Trinity.
Quote ID: 2410
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 280
Section: 3D2
The King Clovis said to his men, “I take it very badly that these Arians hold part of Gaul. With God’s help, let’s go and conquer them and bring the land under our authority.”
Quote ID: 2411
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 283
Section: 3D2
38. On the Patriciate of King ClovisThen Clovis received from the emperor Anatasius documents conferring the consulate on him and, in the church of the blessed Martin, having been vested in the purple tunic and chlamys, he set a diadem upon his head.
Quote ID: 2412
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 285
Section: 3D2
“Why,” asked Clovis, “have you disgraced our lineage by allowing yourself to be bound? It would have been better for you to die.”Raising his ax, he drove it into Ragnachar’s head. Then he turned to Ragnachar’s brother.
“If you had given your brother help,” he said, “surely he wouldn’t have been bound.”
With a blow of his ax, he killed him the same way.
Pastor John notes: John’s note: Clovis’s regular method
Quote ID: 2413
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 289
Section: 3D2
Gregory continued his account of Gallic affairs after Clovis’s death with a history of the king’s successors. This history is the major, if not the only source (cf.20) for the half century following Clovis’s death.
Quote ID: 2414
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 300
Section: 3D2
When they were killed, Chlothar mounted his horse and went away, viewing the killing of his nephews as of little consequence. Childebert retired to the outskirts of the city. As for the queen, she placed their small bodies on a bier and accompanied it to the basilica of Saint Peter amid much psalm singing and endless grieving. She buried them side by side. One of them was ten years old, the other seven. But the third, Chlodoald, they were unable to get hold of, since he was saved by the help of his fighting men. He put aside his earthly kingdom and passed over into the Lord’s service; cutting his hair with his own hands, he became cleric, performing good works, and passed away from this life as a priest.Pastor John notes: John’s note: Escaped death by this
Quote ID: 2415
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 305/306
Section: 3D2
King Chlothar had proclaimed that all the churches of his kingdom were to pay a third of their income to the fisc. When all the bishops had unwillingly agreed to this and signed their names, the blessed Injuriosus bishop of Tours, ca. 530-546, manfully rejected doing so and refused to sign.“If you try to take the things of God,” he said, “the Lord will quickly take away your kingdom, for it is wrong for the poor to have to fill your granary, when you should be feeding them from it.”
He was angry with the king and left without saying farewell.
The king was unsettled by this and, being afraid also of the power of the blessed Martin, sent after the bishop with gifts, begging pardon, condemning his own actions, and asking also that the bishop intercede with the power of the blessed Martin on his behalf.
Quote ID: 2416
Time Periods: ?
From Roman To Merovingian Gaul
Alexander Callander Murray
Book ID: 93 Page: 318
Section: 3D2
Mummolus The PatricianHis Career and Campaigns against the Saxons and Lombards (IV 42, 44)
Eunius, also called Mummolus, was promoted to the post of patrician by King Guntram. It is necessary, I think, to recollect at greater length certain details about the beginning of his service.
Pastor John notes: John’s note: 570?, Gaul
Quote ID: 2417
Time Periods: ?
Gregory of Tours: The Merovingians
Alexander Callander Murray (Edited and Translated)
Book ID: 102 Page: 10
Section: 3D2
Now the queen never ceased instructing the king to recognize the true God, and to abandon his idols. But in no way could she bring him to believe, until at last, when waging war upon the Alamanni, he was forced by necessity to confess what of his free will he had denied. It happened that, when the two hosts joined battle, the slaughter was fierce and the army of Clovis was in danger of annihilation.When he saw this, the king raised his eyes to heaven and, with a change of heart, began to weep.
“Jesus Christ,” he said, “You who Chlothild proclaims are the Son of the living God, who are said to give aid to those in distress and to grant victory to those that put their hopes in You, I humbly implore Your glory for help…”
Quote ID: 2561
Time Periods: ?
Gregory of Tours: The Merovingians
Alexander Callander Murray (Edited and Translated)
Book ID: 102 Page: 11
Section: 3D2
To begin, the king asked to be baptized by the bishop. The new Constantine advanced to the front to wipe out the disease of the old leprosy, to wipe away in new waters the filthy stains borne from ancient times.As the king entered the water, the saint of God eloquently addressed him with the words, “Gently bow your head, Sicamber; worship that which you have burned; burn that which you have worshipped.”
….
Then the king, acknowledging almighty God in the Trinity, was baptized in the name of the Father, the Son, and the holy Spirit, and anointed with holy chrism under the sign of the cross of Christ.
Quote ID: 2562
Time Periods: ?
Gregory of Tours: The Merovingians
Alexander Callander Murray (Edited and Translated)
Book ID: 102 Page: 12
Section: 3D2
At this time the two brothers Gundobad and Godigisel were in possession of a kingdom in the area of Rhône and Saône, including the province of Marseilles. Both they and their people were followers of the Arian sect.Since the brothers were at odds with each other, Godigisel, who had heard of the victories of King Clovis, secretly sent envoys to him to say, “If you give me help to go after my brother, so I can either kill him in battle or drive him from the kingdom, I will pay you each year such a tribute as you may wish to impose.”
Clovis gladly took the offer and promised him aid whenever it was required. At the appointed time, he brought his army against Gundobad.
Quote ID: 2563
Time Periods: ?
Gregory of Tours: The Merovingians
Alexander Callander Murray (Edited and Translated)
Book ID: 102 Page: 16
Section: 3D2
Then King Clovis said to his men, “I take it very badly that these Arians hold part of Gaul. With God’s help, let’s go and conquer them and bring the land under our authority.”
Quote ID: 2564
Time Periods: ?
Gregory of Tours: The Merovingians
Alexander Callander Murray (Edited and Translated)
Book ID: 102 Page: 19
Section: 3D2
He left Tours and came to Paris, where he established the seat of his government. There he was also joined by Theuderic.
Quote ID: 2565
Time Periods: ?
Gregory of Tours: The Merovingians
Alexander Callander Murray (Edited and Translated)
Book ID: 102 Page: 21/22
Section: 3D2
Clovis arrived and deployed his forces against him. Ragnachar, on seeing his army defeated, was ready to run for it, but was caught by the army and brought before Clovis with his arms bound behind his back, as was his brother Richar.“Why,” asked Clovis, “have you disgraced our lineage by allowing yourself to be bound? It would have been better for you to die.”
Raising his ax, he drove it into Ragnachar’s head. Then he turned to Ragnachar’s brother.
“If you had given your brother help,” he said, “ surely he wouldn’t have been bound.”
With the blow of his ax, he killed him the same way.
After the death of the brothers, their betrayers recognized that the gold that they had received from Clovis was false.
When they told the king this, he is said to have answered, “Someone who willfully lures his lord to his death deserves to receive gold such as this. “He added that to be alive should be enough for them unless they wanted to pay for the wicked betrayal of their lords by being tortured to death.
On hearing this, they decided to earn his favor, claiming that it was enough if they could obtain their lives.
The above mentioned two kings were kinsmen of Clovis. Their brother, whose name was Rignomer, was killed at Le Mans by order of Clovis. With their deaths, Clovis acquired their entire kingdom and treasure. And he killed many other kings and his own near relatives whom he suspected might take away his kingship, and in this way, he extended his authority over all Gaul.
One day, however, when he had gathered together his followers, he is supposed to have said with respect to his kinsmen he had destroyed, “How sad it is for me to be left like a traveler among strangers and to have no kin to help me if trouble comes along.”
He said this, not because he felt grief for their deaths, but as a trick, to see if he could still find someone to kill.
After these events had taken place, Clovis died at Paris [a. 511] and was buried in the basilica of the Holy Apostles, which he himself had built along with Chlothild his queen. He passed away in the fifth year after the battle of Vouillé. His reign amounted to thirty years in all. His age was forty-five.
Quote ID: 2566
Time Periods: ?
Growth of Church Institutions, The
The Rev. Edwin Hatch, M. A., D.D., (Reader In Ecclesiastical History In The University Of Oxford Sec
Book ID: 230 Page: 10
Section: 3A1,3A4,3D2
Here and there, on the large estates of Roman owners, there was a chapel for Christian service; but the mass of the Celtic peasantry was unconverted. The familiar word “pagan” or “villager” comes to us from this time, and indicates this feature of it. Christianity was the religion of the governing classes and their immediate dependants; it belonged to the cities and not to the country; it was almost a part of the imperial regime.Upon this state of things came the slowly rolling waves of Teutonic conquest.
Quote ID: 5769
Time Periods: 456
Growth of Church Institutions, The
The Rev. Edwin Hatch, M. A., D.D., (Reader In Ecclesiastical History In The University Of Oxford Sec
Book ID: 230 Page: 11/12
Section: 3A1,3A3,3A4,3D2,4B
The Celts and Romans still formed the mass of the population. They retained their customs and their laws. The framework of the imperial organization remained without material change. And within that framework two features, the one of German character and the other of German usage, preserved much that was old, and laid the foundation of much that was to come. The one feature was that the Germans loved the country rather than the town, and that consequently, though great estates changed hands, the cities were left for the most part to their former inhabitants. The other feature was that, following their traditional usage, they did not impose their own laws upon the inhabitants of the territories which they conquered, but allowed each race to retain, and to be judged by, its own legal code. The general result was that in the cities was gathered together almost all that survived of Rome; the schools preserved the Roman tongue, the courts preserved Roman law, the Church preserved Roman Christianity. Of all this survival of Roman life, the bishop of the civitas was the centre. Round him the aristocracy of the old Roman families naturally gathered. He symbolised to them their past glories and their ancient liberties. He was their refuge in trouble, and their chief shield against oppression. His house was not infrequently the old praetorium, the residence of the Roman governor. Even his dress was that of a Roman official. In him the empire still lived.3A
Quote ID: 5770
Time Periods: 56
Growth of Church Institutions, The
The Rev. Edwin Hatch, M. A., D.D., (Reader In Ecclesiastical History In The University Of Oxford Sec
Book ID: 230 Page: 12/13
Section: 3A1,3A4,3D2
He came to have a seat side by side with the Teutonic graf or comes, and ultimately had a jurisdiction of his own. His wealth arose partly from the practice of the Roman landowners, sometimes in default of heirs and sometimes in spite of them, bequeathing their lands to him as the head of the political party to which they belonged; and partly from the growing custom on the part of the non-Roman element in the population, of endowing the Church with property “in remedium animae,” i.e., to save their souls. The city bishop thus became in a large number of instances a great landowner. As such he not only was the dispenser of ample charities to the poor, but also had a large number of dependants in the serfs, or slaves, upon the Church lands. He was, in short, a personage of such wealth and power that the Frankish king, Chilperic, is reported to have said more than once, “Absolutely the only persons who reign are the bishops: our i.e. the royal influence has perished, and is transferred to the bishops of the cities.”{1}
Quote ID: 5771
Time Periods: 56
Growth of Church Institutions, The
The Rev. Edwin Hatch, M. A., D.D., (Reader In Ecclesiastical History In The University Of Oxford Sec
Book ID: 230 Page: 31
Section: 3A1,3D2
The precise means by which the new system was framed and enacted will be variously described as ecclesiastical, or civil, or both, according to the point of view of the narrator. The enactments are to be found, without variation of phrase, in the collections of Church councils and in those of Frankish laws; they are quoted sometimes as ecclesiastical canons, and sometimes as civil “capitularies.” The preamble, in almost all cases in which it has survived, recites that they were made by the head of the State, with the joint advice of clergy and laity.
Quote ID: 5776
Time Periods: 56
Growth of Church Institutions, The
The Rev. Edwin Hatch, M. A., D.D., (Reader In Ecclesiastical History In The University Of Oxford Sec
Book ID: 230 Page: 157/158
Section: 3D2
The conversion of the Teutonic and Celtic races was a slower process than has sometimes been supposed. For several centuries after the adhesion of the Frankish kings to the Catholic faith, although the network of Christian organisation appeared to cover the greater part of the Frankish domain, Christianity was, in fact, only a thin veneer over the surface of a pagan society. It was the religion of the court, and of the survivors of the Roman population; but it was not the religion of the masses of the people. The Teutonic gods were openly worshipped. In some places their altars stood by the side of the Christian churches. It was thought not only that the two religions might coexist in the State, but also that the gods of their forefathers and the God of the Christians might be worshipped side by side. Even after the majority of the people began to come to Christian worship, and to receive the Christian sacraments, heathen practices lingered on a considerable scale.
Quote ID: 5806
Time Periods: 67
History of Rome
Michael Grant
Book ID: 109 Page: 462
Section: 3D2
The Successor States in the WestWhen Rome’s rule crumbled in the west, it left the Visigoths ruling the southwest of Gaul as well as Spain, and the Burgundians in control of southeastern Gaul, while another group of German communities, the Franks, had established themselves in the north of the country. The Visigoths and Burgundians, however, whose Arian “heresy” was alien to the local Catholic populations and their bishops, were overcome in 507 by the Franks, whose pagan chief and founder of the Merovingian dynasty Clovis of Turnacum (Tournai), (ca. 482-511), had embraced the Catholic brand of Christianity with three thousand of his warriors. He was sent the emblems of a Roman consul by the eastern roman emperor Anatasius I; yet his kingdom was not a dependency of Constantinople, but the independent nucleus of a future nation-state. Clovius and his successors extended this Frankish dominion both to the east and to the south, where Mediterranean Gaul gave them strength and culture.
Quote ID: 2638
Time Periods: ?
History of the Franks
Gregory Bishop of Tours
Book ID: 110 Page: 45
Section: 3D2
Now Clovis the king said to his people: “I take it very hard that these Arians hold part of the Gauls. Let us go with God’s help and conquer them and bring the land under our control.” Since these words pleased all, he set his army in motion.
Quote ID: 2648
Time Periods: ?
History of the Franks
Gregory Bishop of Tours
Book ID: 110 Page: 47
Section: 3D2
Clovis received an appointment to the consulship from the emperor Anastasius, and in the church of the blessed Martin he clad himself in the purple tunic and chlamys, and placed a diadem on his head. Then he mounted his horse, and in the most generous manner he gave gold and silver as he passed along the way which is between the gate of the entrance of the church of St. Martin and the church of the city, scattering it among the people who were there with his own hand, and from that day he was called consul or Augustus. Leaving Tours he went to Paris and there he established the seat of his kingdom.
Quote ID: 2649
Time Periods: ?
History of the Franks
Gregory Bishop of Tours
Book ID: 110 Page: 49/50
Section: 3D2
After this he turned to Chararic. When he had fought with Siagrius this Chararic had been summoned to help Clovis, but stood at a distance, aiding neither side, but awaiting the outcome, in order to form a league of friendship with him to whom victory came. For this reason Clovis was angry, and went out against him. He entrapped and captured him and his son also, and kept them in prison, and gave the tonsure; he gave orders to ordain Chararic priest and his son deacon.Clovis came and made war on him, and he saw that his army was beaten and prepared to slip away in flight, but was seized by his army, and with his hands tied behind his back, he was taken with Ricchar his brother before Clovis. And Clovis said to him: “Why have you humiliated our family in permitting yourself to be bound? It would have been better for you to die.” And raising his ax he dashed it against his head, and he turned to his brother and said: “If you had aided your brother, he would not have been bound.” And in the same way he smote him with his ax and killed him.
The kings named above were kinsmen of Clovis, and their brother, Rignomer by name, was slain by Clovis’ order at the city of Mans. When they were dead Clovis received all their kingdom and treasures. And having killed many other kings and his nearest relatives, of whom he was jealous lest they take the kingdom from him, he extended his rule over all the Gauls. However he gathered his people together at one time, it is said, and spoke of the kinsmen whom he had himself destroyed. “Woe to me, who have remained as a stranger among foreigners, and have none of my kinsmen to give me aid if adversity comes.” But he said this not because of grief at their death but by way of a ruse, if perchance he should be able to find some one still to kill.
After all this he died at Paris, and was buried in the church of the holy apostles, which he himself had built together with his queen Clotilda.
Quote ID: 2650
Time Periods: ?
History of the Franks
Gregory Bishop of Tours
Book ID: 110 Page: xxii
Section: 3A2A,3D2,4B
Outside of the interests of the orthodox group, Gregory is not morally thin-skinned; he shared in the brutality of his contemporaries, as we can see in many recitals. His portrait of Clovis throws no false light back on Gregory. Clovis was a champion and favorite of the right supernatural powers in their fight with the wrong ones, and any occasional atrocities he committed in the struggle were not only pardonable but praiseworthy.{1}....
The truth was that the condition of the people’s minds made the profession an impossibility. Disease was looked upon as supernatural. The sick man thought he had a better chance if he called the priest rather than the doctor.
Quote ID: 2641
Time Periods: 67
History of the Franks
Gregory Bishop of Tours
Book ID: 110 Page: xxiv
Section: 3A2A,3D2
The inhibiting and paralyzing force of superstitious beliefs penetrated to every department of life, and the most primary and elementary activities of society were influenced. War, for example,was not a simple matter of a test of strength and courage, but supernatural matters had to be taken carefully into consideration. When Clovis said of the Goths in southern Gaul, “I take it hard that these Arians should hold a part of the Gauls; let us go with God’s aid and conquer them and bring the land under our dominion,”{2} he was not speaking in a hypocritical or arrogant manner but in real accordance with the religious sentiment of the time.
Quote ID: 2643
Time Periods: 67
How the Irish Saved Civilization
Thomas Cahill
Book ID: 111 Page: 30
Section: 1A,3D2
As Theodoric, the homely king of the Ostrogoths, was fond of saying: “An able Goth wants to be like a Roman; only a poor roman would want to be like a Goth.”
Quote ID: 2655
Time Periods: 56
Inheritance of Rome, The
Chris Wickham
Book ID: 236 Page: 76
Section: 3D2
On 25 February 484, Huneric, king of the Vandals and Alans, and ruler of the former Roman provinces of North Africa, issued a decree against the ‘Homousian’ (we would say Catholic) heresy of the Roman population of his kingdom.
Quote ID: 5910
Time Periods: ?
Inheritance of Rome, The
Chris Wickham
Book ID: 236 Page: 77
Section: 3D2
Huneric was not the only king to persecute Catholics; Thrasamund (496-523) did the same in the 510s. Conversely, however, there is evidence to show that the Vandals thought they were being very Roman. Those we know about all spoke Latin. Huneric married Honorius’ great-niece, and had spent time in Italy. The Vandal administration seems to have been close to identical to the Roman provincial administration of Africa, and to have been staffed by Africans (at most they may have adopted a Vandal dress code); the currency was a creative adaptation of Roman models; the kings taxed as the Romans had; the Vandal elites accumulated great wealth as a result, which they spent in Roman ways, on luxurious town houses and churches…
Quote ID: 5911
Time Periods: ?
Inheritance of Rome, The
Chris Wickham
Book ID: 236 Page: 92
Section: 3D2
The high point of the Gothic western Mediterranean was around 500. It was destroyed by two men, Clovis the Frankish king and the eastern emperor Justinian…
Quote ID: 5913
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 63
Section: 3D2
He had taken part in the recent civil war, marching with Theodosius as captain of Gothic federate troops, and had returned with high hope of promotion in the Roman army. He aspired, like other German leaders, to the post of a Roman general commanding legions. He built on promises made by Theodosius, but when that Emperor died the promises were not fulfilled, and Alaric was bitterly disappointed.
Quote ID: 7549
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 96
Section: 3D2
August 24, A.D. 410. This time the Gothic king was in no humour to spare the capital of the world. He allowed his followers to slay, burn, and pillage at will. The sack lasted for two or three days. It is true that some respect was shown for churches; and stories were told to show that the violence of the rapacious Goths was mitigated by veneration for Christian institutions.
Quote ID: 7550
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 167
Section: 3D2
In the eyes of the government of Constantinople, Romulus Augustulus was a usurper. This usurper had now been deposed by a military revolution; the leader of that revolution, Odovacar, had shown no disloyalty to the eastern emperor, whose authority he fully acknowledged. There was no thought here of any dismemberment, or detachment, or breaking away from the Empire. Odovacar was a Roman officer, he was raised by the army into the virtual position of a magister militum, and his first thought, after the revolution had been carried through, was to get his position regularised by imperial authority, to gain from Zeno a formal recognition and appointment. Odovacar was in fact the successor of the series of German commanders who had supported the Empire for eighty years.
Quote ID: 7552
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 169
Section: 3D2
Accordingly, while he accepted the patriciate from Zeno, and so legitimised his position as an imperial minister in the eyes of Italy, he fortified himself by assuming another title which must have expressed his relation to the barbarian army, viz. the title of king, rex. We do not know what solemnity or form accompanied the assumption of this title. But its effect was to give Odovacar the double character of a German king as well as an imperial officer. A close parallel to this double position is that of Alaric at the close of the fourth century.
Quote ID: 7553
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 170
Section: 3D2
The year 476 has been generally taken as a great landmark, and the event has been commonly described as the fall of the Western Empire. This unfortunate expression conveys a wholly erroneous idea of the bearings of Odovacar’s revolution.
Quote ID: 7554
Time Periods: 56
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 172
Section: 3D2
I must return to the settlement of the barbarians in Italy which was carried out by Odovacar. Two-thirds of their estates were left to the Italian proprietors; one-third was taken from them and assigned to the German soldiers, who were thus distributed throughout Italy.....
These divisions of land among the barbarians were simply an extension of the old Roman system of quartering soldiers.
Quote ID: 7555
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 240/241
Section: 3D2
A ruler of Clovis’s intelligence could not have failed to discern the immense support he would derive from the Gallo-Roman Church by his conversion.But it was equally manifest that his Christianity would be worse than useless if it were Christianity of the Arian form. To embrace the Arian creed might have seemed the obvious course, seeing that his German neighbours--Visigoths, Ostrogoths, Burgundians--were all Arian. That would have been a fatal mistake; and we may be sure that it was neither an accident nor his own religious preferences, but his political perceptions, that helped him to avoid it. It would be absurd to suppose that he weighed in the balance of judgement the Arian against the Catholic doctrine, and decided on grounds of reason or theory in favour of the former.
Quote ID: 7556
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 242/243
Section: 3D2
The incalculable importance of Clovis’s adhesion to the Catholic faith has been fully recognised by historical writers. They emphasise it strongly as an event of ecumenical consequence--Welthistoriche Beteutung. What they have not seen clearly enough is that the event was not an accident or a sudden inspiration. It was, so far as I can see, the crown of a consistent, calculated policy, which displays Clovis’s high intelligence and eminently statesmanlike perception. To suppose that he was not conscious of the political bearings of what he did, to believe that it was the toss of the dice or a freak of circumstance whether he became a Catholic or an Arian, is to hold an opinion of Clovis’s mental power which is inconsistent with his great achievements.....
It was simply a case of taking a wide and statesmanlike view of the political situation, estimating the conditions in which his kingdom was placed, and choosing the policy which would best tend to its consolidation.
Quote ID: 7557
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 248
Section: 3D2
Clovis embraced Christianity in its Catholic form, and, when the time was ripe, he could profess to go forth as a champion of Catholic orthodoxy to drive the Arian heretics from Gaul.Pastor John notes: John’s note: The Franks & the Gothics!!!!!
The lordship of Aquitaine hereby passed from the Goths to the Franks; it became part of Francia in a wide sense of the term; and the authority of Clovis extended to the Pyrenees.
Quote ID: 7558
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 249
Section: 3D2
The overthrow of the Visigoths made a deep impression on the Gallo-Roman Church, and the impression is preserved in the pages of Gregory of Tours......
Gregory represents Clovis as invading their kingdom without any provocation. “It vexes me”, said Clovis to his followers, “to see these Arians holding a part of Gaul. Let us attack them with God’s aid, and, having conquered them, subjugate their land”. We need not take this story literally, but it expresses an important historical fact, viz. that Clovis’s Visigothic war stands out among his other wars as one in which he had the enthusiastic support, not merely of his own Franks, but of the Gallo-Roman Christians and the Church.
Quote ID: 7559
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 250
Section: 3D2
The enlargement of his kingdom by the annexation of south-western Gaul altered the centre of the realm, and rendered it expedient for the king to move his residence farther west than Soissons. He fixed on Paris, which then, at the very moment when the greater part of Gaul became co-extensive with Francia, was chosen for preeminence.
Quote ID: 7560
Time Periods: ?
Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians, The
J. B. Bury
Book ID: 310 Page: 252/253
Section: 3D2
But the most important point is that his Gallic kingdom, when it was an accomplished fact, was recognised by the Emperor Anastasius as nominally within and not outside the Empire......
The founder of the Frank monarchy died in 511, and for the last three years of his life he was by virtue of his consular title formally recognised by the Empire. That title was doubtless a recognition of his championship of orthodoxy against the Arian Visigoths.
Quote ID: 7561
Time Periods: ?
Jesus Papyrus, The
Carsten Peter Thiede & Matthew D’Ancona
Book ID: 348 Page: 105
Section: 1A,3D2
In other words, even before the first actual codex or codex fragment was rediscovered by archaeologists, there existed clear evidence for the existence of the codex in the eighties of the first century—New Testament times, in other words.
Quote ID: 8041
Time Periods: 1
Late Antiquity: A Guide to the Postclassical World
Ed. G.W. Bowerrsock, Peter Brown, Oleg Grabar
Book ID: 126 Page: 115
Section: 3D2
Bonitus was the first of a long series of Franks in Roman service. In 355 his son, the thoroughly Romanized Silvanus who was commander of the Roman garrison at Cologne, was proclaimed emperor by his troops. Although Silvanus was quickly assassinated by envoys of Emperor Constantius.
Quote ID: 2884
Time Periods: ?
Later Roman Empire, The
Averil Cameron
Book ID: 243 Page: 150
Section: 3D2
This event shocked John Chrysostom badly. Or was it conscience? He had turned over Eutropius, who himself had sought asylum in a church.
Quote ID: 6162
Time Periods: ?
Later Roman Empire, The
Averil Cameron
Book ID: 243 Page: 149b
Section: 3D2
When seven thousand Goths took refuge in a Xn church, they were massacred by the citizens of Constantinople by setting fire to the building.
Quote ID: 6161
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 7
Section: 3D2
The controversy over the exact date of this conversion, however, is not nearly so important as the fact that the Franks as a people became Catholic rather than Arian Christian. Even though real conversion may have taken place over an extended period of time, Clovis’s formal conversion seems to have brought almost immediate sympathy from the Gallo-Roman Catholic hierarchy in Gaul, which supported him against his barbarian neighbors who remained Arian at this time.
Quote ID: 6185
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 8
Section: 3D2
At any rate, Clovis responded to his new responsibilities by codification of the Frankish law. Presumably the customary laws of the Franks had existed in unwritten form before the time of Clovis, but to Clovis almost certainly belongs the oldest version of the written Salic law, dating from the last years of the fifth century or from the first years of the sixth (it was probably issued between 507 and 511). In issuing a written collection of laws, Clovis was following Visigothic and Burgundian precedent; also like the Visigoths and Burgundians, he almost certainly had the help of advisors trained in the Roman law.
Quote ID: 6186
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 9
Section: 3D2
Clovis had achieved unity not only by defeating the Romans and the Visigoths and laying the foundations for defeat of the Burgundians, but also by defeating the rival Frankish kings, including some within his own family.
Quote ID: 6187
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 26
Section: 3D2
The Lombards were the last major Germanic people to invade the Empire. They entered in the second half of the sixth century, invading an Italy torn by a long-drawn-out war between the Ostrogothic kingdom and the Byzantine Empire.
Quote ID: 6188
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 52
Section: 3D2
the laws survive in so many manuscripts of differing order and content that it has been impossible for the various learned editors who have tackled the problem to establish a single critical text. There are many versions of the laws and numerous varying texts of each of these versions.
Quote ID: 6189
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 55
Section: 3D2
The present work offers a translation of two versions of the Salic law. The first is that usually called the Pactus Legis Salicae which contains the 65-title Pactus issued by Clovis in the early sixth century plus the prologue and capitularies issued later in the sixth century by Clovis’s sons and grandson, Childebert I, Chlotar I, and Chilperic I.
Quote ID: 6190
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 79
Section: 3D2
XIV. . . .
2. If a Roman robs a Salic barbarian (barbarum Salicum) and it is not certainly proved against him, he can clear himself with twenty-five oathhelpers, half of whom he has chosen. If he cannot find the oathhelpers (called mosido in the Malberg gloss) he shall go to the ordeal of boiling water.
Pastor John notes: John’s note: see page 116
Quote ID: 6191
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 116
Section: 3D2
1. If a man has been sentenced to the hot water ordeal and it is agreed that he who was sentenced may redeem his hand and offer oathhelpers, then he may redeem his hand for one hundred twenty denarii
Quote ID: 6192
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 141
Section: 3D2
LXLCONCERNING THIEVES WHO FLEE TO A CHURCH
1. It has been agreed with the bishops that no one shall presume to drag a thief or other guilty person from the porch (de atrio) of a church; [if a man does this], he shall be punished according to the canons (canonibus). [80]
Quote ID: 6193
Time Periods: ?
Laws of the Salian Franks, The
Translated and with an Introduction by Katherine Fischer Drew
Book ID: 245 Page: 171
Section: 3D2
3. At a time pleasing to God, Clovis, king of the Franks, fiery and handsome and renowned, first received Catholic baptism, and the noble kings Clovis, Childebert, and Choltar clearly emended that which seemed less suitable in the pact.4. Let him who esteems the Franks live by the present decree. May Christ protect their kingdom, give them rulers, fill them with the light of his grace, protect their army, and give them the protection of the faith. May Jesus Christ, lord of lords, bestow with his gracious love the joys of peace and times of happiness.
. . . .
And , after the knowledge of baptism, the Franks decorated with gold and precious stones the bodies of the blessed martyrs whom the Romans had mutilated with fire or sword or else had thrown to the beasts to be torn. And after the knowledge of baptism, the Franks, having found the bodies of the blessed martyrs whom the Romans had mutilated with fire or sword, decorated them with gold and precious stones.
Quote ID: 6197
Time Periods: ?
Legionary - The Roman Soldier’s (Unofficial) Manual
Philip Matyszak
Book ID: 128 Page: 99
Section: 3D2
The barbarians were adapting themselves to Roman ways, becoming accustomed to hold markets, and meeting in peaceful assemblies. Under careful (Roman) supervision they were forgetting their old customs gradually and without really noticing. Because of this they were not disturbed by their changing lifestyle, and were becoming different without knowing it.CASSIUS DIO HISTORIES 56.18
Quote ID: 2907
Time Periods: ?
Making of a Christian Aristocracy, The
Michele Renee Salzman
Book ID: 297 Page: 41
Section: 3D2
One segment of the aristocracy that grew, beginning with the reign of Constantine but especially after Valentinian’s reforms, consisted of men who arose via military service. Some of these men came from backgrounds similar to other clarissimi; the military count Theodosius and his son, an army official (dux) under Valentinian, came from a Spanish family of landowners who also included civilian office holders. But a good number of military men were of “barbarian” origins, that is, were non-Romans, from areas out-side of or on the fringes of the empire. These men and their children were generally “Romanized” within a generation or two, and so military officers often appear as barbarians in our texts “only because we are told so or guess because of their names, not because of their behaviour. {128}
Quote ID: 7429
Time Periods: ?
Mohammed and Charlemagne
Henry Pirenne
Book ID: 373 Page: 19/20
Section: 3D2
The Barbarians we needed, as soldiers, and as agricultural labourers. They asked nothing better than to enter the service of Rome. Thus the Empire, on its frontiers, became Germanized in respect of blood; but not otherwise, for all who entered the Empire became Romanized.{1}….
Before long almost the entire army was composed of Barbarians;…
Quote ID: 8214
Time Periods: ?
Mohammed and Charlemagne
Henry Pirenne
Book ID: 373 Page: 32/33
Section: 3D2
Thus, at the beginning of the 6th century there was not an inch of soil in the West still subject to the Emperor. At first sight the catastrophe seems enormous; so enormous that the fall of Romulus has been regarded as beginning a second act of the world-drama. But if we examine it more closely it seems less important.For the Emperor still had a legal existence.
….
Theodoric governed in his name…Clovis prided himself upon receiving the title of consul.{2}
….
The Empire subsisted, in law, as a sort of mystical presence; in fact—and this is much more important—it was “Romania” that survived.
Quote ID: 8216
Time Periods: ?
Mohammed and Charlemagne
Henry Pirenne
Book ID: 373 Page: 37/38
Section: 3D2
But the Germans wished neither to destroy nor exploit the Empire. Far from despising it, they admired it. They did not confront it with any superior moral strength.….
The truth is that in every respect they had much to learn from the Empire. How could they resist its influence?
Quote ID: 8217
Time Periods: ?
Mohammed and Charlemagne
Henry Pirenne
Book ID: 373 Page: 46
Section: 3D2
No doubt the Germanic kings installed in the Empire were national kings to their peoples—reges gentium,in the words of Gregory the Great.{1}….
But for the Romans they were Roman generals to whom the Emperor had abandoned the government of the civil population. It was as Roman generals that they approached the Romans,{2} and they were proud to bear the title on such occasions: we have only to recall the cavalcade of Clovis when he was created honorary consul. Under Theodoric an even simpler state of affairs prevailed. He was really a Roman viceroy. He promulgated not laws but edicts only.
Quote ID: 8221
Time Periods: ?
Mohammed and Charlemagne
Henry Pirenne
Book ID: 373 Page: 46
Section: 3D2
Theodoric assumed merely the simple title of rex, as though he wished his Barbarian origin to be forgotten.
Quote ID: 8222
Time Periods: ?
Mohammed and Charlemagne
Henry Pirenne
Book ID: 373 Page: 46
Section: 3D2
Theodoric struck coins, but in the name of the Emperor. He adopted the name of Flavius,{4} a sign that he had adopted the Roman nationality.
Quote ID: 8223
Time Periods: ?
Mohammed and Charlemagne
Henry Pirenne
Book ID: 373 Page: 47
Section: 3D2
The organization of the judiciary was entirely Roman, even for the Goths; and the Edict of Theodoric was thoroughly Roman.
Quote ID: 8224
Time Periods: ?
Mohammed and Charlemagne
Henry Pirenne
Book ID: 373 Page: 47
Section: 3D2
In short, the Goths were the military basis of the royal power, which in other respects was Roman.
Quote ID: 8225
Time Periods: ?
Nova Historia [New History]
Zosimus Historicus
Book ID: 376 Page: 241
Section: 3D2
But Alaric was not sufficiently excited even by these men to undertake a war, but still preferred peace, bring still mindful of the league into which he had entered with Stilico. He therefore sent ambassadors with a desire to procure a peace, even if he acquired for it but a small sum of money.
Quote ID: 8244
Time Periods: ?
Organization of the Early Christian Churches, The
Edwin Hatch, M. A.
Book ID: 255 Page: 160/161
Section: 3A1,3D2
Lecture VI: The Clergy as a Separate Class.All this was intensified by the decay and fall of the Roman Empire. When the surging tides of barbarian invasion swept over Europe, the Christian organization was almost the only institution of the past which survived the flood. It remained as a visible monument of what had been, and, by so remaining, was of itself an antithesis to the present. The chief town of the Roman province, whatever its status under barbarian rule, was still the bishop’s see. The limits of the old ‘province,’ though the boundary of a new kingdom might bisect them, were still the limits of his diocese. The bishop’s tribunal was the only tribunal in which the laws of the Empire could be pleaded in their integrity. The bishop’s dress was the ancient robe of a Roman magistrate. The ancient Roman language which was used in the Church services was a standing protest against the growing degeneracy of the ‘vulgar tongue.’ These survivals of the old world which was passing away gave to the Christian clergy a still more...
Pastor John’s comment: Wow
. . . .
To the ‘pagani’ of Gaul and Spain, to the Celtic inhabitants of our own islands, and, in rather later times, to the Teutonic races of Central Europe, they were probably never known except as a special class, assuming a special status, living a special life, and invested with special powers.
Quote ID: 6437
Time Periods: 56
Origins of Modern Europe, The
R. Allen Brown
Book ID: 256 Page: 4
Section: 1A,3D2
As for the classical inheritance of Greece and Rome, the barbarians, it has been well said, came not to destroy the Roman Empire but to enjoy it: the learning of the ancients was not in the event lost but was first preserved.
Quote ID: 6457
Time Periods: 456
Origins of Modern Europe, The
R. Allen Brown
Book ID: 256 Page: 19
Section: 3D2
Doubtless the barbarian invasions of the fifth century seemed dramatic enough at the time, but the invaders came, as we have seen, to enjoy rather than destroy the Empire, they were scarcely, as we have yet to see, a new phenomenon when they came . . .
Quote ID: 6464
Time Periods: ?
Origins of Modern Europe, The
R. Allen Brown
Book ID: 256 Page: 24
Section: 3D2
And so it came about that of the barbarian tribes moving into the Roman Empire in the West in the fifth century, all save the still pagan Franks in Gaul and the Anglo-Saxons in England were not just Christians when they came but Arian heretics, to add one more disruptive element to a disintegrating world.
Quote ID: 6467
Time Periods: 6
Origins of Modern Europe, The
R. Allen Brown
Book ID: 256 Page: 31
Section: 3D2
This is a quote . . . the late Belgian scholar, Henri Pirenne, at the end of his book, Mohammed and Charlemagne, . . .‘(I) The Germanic invasions destroyed neither the Mediterranean unity of the ancient world, nor what may be regarded as the truly essential features of the Roman culture as it still existed in the 5th century, . . .
Quote ID: 6469
Time Periods: 5
Origins of Modern Europe, The
R. Allen Brown
Book ID: 256 Page: 32
Section: 3D2
Pirenne’s book must be read in its own right, but it is probable that most historians would nowadays subscribe to his insistence upon continuity in the fifth and sixth centuries and be reluctant to proclaim an absolute end to the Roman Empire in the West as the immediate result of the barbarian invasions.3D2
Quote ID: 6470
Time Periods: 156
Origins of Modern Europe, The
R. Allen Brown
Book ID: 256 Page: 35
Section: 3D2
. . .it has been said of Clovis that without him ‘Gaul would not have become France’,{1}. . .. . . .
. . . though it is too late now, by long-established habit, to call him anything but Clovis, he is in a real sense the first of the long line of French kings Louis. Clovis ‘lived and died a Frankish chieftain, a warrior of the Heroic Age, a man of blood and a seeker after gold’,{2} yet the most important event of his reign, notwithstanding the bloodshed and the wars, was his conversion to Christianity, and Christianity in its Catholic, orthodox and Roman form.
. . . .
. . . another of the great moments in history, but it may seem entirely characteristic of this marvellously personal age that it was the direct result of a vow taken in a hard-pressed moment on the battlefield . . .
Quote ID: 6471
Time Periods: ?
Orosius: Seven Books of History against the Pagans
A. T. Fear
Book ID: 165 Page: 12
Section: 3D2
Jerome was horrified; ‘what can be safe if Rome has fallen?’ he asks, and elsewhere bewails that, ‘the whole world has perished with this single city.’{71} Augustine was to deal with the problem by insisting on the distinction between the earthly and heavenly cities and placing priority on the latter. Orosius, though, was taken to a very different tack......
He makes the bold claim that the sack was of no significance, and goes on to stand on its head the standard pagan view that it had come about because of Rome’s neglect of her traditional gods by insisting that its occurrence was, in fact, due to the presence of pagans, not Christians, in the city. {72}
Quote ID: 3471
Time Periods: 5
Orosius: Seven Books of History against the Pagans
A. T. Fear
Book ID: 165 Page: 398
Section: 3D2
…more severely than usual, at that time two Gothic tribes, led by their two most powerful kings, raged through Rome’s provinces. 9. One of these was Christian, more like a Roman, and, as events have proved, less savage in his slaughter through his fear of God.{442}….
{442} Alaric and his people. Orosius goes on to make great play of Alaric’s Christianity, conveniently forgetting that Alaric and the Goths were Arians, a heresy that he has ferociously denounced.
Quote ID: 8398
Time Periods: ?
Orosius: Seven Books of History against the Pagans
A. T. Fear
Book ID: 165 Page: 401
Section: 3D2
Alaric came, besieged, threw into panic, and burst into Rome as she trembled, but he first gave the order that whoever had fled to the holy places, above all to the basilicas of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, were to be left safe and unharmed.{459} He also told his men that as far as possible, they must refrain from shedding blood in their hunger for booty.. . . .
{459} Orosius’s choice of verb for Alaric’s entry into Rome, inrumpere, ‘to break in’, is perhaps chosen to deny any questions of treachery. Procopius, History of the Wars, 3.2.20-32, explicitly states that the Visigoths entered the city through treachery and perhaps this was also true of Zosimus, 6.7, whose account of the sack is lost, but who hints here that the Anicii family may have betrayed Rome. Alaric entered through the Salarian Gate on 24 August AD 410. For churches as refuges in the sack, see also Augustine, City of God 1.2 and 1.7.
Quote ID: 3487
Time Periods: 5
Orosius: Seven Books of History against the Pagans
A. T. Fear
Book ID: 165 Page: 402
Section: 3D2
3. As the barbarians rampaged through the City, it happened that in a certain convent one of the Goths, a powerful, Christian man, came across an elderly virgin, who had dedicated her life to God. When he asked her, politely, for gold and silver, 4. steadfast in her faith, she promised him that she had a great deal and would soon bring it forth, and brought it forth. When she saw that the barbarian was astounded by the size, weight, and beauty of what she had brought out, but had no idea of the nature of the vessels, Christ’s virgin said to him, 5. ‘These are the sacred vessels of the Apostle Peter, take them, if you dare, and you will be judged by your act. I dare not keep them, as I cannot protect them,’ 6. The barbarian was moved to religious awe through his fear of God and the virgin’s faith, and sent a messenger to tell Alaric about these matters. He immediately ordered that all the vessels should be taken back, just as they had been found, to the basilica of the Apostles 7. and that the virgin and any other Christians who might join her be taken there with the same degree of protection.
Quote ID: 8399
Time Periods: ?
Papal Monarchy from St. Gregory the Great to Boniface VIII (590-1303), The
William Barry
Book ID: 342 Page: 37
Section: 3D2
The fall of Rome in 410 was the destruction of Paganism. As a public religion it disappeared no less completely than the Jewish rites and sacrifices on the burning of the Temple. Innocent had saved the Basilicas of the Apostles from profanation, and Alaric remained only three days in the city. But, henceforth, sacred ceremonies, popular festivals, and the great days in the Calendar must all be Christian.
Quote ID: 7927
Time Periods: ?
Papal Monarchy from St. Gregory the Great to Boniface VIII (590-1303), The
William Barry
Book ID: 342 Page: 54
Section: 3D2
By a supreme good fortune, the Franks under Chlodowig (Clovis, Louis, Ludwig, are all forms of this Teutonic name) had accepted Roman Christianity at the hands of Remigius, Bishop of Rheims (496). It was a conversion equal in importance to that of Constantine, nor unlike it in its motives or its results. The mightiest sword wielded by a Barbarian was now at the disposal of the Roman Pontiff.
Quote ID: 7936
Time Periods: ?
Procopius, History of the Wars, LCL 107: Procopius III, Books 5-6.15
Translated by H. B. Dewing
Book ID: 333 Page: 11
Section: 3D2,4B
…in governing his own subjects, he invested himself with all the qualities which appropriately belong to one who is by birth an emperor. For he was exceedingly careful to observe justice, he preserved the laws on a sure basis, he protected the land and kept it safe from the barbarians dwelling round about, and attained the highest possible degree of wisdom and manliness. And he himself committed scarcely a single act of injustice against his subject, nor would he brook such conduct on the part of anyone else who attempted it....PJ: the last five words are on page 13.
Quote ID: 7826
Time Periods: 6
Rome and the Barbarians (100 B.C. – A.D. 400)
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 190 Page: 339
Section: 3D2
As if the lives of Romans and barbarians were not sufficiently entangled, some barbarians were able to move back and forth between Roman service and high rank among the barbarians. Mallobaudes is a case in point. Such individuals enjoyed elite status in both societies. A Frank by birth, he worked his way up the ranks of the Roman army from junior officer before retiring back to barbaricum where he became a Frankish king. Later we find him back in the Roman army as a comes domesticorum, at that time commander of the emperor’s household guard, a very important position indeed. {42}
Quote ID: 4215
Time Periods: ?
Rome and the Barbarians (100 B.C. – A.D. 400)
Thomas S. Burns
Book ID: 190 Page: 367
Section: 3D2
Another Goth, Alaric, emerged from obscurity around 390, but not at the head of an independent nation of Goths. Alaric’s foremost desire was a generalship in the Roman army. He got his wish, first from the government in Constantinople, but he lost it. Then he got his wish granted again, this time by the western government in Milan (later Ravenna), but he lost it for a second time. Then and only then did Alaric claim the title of rex Gothorum (king of the Goths) and begin his famous sieges of Rome. It was a last resort, taken only after all legal attempts to realize his cherished dream of Roman command had failed. Later a dynasty of Visigothic kings would base their claims to rule upon the legends of Athanaric and Alaric.
Quote ID: 4221
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 23
Section: 3D2
The rejoicing which Fulgentius saw upon his arrival in Rome was nonetheless sincere among all sections of the population; they and their city now enjoyed a peace and prosperity that had long been lacking. But the ruler they welcomed was no Roman emperor; he was a king - but a king of a barbarian nation, the Ostrogoths - and an illiterate and a murderer. His name, like that of his younger contemporary Arthur, was to live in legend as Dietrich of Bern; it was Theodoric.Pastor John notes: John’s note: This is what happened
Quote ID: 4224
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 23
Section: 3D2
The provinces of Gaul passed out of direct imperial administration and were settled and ruled by Franks and Burgundians. Ephemeral emperors, sponsored by the generals and ministers, rose and fell until the last, a boy, was placed on a meaningless throne by his father Orestes who - such were the revolutions of the times - had once served as Attila’s secretary. This was Romulus, fittingly nicknamed Augustulus, the Little Emperor. He did not last long; an army commander, Odoacer, chieftain of the Rugian tribe in imperial pay, held an emperor to be superfluous for the diminished West and in 476 deposed him settling him with a pension in a comfortable villa near Naples.Pastor John’s Note: Odoacer ruled wisely in Italy, and the population as a whole regarded him highly (esp. the senate!), but Zeno, emperor of the eastern half of the Roman Empire, wanted Italy restored to the emperor’s control, and in 489 commissioned Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, to accomplish his will.
Pastor John’s note: Peace in the West until.....
Quote ID: 4225
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 24
Section: 3D2
So Theodoric marched, defeated Odoacer and pinned him behind the walls of Ravenna. There he was held for three years until a compromise solution, the sharing of the rule of Italy, was agreed upon. At a celebratory banquet, Theodoric ended an unworkable partnership by murdering his new colleague. Henceforth he too ruled alone, although with the qualified support of persons of great influence.When Fulgentius [an exile from north Africa, as the Arian Vandals had taken his father’s land and persecuted Trinitarians] saw him in Rome, he had been sole ruler for seven years. The odds had been against him achieving a peaceful government. As an illiterate barbarian he might have met opposition from the custodians of culture, the senate; as an Arian heretic, distrust from the Church.
Quote ID: 4226
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 24/25
Section: 3D2
.... the Vandal kings were also Arian and were continuously hostile to their Catholic subjects. In 496 King Thransamund initiated a persecution in north Africa; all Catholic churches in Africa were closed, the consecration of bishops was forbidden and the existing bishops exiled to Sardinia, a backward, uncivilized and pagan island, notoriously unhealthy and for long used as a penal settlement.
Quote ID: 4227
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 25
Section: 3D2
Theodoric As a boy he had been sent as hostage for his nation to Constantinople and been brought up at the imperial court. He joined the imperial service, bringing his tribe within the confines of the Empire, rose higher in rank but remained a restless, ambitious danger in the manoeuvres of the warlords.
Quote ID: 4228
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 26
Section: 3D2
Throughout the whole of Italy Theodoric made no gates for any city, and what gates there were to the cities were never closed. Anyone with business to transact could do it at any time of night as safely as by day.
Quote ID: 4229
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 27
Section: 3D2
The Romans, as Procopius noted later, were distinguished by a passionate antiquarianism, especially in anything that concerned their own city, an antiquarianism that expressed itself in their literature and their adherence to the forms of their ancestors. The closely-knit families that composed it were proud and ancient; they held the consulships and the greater magistracies, sources of pride and prestige if now actually meaningless.
Quote ID: 4230
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 28
Section: 3D2
There were two notable Roman families, the Anicii and the related Symmachi. Their influence was “empire-wide”. Their family traditions went back to the days of the Republic. They had provided many of the previous emperors. They represented the “old international order” of the pre-Christian Roman Empire, and had “provided the last stronghold for the pagan religion, cults, and associations.”
Quote ID: 4231
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 29
Section: 3D2
Strongly orthodox and traditionally opposed alike to Arianism and the unorthodoxies of the East, the Anicii, like others of their class, had nevertheless a legacy of co-operation with the new rulers in the West as well as an instinctive and sentimental accord with the imperial hegemony in the East. An Anicia, Faltonia Proba had been suspected of opening the gates of Rome to the Visigoths in 410 in furtherance of better relations between Romans and barbarians.
Quote ID: 4233
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 32
Section: 3D2
Occasional crises of harvest or maladministration apart, Ostrogothic Italy was prosperous and peaceful. Furthermore, under Theodoric Italy had again assumed the leadership of the western Mediterranean; a network of marriage alliances, of one sister to the Vandal king, another to the heir of Burgundy, and his daughter to the heir to the Visigothic throne, assured him a patriarchal status in Europe. His rule was firm over southern France and extended into modern Austria and Yugoslavia. Rome could, vicariously, again regard itself as ruler of the West after the humiliations of the previous century. To the city itself Theodoric showed favour, through the agency of the senate, by maintaining its monuments and its amenities, by keeping in constant repair its drainage system, its water-supply and the river embankment, and by providing circus games and ensuring the corn-supply.
Quote ID: 4236
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 32
Section: 3D2
Life as yet was uninterrupted. Thomas, the leading charioteer of the hippodrome of Constantinople, found it worthwhile to move to Rome and perform there; he was granted a public salary for, as Cassiodorus remarked, he was ’the first in his art’.
Quote ID: 4237
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 32
Section: 3D2
Cassiodorus himself, Theodoric’s Roman secretary, most fully represented this co-operation between king and senate.
Quote ID: 4238
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 33
Section: 3D2
Of modest family and modest wealth, as the senate estimated it, circumstances had soon put the young Cassiodorus in the role of adviser-general to the German king. It was a role that suited his talents for, although erudite and well-read, he was not an original or critical thinker; his tastes turned towards the elegant framing of correspondence and the preservation of what he felt was in danger of being lost--the whole learning of the ancient world. His writing was encyclopaedic and forced: ’Speech, ’he declared, ’is the common gift of all mankind; it is embellishment alone that distinguishes the learned from the unlearned.’
Quote ID: 4239
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 34/35
Section: 3D2
Theodoric himself frowned on the attempt to make Goths into Romans by education, a prejudice shared by most of his people. Cassiodorus, following the collapse of all his hopes for the Romano-Gothic state, retired to his home in Squillace in Calabria where he founded the ’Vivarium’, a monastic community devoted to effecting his projects for the correct edition and production of literary, historical and educational works.----
The other figure of Ostrogothic Rome who towered above his surroundings and whose influence was to sustain Europe in the succeeding centuries was an Anicius, the philosopher Manlius Severinus Anicius Boethius. His inclinations were primarily academic and philosophical; he had entered public life only, he states in the Consolations of Philosophy, in accordance with the dictate of Plato that ’States would be happy if either philosophers ruled them or their rulers turned philosopher.’
Quote ID: 4241
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 35
Section: 3D2
He too, like Cassiodorus, was concerned for Western education, but his concern lay in constructing an adequate bridge to keep the West in contact with the founts of philosophy in the East. His death - the result of a welter of theological, political and personal interest at Rome and Ravenna - gave him the status in Western Europe of a martyr and a father of the church.Rome, a city with no industrial or commercial but only social and traditional justification, retained one prerogative of civilization, the formation of factions to occupy the inhabitants.
Quote ID: 4242
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 42
Section: 3D2
*John’s Note: When Fulgentius [PJ: Latin writer and grammarian (late 5th–early 6th century) had first come to Rome as a refugee from the Arian Vandals, he was deeply impressed at the welcome an Arian king, Theodoric, received from the Roman clergy. Apparently, this tolerant, or at least cooperative attitude in religious matters guided his course in the following years. By negotiations, he helped to end the present crisis.At a synod, this Symmachus was named Pope and Lawrence was given the compensation of a bishopric in Nocera.*
Quote ID: 4247
Time Periods: 56
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 46
Section: 3D2
Leader of the senate Boethius was summoned before Theodoric at Ravenna. Boethius’s exposure of corruption in Campania had already made him enemies within the Arian Theodoric administration. He had played a leading part in controverting Arianism, and further charges of witchcraft and of holding secret assemblies were thrown in to give added strength to the case.Pastor John notes: John’s Note: Some Italians’ renewed contact and interest in Constantinople angered Theodoric.
Quote ID: 4249
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 46
Section: 3D2
In his cell in Pavia, Boethius resumed his philosophy and wrote the Consolations before being bludgeoned to death.
Quote ID: 4250
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 47
Section: 3D2
In August, 523, Pope Hormisdas, who had been in Theodoric’s confidence, died. His successor was Pope John, from Tuscany, a firm opponent of Arianism who, to Theodoric’s great anger, set out to re-dedicate to Catholic use the Arian churches in Rome. He was associating with Rome with men of known imperialist sympathies, while in the East the persecution of Arians and the confiscation of their property was stepped up.
Quote ID: 4251
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 47/48
Section: 3D2
His Pope John’s welcome was royal; officials, including Justinian, met him at the twelfth milestone from the capital, ’for since the days of the blessed Pope Sylvester in the time of Constantine, they had wished to be accounted worthy to receive the Vicar of St. Peter in Greece’. John arrived on the 19th of April, Easter Day, and celebrated the feast in the capital with full imperial splendour; then, as a climax, he crowned Justin. A month later he was back in Ravenna Italy, worn out by his mission, and was immediately imprisoned by the king; in prison, mercifully, on the 18th May, he died.----
....at his burial senators snatched pieces from his vestments as relics of one dead in their cause.
Quote ID: 4253
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 49
Section: 3D2
The same year, at the end of August, 526, Theodoric died of a stroke. He had failed in his ambition to “break the religious sympathy of a united Catholicism in East and west as he had thought to break the civil solidarity.” (Pg.47)
Quote ID: 4254
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 49
Section: 3D2
When Felix IV John’s successor died in 530 there was a double election. The majority of the Roman clergy supported Dioscorus, a deacon originally from Alexandria who had a high reputation in the East, having spent some years in Constantinople, and perhaps only seven out of nearly seventy supported the Gothic candidate, Boniface. Again two consecrations were made, Dioscorus within the Lateran basilica and Boniface in a hall of Lateran palace. For a month the dispute raged and it was only ended by Dioscorus’s premature death on 14th October. Even then Boniface had difficulty in asserting his authority; Constantinople had already been in communication with Dioscorus and now Boniface demanded a written declaration of loyalty from the clergy. This did not end his difficulties in securing a clear succession of policy in Gothic favour.
Quote ID: 4255
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 279
Section: 3D2
But Charles accepted with alacrity and his journey through Italy in the autumn of 875 was unimpeded; on Christmas Day 875 he was crowned Emperor in St. Peter’s having, a German chronicler noted bitterly, ‘like Jugurtha, corrupted the senate and the whole Roman people with money’.
Quote ID: 4411
Time Periods: ?
Rome in the Dark Ages
Peter Llewellyn
Book ID: 191 Page: 47b
Section: 3D2
Early in 526, Theodoric sent the elderly and feeble Pope John to Constantinople to deal with various matters. He also told John that he was to tell the Emperor Justin, “to bring back to Arianism those whom he forced to accept the Catholic faith.” John resolutely refused to promise to fulfill that part of Thoedoric’s mission. Still, the king sent him.Pastor John notes: John’s note: Pope John entangled
Quote ID: 4252
Time Periods: ?
End of quotes