A Tale of Two Roman Emperors (An op-ed)
by Mike Kimel
A Tale of Two Roman Emperors
It has been about 1,975 years since the death of the Roman emperor Caligula, but his name is still associated with horrors. If contemporary accounts are within a mile of being reliable, he was an insane megalomaniac with delusions of divinity. He was also into large buildings, and he picked up the habit of accusing people of treason. Physically, he was described as being a tall man with noteworthy hair issues. Reputedly, he required very little sleep and had incestuous relations with his sister. Despite all his blustering, Caligula also was one of the few Roman emperors not to get himself embroiled in wars, whether foreign or domestic. Nevertheless, his lack of self-control, his recklessness with the public purse and his apparent lack of basic economic skills caused a lot of damage to Rome’s finances. By then, however, Caligula had alienated pretty much everyone and most Romans were pleased when he was assassinated. Valens, who lived a few hundred years later, was a much less remembered and certainly less hated emperor. (Hopefully I got the details below mostly right.) Valens was appointed co-emperor by hisolder brother, the emperor Valentinian. Valentinian sent Valens to deal with troubles in the Eastern half of the Empire. And Valens had one way of dealing with issues: militarily. He started out by putting down the mutiny of a usurper. Then he crossed the Danube and fought the Goths. After that there was trouble with the Armenians, and the Persians. At about that time, Valentinian died, leaving Valens as the senior Roman Emperor, with Valentinian’s son as his junior partner.
Meanwhile, further away from Rome’s borders, the Huns were on a reign of terror. Several Gothic tribes, pressed hard by the Huns, sought out the protection of the Roman Empire. One of the tribes, the Thuringians, had been allied with Rome in a few small wars, and Valens granted them asylum and land. In exchange, the Thuringians were to give up their arms, and provide military-aged men to participate in the defense of the Empire. The rest, Valens thought, would take up farming like good Romans. Somewhere along the line, something went wrong. A lot of somethings, actually. It seems that the troops available for controlling the border where the Thuringians were to cross were few in number and it is alleged that most of the Thuringians never did give up their weapons. Not long after the Thuringians were admitted, there were complaints from locals that the Goths were raiding and pillaging
within Roman territory. On the other hand, it seems that the Romans were slow in allocating land to the Thuringians. Making matters worse, other Goth tribes crossed into Rome en masse and without permission as they were more afraid of the Huns than they were of the Romans.
Soon there were an awful lot of Goths in one place, far more than the Romans had anticipated. Far fewer of those Goths than the Romans had expected had the makings of good farmers. That led to a famine among the Goths inside the Empire, and with both sides accusing each other of not living up to the treaty, Rome refused to help. The now
starving mass of Goths rebelled. This rebellion at an unimportant edge of the Empire occasionally tookmthe form of small battles when the Goths attacked a military outpost or an enthusiastic local Roman commander forced a fight. For the most part, however, hordes of Goths would descend upon unfortified civilian towns and villages, plundering, destroying, massacring and dragging the survivors away to slavery. Eventually, Valens himself got involved. His involvement amounted to getting himself killed and his army destroyed at the Battle of Adrianople. That only served to inflame the fear of the Goths within the Empire. Even Goths who had had emigrated and integrated successfully decades earlier found themselves under suspicion, as did those serving in the legions.
There were massacres by both sides.
Eventually, Valens’ successor, Theodosius, signed another peace treaty with the Goths under terms far less favorable to Rome. Integration was no longer a goal; the Goths were granted territories within the
Roman Empire and subject to their own laws. Theodosius, like Valens before him, was under the delusion that the Goths would focus their energies on becoming farmers, and he sold the treaty to Rome that way. Needless to say, this was a period of uneasy cooperation and mutual suspicion between the Roman Empire and the Goths. Over time, the Goths came to be viewed as constituting two major groups: the Ostrogoths in the East (mostly the Balkans) and the Visigoths in the West (mostly France and the Iberian peninsula). When Theodosius died, many Goth tribes decided that their treaties with Rome no longer applied. The Visigoths would go on to ravage them Italian Peninsula and sack Rome in 410. The concept of the Roman Empire still carried a bit of weight, so the Western Roman Empire would sputter on, in name at least, for a few more decades. The Eastern Roman Empire dragged itself along for longer, though it too was a shadow of its former self.
The differences between the Caligula and Valens couldn’t be starker. Caligula was lurid, vicious and unpredictable. By all accounts, he was a monster. Valens was more conventional, and more civilized. When the Goths were threatened by the Huns, he was simultaneously humanitarian and pragmatic. He assumed that Goths who had previously allied themselves with Rome would assimilate and become good Romans as so many nations had before. Caligula, of course, gave the benefit of the doubt to no-one. But the bigger difference between the two
emperors was this: the Roman Empire survived Caligula. For practical
purposes, it did not survive Valens.
The Roman Empire died because of Christianity. They simple lost their will when their customs were destroyed.
Mike, i am sorry this all seems terribly muddled. Caligula was only in power for four years and during that time set in motion the annexation of Mauretania and an abortive invasion of Britain, one that was pursued sucessively by his uncle and successor Claudius. This despite the fact that he inherited an empire that his predecessor Tiberius, following in large part the lead of HIS predecessor Augustus had declared to be more or less fixed as to boundaries. That is in some sense Caligula wasn’t “supposed” to be a foreign military adventurer and in his brief reign didn’t really show much signs of paying attention to even that. If say he hadn’t been assassinated in fairly short order.
But beyond all that you just can’t compare the Rome of the Julio-Claudians with that of Theodosius some three plus centuries later. For one thing there was a lot of empire building in between.
Caligula inherited a fairly new empire at the height of its powers and managed to get killed before he could screw it up too badly. Nearly four centuries later world historical processes that over the next whole millennium would send wave after wave of people off the Russian Steppe towards the West and Mid-East (Huns, Magyars, Mongols, Turks etc). If you will Caligula caught a break by inheriting at a time when his close ancestors/relatives by marriage Julius Caesar, Augustus and Tiberius had temporarily suppressed the Germans themselves being pressed westward by the Steppe folk. But I don’t see any of this being particularly explained or illuminated by any personal difference between Caligula and Valens. Different times, different circumstances entirely.
Bert pure and simple bullshit. For one thing the Eastern Roman Empire (which at the time Rome was converted to Christianity was the dog wagging the tail) persisted and largely flourished for more than a thousand years after. The history of the Western Empire is a little more muddled but within a couple of generation each of the warlords and kings who ‘toppled’ it had themselves been converted to Christianity. And for the most part, and to the best they could tried to preserve ‘Romanitas’. You would be hard pressed to find a ‘post-Roman’ or ‘sub-Roman’ polity that was not one type of Christianity or another. Sure the Goths for the most part were Arian Christians which good Catholic Christians thought was at least schismatic, but try as you might you won’t find extended periods of paganism among the rulers of any of the areas of the Western Empire that were conquered by “Barbarians”. Where paganism survived (Germany, Scandinvia) it was entirely in areas that had never come under Roman Christian control
I would sure be interested in counter-examples.
Bruce,
I am not a historian, but I don’t think you are correct. Caligula’s predecessor, Tiberius, was a great general who conquered some territories that would eventually figure heavily in Roman history like Dalmatia and Panonia and other pieces of what today are Hungary and the various parts of the old Yugoslavia. (Diocletian was born in Dalmatia, and Valens was either from Panonia or from somewhere awfully close.) He also conquered pieces of Germania.
Also, Mauretania at that time was ruled by Ptolemy. He was a first cousin of Germanicus and Claudius, and a second cousin to Caligula and Nero. Under Ptolemy’s predecessor, Juba (so this is well before Caligula) Mauretania became a client state of Rome. So the notion that it would be incorporated into the Roman Empire seamlessly makes sense.
As to Britania… my understanding (which admittedly is limited to reading from second and third hand sources) is that nobody quite knows what happened. Some have felt that Caligula was planning to invade, some that he wasn’t.
In any case, I would be surprised if there wasn’t fighting just outside of Roman borders during Caligula’s era. So the opportunity to take in a lot of refugees or immigrants wasn’t new to Valens.
Most Roman history was told by historians pandering to the senatorial and equestrian classes. I get the impression Suetonius and Tacitus had a class based grudge since they chronicled a time when the emperors were squeezing the upper classes and taking away their prerogatives. Caligula brought back Roman elections which surely ticked off some. Nero gave slaves standing in court. They probably even demanded that the upper classes pay some of their taxes.
I am always suspicious of accusations of sexual turpitude in political contexts. Look at Beria, the monster who headed the NKVD, executed for his supposed sexual pleasure palaces. Look at the crap written about Louis XIV through XVI and their court. There was a whole genre of pornography about the sexual excesses of the French court, most of it god awful. Hitler had an amazingly boring and conventional sex life, though he was often portrayed on stage as having “abnormal” i.e. gay relations with Goring, Goebbels and the like.
By the time Valens was emperor, the upper classes had a new place in the empire, and it didn’t involve politics. They were just rich landowners. The senate hadn’t been a real power for over a century. The city of Rome was increasingly irrelevant to the empire, save as a cultural center. The capital was in Constantinople and imperial power dominant. There was much less of an audience for tales of imperial immorality.
Kaleberg some excellent points on Suetonius. And Tacitus too for that matter. There is good reason to doubt almost all the sexual nonsense found related about Tiberius.
But I don’t think you would have a lot of luck resurrecting the reputations of Caligula or Nero. But I would be interested in seeing sources for either the “restoring elections” or “giving slaves standing in court”. Because I don’t believer elections were ever suspended as such or that Caligula actually granted powers to magistrates in any important ways that Tiberius didn’t and nothing in my understanding of Roman Law (limited though not zero) would lead me to that “standing” conclusion.
I have been wrong before. But not for that last ten minutes or so. Still willing to maintain an open mind.
This seems to be the source of the standing thing. From Wiki “Slavery in ancient Rome” footnote 68
McGinn, Thomas. Prostitution, Sexuality, and the Law in Ancient Rome. Oxford University Press, 2003 Pg. 309
Not interested enough to confirm it. But there it is.
Caligula and elections: Wiki Caligula
Suetonius, The Lives of Twelve Caesars, Life of Caligula 16.2.
This one I may check out. But not made up.
Suetonius, Caligula 16.2 ‘He tried to restore voting rights to the citizen body by reviving the traditional electoral assemblies. ‘
http://homepages.wmich.edu/~esalisbu/De%20Vita%20Caesarum/Gaius%20(Caligula).pdf
I am not sure this equates to “bring back elections” as much as restoring the franchise. But it would take a lot of work to chase down so for the time being:
“5 points to Kaleberg!”
https://books.google.com/books?id=bwzwBgAAQBAJ&pg=PT311&lpg=PT311&dq=caligula+elections&source=bl&ots=Q4ohgh_rLR&sig=ook6cFTKva1MbeFjVdZ7g6ABAm4&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjSt6C88u_OAhVPzmMKHXrmBhEQ6AEINDAD#v=onepage&q=caligula%20elections&f=false
A lot less to this claim. Tiberius had removed some election powers from the Assembly and transferred them to the Senate and Caligula did in form restore them. With the proviso that he maintained tight control of the candidate list to the point that this was more like a ratification of the People’s Congress in Communist China. Form over substance. Certainly there is no support to the idea that Caligula in any way reduced the power of the Emperor in any of this.
Good topic!
ILSM,
Thanks. My Dad made the Caligula point in a conversation and everything clicked. As you can imagine, I am horrified by Caligula but Valens manages to scare me even worse.
ILSM,
I should say that while my Dad mentioned Caligula, the point about Valens was mine.
Oh my oh my! A comment thread with intelligent discussants that’s run for several days without mentioning Hilary Clinton or Donald Trump.
Aren’t you folks worried that the Internet Police will show up and shut your web site down for lack of relevancy?
mike:
Give it time and the trolls will appear to discuss it.
History of Valens very thorough and impressive. All I know is what I read in the relevant chapter of “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”
Some comments
1) the Goths who crossed the Danube were all Visigoths. The Ostrogoths escaped the Huns going into Germany and out of the reach of literate historians (later they returned and tried and failed to cross the Danube in force).
2) Gibbon stresses cruel treatment of Visigoths before they revolted. I guess your more balanced description is fairer
3) Valens forced Visigoth leaders to hand over their sons as hostages. Those hostages were killed when the Visigoths revolted. He didn’t rely on trust.
4) Valens was paranoid and killed many suspected traitors. Not at the Caligula level, but he wasn’t well liked by the surviving aristocrats in Constantinople.
5) I’m not a fan of Theodosius but it has to be remembered that his army couldn’t face the Visigoths in the open field. He probably made the best possible deal with them post Adrianople.
Of course (as noted above) lots of things outside imperial palaces had changed over the centuries. The Roman armies were vincible.
I agree on class bias of Svetonius and Tacitus (they are quite frank about it).
On elections, who cares ? Caligula exercised absolute power. There were people with titles such as consul, but there were irrelevant. I agree with Bruce — as under Mao there were the forms of a Republic but no Republic.
On some rights for slaves, I recall reading that slaves got some rights under Hadrian and the Antonines. Nero may have made some abortive effort which ended with his death. There definitely was a change from slaves are pure property (like shoes) to slaves are considered almost human, but I think it really effectively occurred long after Nero.
As above my one and only source is “The Decline and Fall …”
Robert Waldmann,
To repeat above, I am not a historian and I it has been almost three decades since I waded through Gibbon. But being human, he had his biases just as I have mine. I think a bit of logic and assumptions of path dependence mean the chain of events that began with the crossing of the Danube by the Goths lead to certain conclusions depending on two questions:
(E.g., if the Goths were limited in number and unarmed then there no Goth raiding parties terrorizing local settlements so Rome’s behavior was uncalled for, but if they were not limited in number and armed, then the raiding party stories were probably true and the Romans were didn’t react excessively.)
That said, it seems there is general agreement among historians who study the period that exactly how the crossing of the Danube by the Goths took place, in particular how many and whether they remained armed, is unclear. And the rest of the story hinges on those two issues.
It is generally
Argh. Comment above was being edited and I somehow posted it not even half done. Please ignore.
To try again,
o repeat above, I am not a historian and I it has been almost three decades since I waded through Gibbon. But being human, he had his biases just as I have mine. I think a bit of logic and assumptions of path dependence mean the chain of events that began with the crossing of the Danube by the Goths lead to certain conclusions depending on two questions:
1. Were the Goths limited in number?
2. Were they armed?
There is general agreement among historians that they were not limited in number; the tribe that was granted safe passage was not the only Goth tribe to pass into Roman territory.
As to question 2 – page 152 of this book (https://books.google.com/books?id=H5b9AwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false) makes it clear that there are sources on both sides of the argument. So what likely happened? Well, probably, some of the Goths were disarmed, but many (perhaps particularly the “illegals”) were not disarmed. And to me at least, that assumption seems to flow most easily into the chain of events that followed. If explains the over-crowding of the camps, the Goth raiding parties, etc.