Barbarian Invasions and Recovery
HISTORY 100
WORLD HISTORY
13 FEBRUARY
THE BARBARIAN INVASIONS AND RECOVERY
DICTIONARY TIME-LINES
LEARNING OBJECTIVES
In this section, you should learn the meaning and significance of the
following terms:
- Classical Empires, Germanic "Barbarians," Constantine the Great,
Christianity, Constantinople, Huns, T'ang dynasty, Justinian, Byzantine
Empire.
You should also be considering the following questions:
- What were the weakneses in the Roman Empire?
- How did the reforms of Diocletian and Constantine change the Roman Empire?
- In what ways did Western Europe come to differ from the rest of the "belt
of civilizations"?
TEXT
If it's not one thing, it's another. We've seen the
Agricultural Revolution get started about 10,000 BC and give rise to what we
have called "the neolithic kingdoms" by about 2500 BC or so. Then along came the
bronze-armed chariot peoples out of Inner Asia starting in about 1750 BC,
conquering some of these neolithic kingdoms and forcing others to become
Bronze-Age Empires in order to survive. Then about 1200 BC, those folks from
Inner Asia came charging south again, but this time they were using iron. This
not only toppled the old Bronze- Age Empires but changed the basic rules under
which society had been developing. The new situation favored the sharing of
power among a much greater proportion of the population than before and an era
of relative "democratization" began.
This seemed like a pretty good deal for the new Iron-Age Empires, since they
had a greater population than the peoples of the North, and so could assemble
much larger armies. They expanded to absorbed regions much unlike their homeland
and then spent a great deal of time and energy in developing institutions and
traditions to unify the different peoples under their control. By about 200 BC,
these Classical Empires were flourishing and were creating arts and literatures
of great beauty while at the same time maintaining states in which law, order,
security, and prosperity characterized the inhabitants way of life.
Then, in the 300's AD, those people from Inner Asia came once again, this
time riding horses and shooting at the foot soldiers of the Classical Empires
with short but powerful bows. They attacked all of the empires from China to
Rome, and succeeded, at least for a time, in conquering and ruling a sizable
portion of each of them. We'll concentrate our attention on Rome, since
something happened (or, rather, something didn't happen) there that would
make a great deal of difference in the future.
The Roman empire was centered on the basins of the eastern and western
Mediterranean Sea, although it had extended its power to include most of
continental Europe up to the Rhine and Danube rivers. Although it had begun as a
city-state and a republic, it had become a empire in about 30 BC and power had
been concentrated in the hands of an emperor who, like the emperors of the other
Classical Empires, was considered to be at least semi-divine if not completely
so. When the Roman empire emerged, however, it was missing one important thing.
There was no provision for how power was to pass from a dead ruler to his
successor. Over time, various methods were tried, usually being imposed by
violence of one sort or another. At the same time, the Romans found that they
had to invest a lot of their resources in building fortifications to defend the
western portions of their frontier against various tribes of people, all
speaking variations of old German and so called Germanic
barbarians. They were not really barbarians except from the Roman point
of view, but that's how the Romans described them, and the description has more
or less stuck. On their eastern frontier, the Romans found themselves engaged in
a long and costly series of wars with the New Persian Empire, wars which
weakened the Romans a great deal and gained them very little.
By about 275 AD, the Roman empire had disintegrated almost completely, and
there were thirty different men each with an army and each claiming to be
emperor. It was clear that, if the empire was to survive internal collapse,
changes had to be made. In 383, a general by the name of Diocletian
managed to defeat other claimants and restore the empire to a single rule. He
began a series of reforms that were really completed and made effective by his
successor Constantine the Great (306-337). Their reforms changed
the Roman empire greatly.
In the first place, they were unable to continue the investment necessary to
maintain the unity of the eastern and western halves of the empire, and so
divided the empire into two parts. The western section was far less developed
and well-populated than the eastern portion of the old empire, so it was
necessary to increase taxes there. The result of this was the disappearance of
the middle class and the flight of independent farmers to the protection of
their wealthy (and tax-exempt) noble neighbors. The West slowly sank while the
East, freed of the expense of maintaining the West, soon began to flourish. The
old state religion hadn't seemed to work very well in keeping people peaceful
and loyal to the central government, so Constantine, for reasons best known to
himself, chose to make a mystical eastern cult known as
Christianity the state religion. It took a long time for these
reforms to take hold, but, by 400, the empire was a far different place than it
had been.
While all of this was going on, things were happening in Inner Asia. We are
not sure what caused the movement of peoples, but the nomads on horse-back
seemed to be expanding in all directions. In China, the empire had been
divided into northern and southern empires, and, in 386, the northern empire was
taken over by peoples from Inner Asia, speaking the Mongol language. In
India, the White Huns occupied the western part of the country in
about 425, and, for a long time, carried out destructive raids from this base
into northern India. Another branch of the White Huns gained control of an
eastern portion of the Persian empire in about 460.
The situation in the Roman empire(s) was a bit more complicated. When the
Huns had reached them, one of the German tribes asked the eastern
emperor for permission to enter the empire and take refuge behind the Danube
River. He agreed, and they crossed over and took up Roman lands. They had not
expected to have to pay taxes, however, and decided to march to the eastern
Roman capital at Constantinople and complain to the emperor. The
emperor decided that the Germans needed to be taught a lesson and so led his
entire army against them. Much to everyone's surprise (including the Germans'),
the Germans defeated the Romans, killing the emperor and practically wiping out
the imperial army (378). It took a while to get things back in order, but the
new eastern emperor decided that it would be a much better idea for the Germans
to attack the western empire. He was able to offer them gold and silver and so,
in 407, the Germanic tribes began pouring across the western frontiers of the
empire. By 500, German kings ruled all portions of the western empire, although
they all had legal documents proving that they were actually representatives of
the emperor in Constantinople, who had employed them to re-unit the empire under
his dominion.
The sixth century was a period during which the Classical Empires recovered
the territories that had been lost. In a long and complex process, China was
finally reunited in 589 and, in 618, the great T'ang dynasty
(589-907) was established. The power of the White Huns in India was ended with
their defeat by the Turks in their homeland, while the Persians and Turks allied
to drive the White Huns from the Persian territory they had occupied.
Something strange happened in the area of the Mediterranean. The emperor
Justinian (527-565) undertook the reconquest of the western empire
from its German rulers and made considerable headway in this before his death.
After his death, however, his successors busied themselves fighting against the
Persians and the inhabitants of the eastern empire seemed to have little desire
to hold onto a western empire that was simply a drag on the eastern economy.
They instead abandoned many Roman institutions, returned to their native Greek
tongue, and allowed a new wave of Germanic invaders to occupy what had once been
the Roman Empire in the West. Although the inhabitants of the eastern
Mediterranean continued to refer to themselves as Romans, the changes in that
portion of the Roman Empire were so great, that historians generally refer to it
as the Byzantine Empire. The Byzantine Empire and its great
capital of Constantinople survived until its final conquest by the Turks in
1453.
Western Europe was at the end of the great belt of civilizations and was cut
off from the advances those civilizations made in later years. Such things as
paper, printing, gunpowder, the compass, windmills, and many other innovations,
reached Europe only after they had been common for many years in the rest of the
civilized world. What is more, Western Europe was the only portion of a
Classical Civilization to fall to "barbarian" invaders and not to be recovered.
It had to create a new tradition acceptable to the disparate people who
inhabited the region. The Germanic inhabitants had no tradition of centralized
rule and there was no central geographic feature (such as a great river basin)
upon which to base such a centralized rule. Although the ideal of a Roman Empire
of the West remained attractive for a long time, the Europeans began to adapt
the traditions and culture of a Classical Empire to an essentially decentralized
and egalitarian society.
ASSIGNMENTS
REQUIRED ASSIGNMENTS
The Roman Empire is a very popular topic. There are over 1500 web sites
devoted to aspects of the subject, so it is very difficult to chose one or two
to give you an overview. A small selection of sites concentration on the late
empire will have to serve as a sample. The ORB encyclopaedia has an Overview of
Late Antiquity, and the ruins of Diocletian's
palace is quite evocative. Another site, providing a history of The Early Centuries of the
Greek Roman East will have to round out that subject of the Late Roman
Empire, a topic that merges into that of Medieval Europe.
RECOMMENDED ASSIGNMENTS
This might be a good opportunity to get a better picture of the Roman Empire
at its height. For pure visual effect, the Pompeii Forum
Project is well worth the time it takes to load it. There is a nice site
showing a reconstructed Roman villa, or country
estate, in Germany, and another that features the reconstruction of the frontier
town of Xanten,
also in Germany. There is also the Vichten
mosaic, found in modern Luxembourg, that illustrates as well as anything the
amalgamation of Roman and Greek themes into Graeco-Roman culture. For a change
of pace, you might wish to see the sights of an ancient Qin Palace in China. This last site is
actually a catalogue, but the pictures of the works for sale are quite
beautiful, and the text is intriguing.
This text was produced by Lynn H. Nelson, Department of
History, University of Kansas.
11 February 1998
Lawrence KS
.
