The Historians of Late Antiquity (38 page)

Ammianus fully narrates the events leading up to the Battle of Adrianople in book 31 of the
Res Gestae
(Lenski 1997). He writes that omens of the coming death of Valens were visible everywhere, and that the ghosts of those whom the emperor had unjustly executed were particularly unquiet (31.1). Ammianus describes the Hunnic conquest of the Alans and their attacks upon the Goths, and he sees the Huns as the ultimate cause of the invasion (31.3). The historian further suggests that Valens agreed to the settlement because he was eager for army recruits and for the gold that the
treasury would receive from the provinces in lieu of the regular draft (31.4.1–4). The crossing itself is described hyperbolically, with countless Goths crossing day and night on every sort of boat and raft (31.4.5–6). Ammianus singles out the generals in Thrace who oversaw the operation, Lupicinus and Maximus, for their greed and incompetence (31.4.9–11). These accusations, including the charge that the generals traded dogs to be used as food to starving Goths in return for the slavery of their children, may derive from an official report of an inquiry into the disaster. It is, in any case, very much in keeping with Ammianus’ view of history for personal immorality to have led to disaster for the state.

As the generals supervised the crossing of the Danube, another group of Goths secretly crossed at a distance and made contact with those who had preceded them. At this point Ammianus tells us that Lupicinus invited Fritigern and Alavivus, the Gothic leaders, to dinner, and then had their guards treacherously put to death. These events outraged the Goths, and in a quick battle they defeated Roman forces. The size of the Gothic warband was augmented by the addition of Gothic slaves and others from the region who directed them to the richest parts of Thrace. “Without distinction between age or sex, everything was aflame with massacres and burnings” (31.6). The significance of the defeat is magnified by Ammianus’ pause to compare it with events from the fourth century BC and the third century AD which had been even greater disasters for the state (31.5.10–14). Yet Ammianus seems to suggest that, just as those tragedies had been overcome, so too could this one.

Ammianus criticizes the generals sent by Valens, men of “high ambition but unfit for battle,” for failing to realize that guerrilla warfare, not open battle, was necessary in the mountainous terrain of Thrace (31.7.1–3). Near the town of Salices the two forces met in a violent but inconclusive struggle. The continuing devastation of Thrace is described by Ammianus in pathetic tones (31.8.6–8). Frigiderius defeated a group of Goths, sending the survivors to Italy to work the land (31.9), but he was replaced by the less trustworthy general Maurus (3.10.21). In the meantime Gratian, coming east to bring reinforcements, was delayed by the need to fight Germans along the Rhine (31.10).

Valens departed from Constantinople determined to fight the Goths near Adrianople. Ammianus attributes the decision to meet in battle primarily to Valens’ jealousy of the successes of Gratian and his subordinates, as well as to a mistake in scouting which
suggested that the Gothic force was much smaller than it actually was (31.12). In a grim and bloody battle on 9 August 378, the Romans were defeated, and Valens’ body was never found; the emperor may have burned to death in a house in which he sought refuge. Scarcely a third of the Roman army escaped.

In the morning after the battle, the Goths laid siege to the city of Adrianople, but were unsuccessful at taking it (31.15). Joining with a contingent of Huns and Alans, they marched on Constantinople, but were frightened away by a bizarre sight. Ammianus claims that one of the Arab defenders of the city, longhaired and in a loin cloth, cut the throat of a Goth and proceeded to drink the blood from the open wound (31.16.6). Another disturbing event concludes the narrative of the
Res Gestae
. The count Julius, Ammianus says, “distinguished himself by a swift and beneficial deed” (31.16.8). He sent secret directions to those who were supervising the Goths who had been dispersed throughout Asia Minor, ordering them to summon the Goths to congregate to receive military stipends and then to quickly put them to death
en masse
. “When this prudent plan,” Ammianus remarks, “had been completed without outcry or delay, the eastern provinces were saved from great danger” (31.16.8).

A lengthy fragment from Eunapius covers this period in Romano-Gothic relations (
fr
. 42; Paschoud 1989c). Eunapius describes with pathos the slaughter of the Goths by the Huns and the gathering of weeping and supplicant Goths on the far side of the Danube. The historian attributes the blame for allowing the crossing of the Danube to Valens’ desire for recruits, as Ammianus had. Eunapius claims that the greed and lust of the officers in charge led to large numbers of young Goths being admitted to the empire to serve as domestic slaves or field workers. In a chronologically confused and bizarre passage, Eunapius claims that these Gothic children matured with tremendous speed and were old enough to rise in revolt as their older relatives looted Thrace.

Just as Ammianus had been critical of the Romans’ decision to meet the enemy in direct battle, so Eunapius seems to suggest that guerrilla warfare and supply disruption would have been superior methods of operation. Eunapius adds that this advice, which would certainly seem obvious enough after the proven failure of the direct method, is evidence for the value of an education in literature and history to the would-be general (
fr
. 44). This should be considered a gibe at the unlettered Valens, who is implicitly compared to the learned Julian.

A fragment of Eunapius once thought to refer to the period after Adrianople may rather be better associated with the Gothic crossing of the Danube (Heather 1986: 305–10). Regardless of date, the fragment neatly combines two of Eunapius’ dislikes, barbarians and Christians, into one monitory tale. In an apparent reference to the agreement of the Goths to convert to Christianity in return for settlement over the Danube, he claims that barbarians swore false oaths which the emperors foolishly trusted. He adds that barbarians easily infiltrated the empire by disguising themselves as bishops or monks (
fr
. 48.2). The historian asserts that despite the disguise, the Goths in reality spurned Christianity and revered their own sacred objects in secret. So low had the Romans fallen that even ordinary people were deceived by this trick. Although Eunapius blames Roman degradation in the form of Christianization for Gothic success, he does not therefore absolve the Goths. On the contrary, he claims that the majority of Goths had sworn eternal enmity to Rome, to the effect that no matter how friendly the Romans were, they would always attempt to seize territory from them (
fr
. 59).

For Rufinus and the other church historians, the disaster at Adrianople can be largely understood as divine revenge for the Arian Valens’ persecution of orthodoxy. Rufinus omits any details of the crossing but simply states that Valens, too late, turned his military forces from the churches to the barbarians (11.13). The emperor was burned to death “for his impiety,” and Rufinus concludes with the comment that the battle was “the beginning of evil times for the Roman empire from then on.”

Socrates’ account is much more detailed than that of Rufinus. He comments that the emperor’s decision to admit the Goths into the empire was the “one time alone that he showed compassion,” although he quickly adds that there were more material benefits for Valens of Gothic settlement, such as the availability of recruits and the ability to commute the regular Roman draft to gold (4.34.2). Once Valens had arranged for Goths to be settled on Roman territory, he neglected to raise troops from among the Romans. Socrates pointedly alters the emphasis of Rufinus, claiming that “this change” in recruitment “was the beginning of evil times for the Roman empire for a short time after” (4.34.6). When disturbances broke out during the crossing of the Danube, Socrates says that a sluggish Valens had to be reprimanded by chants in the Hippodrome in Constantinople in order to encourage him to fight the Goths. Valens left Constantinople cursing and promising to take his revenge on the
impudent residents upon his return. Despite his slow start, however, Socrates says that the emperor had great success against the enemy up until the Battle of Adrianople itself (4.38).

Sozomen’s information about the Goths comes almost entirely from Socrates, although it is extended and elaborated rhetorically. In particular, Sozomen emphasizes that Valens’ death was the result of his persecutions by having the monk Isaac boldly tell the emperor as he leaves for battle that he would not return to the East unless he returned the churches to those following the Nicene Creed (6.40.1; cf. Lenski 1997: 153–5). He also expands the simple sentence of Socrates which suggested the possibility that Valens had died in a fire into a vivid and dramatic version of the emperor’s last moments (6.40.3–5).

Theodoret’s treatment of events is predictably didactic and fuzzy in the details. He repeatedly emphasizes through anecdotes that Valens’ heterodoxy was responsible for his downfall. After “the Lord roused the Goths to war,” Theodoret says that Valens realized his weakness for the first time, and wrote to his brother seeking his help. Valentinian rejected his brother’s entreaty, thinking it improper to help a heretic (4.31). Since Valentinian had in fact died a year before the crossing of the Goths, this story is particularly unlikely. Theodoret adds that when Valens criticized his general Trajan after his failure to defeat the Goths, Trajan boldly responded that Valens’ heresy, not Trajan’s cowardice, was responsible for the loss. Other generals concurred with Trajan’s diagnosis of the problem (4.33). Because Valens rejected these warnings and the advice of the monk Isaac (4.34), his army turned and fled at Adrianople. “Thus in this present life he paid the price of his offenses” (4.36.2).

Orosius’ account, like that of Theodoret, is heavily didactic, although less fanciful (7.33). The Huns provide the ultimate cause, and the avarice of the Roman officials the proximate cause, of the invasion. Valens’ persecution of the orthodox, however, explains his failure and death. The emperor’s death leads Orosius to a predictably dramatic lament. He is struck by the fact that an Arian emperor was killed by the Arian Goths, “and so, by the just judgement of God, those men who burned him alive will also burn when they are dead, for the vice of the error which he taught them” (7.33.19).

The treaty agreed upon by the Goths and the Romans in 382 remained in force until the death of Theodosius in 395. The Gothic revolt which followed took place under the leadership of Alaric, and
may have been the result of dissatisfaction at the heavy losses suffered by Gothic troops fighting in Roman civil wars. Alaric and his troops exploited the hostility between the eastern and western courts which persisted for the next fifteen years. At times Alaric was allied with Stilicho, the guardian of Honorius in the west, and at other times he did the bidding of the successive guardians of Arcadius in the east (Liebeschuetz 1990; O’Flynn 1983: 14–62). After the assassination of Stilicho in 408 Honorius rejected Alaric’s demands, and the Goths sacked the city of Rome in frustration on 24 August 410. Alaric died from illness a year later, and his brother-in-law Ataulf succeeded him. Ataulf married the sister of Honorius, Galla Placidia, who had been seized during the sack of Rome, and they had a son, Theodosius. Ataulf and his son were killed in a coup shortly after, however, and under the leadership of Theodoeric I, the Goths were settled in southern Gaul in 418. There they established the Kingdom of Toulouse, which would last until its destruction by Clovis and the Franks in 507. Throughout the fifth century, these Goths would fight often as allies of the Romans against newer groups of barbarians who threatened the empire.

The full account of the careers of Alaric and Ataulf was a major part of the history of Olympiodorus, which unfortunately does not survive intact. This part of Olympiodorus was a source not only for Zosimus, but also for Sozomen’s ninth, unfinished book. Olympiodorus was a defender of Stilicho, as is clear, for example, in his apparent acceptance of Stilicho’s claim of regency over both Honorius and Arcadius (
fr
. 1) and his statement that Stilicho “fought many successful wars for the Romans” (
fr
. 3). It appears, then, that Olympiodorus blamed the sack of Rome at least in part on Stilicho’s assassination (
fr
. 7.5).

The Greek church historians do not describe the sack of Rome itself in detail. Sozomen emphasizes that because of Alaric’s respect for St Peter, the large church around his tomb served as an asylum which provided safety to many Romans (9.9.4–5). Socrates states that after plundering the city, Alaric and his men left quickly when they heard that an eastern army was on its way (7.10.6–7). This appears to be a piece of eastern propaganda which attempts to explain the lack of interest in western suffering shown by the administration of Theodosius II.

In contrast to the Greek ecclesiastical historians with their eastern focus, Rome’s sack was central to the very purpose of Orosius’ work. Orosius draws a careful contrast between Alaric, a Goth and a Christian, and the pagan Gothic leader Radagaisus
(7.37.8–12; Teillet 1984: 113–60). He claims that the Romans, threatened by Alaric, turned to paganism, and he is thereby able to portray Alaric’s sack as a Christian victory over a pagan city. Romans should be glad, according to Orosius’ interpretation, that they were spared the horrific results which the victory of the pagan Radagaisus would have brought about. Although Alaric’s invasion was temporarily frightening, by allowing the basilica of Peter and Paul to remain as an asylum he demonstrated, Orosius claims, that his Goths were eager for plunder but not for massacre (7.39.1). At one point during the sack, according to Orosius, gold and silver church vessels were transferred through the city without danger, with barbarian and Roman alike singing hymns. The occupation lasted a mere three days, he writes, and Rome has already regained its former strength (7.40.1).