(19) THEODOSIUS –
THEODOSIAN DYNASTY (EASTERN EMPIRE – BRIEFLY WHOLE EMPIRE)
379 – 395 AD (15 YEARS 11 MONTHS 29 DAYS)

 

I know Dovahhatty does something of a hatchet job on Theodosius but I tend to agree with his caption for Theodosius – “I’m busy thinking how to be horrible at everything and yet still be remembered as ‘great'” (in marked contrast to Dovahhatty’s admiration for Theodosius’ father, Theodosius the Elder or Count Theodosius, with which I also tend to agree).

And yes – my understanding is that “great” was used in Roman imperial titles essentially to mean the first of his name as emperor, particularly to distinguish them from other emperors of the same name – so you have Valentinian and Constantine as the Great, but also Theodosius and Leo.

And yes – similarly to my Pertinax-Thrax line separating good from bad emperors, we come to the first of two emperors right on my dividing line separating bad from good emperors.

I anticipate that it will be controversial ranking both emperors as ‘bad’, albeit right on the threshold of being decent – as others might rank them as ‘good’, indeed probably much higher than either Pertinax or Maximinus Thrax, even if their reigns had mixed or problematic aspects.

So back to Theodosius, although Dovahhatty takes a lot of historical license overstating the case against him, it coincides with what I’ve always thought of him.

And I just can’t forgive him for inflicting the worst dynasty on the classical empire – the Theodosian dynasty. And inflict it he did – immediately in the form of his two sons as imperial heirs, Arcadius on the eastern empire and Honorius on the western empire, ensuring the permanent division of the empire and the fall of the latter.  Theodosius was – briefly – the last emperor of the whole empire, both western and eastern halves.

Let’s start with where Dovahhatty overstates his case – the western emperor Gratian proclaimed Theodosius as eastern emperor during the ongoing Gothic War of 376-382 AD in the wake of the disastrous defeat and death of the preceding eastern emperor Valens in the Battle of Adrianople in 378 AD.

Theodosius had few good options as the new eastern emperor essentially thrown a hospital pass by Gratian. The forces available to the eastern empire were too depleted, not least by the losses at Adrianople, to drive the Goths out – and although Theodosius was able to ultimately win the Gothic War and pacify the Goths, he had to settle for, well, settling the Goths within the empire.

As Dovahhatty acidly observes with Theodosius “completely caving in”, “the Goths were allowed to settle inside the empire, under their own leaders…fully armed and exempt from ever being Romanized and thus civilized, a complete betrayal of Rome’s oldest tradition”.

One doesn’t have to go quite so far as that to acknowledge that “although his pacification of the Goths secured peace for the Empire during his lifetime, their status as an autonomous entity within Roman borders caused problems for succeeding emperors”. From here on, no longer were the barbarians at the gates, they were inside the gates.

In other words, it was the institution of the foederati system on an unprecedented scale – where the Romans settled Germanic tribes as effectively independent states within the empire on the basis of a treaty or foedus to lend military forces to the empire. Of course, the Germanic tribes had already become the lifeblood for recruitment to the Roman army and even as its commanders, but the foederati represented a significant downgrade, not least in territory and taxation revenue lost within the empire.

It may have been the best of the bad options at the time but one can’t help feeling that Theodosius was kicking the can down the road – and ironically it was the western empire that had to pick it up next century, even though Theodosius settled the Goths within the eastern empire. In this – kicking the can down the road for the empire to pick up later, even if it was the best of bad options – Theodosius resembled the other emperor holding my dividing line between bad and good emperors. For the other emperor, picking up that can came with the Crisis of the Third Century – with Theodosius, it came with no less than the fall of the western empire.

However, as I said, Theodosius had few good choices. The western empire under Gratian provided little assistance, something that would rebound to bite the western empire back, particularly when the Visigoths moved from the eastern to the western empire. Theodosius had to resort to desperate recruiting measures to fill the ranks of the army – conscripting farmers and miners, as well as Germanic auxiliaries including the Goths themselves, who after the settlement (and to some extent before in the form of deserters and mercenaries) were to be one of the few reliable sources of manpower for the army. Loyal and competent Germanic officers, typically the Frankish officers like Arbogast that became the force behind the throne in the western empire in the fourth century (as the Goths themselves were to become in the eastern empire in the fifth), helped turn the tide of the Gothic War to force the Goths into a treaty.

And thereafter, the Visigoths were arguably among the more reliable Germanic foederati or allies for the Romans, at least for their crucial role in helping Aetius win against the Huns in Gaul. More immediately for Theodosius, “by the start of his reign, much of Eastern Roman Empire’s military was devastated and Goths–who were more nuanced than savage barbarians and too divided to serve under a single force in real-life–were (the) only military available in such short notice”.

It’s just that Theodosius seemed set upon achieving the worst of all worlds – with a policy seemingly designed for an alliance with the Goths but alienating them instead, particularly the Visigoths and the Visigothic leader Alaric, who would then descend upon the western empire and sack Rome.

It is arguable that an effective alliance with the Goths might have had a similar result to the revival of Rome under the Illyrian emperors – Theodosius even settled the Visigoths in Illyria.

However, Theodosius exploited the Visigoths under Alaric as the Roman equivalent of cannon fodder – legion fodder – for expendable casualties in the Battle of the Frigidus against a western usurper, the puppet of his former Frankish commander Arbogast, whom he himself had appointed as supreme military commander of the western empire. “Despite losing many thousands of his men”, Alaric “received little recognition from Rome and left the Roman army disappointed” – subsequently, “as the leader of the only effective field force remaining in the Balkans, he sought Roman legitimacy, never quite achieving a position acceptable to himself or to the Roman authorities”.

The Battle of the Frigidus prompts to mind the other major criticism of Theodosius – that he didn’t just simply foist his two useless sons on each half of the empire, but that he did so “defending his own dynastic interests at the cost of two civil wars”, intervening in the western empire on two occasions.

The first was in 388 when Magnus Maximus usurped the western emperor Gratian. Granted on that occasion he installed Gratian’s half-brother Valentinian II as western emperor, but essentially as puppet of Arbogast – and probably mere placeholder for his own son Honorius.

The second was in 394 when Arbogast proclaimed Eugenius as emperor after the (suspicious) death of Valentinian II, resulting in the decisive Battle of the Frigidus and Theodosius becoming emperor of the whole empire, to be succeeded by his two sons.

Both civil wars were disastrous for the empire, particularly the latter and particularly for the western empire, severely depleting the manpower of the army to repel or resist barbarian invaders thereafter.

On top of that, there’s the controversy of the infamous Massacre of Thessalonica, where civilians were killed by Roman troops – or a “Gothic horde” as Dovahhatty characterized them, although the sources are not clear as to this or the role of Theodosius in the massacre.

There’s also the controversy of him upholding Nicene Christianity as the official religion stamping out Arian Christians and pagans, although again his role in doing so is not clear and may well be overstated.

However, there remains his damned dynasty – “His two sons proved weak and incapable rulers, and they presided over a period of foreign invasions and court intrigues, which heavily weakened the empire”. And it didn’t stop there as his descendants would rule the empire for the next six decades, ensuring its enduring division – and the fall of the western empire.

 

DID DOVAHHATTY DO RIGHT?

 

Really, I’ve been clear about my agreement with Dovahhatty from the outset of this feature – while he does overstate the case against Theodosius, I tend to agree with his caption about Theodosius thinking how to be horrible at everything and still be remembered as great. I particularly like how he has Theodosius grovelling to Goths (and the Church), much to the disdain of Stilicho.

 

RATING: 3 STARS***
C-TIER (MID-TIER)
EMPIRE-BREAKER