Dovahhatty – Unbiased History of Rome XIX: The Fall of Rome

(7) LAST WESTERN EMPERORS –
LIBIUS SEVERUS, OLYBRIUS, GLYCERIUS, ROMULUS AUGUSTULUS, JULIUS NEPOS, AVITUS & ANTHEMIUS
(455-456 & 461-476 AD)

The archetypal weak emperors of the dying western empire – embodying the terminal decline of imperial office to the figureheads or puppets of the barbarian warlords who ruled the empire or its remnants in all but name.

Best symbolized by the “last western emperor”, Romulus Augustulus, whose deposition by Odoacer marked the end of the western empire as political entity and proverbial Fall of the Roman Empire – with the perfect irony of being named for Rome’s legendary founder and derisively nicknamed Augustulus or little Augustus.

Such was the power of that irony that historians traditionally identified him as the last western emperor, even though the claim arguably belongs to Julius Nepos (and others asserted imperial claims even afterwards), and his deposition as the Fall of the Empire.

“Romulus being seen as the last emperor over other contenders derives not only from Romulus having been the last emperor proclaimed in the west, but also from the poetic nature of being named after both Romulus, the founder of Rome, and Augustus, the first Roman emperor. Many historians have noted the coincidence that the last emperor combined the names of both the city’s founder and the first emperor. In The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Gibbon wrote that “the appellations of the two great founders of the city and of the monarchy were thus strangely united in the last of their successors.””

The archetypal weakness of the last western Roman emperors is such that you could arguably swap all of them into my top ten worst emperors and indeed I considered Romulus Augustulus for my wildcard tenth place given how well he symbolized them as well as the irony of his name. In the end, I considered that they ranked special mention as opposed to other emperors with more notorious cruelty and depravity or that were more actively destructive – or both, above all those who ruled from a position or at at time of greater imperial power.

These last western emperors may have been archetypally weak, but that wasn’t so much any particular emperor as it was a quality of the position of emperor itself by then – excepting of course Majorian’s reign and reversal of fortune for a few years. And intentionally so, by the military commanders who sought to use these emperors as puppets, until the barbarian warlord Odoacer decided to dispense with such puppets altogether.

So I also considered that it wouldn’t be fair to simply rank the last non-dynastic western Roman emperors in my top ten worst emperors – with the notable exception of Petronius Maximus, whom I did consider to be actively destructive enough for my wildcard tenth place entry. That’s so even for poor Romulus Augustulus despite the notoriety of his name and status as the last western emperor – and somewhat surprisingly, he actually ranked in the middle of the pack among these emperors, which I decided to rank both in and within the one special mention.

So here goes ranking them within the special mention, from worst to best.

First, the four who rank worst as the archetypal weak last western roman emperors:

LIBIUS SEVERUS (461-465 AD: 3 YEARS 11 MONTHS 26 DAYS)

I see no reason to dissent from Dovahhatty’s assessment that the German commander Ricimer deliberately “arranged for the weakest, most pathetic of men to be his puppet” – particularly as he did so after Majorian and would have been determined to avoid another such figure. He was rumored to have been poisoned by Ricimer to abandon him for a candidate more appealing to the eastern empire.

OLYBRIUS (472 AD: 7 MONTHS)

The oily Olybrius comes in next, with the distinction of being a puppet twice over – for the Vandals and for Ricimer, before dying of illness.

GLYCERIUS (473-474 AD: 1 YEAR 3 MONTHS 19/21 DAYS)

Glycerius was at least not the puppet of Ricimer, because that rat had finally died during the reign of his predecessor Olybrius – instead he was the puppet of Gundobad, the new German military commander, until Gundobad decided to abandon him. And at least he managed to deter invasions of Italy by the Visigoths and Ostrogoths – the former by his local commanders repelling it and the second by paying them tribute in gold. He was not recognized by the eastern emperor, who instead sent an army to install its candidate, Julius Nepos – although Glycerius managed to peacefully abdicate and be ordained a bishop

ROMULUS AUGUSTULUS (475-476 AD: 10 MONTHS 4 DAYS)

And here he is – the iconic last western Roman emperor but surprisingly not the worst of them. After all, he was a child briefly enthroned by his father as his nickname signified. Still a weak puppet emperor but I give him bonus points because he was a child. Also, at least he was a puppet of a Roman commander, his father Orestes. Orestes was smart enough to not claim the throne for himself, given how dangerous that particular seat was by this time, but ruling through his son as figurehead didn’t really work out for him either. The barbarian general Odoacer defeated and killed him, deposing Romulus as well and dispensing with any western emperor altogether, ruling as the new barbarian king of Italy. Odoacer was surprising decent about it all, including sparing Romulus to live in peaceful retirement.

And now the three who rank somewhat above the other last western roman emperors for at least trying to do something

JULIUS NEPOS (474-475 AD: 1 YEAR 2 MONTHS 4 DAYS)

Julius Nepos was the eastern empire’s candidate for western emperor who deposed Glycerius, but was deposed in turn by the Roman commander Orestes. Bonus points for retreating to his home province of Dalmatia and continuing to claim the western imperial title from there, with the continued recognition of the eastern empire – effectively seceding from and even outlasting Roman imperial rule in Italy until he was killed in 480, by two of his generals while planning an expedition to recover Italy. Ironically, even Odoacer paid lip service to him as emperor, minting coins in his name but otherwise ignoring him – which was pretty much also what the eastern empire did as well, recognizing him but otherwise not giving him any actual support.

He had also worked to restore the western empire in his brief reign – possibly repelling a Visigothic invasion of Italy and also managing to again reduce the Burgundians to Roman foederati, but otherwise mostly unsuccessful in reviving Roman power in Gaul, unable to halt Visigothic conquests there.

AVITUS (455-456 AD: 1 YEAR 3 MONTHS 8 DAYS)

Absent the revival of Roman power under a figure such as Majorian, the western empire didn’t have much prospect for survival on its own except perhaps for the two options involving an alliance or merger with the only two states that could save it. Avitus tried for the first – a Romano-Gothic alliance, from which one might even speculate on an enduring western Romano-Gothic empire (particularly if it involved both Visigoths and Ostrogoths).

Avitus had a good relationship with the Visigoths, arguably the best of Rome’s Germanic foederati at that time – particularly their king Theodoric II, as Avitus had come out of retirement to fight alongside the previous king Theodoric and the supreme Roman commander Aetius as allies against the Huns. He was sent as an ambassador to Theodoric II, probably to seek support for the emperor, although he loses points for that emperor being Petronius Maximus. As Petronius Maximus was killed by the Roman mob and the Vandals sacked Rome, Theodoric II acclaimed Avitus as emperor instead.

Avitus opposed the reduction of the empire to Italy alone – one might think for good reasons of Gaul being both the remaining reliable source of army recruitment in the western empire and also his power base, bringing a Gallic army (and probably Gothic forces) with him to Italy as well as seeking to introduce Gallic senators into the imperial administration.

And pretty much everyone in Rome hated him for it as the “foreign” emperor – and having invaded Hispania at his behest, Theodoric II was unable to help him against the rebel Roman generals who deposed him, although again he loses points for one of those generals being Majorian. So yes – he was deposed for his trouble but spared on condition that he became a bishop, only perhaps to have been killed afterwards anyway.

ANTHEMIUS (467-472 AD: 5 YEARS 2 MONTHS 29 DAYS)

Generally recognized as the last effective western emperor – and perhaps not coincidentally the one with the longest reign – Anthemius tried for the second and more obvious of the two options for alliance or support, the eastern empire, not surprisingly reflecting that he came from there as its candidate for western emperor.

“Anthemius attempted to solve the two primary military challenges facing the remains of the Western Roman Empire: the resurgent Visigoths, under Euric, whose domain straddled the Pyrenees; and the unvanquished Vandals, under Geiseric, in undisputed control of North Africa”.

He even had the support of the eastern empire for the latter, with the eastern empire launching its own massive invasion fleet against the Vandal kingdom in north Africa – something that would have been much better timed with Majorian’s planned campaign against the Vandals. Sadly, the eastern empire screwed this up, with the catastrophic defeat of its fleet and consequent near bankruptcy of their empire for thirty years or so.

Predictably, Anthemius ran afoul of Ricimer – “Unlike most of his predecessors, Anthemius refused to yield, and his insistence on ruling independently brought him into conflict with Ricimer. This eventually escalated into open warfare between the two, with the result that Anthemius lost not only his throne, but also his head, in 472.”

DID DOVAHHATTY DO RIGHT?

Dovahhatty summed up the fate of the western empire and its last emperors best, as in my feature image with Odoacer and Romulus Augustulus – “When Odoacer broke through Ravenna’s gates, he didn’t find the all-powerful emperor of the civilized world…instead he found a weak, trembling child unable to protect himself, much less the people he nominally ruled”.

Although Dovahhatty depicted poor Romulus as a memetic virgin, it was more from sheer pathos than the usual reprehensible character for which Dovahhatty reserved depiction as virgins.

Otherwise, Dovahhatty’s depictions in order of my rankings –

AVITUS: Wojak

LIBIUS SEVERUS: Virgin

ANTHEMIUS: Wojak

OLYBRIUS: Wojak

GLYCERIUS: Wojak

JULIUS NEPOS: Wojak

RATING: 1 STAR*
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Dovahhatty – Unbiased History of Rome XIX: The Fall of Rome

(6) BASILISCUS –
LEONID DYNASTY
(475-476 AD: 1 YEAR 7 MONTHS)

And now we come to the last eastern emperor before my arbitrary cut-off point of 476 AD for the last western Roman emperor Romulus Augustulus and the ‘fall’ of the (western) Roman Empire. (Yes, technically Zeno had regained his throne for a second reign just in time for Romulus Augustulus being deposed, but as I stated in the introduction to my top ten emperors, I excluded Zeno so as to consider him with the eastern emperors as he mostly reigned after the fall of the west).

And it might be said that the eastern empire was saving up its worst to that point, excluding Arcadius as the eastern version of Honorius – and hence one of my special mentions that could arguably be swapped into the top ten worst emperors. The only redeeming feature of the reign of Basiliscus was its brevity, as it was cut mercifully short by the emperor he had deposed, Zeno, deposing him in turn to take the throne back.

To give him credit, he had a distinguished military career which had seem him rise to the position of magister militum or military commander in Thrace, where he had considerable success guarding the Balkan frontier of the eastern empire, defeating the Huns and Goths.

Which makes it even more mystifying that he botched the invasion of the Vandal kingdom in North Africa, the eastern empire’s last ditch effort under Emperor Leo to salvage the western empire before the latter fell. The eastern empire’s expedition was reputed to have consisted of 1,113 ships with over 100,000 men under the command of Basiliscus. Basiliscus accepted the Vandal king Gaeseric’s offer of a truce – which the Vandals used to construct fireships to wreak utter havoc on the eastern empire’s fleet, defeating it at the Battle of Cape Bon in 468 AD and reducing the eastern empire to near bankruptcy for thirty years with the loss of its fleet.

There were accusations at the time that Basiliscus had been bribed to lose the battle by Aspar, the Germanic magister militum or commander in chief of the eastern empire, who was really running the eastern empire at that time. Historians tend to dismiss this but do accept that Baliscus was incompetent or foolish for accepting the offer of a truce.

That should have been the end of him but no – he came crawling back to Constantinople and literally hid in a church, until his sister – the Empress Verina – secured him a pardon, ostensibly for a comfortable retirement. Damn – the irony of a western emperor named Julius Nepos, contemporaneous with Basiliscus to boot, when Basiliscus might have been named Basiliscus Nepotismus.

Amazingly, he managed to slime his way to the throne itself, conspiring with his sister to depose the emperor Zeno. The conspiracy was to install her lover Patricus as emperor, but Basilicus convinced the eastern Roman Senate to acclaim him as emperor instead.

Needless to say, his brief reign antagonized everyone – starting with his co-conspirators, not least his sister when he not only subverted her choice of Patricus as emperor, but also had Patricus executed. His other co-conspirators defected back to Zeno and he alienated everyone else through a combination of heavy taxation (presumably to help pay back the bankruptcy his loss of the fleet had caused) or heretical religious policies.

Not surprisingly, Zeno reclaimed his throne and Basiliscus once again hid in a church – but this time had no sister to help him out. The legend is that he surrendered upon Zeno taking an oath not to spill his blood, but Zeno simply stripped him and left him inside an empty cistern to die instead, keeping the oath in its literal sense.

DID DOVAHHATTY DO RIGHT

The last virgin eastern emperor before the fall of the western empire – Yes, technically there was Zeno as I said, but Dovahhatty depicts him as a wojak. Although…Dovahhatty doesn’t even show him as emperor, only as the nameless Roman commander who lost the Battle of Cape Bon.

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Dovahhatty – Unbiased History of Rome: Diocletian’s Tetrarchy

(5) CARINUS –
NON-DYNASTIC (CARAN DYNASTY) / CRISIS OF THE THIRD CENTURY
(283-285 AD: 2 YEARS)

And it’s my other special mention for a Crisis of the Third Century emperor who could arguably be swapped into the top ten worst emperors. The empire was almost out of the crisis but had to deal with this reprobate before he was defeated and killed in battle with a far better imperial claimant, Diocletian, whose reign finally ended the crisis.

Ironically, his father Carus was one of the people who had done their part to see an end to the crisis, hence ranking special mention in my good emperors, but the apple fell pretty far from the tree in this case. Given that he succeeded his father as emperor, that would technically make him part of a Caran dynasty but I’m counting it as non-dynastic because Carus disowned him on hearing how he ruled as co-emperor and declared an intention of replacing him with yet another better candidate (and special mention in my good emperors), Constantius. There was also his brother Numerian, who had accompanied their father on campaign against the Sassanid Persians (which saw both of them killed in succession) while Carinus had been appointed as co-emperor in the western empire.

“Carinus has the reputation of being one of the worst Roman emperors…dissolute and incompetent”.

“He indulged in all manner of extravagance and excess. He is said to have married and divorced nine different women during his short reign in Rome and to have made his private life notorious…to have persecuted many who he felt had treated him with insufficient respect before his elevation, to have alienated the Senate by his open dislike and contempt, and to have prostituted the imperial dignity with the various low entertainments he introduced at court”.

Despite (or perhaps because of) all his marriages, he was reputed to have been a little too…thirsty with the wives of his officers, which saw him ‘fragged’ by one such man at the Battle of Margus River against Diocletian. That and his army, which outnumbered that of Diocletian, deserted him to Diocletian.

DID DOVAHHATTY DO RIGHT?

Yes – we’re talking a memetic virgin emperor here. Dovahhatty has some fun with Carinus “cucking” his officers with their wives and earning his fate at the hands of one of them.

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Dovahhatty – Unbiased History of Rome: Crisis of the Third Century

(4) TREBONIANUS GALLUS –
NON-DYNASTIC / CRISIS OF THE THIRD CENTURY
(251 – 253 AD: 2 YEARS 2 MONTHS)

The embodiment of the Crisis of the Third Century.

Honestly, I’m just impressed and surprised that this is the first emperor from the Crisis of the Third Century among my worst emperors, albeit as one of my special mentions you could arguably swap into the top ten worst emperors.

Indeed, for a period notorious for all the systemic problems of the empire – including those of imperial office – magnified to the point of the empire’s near collapse, as indicated by the very name historiographical convention has given it, it’s surprising how many capable emperors it did have, albeit more leading it out of the crisis than going in. I ranked Aurelian in third place in my top ten best emperors – but I also awarded special mention to Gallienus, Claudius Gothicus, Tacitus, Probus and Carus.

Yes – it certainly did have its bad emperors and we’re coming to them, but mostly they didn’t last long before being assassinated or killed by their successors, which is perhaps the archetypal defining trait of the period.

However, Trebonius Gallus stands out, both for the length of his reign as longer than most imperial claimants in this period, and that he embodied impotent and supine inactivity at a time of crisis. Well, not literally impotent, since he had a son whom he made co-emperor (but was killed by soldiers at the same time as his father, hence no Gallan dynasty) – but impotent in terms of doing anything useful.

As per Youtuber Spectrum – “Here’s a tip if you’re the emperor during the Crisis of the Third Century. Don’t be completely useless. Actually respond to barbarian invasions. And please mind the debasement of the currency. Do anything, at all. Anything. Please. Just don’t be a useless NEET”.

And by debasement of the currency, I mean gutting it to make it almost completely useless, reducing it to less than a hundredth of its silver content.

He may even have been worse than useless, betraying his predecessor Decius for the latter to be defeated by invading Goths, at least according to contemporary rumors supported by the historian Dexippus. It’s probably not true but I prefer to believe it.

DID DOVAHHATTY DO RIGHT?

Classic virgin depiction.

I also like Dovahhatty borrowing from Captain America – “No, I don’t think I will” – as the caption in answer to Decius pleading for reinforcements. Indeed, Dovahhatty gives him some of the funniest captions, including the one I use as general feature image for these special mentions – “I. DON’T. CAAARE!”

Needless to say, Dovahhatty subscribes to the treason theory. Treason doesn’t pay as the Gothic leader Cniva demanded more tribute – “which of course Gallus couldn’t pay, that was the point, so he used this to invade the empire again”

RANKING: 1 STAR*
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Dovahhatty – Unbiased History of Rome XIII: The Severan Dynasty

(3) GETA –
SEVERAN DYNASTY
(211 AD: 10 MONTHS AND 15/22 DAYS)

Caracalla lite – as bad as his older brother, just not as good at being bad. Hence one of my special mention entries you could arguably swap into the ten worst emperors, similar to that other bad brother Constantine II.

The younger of two brothers who hated each other even before they became co-emperors upon their father’s death – technically Geta was emperor from 209, as Caracalla was from 198, but both were junior or subordinate emperors to their father, Septimus Severus, the first time the empire was ruled by multiple emperors.

That extended to dividing the palace between them, each with guards to prevent assassination by the other, and literally only meeting in the presence of their mother in attempts to mediate their rivalry. Roman historian Herodian asserted that their rivalry even extended to plans to split the empire between them in two halves (foreshadowing the empires’ subsequent division into eastern and western halves) but their mother sensibly quashed those plans.

Caracalla was more ruthless and hence got the jump on Geta, assassinating the latter under pretext of a ‘peace meeting’ in their mother’s quarters to deprive Geta of his guards, with Geta dying in her arms.

There’s not much more to say – as Spectrum pointed out, Geta ranks somewhat above Caracalla because history was spared Geta inflicting himself on it too long. “Apparently he (Geta) was just like him (Caracalla) and therefore terrible both as a person and as a ruler. He comes out as the better one just because he didn’t live as long so…yay?”

As usual, Gibbon summed it up best – “In the anguish of a disappointed father, Severus foretold that the weaker of his sons would fall a sacrifice to the stronger; who, in his turn, would be ruined by his own vices.”

DID DOVAHHATTY DO RIGHT?

The chad Caracalla vs the virgin Geta – yeah, pretty much, except for Caracalla, who was worse.

I have to admit that Geta features in one of Dovahhatty’s funniest distortions of history – that Caracalla did not conspire the assassination of his brother but just some random guard that was so bored by their mother’s speech for them just to get along.

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Dovahhatty – Unbiased History of Rome XIII: The Severan Dynasty

(2) DIDIUS JULIANUS –
NON-DYNASTIC / YEAR OF THE FIVE EMPERORS
(193 AD: 2 MONTHS 4 DAYS)

Did…did you just buy the Roman empire, dude?

Yes – it’s the emperor who bought his position when the Praetorian Guard infamously auctioned it off after assassinating his predecessor Pertinax, thereby becoming the worst of the imperial claimants in the so-called Year of the Five Emperors (as well as a special mention that could arguably be swapped into the top ten worst emperors) and throwing the position of emperor itself into disrepute. “His blatant purchase of the throne shattered any illusions of normalcy in the Roman Empire”.

Which worked out as well as you’d expect for him, which is to say not at all, as three rival generals – you know, men with armies rather than money – laid claim to the imperial throne, with Septimus Severus winning out.

Of course, with such a brief ill-gotten reign, he had no lasting accomplishment or effect except one and even that sucked – devaluing the currency, reversing the reforms of Pertinax, such that he literally and figuratively debased the empire. You’d think he’d be smarter about money since that was the only quality that literally bought him the throne.

Historian Cassius Dio had him exclaim just prior to being killed by a soldier – “But what evil have I done? Whom have I killed?”

DID DOVAHHATTY DO RIGHT?

Dovahhatty answered those questions best. Firstly, listening to his wife, nagging him into buying the empire. (Dovahhatty captions her “Go and buy the empire! I’ve already bought our imperial regalia”). Secondly, by consequence himself.

RATING: 1 STAR*
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