Aurelian And The Third Century (Roman Imperial ...
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A second and longer-term natural disaster that took place during the third century was the increased variability of weather. Drier summers meant less agricultural productivity and more extreme weather events led to agricultural instability. This could also have contributed to the increased barbarian pressure on Roman borders, as they too would have experienced the detrimental effects of climate change and sought to push inward to more productive regions of the Mediterranean.[30]
This resulted in runaway rises in prices, and by the time Diocletian came to power, the old coinage of the Roman Empire had nearly collapsed. Some taxes were collected in kind and values often were notional, in bullion or bronze coinage. Real values continued to be figured in gold coinage, but the silver coin, the denarius, used for 300 years, was gone (1 pound of gold = 40 gold aurei = 1,000 denarii = 4,000 sestertii).[citation needed] This currency had almost no value by the end of the third century, and trade was carried out without retail coinage.
All the barracks emperors based their power on the military and on the soldiers of the field armies, not on the Praetorians in Rome. Thus, Rome lost its role as the political center of the empire during the third century, although it remained ideologically important. In order to legitimize and secure their rule, the emperors of the third century needed above all military successes.[44]
The problems for Alexander mounted in the years that followed. In a crisis that presaged the turbulences of the third century, violence erupted in the east. The rise of the Sassanids in Persia, led by Ardashir, meant that Rome was facing a severe threat to its eastern frontier once more.
Although the crisis of the third century is typically presented as a period of pronounced political instability, it is notable that Valerian and Gallienus respectively reigned for a considerable amount of time.
The emperor fought the pretender. However, the power vacuum left in the Germanic region encouraged an invasion by tribes across the limes, spreading terror across the western European provinces. The invaders even reached as far as southern Spain, where they sacked the city of Tarraco (modern Tarrangona). The pattern had been set for the coming years. This was to be the most turbulent period of the crisis of the third century.
Traditional narratives frame the reign of Aurelian as a turning point in the crisis of the third century; his victories in the east and west, his reunification of the empire, and his fortification of his capital testify to the reassertion of Roman power. However, there is little in the reigns of his immediate successors, Tacitus (a fan, not a descendant, of the first century historian) and Florianus, that the empire was on the route to definitive recovery. Indeed, the hapless Florianus appears to have been emperor for less than 100 days!
They settled on a junior officer, Diocles, whose background is largely unknown. Acclaimed in AD 284, Diocles took a new name: Marcus Aurelius Gaius Valerius Diocletianus. Carinus himself would be betrayed to Diocletian. The empire returned to the control of one man. Diocletian, however, had no interest in suffering the same fate as many of his predecessors and ushered in a period of profound change. With Diocletian the curtain was brought down on the crisis of the third century, and imperial history passed from the Principate to the Dominate.
Throughout the third century, the Roman Empire reaches from present-day Spain, through Northern Africa, across Asia Minor, and touches the edge of Saudi Arabia. The religious life of third-century was compiled of cults and their interactions with other cults. There was an emphasis on individuality and personal practices of piety.
The emperor also tried to restore confidence in the imperial monetary system. The Roman silver coin was massively debased during the third century. Under Augustus, the coin contained 98% silver, during the reign of Septimius Severus 50%, and when Aurelian came to power, the coin contained a mere 1.5%. To fight rampant inflation, Aurelian aimed to mint the coin with up to 5% guaranteed silver.
The Aurelian wall both surrounds Rome and has come to dominate thecity's critical fortunes with its looming height that captures theimagination of scholars and travelers alike. As a late antiqueintervention, the wall (begun in 271 CE) organized the city's interioras much as it circumscribed the city's borders according to HendrikDey in his book, The Aurelian Wall and the Refashioning of ImperialRome, AD 271-855. Dividing the interior of Rome (in urbe)from the peripheral areas (foris murum) significantlytransformed the trajectories along which people and all theirprovisions moved: the wall featured sixteen major gates built in thethird century CE with several major adjustments prior to the end ofthe ninth century which rarely sealed off the city and more frequentlyshaped the city's post-classical growth. As Dey tell the story, thewall did not rise as a fortress anticipating Rome's retrenchment fromthe world. On the contrary, Dey articulates that building the wallinitially from 271-282 CE and subsequently from 401-403 CE indicatemammoth ambitions in both campaigns that effectively revitalizedRome's building industry and the city itself. Thus, Dey's book joinsa growing shelf of recent books by authors who are uncomfortable withthe narrative that the ancient capital lapsed into decrepitude as aconsequence of military vulnerability. Dey presents evidence thatinner-city Rome was rebuilt (such as after the devastating fire whenCarinus was emperor in 283) while authorities implemented new systemsof food distributions due to the reorganized urban administration thatAurelian set up. Thanks to Dey's research, it is now clear that thewall was not a calcified shell containing Rome's inhabitants, but adynamic agent that allowed authorities to entertain, feed, govern,protect, tax, and transport Romans as well as their neighbors andguests.
This is a major story and one that one that Dey correctly recognizedas worthy of attention to reverse the near oblivion into whichscholarship on the ever-present Aurelian wall had fallen. The firstchapter summarizes the story of the wall, building upon the importantcontributions of Lucos Cozza and Robert Coates-Stephens; Dey offers aclear outline of when the circuit measuring nearly 19 kilometers inlength was built of brick-faced concrete. Under Aurelian the wall wasconstructed up to an initial eight-meter height and then doubled instature during the reign of emperor Honorius from 401-403. Inaddition, Dey recounts that the inconsistent brickwork, clearly addedafter the campaign of Aurelian, points toward a series of fourth-century interventions. Yet Dey argues that there was no significantelevation of the walls during the reign of Maxentius (306-312), aspreviously had been believed. Further significant repairs can betraced to the fifth-century initiatives of imperial authoritiesfollowed by restoration campaigns under the Ostrogothic King and laterby the Byzantine emperor's strengthening of the circuit in the sixthcentury. After the seventh century, responsibility for the upkeep ofthe wall fell to the popes with the final major extension of theenceinte attributed to Pope Leo IV (847-855).
The second chapter addresses who built the wall: it was an imperialinitiative, according to Dey. In the late third century CE, theauthor argues, the director of Rome's public works (curator operumpublicorum) oversaw all of the practical aspects of constructionat the behest of the emperor, in this case Aurelian. Inscriptionsrecording repairs to the wall credit the fourth- and fifth-centurycampaigns to those serving as Rome's urban prefect (praefectusurbi), a position appointed by the emperor who also functioned asthe leader of the senate. Even under emperor Honorius, when the walldramatically increased in height, the senatorial office of the urbanprefect clearly oversaw the construction bureaucracy. During the latethird and early fourth centuries, Aurelian instigated and Constantineimplemented reforms to Rome's corporations (collegia), makingtheir labor obligatory. By the middle of the fifth century, thecollegia had diminished on account of the burdens of theircompulsory service, leading subsequently to more haphazard repairsundertaken by less professionally skilled citizens. Aurelianreorganized both construction workers and those in the food industryin a way that opens up a fascinating link between the two endeavors,since the emperor increased the grain and oil dole in addition tointroducing subsidized provisions of pork and wine for those livinginside the walls. Dey sheds light upon the Aurelian wall shaping thewider transportation network by charting how tracts of land beyond thewalls were designated as vineyards for the subsidized wine providedinside the city, with the proceeds funding construction projects. Thewall, implicitly, divided those country folk who produced food anddrink from the urban residents who consumed it.
The reason for constructing the wall is the topic of the thirdchapter, which Dey subtly defines as going far beyond the practicaland obviously clear purposes of defending Rome. Aurelian's new wallplaced the imperial bureaucracy firmly in charge of the work force andfurther provided mechanisms for the emperors to control thearistocratic estates situated immediately within the city's confines.Additionally, the imperial coffers were augmented by the customscollections that the wall facilitated so as to fund the fooddistributions. Yet, after Aurelian's reign, the emperors rarelyresided in Rome and they appointed local senators to officesadministering all facets of the building industry and plausibly theoversight of food distribution as well. Dey's reading of Rome's lateantique circuit as a sign of imperial authority at times feelsslightly exaggerated in that the argument relies on ancient historianswithout according proper consideration to the senatorial inscriptions,such as that of the senator Longinianus mentioning repairs to the wallin 401. It is clear that Aurelian pioneered the wall to strengthenhis own position as emperor and that his political motives help toexplain how the beautification of the wall made it as impressive as itwas defensive. Fifth-century embellishments such as crosses and star-burst patterns added under emperor Honorius in the early fifth centuryadvance Dey's claim that under this Christian ruler the wall became anapproximation of the heavenly Jerusalem as described in the Apocalypseof John. Yet earthly Rome was a physical entity while the celestialcity was an ideal. The reading that Honorius' gifted court poetClaudian ascribes explicitly to the wall, revealing the victoriousmessages that redounded to the young emperor as he marchedtriumphantly into Rome in 404, provides more eloquent testimony to theearly fifth-century ornament in the wall than the oblique allusions tothe celestial Jerusalem. 59ce067264
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