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Source: Roman Emperors - Theodosius

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Titre	Roman Emperors - Theodosius

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Emperor Flavius Theodosius "the Great" of Rome I RE04

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Copyright (C) 1998, David Woods. This file may be copied on the condition that the entire contents, including the header and this copyright notice, remain intact. list of secondary sources and notes is extensive, click on link to view in full

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Origin and Early Career Flavius Theodosius was born at Cauca in Spain in about 346 to Thermantia and Theodosius the Elder (so-called to distinguish him from his son).[[1]] Theodosius the Elder was a senior military officer serving in the Western empire and rose to become the magister equitum praesentalis under the emperor Valentinian I from late 368 until his execution in early 375.[[2]] As the son of a soldier, Theodosius was legally obliged to enter upon a military career. He seems to have served under his father during his expedition to Britain in 367/8, and was the dux Moesiae Primae by late 374.[[3]] Unfortunately, great controversy surrounds the rest of his career until Gratian had him hailed as his imperial colleague in succession to the emperor Valens at Sirmium on 19 January 379.[[4]] It is clear that he was forced to retire home to Spain only to be recalled to active service shortly thereafter, but the circumstances of his forced retirement are shrouded in mystery.[[5]] His father was executed at roughly the same time,and much speculation has centred on the relationship between these events. A general consensus seems to have emerged, however, that the future emperor was forced into retirement shortly after the execution of his father at Carthage in Africa during the winter of 375/6.[[6]] The same court faction which had engineered the death of his father managed to persuade Valentinian to dismiss him also, or so the consensus goes. This interpretation of events is incorrect, however, not least because it places far too much trust in a number of unreliable sources.[[7]] The answer to the mystery surrounding Theodosius' forced retirement lies in Ammianus' description of a severe defeat which Sarmatian raiders inflicted upon Roman forces in the province of Valeria in late 374 when they almost annihilated a legio Moesiaca, i.e. a legion from Moesia, and a legio Pannonica, i.e. a legion from Pannonia.[[8]] These legions had been sent to intercept a party of Sarmatians who had been pursuing a senior Roman officer named Aequitius deep into Roman territory, and would undoubtedly have triumphed had they acted together. But they failed to co-operate, and their quarrelling allowed the Sarmatians to catch them unprepared, defeating the legion from Moesia first, then the legion from Pannonia. Valentinian's reaction to this defeat can best be judged from his reaction to an earlier defeat which the Alamanni had managed to inflict on his forces in Gaul during the spring of 365.[[9]] He sought out those who had been the first to turn and run before the enemy and blamed them for the subsequent defeat. He ordered the unit in question - the Batavi - to be stripped of their weapons and sold into slavery, and it took the whole army to persuade him to relent. In this instance, the first of the two units to break and run had been the legion from Moesia. Hence Valentinian would have held their commanding officer responsible for the wider defeat, and, as the dux Moesiae Primae, Theodosius was the officer ultimately responsible for this unit. Hence Valentinian dismissed Theodosius and sent him home to Cauca in Spain in the same manner, and for the same reason, that the emperor Constantius II had dismissed Valentinian himself in 357, or the magister equitum per Gallias Marcellus in the same year.[[10]] He had found him guilty of cowardice. The best explanation for the death of Theodosius the Elder is that he had tried to intervene on behalf of his son, and Valentinian had had him executed as a result, most probably during the early new year of 375.[[11]] His son regained his commission within the army only following the death of Valentinian himself on 17 November 375. He seems to have obtained a position similar to that which he had originally held at his dismissal, that of dux Valeriae perhaps. He campaigned against the Sarmatians again in376, during which he was promoted as the magister militum per Illyricum.[[12]] He remained as magister militum per Illyricum from 376 until 19 January 379 when the western emperor Gratian appointed him to succeed his eastern colleague Valens who had beenkilled at the Battle of Adrianople on 9 August 378. The fact that Gratian chose him as his new colleague does not necessarily mean that he enjoyed a particularly good reputation as the best general of his day. Gratian had effectively been forced to choose him since he seems to have been the most senior officer of Roman birth available to him at the time.[[13]] Foreign Policy The problem confronting Theodosius immediately upon his accession was how to check the Goths and their allies who were continuing to ravage the Balkans.[[14]] One difficulty was that they had spread beyond the diocese of Thrace into the dioceses of Macedonia and Dacia in the prefecture of Illyricum, which had traditionally belonged to the western empire. The result was that Gratian surrendered the three dioceses of the prefecture of Illyricum to the temporary control of Theodosius for the duration of the Gothic crisis, while he himself returned to Trier in Gaul.[[15]] The date of this transfer is disputed, but it seems to have come into formal effect at the beginning of the new tax year on 1 September 379 and may be presumed to have ended on 31 August 382. This left Theodosius in control of the entire theatre of operations. Theodosius left Sirmium, the site of his accession, for Thessalonica in Macedonia which remained his base for the campaign seasons of 379 and 380. Gratian had transferred some of his own officers and men to Theodosius in order to assist him in his efforts to rebuild the eastern field-armies, which had been shattered at the Battle of Adrianople. These transfers included his comes domesticorum Richomer, who became Theodosius' magister peditum praesentalis, a post which he retained until his death by illness in late 392.[[16]] We are poorly informed about the exact sequence of events during the Gothic war, but Theodosius' "general" Modares appears to have inflicted an important defeat upon the Goths somewhere in Thrace in 379.[[17]] Theodosius proved himself willing to recruit one group of barbarians into his army to use against the other groups who remained hostile, but this was a risky strategy. In order to reduce the risk, Theodosius transferred some of these fresh barbarian recruits to Egypt in return for some of the experienced Roman troops stationed there, during late 379 apparently.[[18]] Nevertheless, a large number of his new recruits appeared to have defected to the other side during the course of his campaign in 380, so that he suffered at least one serious reverse. He left Thessalonica and entered Constantinople for the first time on 24 November 380.[[19]] He was to remain in Constantinople, or its immediate vicinity, until late 387. During the winter of 380/1 he wrote to Gratian for his help against the Goths in Illyricum, and Gratian replied first by sending his "generals" Bauto and Arbogast against them, then by taking to the field himself.[[20]] They appear to have succeeded in driving the Goths and their allies from Illyricum and back into Thrace during 381. Theodosius, however, did enjoy a propaganda coup when the Gothic chieftain Athanaric surrendered to him at Constantinople on 11 January 381, although he died only two weeks later.[[21]] Theodosius finally reached a settlement with the remainder of the Gothson 3 October 382.[[22]] The exact terms of this settlement have not been preserved, but it is clear that the Goths were granted the right to settle large amounts of land along the Danube frontier in the diocese of Thrace and enjoyed an unusual degree of autonomy.[[23]] Many came to serve in the Roman army, but the terms of their service remain unclear. Many volunteered to serve on a full-time professional basis, while more were obliged to serve only for the duration of a specific campaign. The results were that the Goths who settled within the empire remained a constant threat to its internal stability. A substantial number of Gothic troops defected to the side of Magnus Maximus when Theodosius joined his forces with those of the young Valentinian II at Thessalonica in 387 in preparation for their joint campaign westwards against Maximus.[[24]] These hid in the rough country about Thessalonica until Theodosius managed to drive them back into Thrace during his return from the West in 391, where they remained a threat as late as 392 when they managed to kill the "general" Promotus.[[25]] One of their emerging leaders, Alaric, participated in Theodosius' campaign against Eugenius in 394, only to resume his rebellious behaviour against Theodosius' son and eastern successor, Arcadius, shortly thereafter. Nor did the external threat cease. The "general" Promotus won a notable victory for Theodosius in 386 when he defeated an attempt by Odotheus and his Greuthungian Goths to force their way across the Danube.[[26]] The East remained relatively quiet under Theodosius. The Saracens rejected their previous treaty of 377 with the Romans and resumed their raids once more along the frontier from Arabia to Syria in 383 apparently.[[27]] We do not know the reason for this revolt, but the magister peditum praesentalis Richomer appears to have crushed it in but one campaign that year. As a result, the Salihids replaced the Tanukhids as the dominant group among Rome's Saracen foederati. As for the Persians, Theodosius maintained good relations with a rapid succession of Persian kings during his reign. Armenia remained a potential source of conflict between the two powers until they reached agreement upon the division of this country in 387 when Theodosius sent his magister militum per Orientem Stilicho on an embassy to the Persian court.[[28]] In accordance with this agreement, the pro-Roman king Arsak retained possession of the western part of the country, while the pro-Persian king Khosro retained possession of the eastern part...

Origin and Early Career

Flavius Theodosius was born at Cauca in Spain in about 346 to Thermantia and Theodosius the Elder (so-called to distinguish him from his son).[[1]] Theodosius the Elder was a senior military officer serving in the Western empire and rose to become the magister equitum praesentalis under the emperor Valentinian I from late 368 until his execution in early 375.[[2]] As the son of a soldier, Theodosius was legally obliged to enter upon a military career. He seems to have served under his father during his expedition to Britain in 367/8, and was the dux Moesiae Primae by late 374.[[3]] Unfortunately, great controversy surrounds the rest of his career until Gratian had him hailed as his imperial colleague in succession to the emperor Valens at Sirmium on 19 January 379.[[4]] It is clear that he was forced to retire home to Spain only to be recalled to active service shortly thereafter, but the circumstances of his forced retirement are shrouded in mystery.[[5]] His father was executed at roughly the same time,and much speculation has centred on the relationship between these events. A general consensus seems to have emerged, however, that the future emperor was forced into retirement shortly after the execution of his father at Carthage in Africa during the winter of 375/6.[[6]] The same court faction which had engineered the death of his father managed to persuade Valentinian to dismiss him also, or so the consensus goes. This interpretation of events is incorrect, however, not least because it places far too much trust in a number of unreliable sources.[[7]]
The answer to the mystery surrounding Theodosius' forced retirement lies in Ammianus' description of a severe defeat which Sarmatian raiders inflicted upon Roman forces in the province of Valeria in late 374 when they almost annihilated a legio Moesiaca, i.e. a legion from Moesia, and a legio Pannonica, i.e. a legion from Pannonia.[[8]] These legions had been sent to intercept a party of Sarmatians who had been pursuing a senior Roman officer named Aequitius deep into Roman territory, and would undoubtedly have triumphed had they acted together. But they failed to co-operate, and their quarrelling allowed the Sarmatians to catch them unprepared, defeating the legion from Moesia first, then the legion from Pannonia. Valentinian's reaction to this defeat can best be judged from his reaction to an earlier defeat which the Alamanni had managed to inflict on his forces in Gaul during the spring of 365.[[9]] He sought out those who had been the first to turn and run before the enemy and blamed them for the subsequent defeat. He ordered the unit in question - the Batavi - to be stripped of their weapons and sold into slavery, and it took the whole army to persuade him to relent. In this instance, the first of the two units to break and run had been the legion from Moesia. Hence Valentinian would have held their commanding officer responsible for the wider defeat, and, as the dux Moesiae Primae, Theodosius was the officer ultimately responsible for this unit. Hence Valentinian dismissed Theodosius and sent him home to Cauca in Spain in the same manner, and for the same reason, that the emperor Constantius II had dismissed Valentinian himself in 357, or the magister equitum per Gallias Marcellus in the same year.[[10]] He had found him guilty of cowardice.

The best explanation for the death of Theodosius the Elder is that he had tried to intervene on behalf of his son, and Valentinian had had him executed as a result, most probably during the early new year of 375.[[11]] His son regained his commission within the army only following the death of Valentinian himself on 17 November 375. He seems to have obtained a position similar to that which he had originally held at his dismissal, that of dux Valeriae perhaps. He campaigned against the Sarmatians again in376, during which he was promoted as the magister militum per Illyricum.[[12]] He remained as magister militum per Illyricum from 376 until 19 January 379 when the western emperor Gratian appointed him to succeed his eastern colleague Valens who had beenkilled at the Battle of Adrianople on 9 August 378. The fact that Gratian chose him as his new colleague does not necessarily mean that he enjoyed a particularly good reputation as the best general of his day. Gratian had effectively been forced to choose him since he seems to have been the most senior officer of Roman birth available to him at the time.[[13]]

Foreign Policy

The problem confronting Theodosius immediately upon his accession was how to check the Goths and their allies who were continuing to ravage the Balkans.[[14]] One difficulty was that they had spread beyond the diocese of Thrace into the dioceses of Macedonia and Dacia in the prefecture of Illyricum, which had traditionally belonged to the western empire. The result was that Gratian surrendered the three dioceses of the prefecture of Illyricum to the temporary control of Theodosius for the duration of the Gothic crisis, while he himself returned to Trier in Gaul.[[15]] The date of this transfer is disputed, but it seems to have come into formal effect at the beginning of the new tax year on 1 September 379 and may be presumed to have ended on 31 August 382. This left Theodosius in control of the entire theatre of operations. Theodosius left Sirmium, the site of his accession, for Thessalonica in Macedonia which remained his base for the campaign seasons of 379 and 380. Gratian had transferred some of his own officers and men to Theodosius in order to assist him in his efforts to rebuild the eastern field-armies, which had been shattered at the Battle of Adrianople. These transfers included his comes domesticorum Richomer, who became Theodosius' magister peditum praesentalis, a post which he retained until his death by illness in late 392.[[16]]
We are poorly informed about the exact sequence of events during the Gothic war, but Theodosius' "general" Modares appears to have inflicted an important defeat upon the Goths somewhere in Thrace in 379.[[17]] Theodosius proved himself willing to recruit one group of barbarians into his army to use against the other groups who remained hostile, but this was a risky strategy. In order to reduce the risk, Theodosius transferred some of these fresh barbarian recruits to Egypt in return for some of the experienced Roman troops stationed there, during late 379 apparently.[[18]] Nevertheless, a large number of his new recruits appeared to have defected to the other side during the course of his campaign in 380, so that he suffered at least one serious reverse. He left Thessalonica and entered Constantinople for the first time on 24 November 380.[[19]] He was to remain in Constantinople, or its immediate vicinity, until late 387. During the winter of 380/1 he wrote to Gratian for his help against the Goths in Illyricum, and Gratian replied first by sending his "generals" Bauto and Arbogast against them, then by taking to the field himself.[[20]] They appear to have succeeded in driving the Goths and their allies from Illyricum and back into Thrace during 381. Theodosius, however, did enjoy a propaganda coup when the Gothic chieftain Athanaric surrendered to him at Constantinople on 11 January 381, although he died only two weeks later.[[21]] Theodosius finally reached a settlement with the remainder of the Gothson 3 October 382.[[22]] The exact terms of this settlement have not been preserved, but it is clear that the Goths were granted the right to settle large amounts of land along the Danube frontier in the diocese of Thrace and enjoyed an unusual degree of autonomy.[[23]] Many came to serve in the Roman army, but the terms of their service remain unclear. Many volunteered to serve on a full-time professional basis, while more were obliged to serve only for the duration of a specific campaign. The results were that the Goths who settled within the empire remained a constant threat to its internal stability. A substantial number of Gothic troops defected to the side of Magnus Maximus when Theodosius joined his forces with those of the young Valentinian II at Thessalonica in 387 in preparation for their joint campaign westwards against Maximus.[[24]] These hid in the rough country about Thessalonica until Theodosius managed to drive them back into Thrace during his return from the West in 391, where they remained a threat as late as 392 when they managed to kill the "general" Promotus.[[25]] One of their emerging leaders, Alaric, participated in Theodosius' campaign against Eugenius in 394, only to resume his rebellious behaviour against Theodosius' son and eastern successor, Arcadius, shortly thereafter. Nor did the external threat cease. The "general" Promotus won a notable victory for Theodosius in 386 when he defeated an attempt by Odotheus and his Greuthungian Goths to force their way across the Danube.[[26]]

The East remained relatively quiet under Theodosius. The Saracens rejected their previous treaty of 377 with the Romans and resumed their raids once more along the frontier from Arabia to Syria in 383 apparently.[[27]] We do not know the reason for this revolt, but the magister peditum praesentalis Richomer appears to have crushed it in but one campaign that year. As a result, the Salihids replaced the Tanukhids as the dominant group among Rome's Saracen foederati. As for the Persians, Theodosius maintained good relations with a rapid succession of Persian kings during his reign. Armenia remained a potential source of conflict between the two powers until they reached agreement upon the division of this country in 387 when Theodosius sent his magister militum per Orientem Stilicho on an embassy to the Persian court.[[28]] In accordance with this agreement, the pro-Roman king Arsak retained possession of the western part of the country, while the pro-Persian king Khosro retained possession of the eastern part...