Ravenna

Capital of Empire, Crucible of Europe

Judith Herrin

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN: 9780691204222, 9780691153438
• eBook ISBN: 9780691201979
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: European Medieval History
• Index: History

A riveting history of the city that led the West out of the ruins of the Roman Empire

At the end of the fourth century, as the power of Rome faded and Constantinople became the seat of empire, a new capital city was rising in the West. Here, in Ravenna on the coast of Italy, Arian Goths and Catholic Romans competed to produce an unrivaled concentration of buildings and astonishing mosaics. For three centuries, the city attracted scholars, lawyers, craftsmen, and religious luminaries, becoming a true cultural and political capital. Bringing this extraordinary history marvelously to life, Judith Herrin rewrites the history of East and West in the Mediterranean world before the rise of Islam and shows how, thanks to Byzantine influence, Ravenna played a crucial role in the development of medieval Christendom.

Drawing on deep, original research, Herrin tells the personal stories of Ravenna while setting them in a sweeping synthesis of Mediterranean and Christian history. She narrates the lives of the Empress Galla Placidia and the Gothic king Theoderic and describes the achievements of an amazing cosmographer and a doctor who revived Greek medical knowledge in Italy, demolishing the idea that the West just descended into the medieval "Dark Ages."

Beautifully illustrated and drawing on the latest archaeological findings, this monumental book provides a bold new interpretation of Ravenna's lasting influence on the culture of Europe and the West.

1

The emergence of Ravenna as the imperial capital of the West

In the centuries before Rome adopted Christianity as its official religion, the Eternal City served as a symbol of world domination imposed by vigorous military leaders and efficient civilian administrators. Within its vast fortifications, along its famous streets, among its magnificent public buildings, emperors proclaimed their victories over distant foreign rulers in triumphal processions, statues and inscriptions. The Roman Senate commemorated those displays of power and the Roman populace joined in the celebrations, an essential element of the imperial policy of ‘bread and circuses’. The imperial court, based in the great palace on the Palatine hill, processed appeals for judgment, military reports, tax returns and news from the frontiers, while priests attached to the temples ensured divine support for the empire through their sacrifices and prayers. It was to Rome that ambitious young men and women, talented poets, sculptors, merchants, mercenaries and entertainers, came to seek the patronage of Roman aristocrats and to make their fortunes. The city was the centre of the known world and all roads led to Rome.

Yet during the third century rulers no longer resided there permanently. An increasing number of emperors from military backgrounds based themselves in other, more strategically significant cities, and wherever the emperor went the court and part of the administration had to accompany him. In the ancient capital the Senate continued to appoint a prefect to govern the city and had responsibility for providing grain supplies for the urban population. On 1 January every year it bestowed the highest honour of the consulship on two individuals, nominated by the emperor, who gave their names to the year and thus established a dating system. The consuls were also expected to finance extravagant popular entertainment in the form of horse and chariot races, wild beast fights and displays of dancers, mimes and acrobats. While the Senate remained the power base of aristocratic families who had traditionally provided well-educated sons to govern the provinces, command the armies and protect the legal system, the shift away from Rome as the sole centre of empire created a novel style of imperial rule: a more direct attention to frontier security, increased military efficiency and supplies to combat hostile attacks. The reign of Diocletian (284–305) marked a distinct break, with changes that inaugurated a new era. During this period Ravenna emerged from its insignificant beginnings to become an imperial capital.

The Reforms of Diocletian

Diocletian was a military leader from Dalmatia who was acclaimed emperor by his troops in 284 and set out to reverse the economic and political decline characterized by modern historians as ‘the crisis of the third century’.¹ He began by reinforcing the empire’s northern borders, threatened by Sarmatian and Germanic forces, and reorganizing its administration. In a dramatic shift, in 286 he moved the imperial court from Rome to Milan, and appointed a military colleague, Maximian, as his co-emperor with authority to rule in the western half of the empire. Diocletian made his own capital in Nicomedia (modern-day I˙zmit in north-western Turkey), a city from which he could protect the empire from the threat of Persian invasion more effectively. This initial division of imperial authority was followed in 293 by the appointment of two junior emperors, called caesars, who would inherit full power after a fixed period. In this way, Diocletian tried to introduce a system for orderly succession that would prevent the wars frequently generated by rival claimants to the imperial title.

While the two emperors constructed palaces and administrative buildings in their new capital cities, Nicomedia and Milan, the two caesars set up their courts in bases closer to the borders: Antioch in northern Syria and Trier in the West. Other centres, such as Serdica (modern Sofia in Bulgaria) and Thessalonike (in Greece) were also used, producing new ‘imperial’ capitals that symbolized the extension and consolidation of Roman power far from Italy. From Milan major routes to central Europe and the East, and to transalpine Europe, the North and West, established a more northerly communication system that partly replaced the centrality of Rome. Between 337 and 402 emperors from Constantius II to Honorius made Milan their preferred residence, and courtiers and imperial officials constructed elegant villas there for themselves.²

Diocletian’s rule of four, the ‘tetrarchy’, designed to exert stronger control over frontiers very distant from Rome, was accompanied by drastic reforms to imperial government. Civilian administration was separated from military and was overhauled to increase the efficiency of tax collection. Fortifications, factories (for weapons as well as uniforms) and roads were built, while taxation in the form of food supplies for local armies was introduced, all designed to assist military success. Many provinces were divided into smaller units, which acquired a distinct hierarchy of officials under a governor and a salaried judge. As part of this process, in 297 Ravenna became the capital of the province of Flaminia, the coastal section of north-east Italy.

Today, Diocletian is generally remembered for his persecution of the Christians from 303 to 311, and his attempt to standardize prices by the Price Edict of 301. Neither policy succeeded and both were reversed by his eventual successor Constantine. His vast palace at Split marks a megalomaniac ambition that included the adoption of Persian regalia, such as wearing a crown and specifically imperial costume, and ceremonial that required visitors to bow low before his throne.³ Although he and his co-emperor Maximian retired in 305 as planned, the peaceful transfer of power proved elusive. Military forces often refused to accept the designated caesar and instead promoted their own commanders as emperor. Constantine I was one of those, acclaimed by his troops at York in 306. He fought his way across the length and breadth of the Roman world, eliminating all rivals, to become sole emperor in 324.

The Innovations of Constantine I

In 330 Constantine inaugurated a new capital city in the eastern half of the Roman Empire, giving it his own name, Constantinople, the city of Constantine, and a Christian identity. By the late fourth century it became known as the ruling city (basileuousa) or queen of cities, basilis ton poleon, also basilissa polis. In recognition of the Christian faith, Constantine also endowed large, prominently sited churches in major cities; ordered bishops to convene in councils over which he presided; and issued Christian regulations that were incorporated into imperial law. The emperor granted toleration to the Christians and stabilized prices by minting a reliable gold currency. Evidence of his building activity remains in Trier, which had developed into a magnificently fortified centre that protected the Rhine frontier of the empire for over a century, until 395. There he built the massive basilica, baths and palace decorated with frescoes, now painstakingly restored. In his new capital on the Bosporus, he established a New Rome, a name that both imitated and challenged its predecessor. Although the ancient aristocratic families who formed the Senate remained in charge of Old Rome’s civic routines, republican traditions and polytheistic cults, their power was gradually weakened by Constantine’s creation of an eastern senate in his new capital.

The extent of Constantine’s adoption of the faith is much disputed. While Christian authors followed Eusebius in insisting on his conversion prior to the battle of the Milvian bridge outside Rome in 312, Constantine continued to promote an emperor cult in association with specific pagan gods. Nonetheless, one year later, in a decree known as the Edict of Milan, Christianity was accorded the same privileges as other cults, provided that all its followers prayed to their god for the well-being and triumph of the Roman empire, as every other group was obliged to do. Although the Christians constituted a minority and were by no means united, the emperor’s patronage promoted their dominance, which was celebrated at the council that took place at Nicaea in 325. The emperor summoned all the bishops of the Roman empire and instructed them to determine a definition of Christian belief – the creed – and to resolve problems of clerical discipline. The meeting identified the doctrines elaborated by Arius, a deacon of the church of Alexandria, as unorthodox and heretical. It was later commemorated as the first Universal (Oecumenical) Council, its definition became the Nicene Creed and its supporters can be identified as Catholic Christians.

Constantine abolished the Praetorian Guard of Rome for opposing him at the Milvian bridge, and built several major churches in the city; he donated a large basilica, which became the Lateran palace, to its bishop, while his mother, Empress Helena, supervised similar building in Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Rome.⁴ On his deathbed Constantine requested baptism from the bishop of Nicomedia and was the first Roman emperor to be given a fully Christian burial, in a sarcophagus in the mausoleum he had constructed for himself and his family, a rotunda attached to the church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople.⁵ After his death in 337 his sons fought each other to succeed to his position as sole emperor, but gradually a de facto division of the empire developed by which the senior emperor, who resided in Constantinople, normally appointed a junior colleague to rule in the West.⁶

In the course of the fourth century, the two halves of the Roman world gradually became less balanced. Under Constantine’s dynasty the new capital of Constantinople increased in prestige as Rome waned; the transalpine western provinces remained poorer than the East, where power was more effectively exercised. On the death of Emperor Julian in 363, army officers took charge of the imperial position. One year later Valentinian, a general from Pannonia in the western Balkans, was acclaimed by the leading military and civilian officials, and he promoted his younger brother Valens as co-emperor. Both new leaders were obliged to deal with military threats, which took Valentinian to Trier and, later, Milan, while Valens settled in Antioch to deal with the Persians. Both were Christians, though Valens favoured the Arians.

The Theology of Arius

Despite the creation in 325 of the Nicene Creed to be recited at every church service, Constantine failed to settle the debate over Arianism. Some Christians thought that the insistence on one god (monotheism), which gave their faith such a different character from the cults of the ancient gods and goddesses (polytheism), was compromised by belief in the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Some insisted that it was improper for the Father not to take precedence over the Son, as fathers naturally created their sons. In the early fourth century, Arius had developed this objection to the equality of the three forms of God in a detailed theological argument that influenced much later thinking. His definition was countered by the Catholic assertion that all three members of the Trinity shared the same substance, essence and nature that predated the birth of Jesus, the son of God, as recounted in the Gospel stories. The Arians contended that the Son could only be of similar nature to the Father (in Greek homoios, hence the name Homoian attached to this theology). In spite of Arius’ condemnation in 325, Constantine’s successors observed this Homoian theology as orthodox and used missionaries to spread it among Germanic tribes. The Arians succeeded in founding a rival church that won the loyalty of fourth-century emperors and set their own ‘orthodox’, or ‘catholic’, definitions of correct belief, against those of their Catholic opponents, who claimed exactly the same terms.⁷

In Constantinople the Arian clergy drew considerable support from military commanders of Germanic and Gothic origin. The Goths had been converted to Arian Christianity as the official ‘orthodox’ faith, and their founding bishop, Ulfila (341–81), had devised a written alphabet for his people and then translated the Bible and liturgical texts into Gothic so that they could worship in their own language. In conjunction with the support of Constantius II (337–61) and Valens (364–78), Arianism extended to the West, notably to Milan, then capital of the western half of the Roman empire. The city’s Christian population was divided into two rival factions, supporters of Arius and opponents who remained loyal to the ruling of the Council of Nicaea. In 355 a local synod held in Milan imposed the pro-Arian view and appointed Auxentius, a disciple of Ulfila from the East, as bishop.⁸ Despite many attempts to unseat him, he remained in control of Milan for twenty years sustaining the doctrines of Arius, which continued to generate violent clashes as recorded by Ambrose, Catholic bishop of Milan (374–97).

In contrast, Arianism made less impact in Rome, still dominated by a largely pagan Senate. The Christian community, led by bishops who traced their line back to St Peter, had emerged very gradually from the city’s profoundly embedded polytheistic cults with their impressive temples on the Capitol, where imperial sacrifices were made, and throughout the Forum where the Vestal Virgins sustained the sacred flame at the hearth of Vesta. Emperors very rarely went to Rome; the ceremonial visit of Constantius II in 357 was exceptional and was not repeated until Theodosius I made the same journey over thirty years later.⁹ The fate of the empire, however, was being decided on distant borders far from the immediate concerns of the Roman Senate or the city’s bishop, by Germanic military forces that had embraced Arian Christianity.

A telling weakness of the entire Roman administration can be traced to the increasing numbers of non-Roman mercenaries in the army. Often recruited in Balkan regions and commanded by their own leaders, who were paid for each campaign in which they participated, some pursued their ambition to occupy imperial territory as federate allies of the emperor, others merely threatened to invade and destroy. As the influence of these auxiliary troops grew throughout the fourth century, they began to dominate the Roman army and spread their adherence to Arian Christianity.¹⁰ Their Germanic and Gothic generals gained senior military posts, deepened a serious division within the army, and promoted the rival form of Christian belief that was often shared by hostile groups beyond the empire’s frontiers. The reduction of imperial fighting power became clear at the disastrous battle of Adrianople in 378, when Gothic forces killed Emperor Valens together with many of his generals in an unprecedented and total rout.

The Achievements of Theodosius I (379–95)

As a result of this devastating defeat, the young western emperor, Gratian, had to call on Theodosius, a disgraced Roman general who had retired to Spain after his father’s execution, to save Constantinople from the Goths. Theodosius duly set out on the long journey from Spain to the East. His progress was interrupted by confrontations and then negotiations with the Goths over their determination to settle within the empire on the richer land south of the Danube. After battles with Sarmatians near Sirmium in the Balkans, Theodosius was acclaimed emperor by his victorious troops, and Gratian made his appointment official on 19 January 379 (Plate 1). Theodosius then settled a large number of Gothic families on imperial territory as federate forces, obliged to fight for the empire. His long reign constituted another major turning point in imperial history, marked by his successful campaigns against hostile forces, his promotion of Christianity as the official religion, and his decision to install his two sons as emperors, which marked the division of the East from the West.

In the history of Ravenna Theodosius is especially important as the father of Empress Galla Placidia, who ruled as regent in Ravenna from 425 for thirteen years. The emperor had married his wife Flaccilla in Spain and they had a son, Arcadius, born before 379, a daughter Pulcheria, who died young, and in 384 another son, Honorius. Theodosius also adopted his niece Serena, when her father died; he made her legally his daughter and married her to his leading general, Stilicho. After Empress Flaccilla died in 386, Theodosius negotiated a second marriage to Galla, a princess of the dynasty of Valens, which was celebrated in Thessalonike in 387. From this second marriage the only child that survived to adulthood was Galla Placidia, half-sister of the young princes Arcadius and Honorius.

Theodosius was not only a most pious Christian, strongly anti-heretic, but he also firmly opposed the polytheist cults and issued laws against their celebrations and sacrifices. Following the example of Constantine I he summoned another Universal Council of bishops to Constantinople in 381, where they repeated the condemnation of Arianism and agreed a slightly revised version of the Nicene Creed of 325. The council also issued several canons – ecclesiastical laws – including one that elevated Constantinople to a status equal to Rome.¹¹ Bishops of Rome considered this deeply insulting to St Peter (Petrus) the rock, petra, on which Christ had founded his church and which they claimed gave them superior authority. While the canon became a source of much rivalry between Old and New Rome, Theodosius had given legal standing to the emergent new civilization of early Christendom. Like Constantine, Theodosius campaigned througho...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of illustrations
• A note on spellings
• Maps
• Table of competing powers in Ravenna
• Introduction
• 1 The emergence of Ravenna as the imperial capital of the West
• PART ONE 390 – 450 Galla Placidia
• PART TWO 450 – 93 The Rise of the Bishops
• PART THREE 493– 540 Theoderic the Goth, Arian King of Ravenna
• PART FOUR 540 – 70 Justinian I and the campaigns in North Africa and Italy
• PART FIVE 568– 643 King Alboin and the Lombard conquest
• PART SIX 610 – 700 The expansion of Islam
• PART SEVEN 685– 725 The two reigns of Justinian II
• PART EIGHT 700 – 769 Ravenna returns to the margins
• PART NINE 756– 813 Charlemagne and Ravenna
• Conclusion: The glittering legacy of Ravenna
• Notes
• Acknowledgements
• Index