Chapter VI: Septimius Severus, Caracalla, Macrinus, Elagabalus and Alexander Severus; and taxation
Read it here, here and here.
1) Good quotes
The juicy bits are all from the reign of Elagabalus:In a magnificent temple raised on the Palatine Mount, the sacrifices of the god of Elagabalus were celebrated with every circumstance of cost and solemnity. The richest wines, the most extraordinary victims, and the rarest aromatics, were profusely consumed on his altar. Around the altar a chorus of Syrian damsels performed their lascivious dances to the sound of barbarian music, whilst the gravest personages of the state and army, clothed in long Phoenician tunics, officiated in the meanest functions, with affected zeal and secret indignation.
I dunno, it sounds rather fun to me. (When I read this passage out to my wife, she sensibly asked, "If their indignation was secret, how do we know about it?") 59 A dancer was made præfect of the city, a charioteer præfect of the watch, a barber præfect of the provisions. These three ministers, with many inferior officers, were all recommended, enormitate membrorum.
That is, because they had very large penises; but we don't write that bit in English, Mr Gibbon.
More seriously, though, we have a sober reflection on colonialism then and now: Spain, by a very singular fatality, was the Peru and Mexico of the old world. The discovery of the rich western continent by the Phoenicians, and the oppression of the simple natives, who were compelled to labour in their own mines for the benefit of strangers, form an exact type of the more recent history of Spanish America.
and the concluding section on taxation is nicely topped and tailed: The personal characters of the emperors, their victories, laws, follies, and fortunes, can interest us no farther than as they are connected with the general history of the Decline and Fall of the monarchy. Our constant attention to that great object will not suffer us to overlook a most important edict of Antoninus Caracalla, which communicated to all the free inhabitants of the empire the name and privileges of Roman citizens. His unbounded liberality flowed not, however, from the sentiments of a generous mind; it was the sordid result of avarice...
...The rougher trade of arms was abandoned to the peasants and barbarians of the frontiers, who knew no country but their camp, no science but that of war, no civil laws, and scarcely those of military discipline. With bloody hands, savage manners, and desperate resolutions, they sometimes guarded, but much oftener subverted, the throne of the emperors.
treize64 pointed out in a comment last week that Gibbon is rather interested in parenting skills or the lack thereof, and these two passages about Caracalla's parents struck me: Distracted with the care, not of acquiring, but of preserving an empire, oppressed with age and infirmities, careless of fame, and satiated with power, all his [Septimius Severus'] prospects of life were closed. The desire of perpetuating the greatness of his family was the only remaining wish of his ambition and paternal tenderness.
The empress Julia had experienced all the vicissitudes of fortune. From an humble station she had been raised to greatness, only to taste the superior bitterness of an exalted rank. She was doomed to weep over the death of one of her sons, and over the life of the other.
2) Summary
This is the longest chapter so far (34 pages in my edition), with lots of exciting narrative and a final analytical passage that is more absorbing than Gibbon sometimes manages. Septimius Severus' reign is passed over rather rapidly apart from his keenness for astrology and killing the Scots. (More on both below.) He leaves to empire to his sons, Caracalla and Geta, but the former kills the latter. Caracalla lasts six years but is killed by Macrinus in an army coup while in Syria, his mother's homeland; Caracalla's aunt mounts a counter-coup a year later and gets her teenage grandsons Elagabalus and then (after Elagabulus' dissolute reign is brought to the usual violent end) Alexander Severus into power. The narrative ends with a very positive portrait of Alexander. The last fifth of the chapter is a lucid survey of the Roman Empire's tax base, as an explanation for Caracalla's granting of citizenship to all non-slaves in the empire (a point made less clearly back in Chapter II).
3) Questions arising
Astrology: Many years ago I read Frederick H. Cramer's Astrology in Roman Law and Politics, a slightly gossipy but rather fascinating account of astrology in Rome and the Empire up to about this period. Astrology plays a big role in this chapter, both in the origin of Caracalla's parents' marriage: Like most of the Africans, Severus was passionately addicted to the vain studies of magic and divination, deeply versed in the interpretation of dreams and omens, and perfectly acquainted with the science of judicial astrology; which, in almost every age, except the present, has maintained its dominion over the mind of man... as soon as he had discovered that a young lady of Emesa in Syria had a royal nativity he solicited, and obtained her hand.
...and also in bringing about Caracalla's death: Malice or fanaticism had suggested to an African, deeply skilled in the knowledge of futurity, a very dangerous prediction, that Macrinus and his son were destined to reign over the empire.
I find the geography of all this rather interesting. One point that struck me very forcefully from Cramer's book, and that has lingered with me for the last, oh, fifteen years I suppose, is the heavy concentration of astrologers in the small kingdom of Commagene. The neighbouring city of Harran/Carrhae, the site of Caracalla's assassination, had a local moon-worshipping cult which survived as the Sabian star-worshippers into the early days of the Islamic period and supplied the astrological talent for the early period of the Abbasid Caliphate. Emesa (now Homs), with its sun-worshipping cult venerating a conical meteorite, is not much more than 300 km from Harran (which is now just over the border into Turkey, south of Şanlıurfa). There's clearly something in the local environment generating an interest in matters astrological in the area.
By contrast I'm a bit mystified by the astrological credentials of the Africans. Certainly the intellectual side of astrology flourished in Alexandria in particular and in Egypt in general, but Septimius Severus (for sure) and Macrinus' unnamed adviser (by implication) came from farther west. (I am right, aren't I, in thinking that 'Africa' in this context means the province and not the continent?)
gender and sex: There are a lot of women in this chapter, but they are all related to each other and (though this point is not stressed) all sun-worshippers from Emesa. Gibbon thinks women ruling is against nature: In every age and country, the wiser, or at least the stronger, of the two sexes, has usurped the powers of the state, and confined the other to the cares and pleasures of domestic life. In hereditary monarchies, however, and especially in those of modern Europe, the gallant spirit of chivalry, and the law of succession, have accustomed us to allow a singular exception; and a woman is often acknowledged the absolute sovereign of a great kingdom, in which she would be deemed incapable of exercising the smallest employment; civil or military. But as the Roman emperors were still considered as the generals and magistrates of the republic, their wives and mothers, although distinguished by the name of Augusta, were never associated to their personal honours; and a female reign would have appeared an inexpiable prodigy in the eyes of those primitive Romans, who married without love, or loved without delicacy and respect.
Yet in fact he has rather good words for the rule of the empire effectively by Mamæa in the name of her son Alexander.
Once again, the double standard applies. "[I]f we may credit the scandal of ancient history, chastity was very far from being the most conspicuous virtue of the empress Julia." Also it's OK for Elagabalus to have sex with lots of women, but his exploits with men are clearly considered disgusting.
the army: That's all incidental, of course. The key point in this chapter is that the army has become overpaid and overpowerful. The tax base, as carefully explained in the final analytical section, is barely adequate to cover the costs of keeping the soldiers happy, and the constitutional forms of election and accountability of the emperor through the ancient institutions of Rome have been eclipsed by the question of who has the loyalty of the legions. For the last few chapters, Gibbon has been blaming the emperors starting with Commodus for allowing this state of affairs to arise and continue, and his evidence here is compelling. It is ironic that the one interesting constitutional innovation is made by the second worst of these five emperors, Caracalla.
sources (and Scotland): There is some fun in the footnotes as Gibbon challenges other scholars, and the Augustan History. My favourite one though is his gentle puncturing of Ossian: 16That the Caracul of Ossian is the Caracalla of the Roman history, is, perhaps, the only point of British antiquity in which Mr. Macpherson and Mr. Whitaker are of the same opinion; and yet the opinion is not without difficulty. In the Caledonian war, the son of Severus was known only by the appellation of Antoninus; and it may seem strange that the Highland bard should describe him by a nickname, invented four years afterwards, scarcely used by the Romans till after the death of that emperor, and seldom employed by the most ancient historians.
Macpherson is of course the forger of the Ossian poems. I know little of Whitaker, but interestingly his correspondence with Gibbon about Ossian and also the Decline and Fall is online here. He accuses Gibbon, in the politest possible way, of not knowing much about ancient Britain.
an odd omission: it seems a bit strange that in a chapter about Caracalla there is no mention of The One Thing We Know about him.
4) Coming next
Chapter VII: Maximin, Maximus, Balbinus, the three Gordians and Philip the Arab. Read it here, here or here.
1) Good quotes
The juicy bits are all from the reign of Elagabalus:In a magnificent temple raised on the Palatine Mount, the sacrifices of the god of Elagabalus were celebrated with every circumstance of cost and solemnity. The richest wines, the most extraordinary victims, and the rarest aromatics, were profusely consumed on his altar. Around the altar a chorus of Syrian damsels performed their lascivious dances to the sound of barbarian music, whilst the gravest personages of the state and army, clothed in long Phoenician tunics, officiated in the meanest functions, with affected zeal and secret indignation.
I dunno, it sounds rather fun to me. (When I read this passage out to my wife, she sensibly asked, "If their indignation was secret, how do we know about it?") 59 A dancer was made præfect of the city, a charioteer præfect of the watch, a barber præfect of the provisions. These three ministers, with many inferior officers, were all recommended, enormitate membrorum.
That is, because they had very large penises; but we don't write that bit in English, Mr Gibbon.
More seriously, though, we have a sober reflection on colonialism then and now: Spain, by a very singular fatality, was the Peru and Mexico of the old world. The discovery of the rich western continent by the Phoenicians, and the oppression of the simple natives, who were compelled to labour in their own mines for the benefit of strangers, form an exact type of the more recent history of Spanish America.
and the concluding section on taxation is nicely topped and tailed: The personal characters of the emperors, their victories, laws, follies, and fortunes, can interest us no farther than as they are connected with the general history of the Decline and Fall of the monarchy. Our constant attention to that great object will not suffer us to overlook a most important edict of Antoninus Caracalla, which communicated to all the free inhabitants of the empire the name and privileges of Roman citizens. His unbounded liberality flowed not, however, from the sentiments of a generous mind; it was the sordid result of avarice...
...The rougher trade of arms was abandoned to the peasants and barbarians of the frontiers, who knew no country but their camp, no science but that of war, no civil laws, and scarcely those of military discipline. With bloody hands, savage manners, and desperate resolutions, they sometimes guarded, but much oftener subverted, the throne of the emperors.
treize64 pointed out in a comment last week that Gibbon is rather interested in parenting skills or the lack thereof, and these two passages about Caracalla's parents struck me: Distracted with the care, not of acquiring, but of preserving an empire, oppressed with age and infirmities, careless of fame, and satiated with power, all his [Septimius Severus'] prospects of life were closed. The desire of perpetuating the greatness of his family was the only remaining wish of his ambition and paternal tenderness.
The empress Julia had experienced all the vicissitudes of fortune. From an humble station she had been raised to greatness, only to taste the superior bitterness of an exalted rank. She was doomed to weep over the death of one of her sons, and over the life of the other.
2) Summary
This is the longest chapter so far (34 pages in my edition), with lots of exciting narrative and a final analytical passage that is more absorbing than Gibbon sometimes manages. Septimius Severus' reign is passed over rather rapidly apart from his keenness for astrology and killing the Scots. (More on both below.) He leaves to empire to his sons, Caracalla and Geta, but the former kills the latter. Caracalla lasts six years but is killed by Macrinus in an army coup while in Syria, his mother's homeland; Caracalla's aunt mounts a counter-coup a year later and gets her teenage grandsons Elagabalus and then (after Elagabulus' dissolute reign is brought to the usual violent end) Alexander Severus into power. The narrative ends with a very positive portrait of Alexander. The last fifth of the chapter is a lucid survey of the Roman Empire's tax base, as an explanation for Caracalla's granting of citizenship to all non-slaves in the empire (a point made less clearly back in Chapter II).
3) Questions arising
Astrology: Many years ago I read Frederick H. Cramer's Astrology in Roman Law and Politics, a slightly gossipy but rather fascinating account of astrology in Rome and the Empire up to about this period. Astrology plays a big role in this chapter, both in the origin of Caracalla's parents' marriage: Like most of the Africans, Severus was passionately addicted to the vain studies of magic and divination, deeply versed in the interpretation of dreams and omens, and perfectly acquainted with the science of judicial astrology; which, in almost every age, except the present, has maintained its dominion over the mind of man... as soon as he had discovered that a young lady of Emesa in Syria had a royal nativity he solicited, and obtained her hand.
...and also in bringing about Caracalla's death: Malice or fanaticism had suggested to an African, deeply skilled in the knowledge of futurity, a very dangerous prediction, that Macrinus and his son were destined to reign over the empire.
I find the geography of all this rather interesting. One point that struck me very forcefully from Cramer's book, and that has lingered with me for the last, oh, fifteen years I suppose, is the heavy concentration of astrologers in the small kingdom of Commagene. The neighbouring city of Harran/Carrhae, the site of Caracalla's assassination, had a local moon-worshipping cult which survived as the Sabian star-worshippers into the early days of the Islamic period and supplied the astrological talent for the early period of the Abbasid Caliphate. Emesa (now Homs), with its sun-worshipping cult venerating a conical meteorite, is not much more than 300 km from Harran (which is now just over the border into Turkey, south of Şanlıurfa). There's clearly something in the local environment generating an interest in matters astrological in the area.
By contrast I'm a bit mystified by the astrological credentials of the Africans. Certainly the intellectual side of astrology flourished in Alexandria in particular and in Egypt in general, but Septimius Severus (for sure) and Macrinus' unnamed adviser (by implication) came from farther west. (I am right, aren't I, in thinking that 'Africa' in this context means the province and not the continent?)
gender and sex: There are a lot of women in this chapter, but they are all related to each other and (though this point is not stressed) all sun-worshippers from Emesa. Gibbon thinks women ruling is against nature: In every age and country, the wiser, or at least the stronger, of the two sexes, has usurped the powers of the state, and confined the other to the cares and pleasures of domestic life. In hereditary monarchies, however, and especially in those of modern Europe, the gallant spirit of chivalry, and the law of succession, have accustomed us to allow a singular exception; and a woman is often acknowledged the absolute sovereign of a great kingdom, in which she would be deemed incapable of exercising the smallest employment; civil or military. But as the Roman emperors were still considered as the generals and magistrates of the republic, their wives and mothers, although distinguished by the name of Augusta, were never associated to their personal honours; and a female reign would have appeared an inexpiable prodigy in the eyes of those primitive Romans, who married without love, or loved without delicacy and respect.
Yet in fact he has rather good words for the rule of the empire effectively by Mamæa in the name of her son Alexander.
Once again, the double standard applies. "[I]f we may credit the scandal of ancient history, chastity was very far from being the most conspicuous virtue of the empress Julia." Also it's OK for Elagabalus to have sex with lots of women, but his exploits with men are clearly considered disgusting.
the army: That's all incidental, of course. The key point in this chapter is that the army has become overpaid and overpowerful. The tax base, as carefully explained in the final analytical section, is barely adequate to cover the costs of keeping the soldiers happy, and the constitutional forms of election and accountability of the emperor through the ancient institutions of Rome have been eclipsed by the question of who has the loyalty of the legions. For the last few chapters, Gibbon has been blaming the emperors starting with Commodus for allowing this state of affairs to arise and continue, and his evidence here is compelling. It is ironic that the one interesting constitutional innovation is made by the second worst of these five emperors, Caracalla.
sources (and Scotland): There is some fun in the footnotes as Gibbon challenges other scholars, and the Augustan History. My favourite one though is his gentle puncturing of Ossian: 16That the Caracul of Ossian is the Caracalla of the Roman history, is, perhaps, the only point of British antiquity in which Mr. Macpherson and Mr. Whitaker are of the same opinion; and yet the opinion is not without difficulty. In the Caledonian war, the son of Severus was known only by the appellation of Antoninus; and it may seem strange that the Highland bard should describe him by a nickname, invented four years afterwards, scarcely used by the Romans till after the death of that emperor, and seldom employed by the most ancient historians.
Macpherson is of course the forger of the Ossian poems. I know little of Whitaker, but interestingly his correspondence with Gibbon about Ossian and also the Decline and Fall is online here. He accuses Gibbon, in the politest possible way, of not knowing much about ancient Britain.
an odd omission: it seems a bit strange that in a chapter about Caracalla there is no mention of The One Thing We Know about him.
4) Coming next
Chapter VII: Maximin, Maximus, Balbinus, the three Gordians and Philip the Arab. Read it here, here or here.