[lit-ideas] Re: Rome and the Barbarians
- From: Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: "lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2014 13:37:36 -0700 (PDT)
Odoacre had to apply to the Eastern empire in order to obtain some form of
legitimacy, and he was granted the title of patrician. One reason he could not
apply for the title of emperor was that Julius Nepos, who had been previously
named an emperor in the West by Eastern Roman Emperor Leo I (and was married to
Leo's niece) was still alive at the time.
O.K.
On Thursday, April 10, 2014 10:22 PM, "Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx" <Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx>
wrote:
Yes, the Barbarians, not the Barberinis!
In a message dated 4/10/2014 2:52:28 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
profdritchie@xxxxxxxxx writes:
"What an interesting piece, at least for someone whose period is not
Roman. I particularly liked the suggestion at the end that one reason there
are
so many theories is that there is so little evidence. I began work right
away on Ritchie's Law, an equation demonstrating the relationship between
volume of evidence V and number of theories N, when I realized that escaping
this law's embrace would be Theory (with a big T), that wadge of
scholarship which exists with its own particular relationship to evidence.
Would
Theory have to have its own equation or equations, possibly in some manner
akin to the relationship between Newtonian and Quantum equations? And then I
remembered Elizabeth Potter's recent book suggesting links among Boyle's
law and class and gender relations in the era in which it was created. What
might I be demonstrating about my own humble existence if I went through
with the project? Discouraged, I cast about for a more manageable task,
making for example small changes in the design of the Brompton bike, which was
invented by an un-related Ritchie who, it seems to me, may have folded a
Moulton."
For the record, below, extracts from the Italian HISTORIOGRAPHY (of the
so-called or alleged 'fall' of the Roman Empire -- I follow Brown in using
scare quotes).
Next: the Barberinis and the second sack of Rome, as per Pasquino? (*)
Cheers,
Speranza
---
(*) The famous pasquinata: "Non fecerunt barbari fecerunt Barberini" --
quello che non hanno fatto i barbari, hanno fatto i Barberini.
Heather's book was translated to the Italian, but I don't think complete
with subtitle -- with the PROVOCATIVE subtitle by Heather, I mean, which
explicitly makes a mention to the barbarians ("Aren't we all?").
I'll try to paraphrase each paragraph of Heather's complex theory as
historiographically examined by the It. Wikipedia at
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caduta_dell'Impero_romano_d'Occidente_(storiogr
afia)
"HEATHER, in contrasto con sostenitori della teoria della caduta
dell'Impero come una "trasformazione" senza rotture brusche, afferma in "La
caduta
dell'Impero romano: una nuova storia" che la causa prima della "caduta"
dell'Impero fu l'evento devastante delle invasioni barbariche."
--- which is what L. Helm was emphasizing. Indeed, the very phrase, ‘
barbarian invasion’ seems theory-laden. I would prefer to speak of migration
due, who knows, to over-population (those Germanics kept reproducing!)
The Italian wiki goes on:
“Heather afferma che Roma, per affrontare la minaccia sasanide, dovette
concentrare buona parte delle sue forze (il 40% dell'esercito romano
d'Oriente) sul limes orientale.”
I think the idea of ‘pars occidentalis’ and ‘pars orientalis’ is a good
cause. I mean, what’s the good of an empire which is going to have two
parts. Imagine if Victoria (the Queen) had allowed for Australasia to be part
of the Eastern British Empire! “Stuff and nonsense!” – she would typically
NOT be amused.
The Wikipedia goes on:
“Secondo la storiografia più diffusa tale riorganizzazione dello stato,
operata da Diocleziano e Costantino I nel tentativo di risolvere la crisi
persiana, portò a un declino generalizzato dell'economia”.
I.e. imperial bureaucracy meant economic decline. I can identify with that!
--- and this brought an increase in taxation.
“Heather smentisce queste tesi di un declino generalizzato dell'economia
rurale nel tardo impero sulla base di recenti studi archeologici”
This is interesting in that it mentions the EVIDENCE. For indeed, here,
for the historian, the issue is between THEORY and EVIDENCE.
For the philosopher of history (alla Montesquieu, or Hegel, or – Grice!)
it may be different!
Heather speaks of a “fiscalismo oppressivo del Tardo Impero” – an
oppressive fiscalism. Which reminds me of a Tea Party at Boston (I never say
“in”
Boston).
Of course one has to distinguish of the once and future Italy (and Roma,
the eternal city) and the Roman empire proper. The evidence Heather gathers
is extra-Italian, it seems. What is a fact, though is what the Wikipedia
refers to as
“a partire dal IV secolo, un declino nelle città” – of the cities,
including Rome.
A decline in the city of Rome – which I think is in the end, unless you
are a proud Roman, a good thing, since there is more to Italy than the
Colosseum!
What happened, and this I think is retained in the passage Ritchie was
referring to:
"i literati proprietari terrieri provinciali ora volsero la loro
attenzione a dov'era il denaro … passato dalle politiche provinciali e locali
alle
burocrazie imperiali."
So what about the ‘bararians’ that count, i.e. the Germans? (or
Germanic)? – since it was the Germanic people who held military office as more
or
less mercenary – fighting ‘for the glory of Rome’, yet holding an underlying
different idea of ‘nationality’ (or kinship).
“La crescita della prosperità dovuta ai contatti con l'Impero aveva
condotto a disparità di ricchezza sufficienti a creare una classe dominante in
grado di mantenere il controllo su molti più gruppi rispetto che in
precedenza, con il risultato che i "barbari" erano diventati una minaccia più
seria.”
The Germanic borderline tribes then were becoming ‘rich’ and developing a
royal elite.
If Ritchie mentions his law, so does Heather. He uses what he calls the
third principle of dynamics:
“L'estrema aggressività dello stato romano nei confronti dei "Germani"
abbia portato a una reazione uguale e opposta che abbia permesso ai Germani di
reagire alla supremazia romana riorganizzando la propria società in modo
da riuscire a liberarsi dalla dominazione romana, giungendo infine a
provocarne la caduta.”
The alleged ‘fall’ of the Romans then was a logical even physical effect
of their aggression towards the Germans which was soon enough reciprocated.
At this point Heather introduces the Huns and the "effetto domino".
It was the Huns who got the “Visigoti, Vandali, Alani, Svevi, Burgundi a
entrare all'interno dei confini dell'Impero.”
---- and recall that while the Romans cared to build a few walls in
Northern Britain, the Continent was less protected?
At this point Heather mentions the co-alition, if that’s the word, of
different Germanic tribes, which looked puzzling to me – In what used to be
Roman Britannia, after all, the Angles were fighting against the Saxons and
the Jutes. So, it was not in their blood to co-operate, as they did, however,
to join forces against the Romans.
numerica rispetto agli invasori del V secolo, stimati intorno a
110.000-120.000 guerrieri.[30]
But it would be simplistic on Heather’s part to JUST blame the Barbarian
or Germanic movements.
“Inoltre le lotte all'interno dello stato romano per la conquista del
potere imperiale tra i generali.”
I.e. there was an internal (or what I would call intestine or civil, even)
war, as it were, within the corridors of power within the “Roman state”
(whatever that was at the time), with one goal, according to Heather: the
conquest of Imperial power, and this was pursued among the warlords – where I
would read it to mean “Roman” generals, proper.
For Heather, the Barbarians, or Germans, were what Aristotle would call
the ‘efficient cause’, even alla Leibniz. Quoting from Heather, the
Wikipedia has:
“Senza i barbari, non ci sono prove del fatto che nel V secolo l'Impero
avrebbe comunque cessato di esistere.”
I.e. you can speak of the bureaucracy, and the rest of it, but “without
the Barbarians,” there are no proofs (again, note Heather’s emphasis on
matters of evidence rather than free theorising) of the ‘fact’ that the Empire
‘fell’, when the last emperor ‘abdicated’ – even if his life was spared,
he was giving a princely pension, and his ‘successor’ showed all the
respect he could, calling himself ‘rex Italiae’, king of Italy, all the Roman
institutions like the Senate – and stuff. He even learned proper Italian!
The local Roman (ethnically Roman, as it were) army could not, according
to Heather, cope with “dei foederati germanici”, the Germanic foederati –
there is no strict translation for this, but ‘federal’ comes to mind.
“provocando”, according to Heather, “la “caduta” finale dell'Impero e la
formazione dei regni romano-barbarici”, i.e. the formation of the kingdoms
(such as the kingdom of Italy, under Odoacre) which Heather labels ‘
Roman-barbarian’, but some prefer to label ‘Latin-German’ or Roman-Germanic’
(to avoid the hateful implicature of ‘barbarian’ especially vis-à-vis
theories that are built on the base of the VIRTUES these peoples brought to
the s
cene!
“Tuttavia Heather non ritiene che la "caduta" di Roma fosse per questi
rapporti di forze inevitabile ma, a suo parere, fu dovuta anche alla casualità
di vari avvenimenti che se avessero avuto esito diverso avrebbero potuto
ritardarla anche di molto.”
This point above I found of interest, and a cross-reference of
meta-history and philosophy of history. Surely there is no HISTORICAL
INEVITABILITY,
and I wonder what readership Heather is having in mind (not philosophers!).
On top of that, Heather enages in counter-factual reasoning that HAS been
criticized by philosophers of history (such as Danto?).
At this point, there is a mention of a battle loss. And this can be
generalized. In the standard historiography which is political, rather than
social, it is all about who wins what battle. And surely Heather can occupy a
few passages expanding on what battles the Romans could have won that would
NOT have led to the alleged ‘fall’ of the Empire.
(I prefer another trend in historiography: Odoacre could NOT have used the
title of ‘emperor’, because he was just a ‘patrician’ of the ‘pars
orientalis’ of the Empire. Hence he chose to call himself ‘rex’, king. Had he
maintained the title of emperor, the ‘fall’ would not have happened, and
Humpty Dumpty would still be sitting up on the wall!
At this point, Heather mentions the “fallimento della spedizione, dovuto
anche a sfortuna meteorological”, which reminds me of Cleopatra’s nose. I
mean, how are we to interpret historical change? My ultimate take is
INTENTIONAL, alla Grice, and Von Wright – history proceeds via the intentions
of
historical agents!
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