In a climate of almost paranoid suspicion, one of the easiest ways for an individual to prove his loyalty was to inform on another. This proof often brought promotion or other favours from a grateful emperor. Additional incentive was provided because such informers were usually rewarded with a share of the condemned man's property. Many wholly innocent men were attacked in this way and the vast majority were executed, for it was extremely difficult to disprove allegations, while evidence was easily fabricated. Ammianus felt that Constantius was too ready to mistrust people, but he was even more sickened by the willingness of officers and officials to turn on their colleagues - or indeed anyone they felt was vulnerable to an accusation. He tells of one frequent informer who was nicknamed `the count of dreams' because of his skill in twisting innocent stories of dreams told over the dinner table into aspirations for imperial power. Another was called Paul `the chain' because the evidence he invented would surround innocent men and always proved impossible to escape. Serving in the imperial bureaucracy had become very dangerous and this obviously did not promote efficiency.'°
Ammianus mentions by name many of the prominent victims of these purges. In 353 he was attached to the staff of the commander of the field forces in the east, the Master of Soldiers Ursicinus. Under suspicion after the fall of Gallus, in part because of the action of his sons, the general was put in charge of courts prosecuting others implicated in the recent disturbances. It was an unusual job for a senior soldier, and his behaviour was clearly monitored to assess his own loyalty to Constantius. Such tribunals condemned many unnamed and less prominent people - the relatives of the more powerful, as well as officers and officials whose careers they had advanced through their patronage. Investigations and arrests were made throughout Britain, Gaul and Spain in the aftermath of Magnentius' revolt. It is only because we have Ammianus' account that we become aware of this ripple effect, as punishments reached out to claim many more individuals than simply the leaders in civil wars and usurpations. This process is normally invisible in the skimpy sources for so many other internal struggles, but needs always to be kept in mind.T'
Even the briefest of challenges for imperial power caused considerable upheaval, creating a climate of nervousness that filtered a long way down the hierarchies of the army and administration. Men had to choose sides, trying to guess who would win. Even if they remained loyal to the eventual victor, they could not be sure that their innocence would protect them. Ambitious officials grew powerful through accusing others, sometimes out of personal enmity, but also just because they felt that they could get away with it. At the top, the emperor was suspicious that his most powerful subordinates wanted to supplant him - usurpation and civil war remained facts of life. Added to which, the growth in bureaucracy and the grand ceremonies of court life made it harder for him to know what was going on.
The climate of the times is well illustrated by the fate of Silvanus, the officer who had defected from Magnentius during the civil war. When the conflict was over, Constantius rewarded him with the post of commander of the army in Gaul. Silvanus was a Frank, whose father had fought with distinction for Constantine. He was one of many army officers of Germanic descent in the army at this time. A chieftain of the Alamanni had been prominent in Constantine's proclamation as emperor at York in 306. Many of these men adopted Roman names, all had been granted citizenship and social status commensurate with their rank, and were in every important cultural respect Roman. Silvanus was a Christian - something still rare amongst the Franks living outside the empire - and his loyalty was clearly to the empire, even if his earlier defection made it less clear to which specific emperor.'2
Early on in his command Silvanus gave letters of recommendation to an imperial official operating in the area. It was entirely normal to request such things from those with power in a region, but the man in question had a more sinister motive. He carefully erased the ink carrying the main text of the letters, leaving only the general's signature on each page. Then new letters were written, addressed to a range of senior officers, administrators and other prominent men, hinting at plans for rebellion against Constantius. These were passed on to fellow conspirators, including Praetorian Prefect Lampadius, and several other high-ranking officials. The prefect, whose role gave him access to the emperor outside the restrictions of court ceremony, privately handed these to Constantius.
The emperor immediately ordered the arrest of the men named in the letters. However, some officers - many of them also of Frankish descent and including Malarichus, the commander of one of the guard regiments - staunchly protested Silvanus' innocence. Constantius relented a little, but did not agree to their proposal to send one of their number to bring Silvanus to the court in Milan so that he could explain himself. Instead, he listened to Silvanus' predecessor in the Gallic command, who had no love for his replacement, and selected another emissary. This man went to Gaul, but made no effort to meet or contact Silvanus. Instead he joined up with a local official and started treating anyone vaguely associated with the general as an already convicted rebel. In the meantime the conspirators sent another forged letter, incriminating both Silvanus and Malarichus. It was worded in such a way that the recipient - the man in charge of the arms factory at Cremona in northern Italy - was left baffled, and sent back asking for an explanation.
Malarichus took this to the emperor and loudly proclaimed that a conspiracy was underway. Constantius ordered an investigation that spotted the imprint of the original text and so exposed the letters as forgeries. Lampadius was arrested, but still had enough influential friends to secure his release. One of his fellow conspirators was examined under torture, but he, too, was subsequently released and none of the others were punished at all. The man who had made the forgeries in the first place was soon afterwards promoted to be corrector governing one of the regions of Italy.
Although Silvanus had been cleared of any wrongdoing, the slow pace of communications meant that he did not know it. His friends at court had informed him of the accusations and the forged letters, while the behaviour of the emperor's messenger suggested that he had already been condemned without any chance of defending himself. At one point he considered fleeing beyond the frontiers to seek refuge amongst the Franks. Yet another Frankish officer serving in the army persuaded him against this, saying that the tribesmen would either kill him or happily take payment to hand him back to the Romans. The Franks were not a nation, but many loosely connected tribes and clans.
Silvanus had never planned to claim the throne. In the summer of 355 he paid his troops in the name of Constantius, making a speech praising the emperor and urging them to be steadfast in their loyalty. As Ammianus points out, `if he sought the insignia of imperial power, he would have given out this largesse in his own name'. Yet he felt trapped, found guilty without a hearing. Faced with what seemed inevitable execution, Silvanus decided that his only hope of survival was to make a bid for the throne. Perhaps he could supplant Constantius, or at least negotiate from a position of strength for acceptance as co-ruler. Four days after the pay parade - the date was probably ii August - he was hailed as emperor by his army at Cologne. It was a hastily organised, makeshift ceremony, with the new emperor wearing a cloak of imperial purple made from small flags taken off several army standards and sewn together.13
Constantius was stunned when the news of the usurpation reached Milan. At the court was Ursicinus, still under a degree of suspicion, and it was decided to send him to deal with Silvanus. He did not go with an army, but a few officers and ten of his personal staff, including Ammianus himself. His instructions were to deal with the usurper covertly, but the historian later wrote that they felt like `beast-fighters thrown down amongst savage animals'. They hastened to Cologne, carrying a friendly letter from Constantius, in which he pretended not to know of Silvanus' elevation. He was to hand over his command to Ursicinus and return with all honours to Milan.14
When the party reached Cologne and saw considerable forces gathered wi
th every sign of local support for the usurper, Ursicinus decided instead to present himself as a sympathiser and prostrated himself before Silvanus in the appropriate manner. He was welcomed as a valuable ally, the whole thing made plausible since he, too, had fallen under Constantius' unjustified suspicion. As Silvanus resisted the calls of his men to march on Italy - it was just a few weeks since his proclamation so he may not have been ready, but he may simply have been reluctant to escalate the conflict - the new arrivals secretly went to work. Having discovered that a pair of army units were lukewarm in their support for the usurper, substantial bribes were paid over to persuade them to turn on Silvanus. At dawn a party of these soldiers burst into the palace, cutting down any sentries in their path. Then:
Silvanus was dragged out of chapel, where he had in terror taken refuge on his way to a Christian service, and was cut to ribbons by their swords. And thus died a general of considerable merit, who had resorted to the most desperate measures to save himself for fear of the calumnies in which he was ensnared during his absence by a faction of enemies.15
The usual purge of the dead man's relatives and associates followed, Paul `the chain' playing a prominent role in `discovering' information that led to many being executed. Ammianus mentions five victims by name, as well as `many others.' Even Ursicinus was for a while under suspicion of misappropriating funds.'6
Silvanus' reign had lasted just twenty-eight days. His murder avoided a civil war, which would inevitably have been far more costly in lives than the executions that did occur in its aftermath. Yet it is important not to measure the costs of usurpations solely in terms of casualties and physical damage. Each emphasised just how precarious a career in the imperial service was. One of the most striking features of this episode is the willingness with which senior Roman officials arranged the disgrace and death of colleagues for their own personal advantage. Another is the difficulty that Constantius had in knowing what was going on in his empire. If anything, the massive increase in bureaucracy kept an emperor less well informed than he had been in the first and second centuries. None of this made for the efficient running of the empire.'7
Yet good government was not the highest priority for emperors - survival was. Throughout his career, Constantius was always willing to execute, murder or fight a civil war against anyone who challenged his grip on imperial power. The emperors of the Principate had likewise often shown themselves to be utterly ruthless. Ammianus compared the plight of Ursicinus in 354 to that of Corbulo, a distinguished general instructed to commit suicide by Nero. In the first century both Augustus and Vespasian, two men generally treated in our sources as amongst the best emperors, won power in the first place through civil war. Yet the difference was still considerable. Usurpations were not as common in the fourth century as they had been in the third, but they were still frequent. Emperors were harder to murder because of the greater security at court, but the danger of someone winning over a large part of the army remained very real.
No emperor was ever wholly secure. The complex bureaucracy and divided hierarchy, with strict division between military and civil power and complex relations within each one, gave some protection. It was harder for a man to mount a successful challenge. Yet it was not impossible, and if he managed to build up wide support in the different branches of the army and administration then the challenge was likely to be a dangerous one. Emperors were understandably nervous and mistrustful, and their attitude inevitably filtered downwards. Their subordinates knew that they could at any time fall under suspicion. A career could end abruptly in torture and death, or could flourish, quite possibly through the demise of others. Violent competition underlay all levels of government, especially the highest ranks. There was also a degree of ambivalence. For most career soldiers and civil servants, it did not really matter who the emperor was. All that was important was to win his favour and avoid his mistrust. Whoever the emperor was, he would always need his subordinates. Army and bureaucracy survived each usurpation, even if many of the individuals within them became casualties.
Yet, for all the suspicion and paranoia of imperial government, fourthcentury emperors lived lives of splendour. Surrounded by ceremony, everything about them was supposed to be blatantly lavish and spectacular. Emperors were special, chosen of God and above the rest of humanity. This was always emphasised, even for men who had just recently proclaimed themselves as rulers. Ursicinus was only behaving as he was expected to do when he prostrated himself before Silvanus. Merely possessing enough purple material to fashion an imperial cloak led some men to their executions.
In reality emperors were always insecure, but in public they were presented as overwhelmingly superior and utterly certain of their rule. This is conveyed well in Ammianus' account of Constantius' entry into Rome in 357. Although not formally holding a triumph, the grand procession of troops suggested just that. Constantius was surrounded by standards and rank on rank of troops, including cataphracts in gleaming armour that even included silvered masks for their faces, so that they seemed `polished statues and not men'. The emperor
And so being acclaimed as Augustus by enthusiastic voices, while the hills and shores echoed the roar, even so he remained utterly still, staying as unmoved as when he was seen in the provinces. And although he leaned a little forward when going under huge gates (even though he was a short man), he stared fixedly ahead, just as if his neck was held in a vice, and glanced neither to the right nor left; he did not even sway when the wheel jolted on a rock, and was never seen to spit, or touch his nose or cheek, or move his hands at all."
11
Enemies
`Shall I now proceed to recall, as though they were something new or previously unheard of, the reconquest, by your valour, of the Gallic province, the subjection of the whole barbarian race, when these triumphs have, in this part of the Roman Empire, been hailed as most deserving of glory by the laudatory voice of popular acclaim, to such an extent as to merit the envy of your cousin the Emperor?' - Speech of thanks to Emperor Julian by Claudius Mamertinus, delivered z January 362.'
or all the magnificent ceremonial of the imperial court, no emperor was ever free from the fear of usurpation. It was a very personal and immediate threat, for challengers obviously did not want to destroy the empire, simply to possess it. Being killed by a rival remained the most frequent cause of death for emperors. Successful usurpers needed the support of a substantial section of the army. Emperors could try to monitor the loyalty of senior officers, giving important commands only to the most loyal. They also continued to make soldiers take an oath of personal allegiance, and to remind them of their loyalty with parades and donatives on significant imperial festivals throughout the year. Yet, inevitably, they remained distant figures to the overwhelming majority of their troops and most of their officers.
The risk that his army might turn against him was something an emperor had to live with. Emperors could not dispense with the army, or even reduce its size substantially and so hope to reduce its power. In the first place, any serious reduction would have created large numbers of unemployed officers as well as demobilised troops. At the least this was likely to increase banditry within the provinces - when Septimius Severus had dismissed the praetorians there was a rapid increase in levels of armed robbery in Italy. More probably it would have created an immediate power base for a usurper who promised to reinstate them.'
Yet the main reason the army could not be reduced was simply because it was necessary. None of Rome's foreign enemies threatened its existence. The tribal peoples were disunited - mostly they raided, and at the very worst might nibble away and occupy small areas of land in the frontier zones. The Persians were both more united and more sophisticated militarily, but even they could not hope to do more than win back some of the territory lost to the Romans. Foreign wars were not life and death struggles, at least as far as the Romans were concerned, but they were frequent. Rome had many enemies living alongside its vast frontiers. Just because none of them
individually posed an overwhelming threat to the empire did not mean that they posed no threat at all. Violent crime does not threaten the existence of modern democracies, but in turn that does not mean that it can simply be ignored, even if governments and voters seem resigned to its frequency in some areas. For the Romans, raiding across the frontiers needed to be kept at a level the government could accept. Warfare also played a central role in imperial ideology. Winning victories over foreign opponents was the ultimate proof of an emperor's capacity to rule, any success receiving a prominent place in their propaganda. The desire for glory certainly inspired successive emperors to launch frontier campaigns.
A `New Model'Army
As we have seen, Diocletian and Constantine presided over a major restructuring of the army, alongside their reform of civil administration. Troops were now divided into two distinct grades, the comitatenses and limitanei. The latter received less pay and had lower physical requirements, but were still full-time professional soldiers. The root of the name was the word for military road (limes), although there is some dispute as to the precise significance of this. The limitanei were also sometimes called riparienses, which came from ripa (the banks of a river). They were stationed in provinces, usually in frontier areas, and were commanded by duces. Their role was to patrol and police the area around their garrisons and deal with relatively small-scale attacks, such as raiding bands numbering a few dozen or at most a couple of hundred warriors. One study has noted that we never hear of raiding bands of less than 400 men and suggested that smaller groups were routinely stopped by the limitanei.3
How Rome Fell: Death of a Superpower Page 25
