The History of the Medieval World: From the Conversion of Constantine to the First Crusade by Susan Wise Bauer
Authors: Susan Wise Bauer
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didn’t merely want to be emperor. He wanted to be a real emperor, a lawful emperor, and in order to have any chance to assert this, he had to align himself with the Christian church. Even while Ambrose preached that the church was separate from the power of the emperor, the emperors wielded the church as a weapon against each other.
As Maximus marched across the Alps towards Milan, Theodosius marched west with his own army—and Valentinian II and Justina fled from Italy into Pannonia, taking with them Valentinian’s sister Galla and leaving Milan open to Maximus and his armies. When Theodosius arrived in Pannonia, Justina offered to give Theodosius her daughter Galla if he would drive Maximus out. Theodosius accepted; Galla was reputedly very beautiful, but in addition the marriage related him, the rough ex-soldier from Hispania, to the Valentinian dynasty.
He then marched the rest of the way to Milan, sending ahead of him plenty of information about the size and lethal skill of his army. Possibly Maximus had not expected Theodosius to actually leave the eastern border and come all the way west. In any case, by the time Theodosius reached Milan, Maximus’s men were so thoroughly intimidated that his own soldiers took Maximus captive and handed him over. The war was resolved without a single battle. Theodosius executed Maximus, bringing an end to the reign of the first king of the Britons. He also sent an assassin, his trusted general Arbogast, to find Maximus’s son and heir. Arbogast found the young man in Trier and strangled him. 8
The whole invasion had worked out pretty well for Theodosius. He now had a whole new level of power over the west; he was Valentinian’s brother-in-law and deliverer, and he staged a triumphal procession to Rome in which he took center stage. He then departed, taking his beautiful young wife with him and leaving his general Arbogast (now back from strangling Maximus’s son) to be Valentinian’s new right-hand man.
Like Stilicho, Arbogast was of “barbarian” descent. His father was a Frank, and so although he could pursue a shining career in the army, he had no hope of ascending to the imperial throne. Theodosius’s most trusted aides tended to be half (or more) barbarian; they could not challenge their master for the crown. Arbogast was an experienced soldier by this time, and Valentinian II, accustomed to being dominated, was helpless against him. Arbogast took over the administration of the empire, reporting directly to Theodosius in the east, while Valentinian II sat in his imperial throne as little more than a figurehead.
In essence, Theodosius now had control over the entire empire, and he turned his attention again to the project of unification. On his return to Constantinople, he began to issue the Theodosian Decrees—a set of laws designed to bring the whole Roman realm into line with orthodox Christian practice. The first decree, issued in 389, was a strike at the very root of the relationship between the old Roman religion and the Roman state: Theodosius declared that the old Roman feast days, which had always been state holidays, would now be workdays instead. Official holidays then, as now, were ways of laying out the mythical foundations of a nation, of pointing citizens towards the high points of the past that helped to define the present. Theodosius was not just Christianizing the empire; he was beginning to rewrite its history.
In this he was slightly out of step with the mood of the west. Back in Rome, the senators had already applied three times to the imperial court in Milan, asking that the traditional Altar of Victory (removed by Gratian) be reinstalled in the Senate. The appeals had been led by Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, the prefect (chief administrative officer) of the city of Rome. He begged Valentinian to preserve the customs of the past: “We ask the restoration of that state of religion under which the Republic has so long prospered,” he wrote.
As Maximus marched across the Alps towards Milan, Theodosius marched west with his own army—and Valentinian II and Justina fled from Italy into Pannonia, taking with them Valentinian’s sister Galla and leaving Milan open to Maximus and his armies. When Theodosius arrived in Pannonia, Justina offered to give Theodosius her daughter Galla if he would drive Maximus out. Theodosius accepted; Galla was reputedly very beautiful, but in addition the marriage related him, the rough ex-soldier from Hispania, to the Valentinian dynasty.
He then marched the rest of the way to Milan, sending ahead of him plenty of information about the size and lethal skill of his army. Possibly Maximus had not expected Theodosius to actually leave the eastern border and come all the way west. In any case, by the time Theodosius reached Milan, Maximus’s men were so thoroughly intimidated that his own soldiers took Maximus captive and handed him over. The war was resolved without a single battle. Theodosius executed Maximus, bringing an end to the reign of the first king of the Britons. He also sent an assassin, his trusted general Arbogast, to find Maximus’s son and heir. Arbogast found the young man in Trier and strangled him. 8
The whole invasion had worked out pretty well for Theodosius. He now had a whole new level of power over the west; he was Valentinian’s brother-in-law and deliverer, and he staged a triumphal procession to Rome in which he took center stage. He then departed, taking his beautiful young wife with him and leaving his general Arbogast (now back from strangling Maximus’s son) to be Valentinian’s new right-hand man.
Like Stilicho, Arbogast was of “barbarian” descent. His father was a Frank, and so although he could pursue a shining career in the army, he had no hope of ascending to the imperial throne. Theodosius’s most trusted aides tended to be half (or more) barbarian; they could not challenge their master for the crown. Arbogast was an experienced soldier by this time, and Valentinian II, accustomed to being dominated, was helpless against him. Arbogast took over the administration of the empire, reporting directly to Theodosius in the east, while Valentinian II sat in his imperial throne as little more than a figurehead.
In essence, Theodosius now had control over the entire empire, and he turned his attention again to the project of unification. On his return to Constantinople, he began to issue the Theodosian Decrees—a set of laws designed to bring the whole Roman realm into line with orthodox Christian practice. The first decree, issued in 389, was a strike at the very root of the relationship between the old Roman religion and the Roman state: Theodosius declared that the old Roman feast days, which had always been state holidays, would now be workdays instead. Official holidays then, as now, were ways of laying out the mythical foundations of a nation, of pointing citizens towards the high points of the past that helped to define the present. Theodosius was not just Christianizing the empire; he was beginning to rewrite its history.
In this he was slightly out of step with the mood of the west. Back in Rome, the senators had already applied three times to the imperial court in Milan, asking that the traditional Altar of Victory (removed by Gratian) be reinstalled in the Senate. The appeals had been led by Quintus Aurelius Symmachus, the prefect (chief administrative officer) of the city of Rome. He begged Valentinian to preserve the customs of the past: “We ask the restoration of that state of religion under which the Republic has so long prospered,” he wrote.
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