The Fall of the Roman Empire by Michael Grant Read Free Book Online Page A

after another for generation after generation. And the rivalry between these usurpers and their 'legitimate' competitors (a distinction that is not, incidentally, always easy to make) was one of the principal causes of the debilitation of Rome's authority.
    For the civil wars which resulted from such usurpations decisively undermined the internal security of the Roman world. Furthermore, on many demonstrable occasions these struggles served as an irresistible invitation to Germans and other enemies to break into the distracted provinces. From the first century AD up to the very end of the Roman Empire more than four hundred years later, scarcely a single decade passed when there was not, at some juncture, a rival Emperor in the field, and often there were more than one simultaneously.
    This state of affairs was the product of an insoluble dilemma. The army had to be strong enough to protect the frontiers. But if it was strong enough to do that, then it was also strong enough to turn against the Emperor whenever one of its generals prompted it to revolt. True, it was only due to the army that the Empire continued in existence at all. But it was also the fault of the army, and the men who commanded it, that internal peace was never achieved for very many years at a time. And because of this fatally weakening disunity, the Romans sustained huge and continuing dislocations, casualties and wastages.
    At times, the anarchy produced by this situation amounted virtually to national paralysis. For example, during the period of only a century and a half leading up to Constantine the Great (306-37), very nearly eighty generals, either in the capital or in some other part of the Empire, were hailed by the Imperial title. Between 247 and 270 alone no less than thirty such men were acclaimed. Some were too afraid to refuse the offer.
    These usurpers provide a paradise for modern numismatists, who come into their own as purveyors of historical information. For, as soon as a man declared himself Emperor, he promptly issued the money that was needed to shore up his soldiers' loyalty - and at the same time it served the purpose of spreading abroad the knowledge of his name and image. And specimens of these coins, ranging from tens of thousands in some cases to one single surviving specimen in others, have come down to us and can be seen today.
    In the last epoch of the Empire, the same destructive process went on and on, and the succession remained as turbulent and rapidly changing as before. In the time of Valentinian I'S dynasty, there were still numerous generals and others who decided to attempt these violent grasps at the throne. At least ten men made these lunges, all unsuccessfully in the end, but with varying degrees of initial acceptance. The number rises to thirteen if we include three North African troublemakers with ambiguous intentions. And perhaps there were more.
    It is evident what an additional drain the struggles to put down all these usurpers must have imposed on the already hopelessly strained resources of imperial manpower and revenue. And it becomes clearer, too, not only why Valentinian 1 was determined to guarantee a peaceful dynastic succession, but why the army and Empire as a whole still persevered with this policy of heredity throughout the long reigns of the incompetent last members of his house.
    Moreover, on the question of usurpers, if not on anything else, the Western and Eastern Emperors, who had a common interest in maintaining the dynasty to which both alike belonged, generally managed to work together - it being understood that as long as one lawful Emperor survived in any part of the Roman world, no other could be created without his agreement. This understanding was not, it is true, invariably observed. Nevertheless, as long as Valentinian I'S dynasty still occupied the thrones in West and East, not one of its rivals ever succeeded in ousting its representatives from either one of the two Empires.
    All the