174 - The Sack of Rome Part II

Hello, and welcome to the History of Rome, Episode 174, The Sack of Rome, Part 2. Last time, we left off with the assassination of Valentinian III, last of the Theodosians, and the subsequent elevation of Petronius Maximus, first of the so-called Shadow Emperors, pale imitations who bickered over an ever-shrinking imperial pie in the last days of the Western Empire. Petronius Maximus would get this terminal phase started in fine style by reigning for just 77 days in 455 AD, his major accomplishment provoking the Vandals to sack Rome. We are a long way from the golden age of the Antonines.

Maximus' problem was that he didn't really have any inherent imperial legitimacy. He had killed the previous emperor and had spread some bribes around, but that was really all he had going for him. So, as I mentioned last week, he forced the emperor's widow Licinia Eudoxia to marry him. After all, she was not just the wife of the late Western Emperor Valentinian III, she was also the daughter of the late Eastern Emperor Theodosius II, so she was just oozing legitimacy. And marrying her was not only practical, it was kind of necessary given the circumstances. But Maximus was not content to stop there. He wanted to firmly intertwine his own family with the Theodosians and spawn a new dynasty. So, Maximus named his son Caesar, and then married the boy to Valentinian and Licinia Eudoxia's eldest daughter, the now 15-year-old Eudoxia the Younger.

Except that, if you'll recall, her hand had already been promised to the Vandal prince Huneric. This wedding had not yet taken place, but neither had it ever been called off. Maximus obviously thought that with Valentinian dead, he could start rearranging dynastic marriages as he saw fit. But, well, King Genseric did not take kindly to the change in plans. After all, he was about to marry his son into the Roman imperial family, and that is not something you just let slip away. So how did Genseric find out that the engagement was cancelled, and that Eudoxia was going to be married off to some usurping senator's son? He was alerted by the mother of the bride, and recently widowed Licinia Eudoxia. She knew darn well that Maximus had killed her husband. And so, taking a page from the playbook of her, let's see, what would she be, cousin-slash-sister-in-law Huneria, Licinia Eudoxia wrote a letter to Genseric begging the Vandals to come save her and her family from the brute Maximus.

When this letter arrived, Genseric blew his top and mustered an invasion force almost immediately. Whoever this Maximus character was, he was going to rue the day that he had messed with the Vandals. Back in Rome, Maximus was settling comfortably into his new role as emperor, ready to enjoy all the powers and luxuries that came with being the supreme leader of a mighty—what's that you say? The Vandals have set sail from North Africa? Really? Well, that can't be good. Where do you suppose they're headed? Oh, they're headed here! Oh my! Well, better call out the legions. What's that? We really don't have any legions anywhere in the area? Hmm, what should we do? Panic? Yes, let's do that. Let's panic.

Knowing that he had nothing even close to enough troops to fight the Vandals, and that it was almost guaranteed that someone would eventually betray Rome to the barbarians to save their own skin, Maximus told the frightened citizens of the city to just make a run for it. The Vandals are coming. I can't stop them. Best to just literally head for the hills and wait until they're gone. The citizens of Rome took Maximus' advice and began pouring out of the Eternal City. But before they left, they decided that it really wouldn't be right to just let Maximus off the hook for provoking a Vandal invasion like that. There are a couple of different versions of the story, but basically, as the emperor was preparing to make his own escape, he was tracked down by a mob, stoned to death, torn limb from limb, and then had his bits and pieces thrown into the Tiber. He was about sixty years old, and had called himself emperor for two and a half months.

Three days after Maximus was consumed by this angry mob, the Vandals arrived on the Italian coast and marched on Rome. No one stood in their way. The gates of the city were not even locked. Genseric entered Rome and commenced with a good and proper sacking. Now there is some controversy about when the sack actually took place, with some sources saying late May, others saying early June, while still others say that it wasn't until August. But the sources generally agree that Maximus did not reign for more than three months, that Valentinian III died in March, and that Maximus died before the Vandals arrived. So I'm not sure where the August date is coming from. But other than that, I don't think that we can be so confident in our sources that we can just definitively say, no, it was on June 2, 455 AD. So when you're asked on the test, when did the Vandal sack Rome, all you need to put is 455. Half credit if you say after the Goths sacked Rome, quarter credit if you say sometime after Constantine, no credit if you ask what a Vandal is, negative credit if you ask what a Rome is.

Like the Gothic sack 45 years earlier, the Vandal sack turned out to not be all that we have been led to believe that it was. Yes, the Vandals occupied the city for two weeks, and yes, they carted off most of the treasure the Goths had not already carted off. But it was not mindlessly terrorizing and destructive. Archaeologists sifting through the layers of Rome haven't really found anything that points to a widespread general destruction of the city in the 5th century, and they actually have ways of determining these sorts of things using science. This conclusion jibes with the stories about Pope Leo I, soon enough to be known as Leo the Great, for obvious reasons, convincing Genseric to forego putting Rome to the torch, and instead limit himself to simple plundering. Genseric was either swayed by the Pope, or was already planning on limiting the scope of his conquest. And so, unlike the Huns at Aquileia, when the Vandals withdrew from Rome two weeks later, it still stood. But that did not mean that they did not strip the city bare. Sources mention that not only was all the treasure Titus and Vespasian had brought back from Judea hauled off, but half the roof of the Temple of Jupiter was too.

As controlled as the sack was, though, it did not stop the word Vandal from entering our lexicon as one who willfully or ignorantly destroys, damages, or defaces property belonging to another or to the public. Since the ancient world is absolutely riddled with Romans and barbarians alike willfully destroying each other's property, it's kind of unfair to saddle the Vandals with the kind of denotative baggage. But on the other hand, I imagine they'd be happier about it than what happened to the poor Goths, a proud nation of noble warriors, whose name now inexplicably means vampire-loving sad sack.

When the Vandals withdrew from Rome and sailed back to North Africa, they also took with them the greatest prize of all, and the prize that they had come for in first place, the Augusta, Lysina Eudoxia, and her two daughters, Eudoxia the Younger and Placidia. The three imperial women would be held by the Vandals as extremely well-treated prisoners for the next seven years, and the marriage of Huneric and Eudoxia took place as scheduled, and the union produced the future Vandal king Hilderic, who had both Vandal and Theodosian royal blood running through his veins, and who would make for a very controversial figure in the sixth century, and thus sadly beyond our scope.

But more important than what they took with them is what the Vandals left behind, namely a psychologically scarred Roman population and an imperial power vacuum. Since Maximus's death, no one was technically in charge of the Western Empire, and with Rome reeling from the invasion, it did not look like either the Senate or the Italian armed forces were going to get their act together any time soon to nominate a new candidate for the job. Which brings us to Aparcheus Avetis, the gallo-Roman senator who has been popping up off and on over the past twenty-five years, usually when it comes time to broker some kind of deal between Rome and the Goths, which is exactly why he is popping up now. After becoming emperor, Maximus wanted to make sure that the Goths would back him, and so he promoted Avetis to Magister Militum of Gaul and asked him to please arrange Gothic support for the new regime. But since Maximus was only emperor for two months before the sack of Rome, that meant that Avetis was just barely getting started when the news came that Maximus was dead.

So, who is emperor now? asked the Goth king Theodoric II, who by the way had risen to power after killing his older brother Thorismond following the battle of the Catalanian fields in 453. Well, I'm not really sure, replied Avetis. I guess we'll have to wait and see. Why wait? asked Theodoric. You're rich, you're in control of the Gallic legions, and you know we support you 150%, so why don't you just become emperor? When he did the math, Avetis realized that Theodoric had a point. With the Goths staunchly in his corner, he almost certainly commanded the largest military force in the Western Empire. So the question wasn't why, it was why not? So, accompanied by a Gothic army, Avetis traveled down to Arles, and announced to the Gallic provincial council that he was willing to take power if they wanted him to. And they wanted him to. Getting one of their own in power was a hugely appealing prospect. They proclaimed Avetis Augustus on July 9, 455 AD.

The new, self-proclaimed-by-default-whatever-emperor spent the next three months consolidating his power base in Gaul before he moved over the Alps in September and entered Italy before winter set in. In a bit of a pleasant throwback to the good old days, Avetis did not head straight for Ravenna. Instead, he merely dispatched a Gothic garrison to go hold the city in his name, while he himself continued on to Rome. Maybe it was the political circumstances of the moment that drove his decision. Maximus' reign, brief as it had been, had been based there, and the city had just been sacked, and needed a psychological boost. But Avetis clearly felt the need to be in Rome rather than the now-imperial capital of Ravenna. Which, like I say, is a pleasant throwback to the good old days.

But though Avetis had as good a claim to any to imperial power, that did not mean that he was the only interested party in who should rule the West. Ralph Matheson of the University of South Carolina identifies at least four other such interested parties. The Eastern Emperor Marcian, the Italian nobility, the just-departed Vandals, and the leaders of the Italian armed forces, Majoran and his Germanic colleague-slash-mentor Ricomer. All of them could be theoretically induced to follow Avetis if he played his cards just right. Unfortunately, he would not play his cards just right. Not because he was a bumbling fool or anything, but just that these things are delicate and not a little bit unfair.

Avetis started at the top, and dispatched envoys to Constantinople seeking recognition for his rule. Either because the Eastern Emperor wanted to appoint his own man, or because he wasn't sure Avetis would survive and didn't want to put his own prestige on the line, Marcian was non-committal about backing Avetis. Well, okay, thought Avetis. No matter. He'll come around. He next sent envoys to Genseric, attempting to lay down some law. I am not Maximus. I have an army. Don't even think about trying to invade Italy a second time. That sort of thing. Which, of course, Genseric scoffed at. As soon as March rolled around and the Mediterranean was safe for sailing again, the Vandals started raiding the Sicilian coast.

But these raids were not all bad for Avetis. With the Vandals once again on the offensive, the new Emperor dispatched Ricomer to head up the response. Avetis knew damned well that Ricomer and Magorian represented the greatest threats to his regime. Tying up Ricomer in what was sure to be a protracted conflict on the high seas would give Avetis just the kind of breathing room he needed. Which is to say that as long as Ricomer was fighting Vandal pirates, he wasn't fighting Avetis. But this breathing space didn't really do Avetis any good. The political fractures in the West were by now simply too great to overcome. In another era, an Emperor reigning from Rome with the backing of troops from Gaul would have raised very few eyebrows. But these days, Avetis and the Goths were seen just as much foreign occupiers as Genseric and the Vandals had been. And this was exacerbated because though the Goths supported Avetis, there was a certain implied quid pro quo that the new Emperor could not ignore.

So as the citizens of Rome took stock of the damage done by the Vandals, they were mighty annoyed to find Avetis siphoning off what little wealth was left and using it to pay his Gothic supporters. From his perspective, Avetis was simply using his Imperial authority to pay soldiers and the employ of the Empire. But to the Italians, it looked a lot like he was finishing what the Vandals had started. Discontentment spread, and then to make matters worse, famine once again reared its ugly head. Avetis was blamed for the grain shortages even though there was little he could do about it. By the autumn of 456, it was clear that it was time to get out of Rome while the getting was good. Better to head back to Gaul where the climate was better. But he would never get off the peninsula.

Rikomer had demonstrated his military talents throughout the summer by besting the Vandals in skirmish after skirmish, eventually forcing Genseric to recall his men and take stock of his sudden change in fortune. The year before, the Vandal king had stood on the Capitoline hill deciding whether or not to burn Rome to the ground, and now his men couldn't even raid the coast of Sicily without getting tripped up. Rikomer was clearly a man who knew what he was doing. Riding high on these victories, the Germanic general returned to the mainland and began plotting with Majorian to dispense with their rival for power.

The critical mistake Avetis made, and the catalyst that triggered Majorian and Rikomer to act, was his decision to send his Gothic allies on ahead of him. As I just noted, they had become a political liability, and so he ordered them back to Gaul, even though their presence was the main reason he wasn't being directly attacked. But Avetis misjudged the situation, and thought that sending the Goths off would ease tensions rather than flare them up. But flare them up it did. With Avetis now essentially alone in Italy, Rikomer and Majorian pounced. The Italian legions moved on Avetis as the emperor neared Ravenna. Avetis closed ranks in the capital city with the forces he had left, and may have been able to hold out for reinforcements from Gaul, but unfortunately, the terms of securing Gothic loyalty now came back to bite him.

In exchange for supporting his claim to power, Avetis had offered Theodoric the opportunity to expand Goth dominion into Spain. Theodoric had immediately invaded the Iberian peninsula and tried to take it over. So when the desperate call came in from Avetis for Theodoric to come down to Italy and help him defeat Rikomer and Majorian, the Goths were bogged down fighting in Spain, and Avetis was on his own. The now floundering emperor faced his adversaries near the city of Piacenza, but it was hopeless from the start. Rikomer and Majorian's forces overwhelmed him and Avetis fled into the city. In October 456, Avetis was officially deposed by Majorian and placed under house arrest.

In an interesting twist, the deposed emperor was not immediately executed, as you would have expected given the circumstances. Instead, he was forced to renounce his titles and property and agree to become the bishop of Piacenza, a curious form of punishment, but one that removed Avetis from the political picture. He was about 60 years old and had ruled the empire for 15 months. It isn't entirely clear why Rikomer and Majorian decided to leave Avetis alive, but it may have had something to do with currying favor with the eastern emperor Marcian, who, though he had never supported Avetis, may not have been impressed by his cold-blooded execution either. The reason I say this is because Marcian continued to play coy with the would-be emperors of the west even after the fall of Avetis, and so during the winter of 456-57, Avetis lived. But in January of 457, Marcian died, and shortly thereafter, Avetis was killed.

Marcian, by the way, was 65 years old and had been emperor of the east for seven years. His passing marks the official end of the Theodosian dynasty and the extended Valentinian Theodosian dynasty that had ruled the east for almost a hundred years. Marcian's passing appears to have marked the end of leniency for Avetis, because shortly after the eastern Augustus died, the deposed western Augustus was either strangled or starved at Majorian's order. Which is why I personally suspect that negotiations with Constantinople had some kind of impact on Avetis' curious fate, because otherwise, why keep him alive just to kill him? But there is another possible explanation. Just as Avetis didn't have the support of the Italians, Majorian and Ricomer didn't really have the support of the Gauls. By keeping Avetis alive, they may have been hoping to prevent a Gallic uprising. But our sources hint that an uprising in Gaul started up anyway, as most of the nobility, and certainly the Goths, continued to recognize Avetis as the legitimate emperor. So, rather than allow a rallying point to live, Majorian had Avetis killed in early 457.

But now the situation was really muddled. Marcian was dead, and so there was no emperor in the east. Avetis was deposed and then killed, and Majorian not yet elevated, so there's no emperor in the west. So who was running the show? The answer, of course, was the barbarian generals, that good and proper Romans refused to let rule in their own right. In the west, that meant Ricomer, who was trying to rule the west in his own right, with a commission granted by Constantinople, but who would settle for making Majorian a puppet emperor. In the east, we are still talking about Aspar, the ethnic Alon, who had helped settle the Vandal question back in the 430s, and who had remained a powerful force in Constantinople ever since.

When Marcian died in late January 457, the eastern court debated for 11 days who would succeed him. At first, it appeared that Marcian's son-in-law, Anthemius, grandson of the Praetorian prefect Anthemius, who had built the Theodosian walls, would be the emperor. But Aspar stepped in and pushed for a Thracian general named Leo. Aspar finally got his way, and on February 7, 457, Leo was crowned emperor, Leo I. The new emperor was supposed to be a weak-willed puppet who Aspar could control, but it quickly became apparent that Leo had a will of his own. But the elevation of Leo had little immediate impact on the question of who controlled the west.

Next week, though, Ricomer and Majorian will sort it out for themselves. Tired of waiting for Constantinople to nominate someone, anyone to rule, Ricomer will resign himself to the fact that he will not be able to rule the west in his own right, and instead he will push Majorian to become Augustus. By sheer coincidence, it was on April 1, 457 A.D., exactly 1,555 years ago, that Majorian became emperor of the Western Empire.