It’s pure nonsense. The battles of Save and Frigidus River saw much higher losses than Adrianople.
WI Valentinian I Lives Longer
- Thread starter John Fredrick Parker
- Start date
I think that's quite likely, unless Valens has a son of his own in the intervening time (was he married IOTL? I can't remember off the top of my head).
Alternatively, Valentinian might just take over the East directly and try to rule the entire Empire himself, then probably split it again after his death.
John Fredrick Parker
Donor
Valentinian did initially hold jurisdiction over the entire empire for about a month after taking power in 364, before splitting the realm with his brother; Valens, for his part, did have a son, but he died young in 370 (his other children were daughters).
John Fredrick Parker
Donor
The debate on TTL religious policy:
Any thoughts?
Would we agree that, as long as Valentinian and Valens rule, you won’t see the kind of efforts to suppress paganism and non-nicene Christianity that Gratian, Theodosius, and his descendants are known for OTL (however said “suppression” may be characterized)? If we agree on that much, I do wonder if there’s more to discuss on the long term implications for this -- even if we’re just talking about maintaining “tolerance” as the Roman policy (more or less), so that it’s still going strong in the mid 5th Century or so.
Any thoughts?
FWIW, Gratian was over eager to march immediately to Valens's aid with all the forces at his disposal-he was disuaded from doing so by advisors worried about the situation along the Rhine frontier, and then had to turn back anyway when the Rhine frontier erupted. The big change here is probably that with Valentinian alive, the Rhine frontier won't erupt, and Valentinian would be more readily available to assist, particularly while Valens is away. Though if things look less opportune for the Goths anyway, they may not choose this moment to pressure the weakened Roman frontier to let them in.
So, there's a grain of truth here. Adrianople was devastating-it is not an accident that Gratian and then Theodosius pointedly refused to risk another major set piece battle with the Goths for the rest of the Gothic War-they could ill-afford the risk. But it didn't cripple the empire's forces in and of itself.
FWIW withouT Gratian around there's a decent chance Ambrose does not become Bishop of Milan.
John Fredrick Parker
Donor
Thing is, the death of his predecessor and his ascension comes before our PoD -- when Valentinian was still alive.
Although that being said, it is possible that if the latter's younger son, Valentinian II, doesn't rise to Caesar position, that could mean Ambrose has less tensions with the Arians as a whole; we know Gratian was Orthodox, and I believe it's been established that Valentinian I was as well, so that likely means the Bishop of Milan is less anxious as a whole about imperial leadership "falling into heresy". Thinking it over, this change in itself could cool the temperature over theological matters quite considerably during this period.
-----CONSOLIDATE-----
So I noticed we talked about the Gothic Migrations and Religious Policies and Development separately, but it occurs to me that there's a pretty important piece of overlap here -- namely, the fact that the Goths were semi-incorporated into the empire (1) from a position of strong leverage, and (2) in the east initially, could very well have contributed to the Goths maintaining their Arian faith for centuries after crossing the Danube. And of course, the fact that a strong semi-independent kingdom within Rome's borders was holding to Arianism played a significant role in the "heresy's" position during this time period.
But of course, we're discussing a very different scenario -- one where the Goths likely don't win a decisively victory after revolting, if they even revolt at all, and are more likely to settle in the Western part of the Empire than the East. Could those changes be enough to encourage them to convert to Nicene Christianity in the shorter term? Would Ulfilas be as likely to convert as many Goths to Arianism in the first place (given the late PoD)? And how does that impact Christianity going forward?
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I hardly see the Goths rising up like Otl, for two simple reasons: the first is that with Valentinian I alive in 376 (the year in which the Goths asked for refuge in the empire) he is much closer from a logistical point of view than his brother (who Otl was more than 2 thousand kilometers away) the management of the immigration of the Goths will be more controlled and rapid than in Otl, furthermore if Valentinian is the one who will deal with the issue it is more than certain that a good part of them will be settled in Gaul and minor place in Britannia ( alleviating another Otl controversy, where they initially sought shelter from Hunnic repercussions, then a land to settle with imperial permission and potentially employment, all as normal Roman citizens ) then if they are settled in the West ( at least for the majority of them ) it is probable that they will remain Aryans, but it is also normal to believe that a part of them will be converted to the Nicene creed ( especially if some end up in northern Italy, another place where there was a great demand for labor ) certainly their faith will be tolerated but not supported, as the alliance between papacy and emperor was very close in this period
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John Fredrick Parker
Donor
@Nuraghe I do wonder how committed the Goths are to Arianism at the point of the PoD, or even how many have actually converted. Supposedly, Ulfilas converted a large number of them in 376 alone.
well we know that already in 341 the bishop of Constantinople, Eusebius of Nicomedia, appointed him bishop among the Goths, it is true that at the beginning his mission as an evangelizer failed, when King Athanaric unleashed a persecution against the Christian Goths, who for this reason migrated with Ulfilas in the area today on the border between Romania and Bulgaria, with the approval of the Roman emperor Constantius II (therefore at the time of Adrianople he had had at least 30 years of proselytism disposals, he also died in 388)
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from what I understand at least more than 50 thousand of them were already converted when Valens made his first punitive campaign beyond the Danube after defeating Procopius in 369 ( at least those who followed Fritigern )
John Fredrick Parker
Donor
Complicating things even further is that, as of the PoD and the 376 crossing, King Athanaric was still persecuting Christians. If we can safely assume the years 369 to 376 weren't especially good for Gothic Christianity (a fair assumption, I'd say), that means that as "little" as one in four of the Goths who crossed the Danube in the latter year were already converted, and those that were could not have been Arian for more than a generation or so. So I do think, given the PoD, having a majority of Goths become Nicene Christians within a generation or so wouldn't be an unreasonable expectation.
Which, as mentioned, would have massive implications for Christian demographics in the west for the next couple of centuries. To give an idea of what I'm talking about -- OTL, the Visigothic Kingdom remained (more or less) officially Arian until the Council of Toledo in 589. If German ancestry doesn't have a strong correlation it did with the dispute OTL, then the Nicene-Arian disputes and overall Doctrinal Issues of the 5th Century look very different from OTL. Would you agree with that much?
If so, how do we flesh this out further? (@AndreaConti any ideas here?)
this would actually be very true, but we must also consider that the Goths resettled in the West could not only convert to the Nicene creed but also assimilate to the Roman identity within a few generations ( which would also increase the number of Christians in this part of the empire, favoring religious conformity due to there being no opposing poles of power as in the East ( where there were simultaneously the court of Constantinople, the seats of the patriarchs of Antioch, Alexandria and Jerusalem at war with each other )
John Fredrick Parker
Donor
If Goths do adopt Nicene Christianity and integrate more effectively into Roman society as a whole, I wonder how this affects the longer term prospects for Non-Nicene Christianity. If a subsequent Eastern Emperor decides to push the Christian churches back toward Orthodoxy, would there be as much pushback as there was under Theodosius (especially if it's not coming in parallel with suppression of paganism or what have you)?
Didn't Gratian send aid to Valens, but had to turn back due to a Germanic incursion, but then came back again only a few months later.
Only for Valens to act before he could link up with Gratian?
Wasn't those efforts as a result to win over St. Ambrose of Milan?
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John Fredrick Parker
Donor
That sounds about right -- I would say, given how aggressive Valentinian had been in maintaining said German border when he was alive, I'm inclined to think such incursions would be less likely to happen at this particular point if he was the one they'd be dealing with. This, combined with more experience in both logistics and communicating with his brother, likely means the course of events mentioned above don't happen; meaning the Disaster at Adrianople doesn't happen. Which, as noted, has massive implications.
He was absolutely a factor in this. When talking about him earlier in the thread, it was noted he was installed as Bishop of Milan only about a year before the PoD; I also noted that, in dealing with Valentinian I as senior and Gratian as junior (both committed Niceans, and his open supporter "only" being junior) instead of Gratian as senior and a young Valenitnian II as junior (the latter being enamored with Arianism), Ambrose is likely to be a lot more chill about the mere existence of Arianism in the empire as a whole. This would lower the temperature on religious issues across the empire, pretty much on its own.
Or at least that was my impression. What do you think?
I raise a point of attention: the traditional idea of the early Gothic mass conversion to Arianism, also due to the interpretation of numerous texts by Saint Ambrose, such as the epistle to Marcellina, in which the bishop of Milan explains a perfect overlap between Goths and Arians, Romans and Nicenes, which from religious propaganda texts as they were, are seen as historiographical testimonies, is the subject of continuous revision, at least in the Italian and Spanish context
First of all, the idea that the Arian religious choice was already an instrument for the construction of identity in the second half of the 4th century, implies a nineteenth-century vision of the concept of people, which was not present at the time: the "identity model ” in fact implies the presence of two compact groups, or who at least perceived a common belonging to the same macrogroup and recognized each other in their adherence to particular symbols; on the other hand, the massive adhesion of the barbarians to the Arian creed and of the Romans to the Nicene creed is taken for granted, without taking into consideration either the changes that occurred in the religious balance of the empire, nor the oscillations that characterized the political and diplomatic relations between Rome and the Goths.
Secondly, starting from the 90s of the last century, scholars of Roman law have proceeded with a profound re-examination of the problems linked to the application of the law in the late ancient period, and particular attention has been dedicated to the specific characteristics of the anti-heretical norms in the Theodosian and post-Theodosian. This led to reducing the scope of the imperial measures and to proposing a reconstruction on the basis of which the legislative activity would not lead to an immediate unification of the imperial population from a religious point of view, which would instead struggle to establish itself, leaving large spaces for action to non-Nicene groups
Thirdly, studies relating to Gothic history, starting from the first formulation of the theory of "ethnogenesis" by Wenskus and Wolfram up to subsequent reworkings, have shown how the "Goths" are not to be understood as an always and continuously existed, but rather the product of a long process of mixing groups of different backgrounds and origins, with an identity in continuous transformation.
Therefore we tend to divide Gothic history, from a religious point of view, into three phases: the first includes the period between the 3rd century and 401, the date in which Alaric left with his entourage from Epirus towards the West . In it we find a phenomenon that can be defined as "involuntary evangelization", re-elaborating Gibbon's formulation, in which Christianization does not seem to depend on any planned action, but arises from prolonged contact with pre-existing Christian communities, both in Gothia and elsewhere. interior of the empire. During the period of stay in Moesia II and Thrace, the signs of a "voluntary evangelization" seem to be able to be identified, in which some bishops of the area seem to make contact with the barbarians in order to convert them to their beliefs. In this phase, the conversion does not occur exclusively in a subordinationist or Nicene sense, but is modulated on the basis of the faith professed by the communities with which the Goths, still faithful to traditional cults, must have come into contact. Therefore, both the Arian Goths and the Nicaean Goths, of whom we also have numerous testimonies in the documents of the time, are two small minorities compared to the followers of the traditional cult: Christianity in its variants was essentially widespread among the elites, who they used not to distinguish themselves from the Romans, but to highlight their acculturation process, which was a sort of identifier of social and political status
The second phase is in the era of Alaric, which corresponds to a crucial moment in the process of formation of the group that will then be
settled in Gaul and Spain. During the campaigns fought in Italy, in fact, the group that left Epirus saw a very strong increase in numbers due to the passage between the ranks of the barbarian army of some components that had previously been part of the Roman team, who were both foederati and Romans: so the rate of conversion to Christianity, in both the Arian and Nicean variants, grows exponentially
Only in 418, with the settlement in Aquitaine, in order to guarantee the maintenance - and indeed the expansion - of the sphere of autonomy acquired with the agreements with Flavius Constantius and Honorius, therefore as a conscious political choice, the adherence to the Arian creed , initially determined by particular circumstances and contingencies that were somewhat fortuitous, could be recognized as a distinctive element of the barbarian population compared to the Roman one, and exalted to the point of becoming a true cultural marker
What happens if instead circumstances lead to mass Niceanization in the first phase: in my opinion, Alaric's policy changes very little. Honorius might be more inclined to grant him the title of magister militum, but this also clashes with other factors and political considerations on the part of the emperor. Athaulf's position could be stronger and lead to a progressive integration between the Gothic and Roman elites, which could also be very different from what I'm enjoying telling you. Furthermore, given the Frankish and Lombard example, it is not certain that the conversion to Nicaean Christianity and the related cultural assimilation will lead to the destruction of the identity of the Gothic people
First of all, the idea that the Arian religious choice was already an instrument for the construction of identity in the second half of the 4th century, implies a nineteenth-century vision of the concept of people, which was not present at the time: the "identity model ” in fact implies the presence of two compact groups, or who at least perceived a common belonging to the same macrogroup and recognized each other in their adherence to particular symbols; on the other hand, the massive adhesion of the barbarians to the Arian creed and of the Romans to the Nicene creed is taken for granted, without taking into consideration either the changes that occurred in the religious balance of the empire, nor the oscillations that characterized the political and diplomatic relations between Rome and the Goths.
Secondly, starting from the 90s of the last century, scholars of Roman law have proceeded with a profound re-examination of the problems linked to the application of the law in the late ancient period, and particular attention has been dedicated to the specific characteristics of the anti-heretical norms in the Theodosian and post-Theodosian. This led to reducing the scope of the imperial measures and to proposing a reconstruction on the basis of which the legislative activity would not lead to an immediate unification of the imperial population from a religious point of view, which would instead struggle to establish itself, leaving large spaces for action to non-Nicene groups
Thirdly, studies relating to Gothic history, starting from the first formulation of the theory of "ethnogenesis" by Wenskus and Wolfram up to subsequent reworkings, have shown how the "Goths" are not to be understood as an always and continuously existed, but rather the product of a long process of mixing groups of different backgrounds and origins, with an identity in continuous transformation.
Therefore we tend to divide Gothic history, from a religious point of view, into three phases: the first includes the period between the 3rd century and 401, the date in which Alaric left with his entourage from Epirus towards the West . In it we find a phenomenon that can be defined as "involuntary evangelization", re-elaborating Gibbon's formulation, in which Christianization does not seem to depend on any planned action, but arises from prolonged contact with pre-existing Christian communities, both in Gothia and elsewhere. interior of the empire. During the period of stay in Moesia II and Thrace, the signs of a "voluntary evangelization" seem to be able to be identified, in which some bishops of the area seem to make contact with the barbarians in order to convert them to their beliefs. In this phase, the conversion does not occur exclusively in a subordinationist or Nicene sense, but is modulated on the basis of the faith professed by the communities with which the Goths, still faithful to traditional cults, must have come into contact. Therefore, both the Arian Goths and the Nicaean Goths, of whom we also have numerous testimonies in the documents of the time, are two small minorities compared to the followers of the traditional cult: Christianity in its variants was essentially widespread among the elites, who they used not to distinguish themselves from the Romans, but to highlight their acculturation process, which was a sort of identifier of social and political status
The second phase is in the era of Alaric, which corresponds to a crucial moment in the process of formation of the group that will then be
settled in Gaul and Spain. During the campaigns fought in Italy, in fact, the group that left Epirus saw a very strong increase in numbers due to the passage between the ranks of the barbarian army of some components that had previously been part of the Roman team, who were both foederati and Romans: so the rate of conversion to Christianity, in both the Arian and Nicean variants, grows exponentially
Only in 418, with the settlement in Aquitaine, in order to guarantee the maintenance - and indeed the expansion - of the sphere of autonomy acquired with the agreements with Flavius Constantius and Honorius, therefore as a conscious political choice, the adherence to the Arian creed , initially determined by particular circumstances and contingencies that were somewhat fortuitous, could be recognized as a distinctive element of the barbarian population compared to the Roman one, and exalted to the point of becoming a true cultural marker
What happens if instead circumstances lead to mass Niceanization in the first phase: in my opinion, Alaric's policy changes very little. Honorius might be more inclined to grant him the title of magister militum, but this also clashes with other factors and political considerations on the part of the emperor. Athaulf's position could be stronger and lead to a progressive integration between the Gothic and Roman elites, which could also be very different from what I'm enjoying telling you. Furthermore, given the Frankish and Lombard example, it is not certain that the conversion to Nicaean Christianity and the related cultural assimilation will lead to the destruction of the identity of the Gothic people
well it depends on where they are settled and how they are assimilated into the state (if we imagine that of the initial 200 thousand refugees, they are divided into 1/3 each in a different area, it is probable that a part of them will be settled in the Eastern Balkans / Moesia ( so they end up on the border between the Western and Eastern empire and the limes, most likely involuntarily becoming pawns in the power game between the two courts and their respective patriarchs, and all this excluding the still pagan component of the imperial elite ( because it can now be defined as such )
Prior to his appointment as Bishop of Milan, which he originally didn't want (the people of Milan foisted the position upon him, he wasn't even a member of the clergy), he was generally pretty pragmatic in his dealings with both Nicenes and Arians. He really wasn't fanatically Nicene.
However, once he became bishop it seems he decided that since he now held the position he should do his utmost to defend his creed against all comers, Non-Nicene Christians and pagans alike, thus he became a hardline Nicene man. He also forced even Emperors to bend the knee, thus laying the precedent for over a thousand years of struggle between Church and State.
St. Ambrose is pretty damn important.
John Fredrick Parker
Donor
I think part of the context of Ambrose’s turn to a hard-line stance isn’t just in that he found himself with the job, but in the particular emperors he was dealing with -- as mentioned, the young Valentinian II had Arian proclivities Ambrose couldn’t seem to talk him out of, which certainly added to his anxiety; then of course, you have the turmoil going on in the east after Adrianople, which contributed a lot to the idea that the Orthodox were under assault and that the men who would be emperor needed to be held to account to God. Having a figure like Valentinian I remaining at the helm longer, with his mixture of tolerance with firm support for the “true” faith, would do wonders to put Ambrose’s mind at ease; I imagine he would remain pragmatic for longer in such a scenario.
No doubt.
i think a whole lot of benefits would come with valentinian living longer. first: he would have made sure the settlement of the goths in roman territory was more regulated (in OTL the romans let the goths keep their weapons and stay in large groups) and second: if the goths still revolt valens will probably wait for his brother to arrive with his army to fight them rather then diving into battle without waiting (which he did to valentinian's son gratian IOTL). third: gratian and valentinian ii will become emperors later in life which is good. gratian will probably be less lazy and valentinian ii might have some skill in either administration or military matters rather than being just a puppet and due to the fact that valens had no heir the two brothers might become emperors of both east and west rather than co emperors of the west. and fourth: theodosius i doesn't become emperor which is good because i honestly think that valentinian i was a better emperor than theodosius he never forced his religious beliefs on the empire and gratian and valentinian ii were certainly not as bad as arcadius and honorius.