Theodosius

To understand the death of Valentinian II in 392 A.D. we have to look at the events leading up to the pivotal year of 387. Remember that Gratian, Valentinian’s older brother, had elevated Theodosius to Augustus of the eastern empire in 379 in order to quell the Gothic rebellion in Thrace. Theodosius restored order quickly by providing the disenchanted Goths with food, shelter and land within the borders of the empire. By November of 380 vast numbers of Goths were also being recruited into Theodosius’ legions.

Gratian showed favoritism toward the barbarian element in his armies as well, going so far as to hand pick his personal guard from members of the Alani tribes. Openly favoring these barbarians at the expense of his Roman colleagues lay behind a crisis that emerged in 383 when an imperial general serving in Britain by the name of Magnus Maximus was suddenly acclaimed Augustus by his fed up legions. Maximus promptly landed his troops in Gaul and defeated Gratian near Paris. Gratian was captured and murdered. Nothing stood between the 12 year old Valentinian and Maximus’ invading army.

With Theodosius occupied with the Persians in the east, it was fortunate for the boy that Maximus was content to be acknowledged as co-emperor of the West for the time being. Too bad Valentinian’s mother, Justina, hadn’t brought up her son in the accepted state religion. Sixty years earlier Constantine the Great had assembled a large group of bishops to Nicaea to come to an agreement on the nature of God and the Christ. Through this assembly the branch of christianity known as Arianism was declared heresy and what became known as the Nicene creed was proclaimed the official Roman religious belief system.

In 387, after repeated failures by the bishop Ambrose to convert the young emperor to the Nicene faith (failures due largely to the efforts of Justina), Maximus crossed the Alps to deliver the Empire from heresy. Justina and Valentinian fled to Thessalonica where they were joined by Theodosius who by this time was free of the Persian threat. In June of 388 Theodosius and Valentinian (now a man of 17) pursued Maximus to Aquileia where he was forced to surrender and put to death.

The appointment of the Frankish general Arbogast to govern Gaul during the interim of Valentinian’s return to Milan was the final nail in the young emperor’s coffin. Theodosius and Valentinian traveled to Rome and then on to Milan. Early in 391 Theodosius returned to Constantinople and Valentinian traveled to Vienne to accept the transference of power in Gaul from Arbogast, the barbarian Frankish general. When it became clear that Arbogast had no intention of relinquishing power, Valentinian asserted his authority by issuing a written order demanding Arbogast’s immediate resignation. Arbogast refused, war was declared, and just days later Valentinian was found dead in his apartment.

This ends the story of one of the most tragic figures in Roman history. Valentinian’s coinage, however, offers great variety despite his brief reign. His coinage and the coinage of Theodosius are the last bronze issues before artistry and legibility pass into miserable shadows of what Roman coinage once was. Take advantage of the affordability of these fascinating relics that predate the fall of Rome by only a few years.

Before we set the stage for our story, here’s a $12.00 purchase  I made a year ago that illustrates the central figure of the western Roman Empire from 375 to 392 A.D.

This bronze follis of Valentinian II was struck sometime between 383 and 392 A.D. The bust of Valentinian appears on the obverse wearing a pearl diadem, imperial drapery, and a military cuirass. The legend around translates to “Our Lord Valentinian, Dutiful Emperor”. The reverse portrays the emperor dragging a captive to the right while holding a labarum inscribed with the christian “chi-rho” symbol. The surrounding inscription celebrates the “Glory of the Romans” with the mintmark for the 1st officina (workshop) of Siscia, a town in what was once Yugoslavia, below.

Until 383, Valentinian ruled the western empire jointly with his older brother Gratian. Because of Valentinian’s age, his mother Justina ruled in his name. Back in 379 a huge uprising of Visigoths in the east, along with the ever present threat of the Persian empire, prompted Gratian to elevate Theodosius, a successful general, to emperor of the eastern empire. Theodosius was replacing the former eastern emperor, Valens, who had caused the Gothic unrest and lost his life in an attempt to restore order.

Unfortunately, Gratian would institute a very unpopular military policy that would contribute to Valentinian’s fate. Theodosius would perpetuate that policy while cleaning up the mess created by Valens, inadvertently putting into motion the events that would lead to the sack of Rome in 408 A.D. and the downfall of the empire. Justina would provide the final excuse an usurper would need to get the ball rolling: religion.

The fall of the Roman Empire has always held a great fascination for me. If you’ve ever read any Roman history, you know everyone has their own idea of when this began. In my opinion the empire began to rapidly decay after the death of Constantine I, the Great when his three surviving sons split the empire between them. Less than 40 years later, the decline was past the point of no return.

We as coin collectors are very fortunate that the economy of the late empire was so inflationary. The study of economics was 1,400 years in the future so the Romans’ answer to poverty was to mint more coins. Today there is an abundance of surviving coinage from the time period between 307 to 395 A.D., to the point that one can acquire a monetary record of Rome’s downfall for less than $50 per coin.

In this post I would like to set the stage for an interesting, though somewhat lengthy, series of upcoming posts that will illustrate what I feel are the true causes of the collapse of the Roman empire. The main character, Valentinian II, is possibly the most tragic figure in Roman history. In 375 A.D., at the age of 4, he became co-Augustus of the western empire. By the age of 21, he would be dead.

Here we have another follis struck during the reign of the emperor Constantine I, the Great around 321 to 324 A.D. The portrait here is of Constantine’s eldest son Crispus with the legend IUL CRISPUS NOB C, or Julius Crispus Nobillisimus Caesar. Note that he wears a laurel wreath rather than a pearl diadem, denoting his position of Caesar rather than Augustus. On the reverse we have the legend CAESARUM NOSTRORUM, meaning “our Caesar”, surrounding a wreath with VOT X in the center. This signifies that he has ruled by the grace of the people for the last 10 years (loosely). The mint and officina are denoted by A SIS, or Siscia, a city in modern day Yugoslavia and officina 1 with a sun afterwards (?).

321-324 A.D.

The period btween 321 and 324 A.D. would encompass a civil war, a drastic change in the religious outlook of the empire, and events leading to the execution of the eldest Caesar, Crispus himself.

In 321 Crispus’ father Constantine I, the Great passed a law proclaiming Sunday, “the venerable day of the Sun”, as a day of rest. Events were also set in motion for the Nicaean Council of 325 in which Arius, Archbishop of Alexandria, whose beliefs that Jesus Christ was subordinate to God and used as an instrument for salvation rather than as one substance with God, was branded as a heretic, erupting the Eastern empire into riots and chaos.

During the years 322-323 the Empire was thrown into a civil war when Licinius, co-emperor with Constantine, used an incursion of Constantine’s troops into his territories to put down a Gothic invasion as a stepping stone toward furthering his ambitions toward imperial domination. Crispus was instrumental in crushing Licinius’ navy, preventing reinforcements from reaching land and paving the way for Constantine’s victory.

Unfortunately for Crispus, these events sowed the seed of jealousy in his father. Crispus was popular with the army and the citizenry. Suddenly, in 326, Crispus was arrested and put to death. Rumors flew that he was having an affair with his stepmother, Fausta, who was executed shortly afterward. At least four ancient historians associate her with  the fate of the Crispus. See John Julius Norwich’s  A Short History of Byzantium for more on this ancient soap opera.

The City

Siscia became a Roman colony in the time of the emperor Vespasian (69-79 A.D.) under the name of Colonia Flavia. The city became a part of Trajan’s new province of Upper Pannonia around 103 A.D. and became an important military headquarters and center for arms manufacture. Around 262 A.D. during the reign of Gallienus, Siscia became one of the greatest inperial mints, continuing to issue extensive coinage until it fell into the hands of the Ostrogoths early in the fifth century.

It would have been a fascinating time to be alive. Your day might consist of a trip to the forum where you would receive the news of the day from a town crier. Two of this particular coin might purchase a loaf of bread or a couple of portions of watered down wine for you and a friend. Chances are you would be scandalized by the news that the Archbishop had been branded a heretic and exiled to a backwater town overrun by barbarians. You might worry for the safety of your own soul, being a follower since before you could remember. Political strife and uncertainty would have been the order of the day during this tumultuous time.

The Coin

From a historical perspective, there is no greater bang for the buck than ancient Roman coinage. The bronze coin pictured here is usually referred to as a follis, or nummi. It was struck about 335 A.D. during the reign of Emperor Constantine I the Great in Antioch, a city in what is now Turkey.
The portrait on the obverse is actually that of Constantius II. He was the middle son of Constantine and his second wife, Fausta. The inscription on the obverse reads: FL IVL CONSTANTIVS NOB C which is the formal name (Flavius Julius Constantius) and his title (Noble Caesar).
The reverse portrays two soldiers facing one another, each holding reversed spears and resting their other hand on shields set on the ground, with two military standards between them. The inscription reads: GLORIA EXERCITVS, or Glory of the Army. Below are the letters SMANZ which stand for Sacra Moneta (SM, official or sacred money), the mint city of Antioch (AN), and the officina (the specific workshop, in this case Z, zeta, the 7th letter of the Latin alphabet, so Officina 7).

335 A.D.

Constantius was 18 at the time this coin was minted. In 335 A.D. he witnessed the elevation of his youngest brother, Constans, to the rank of Caesar. Constantius had received this honor 10 years earlier in 324, and stood to inherit the eastern provinces of the Empire. His father Constantine was 62 years old and celebrated the 30th year of his reign by consecrating the rebuilt Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Constantius may have been present for this ceremony, and if so, would have witnessed ambassadors from Ethiopia, Persia, and far off India arriving to congratulate his father on the peace and prosperity that had prevailed during his reign.

The City

Antioch had been the principal center of Northern Syria for centuries by 335 A.D. After Rome and Alexandria it was the third largest city of the Empire and became the capital of the province in the third century. It derived great wealth from its position on the commercial route from Asia to the Mediterranean. As a result, the economy of Antioch was far more stable than most of the Empire, which was suffering from rampant inflation.

Buying Power

This economic climate gave the follis real purchasing power, whereas the same coin in the Western provinces would only be useful as small change. An unskilled laborer might receive 2 or 3 folles a day, but a craftsman could earn around 8 to 12. Surviving prices for everyday items are scant but Doug Smith cites a source on his website that places baked bread at 2 nummi, meat between 4 and 8 nummi a pound, and wine at 6 to 14 nummi per sextarius (about a pint) depending on quality.

As a regular joe in 4th century Antioch, you would probably make a weekly trip to the market with a leather pouch containing your earnings tied to your belt by the drawstring. As a farm laborer you would have difficulty purchasing anything beyond raw materials (grain, unspun wool, etc.) and would have to rely on your ability to make your clothing and essentials by hand. However, as a blacksmith or an apprentice to a skilled profession you would have the means to purchase finished products, cloth, and items that would befit your higher social status.

I guess the best thing about ancient coins is that you can hold so much history in your hand for around 25 dollars. The collecting possibilities are endless and if you enjoy contemplating your coins in a historical context, there is a wealth of material available. Check out Doug Smith’s website and vcoins.com. Also, if you would like to read more about the Roman economy and the coinage involved, check out Coinage in the Roman Economy, 300 B.C. to A.D. 700 (Ancient Society and History). You’ll be hooked!