5.0 out of 5 stars
Aurelian the Remarkable, December 12, 2011
This review is from: Aurelian and the Third Century (Roman Imperial Biographies) (Paperback)
I came across Alaric Watson's Aurelian and the Third Century in my research to straighten out the confused chronology of Aurelian's reign in the latter half of that century. I have been compiling a chronology of the later Roman empire for my own edification since I had never studied that period either as an undergraduate or graduate student of Latin. I found Watson's monograph to be of invaluable help, perhaps the only contemporary work that comes to grips with all the problematic ancient sources and reviews the many modern attempts to untangle and make sense of the ancient texts in the light of archaeology, numismatics, inscriptions and papyri. Watson holds a Ph.D. in Roman history and once taught the subject, but later became a barrister (counselor-at-law) in London. The title of his unpublished thesis is The Representation of Imperial Authority: Problems of Continuity in the Mid-Third Century A.D. (1991). Therefore he comes well prepared to present a detailed account of the life of the midthird-century emperor, Aurelian.
In the history of the later Roman empire the third century after 235 A.D. was a period of great upheaval and stress, marked by political, military and economic insecurity. It was an era of increasing barbarian raids and invasions, shrinking population, shortage of manpower for the army, military uprisings and consequently rapid change of emperors, loss of territory and provincial separation, abandonment of farmland and the consequent decline of agricultural production, plague, scarcity, rising taxes, inflation and debasement of the coinage, to mention only a few of the problems that beset Rome's empire and threatened to undo it. After the rule of Gallienus (253-268), who instituted changes that eventually led to complete reorganization of the empire under Diocletian, Aurelian (270-275), a supremely capable general of cavalry from Illyria, stands out as the man who salvaged it from disintegration and reunited what had been fractured into thirds during Gallienus' reign and who furthered economic and administrative reform and the defense of the frontier in only four years; he continued the work that Gallienus had begun. His accomplishments, reflective of a purely military and conservative outlook, stemmed what looked to be an early demise of the Roman polity. He might have achieved more had he not been murdered by a cabal of his own officers to forestall what they erroneously thought was to be their execution. Yet the importance of his achievement for the later development of Europe and the Mediterranean is incalculable (I borrow Watson's own words).
In his introduction Watson sets the stage of the third-century "crisis." Part I chronicles in six chapters the years that led to the ascendancy of Aurelian and the five years of his reign. Part II presents in four chapters his internal policies and reforms. Then follow a conclusion and two appendices, with notes, bibliography and index. Watson provides a section of dates (a chronology of events) and four maps after his preface. Illustration of the remains of Palmyra (Biblical Tadmor in Syria), some coins from Aurelian's reign and a surviving section of the Aurelianic wall in Rome round out the contents of the book. Its 303 pages include a full index.
Although admirably descriptive of events and unstinting in wrestling with the conflicting statements of ancient authors and the views of their modern interpreters, this is a work principally for scholars who are researching Roman history of the third century. Its detail, technical analysis and exhaustive sifting of the primary sources and an enormous amount of secondary sources are superb, but only one already knowledgeable of the period and its problems will derive substantial benefit. Watson sorts out and clarifies many of the sticky problems of the order of events and the participants. His discussion carefully scrutinizes every piece of known evidence that has bearing on each subject that comes under consideration, and he does not hesitate to dismiss ancient testimony when it shows signs of bias, inconsistency, anachronism or sheer invention. His footnotes are voluminous and numerous. Watson in my estimation sums up everything that may be known about Aurelian and his time until 1999, the year of publication of the hardback edition. It is a monumental achievement and a very important book.
Despite the admirable and thorough treatment of that complex age and Aurelian's role in it Watson's work leaves much to be desired. First, it would have helped the reader greatly if appendix A, excursion on sources, had been placed first rather than after the conclusion, because the great number of footnotes comprises a massive amount of abbreviations that might have been less cryptic and daunting for the average reader if the discussion of the ancient sources had come at the beginning. Moreover, many abbreviations of journals and collections of archaeological material are left undecoded; only another historian of Roman antiquity would know what they refer to. Second, the overall usefulness of the book would have been enhanced had the black and white illustrations near the center of the text been printed on heavier stock and especially if the illustrated coins had been enlarged to bring out the detail and their Latin inscriptions been spelled out in full. Watson might have helped the reader if his discussion of these coins in the text had been keyed to the two plates that illustrate them; only the footnotes, and very few of those, are linked to the illustrated coins. It would have been helpful too if additional views of Palmyra and the Aurelianic walls of Rome had been included. Third, in spite of the vigor and vividness of his expression especially in descriptive passages of military conflict Watson's text would surely have benefitted from the work of an editor versed in the fine points of grammar, usage, style and punctuation, all in the interest of imposing consistency and conformity with standard literary usage. A proofreader with an eagle's eye for misspellings and other irregularities would also have helped. It has become increasingly apparent that in today's publishing world attention of this kind, even in scholarly works, has been lacking, and the results are unfortunate.
In my way of sizing up an author's mind I examine the care or lack of it that he gives to proper diction and accepted literary usage because they rescue his thought from obscurity, confusion and pedestrian and flabby usage, which have become so common in contemporary literary production. I give a brief sampling of his "popularisms," which scholarly writing in particular would do best to avoid. Watson is overly fond of "level," "area," "basis," and the phrases "based on," and "with regard to," colorless and hackneyed words, for which English has an abundance of concrete and economical substitutes, which lend precision and liveliness to expression and condense the verbiage. "One very important manifestation of this problem was the high level of fraud perpetrated by the mint workers themselves..." (p. 127). Read "the enormous fraud..." "With regard to provincial administration, there were three areas to which Aurelian particularly addressed himself." (p. 154). Read "In the provincial administration...three (pressing) matters..." "The mint at Alexandria was thus an anomaly, operating on a different basis from the other imperial mints..." (p. 214). Read "which operated differently from..." "Homo's (a French author) first phase is, in reality, a phantom based on an over-interpretation of the coinage..." (p. 193). Read "a phantom that derived from..."
One of my pet peeves in contemporary writing and speech is the erroneous use of "agenda." Two glaring misapplications of this word appear in two successive sentences (p. 161): "Some of them [senators] may even have actively provoked the mob in order to further their own political agenda. It is clear that this agenda included the overthrow of Aurelian." (p. 161). Let it be known that agenda "are" a plural form in Latin that means "THINGS to be done;" it cannot be anything else. It is a slipshod extension of a word from parliamentary and business usage that is made to cover such notions as "ulterior motive," "covert design," "malign intent," "plan," etc. It is just plain wrong to construe it as a singular noun and convenient catch-all for other words and phrases which a writer is too lazy to look up. Watson ought to have known this, but perhaps he never was a serious student of Latin nor took a rigorous course in bone-head English. Another is the contemporary trend to exaggerate and employ overkill in the search for novel and forceful expression, while disregarding old tried and true usage. One of these is "impact," which means a forcible striking against. On page 198 Watson trots out this novelty: "Its [Christianity's] success can be put down...to the impact and good example of Christian charity..." I know that this word in the early 19th century was extended to mean "have an effect upon," but the image of striking against is too strong for the context. "Effect" would have done quite well here. A final example of this type is the endless application of "issue" to define almost any important circumstance or problem. "By the early summer of 271 his position was sufficiently secure for him to turn his attention to broader issues." Watson's choice to use that word was clearly dull and colorless. He might easily have written "more serious problems." Finally, Watson exhibits the growing trend of crumbling relationships in the language. Prepositions are words of relationship and their misuse in my estimation reflect the strained state of relationship among people in today's society. On page 203 he writes, "The cycle of foreign and civil wars not only drained the empire's...
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