StudySpace: Western Civilizations, 16 e.

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1. Introduction
1. Rome after 180
2. Transitions -- ancient to medieval world: Late Antiquity
3. The Spread and triumph of Christianity
4. "Barbarization"
5. Cultural assimilation
2. The Reorganized Empire
1. The Reign of Diocletian (c. 236-305; emperor 284-305)
1. Called himself dominus ("lord")
2. Persian-style ceremonial deference at court
3. Took steps to define formal rules of imperial succession
4. Divided his realm in half
1. Diocletian took wealthier eastern half
2. Maximian took the eastern half
5. The "Tetrarchy" ("the rule of the four")
1. Permitted a degree of decentralization
2. Designed to end succession disputes
6. Separated military from civilian chains of command
7. Stabilized the currency and new system of taxation
8. Ruled from Nicomedia (Asia Minor), retires at Split (Croatia) in 305
2. The Reign of Constantine (272-337; emperor 324-337)
1. Followed Diocletian's footsteps
2. Government
1. Ruled by decree
2. Extensive spy network
3. Declared army service hereditary
4. Bound farmers and craftsmen to their trade
3. Moves the capital to Constantinople (324)
4. Made imperial succession hereditary
1. Brought Rome back to principle of dynastic monarchy
2. Divided his realm among three sons
3. From Constantine to Theodosius
1. Constantinople as leading city
2. Regionalism
3. Growing gap between rich and poor
4. Secessionist movements (Britain, Spain, Gaul, and Germany)
3. The Emergence and Triumph of Christianity
1. How can we explain the appeal of early Christianity?
2. The career of Jesus
1. First-century sources
2. Born in Judea
3. Preaching, healing, and teaching
4. Messianic entry (30) into Jerusalem during Passover
5. Arrest
1. Pontius Pilate
2. Crucifixion
3. The Christ (the "anointed one")
3. Jesus and Second Temple Jerusalem
1. The Dead Sea Scrolls
2. Roman control of Judea was tenuous
3. Zealots sought to expel the Romans by force
1. Destruction of the Jewish Temple (66-70)
2. Destruction of Jerusalem (132-135)
4. Judaism, monotheism, and the covenant
1. Interpreting the Covenant
1. The Torah -- first five books of Old Testament
2. Sadducees -- hereditary Temple priesthood and aristocratic guardians
3. Pharisees -- interpreters of religious law
4. Essenes -- radical, splinter group, spiritual deliverance through asceticism
5. Jesus as controversial figure
1. He was the messiah promised by God to deliver Israel
6. Re-interpretation of Jesus' role as messiah: Greek theology
4. The Growth of Christianity in the Hellenistic World
1. St. Paul (c. 10- c. 67)
1. Born at Tarsus (Asia Minor)
2. Converted to Christianity
3. Declared himself to be the apostle to the Gentiles
4. Rejected Jewish law as irrelevant to salvation
5. Making converts among Greek-speaking Jewish communities
2. The appeal of Christianity
1. Communal aspect
2. Early organizational structure
3. Role of women
4. Appealed to broad range of social classes
5. Promise of salvation
3. Judaism and Christianity
1. Hostility
2. Understanding the messiah
4. Christianity and the Roman Empire
1. Treated early appearance of Christianity with indifference
2. Persecutions were intermittent and short-lived
3. By 300, 1-5% of total Roman population were perhaps Christians
4. Constantine's conversion -- the Milvian Bridge (312)
1. Made Christianity the favored religion
5. Julian the Apostate -- abandoned Christianity and attempted to revive Roman paganism
6. Theodosius the Great
1. Prohibits pagan worship
2. Makes Christianity the state religion
5. The New Contours of Fourth-Century Christianity
1. Doctrinal Quarrels
1. Arians and Athanasians: the Trinity
2. The importance of orthodoxy
3. Christian theology and the Classical tradition
4. Council of Nicea (325)
1. Arian heresy is condemned
2. Emperor presided over councils
5. The growth of ecclesiastical organization
1. Clergy and laity
2. Hierarchical organization
1. Distinctions of rank
2. The Pope as bishop of Rome
3. The "Petrine Succession"
6. The spread of monasticism
1. Disillusionment
1. Asceticism as a substitute for martyrdom
2. Response to increasing worldliness
2. St. Benedict of Nursia (c. 480-c. 547)
1. The Latin or Benedictine Rule
1. Poverty, chastity, obedience, labor and prayer
2. Absolute authority of the abbot
3. Missionary work
4. Dignity of human labor
7. Changing attitudes toward women, marriage, and the body
1. Christianity favorable toward women
2. The denigration of women
3. Virginity as highest spiritual standard
4. The denigration of sexuality
6. The Germanic Invasion and the Fall of the Western Roman Empire
1. Observations
1. Rome faces renewed pressure beyond its frontiers
2. Power of Persia forced Rome to maintain a large army along the eastern frontier
3. Mid-third century attacks by Germanic tribes, renewed in early fifth century
2. German-Roman Relations
1. The German presence in Rome
1. Treated as barbarians
2. German soldiers familiar in the Roman army
3. Some German tribes had been settled inside Roman borders (foederati)
4. Many Germans had converted to Arian Christianity
3. Collapse of the western empire
1. Movement of the Huns to the Black Sea (mid-fourth century) forced the Goths and others to migrate south
2. The Goths had been clients of Rome for several centuries
3. The Romans permit the Goths to cross the Danube (376)
4. Revolt of the Goths (378) put down at the Battle of Adrianople
5. Emperor Theodosius (r. 379-395)
1. Restored peace by accommodating the Goth's demands
2. Enrolled them in the Roman army
3. Divided the empire between his two sons
4. The Goths rebelled under Alaric and invaded Italy
5. The Huns moved westward forcing other Germanic tribes toward the Rhine frontier
6. The Vandals cross the Rhine and invade Gaul (406/7)
1. Joined by the Goths
2. The city of Rome is sacked (410)
3. The Goths move westward into Gaul and Spain (Visigoths)
7. Vandals attack Rome by sea (445)
8. Franks, Burgundians and Alamans establish kingdoms in Gaul
9. Romulus Augustulus is deposed by Odovacer (476)
4. The Success and Impact of the Germanic Invasions
1. Invading armies were small but grew larger "on the march"
2. Explaining Rome's collapse
1. The western empire could not defend itself
2. Armies were difficult to move in an emergency
3. Tax levels were already high so support of the army was made more difficult
4. Low civilian morale
5. Bureaucratic regime inspired little loyalty
3. The survival of the eastern empire
1. Greater wealth to maintain military forces
2. Cities remained powerful centers of industry and trade
3. Smaller borders and its armies were better supplied
4. Economic consequences
1. Western empire characterized by mass produced, low cost, high quality consumer goods
2. By 500, the economy was shattered
3. Standards of craftsmanship declined
5. Roman life
1. Tax, legal and administrative systems survived
2. Aristocrats continued to dominate civic life
3. The survival of Roman culture
7. The Shaping of Western Christian Thought
1. The classical heritage and the Church Fathers
2. St. Jerome (c. 340-420)
1. Translated the Bible into Latin (the Vulgate)
2. Bible to be understood allegorically
3. St. Ambrose (c. 340-397)
1. On the Duties of Ministers
2. God helps some Christians and not others (the "gift of grace")
4. The life and thought of St. Augustine (354-430)
1. The quest for Christianity
2. Archbishop of Hippo (395)
3. Confessions
1. Predestination
2. Doctrine of charity
4. On the City of God
1. Predestination
2. City of Man -- "live according to man"
3. City of God -- "live according to God"
4. The Bible contains all wisdom
5. A modified acceptance of classical thought
5. Boethius links classical and medieval thought (c. 480-524)
1. The "last of the Romans"
2. Wrote handbooks on the liberal arts
3. Handbooks on arithmetic and music
4. Aristotelian logic
5. The Consolation of Philosophy
1. What is human happiness?
2. The "highest good" is God
6. Execution by Theodoric (524)
8. The Christianization of Classical Culture in the West
1. The challenge of classical ideas
2. Replacing paganism with Christianity
3. "Winnowing out" of classical texts
4. Neoplatonism
5. What is the relationship between classical thought and Christianity?
6. Cassiodorus (c. 490-c. 583)
1. History of the Goths
2. The Institutes
3. Classical literature as primer for understanding the Bible
4. Copying manuscripts
7. Preserving Christianity
9. Eastern Rome and the Western Empire
1. Justinian's revival of the empire (482-565; emperor 527-565)
1. Barbarian pressures
2. The heir of imperil Rome
3. Empress Theodora (c. 500-547)
2. The codification of Roman law
1. Code
2. Novels
3. Digest
4. Corpus Juris Civilis
3. Justinian's military conquests -- the "Roman lake"
4. The impact of Justinian's reconquest on the western empire
1. Devastation in northern and central Italy
2. The Lombard invasion
3. Visigoths in Spain
10. Conclusion
1. Late antiquity
2. Vulgarization of learned culture
3. Christianization of the empire
4. Byzantium, Islam, and Western Europe

 

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