Roman Empire’s Transformation: Division, Barbarian Influx, and Legacy

The third-century civil wars brought the Roman Empire to a crisis. Diocletian’s creation of the dominate and reorganization of government temporarily relieved this crisis, but his reforms only delayed the division of the empire. In the late fourth century, migrations of non-Roman peoples fleeing the Huns brought intense pressures on the central government. Emperor Theodosius I divided the empire into western and eastern halves in 395 to try to improve its administration and defense. When Roman authorities bungled the task of integrating barbarian tribes into Roman society, the newcomers created kingdoms that eventually replaced imperial government in the west. Roman history increasingly divided into two regional streams, even though emperors as late as Justinian in the sixth century retained the dream of reuniting the empire and restoring its glory.

The large-scale immigration of barbarian tribes into the Roman Empire transformed not only the western empire’s politics, society, and economy but also the tribes themselves, as they developed their own ethnic identities while organizing themselves into kingdoms inside Roman territory. The economic deterioration and political weakness that accompanied these often violent changes destroyed the public-spiritedness of the elite, which had been one of the foundations of imperial stability, as wealthy nobles retreated to self-sufficient country estates and shunned municipal office.

The eastern empire fared better economically than the western and avoided the worst violence of the migrations. Eastern emperors attempted to preserve “Romanness” by maintaining Roman culture and political traditions. The financial drain of trying to reunite the empire by wars against the new kingdoms increased social discontent by driving tax rates to unbearable levels, while the concentration of authority in the capital weakened local communities.

Constantine’s conversion to Christianity in 312 marked a turning point in Western history. Christianization of the empire occurred gradually, and it was not until 391 that it became the official state religion and public polytheist worship was completely banned. Christians attempted to come closer to God by abandoning everyday society to live as monks. Monastic life redefined the meaning of holiness by creating communities of God’s heroes who withdrew from this world to devote their service to glorifying the next. In the end, the imperial vision of unity faded in the face of the powerful effects of political and social transformation. Nevertheless, the memory of Roman power and culture remained potent and present, providing an influential inheritance to the peoples and states that would become Rome’s heirs in the next stage of Western civilization.

Also, the greatest danger to the survival of the plays, histories, philosophical works, poems, speeches, and novels of classical Greece and Rome, which were polytheist and therefore potentially subversive of Christian belief, stemmed not so much from active censorship as simple neglect. Another factor promoting the preservation of classical literature was that the principles of classical rhetoric provided the guidelines for the most effective presentation of Christian theology. Theologians refuted heretical Christian doctrines by employing the dialogue form pioneered by Plato, and polytheist traditions of biography praising heroes inspired the hugely popular genre of saints’ lives.

The growth of Christian literature generated a technological innovation used also to preserve classical literature. Polytheist scribes had written books on sheets of parchment or paper.

Despite its continuing importance in education and rhetoric, classical Greek and Latin literature barely survived the war-torn world dominated by Christians.