The Greatest Story in the World, Period 2 by Horace G. Hutchinson

For a whole hundred years now, that is from A. D. 200 to 300, this / greatest story in the world is really made up of a succession of / small stories, each almost exactly the same as the last. They are / stories about the "barbarian," at some point or other of the / boundaries of the Empire, trying to break through, here and there / succeeding in making a breach in the wall, and penetrating into the / Empire, but again and again being thrust back, so that the old / boundaries, as established by Hadrian, were on the whole tolerably / well maintained all through this hundred years.

The first serious break in the wall was made by a tribe called the / Franks, from the east side of the Rhine, breaking through the / boundary between the Empire and Germany. There was at least one / other tribe in alliance with the Franks in this invasion, but it is / the Franks of whom we should, I think, take notice particularly, / because here we find them for the first time in what the Romans / called Gaul, and in what is now called, from these very Franks, or / from their descendants, France.

[Sidenote: The Gallic Empire]

But they did not remain long in Gaul at that time. They were driven / out by the legions. And the legions in that province had to do the / work of driving them out without getting any help from Rome. The / result of that was that these legions, finding that they had to rely / on themselves, thought that they might as well have a government of / their own. They {15} chose an "emperor" for themselves, a "Gallic / Empire" was founded -- the Empire of Gaul -- and it was obeyed even / across the Pyrenees, in Spain, and across the Channel, in Britain. / This so-called Gallic Empire had an existence of about thirty years, / after which it was overthrown and the Empire of Rome was / re-established over Gaul.

The story was almost exactly repeated in other parts of the Empire. / The Goths, a tribe perhaps of the same race and origin as the Franks, / and of similar habits, but living not so far towards the north, broke / in across the Danube. They were a very formidable force, and overran / the Balkans. They defeated a Roman army, under the Emperor Decius / himself, and Decius was killed in the battle. We must not allow / ourselves to be misled by the term "barbarian," applied by the Romans / to all these peoples, and to think of them as mere savages. These / Goths had possessions on the Black Sea and they are said to have sent / out, during this century, a fleet estimated at 500 ships which made / incursions along the coasts of Asia Minor and Greece as formidable as / any that the Vikings, later on, made further north. They actually / stormed and pillaged such cities as Corinth and Athens.

Further east the Persians came pressing in upon the Empire. They / were defeated and driven back by the Syrian _dux Orientis_, duke of / the East, as he was called. He was no more than a high official, / appointed by Rome, but after this success against the Persians he / proclaimed himself as an independent prince, the Prince of Palmyra. / Zenobia, his widow, who succeeded him in his real power, though a / young son was the successor to his title, maintained the independence / of Palmyra, and even conquered Egypt, but again there happened that / which we have seen more than once in the course of the great / story -- the {16} enemies of Rome prevail against her for a while, / until she is provoked to put forth her full strength against them; / but, once she is roused to strenuous action, they go down before her. / Zenobia was defeated and brought in triumph to Rome about twenty-four / years before the end of the century, and in A. D. 300 the Roman Empire / stood within its bounds not greatly changed from its bounds of a / hundred years before. There was, however, a real, if not a very / visible, difference: the "barbarians," although for the time thrust / back, had probably learnt that the Roman power was not quite / invincible; and the legions guarding the frontiers had learnt that / they had to rely on their own forces, without assistance from the / central headquarters at Rome, for repelling the barbarians, and / therefore felt less disposed to look on Rome as their master.

[Sidenote: The barbarians]

The condition of the Empire within its frontiers was far less / prosperous at the close than it had been at the beginning of the / century. We saw how the Greek thought and culture had been carried / along the Roman roads to the far boundaries of the Empire. But / although the barbarian armies were still kept outside those / boundaries, a great many of the barbarians had come to settle within / the Empire and had been taken into the legions. No doubt some of / them learned the arts and the wisdom and the civilisation which the / Romans had learnt from the Greeks, but on the other hand they / prevented the spreading of these good lessons throughout the world. / If they became somewhat "Romanised," the Roman Empire at the same / time became somewhat "barbarised," by their coming in. Moreover / Gaul, as we have seen, had been the scene of war, and so, too, parts / of Italy itself, Greece, the Balkans, as we should call the district / now, Asia Minor and Egypt. There was scarcely a corner of the Empire / in which the _Pax {17} Romana_, had not been broken. Therefore the / fields were waste, the population diminished, the towns were / partially abandoned, trade was nearly at a standstill. Disease and / lack of food followed in the train of war.