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ewxEarly this year I started reading Edward Gibbon's History Of The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire, intending to finish it by the end of the year. Well, in the last few days of June I finished the fourth volume (this edition has eight volumes) so I'm bang on schedule.
Obviously there is a lot that goes on in four volumes; I would call Gibbon's writing neither concise nor dense, but he does make good use of words to convey facts and opinions. However, the key events that occupy these volumes are the rise of Christianity, the conversion of Constantine and the doctrinal disputes that wracked the Empire and its western successors; the division of the Empire; and the disintegration of the Western Empire.
Gibbon seems to me to less feel that it "couldn't happen again" than the author of the introduction perhaps gives him credit for; but the great European catastrophes of the last couple of centuries were ahead of him, and yes, perhaps they do show him up as being over-optimistic regarding the medium term future of European civilization. Which should be a lesson for those of us living with late-20th-century prosperity without the Soviet threat to remind us of the alternatives.
Gibbon might draw a comparison between the current fuss over immigration and the migration - violent and otherwise - of barbarians into the Empire's land and their recruitment into the army. But I think the example of the USA in particular is that modern western societies have far better institutions to cope with this, and benefit from it, than the Romans did.
The last few pages, apart from musings on general lessons, concern the western successor states (nominally Franks, Goths, Angles/Saxons, etc, though all sorts of people ended up in all sorts of places, and plenty of people stayed where they and their ancestors had been for many years). While the British strand is relatively familiar to me my knowledge of the transition from Gaul to France, and the early centuries of that kingdom, are quite lacking; perhaps a comprehensive history of France will make a good buy at some point.
Gibbon famously dislikes both Christianity and the Byzantine Empire. The former he blames for the weakening of Roman military prowess, though admitting that perhaps its spread amongst the enemies and eventual new rulers of the Western Empire might have softened the blow; though the political and legal maneuvers of Theodoric and Clovis might equally, and surely more plausibly, be explained by practicality rather than a religiously-induced compassion (Clovis for instance seems to have no compunction about great brutality when it suited him; equally the Vandals were so destructive, despite their ostensible Christianity, that their name holds a negative meaning even today). The latter, later Empire is gloriously described as "in a perpetual and premature state of decay", an unfair attitude that only seems to have lost widespread traction in the relatively recent past; perhaps the next volume, which includes Justinian, will offer a better light.
Gibbon's liking for sarcasm and satire, more often expressed in footnotes than in the body of the text, makes his work a joy to read; Decline And Fall is, to me, a work of art in a sense unrelated to its function as a history.
Expect another report in December or January!
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-02 01:10 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-02 03:03 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-02 03:24 am (UTC)Infantry comprised of Halberdiers, Varangian Guard and Byz Inf swordsmen eats Mongols for brekky. Especially in forest.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-02 04:02 am (UTC)Personally, I try to fight the Mongols from the top of a hill with lots of arbalests. They have an unfortunate habit of sending in their best troops first, while you've still got lots of ammo. They quickly get slaughtered and routed leaving the less Golden bits of the Horde to be easily mopped up.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-02 04:41 am (UTC)Re: Mongols - I'll play you the Battle of Khazar, 1234, when Lord Stepan Nezhkov's battered, weary Russians cobbled together with ticky tacky fought the ENTIRE GOLDEN HORDE to a standstill and killed the Khan in the first charge.
Clue:
Dismounted Druzhina = Feudal Foot Knights in units of 60.
Halberdiers in forest.
Steppe Heavy Cav to take on Mongol Horse Archers on more or less equal terms.
Steppe Cav to clean up.
My greatest ever military triumph.
(no subject)
Date: 2004-07-02 04:42 am (UTC)Nezhkov's No-Marks = 4,000 troops.
Ogadai's Golden Horde = 13,000.