Maximinus Thrax

Maximinus Thrax

Bust of Maximinus Thrax
in Capitoline Museums, Rome
27th Emperor of the Roman Empire
Reign 20 March 235 – early May 238
Predecessor Severus Alexander
Successor Pupienus and Balbinus
Born c. 173
Thrace or Moesia
Died May 238 (aged 65)
Aquileia, Italy
Wife
Issue Gaius Julius Verus Maximus
Full name
Gaius Julius Verus Maximinus Augustus
Father Unknown, possibly Micca[1]
Mother Unknown, possibly Ababa[1]

Maximinus Thrax (Latin: Gaius Julius Verus Maximinus Augustus;[2] c. 173 – May 238), also known as Maximinus I, was Roman Emperor from 235 to 238.

Maximinus is described by several ancient sources, though none are contemporary except Herodian's Roman History. He was a so-called barracks emperor of the 3rd century; his rule is often considered to mark the beginning of the Crisis of the Third Century. He died at Aquileia whilst attempting to put down a Senatorial revolt.

Rise to power

Most likely Maximinus was of Thraco-Roman origin (believed so by Herodian in his writings).[3] According to the notoriously unreliable Augustan History (Historia Augusta), he was born in Thrace or Moesia to a Gothic father and an Alanic mother,[4] an Iranian people of the Scythian-Sarmatian branch; however, the supposed parentage is highly unlikely, as the presence of the Goths in the Danubian area is first attested after the beginning of the Crisis of the Third Century. British historian Ronald Syme, writing that "the word 'Gothia' should have sufficed for condemnation" of the passage in the Augustan History, felt that the burden of evidence from Herodian, Syncellus and elsewhere pointed to Maximinus having been born in Moesia.[5] The references to his "Gothic" ancestry might refer to a Thracian Getae origin (the two populations were often confused by later writers, most notably by Jordanes in his Getica), as suggested by the paragraphs describing how "he was singularly beloved by the Getae, moreover, as if he were one of themselves" and how he spoke "almost pure Thracian".[6]

His background was, in any case, that of a provincial of low birth, and was seen by the Senate as a barbarian, not even a true Roman, despite Caracalla’s edict granting citizenship to all freeborn inhabitants of the Empire.[7] In many ways, Maximinus was similar to the later Thraco-Roman emperors of the 3rd-5th century (Licinius, Galerius, Aureolus, Leo the Thracian, etc.), elevating themselves, via a military career, from the condition of a common soldier in one of the Roman legions to the foremost positions of political power. He joined the army during the reign of Septimius Severus,[8] but did not rise to a powerful position until promoted by Alexander Severus.[9] Maximinus was in command of Legio IV Italica, composed of recruits from Pannonia,[10] who were angered by Alexander's payments to the Alemanni and his avoidance of war.[11] The troops, among whom included the Legio XXII Primigenia, elected the stern Maximinus, killing young Alexander and his mother at Moguntiacum (modern Mainz).[12] The Praetorian Guard acclaimed him emperor, and their choice was grudgingly confirmed by the Senate,[7] who were displeased to have a peasant as emperor. His son Maximus became caesar.[7]

Rule

O: laureate draped and cuirassed bust of Maximinus

MAXIMINVS PIVS AVG GERM

 R: Maximinus holding sceptre; standard on either side

P M TR P II COS P P

silver denarius struck in Rome from February to December 236 AD; ref.: RIC 4

Consolidation of power

Maximinus hated the nobility and was ruthless towards those he suspected of plotting against him.[13] He began by eliminating the close advisors of Alexander.[14] His suspicions may have been justified; two plots against Maximinus were foiled.[15] The first was during a campaign across the Rhine, when a group of officers, supported by influential senators, plotted to destroy a bridge across the river, in order to strand Maximinus in hostile territory. [16] They planned to elect senator Magnus emperor, afterwards; but the conspiracy was discovered and the conspirators executed.[13] The second plot involved Mesopotamian archers who were loyal to Alexander.[17] They planned to elevate Quartinus, but their leader Macedo changed sides and murdered Quartinus instead, although this was not enough to save his own life.[13]

Defence of frontiers

The accession of Maximinus is commonly seen as the beginning of the Crisis of the Third Century (also known as the "Military Anarchy" or the "Imperial Crisis"), the commonly applied name for the crumbling and near collapse of the Roman Empire between 235 and 284 caused by three simultaneous crises: external invasion, internal civil war, and economic collapse.[9]

Maximinus' first campaign was against the Alamanni, whom Maximinus defeated despite heavy Roman casualties in a swamp in the Agri Decumates.[18] After the victory, Maximinus took the title Germanicus Maximus,[7] raised his son Maximus to the rank of caesar and princeps iuventutis, and deified his late wife Paulina.[14] Maximinus may have launched a second campaign deep into Germania, defeating a Germanic tribe beyond the Weser in the Battle at the Harzhorn.[19][20] Securing the German frontier, at least for a while, Maximinus then set up a winter encampment at Sirmium in Pannonia,[7] and from that supply base fought the Dacians and the Sarmatians during the winter of 235–236.[14]

Gordian I and Gordian II

Early in 238, in the province of Africa, a treasury official's extortions through false judgments in corrupt courts against some local landowners ignited a full-scale revolt in the province.[21] The landowners armed their clients and their agricultural workers and entered Thysdrus (modern El Djem), where they murdered the offending official and his bodyguards[22] and proclaimed the aged governor of the province, Marcus Antonius Gordianus Sempronianus (Gordian I), and his son, Gordian II, as co-emperors.[23] The Senate in Rome switched allegiance, gave both Gordian and Gordian II the title of Augustus, and set about rousing the provinces in support of the pair.[24] Maximinus, wintering at Sirmium immediately assembled his army and advanced on Rome, the Pannonian legions leading the way.[14]

Meanwhile, in Africa, the revolt had not gone as planned. The province of Africa was bordered on the west by the province of Numidia, whose governor, Capelianus, nursed a long-standing grudge against the Gordians and controlled the only legionary unit (III Augusta) in the area.[25] He marched on Carthage and easily overwhelmed the local militias defending the city.[21] Gordian II was killed in the fighting and, on hearing this, Gordian I hanged himself with his belt.[26]

Pupienus, Balbinus, and Gordian III

When the African revolt collapsed, the Senate found itself in great jeopardy.[27] Having shown clear support for the Gordians, they could expect no clemency from Maximinus when he reached Rome. In this predicament, they determined to defy Maximinus and elected two of their number, Pupienus and Balbinus, as co-emperors.[14] When the Roman mob heard that the Senate had selected two men from the patrician class, men whom the ordinary people held in no great regard, they protested, showering the imperial cortège with sticks and stones.[28] A faction in Rome preferred Gordian's grandson (Gordian III), and there was severe street fighting. The co-emperors had no option but to compromise, and, sending for the grandson of the elder Gordian they appointed him Caesar.[29]

Defeat and death

Maximinus marched on Rome,[30] but Aquileia closed its gates against him. His troops became disaffected during the unexpected siege of the city, during which they suffered from famine and disease.[13] In May 238, soldiers of the II Parthica in his camp assassinated him, his son, and his chief ministers.[27] Their heads were cut off, placed on poles, and carried to Rome by cavalrymen.[14]

Pupienus and Balbinus then became undisputed co-emperors.

Politics

Maximinus doubled the pay of soldiers;[8] this act, along with virtually continuous warfare, required higher taxes. Tax-collectors began to resort to violent methods and illegal confiscations, further alienating the governing class from everyone else.[14]

According to early church historian Eusebius of Caesarea, the Imperial household of Maximinus' predecessor, Alexander, had contained many Christians. Eusebius states that, hating his predecessor's household, Maximinius ordered that the leaders of the churches should be put to death.[31][32] According to Eusebius, this persecution of 235 sent Hippolytus of Rome and Pope Pontian into exile but other evidence suggests that the persecutions of 235 were local to the provinces where they occurred rather than happening under the direction of the Emperor.[33]

Appearance

Ancient sources, ranging from the unreliable Historia Augusta to Herodian, speak of Maximinus as a man of significantly greater size than his contemporaries.[34][35] He is, moreover, depicted in ancient imagery as a man with a prominent brow, nose, and jaw; symptoms of acromegaly.[36] His thumb was said to be so large that he wore his wife's bracelet as a ring for it.

According to Historia Augusta, "he was of such size, so Cordus reports, that men said he was eight foot, six inches (c. 2.5 metres) in height".[37] It is very likely however that this is one of the many 'tall tales' in the Historia Augusta, and is immediately suspect due to its citation of 'Cordus', one of the several fictitious authorities the work cites.[38]

Although not going into the supposedly detailed portions of Historia Augusta, the historian Herodian, a contemporary of Maximinus, mentions him as a man of greater size, noting that: "He was in any case a man of such frightening appearance and colossal size that there is no obvious comparison to be drawn with any of the best-trained Greek athletes or warrior elite of the barbarians."[39]

Some historians interpret the stories on Maximinus' unusual height (as well as other information on his appearance, like excessive sweating and superhuman strength) as popular stereotyped attributes which do no more than intentionally turn him into a stylized embodiment of the barbarian bandit[40] or emphasize the admiration and aversion that the image of the soldier evoked in the civilian population.[41]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 Historia Augusta, Life of Maximinus, 1:6
  2. ↑ In Classical Latin, Maximinus' name would be inscribed as GAIVS IVLIVS VERVS MAXIMINVS AVGVSTVS.
  3. ↑ Herodian, 7:1:1-2
  4. ↑ Historia Augusta, Life of Maximinus, 1:5
  5. ↑ Syme, pp. 182, 185–6
  6. ↑ Historia Augusta, Life of Maximinus, 2:5
  7. 1 2 3 4 5 Southern, pg. 64
  8. 1 2 Potter, pg. 168
  9. 1 2 Canduci, pg. 61
  10. ↑ Herodian, 8:6:1
  11. ↑ Southern, pg. 63
  12. ↑ Potter, pg. 167
  13. 1 2 3 4 Canduci, pg. 62
  14. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Meckler, Maximinus Thrax
  15. ↑ Potter, pg. 169
  16. ↑ Herodian, 7:1:5-6
  17. ↑ Historia Augusta, Life of Maximinus, 11:1
  18. ↑ Herodian, 7:2:7
  19. ↑ Historia Augusta, The Two Maximini. 12:1-4
  20. ↑ Herodian, 7:2:3
  21. 1 2 Canduci, pg. 63
  22. ↑ Herodian, 7:4:6
  23. ↑ Southern, pg. 66
  24. ↑ Zonaras, 12:16
  25. ↑ Potter, pg. 170
  26. ↑ Historia Augusta, Life of Maximinus, 19:2
  27. 1 2 Southern, pg. 67
  28. ↑ Herodian, 7:10:5
  29. ↑ Canduci, pg. 66
  30. ↑ Zosimus, 1:12
  31. ↑ Eusebius. "Church History". Book 6, Chapter 28. New Advent. Retrieved 25 April 2014.
  32. ↑ Papandrea, James L. (January 23, 2012). Reading the Early Church Fathers: From the Didache to Nicaea. Paulist Press. ISBN 978-0809147519.
  33. ↑ Graeme Clark, "Third-Century Christianity", in the Cambridge Ancient History 2nd ed., volume 12: The Crisis of Empire, A.D. 193–337, ed. Alan K. Bowman, Peter Garnsey, and Averil Cameron (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), p.623.
  34. ↑ Historia Augusta, Life of Maximinus, 2:2
  35. ↑ Herodian, 7:1:2
  36. ↑ Klawans, Harold L. The Medicine of History from Paracelsus to Freud, Raven Press, 1982, New York, 3–15
  37. ↑ Historia Augusta, Life of Maximinus, 6:8
  38. ↑ Syme, pp. 1-16
  39. ↑ Herodian, 7:1:12
  40. ↑ Thomas Grünewald, transl. by John Drinkwater. Bandits in the Roman Empire:, Myth and Reality, Routledge, 2004, p. 84. ISBN 0-415-32744-X
  41. ↑ Jean-Michel Carrié in Andrea Giardina (ed.), transl. by Lydia G. Cochrane. The Romans, University of Chicago Press, 1993, p. 116-117. ISBN 0-226-29050-6

Sources

Primary sources

Secondary sources

Further reading

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Regnal titles
Preceded by
Alexander Severus		 Roman Emperor
235–238
Served alongside: Gordian I, Gordian II, Pupienus and Balbinus (all 238)		 Succeeded by
Pupienus and Balbinus
Political offices
Preceded by
Gnaeus Claudius Severus,
Titus Claudius Quintianus		 Consul of the Roman Empire
236
with Marcus Pupienus Africanus Maximus 		Succeeded by
Lucius Marius Perpetuus,
Lucius Mummius Felix Cornelianus
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