HistoryofWesternCivilizationbefo (36).pdf

4.3 The Crisis of the Third Century and ConstantineHi,everybody.This is the third part of chapter four:The Crisis of the Third Century and Constantine.1.The Year of the Five Emperors 193ADWe talked about the last time,Commodus was assassinated in 192 and this marked the end of the 200-year Pax Romana.The next year 193 ADa new civil war started.Within one year five emperors claimed to be the Roman Emperor.The first one was Pertinax,a son of a freed slave;thefirst emperor was not from the patrician family.He first worked as a school teacher,later abandoned his career and joined the army.Less thanthree months Pertinax was murdered by his own soldiers.The Severan DynastyThe last of the five emperors was Severus,another powerful general who restored the order and founded the Severan Dynasty.This dynasty hadexperienced power struggles within the imperial family and constant political turmoil.It had 6 emperors,ruled 43 years until the last emperorSeverus Alexander was assassinated by his own troops in 235.It was the last dynasty of the Roman Empire before the Crisis of the Third Century.2.The Crisis of the Third Century(235284AD)also known as the Imperial Crisis and Military Anarchy was a period in the history of theRoman Empire.The Crisis lasted for 50 years started from the assassination of Severus Alexander in 235 to 284 when Diocletian becameemperor.The Roman Empire nearly collapsed under the combined crises including barbarian invasions,civil wars,plague,and economic disasters.During these 50 years,at least 26 people claimed themselves the title of emperor,most of them powerful army generals;they controlled all or partof the Empire.At the same time 26 were accepted by the Roman Senate as legitimate emperors.17 of these legitimate emperors wereassassinated or killed in civil war.By 268,the empire had broken into three parts:first the Gallic Empire to the west,including provinces of Germania,and Gaul,and sometimeHispania,and Britannia;second the Palmyrene Empire,including the eastern provinces of Syria Palaestina,Arabia,Egypt and large parts of AsiaMinor.Palmyra is in todays Syria.And in the middle was the independent Roman Empire.3.External Threats came from all directions.Berbers,an ethnic group indigenous to North Africa harassed the southern frontiers.To the east intodays Iran there was a constant threat to the Roman Empire,Sasanian Empire.The Sasanian Empire from 224 to 651 was the Persian Empirebefore the rise of Islam.But the biggest threat was from north and west,the Germanic peoples(日耳曼人日耳曼人).Germania was the Roman termfor the region in north-central Europe,located to the north and east of the Gaul,an area extended from the Danube River to the Baltic Sea andfrom the Rhine River to the Vistula River in Poland.Germanic peoples referred to the tribes lived in Germania.They were considered barbariansby Romans,less civilized and more physically hardened.4.Germanic peoples originally lived in the southern region of Scandinavia.From around 500BC they started migration to the south andsoutheast,finally became the threat of the Roman frontiers.We can see the migration of the Germanic peoples from this map.5.The Germanic people in the west were the Franks on the Lower and Middle Rhine River area.To the east the Goths,they played animportant role in the fall of the Western Roman Empire.The western branch of the Goths called Visigoths and the eastern branch of Goths calledOstrogoths.The Vandals were another East Germanic inhabiting present-day southern Poland.6.Todays Germanic peoples are those who speak Germanic languages,a branch of the Indo-European language family.The West Germaniclanguages including English,German and Dutch.The North Germanic languages are Danish,Faroese,Icelandic,Norwegian and Swedish.Weshould know the difference between the Germanic peoples(日耳曼人),and Germans.Germen has three meanings,first(德意志人)all peoplewho speaks German,the Germanic ethnic group including Germans in Germany and other counties,mainly Austria,Switzerland,Liechtenstein andLuxembourg.Second(德国人)the people of the county of Germany.Third,German is a language spoken by all Germans(德语).The other twoimportant languages in Europe are Romance and Slavic language.The Romance languages also called the Latin languages including Spanish,Portuguese,French,Italian,and Romanian and so on.The Slavic languages including Russian,Belarusian,Ukrainian,Polish,Czech and Slovakand so on.7.Aurelian 270 to 275Aurelian was the emperor ruled the Empire from 270 to 275.He was a great military commander.He stabilized the frontiers by defeating severalGermanic tribes and conquered the Gallic Empire in the west and Palmyrene Empire in the east.He united the whole Empire.The city of Orlanscity of Aurelian in France is named after Aurelian.8.Diocletian(284-305)was a successful Soldier-Emperor who finally restored and stabilized the Empire and finally finished the Crisis of theThird Century.The Tetrarchy.Diocletian received the title of Iovius or Jupiter thus was treated like a living god.Diocletian created a new form of governmentTetrarchy;the term Tetrarchy was used by historians in the 19th century to describe the new form of government.It was from a Greek termmeaning leadership of four people.Diocletian divided the Empire into eastern and western parts and each part ruled by a senior emperor calledAugustus and a junior emperor called Caesar.Caesar was younger,who would be adopted by the Augustus as son and heir and marry thedaughter of Augustus and in the future to succeed Augusta.From this map,we can see the empire were ruled by the four emperors.In the east,Diocletian was Augustus,he ruled this area,and Caesar was Galerius;in the west the Augustus Maximian ruled this area,and the CaesarConstantius lived in this area.Thus the empire was divided into four districts.1Great Persecution.One day in 299,Diocletian took part in a ceremony of sacrifice aimed to predict the future.But the Roman priests wereunable to obtain the desired omens.They blamed this failure to the presence of the Christians.This led to the Great Persecution from 303-313.Diocletian issued four Edict against the Christians ordered the destruction of Christian scriptures and places of worship across the empire,andprohibited Christians from assembling for worship.Many Christians have been executed.9.Saint Constantine 306-337Constantine was Roman Emperor from 306 to 337.We know Diocletian created a new form of government Tetrarchy.In the East Diocletian wasAugustus,Caesar was Galerius;in the west Maximian was Augustus,and the Caesar was Constantius.Constantine was the son of Constantius,thejunior or deputy emperor called Caesar,his mother Helena was Greek.In 305 the two emperors Diocletian in the east and Maximian in the westboth abdicated,giving up being emperor.This action was intended to promote the two Caesars to be Augustus.But in the west the sons of seniorand junior emperor started fighting each other.In 312 at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge outside Rome,Constantine defeated and killed his enemyMaxentius,the son of the former Augustus Maximian.The night before the battle,Constantine was told in a dream to mark his shield with a signcalled Chi Rho,a cross formed by the first two letters of the Greek word for Christ.He followed it and won the battle.He was the firstemperor baptized and converted to Christianity.He became the sole ruler of both west and east by 324.He established his capital in Byzantium,called it New Rome,later known as Constantinople.He began to transform the Roman Empire into a Christian state and Christianity into a statereligion of the Roman Empire.10.This is the Battle of the Milvian Bridge.We can see Cristian symbol Chi Rho from the side of Constantines army.11.These are the key Words:the Crisis of the Third Century,Germanic peoples,Tetrarchy，Constantine,Constantinople.This is the third part of the 4th chapter the Crisis of the Third Century and Constantine.2