As evidenced by the division of the various programs of the teaching competitions in history, the year 476 appears as the one that marked the end of antiquity. On this date, the last Roman Emperor of the West, the young Romulus, was dismissed by the Barbaric chief Odoacre. Although he bore the name of the legendary founder of Rome, he had not succeeded in maintaining the imperial regime in territories which had been particularly agitated for decades.
However, 476, whose pre -eminence as a conclusive terminal of the ancient period has been imposed since the 16the only century, had no particular political resonance. In all likelihood, the inhabitants of the Roman Empire and the neighboring territories or linked to the latter by various traffic and mobility had not had the impression of having passed from one era to another. Nothing really changed, with the exception of political power and its incarnation, now assumed in the West by Germanic leaders, in what should be appointed the Roman-barbaric or post-Roman kingdoms. In other spaces, the upheavals had already taken place, or would occur later. For still others, 476 did not mean anything.
Specialist in late antiquity and religious, political and social history of the Roman Empire, in particular of its eastern part, professor of universities in Roman history at the University of Caen-Normandy, Sylvain Destephen proposes in the book 542 – The end of Antiquity to rethink and modify our traditional periodization of history, by giving more importance to a more general upheaval which took place during the year 542.
The ends of a world
If Sylvain Destephen chooses 542 as a pivotal date intended to mark the end of antiquity, it is above all due to the important cumulation of events and factors of changes that this year concentrated, from a political, religious and even health point of view.
The modalities of government of the Empire changed first. The two consuls, who directed Rome and its territories conquered from a civil point of view as military since the times of the Roman Republic, disappeared for the benefit of the Emperor alone. The latter concentrated in his hands more and more important powers, which had to be used to order the Empire in a rigorous way and, above all, to do so in agreement with the Christian religion, in order to ensure the salvation of the imperial family and that of its subjects.
“Living law”, incarnation of the law, Justinian ieremperor from 527 to 565 and central figure in the work, aimed to better organize and unify the Empire from an institutional point of view, to maintain its political and religious stability. The collaboration with “law experts” intensified in this sense: Sylvain Destephen thus deepens the portrait of Tribonian, originally from Asia Minor, who studied law in Beirut to then become a lawyer in Constantinople.
The past work of the former emperors and their jurisconsults, associated with its science of law, led to the publication of the first edition of the famous Justinian code In 529. This compilation of laws aimed to collect part of the existing normative texts and update them in the new context of an increasingly Christianized Empire. It was accompanied in 533 of the Digestan anthology of jurisprudence and comments of texts covering a large period, from the end of the Republic at the time of the Diocletian Emperor (284-305), as well as Institutesan introductory manual to the law to train new lawyers. The year 542, however, marked a drastic drop in legislative measures, in connection with the arrival of the formidable plague.
Better ordering the Empire, it was also standardizing it in terms of religion. On this specific point, the “Christian authoritarianism” of Justinian Ier was indicative of the imperial will to get rid of both pagans and heretics, as evidenced by his collaboration with Jean d’Ephesus, nicknamed the “Idoles Brister”. This monk who became bishop from the Syriac world was opposed to the religious doctrine of the emperor, because he was monophysite and therefore believed in the only divine nature of Christ: this went against the imperial doctrine in particular inherited from the councils of Nicea (325), Constantinople (381) and Chalcedonia (451), who recognized two kinds, human and the other divine.
Even if he was a heretic in the eyes of Justinian Ierimperial pragmatism prevailed to establish a “universal Christian empire”. It was thus in 542 that the emperor charged Jean d’Ephesus to convert the last followers of traditional religion to Asia Minor, in regions which correspond to the current Aegean coast of Turkey.
The Cavaliers of the Apocalypse
In the flood of the characters and events mobilized by the author, a particular actress, who put in all the efforts of the imperial government, is placed on the front of the stage: the plague. Much more than a barbaric chief, it was apparently innocent rodents who carried devastation throughout the Mediterranean and the European continent.
The terrible disease was indeed attacked by already weakened bodies and spirits. In line with the studies on the environmental history of ancient periods, the author recalls the climatic problems which arose in the years 535-536, when the “little ice age of late antiquity” helped to cool the climate considerably and to diminish the harvests. No doubt caused by major volcanic eruptions throughout the globe, this cooling, associated with the disease, was perceived as a divine punishment. In addition, Constantinople’s urban increase did not take care of an ever greater population in a constant and suitable manner. The city, founded by Constantin Ier (306-337) On the site of ancient Byzantium, had become the new center of power and the capital of the Empire at the expense of Rome and the mouths to feed were more and more numerous.
In addition to scarcity, famine and illness were added the evils of war. On its eastern borders, the Empire was well agitated. In 541, Bélisaire, famous general of Justinien Ierwas sent to the Persian front, during the resumption of the centenary war which opposed the Romans to the Sassanid kingdom. The latter were then eager to expand in Armenia, as well as in the less known Caucasian kingdoms of Lazique, Iberia – which correspond more or less to the current Georgia – and Albania. In 542, the reverse of the Romans had the consequence of making Caucasus a space now exclusively dominated by the Persians.
But above all, the years 530 to 550 highlighted a marked interventionism of the imperial regime in the former Roman West, now governed by Germanic sovereigns within the various post-Roman kingdoms. To IVe and Ve A centuries, the Empire had encountered many difficulties in defending certain territories of the incursions and migration of peoples whole external to its borders.
In the imperial power had thus succeeded several kingdoms which remained more or less close to Constantinople from a diplomatic point of view and which opposed each other on numerous occasions, as evidenced by the example of the Franks and the Visigoths. Two of these entities in particular, the Ostrogothic kingdom of Italy and the Vandal Kingdom of North Africa, were in the viewfinder of the Emperor, determined to recover the territories, ancient Roman possessions. If the North African reconquest was the case of under two years old and made it possible to bring back under the prince of Africa’s Christians, the war was led to Italy. In 542, the resistance of King Ostrogoth Baduila and the siege of the ancient Rome put the generals of Justinian IerBélisaire and Narsès, in great difficulty, but were not enough to prevent the reconquest.
The choice of a single date to highlight a transition period over several years, even over several decades, is still difficult. The historian Sylvain Destephen thus readily recognizes that if 542 was a decisive year for the Mediterranean basin, she loses in relevance for other spaces. However, retaining 542 as the end of antiquity makes it possible to highlight, as the author writes, “End of a full world, full of men and women, full of energy and exchanges, full of ambitions and hopes”.
