...you don't know what you are talking about:
If a result of the reform was a strengthening of "the borderers, or frontier troops" at the expense of "the palentines, or garrison troops," then I have to say, yes, on the face of it, Gibbon is right.
Gibbon describes the reform as seriously undermining the strength of the military. How on earth, then, would a "strengthening" of these troops mean that "Gibbon is right" when that directly contradicts Gibbon?
Please take note of the part I have put in boldface and underlined, which you ignored completely. Sure, Constantine strengthened the borderer troops, but
he weakened the palentine troops. If given a choice, I would rather put my faith in the palentines. The borderers sound like mercenary troops. To rely on such troops will make you weak.
This is merely my uninformed opinion. A more informed opinion would require a survey of Roman military history from before and after the reform, and then a complex evaluation of the effects of the reform. But let's get something straight: even if someone made this survey, if they read all the relevant texts in their original languages, then their opinion might be more solid, more trustworthy, but it still nothing but opinion.
You seem to think that the opinions of modern scholars are something else: unquestionable facts.
How is this not "some area of contention"? [...]
No. It was settled before that scholar. He isn't writing to contest Gibbon, that was already long past. The point of the paper isn't to disagree with Gibbon (what would be the point? Nobody but you considers him relevant), but to explain why he made this particular error.
Nothing has been settled, and nothing ever will be settled. Historical scholarship proceeds by way of argument and debate. The scholars put out their opinions, and these opinions are examined and criticized by other scholars. At no point are the opinions ever magically transformed into settled dogmas.
Even in the physical sciences, there are no settled dogmas. Evolution, Big Bang, it is all theory. At some unknown point in the future, any of these theories can be overturned by a better theory. Science never really proves anything.
So if there are no dogmas in the physical sciences, which can rely on repeatable experiments and observation, then there can definitely be no dogmas in historical scholarship, which attempts to understand unique and irreversible events from the past that will never be repeated.
I provided you with an unproblematic source about the reforms, and you maintain it is contentious because...why?
Because it is. Your source is problematic. All sources, especially in this field, are problematic. It is necessary to be highly critical of everything. I can't just take your source on faith because it comes from 1969. A scholar isn't automatically more true, the more recently his work was published.
May I remind you how vague these "unproblematic" criticisms actually were? Of the "seperation of the military from the civil service" it is said that this is "considered a much needed reform." Considered by who? Needed why? Gibbon's attack on Constantine is said to be "intemperate." In Jordan's opinion they are. A scholarly consensus on the issue seems to be implied, but I'm not told the arguments that support this consensus. Some quotes are provided from Gibbon to demonstrate somehow that he let himself be carried away with animus against Constantine, but I don't see it; they all seem like sound judgments to me. It is asserted that his opinions have "little basis in fact," but it is not said what facts he missed.
This is from a brief quote. I'm sure he goes into more detail in the rest of the article. But, I'm not going to just assume that these details are so devastating that I have to now throw Gibbon on the trash pile. Perhaps Jordan's arguments merely add emphasis to certain parts of Gibbon, and do not invalidate the main outlines at all.
You don't know enough to evaluate whether Gibbon is right or wrong [...] What sources are you using to evaluate the need for these reforms or their efficacy?
I admit that my support for Gibbon's negative opinion of the military reforms is not based on historical scholarship, which would have to begin with a detailed study of Roman military history. My main sources on this point are certain writings in the genre of "political science": the republican authors, Montesquieu, Machiavelli, Harrington (I know: more old stuff). Then there are the Federalist Papers, Madison's notes on the debates at the constitutional convention, other writings of political figures. On top of that, I try to reason by analogy, from the history of other nations in other time periods.
The military reforms were a decision of government. It looks to me like a bad decision, at least the part of the reform that favored borderers at the expense of palentines. I admit this is not an informed opinion, but I've noticed that you also do not cite facts from Rome's military history, to support your opinion that the reform was good.
Now, your attack on Gibbon, supported by quotes from Gibbon himself, is brilliant. I thank you for it. It shows some real knowledge of Gibbon, and not just of his principle work, but of his other writings as well. Outstanding! You really show better knowledge of Gibbon than I. I only read him about ten years ago, and I probably skipped most of the footnotes (which I usually save for the second reading).
As to the self-criticisms that can be found in his essays, doesn't this actually make him look better? He was so open to recognizing flaws in his earlier thinking, that he was willing to criticize it himself. This shows that he was busy doing real historical thinking instead of constructing irrefutable dogmas, unlike modern scholars, who, as you represent them, are trying to do just that.
...in his desire to paint a peaceful, happy portrait of the age of Rome he so admired, he says of the rule of Hadrian and Antonius Pius that they were disturbed only by "a few slight hostilities that served to exercise the legions of the frontier..." (chap 1). Yet during this period the Bar Kochba revolt occured (132-135 CE) a long and violent uprising by the Jews which eventually required Hadrian himself to settle personally. [...] Yet he certainly knew of the war, and it's violence, as he mentions it in a later chapter and at one point even describes it as the "furious war which was terminated only by the ruin of Jerusalem." Did he forget it when writing chapter one? Or just ignore it because it was inconvenient for his thesis?
Man, it's been so many years, I can only take a stab in the dark. Well, he can't have ignored it because it was inconvenient, or he never would have brought it up later. What was the state of the rest of the Empire during this time? Perhaps the Bar Kochba affair was the only real problem they experienced on the frontier in this period, and the rest of the empire really was "peaceful" and "happy"? Some general statements are justifiable when covering a large period of time. After all, he said "
few general hostilities," as opposed to saying there were
no hostilities.
In fact, he frequently marginalizes uprisings and revolts from Augustus onwards (up until Constantine) because they don't fit well into his portrait. Some he ignores completely (e.g. the Jewish revolt in the late 60s CE, the revolt of Tacfarinas during the reign of Tiberius), others he mentions only in passing, still others he relegates to a footnote. For example, he briefly discusses "three inconsiderable rebellions" in a footnote, despite the fact that these were anything but inconsiderable. Why? Not because he wasn't aware of them, or at least the sources he had were enough. Rather, they didn't fit nicely into his thesis of an uninterrupted peace during the pre-Constantine Rome.
This is, in fact, exactly what I'm looking for when I ask for errors or omissions of fact. I would have to dig him out and reread him in order to refute this stuff. I didn't want to do that, but perhaps it is time. I like to keep masterpieces like The Decline And Fall on about a ten year rotation.
I will say this: I did not carry away the impression of a period of "uninterrupted peace." My impression was of an uninterrupted string of wars, revolts, and disasters. Every time they changed emperors there was a crisis, both before and after Constantine. As to the revolt in the 60's, and the revolt of Tacfarinas, I received the impression that he only skimmed over these earlier periods, because he was mainly interested in later periods. Perhaps he thought it had already been adequately covered by others, perhaps he didn't feel like he had complete enough documentation to assert a judgment. He says nothing about Jesus, correct? As I said, he is not so interested in these early periods (if memory serves... it probably does not).
And so, are these three revolts which he passes over with a mere footnote from this early period? After all, something has to be left out, even if it was 100 volumes long. How critical are these omissions?
In conclusion, I see nothing decisive that would make me reject Gibbon... yet. But I have to admit the arguments are getting better.
I would like to once again repeat the circumstances under which this dispute over Gibbon began. I trust his factual authority, and so when he says that the persecution of Christians by the state is an exaggerated myth, I feel safe in asserting the same thing, so I did. This fact was immediately agreed to by "angellous_evangellous." The guy sounds knowledgeable. So do you. Do you also agree with Gibbon's assessment of Christian persecution?
