Historical causes and effects, from the fall of the Roman empire, 476, to the reformation, 1517 ...

Front matter

HISTORICAL

CAUSES AND EFFECTS

FROM THE

Contents

Chapter ^, ^ Page

I.— The slate of Europe at the close of llie fifth Century 1

II._The Population of Europe at the close of the fifth Century ^

Chapter I

In the firnt j;?jrt of these Ijj-itoncai Si<et/;ne», n^XioriH and evemts were exarnin^yJ from the earlif^ times to the fall of the Roman empire of the West, A. D. 476- It ia intended to comprise in this volume, nations and events from that p^^riod to the Reformation, in the beginning of the sixteenth century.

At the end of the fifth ceiitury, the West of Europe had undergone an entire revolution. The Roman empire of the East continues] nearly one thousand y^^rs after that time, and was then subdued by the Turks. Distinct nations, whom the Greeks and Romans compri.«ed under the general name of bo/rbariana, had possessed thern.selves of the West, This revolution involved not only the tenure of the land: a new order of things arose in govemmerjt and religion — in the objects of desire and aversion — in the orders of society, and, necessarily, in customs and habits. German barbarism intermingled with Roman civilization. As the former had a cor/vmanding influence, the latter entirely disappeared. From this revolution are derived the several nations which now hold all the West of Europe. From this epoch are to be traced the corruptions and abuses of Christianity ; the new charzicter and consequences of war; new languages: new divisions in the orders of society ; the ri.se of the various employments in which the members of society are now seen to be engaged ; the rank and influence of woman in the social and domestic relations of life. Over these various subjects is to be noticed the effect of polilico.l power ; that is, the command over physical strength, by which one, few, or many have been able to prescribe rules and enforce obedience as to all others. 1

2 THE STATE OF EUROPE AT THE

Before the Romans had passed the Alps into the country now called France, it was inhabited by a people known under the general name of Celtte, or Celts, and who called themselves Gael, or Gales, and whence the Roman name for them, Gauls, was derived, and their territory known by the general name of Gaul. Tribes are supposed, at some unknown time, to have emigrated from Asia, and to have occupied a large portion of the West of Europe. They are thought to have been a distinct, and, in many respects, a different people from those who formed the German tribes, and to have come, before these tribes, into Europe. From the Celts, the population of England, France, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland was undoubtedly derived ; though the names among this population were different, and the languages spoken by them so variant from each other as to have lost the proof of common origin.

The Celts were distinguishable from other barbarous people by their religion and their bards. In their religion, we find the same causes producing the same effects, as we have noticed in the religion of Egyptians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans ; that is, awful and terrifying mysteries, conducted by an initiated and sacred fraternity, corresponding to the common name of priests. They were called Druids. Like the Bramins of India, and the priests of Egypt, they formed a distinct class or caste ; and like these, and like the magi of Persia, they were not only the ministers in all holy things, but also the learned in the superstitions, mysteries, and worship which they had invented. They possessed the highest authority in all affairs of government and in the administration of justice ; they appointed officers, and governed absolutely in all things but in warfare, in which they were not held to engage. They denounced the punishments of their religion against those who were sinful or disobedient. Thus we see among the Druids, only one more form of the same propensities which have appeared in most nations and ages where there was only the religion of human creation. In such religions some animal or plant has usually been held sacred. The Druids considered the misletoe (which is called a parasitical plant, because it does not grow from the ground, but from another plant, especially the oak,) as the holiest object in nature ; as the lotus was in India and Egypt. The principal seat of this Druidical power was in England. Some of the wonderful stone structures seen in the British isles, were Druid temples.

The Celtic bards were singing poets, who, as such, were historians, common to most barbarous and warlike nations*

CLOSE OF THE FIFTH CENTURY.

There were such persons among the Greeks, in the early leriods of their history. The Scotch, Welsh, and Irish pipers, ire relics of the Celtic bards. The poems of Ossian, purporting to be translations of ancient Celtic productions, give some impression of the character and effect of this exciting melody.* The Celts were a numerous and powerful race at an early period, and sufficiently so to have invaded, and to have conquered, a part of Spain, and portions of country along the Danube, and to have extended themselves even into Greece. As these nations had no records of themselves, their territories, conquests, and condition are not to be ascertained. Their migrations, changes and revolutions were, doubtless, like those which occurred among the Indians of America, for centuries before they were known to Europeans. The Celts were subjected to the action of the Romans for nearly four centuries, and then to the German barbarians ; so that towards the end of the fifth century, their distinctive name, their Druids, and their bards, had been lost by mingling with other people. They were like great rivers which come, in their course, to a still greater volume of waters, in which their origin, and their name, and their peculiarities, are no longer distinguishable.

CHAPTER IL

THE POPULATION OF EUROPE AT THE CLOSE OF THE FIFTH CENTURY.

Before the year 500, the Roman empire had extended itself beyond the Alps to the north and west. It ruled in what is now called Switzerland, and still further north, from the foot of the Alps, a small distance into Germany, as it now is. The line of Roman possession was different at different times. The forty-seventh degree of north latitude is near their most northern boundary. These regions, which Rome had acquired by conquest, were distinguished by various names, not necessary to be mentioned, as few of them are now so called. West of the river Rhine, and thence to the Atlantic, was Gaul, as the Romans called it, and the same which is now called France. Over the whole of this country the Romans had

* Thomas Moore, in his History of Ireland, has investigated the authenticity of the poems of Ossian, and has shown their true origin, as will be noticed in sketches of Ireland.

4 THE rOPULATION OF EUROPE AT THE

acquired dominion by long-continued and bloody wars. They had also passed over to England. Caesar was the first Roman general who appeared on the island, 53 B. C. England was held as a Roman province till the beginning of the fifth century, and between that time and the year A. D. 446, it was abandoned, and all Roman authority withdrawn. (Mcintosh, chap. I.)

If we begin at the forty-seventh degree of north latitude, where it crosses the river Rhine, and follow that line thence eastwardly, towards the Caspian sea in Asia, we shall mark the line, on the earth's surface, which was (in Europe) the boundary, alternately of Romans and barbarians, as the one or the other prevailed in their conflicts. From this line of latitude northwardly to the Northern Ocean, both in Asia and Europe, is found that vast territory in which millions of human beings dwelt in a state of barbarism. Their origin is unknown. The little that is known of them is obtained through the Greeks and Romans, in describing wars to conquer or repel them, on the frontiers of the empire. The historians who are followed in the accounts given of these nations, are the Grecian Herodotus, and Csesar and Tacitus among the Romans. By the two latter writers, especially, these tribes are distinguished by national names. They knew how to use iron in their warfare, and they had horses, cattle, and sheep.

It is said by Hallam, in his learned and elaborate history of the Middle Ages, that before the end of the fifth century, barbarous nations had thus possessed themselves of the west of Europe. The Suevi held part of Spain ; the Visigoths possessed the remainder, and a part of Gaul, or France, next to Spain ; the Burgundians had established themselves in France, between the rivers Rhone and Saone, on the south-eastern part of France. The Ostrogoths possessed nearly the whole of Italy. The Vandals, who came first of these nations, had traversed Europe into Spain, passed thence into Africa, and penetrated to Carthage, which was their seat of empire. This account by Hallam agrees with those of other writers, through whom it is known, that the northern part of France was held by a people who were called Franks, and who held also the Netherlands, now called Belgium. The Franks were a confederacy of tribes, who dwelt in Westphalia, and the surrounding country east of the Rhine. They confederated to resist the Romans, and took the name of Franks, or Freemen. From this nation, and from the Burgundians, with some other intermixture of the Celtic race, and including that population

CLOSE OF THE FIFTH CENTURY. 5

which the Romans had brought into Gaul, the French nation of the present day are descended.

The present population of Spain are the descendants of Grecian colonists, who had settled on the eastern side of the peninsula before the Romans had risen into power, and also of persons introduced while Spain was a Roman province. To these are to be added the Suevi and Visigoths, and the Saracens or Moors. The latter conquered and held the south of Spain for some ages. The people of Italy, of the present day, are the descendants of the mixed race whom the tribes of barbarians found there, as Roman subjects, and of themselves. In the last ages of the Roman empire of the west, great numbers resorted to Italy from the Greek, Asiatic, and African provinces. In the decline of the empire, barbarians were enlisted in the Roman legions. Besides these, there were many thousands who were held in servitude, and who were gathered from all the countries which the Romans had conquered. Thus, the population of Italy, at the end of the fifth century, was the most mixed of any in Europe.

In the territory before mentioned, having the Rhine for its western boundary, and the forty-seventh degree of north latitude for its southern boundary, many different nations dwelt, to whom Tacitus assigns names and countries. These nations are said, by the German historian John Von Muller, to have had the general name of Teutonic, because they worshipped a God whom they called Tuist, or Tuet. The Teutonic, or ancient parent German language, comprised the Scandinavian, that of a people so called, who dwelt where the kingdoms of Denmark and Sweden now are. It appears, (Wheaton's History of the Northmen,) that the Scandinavians had a literature of their own, and an alphabet of sixteen letters, believed to be derived from the Phoenicians. It was called Runic, a term supposed to imply mystery; and was, undoubtedly, the peculiar property of the priesthood. It must be admitted, that no small part of the narratives concerning these ancient German people, is founded more in conjecture than in positive facts.

Most of the languages of the north of Europe are of this Teutonic class. The name of the Saxons occurs in this northern region. They are supposed to have dwelt on the shores near Jutland, and near the mouth of the Elbe, and west of that river towards Westphalia. They were afterwards known as the Saxon race in England, and the same race who gave their name to a part of Germany now known as Saxony. •

Gibbon, in his history of the Decline and Fall of the Roman

6 THE POPULATION OF EUROPE AT THE

Empire says, that the Goths and Vandals were similar, if not the same people originally, and that the Goths divided into the Ostrogoths, (western,) and Visigoths, (eastern,) and theGepidas. The Vandals he considers to have been divided into the Heruli, Burgundians, and Lombards, (long beards.) About the beginning of the Christian era, (according to this historian,) the Goths were established near the mouth of the river Vistula, in the country where the cities of Thorn, Elbing, Koningsburg and Dantzic now are; and the Vandals in the countries where Mecklenburgh and Pomerania now are. From these abodes the Goths and the Vandals migrated to the country which lies north of the Black Sea, within the two first centuries of the Christian era, which country was called Scj'-thia. The supposition is, that all these nations were originally of Asia, and this is more certainly assumed of the Sclavonians, (so called from slava, fame,) who are first referred to Sarmatia, northwardly of the Caspian Sea. It is, however, of as little importance as of certainty, whether these conjectural localities of the barbarians are well founded or not. Like the natives of America, it is probable that they had wars, vicissitudes, and changes,^ throughout centuries, of which they had neither record nor tradition.

There was one other and distinct people, called the Huns, of whom no doubt seems to be entertained of origin or progress. All writers who mention this people's origin, concur, that they were masters of the extreme east of Asia, and occupied a country of vast extent north of the Chinese wall, (said to be fifteen hundred miles in length,) and that their empire extended to the North Sea. In the third century they moved westward by the north of the Caspian Sea, and subdued all nations with whom they came in contact; or forced them toward the west. In person, habits, and manners, the Huns were a very different people from the barbarians of Europe. They were'^short, swarthy, and ill-formed; but some of the nations who have been mentioned, are described as tall, well-formed, of light complexion, blue eyes, and of pleasing expression. The approach of the Huns \vas the cause of the final overthrow of the Romans. The nations who have been mentioned as having been established in the country northwardly of the Caspian, were driven on to the Roman territories. The Huns occupied the country which was thus deserted, until their increasing numbers, or other motives, urged them to the west. Hungary, so called from them, was their European establishment. But, as has been before (in the first volume) remarked,

CLOSE OF THE FIFTH CENTURY. 7

they appeared in Italy, and even beyond the Rhine in France, under their great chief, Atilla.

We have further to notice the barbarians, in regard to their characteristic qualities, because these have a direct relation to the present occupants of Europe. It is believed that all these qualities are described by historians from the writings of Csesar and Tacitus ; the former, in a great degree, from his own observation; the latter was a highly accomplished civilian, who wrote at Rome towards the close of the hrst century, and whose authority, for what he says of the Germans, may have been works now unknown. However this may have been, his writings on this people are regarded, by all subsequent historians, as worthy of confidence. There is another writer who is quoted by Gibbon, Hallam, and others, by the name of Jornandes, who left a work " on the origin and affairs of the Goths." He died towards the close of the sixth century, his work coming down to the year 552. From such sources, and with the aid of the late work of Von Muller, we shall condense an account of these founders of European nations.

Men, civilized or savage, have the same natural wants and passions, and the same necessity to fill up with action, the successive hours of life, not given to repose. The difference is found in the different modes of gratification. A savage may have some notion of exchanging one thing for another, and some pleasure in sounds, and in objects which please the eye. He has also some idea of command and obedience, and, perhaps, of some rule by which the one should be given, and the other rendered. He has some sentiment of right and wrong, and consequently of justice. But it belongs to a refined age to have carried out these original perceptions into extensive commerce, music, painting, literature, records of the past, comprehension of the future, complex civil government, and solemn courts of justice. The barbarians will be remarked upon in those prominent qualities which will sho\v, that civilized and refined society had its original elements among them; and thence afford the inference, that what is now seen in society arises from the capacity to improve. This capacity is far from having exhausted its powers. It will be further used in extending man's knowledge over the material objects, and in the utility and duty of sound moral action.

Food. The barbarians depended on their herds, and on the game which their forests yielded. They made an intoxicating drink from wheat or barley, and must have known something of the cultivation of the earth. Their herds afforded them

8 THE POPULATION OF EUROPE AT THE

not only milk, but they knew how to convert this into cheese. There were some native fruits.

Clothing. For this they depended on the skins of the animals which they took, and on their flocks and herds. Articles were wrought into garments, in a rude manner, by females.

Dwelling-places. They had not cities, nor towns, nor compact villages ; their abodes were placed wherever a stream or some other inducement invited.

Domestic condiiio/i. The Germans are highly extolled by Tacitus, for some conjugal virtues ; so much so, that he was thought to have intended to satirize Roman matrons, in his praise of these virtues. Certain violations of these rights, of rare occurrence, were punished with death. Chiefs were allowed to have more than one wife.

Religion. In this respect, the barbarians were a rude people. They adored whatsoever objects appeared to them to have power or influence over their good or ill fortune. Hence arose imaginary deities, as common among all savage nations. They supposed these objects of their worship to reside in the recesses of their thick, dark forests, into which no one dared to penetrate. Certain of these places were held to be sacred. They had a class of persons who resembled a similar class among the American Indians, and who ministered in their sacrifices and ceremonies. Some of these nations sacjificed human beings. Their ministers of religion held a superior rank, since they were supposed to be able to foretell the will of their gods, to invoke their favor, or appease their wrath. This was the otflce of the priest among the pagan Greeks and Romans.

Bards. All these nations (like the Celts) had a class of persons who said, or sung history. They were listened to at festivals; and they roused the courage of warriors at the coming on of battle. In this is seen the natural desire of our race to extend existence beyond the short term allowed to individual life, by cherishing and transmitting the memory of the past. It shows, also, the force of example, and the propensity to imitate, and that they must be truly a rude people, who do not feel that they have a property in the deeds of their ancestors.

Employment of time. These savages, like civilized people, had a life to dispose of, time to fill up, and the necessity of doing something. Having neither commerce, literature, the arts, nor agriculture, — and the supply of bodily wants being had from their herds or the chase, — their time was mostly given to preparations for war, and to carrying it on, — to noisy feasting

CLOSE OF THE FIFTH CENTURY. 9

and to gaming. They staked all their possessions, and even personal freedom, on the chances of fortune. A warrior, who would have thought it the highest glory to be where the hottest battle gave the certain alternative of victory or death, would submit to be bound and led away as a slave, if so the result of the game determined his lot. This desire of excitement is equally shown in what is called civilized life. It is to be regretted that gamblers cannot dispose of their persons as the barbarians did. The chief occupation in barbarian life was war, waged for plunder and for glory. This serious measure was preceded by councils, in which the civil or religious chiefs stated the case, and the multitude expressed their negative by hisses and groans, and their assent by striking their lances on their shields. They were brave and powerful warriors, as the Romans had frequent occasion lo know. Their conflicts were not at the long distance which the use of gunpowder permits, but with hand weapons, as, some sort of pointed lance, or short sword. The women were often spectators of the battle, and have been known to urge their flying husbands and sons back upon the foe, and sometimes to kill their children, and then themselves, rather than to be taken and made slaves.

These are some of the traits of the rude nations who were destined to extinguish the learning, philosophy, the arts and sciences of Greeks and Romans — to cast their proud monuments to the earth — and to give, in the long course of ages, a new and worthier character to the world.

Chapter III. The Roman Empire Of The East

• The part of continental Europe which remains to be noticed, as it was at the close of the fifth century, is that which the Romans still held. It will be remembered, that Constantine, in the year "9^ removed the seat of empire from Rome to ancient Byzantium, and gave to that city his own name, which it still retains. Here the Roman name continued until the early part of the seventh century, when the eastern empire began to be called by the name of the Greek empire, and so continued to be, (with the exception of 57 years, from 1204 to

10 THE ROMAN EMPIRE OF THE EAST.

1261,) until the Turks, in the year 1453, possessed themselves of Constantinople, and have held it to the present day. The limits of the eastern empire in Europe, varied in this long lapse of years. They sometimes extended to, and beyond the Danube, northwardly ; and to a line drawn from the north end of the Adriatic Sea, nearly north to the Danube, and included all the territory in Europe between the Danube, the Adriatic, and the waters w^hich flow between Europe and Asia, and, consequently, including Greece and its isles. This is very nearly the same territory over which the Turkish empire extended in Europe, before Greece was severed and erected into a separate kingdom, in our own time.

Before the end of the fifth century, Constantino and his successors had enlarged and embellished Constantinople, and had made it one of the most beautiful cities of the world. Its site is on the extreme point of Europe, near the forty-second degree of north latitude, opposhe to the western shore of Asia Minor, and separated from that shore by the waters which flow from the Black Sea into the sea of Marmora. This current of water is called the Bosphorus, and is said to be so called (from the Greek) because oxen could swim across it. It is sixteen miles long, and of an average breadth of one mile and a half; but, in one place only, thirty-three hundred feet ; at which point, Darius, of Persia, in the year 513 B. C, constructed his bridge of boats, in pursuit of the Scythians. This place is capable of resisting almost any assault, being of triangular form, and having two sides bounding on deep waters, and the third protected by a wall. In eleven centuries, (330 to 1453,) it had been taken but six times.

Whether Constantino foresaw the necessity of defence against the barbarians, and that Rome could not, and that Constantinople could be defended, is questionable. It is more probable that vanity, and a view to his dominions in Asia, may rather have been among his motives. He still ruled over Asia Minor, Armenia, Syria, and Egypt, having the ancient foes of the empire, the Persians and Parthians for his eastern bor-* derers, in the valley of the Euphrates.

The population of the European part of the Roman empire in Europe, had become a very mixed one before the end of the fifth century, and was especially so in Constantinople. There were the descendants of Romans, who had removed from Italy, in Constantino's time ; there were descendants of Greeks, Asiatics, barbarians, and a multitude of slaves. There were also ecclesiastics of all descriptions. There were patricians,

THE ROMAN EMPIRE OF THE EAST. 11

and plebeians, great riches, and great poverty ; the military class, comprising many grades, and of motley compound, insolent and rapacious. The forms of the Christian religion were well known to this collection of human beings, who were, nevertheless, strangers to its morality. One cannot easily decide which that city of the earth is, wherein there has been the greatest amount of splendor, crime, wickedness, and misery. It is probable that this city would stand high, if not highest, in the claim to this distinction. In the notices of "the Church," which are hereafter to be made, there will be occasion to return to Constantinople. At present we have only to inquire how the people of this city disposed of their time, and what were the objects of desire, and means of gratification.

This numerous collection of persons were to be fed, clothed, and sheltered. Food must have been had by agricultural labor, which was applied mostly by the slaves of great landed proprietors, who held estates in Asia Minor, and in ancient Greece, and in the country around Constantinople. Supplies of grain were had from Egypt and from Sicily, and perhaps grain, and certainly fish, from the Black Sea. There must have been some means of paying for these necessaries, which were found, in the expenditures of the Emperor, to sustain the numerous officers and agents necessary to his magnificence; and his treasury was supplied by various forms of taxation. Within the city there must have been artificers of many sorts, Avho derived their subsistence from the afiiuent. The means of knowing by whom, and to what extent, commerce was carried on, are few ; but there is no doubt that there was a valuable commerce between Constantinople and Asia Minor, Egypt, and the east end of the Mediterranean Sea ; and probably from the east, by the way of the Caspian and the Euxine.

Whatsoever may have been the employments in serious labor, to supply continually returning wants, there must have been no small portion of time which was given to pleasures and amusements, and perhaps to the perform.ance of some sorts of duty. The church ceremonies may have furnished some occupation. The movements of the Emperor, and of his retinue, may have furnished objects of attention, because it appears that the people retained some sense of the ultimate sovereignty which had been formerly exercised in Rome. The wars in which the Emperors were engaged, either on the eastern frontier, or with the barbarians nearer home, were subjects of excitement. As there were no printed bulletins in

12 THE ROMAN EMPIRE OF THE EAST.

those days, curiosity must have depended on verbal communications. There vv^ere, probably, popular orators, who had numerous auditors. The succession to the throne was an object of general interest. This was frequently effected by violence and crime, and every new Emperor or Empress, had numerous favorites to reward, and enemies to punish. There were besides, pageantry and shows, which were connected with the court, and some amusements intended more especially for the populace. There is, in Gibbon, some illustration of the manner in which time was passed in this city.

The entertainment of the chariot races was conducted at the public expense in the hippodrome, a word composed of two Greek words, signifying horse and race-course. This place was a splendid edifice, surrounded by columns and adorned by statuary ; it still exists. It was nearly two thousand feet in length, and five hundred in breadth. It was capable of containing a great multitude, and leave space for the exhibition. There were charioteers by profession, and the races were conducted by them, and not as at the Olympic games, where the contest for skill was among the most eminent of the Greeks. The contending parties were distinguished by four difli^rent colors in their dress, blue, green, white, or red. This distinction had prevailed in Rome. Out of these colors, parties were engendered of hostile character, which involved all the inhabitants of the city, and even the Emperor. In the time of Justinian, about the year 532, these factions perpetrated the most horrid crimes, filled the whole city with terror, and came near to forcing the Emperor to seek safety by flight into Asia.

There were splendid theatrical exhibitions and dancing women. These entertainments were also conducted at the public expense. The reputation of those who were performers was of the lowest order. Yet Justinian (whose name is associated with the code of laws, which is the lau\ with various modifications, in most of the present nations of Europe,) raised Theodora, a theatrical performer, to the throne. If Gibbon's account of this female be credited, she was, in some respects, much the superior of her husband. The wife of the renowned Belisarius, whom there will be occasion to mention in Justinian's reign, was a person of the same order, and even more infamous than Theodora, with whom she was, at different times, the subservient friend and implacable foe. From such facts, some conclusion may be drawn as to the manners and morals of this splendid seat of empire, about the close of the fifth century; and in what manner its inhabitants