1 THE COLLAPSE OF CLASSICAL : , Rome, & Gupta

As the classical period drew to an end, the classical societies that helped to shape it were all suffering through periods of decline. Between 200 CE and 600 CE, all three classical civilizations – Han, Rome, and Gupta – collapsed entirely or in part.

EPIDEMIC DISEASES

While serving as routes for the distribution of trade goods and highways for the spread of religious beliefs, the roads and the sea lanes of the classical world also facilitated the movement of biological agents. The Roads were the routes by which grapes, camels, and donkeys made their way from the Mediterranean region to China, while cherries, apricots, , and walnuts traveled in the other direction, from and China to the Mediterranean. Alongside the fruits and nuts were some less welcome traveling companions – infectious and contagious diseases that sparked ferocious epidemics when they found their way to previously unexposed populations. During the 2nd and 3rd centuries CE, the Han and Roman empires suffered large-scale outbreaks of epidemic disease. The most destructive diseases were probably smallpox and measles, and epidemics of plague may also have erupted. All three diseases are devastating when they break out in populations without resistance, immunity, or medicines to combat them. As disease ravaged the two empires, Chinese and Roman populations declined sharply. During the reign of Emperor Augusts, the population of the Roman stood at about 60 million people. During the 2nd century CE, epidemics reduced the Roman population by about one-quarter, to 45 million. Most devastating was an outbreak of smallpox that spread throughout the Mediterranean basin during the years 165 CE to 180 CE. The epidemic was especially virulent in cities, and it even claimed the life of the Roman emperor (180 CE). In combination with wars and invasions, continuing outbreaks caused a significant population decline during the 3rd and 4th centuries CE: by 400 CE the number of Romans had fallen to perhaps 40 million. During the 5th and early 6th centuries CE, the Roman population stabilized, but an epidemic of plague broke out in the mid-6th century and caused a general population decline throughout the Mediterranean basin. Epidemics appeared slightly later in China than in the Mediterranean region. From 50 million people at the beginning of the millennium, Chinese population rose to 60 million people in 200 CE. As diseases found their way east, however, Chinese numbers fell back to 50 million by 400 CE and to 45 million by 600 CE. Thus by 600 CE, both Mediterranean and Chinese populations had fallen by a quarter to a third from their high points during classical .

Trade Networks of Classical Afroeurasia:

2 Effects of Epidemic Diseases

Demographic decline in turn brought economic and social change. Trade within the empire declined, and both the Chinese and Roman economies contracted. Both economies also moved toward regional self- sufficiency: whereas previously the Chinese and Roman states had integrated the various regions of their empires into a larger network of trade and exchange, after about 200 CE, they increasingly established several smaller economies that concentrated on their own needs instead of the larger imperial market. In the , for example, the eastern Mediterranean regions of Anatolia, Egypt, and continued to form a larger, integrated society, but regional economies increasingly emerged in western Mediterranean lands, including Italy, Gaul [France], Spain, and northwest Africa. The demographic of classical Persia, India, and other lands are Figure 1. Mass grave of victims from the that struck the Roman Empire not as clear as they are for between 165 CE and 180 CE. China and the Roman empire. Persia most likely experienced demographic, economic, and social problems similar to those that afflicted China and the Mediterranean basin. Gupta India may well have suffered from epidemic disease and population losses, although there is limited evidence for those troubles in South Asia. In and the Mediterranean basin, however, it is clear that epidemic disease seriously weakened Chinese and Roman societies.

ENVIRONMENTAL CRISES

Environmental problems, such as siltation, saltation, and deforestation, while less dramatic than the impact of diseases, were subtle factors in the collapse of many civilizations. As settled spread throughout Afroeurasia, extensive and slash-and-burn agriculture took a toll on the land. By 600 CE, people had been farming in the same lands for thousands of years. Overgrazing of domesticated animals and the production of crops such as and depleted the soil of nutrients and, in some areas, led to desertification. Irrigation systems left deposits of salt, which over thousands of years left lands sterile, a particular problem in more arid regions like Mesopotamia. Flood control and irrigation systems, like those used in China, built up the river bottoms and made the rivers flow faster. This exacerbated flooding problems, often making them worse than they had been historically. In addition, flood control systems tended to build up silt around the river’s mouth, often filling in land and changing the river’s course. Another environmental challenge was deforestation. In an age when the only fuel available for fires and the main building material for structures such as homes was wood, forests around urban and agricultural 3 areas became denuded of large trees. The loss of ground cover resulted in loss of topsoil, mudslides in hilly areas, and challenges to local economies as the need for wood forced urban areas to timber in from farther away. Although these challenges were often noted in ancient accounts, there was little that classical societies could do to avoid these problems.

COLLAPSE OF THE HAN

By the late 2nd century CE, Han authorities had largely lost their ability to maintain order. Early in the 3rd century CE, in 220 CE, the central government dissolved, and a series of autonomous regional kingdoms took the place of the Han state. With the disappearance of the , China experienced significant cultural change, most notably an increasing interest in .

Nomadic Barbarian Invasions

Beginning long before the Han dynasty, China’s contacts with its northern neighbors had involved both trade and military conflict. China’s neighbors sought Chinese products such as silk. When they did not have goods to trade or when trading relations were disrupted, raiding was considered an acceptable alternative in the tribal cultures of the region. Chinese sources speak of defending against raids of “barbarians” from Shang times (c1500 BCE – 1050 BCE) on, but not until the rise of nomadism in the mid-Zhou period (fifth to fourth centuries BCE) did the horsemen of the north become China’s main threat. The economy of these pastoralist nomads was based on raising sheep, goats, camels, and horses. Families lived in tents that could be taken down and moved north in summer and south in winter when groups of families moved in search of pasture. Herds were tended on horseback and everyone learned to ride from a young age. The typical social structure of the steppe nomads was fluid, with family and clan units linked through loyalty to tribal chiefs selected for military prowess. Charismatic tribal leaders could form large coalitions and mobilize the entire society for war. Chinese farmers and Asian pastoralists had such different modes of life that it is not surprising that they had little respect for each other. For most of the imperial period, Chinese farmers looked on the northern non-Chinese horsemen as gangs of bullies who thought robbing was easier than working for a living. The nomads identified glory with military might and viewed farmers as contemptible weaklings. In the late 3rd century BCE, the (known in Europe as the Huns) formed the first great confederation of nomadic tribes. The ’s Great Wall was built to defend against them, and the Qin sent out huge armies in pursuit of them. The early Han emperors tried to make peace with them, offering generous gifts of silk, rice, , and even imperial princesses as brides. But these policies were controversial, since critics thought they merely strengthened the enemy. Xiongnu power did not decline, and in 166 BCE, 140,000 Xiongnu raided to within a hundred miles of the Han capital. Figure 2. Disney's stereotypical Hun (from the cartoon movie, Mulan) Emperor of the Han dynasty decided that China had to push the Xiongnu back. He sent several armies of 100,000 to 300,000 troops deep into Xiongnu territory. These military campaigns were costly and of limited value because the Xiongnu were a moving target: fighting nomads was not like attacking walled cities. If the Xiongnu did not want to fight the Chinese troops, they simply moved their camps. The Han heavily invested in the extension of the Great Wall and establishment of military garrisons to protect against the Xiongnu and other barbarian groups like them. Maintaining a military presence so far from the center of China was expensive. To pay for these expenses, taxes were raised for the citizens of China by the central government – a burden that the majority found increasingly difficult to pay. To expand the size of the Han army, the government also recruited Xiongnu 4 mercenaries to defend China’s frontier. Their loyalty to the Han was certainly an issue. More importantly, perhaps, military expenses threatened to bankrupt the Han government.

Internal Decay of the Han State

The Han dynasty collapsed fundamentally because of internal problems that its rulers could not solve. This contributed to the breakdown of centralized government. One problem involved the development of factions within the ranks of the ruling elites. Marriage alliances between imperial and aristocratic families led to the formation of many factions whose members sought to advance their prospects in the imperial government and exclude others from important positions. That atmosphere led to constant infighting and backstabbing among the ruling elites, which in turn reduced the effectiveness of the central government. To make matters worse, bureaucrats became more corrupt and local landlords took up much of the slack, ruling their communities according to their own wishes. An even more difficult problem had to do with the perennial issue of land and its equitable distribution. During the last two centuries of the Han dynasty, large landowners gained new influence in the government. They managed to reduce their share of taxes and shift the burden onto peasants. Many peasants lost their farms and became day laborers on large estates. Some had to sell their children into service. Landlords even formed private armies to advance their class interests.

Peasant Rebellion

Those developments provoked widespread unrest, particularly among peasants, who found themselves under increasing economic pressure with no means to influence the government. Pressures became particularly acute during the late second and third centuries when epidemics began to take their toll. In 184 CE, peasant discontent fueled an immense uprising known as the Turban rebellion, so called because the rebels wore yellow headbands that represented the color of the Chinese earth and symbolized their peasant origins. The was spearheaded by Daoist leaders who promised a that was to be brought about by divine magic. The Yellow Turbans attacked the weakness of the emperor but also the self- indulgence and immorality of the current . Although authorities suppressed it after five years of fighting, the rebellion proved to be only the first in a series of insurrections that plagued the late Han dynasty.

Collapse

Meanwhile, Han generals increasingly usurped political authority. By 190 CE, the Han emperor had become a mere puppet, and the generals effectively ruled the regions controlled by their armies. They allied with wealthy landowners of their regions and established themselves as warlords who maintained a kind of rough order based on force of arms. The generals continued to recognize an emperor for a short , but in 220 CE, they formally abolished the Han dynasty and divided the empire into three large kingdoms.

Once the dynasty had disappeared, large numbers of nomadic peoples migrated into China, especially the northern regions, and they helped to keep China disunited for more than 350 years. Between the 4th and 6th centuries CE, nomadic peoples established large kingdoms that dominated much of northern China as well as the steppe lands.

China’s Recovery

Nonetheless, China did revive itself near the end of the 6th century CE. Strong native rulers in the north drove out the nomadic invaders. The briefly ruled, and then in 618 CE, it was followed by the Tang, who sponsored one of the most glorious periods in Chinese . and the bureaucratic system were revived, and indeed the bureaucratic tradition became more elaborate. The period of 5 chaos left its mark somewhat in a continued presence of a Buddhist minority, and new styles of art and literature. But, unlike the case of Rome, there was no permanent disruption. The structures of classical China were simply too strong to be overturned. The bureaucracy declined in scope and quality, but it did not disappear during the trouble centuries. Confucian values and styles of life remained current among the upper class. Many of the nomadic invaders, seeing that they had nothing better to offer by way of government or culture, simply tried to assimilate the Chinese traditions. China thus had to recover from a serious setback, but it did not have to reinvent its civilization. Political stability would once again return in the form of a united China. It was just a matter of time.

COLLAPSE OF THE

Moralists have often interpreted the disintegration of the Roman empire as a symbol of the transitory nature of political structures. Like the earlier collapse of the Han and the later collapse of the Gupta, there was no single cause for the disintegration of the Roman empire. Instead, a combination of internal problems and external pressures weakened the empire and brought an end to Roman authority in the western portion of the empire, whereas centralized imperial rule continued until 1453 CE in the eastern Mediterranean. The Eastern Roman empire remained a center of wealth, military might, and political power well into the post- classical era as the . In the Mediterranean basin as in Han China, imperial weakness and collapse coincided with significant cultural change, notably the increasing popularity of Christianity.

Internal Decay in the Roman Empire

As in the case of the Han dynasty, internal political problems that weakened the central government go a long way toward explaining the fragmentation of the Roman empire. Like their Han counterparts, the Roman emperors faced internal opposition. During the half century from 235 to 284 CE, there were twenty-six recognized emperors (and many others who staked temporary claims to the imperial office). Known as the “barracks emperors,” [a barrack refers to a building used for lodging soldiers] being that most of them were generals who seized power, held it briefly, and then suddenly lost it when they were displaced by rivals or by their mutinous troops. Not surprisingly, most of the barracks emperors died Figure 3. Generals of Roman armies played a major role in destablizing the Western violently: only one is known Roman Empire. for sure to have succumbed to natural causes. Apart from divisions and factions, the Roman empire, like the Han, faced problems because of its sheer size. Even during the best of times, when the emperors could count on abundant revenues and disciplined armed forces, the sprawling empire posed a challenge for central government. After the third century, as epidemics spread throughout the empire and its various regions moved toward local, self-sufficient economies, the empire as a whole became increasingly unmanageable.

Diocletian

The emperor Diocletian (reigned 284-305 CE) attempted to deal with this problem by dividing the empire into two administrative districts. The eastern district included the wealthy lands of Anatolia, Syria, 6 Egypt, and Greece, and the western district embraced Italy, Gaul [France], Spain, Britain, and north Africa. A co-emperor ruled each district with the aid of a powerful lieutenant, and Diocletian hoped the four officials, known as the tetrarchs, would be able to administer the vast empire more effectively than an individual emperor could. Diocletian was a skillful administrator. He managed to bring Rome’s many armies, including unpredictable maverick forces, under firm imperial control. He also tried to deal with a crumbling economy by strengthening the imperial currency, forcing the government to adjust its expenditures to its income, and imposing price caps to dampen . His economic measures were less successful than his administrative reforms, but they helped stabilize the economy ravaged by half a century of civil unrest.

Empire Divided: The Western Roman Empire & The Eastern Roman Empire

Constantine

Yet Diocletian’s reforms also encouraged ambition among the four top co-rulers and their generals, and his retirement from the imperial office in 305 CE set off a round internal struggles and bitter civil war. Already in 306 CE, Constantine, son of Diocletian’s co-ruler Constantius, moved to stake his claim as sole emperor. By 313 CE, he had defeated most of his enemies, although he overcame his last rivals only in 324 CE. Once he had consolidated his grip on power, Constantine ordered the construction of a new capital city, Constantinople, at a strategic site overlooking the Bosporus, the strait linking the Black Sea to the Mediterranean Sea. After 330 CE, Constantinople became the new capital of a united Roman empire. After the collapse of the Western- half of the Roman Empire, Constantinople served as the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantine Empire) until 1453 CE. Constantine was an able emperor. With the reunion of the eastern and western districts of the empire, however, he and his successors faced the same sort of administrative difficulties that Diocletian had attempted to solve by dividing the empire. As population declined (due in large part to disease epidemics) and the economy contracted, emperors found it increasingly difficult to marshal the resources needed to govern and protect the vast Roman empire. Figure 4. Emperor Constantine I The need for protection against external threats became especially acute during the late fourth and early fifth centuries CE.

7 Foreign Threats: Sassanids, Germanic Tribes, the Huns, and More

Apart from internal problems, the Roman empire faced several formidable military threats. One arose on the empire’s southeastern frontiers when the Sassanid dynasty toppled the Parthians in 224 CE and established a powerful state in what is today modern-day Iran. Sassanid and Roman forces clashed repeatedly in the Middle East as each side sought to consolidate its authority in border regions. Some of the conflicts dealt devastating blows. In the year 260 CE, the Roman Emperor Valerian fell captive to Sassanid forces. He spent his last few years at the Sassanid court in Ctesiphon, where his captors forced him to stoop and serve as a mounting stool when the Sassanid king wanted to ride his horse. (After his death, the Sassanids preserved Valerian’s skin as a memento of their victory over the Romans.) Romans and Sassanids engaged in intermittent hostilities until the sixth century CE, but a series of buffer states between the two empires reduced the intensity of conflict after the third century. Migratory Germanic peoples posed a more immediate and serious military threat to the Roman Empire. Indeed, during the fifth century CE, Germanic invasions brought an end to Roman authority in the western half of the empire, although imperial rule survived for an additional millennium in the eastern Mediterranean. Germanic tribes had migrated from their homelands in northern Europe and lived on the eastern and northern borders of the Roman empire since the second century CE. Most notable were the Visigoths, who came originally from Scandinavia and Russia. Like the nomadic peoples who moved into northern China after the fall of the Han dynasty, the Visigoths settled, adopted agriculture, and drew deep inspiration from Roman society. They adapted Roman law to the needs of their society, for example, and converted to Christianity. They also contributed large numbers of soldiers to the Roman armies, serving as auxiliaries and mercenaries. The recruitment of Roman soldiers had become difficult due to population losses that resulted from plagues

and economic turmoil, so barbarian mercenaries were seen as a necessity for protecting the Roman empire’s frontier. Unsurprisingly, their loyalty was always in question since they were outsiders to Roman society. In the interests of social order, however, Romans discouraged settlement of the Visigoths and other Germanic peoples within the empire, preferring that they constitute buffer societies outside imperial borders. During the late fourth century, the relationship between Visigoths and Romans changed dramatically when the nomadic Huns began an aggressive westward migration from their homeland in central Asia. The Huns spoke a Turkish language, and they were likely cousins of the nomadic Xiongnu who inhabited the central Asian steppe lands west of China. During the mid-fifth century CE, the Hun warrior-king Attila organized the Huns into a virtually unstoppable military juggernaut. Under Attila, the Huns invaded Hungary, probed Roman 8 frontiers in the Balkan region, menaced Gaul and Italy, and attacked Germanic tribes living on the northern borders of the Roman Empire.

Cultural Decline

Here, perhaps, is the key to the process of Roman decline: a set of general problems, triggered by a cycle of plagues that could not be prevented, resulting in a rather mechanistic spiral that steadily worsened and was finally forced to collapse due to the effects of a series of barbarian invasions. However, there is another side to Rome’s downfall, although whether as a cause or result of the initial difficulties is hard to say. Rome’s upper classes became steadily more pleasure-seeking, turning away from the political devotion and economic vigor that had characterized the republic and early empire. Cultural life decayed. This was paralleled in late- Han China. Aside from some truly creative Christian writers – the fathers of Western theology – there was very little sparkle to the art or literature of the later empire. Many Roman scholars contented themselves with writing textbooks that rather mechanically summarized earlier achievements in science, mathematics, and literary style. New knowledge or artistic styles were not being generated, and even the levels of previous accomplishments began to slip. A similar process was evident in the later decades of the Han dynasty where Confucian intellectual activity gradually became less creative. This cultural decline, finally, was not clearly due to disease or economic collapse, for it began in some ways before these larger problems surfaced. Something was happening to the Roman elite, the patricians, perhaps because of the deadening effect of authoritarian political rule, perhaps because of a new interest in luxuries and sensual indulgence. Revealingly, the upper classes no longer produced many children, for bearing and raising children seemed incompatible with a life of pleasure-seeking.

Economic Crisis

Regardless of precise causes, the course of Roman decay is quite clear. As the quality of imperial rule declined, as life became more dangerous and economic survival more precarious, many farmers in the Western Roman Empire clustered around the protection of large landlords (patrician estate-owners), surrendering full control over their plots of land in the hope of military and judicial protection. They also sought escape from the burdensome taxes placed upon them by emperors who sought to strengthen the military against foreign invasions as well as to afford the luxuries that made government officials’ lives much nicer. The decentralization of political and economic authority, which was greatest in the western portions of the empire, foreshadowed the manorial system (or manorialism) of Western Europe during the post-classical period (600 CE-1450), known in the west as the Middle Ages or Medieval period of European history. The system of estates gave great political power to landlords and did provide some local stability. This social arrangement, between noble landlords and their peasant laborers became the basis for the Western Europe’s feudal system that would dominate the Middle Ages. But, in the long run, it weakened the power of the emperor and also tended to move the economy away from the elaborate and successful trade patterns of Mediterranean civilization in its heyday. Many estates tried to be self-sufficient. Rather than using slaves as before, nobles relied on peasant labor that was fully under their control. Trade and production declined further and formerly-overcrowded cities shrank in size. The city of Rome, due to near-constant barbarian attacks, was a shadow of its former glory despite the fact that it continued to be the home of the Roman Catholic Church’s leadership in the form of the pope. As discussed, the civilizations of Rome, India, and China were linked together during the classical period, so when one weakened it impacted all, as trade routes (in particular the Great ) became vulnerable when imperial armies could no longer protect them or when the economic resources necessary for trade were either in short supply or no longer available. This situation was made worse by the development of more localized economies in both China and Western Europe at the close of the classical period.

Collapse of the Western Roman Empire

Attila did not create a set of political institutions or a state structure, and the Huns disappeared as a political and military force soon after his death in 453 CE. By that time, however, the Huns had placed such pressure on Visigoths, Ostrogoths, Vandals, Franks, and other Germanic peoples that they streamed en masse into the Roman empire in search of refuge. Once inside imperial boundaries, they encountered little effective resistance and moved around almost at will. They established settlements throughout the western half of the empire – Italy, Gaul, Spain, Britain, and north Africa – where populations were less dense than in the eastern Mediterranean. Under the command of Alaric, the Visigoths even stormed and sacked Rome in 410 CE. By the middle of the fifth century, the western half of the Roman empire was in shambles. Germanic kingdoms 9 were established in Western Europe by 425 CE, a regionalist political pattern that would continue well into the future. In 476 CE, any remaining imperial authority came to an ignominious end when the Germanic general, Odoacer, deposed Romulus Augustulus, the last of the Roman emperors in the western half of the empire. In the Roman empire, as in China, the collapse of the imperial state coincided with important social and cultural changes. The Germanic peoples who toppled the empire looked to their own traditions for purposes of organizing society and government. When they settled in the regions of the former empire, however, they absorbed a good deal of Roman influence. They adapted Roman law to their needs, for example, thus preserving one of the most important features of Roman society. They also began conversion to Roman Catholic Christianity, despite being a syncretized version of it, and pledging their spiritual allegiance to the pope in Rome. Over time, the mingling of Roman and Germanic traditions led to an emergence of an altogether new society – Medieval Europe. In the eastern part of the empire (the Eastern Roman Empire), centered now on Constantinople, the empire in a sense did not fall. Civilization was more deeply entrenched here than in some of the Western European portions of the empire, and there were fewer pressures from invaders. Emperors continued to rule Greece and other parts of southeast Europe, and most of the northern Middle East. This eastern empire – later to be known as the Byzantine Empire – was a product of late imperial Rome, rather than a balanced result of the entire span of classical Mediterranean civilization. Thus, although its language was Greek, it maintained the authoritarian tone of the late Roman emperors. But the Byzantine Empire itself was vibrant, artistically creative, and active in trade.

COLLAPSE OF THE

The decline of classical civilization in India was less drastic than the collapse of Han China. The ability of the Gupta emperors to control local princes was declining by the 5th century CE. Invasions by nomadic peoples, specifically a tribe of Huns known as the White Huns, affected some northern portions of India as early as 500 CE. During the next century, the White Huns penetrated much deeper, destroying the Gupta empire in central India. The Gupta dynasty fell in 550 CE. The collapse of the Gupta was made much easier due to the fact that the Gupta emperors had failed to establish a strong centralized government structure in the first place. Thus, resistance to these horseback invaders was entirely ineffective. Many of the invaders were integrated into the warrior-noble caste of Hindu India, forming a new ruling group of regional princes. For several centuries, no native rulers attempted to build a large Indian state. The regional princes, collectively called “Rajput,” controlled the small states and emphasized military prowess. Few political events of more than local significance occurred. Within this framework, Indian cultural traditions continued to evolve. Buddhism declined further in India proper. Hindu beliefs gained ground, among other things converting the Hun princes, who had originally worshipped gods of battle and had no sympathy for the Buddhist principles of calm and contemplation. Within Hinduism, the worship of a mother goddess, Devi, spread widely, encouraging a new popular emotionalism in religious ritual. The caste system provided a sense of social stability and cohesiveness despite the collapse of the Gupta political system and the return to political regionalism. Clearly, the glory days of the Gupta were long past, although classical traditions survived particularly in Hinduism and the caste system. Indian economic prosperity also continued at high levels.