THE ABANDONMENT OF DACIA AND THE IMPERIAL PROPAGANDA1 Liviu Petculescu2 Abstract: The abandonment of Dacia province was the result of the developments during the rd3 century AD and it must be studied as a part of the 235–284 terrible crisis of the Roman Empire which brought into question even its survival. The Roman historians who described the reunification of the Empire by Aurelianus in prizing terms stated that the emperor withdrew the army and the population from Dacia and moved them south of the Danube to the new province with the same name. So the abandonment of Dacia Traiana was presented as a restoration and not as a loss, since its whole garrison and population were saved and what was left behind was just a deserted territory and nothing else. Thus the official propaganda tried to cover a major failure of the Empire in the same way as after the loss of Germania province in AD 9, when the newly established military commandments west of the Rhine were named Germania Superior and Inferior, to infer the impression that actually the province had not been lost. Keywords: Roman Dacia, 3rd century crisis, abandonment of Dacia, Aurelianus. The abandonment of Dacia province was not a fortuitous event but the result of the developments during the 3rd century and so it must be studied as a part of the terrible crisis between AD 235–284, which brought into question even the survival of the Roman Empire 3. The very difficult situation of the Roman Empire was due to both an internal and an external crisis. Thus, the attacks of the barbarians were accompanied by the military anarchy and the huge inflation that caused the collapse of the economy. The political evolutions in the barbarian world led to unprecedented large‑scale attacks. In Europe, the movements of the Germanic populations from north to south were accompanied by unification processes which caused the formation of great tribe unions near the Roman borders: the Goths north of the Black Sea and westwards up to the North Sea the Vandals, Juthungi, Alamanni, Burgundians, Franks. Several older confederations resisted in the areas of the Middle and Lower Danube, such as the Iranian Sarmatians and the Carpi of Dacian origin that, especially at the beginning of the period, also represented a great danger for the Empire. In Asia, the Arsacid dynasty of the weak Parthian kingdom with a feudal type of struc‑ ture was replaced in 224 by a new dynasty of Persian origin, that of the Sassanids. It meant the establishment of a new Persian state that considered itself the successor of the old kingdom of the Achaemenids and claimed the right to possess all its territories, i.e. the whole Roman Orient. Having a centralised political structure and an impressive army, the kingdom of the Sassanids frequently attacked the oriental Roman provinces throughout the fifty years of crisis, sometimes 1 International colloquium „Policy and propaganda in the Roman empire (1st–3rd centuries AD)”. 2 [email protected] 3 Among the very extensive bibliography on the 3rd century crisis there are two recent publications which synthetize the state of research on this topic: HEKSTER/DE KLEIJN/SLOOTJES 2007 and JOHNE/ HARTMANN/GERHARDT 2008. Ephemeris Napocensis, XXVII, 2017, p. 259–266 260 Liviu Petculescu concurrently with the barbarians from Europe, a situation that brought the empire on the brink of disaster. However, the Roman army saved the situation eventually, in spite of the continuous fights against hard fighting enemies that sometimes outnumbered it. At the same time, soldiers from different provincial armies, aware of their power and role, often proclaimed emperors the generals who had led them to victory. Thus, there were many civil wars between emperors and usurping generals, a situation that brought about the weakening of the military force of Rome and, consequently, of its capacity to resist against external attacks. During this period of time the Roman official propaganda, as mirrored by the historical writings, was forced to pass from the almost exclusive exulting of victories, conquests and the superiority of the Roman civilisation to also hiding the defeats or, if this was not possible, to explaining them through the weaknesses of some emperors, internal anarchy, treacheries or the huge superiority of the enemies. So, when Gordian III died in AD 244 during his campaign against the Persians, the Roman historical tradition kept in Eutropius and Historia Augusta assigns his death to the disease or a treacherous murder but, in the famous inscription named by the modern historians Res gestae divi Saporis, the Sassanian king claims to have killed him in action4. However, as both official propagandas, the Roman and the Persian ones, were equally deceptive, one cannot state the real cause for the death of the Roman emperor. The first large scale attack on Dacia happened in 245 when the Carpi took advantage of the fact that the considerable part of the Roman army from the Lower Danubian provinces transferred in Orient to fight against the Persians didn’t come back to their garrisons. They broke through the defence of the limes Transalutanus and plundered southern Dacia and prob‑ ably also Transylvania, on this occasion capturing an inhabitant from Apulum5. The attack was so powerful that the intervention of the emperor Philip the Arab (244–249) was necessary to drive away the invaders6. The emperor came together with numerous troops, among which vexillations of legio VII Claudia from Moesia Superior and legio XXII Primigenia from Germania Superior7. After the peace treaty was concluded, Philip the Arab had some settlements fortified, especially in Dacia Malvensis, where Romula was provided with a defensive wall8. The same emperor granted the province Dacia in 246 the right to strike its own bronze coins with the legend provincia Dacia9. These coins were issued until 257, when the mint that struck them, most likely at Apulum or Sarmizegetusa, stopped its activity because the situation in Dacia was getting worse. The restoration of the province went on during emperor Decius’ reign (249– 251) mentioned in one of the inscriptions dedicated to him at Apulum as ‘restitutor Daciarum’ and during that of Trebonianus Gallus (251–253), when the road from Micia to Apulum was rebuilt10. In 250 the Goths invaded once again Moesia Inferior with a large army. They caused enormous damage south of the Danube, where they settled for a year and in 251 they succeeded in killing the emperor Decius in the battle at Abrittus, where the Roman army suffered a crushing defeat. It is very likely that during this invasion the barbarians also plundered southern Dacia. Anyway, at latest after this attack, if not a couple of years earlier, subsequent to the 4 Eutropius 9, 2, 3 murder; HA Gord. 30, 8 and 31, 2 murder or disease; Res Gestae divi Saporis 8. 5 CIL III 1054 = IDR III 5, 171. 6 Zosimos 1, 20, 1–2; LORIOT 1975, 793 date the campaign of the emperor against the Carpi from November 245 to the summer of 247. 7 IDR II 325–326 legio XXII; 327–328 legio VII. 8 CIL III 8031 = IDR II 324; IDR II 325–328. 9 ARDEVAN 1992/1993; ALFÖLDY‑GĂZDAC/GĂZDAC 2002/2003 with bibliography. 10 CIL III 1176 = IDR III 5, 431 Apulum; CIL III 8061= IDR III 3, 50 Micia. The abandonment of Dacia and the imperial propaganda 261 Carpic war, the entire so‑called limes Transalutanus was abandoned and the Dacian frontier south of the Carpathians was withdrawn to the Olt river bed11. As the region between the limes Transalutanus and the Olt river deserted by the Romans represented only a fraction of a frontier province it is not surprising that this first territorial loss of the empire at the Lower Danube was not recorded by the historical tradition. Valerianus and his son Gallienus ascended to the throne in 253. Throughout the two emperors’ joint rule, the Romans fought against the Alamanni and the Franks on the Rhine and the Goths and their allies who built a fleet and almost every year beginning with 256 organised plunder attacks on the Black Sea and the eastern Mediterranean. At the same time they have to fight against the Persians in Mesopotamia and on the frontier on the Euphrates river. However, Dacia’s situation seemed to be stable: until 257 bronze coins with the legend provincia Dacia were issued, honorary monuments were dedicated to Gallienus and the members of his family and at Potaissa, the commander of legio V Macedonica completed the construction of a temple dedicated to an oriental deity, Azizus Bonus Puer Conservator 12. From the Dacian army and especially its legions were formed some detachments that were sent to fight against the Persians as it results from the famous triumphal inscription of Sapur which lists among the mili‑ tary units composing the army of Valerianus those from Dacia13. Considering the frequent use of the Dacian troops in the oriental campaigns attested besides the inscriptions from Apameea, Doliche etc. and the oriental deities worshipped by the Dacian army also by the military equip‑ ment originating in the Danubian provinces found at Dura Europos, one can assert that the mention of Dacia as a province contributing to the Roman expeditionary army is real evidence for its effective structure and not only a flattering exaggeration of Sapur. Other vexillations were sent to fight against the Germanic tribes on the Rhine and afterwards remained in the army of the Gallic empire as attested by the aurei struck by Victorinus in 269–70 for the legions V Macedonica and XIII Gemina14. The year 260 was marked by unprecedented catastrophes.