THE ABANDONMENT OF 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 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 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 province in AD 9, when the newly established military commandments west of the were named and Inferior, to infer the impression that actually the province had not been lost. Keywords: , 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 north of the and westwards up to the North Sea the , Juthungi, Alamanni, Burgundians, Franks. Several older confederations resisted in the areas of the Middle and Lower Danube, such as the Iranian and the of Dacian origin that, especially at the beginning of the period, also represented a great danger for the Empire. In , 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 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 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 and 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 transferred in Orient to fight against the Persians didn’t come back to their garrisons. They broke through the defence of the Transalutanus and plundered southern Dacia and prob‑ ably also , on this occasion capturing an inhabitant from Apulum5. The attack was so powerful that the intervention of the emperor (244–249) was necessary to drive away the invaders6. The emperor came together with numerous troops, among which vexillations of legio VII Claudia from 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 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 or Sarmizegetusa, stopped its activity because the situation in Dacia was getting worse. The restoration of the province went on during emperor ’ reign (249– 251) mentioned in one of the inscriptions dedicated to him at Apulum as ‘restitutor Daciarum’ and during that of (251–253), when the road from 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 was abandoned and the Dacian frontier south of the Carpathians was withdrawn to the 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 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 , 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 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. was defeated by the Persians and taken prisoner, a situation that had a terrible echo in the Roman world. Consequently, usurpers rose in the Rhine provinces, and in the Orient. Gallienus managed to eliminate , the emperor proclaimed in Pannonia and who claimed to be ’ descendant, but in the west a Roman state consisting of Gallia, Britannia, and was founded, named by the modern historians the ‘Gallic Empire’. Furthermore, after a series of battles with the Persians and fights among Roman generals, Odenath took command of the Oriental provinces. He was a member of the dynasty ruling and recog‑ nised the authority of the Roman emperor only formally. Under such circumstances, the years 260–268 of Gallienus’ reign as sole emperor repre‑ sented the climax of the 3rd century crisis, when the Roman Empire was on the brink of collapse. The Goths’ confederation raids on land and at sea occurred almost uninterruptedly. In 267 they culminated with a massive attack when part of the invaders went up the Danube, while the others sailed southwards to Greece, but, eventually, they were driven away by Gallienus and asked to conclude a peace treaty.

11 PETOLESCU 2000, 208 and HUTTNER 2008, 196 the probable abandonment of limes Transalutanus after the Carpic war; BOGDAN-CĂTĂNICIU 1984, 142 a possible use of the fortifications oflimes Transalutanus after the Carpic war. 12 CIL III 7971=IDR III 2, 82 Ulpia Traiana Sarmizegetusa; CIL III 1577=8010= IDR III 1, 77 Praetorium; CIL III 1550= IDR III 1, 132 ; CIL III 875 Potaissa. 13 Res Gestae divi Saporis 20. 14 LAFAURIE 1975, 934, Elmer 716 leg V Macidonica PF and Elmer 719 leg XIII Gemina PF issued by the mint from Agrippinensis; ALFÖLDI 1939, 151 consider that the Dacian vexillations stationed permanently in northern Italy from Philip the Arab gone over twenty years later, in 268, to , which is hardly acceptable. 262 Liviu Petculescu

The dramatic general and regional situation affected Dacia as well. Thus, only one inscription dating after 260 was found so far15. It was set up by the commander of legio XIII Gemina at Băile Herculane, not far from the Danube, on the road connecting the province to the rest of the Empire, and not at Apulum, where the legion was quartered. Then, the pres‑ ence after 260 at Poetovio, in Pannonia Superior, of a detachment of soldiers from the legio V Macedonica and XIII Gemina, under the command of a praepositus and including the chief and the members of the clerical staff of the vexillation, accounts for the transfer of the greatest part of the Dacian legions to Gallienus’ field army16. The withdrawal of a considerable part yet not accurately quantified of the army from Dacia is also proved by the rarity of the coins struck by Gallienus, which means that the emperor did not pay the troops in the old garrisons of the prov‑ ince that went beyond the natural frontier represented by the Danube and which was almost impossible to be defended against the barbarians’ ceaseless attacks. Therefore, Gallienus lost the control of Dacia province most probably immediately after 260 but anyway at the latest in 267, during the continuous large scale Gothic attacks. Following Enmann Imperial History, resumed by Paul Orosius, Eutropius, Rufius Festus and Iordanes, mentioned the loss of Dacia by Gallienus without further comments17. This rather unexpected objective approach of the Roman historiography is due to the hostility of the senatorial class toward Gallienus, who not only hindered their access to high military commands but also lost control of most of the empire. For almost the same reasons as the loss of Dacia and in the same period of time the Romans left Agri Decumates, the land between the Rhine and the Danube belonging to the provinces Germania Superior and Raetia. This withdrawal was not mentioned by any of the Roman historians since that territory was not a province and, according to the imperial propa‑ ganda, the Romans overlooked the event in their attempt to diminish their losses. Only in an oration addressed to emperor Constantius I prizing his achievements which redressed the disaster of the past, an anonymous rhetor of the 4th century wrote that “then (implying under Gallienus) Raetia was lost (amissa Raetia)18. This imprecise statement includes an exaggeration, as only a small part of it was abandoned and at the same time an omission, as it does not even mention the loss of the part of Germania Superior or of Dacia province. In 269, during the reign of the Emperor Claudius II Gothicus (268–270), there was a true migration of the Goths, Heruls, , on land and at sea. The main army of the barbarians plundered the Balkan Peninsula but eventually was defeated by Claudius II in a great battle at Naissus, where 50,000 Germanic soldiers were killed and many more were taken prisoners. So severe was the defeat that the military force of the Goths was seriously weakened and for a long period of time they weren’t a major danger to the Empire19. Immediately after his accession, the next emperor, Aurelianus (270–275), had to repulse the attacks of the Vandals on the Danube and to drive away the Juthungi and Alamanni from Italy20. Then, toward the end of the spring of 271 he marched with his army to the Middle and Lower Danubian provinces in order to secure the defence of this region21. The most important measures taken by the emperor to stiffen this endangered sector of the frontier was the abandon‑

15 CIL III 1560 = IDR III 1, 54. 16 AIJ 314–317 = IDRE 267- 270; GILLIAM 1976 canaliclarius rank representing the chief of the clerical staff of the legionary vexillation. 17 Aurelius Victor, de Caesaribus 33,3; Orosius 7, 22, 7; Eutropius 9, 82; Festus 8,2; Iordanes, Romana, 217. 18 Panegyrici Latini 8, 10, 2. 19 HARTMANN 2008, 301–304. 20 HARTMANN 2008, 312–313. 21 ALFÖLDI 1939, 152. The abandonment of Dacia and the imperial propaganda 263 ment of the north-Danubian Dacia which represented the official recognition of the actual loss of the province during Gallienus’ reign and the creation of a new province with the same name south of the Danube22. On this occasion the imperial mint from issued coins and antoniniani with the legends Pannoniae and Dacia Felix, probably to be used mainly for a donativum given to the troops engaged in this operation23. During the organisation of southern Dacia the emperor repelled in Moesia a minor attack of the Goths whom he chased afterwards north of the Danube. That victory favoured the retreat of the remaining troops and of a part of the population from Dacia, especially the urban people acquainted with the Roman way of life. The two Dacian legions were quartered on the frontier of the new Danubian province, which had been protected until then by the very exis‑ tence of the north-Danubian Dacia. Although there is yet no evidence to confirm it, it is very likely that the still remaining auxiliary troops and the civilian refugees from Dacia Traiana were also settled mainly in the territory of the new province. However, so far, one knows only one refugee from Dacia Traiana, C. Valerius Iulianus. Born at Sarmizegetusa, he was a soldier who arrived at the rank of primuspilus in legio XI Claudia III P(ia)F(idelis) quartered at Durostorum but, after his retirement, he and his family settled in this town in Moesia Inferior and not in Dacia24. The Romans’ main reason for leaving Dacia was surely a strategic one. If they wanted to conquer the whole province again and then keep it as a bulwark surrounded by barbarian territories from three parts, that would required an important number of soldiers but the empire did not have so many available military men, since it was engaged in defensive battles for its survival. Therefore, the shortening of the frontier and its location on the Danube was the most efficient solution from a military point of view and the only one reasonable for Aurelianus, especially at that very moment when he needed more troops to fight against Palmyra. Consequently, the abandonment of Dacia and the Agri Decumates was the price the great general and politician Aurelianus had to pay in order to restore the unity of the empire. And in fact, afterwards he regained control over the Orient dominated by Palmyra and over the Gallic empire. Thus he managed to rebuilt the empire and gain the Roman historians’ esteem. The Roman historians, who described the reunification of the Empire in praising terms, stated that the damage caused by the barbarian attacks were so serious that Aurelianus with‑ drew the population25 or the army and population26 from Dacia and moved them south of the Danube to the newly established province with the same name, on part of the deserted territory of the two Moesiae. So, Aurelianus’ abandonment of Dacia Traiana was presented as a restora‑ tion and not as a loss, since by that measure the whole garrison and population of the former province was saved and what was left behind was just a deserted territory and nothing else. Thus, the official propaganda tried to cover a major failure using a method as old as the Empire: after the defeat of the year 9, the troops from Germania were withdrawn west of the Rhine, on the territory of where two military districts were established, Germania Superior and which became later, during Domitianus, regular provinces27. Their names

22 OPREANU 2004, 14–17, after a thorough analysis of the archaeological and numismatic sources concerning the last decades of Dacia Traiana arrived at the conclusion that the abandonment of the province was a process started by Gallienus and finished by Aurelianus. 23 GÖBL 1995, 25, 34–35 Mediolanum 1st emission, spring of 271; 122 no. 17, Pl. 3/17 Dacia Felix, 129 no. 22, Pl. 3/22 Pannoniae. 24 IDRE II 333. 25 Eutropius 9, 15, 1; Festus 8, 2. 26 HA Aurelian 39, 7; Iordanes, Romana 217. 27 , Annales 1, 31; RÜGER 1996, 528. 264 Liviu Petculescu identical to that of the former province were obviously meant to infer the impression that actu‑ ally it had not been lost. In conclusion, the main goal of the imperial historiography was not to describe the actual developments which led to the abandonment of Dacia but to stress the achievements of Aurelianus as a restorer of the entire Roman Empire.

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ABBREVIATIONS AIJ Antike Inschriften aus Jugoslavien. I. und Pannonia Superior, Zagreb. ActaMN Acta Musei Napocensis, Cluj-. ANRW Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt, Berlin-New York. BASP Bulletin of the American Society of Papyrologists, New York. BSNR Buletinul Societății Numismatice Romane, București. CAH The Cambridge Ancient History, Cambridge. CIL Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum, Berlin. HA Historia Augusta. IDR Inscripțiile Daciei Romane. Inscriptiones Daciae Romanae, București. IDRE Inscriptiones Daciae Romanae. Inscriptiones extra fines Daciae repertae Graecae et Latinae (sec. I. II. III), București.