Christianity

Christianity is the final issue relating to late Roman warfare that I wish to review. The conversion of Constantine has been regarded as a major factor in the Roman military decline,20 partly through the adoption of a moral code which had traditions of opposition to military activity and hostility to the empire, and partly through the competition for scarce resources which it introduced, the “idle mouths” of modern critics. These are relevant considerations, and the story of Titus’ switch from military to religious service provides one specific example of a transfer of resources. But one of Christianity’s strengths was the diversity of models afforded in the Bible, and the Old Testament could be cited in defense of military service (e. g. Augustine, contra Faustum 22.74-5; Epist. 189.4). Armies seem not to have been affected by the religious changes of the fourth century, with Christianity taking over the role of traditional religion as the foundation of the military oath of allegiance (Vegetius 2.5), providing a new military standard and chants, and being acknowledged on coinage. Even the wealth and size of the church are unlikely to have grown sufficiently to have caused the weakness of the West in the early fifth century, and in the eastern crisis of the early seventh century ecclesiastical wealth constituted a resource which Emperor Heraclius annexed to finance his military plans. Christianity in fact supported the state through aligning civilian energies with imperial interests, as the experience of frontier cities such as Nisibis in the fourth century, Clermont in the fifth, Edessa in the sixth, and Thessalonica in the seventh reveal. The Christian emperor in Constantinople sat at the center of the state’s secular and religious hierarchies, a dominant position which no western ruler managed to secure.