How the Rise of the Huns Transformed Europe

Episode 11: Rome and the Huns

Barbarian Empires of the Steppes (2014)

Dr Kenneth Harl

Film Review

This lecture concerns the vital role of the steppes nomads (especially the Huns, who played a pivotal role in the collapse of the Roman Empire) in Europe’s transition from “antiquity” to the Middle Ages.

According to Harl, the Huns were first prominent on the Pontic-Caspian Steppes, the heartland of their empire, around 370 – 375 AD.[1]

In 376 AD the Huns overwhelmingly defeated the Goths (who, along with the Sarmatians,[2} enjoyed a 150-year alliance with Rome [3]). With Rome’s permission approximately 100,000 Goths crossed the Danube to resettle in the Roman province of Gaul.

In 410 AD, the Goths, under increasing pressure in Gaul from the Huns, sacked Rome for the first time. As part of the peace settlement, the Romans allowed the Goths to form an independent kingdom in southern Gaul.

Under Attila (434-453 AD), the Huns formed a Hun-ruled confederation of Hun, Germanic, Iranian, Alan (an offshoot of the Sarmatians) and proto-Turkish tribes. As well as crossing the Caucasus to launch raids in Mesopotamia and the Sassanid Persian Empire, the Huns gradually migrated west to the Danube and the Hungarian plains. Assimilating the Alan nomads who lived there, they launched a series of raids against the Eastern Roman Empire.[4] In response to these raids, Eastern Roman Emperor Theodosius II built a massive wall between 408 – 450 AD along the four mile land border of Constantinople.

Although the Hun continued to ravage the eastern provinces of the Eastern Empire, Constantinople (and eastern Asia) remained safe from a future nomad invasions.

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[1] According to Harl, the Huns may have been an offshoot of the Xiongu nomads north of China. The Hans adopted the Chinese “Five Baits” system of diplomacy (see How Steppes Nomads Influenced Eartly Chinese Civilization). The Huns, who spoke a Proto-Turkic language, were the first Turkish speakers in Europe.

[2] See The Role of Sarmatian Nomads in Rome’s Military Success

[3] After the emperor Constantine (306-337 AD) decisively defeated the Goths, they were required to send duty to Rome as well as supplying conscripts to support the Roman military in their war with Persia.

[4] In 330 AD, Constantine split Rome into an Eastern and Western Empire. The eastern Roman court fell under the control of eastern warlords. In the western empire, Roman troops consisted mainly of nomad mercenaries. Prior to its collapse in 476 AD, the Western Roman Empire relied mainly on the Huns to keep its Germanic allies in line.

Film can be viewed free with library card on Kanopy.

https://www.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/video/5694984/5695007

The Origin of Democracy

The Origin of Democracy

Press TV (2015)

Film Review

In this Press TV documentary about “democracy” in early Athens and Rome, what intrigued me most is that it glosses over burning questions that are glossed over in high school social studies. It has always mystified me why the Athenians put Socrates to death  and why the Roman Emperor Constantine declared Christianity the official Roman religion in 313 AD – when only 20% of Romans were Christian and the emperor himself was non-Christian (he converted shortly before his death).

According to the Iranian scholars interviewed in this film, the supposed Athenian democracy was actually ruled by a hereditary nobility. Socrates ran afoul of them because he taught the Athenian form of government was actually a type of demagoguery. He was also highly critical of their lack of concern about morality, justice or the massive social inequality present in Athens at the time.

At the time of Socrates, only about 1/8 of the Athenian population (the landowners comprising the nobility) were allowed any input into government. Women and slaves (who comprised 3/4 of the population) and foreign non-slaves (about 10% of the population) were automatically excluded.

In addition to examining the contrasting political systems in the city-states of Athens and Sparta, the film looks at the Roman Republic (509-37 BC), which combined elements of both. It attributes attributes Constantine’s 313 AD Edict of Milan (which made Christianity the official religion) to a desire to unify the population during a period of growing class warfare and growing conflict with the Persian (Iranian) Empire. The latter, which stretched from the Indus to the Nile Rivers, was an enemy of Rome.

The film also explores two distinct differences between Western and Eastern systems of governance. Slavery was far more prominent under Western “democracy” and leaders were much hard to depose when they became corrupt. In contrast, Persian emperors were deposed when they became corrupt and lost the support of the people they ruled.

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*A demogogue is someone who makes use of popular prejudices and false claims and promises in order to gain power.

The Celts: Advanced Seafarers or Uncivilized Barbarians?

The Celts: Search for a Civilization

By Alice Roberts

Heron Books (2015)

Book Review

Were the Celts of northern Europe the uncivilized barbarians the Greeks and Romans made them out to be? Alice Roberts thinks not. Her book examines the origin of the Celts, the prehistoric tribe responsible for populating Ireland, Wales, Scotland, Cornwall and early Britain. The conventional view is that the Celts originated in central Europe and gradually migrated west to occupy ancient Gaul (France), Britain, Scotland, Wales an Ireland; south to Egypt and northern Italy; and west as far as Kiev and Turkey. Roberts sides with the more recent view that Celtic civilization developed along the Atlantic coast of Europe – a well-connected group of Bronze Age societies extending from Portugal – and migrated westward to occupy Gaul, parts of Germany, the Balkans, Turkey and northern Italy..

The Celts gives a full inventory of all available archeological, linguistic and genetic evidence, as well as accounts from historical texts and oral myths. The picture Roberts paints is totally at odds with Roman and Greek efforts to portray Celts as uncivilized barbarians. Thanks to their great sophistication in mining, smelting metals into weapons and jewelry, and advanced seafaring, the Celts established major trading centers throughout continental Europe. The Tartessos referred to in the Old Testament at the time of Solomon were early Celts who sailed great ships laden with silver, gold, ivory, apes and peacocks to trade with Mediterranean settlements.

The Phoenicians, the first Eastern Europeans they made contact with, traded wine and manufactured goods for their silver, gold, copper and tin. The earliest written evidence of the Celtic language comes from the beginning of the Iron Age in Southwest Portugal.

In addition to well-developed religious practices, the Celts had a written language and appointed druids to serve as judges, guardians of knowledge, and  priests.

During the Iron Age, they developed a reputation as great warriors and often hired themselves as mercenaries to various kings and emperors. In 387, they sacked Rome for the first time, and in 280 BC they conquered Macedonia and moved south into Greece. Julius Caesar’s primary reason for invading and occupying Gaul was to end the constant Celtic raids on Roman territory.

The Middle Ages: More Hidden History

Cathedral, Forge, and Waterwheel: Technology and Invention in the Middle Ages

By Frances and Joseph Gies

Harper Collins (1994)

Book Review

This book debunks the prevailing misconception that the Middle Ages was a Dark Ages and that all knowledge and technology was lost when “barbarian tribes” caused the collapse of the Roman Empire. The authors do this very convincingly by identifying a number of key medieval technologies (most from the Far East) without which the 15th century Renaissance would have been impossible.

These include

• the heavy plow
• open field agriculture, water powered machinery
• Hindu-Arab numerals
• double entry bookkeeping
• the compass and navigational charts
• clockwork
• firearms
• moveable type
• stirrups
• the horse collar harness
• paper
• canal locks
• underground mining

The barbarians themselves (ie Germanic tribes) also provided European civilization with several key inventions:

• soap (the Greeks and Romans never used it)
• socks
• laced boots
• clothing made from multiple pieces of cloth sewn together
• wooden barrels (replacing fragile clay jars and animal skins previously used for food storage).

The book maintains that China was far more important than Rome as a source of medieval technologies. In most cases, technological innovations filtered into Europe along Arab trade routes. It devotes specific attention to the horizontal loom (the Romans used a vertical loom), moveable type (adopted by Gutenberg for his printing press), the water wheel, the wheelbarrow, the odometer, mechanical clocks, gunpowder and the crossbow.

Europeans gained access to Hindu-Arab numbers, the cotton gin and the windmill via India and Persia.

Given the extremely Eurocentric education I received in school, I was extremely surprised to learn about all the inventions Europeans take credit for which originated elsewhere.

 

 

 

Reclaiming Our History: the Myth of Britain’s “Dark Ages”

King Arthur’s Britain

Directed by Francis Pryor (2005)

Film Review

This is a series of three documentaries using modern archeological techniques to explode common myths we’re taught about the history of Britain and the “savages” who were allegedly “civilized” by the Romans and the Catholic church.

In Part 1, filmmakers challenge notions that Rome violently invaded and occupied Britain in 43 AD. Archeological remains suggest that early Britons (Celts) traded with Rome and became acquainted with their literature during the century preceded the alleged Roman invasion. It also appears ones of the British tribal kings requested Rome to send troops to protect him against enemy invaders. I was fascinated to learn that Gnosticism* persisted in Britain long after Constantine banned it (in 380 AD).

Part 2 disputes historical claims that British civilization and culture collapsed after Roman legions withdrew and the designation of the period 410 – 597 AD ad the “Dark Age. In 597 AD Pope Gregory sent St Augustine to England to convert the (Gnostic) Anglo Saxons to Christianity.

Part 3 challenges the myth of the Anglo Saxon invasion that allegedly occurred in the fifth century. Isotope analysis and a new technique called gradeometry suggest what really happened was a gradual assimilation of Germanic (primarily Fresian, Angle and Saxon) immigrants over the period 2,000 BC to 500 AD. The effect of this assimilation can also be seen in the Celtic influence over the development of the English language. The latter differs markedly from other Germanic languages. See Hidden History: The Myth of Anglo Saxon Purity

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*Gnosticism refers to a collection of early pagan, Jewish and Christian beliefs which maintained that followers could instinctively experience the presence of God without the intermediation of a priesthood.

How Arrogance Blinds the West to Their Historic Decline

Peter Frankopan – The Silk Roads

Directed by Justin Hardy (2017)

Film Review

This documentary, based on historian Peter Frankopan’s best selling book Silk Roads, explores the Western trait of putting their own interests at the center of their world and possessing no interest or capacity to understand other cultures.

Typically both Europeans and Americans believe they have a monopoly on “goodness” – that only they can save the world from darkness and suffering. Their ruling elite uses these beliefs to justify invading and occupying third world countries and are surprised when other cultures regard us as smug and arrogant.

According to Frankopan, Europe and the US presently find themselves at the wrong end of global trade routes. Asian countries, especially China, that used to be poor are rich now. Asia provides the vast majority of Western consumer goods and owns most Western debt. Over the last 40 years, there has been a vast transfer of wealth from the West to Asia. These new centers of wealth (especially China) have become the hub of scientific, technological and intellectual progress. However owing to their self-centered navel gazing, most Westerners are totally unaware this is happening.

Frankopan also maintains Europe has never had much to offer in the way of natural resources or intellectual innovation (Christianity has always suppressed knowledge and progress). In 800 AD, Mesopotamia was the wealthiest region in the world, with Baghdad viewed as the global center of trade and learning. During this period, Europe’s most important resource was slaves, with Dublin, Mainz, Utrecht and Venice serving as major trafficking centers for kidnapped women and children.

All this changed with the conquest of the New World, the enslavement of Native Americans and Africans, and the flow of silver and gold back to Europe. This illicit capture of mineral wealth and human beings enabled Europe to developed highly specialized skills in violence and conquest. They no longer needed to produce their own wealth because they could use their military prowess to steal it from other regions.

Over time, the economic decline of the West has eroded their military capability to the point they can no longer win wars.

As in Rome, obscene income inequality is one of the main indicators of an empire in decline.

 

Engels on the Origins of Class Society

The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State

By Friedrich Engels (1884)

Free PDF: Origin of the Family

Book review

Relying on the pioneering work of Lewis Morgan and other early anthropologists, Engels traces the origins of class society back to the agricultural revolution (around 10,000 BC when our hunter gatherer ancestors transformed themselves into farmers). The advent of agriculture resulted in a “surplus” of food, which became the responsibility of an elite (kings and priests) to safeguard for the winter and hard times.

The production of an agricultural surplus also enables the accumulation of wealth and the desire to bequeath one’s riches to descendants. This can only happen if men can trace the paternity of their offspring. Men’s desire to pass on wealth resulted in the introduction of the marriage contract to bind all women to a single man (while men were allowed unlimited partners)  and the replacement of matriarchal society with patriarchy.

Engels goes on to trace how this early wealth creation led to the concept of private property and the feudalistic state. To have a state you have to have a king or supreme leader. He maintains power via a standing army and rewards “knights” in his army with gifts of private property. And because property is no longer owned communally, peasants are forced off the land that provides their subsistence and forced to go to work for knights and lords who have expropriated their land.

The book contains a fascinating section about the way the Iroquois Nation governed themselves – including their use of consensus in decision making, inheritance through the female line and their collective ownership of property. He also outlines how various Iroquois tribes were united in a Confederacy governed by a Federal Council (which formed the basis for state-federal structure the colonists adopted in the Articles of Confederation).

There is also a section about democracy in ancient Athens and the coalescence of Latin tribes into a single Roman government. The final chapter concerns the amalgamation of the various Germanic tribes into the states of Germany and France.

The Assassination of Julius Caesar: Parallels with Trump

The Assassination of Julius Caesar

Michael Parenti (2012)

Film Review

In this presentation, Michael Parenti discusses the fraudulent history we are taught about the late Roman Republic. In particular, he focuses on the popular resistance movement that led to the rise of the Populares in the Roman senate in the second century BC. The revolt of the Roman proletariat was largely a reaction to the privatization of Rome’s collective agricultural lands as latifundia (plantations owned by Roman aristocrats). Historically there was no private land ownership in Rome until thugs hired by aristocrats drove the peasants off their land around 200 BC.

Parenti starts by demolishing the myth promulgated by mainstream historians that Rome was a republic. The Roman senate was a self-appointed oligarchy. For the most part Roman senators paid no taxes though. Instead they loaned money at interest to the Roman government (sound familiar?). The lower classes, in contrast, were heavily taxed.

The first great Populares to serve as consul was Tiberius Gracchus in 133 BC. He and his brother Gaius, who succeeded him, fought for land reform to break up the latifundia and redistribute them to the landless. Despite their aristocratic background, all the Populares consuls challenged a Roman economic system that was rigged in favor of the elites All were assassinated by aristocratic death squads.

Julius Caesar would be the last Populares consul, and he, too, would be assassinated in 44 BC. Among the reforms he enacted were

• Lowering interest and fines on debts
• Building exceptional public libraries to be used by all Roman citizens
• Guaranteeing freedom of religion to Roman Jews
• Ending the practice of forcing people with unpaid debts into slavery
• Introducing a democratic constitution
• Creating state jobs in Rome and the colonies for the unemployed
• Ending Cicero’s* witch hunts and extrajudicial executions

The aristocrats in the senate, who detested Caesar because he threatened their wealth and privilege, responded by labeling him a brutal tyrant and assassinating him. Ironically the emperors who succeeded him were far more tyrannical. Yet the senate aristocrats supported them as they protected their wealth and privilege.

What strikes me most about this presentation are the clear parallels with the current period, with the liberal elite and intelligence establishment portraying Trump as an unspeakable fascist tyrant based on little evidence other than his rhetoric. I’m aware that much of the liberal establishment is justifiably frightened of the ultraconservative bent of Trump’s appointees. However most of the strident anti-Trump rhetoric seems over the top to me.

For me the two main ways the parallels break down are 1) the absence of a genuine reform movement from below similar to the Roman resistance movement that led to the formation of the Populares 2) the absence in Trump of the towering intelligence, charisma and military and political ingenuity that Caesar displayed. Trump’s lack of political experience raises the vital question whether he or his conservative cabinet will be in control. Despite his promise of numerous populist reforms, I’m extremely skeptical whether the prominent conservatives in his cabinet support them.

The Impermanence of Empire

Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic

By Chalmers Johnson

Henry Holt (2007)

Book Review

Available free as a mobi file (download Kindle for PCs free from Amazon) at libcom.org

The third and final volume in a trilogy, Nemesis is a study of the impermanence of empire. Johnson draws on detailed studies of the Roman and British Empire to make specific predictions about the ultimate fate of the US.

After taking inventory of some of the British Empire’s worst atrocities (the deliberate destruction of thriving civilizations in India and China, the extermination of the Tasmanians in Australia, the systemic genocide against the Kikuyu in Kenya*, the slaughter of 10,000 Sudanese and the genocidal Malaysian Emergency), the late Chalmers Johnson asserts that Britain surrendered their empire after World War II due to flagging domestic support for their administrative massacres in India.

Rome, in contrast, continued its imperial conquests and atrocities by imposing a brutal dictatorship at home. Citing the systematic revocation of civil liberties, Johnson theorizes that the US has opted to follow Rome’s example. He makes the uncanny prediction (in 2007) that there will be no change in US foreign policy, even after getting rid of Bush and Cheney.

As the average lifespan of a full fledged empire is 100 years, Johnson predicts the US empire will have collapsed by the 22^nd century. He believes it will maintain the facade of democracy until bankruptcy overwhelms it.

According to Johnson, the loss of the US manufacturing base has forced the country into spending exorbitant sums on totally useless technology (his chapters on Star Wars SDI weapons are particularly illuminating) just to keep the economy afloat.

Aside from the secret budget devoted to covert CIA operations, which he enumerates in detail**, 40% of the Pentagon budget is secret – even from Congress.

The US government finally came out of the closet after 9-11 about being an empire. However they continue to be extremely secretive about the total number of countries they occupy. As of 2007, the official count was 737 bases in 130. However Johnson lists at least a dozen secret bases that are kept off the official list for political reasons.

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*The so-called Mau Mau uprising.

**A partial listing of the democracies overthrown by the CIA and replaced with dictatorships:

• Italy 1947-48
• Iran 1953
• Guatemala 1954
• Indonesia 1957-58
• Brazil 1961-64
• Greece 1964-74
• South Korea 1961-1987
• Philippines continuously
• Chile 1973

Collective Anarchism: Alive and Well in Rome

Radical Rome

Media-Lien (2015)

Film Review

Radical Rome is a short French documentary about Rome’s anarchist anti-austerity movement.

The film focuses mainly on private property the group has reclaimed as public space. One self-governing public space called ESC (Excel, Subtract, Create) has been occupied by activists for over 30 years and boasts a tea room, bike shop, cinema, theater, community kitchen, school for migrants and a sewing factory run by migrants. ESC is non-hierarchical and governs itself via weekly assemblies.

At present, Rome’s youth unemployment rate is 44%. Its anti-austerity movement is mainly driven by students, unemployed youth and older activists over 40.