Changes

In the reign of Alexander Severus, there was a sudden rise in the number of raids by German and other barbarians. These raids were a part of life for Rome’s frontier population but by the 230s, they became more intense and frequent .<ref> Southern, Pat. The Roman Empire from Severus to Constantine (London, Routledge, 2015), p 356</ref>. German tribes became better organized and formed into confederations such as the Franks.

The emergence of the Goths, who created a large state in modern Ukraine, created a significant challenge for the Balkan and Black Sea provinces. They were militarily powerful and were especially proficient in cavalry and even took to the sea to launch piratical attacks in the 250 AD. The barbarian attacks were ferocious for two reasons. First, the Romans had been weakened by constant warfare. The bloody civil wars had been especially devasting. The Roman legions could no longer defeat foreign raids and invasions. <ref>Heckster, p 113</ref>

In 224 AD, Ardashir, the ruler of Fars in modern Iran, defeated and killed the last of the Parthian kings and this is seen as the beginning of the Sassanian Empire. Its Emperors or ‘King of Kings’ portrayed themselves as the heirs of the Great Persian Empire of Xerxes .<ref> Heckster, p 139</ref>. It was a much more formidable state that the Parthian and within two decades, the Sassanians ruled an area much larger than anything governed by their predecessors. The neo-Persian Empire was a centralized state and had a regular army.

As soon as the Sassanians took power, they began raiding Roman Syria and Asia Minor under the capable and ruthless Shapur I. The emergence of a new force in the east was a grave challenge for the legions. The constant battles with the Germans in Europe and Persians in the Near East had overstretched the Roman Army. In consequence, the legions could not defend the frontiers. This, in turn, led to the rise of local warlords and ultimately the rise of the Palmyrene Empire, which for a time ruled almost all of the near East and even Egypt. The foundation of the Sassanian Empire, under a series of able rulers, was one of the most significant factors in the Third Century Crisis.

The inability of the Romans to defend their borders was related to socio-economic factors. A pandemic had decimated the Imperial territories in the 250s and 260s and this led to population decline. The plague according to Gibbon, ‘five thousand persons died daily in Rome, and many towns, that had escaped the hands of the barbarians, were entirely depopulated’ depopulated.’<ref>Gibbon, I, chapter 8</ref>. This had serious repercussions as the army found it harder to recruit legionnaires and the tax base was much reduced, which led to serious economic dislocation. Then as we have seen climate change reduced the yield of agricultural surplus and this led to the near collapse of long-distance trade. Then the constant tax demands of the Emperors added to the dire situation in many provinces. All of these compounded the difficulties facing Rome and weakened its ability to defend itself against the Persians and Germans. However, the economic and social decline of the Empire should not be overstated, as seen in its revival under the Illyrian Emperors.

The Third Century Crisis is sometimes known as the ‘Military Anarchy’ Anarchy.’<ref>Scarre, Chris, Chronicle of the Roman Emperors: the reign-by-reign record of the rulers of Imperial Rome, (London, Thames & Hudson, 1995), p 198</ref>. In other words, the army was not controlled by any unified authority. The different legions sought to have their general become Emperor, because of the prestige and the monetary rewards that they would secure upon his accession. As a result, the legions in the Balkans would fight those from the Western provinces in order to determine who should become the ruler of the Roman World.  The root cause of the civil wars and endless usurpations was the fact that Rome had not developed a formal succession process even though it was a de-facto monarchy. As a result, any general with an army could intimidate the Senate to recognize his right to become the legitimate Emperor. This led to a profoundly unstable system and for almost fifty years there was rarely a strong government. Because as Gibbon noted ‘the soldiery had become aware of their power’, they disregarded any authority that was not aligned with their interests .<ref> Gibbon, I, Chp. 7</ref>. The result was endless civil wars that depleted the ranks of the legions and meant that they could not defend the Imperial provinces. It was only when the army was brought under the control of Diocletian and his reformed administration that the civil wars ended, and the legions could once again protect the Empire.