WEBVTT - Dethroned Emperor: The Fall of Valerian, Part 1 0:00:03.040 --> 0:00:05.360 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of My 0:00:05.480 --> 0:00:14.960 Heart Radio. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:15.080 --> 0:00:18.159 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick and 0:00:18.320 --> 0:00:20.759 Rob do it. What's what's that sound? Is that the 0:00:20.800 --> 0:00:23.639 sound of us digging down a historical rabbit hole that 0:00:23.680 --> 0:00:26.400 you got interested in? What what are we doing today? Oh? 0:00:26.520 --> 0:00:29.240 In this episode, we're going to talk about the fall 0:00:29.360 --> 0:00:34.760 of Valerian, Emperor Valerian of Rome. Uh, this is this is, 0:00:34.800 --> 0:00:36.599 this is gonna be I think a fun one, even 0:00:36.600 --> 0:00:37.960 though this is this is certainly gonna be more of 0:00:38.000 --> 0:00:40.800 a historical direction, not the first time that we've we 0:00:40.960 --> 0:00:43.600 we've gone down a historical rabbit hole, as you say, 0:00:44.200 --> 0:00:48.640 But I think, as always it's important to remember in 0:00:48.680 --> 0:00:51.080 this context, you know what histories are. It's kind of 0:00:51.080 --> 0:00:53.880 like you have you have, you know, histories within with 0:00:53.920 --> 0:00:57.840 capital aging, histories with the lower case h um. Histories 0:00:58.440 --> 0:01:02.640 in general, written his stories, oral histories, past down histories, 0:01:03.560 --> 0:01:07.520 resurrected histories are accounts of the past that very often 0:01:07.520 --> 0:01:13.039 have viewpoints, biases, agendas. They're constructed from memories, evidence, and 0:01:13.080 --> 0:01:15.800 pre existing accounts, all of which are subject to error. 0:01:16.160 --> 0:01:18.800 In short, interest in history is not only a matter 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:22.200 of what happened, but also why did this version of 0:01:22.240 --> 0:01:25.480 what happened happen? Why is this the account that was 0:01:25.520 --> 0:01:28.920 written down or told to others? And um, these are 0:01:28.959 --> 0:01:33.000 all interesting questions to ask about the fall of Emperor Valerian, 0:01:33.720 --> 0:01:38.000 questions that still remain today about what actually happened to him. 0:01:38.080 --> 0:01:42.120 Also how did the defeat go down? But but mostly 0:01:42.200 --> 0:01:45.840 what was his ultimate fate? Ah. So here you're interested 0:01:45.959 --> 0:01:49.200 not only in a question of history, as in what's 0:01:49.280 --> 0:01:51.960 the best we can figure out what happened in the past, 0:01:52.280 --> 0:01:56.960 but a question of historiography. Why did certain historians of 0:01:57.000 --> 0:02:00.920 the past write about history in a certain way? Yeah? 0:02:00.960 --> 0:02:03.640 And I think ultimately this is a story that is 0:02:03.680 --> 0:02:07.560 interesting on both counts because it's also fascinating to to 0:02:07.640 --> 0:02:11.040 look at the various histories and piece together in your 0:02:11.080 --> 0:02:15.360 mind this story of just countless on the in the 0:02:15.480 --> 0:02:21.360 Roman imperial side, you know, just constant overthrow and backstabbing. Uh. 0:02:21.400 --> 0:02:25.920 This uh, this this era of chaos that sees just 0:02:26.320 --> 0:02:29.840 emperor after emperor fall, to all of the infighting in 0:02:30.000 --> 0:02:33.080 Rome as well as to some of the uh, the 0:02:33.160 --> 0:02:35.959 fighting on the borders of the Roman Empire, as well, 0:02:36.320 --> 0:02:39.840 and yeah, then there's also this this question of of well, 0:02:39.880 --> 0:02:42.880 what are these different stories regarding the fate of Valerian 0:02:42.919 --> 0:02:45.080 and what do they mean and how are we supposed 0:02:45.120 --> 0:02:49.280 to interpret them, uh from our modern standpoint. So I'm 0:02:49.320 --> 0:02:52.000 just curious, how did you get interested in this, in particular, 0:02:52.040 --> 0:02:55.280 this question about what happened to Emperor Valerian. I think 0:02:55.320 --> 0:02:58.480 this is one of those kind of just tangent steering 0:02:58.520 --> 0:03:01.800 research where I just I was working on something else 0:03:01.919 --> 0:03:05.640 and then I was curious. I was looking into maybe 0:03:05.800 --> 0:03:11.720 various um emperors and the fall of various emperors and uh, 0:03:11.720 --> 0:03:14.040 and then I started I think I initially just clicked 0:03:14.080 --> 0:03:18.600 on on just like a basic page about Valerian and uh, 0:03:18.680 --> 0:03:22.040 you know, and read some some grizzly details about what 0:03:22.120 --> 0:03:24.200 might have happened to him, and that got me thinking, 0:03:24.200 --> 0:03:26.320 It's like, well, this sounds this is really severe. You know, 0:03:26.360 --> 0:03:28.959 what were the ramifications of this? And then I started 0:03:28.960 --> 0:03:34.200 digging in a little deeper classic rabbit hole dynamics. All right, yeah, yeah, 0:03:34.720 --> 0:03:37.680 all right. So to begin with, let's talk about where 0:03:37.680 --> 0:03:41.160 we're gonna go in what time period we're traveling to. 0:03:41.280 --> 0:03:43.680 For the most part, here, we have to journey to 0:03:43.720 --> 0:03:46.360 the Roman Empire during a time that is known as 0:03:46.440 --> 0:03:50.120 the Crisis of the third century, a period of decades 0:03:50.240 --> 0:03:53.960 lasting from two thirty five to two eighty four CE, 0:03:54.760 --> 0:03:58.440 during which the Roman Empire was just defined by anarchy 0:03:58.480 --> 0:04:02.440 and strife, a time in which it nearly collapsed. One 0:04:02.440 --> 0:04:04.560 of the books that I was looking to for this 0:04:04.880 --> 0:04:08.680 is actually it's an older history book, series of popular 0:04:08.760 --> 0:04:12.520 history books came out many decades ago from Will Durant. 0:04:13.040 --> 0:04:16.480 Uh this is the Story of Civilization. And there's one 0:04:16.480 --> 0:04:18.880 section in the book that deals with primarily with the 0:04:18.960 --> 0:04:22.640 with the Romans, titled the Collapse of the Empire, and 0:04:22.680 --> 0:04:25.800 there's a great quote I want to read from that quote, 0:04:25.839 --> 0:04:29.000 we shall not repeat in bloody detail the names and 0:04:29.080 --> 0:04:33.400 battles and deaths of these impervors of anarchy. In the 0:04:33.480 --> 0:04:39.000 thirty five years between Alexander Severus and Orillian, thirty seven 0:04:39.040 --> 0:04:43.000 men were proclaimed emperors. I'm gonna say it, that's too 0:04:43.000 --> 0:04:47.240 many emperors. That's too many, is it is? It's that 0:04:47.400 --> 0:04:49.320 is just that is that has a lot of emperors 0:04:49.360 --> 0:04:51.119 to go through in such a short period of time, 0:04:51.520 --> 0:04:53.840 And like Will Durant, we are not going to go 0:04:53.880 --> 0:04:55.520 through all of them. We're gonna mention some of them, 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:57.520 just to give you a little color for just how 0:04:57.600 --> 0:05:00.880 much turmoil, how much turnover there was. This was the 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:04.080 time period during which there was there was really not 0:05:04.160 --> 0:05:07.719 any job security to being the emperor of Rome. You know. 0:05:07.800 --> 0:05:11.040 One thing that's always interesting to me about Roman history 0:05:11.320 --> 0:05:14.640 is not just that basically that all Roman emperors are 0:05:14.720 --> 0:05:18.040 bad leaders by modern morals and modern standards, but that 0:05:18.160 --> 0:05:23.000 most Roman emperors were bad leaders by Roman standards. Yeah. 0:05:23.040 --> 0:05:25.640 There there's when you start talking about, well, who are 0:05:25.680 --> 0:05:29.000 the worst emperors, it's you can draw up a pretty 0:05:29.080 --> 0:05:32.000 exhaustive list, uh, and then that they're actually there are 0:05:32.000 --> 0:05:34.479 actually some some pretty pretty fun lists of the shore 0:05:34.560 --> 0:05:37.160 you can find on the internet. But a number of 0:05:37.520 --> 0:05:39.960 really bad ones do occur during this time. Some of 0:05:40.000 --> 0:05:43.080 the other really famous bad ones occur prior to this period. 0:05:43.440 --> 0:05:46.080 But yeah, the Crisis of the Third century runs from 0:05:46.120 --> 0:05:49.040 two thirty five to two eighty four, So that race 0:05:49.120 --> 0:05:51.440 was the question, what do these dates mean? Let's start 0:05:51.440 --> 0:05:55.240 with two thirty five. In the year two thirty five, Uh, 0:05:55.279 --> 0:06:00.080 the Emperor Severus Alexander is assassinated by his own troops. 0:06:01.000 --> 0:06:05.120 So Alexander was had been named emperor at age fourteen, 0:06:05.920 --> 0:06:10.360 and he was a progressive figure in many respects who 0:06:10.400 --> 0:06:12.680 sought to restore the power of the senate and the 0:06:12.720 --> 0:06:16.760 aristocracy and to weaken the dominance of the Roman military. 0:06:17.360 --> 0:06:20.440 So he built libraries, public baths, and other works in 0:06:20.520 --> 0:06:24.120 the empire. He engaged in various economic programs to bring 0:06:24.160 --> 0:06:27.279 down interest rates and also helped the poor. Now I 0:06:27.320 --> 0:06:31.239 say progressive in many respects because he also enforced various 0:06:31.279 --> 0:06:34.719 morality based laws that saw the arrest of prostitutes the 0:06:34.760 --> 0:06:39.919 deportation of homosexuals. Still considered that previous emperors included the 0:06:39.960 --> 0:06:44.080 likes of Caligula, Nero, and Commitists. Uh, these are all 0:06:44.160 --> 0:06:48.039 names that that probably ring a bell in everyone's head, 0:06:48.120 --> 0:06:51.359 you know some of the stories about these individuals. Even 0:06:51.400 --> 0:06:54.040 if that scene from the movie where Caligula chops off 0:06:54.080 --> 0:06:57.000 people's heads with the lawnmower didn't really happen in history, 0:06:57.000 --> 0:07:00.200 Caligula was a really bad guy. Yeah, it's still in 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:05.800 the spirit of Caligula. So Alexander's immediate predecessor was an 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:10.119 emperor by the name of a Lagabalus who had died 0:07:10.120 --> 0:07:14.320 at age eighteen following a short rain that's noted mostly 0:07:14.360 --> 0:07:18.400 for scandals and excess, though Durrant notes that something you 0:07:18.400 --> 0:07:19.520 have to keep in mind, I guess with a lot 0:07:19.520 --> 0:07:23.280 of these individuals is that at least some of these 0:07:23.280 --> 0:07:27.360 scandals were probably fabricated by enemies, of which um uh 0:07:27.400 --> 0:07:31.080 Alagabalus had many in the senatorial class. So just so 0:07:31.600 --> 0:07:34.280 one of one of the many examples will be pointing 0:07:34.320 --> 0:07:38.320 to in this episode where history and the truth is 0:07:38.360 --> 0:07:41.800 of course tweaked to serve some sort of an agenda, 0:07:42.200 --> 0:07:45.880 but by by all accounts, still not a great emperor. 0:07:46.120 --> 0:07:49.880 He hosted weird lotteries, and there's actually an excellent horrible 0:07:49.960 --> 0:07:55.200 history sketch from the historical Comedy of show on British 0:07:55.200 --> 0:07:57.880 television about this. Oh you shared this with me, but 0:07:57.920 --> 0:08:00.000 I'm sorry I did not have time to watch it yet. 0:08:00.000 --> 0:08:02.920 I'm I can't wait to once we're done here. Basically, 0:08:03.000 --> 0:08:06.000 I mean the story is that, yeah, he was like, 0:08:06.000 --> 0:08:09.640 well let's have a lottery, let's let's have some fun romans. 0:08:10.520 --> 0:08:13.160 But you might win some money or a house, but 0:08:13.200 --> 0:08:15.480 you also might win just a whole bunch of flies 0:08:16.040 --> 0:08:19.880 or a poisonous snake. Things. So it was, you know, 0:08:19.960 --> 0:08:22.160 in a way, it was it was kind of like 0:08:22.440 --> 0:08:28.080 very strange reality television of this time period. Huh. Um. 0:08:28.240 --> 0:08:31.840 So I remember Ella Ablis has come up on the 0:08:32.040 --> 0:08:35.200 show at least once before, because it was in our 0:08:35.280 --> 0:08:39.160 invention episode on the history of air conditioning. And there's 0:08:39.160 --> 0:08:42.040 a story told by I'm sorry, I forget the Roman historian, 0:08:42.080 --> 0:08:47.160 but somebody tells a story about Ella Ablas cooling his 0:08:47.160 --> 0:08:49.600 his orchard or his you know, the courtyard at his 0:08:49.640 --> 0:08:53.600 palace by having people bring down snow from the tops 0:08:53.640 --> 0:08:57.199 of a nearby mountain and pile it up just to 0:08:57.320 --> 0:09:01.240 like things cool in the summer, uh, which overall is 0:09:01.400 --> 0:09:03.960 very inefficient. But what I think we decided, well, if 0:09:04.000 --> 0:09:06.120 there's a huge block of snow that would actually sort 0:09:06.160 --> 0:09:08.760 of cool off the area, especially if there's like breeze 0:09:08.760 --> 0:09:12.160 blowing over it. Uh. So this is uh, I guess 0:09:12.240 --> 0:09:17.040 if that's true clever but also kind of kind of excessive. 0:09:17.640 --> 0:09:19.679 But then again, we we also addressed the question of 0:09:19.679 --> 0:09:22.160 whether or not that was true, because I think the 0:09:22.240 --> 0:09:27.200 historian who told that story was a marked adversary of 0:09:27.240 --> 0:09:32.600 the legacy of this emperor. M Yeah, it may have 0:09:32.679 --> 0:09:35.600 just been trying to make him look stupid, right and 0:09:35.640 --> 0:09:37.680 like and also if you're if you happen to be 0:09:37.760 --> 0:09:40.160 this teenage emperor of Rome. I mean, maybe you just 0:09:40.200 --> 0:09:43.040 asked that they bring snow to your house once, and 0:09:43.080 --> 0:09:44.840 then your enemies find out about it, and they're like, 0:09:44.880 --> 0:09:47.000 he brings snow to his house every day. It's the 0:09:47.960 --> 0:09:50.920 most extravagant thing I've ever heard of. Oh yeah, I 0:09:51.000 --> 0:09:55.839 remember when he created ice town. At any rate, about 0:09:55.840 --> 0:09:57.960 the only good thing to say about and it seems 0:09:58.000 --> 0:10:01.200 is that he did seem interested in spring religious freedom 0:10:01.200 --> 0:10:04.640 in the empire, if only so he could keep worshiping 0:10:04.640 --> 0:10:09.400 the Syrian god ball himself. So when Severus Alexander becomes 0:10:09.400 --> 0:10:13.000 emperor at age fourteen, the same as his predecessor, things, 0:10:13.000 --> 0:10:14.840 I guess seemed to be moving in a different direction, 0:10:15.320 --> 0:10:19.440 and his rule proves stable, lasting thirteen years, the longest 0:10:19.520 --> 0:10:22.200 reign of a single emperor in decades. At that point 0:10:23.000 --> 0:10:26.560 he was a temperate figure, and especially early on, his 0:10:26.679 --> 0:10:29.520 mother companion commanded a great deal of power through him, 0:10:29.520 --> 0:10:32.440 and I think was was always a powerful figure in 0:10:32.600 --> 0:10:36.199 his administration, if you will. Together they showed a certain 0:10:36.200 --> 0:10:39.120 amount of openness to the practice of Judaism and Christianity 0:10:39.120 --> 0:10:42.559 within the empire. They even lowered taxes. But of course 0:10:42.800 --> 0:10:45.880 he courted a powerful enemy in attempting to reduce the 0:10:45.920 --> 0:10:49.520 power of the Roman military, and Rome had many external 0:10:49.600 --> 0:10:54.839 enemies during this time, including the Sasanian Empire UH, sometimes 0:10:54.880 --> 0:10:59.080 referred to as the Uh Sassanid Empire or sometimes referred 0:10:59.080 --> 0:11:02.400 to as as a dynasty rather than an empire. This 0:11:02.920 --> 0:11:06.720 is located in Persia and at this point in time 0:11:06.960 --> 0:11:11.520 only recently established in two twenty four by the founder 0:11:12.360 --> 0:11:16.720 Ottashir the First, So about eight years into Alexander's rule, 0:11:17.040 --> 0:11:23.880 the Sasanian army under Ottashir In invades Mesopotamia and threatens 0:11:24.040 --> 0:11:28.920 Roman held Syria. So Alexander initially responds by basically sending 0:11:29.000 --> 0:11:31.360 him a statement condemning the violence of the invasion and 0:11:31.360 --> 0:11:34.720 telling him, look, everyone should be content with current borders 0:11:34.720 --> 0:11:38.600 and domains, and also kind of warning them, if you're 0:11:38.600 --> 0:11:40.320 gonna mess with Rome, you're not going to find it 0:11:40.440 --> 0:11:46.400 as easy as the wars you've been you've been waging previously. Now. Ottashir, 0:11:46.520 --> 0:11:50.120 perhaps interpreting this as weakness, then follows up by demanding 0:11:50.120 --> 0:11:53.760 all of Syria and Asia minor from Rome, and this 0:11:53.800 --> 0:11:57.000 results in a direct military response from Alexander, and he 0:11:57.040 --> 0:12:02.400 manages to push Sasanian forces of Mesopotamia by two thirty three. 0:12:02.920 --> 0:12:06.760 But that's when Rome's Germanic enemies to the north, the 0:12:06.840 --> 0:12:11.760 Alamanni and the Marcomanni, attack, taking advantage of the pleaded 0:12:11.840 --> 0:12:16.160 northern forces to attack Gaul. So Alexander and his mother 0:12:16.240 --> 0:12:20.400 they rejoined the army, having only just briefly celebrated um 0:12:20.679 --> 0:12:24.560 sort of victory over the Sasanians, and he leads the 0:12:24.640 --> 0:12:27.760 army to meet this new threat. On his mother's advice, 0:12:27.800 --> 0:12:30.920 he pushes for peace with the Germanic tribes, offering annual 0:12:30.960 --> 0:12:34.679 payments to keep them in check. His own troops reportedly 0:12:34.720 --> 0:12:38.360 see this as weakness. Uh. They also seem to, you know, 0:12:38.400 --> 0:12:41.600 have issues with his mother's presence. Uh, And so they 0:12:41.760 --> 0:12:43.640 and of course, on top of all this, they still 0:12:43.679 --> 0:12:46.560 hate him for his work against the military, and so 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:51.240 they they mutiny against Alexander and they assassinate him, his 0:12:51.320 --> 0:12:54.719 mother and some of his his key people. And this 0:12:54.800 --> 0:12:57.600 is this is the point where we begin these these 0:12:57.679 --> 0:13:01.280 decades of chaos. This is when we began the crisis 0:13:01.360 --> 0:13:04.040 of the third century. Okay, so the young emperor, his 0:13:04.120 --> 0:13:07.120 mom are dead, they're they're they're they're out of power. 0:13:07.800 --> 0:13:09.720 Who's coming up next to who do they put in 0:13:10.000 --> 0:13:12.920 well a military man. Of course, they lift up um 0:13:13.480 --> 0:13:17.840 maxim minus thracks a sixty two year old commander, and 0:13:18.200 --> 0:13:21.560 his rule would last a mere three years because everything 0:13:21.600 --> 0:13:24.200 just to sends into civil war and death at this point, 0:13:24.840 --> 0:13:28.120 beginning the crisis of the third century in earnest and 0:13:28.160 --> 0:13:31.400 immediately bringing about the what is sometimes called the Year 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:35.080 of Six Emperors in two thirty eight, when six different 0:13:35.120 --> 0:13:37.880 men claimed to be Emperor of Rome. Man you thought 0:13:37.920 --> 0:13:40.480 two popes at the same time was too much? Yeah, 0:13:41.040 --> 0:13:44.920 so the following decades, Yes, we're in fact bloody and chaotic, 0:13:45.080 --> 0:13:48.880 with again thirty seven different proclaimed Roman emperors during just 0:13:48.920 --> 0:13:53.080 a thirty five year time period. Internal factors weakened the state, 0:13:53.559 --> 0:13:57.640 foreign enemies threatened on every front. This period of crisis 0:13:57.760 --> 0:14:01.800 lasted until two eighty four, when the Empire was stabilized 0:14:01.880 --> 0:14:05.880 once more with the reign of Diocletian, who reigned twenty 0:14:05.920 --> 0:14:10.360 one years and then voluntarily retired and died of get 0:14:10.400 --> 0:14:15.000 this natural causes, um, All of this stands and start 0:14:15.080 --> 0:14:19.160 contrast to the short, bloody and doomed reins of most 0:14:19.200 --> 0:14:23.520 of the emperors preceding him. Diocletian is an interesting figure. 0:14:23.920 --> 0:14:26.480 I'm certainly no expert on his life, but I know 0:14:26.560 --> 0:14:31.400 one thing about him is that he actually had the 0:14:31.400 --> 0:14:36.600 the the the unusual seeming insight that maybe hereditary rule 0:14:36.800 --> 0:14:39.400 is stupid and causing a lot of problems because if 0:14:39.400 --> 0:14:42.280 you're just like handing trying to hand power off to 0:14:42.360 --> 0:14:45.120 your son, your son might not actually be good at anything, 0:14:45.200 --> 0:14:47.640 it might not be very smart. So instead, what you 0:14:47.680 --> 0:14:50.920 should have is a system where power is shared between 0:14:51.080 --> 0:14:53.800 I think the idea came up with was the tetrarchy, 0:14:53.840 --> 0:14:56.760 that there would be four rulers who would rule over 0:14:56.800 --> 0:14:59.440 different parts of the empire. They would make decisions together. 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:03.000 Then then after they were in charge, they would pass 0:15:03.080 --> 0:15:06.960 on their office not to their sons, but to like 0:15:07.840 --> 0:15:11.280 basically people, their min tees, people who they had trained, 0:15:11.800 --> 0:15:14.680 uh allegedly on the basis of merit. Though I think 0:15:14.680 --> 0:15:19.560 that pretty quickly devolved into hereditary rule again with Constantine's 0:15:19.600 --> 0:15:23.760 father trying to pass stuff on to Constantine. Yeah. Yeah, this, 0:15:23.760 --> 0:15:27.600 this whole question over hereditary rule is interesting because I mean, 0:15:27.720 --> 0:15:29.680 from a modern perspective, we look at it and we 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:32.080 and we say, well, this that is it's obviously a 0:15:32.080 --> 0:15:35.600 bad idea. Um, there's so much that can go wrong 0:15:35.600 --> 0:15:37.720 with and you look at these historical examples of a 0:15:37.840 --> 0:15:41.440 fourteen year old emperors and it just seems insane. Like, 0:15:42.600 --> 0:15:45.320 my son, I have to realize with horror, will be 0:15:45.400 --> 0:15:50.280 fourteen in four years. Um, I cannot imagine him as 0:15:50.320 --> 0:15:53.360 a fourteen year old emperor. That' but your son is 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:56.480 so much nicer than any Roman emperor that ever lived. 0:15:57.480 --> 0:16:00.440 Well at this point he hasn't become emperor yet, has 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:05.240 a tasted power. But but you know, the other interesting 0:16:05.280 --> 0:16:08.520 side of this, as I've mentioned earlier that uh, severals 0:16:08.520 --> 0:16:11.160 Alexander and his mother, one of their ideas was, all right, 0:16:11.240 --> 0:16:14.239 let's put the power back in more in the hands 0:16:14.280 --> 0:16:17.360 of the aristocracy. Uh, let's get it away from them 0:16:17.360 --> 0:16:19.520 from the military a bit. And apparently one of the 0:16:19.600 --> 0:16:23.480 arguments in this is, well, hey, at least with hereditary rule, 0:16:23.560 --> 0:16:27.200 there's a structure. You know, if you're looking at at 0:16:27.200 --> 0:16:30.720 an alternative that involves just sort of endless parades of 0:16:30.760 --> 0:16:33.600 soldier kings, uh, then you know, how are you supposed 0:16:33.640 --> 0:16:35.400 to work with that? And indeed, I guess you could 0:16:35.400 --> 0:16:38.760 look at the Crisis of the third century as an 0:16:38.800 --> 0:16:41.720 example of what happens when you're ruled mostly by soldier 0:16:41.800 --> 0:16:46.240 kings trying to murder each other or trying to narrowly 0:16:46.280 --> 0:16:50.200 avoid being murdered by your own soldiers. Not saying hereditary 0:16:50.320 --> 0:16:53.560 rule is a great idea, but I'm just saying you 0:16:53.600 --> 0:16:56.720 can see where people can maybe waffle back and forth 0:16:57.280 --> 0:17:01.520 as these different systems results in chaos. I think all 0:17:01.560 --> 0:17:07.840 of these stories are just a brilliant advertisement for liberal democracy. Yeah, alright, 0:17:07.880 --> 0:17:11.040 So these these various imp imperial stories we've looked at 0:17:11.080 --> 0:17:13.240 so far, these are mostly just to set the stage 0:17:14.040 --> 0:17:17.879 for the story of Emperor Valerian, who reigned to fifty 0:17:17.960 --> 0:17:20.600 three through to sixty right in the middle of the 0:17:20.680 --> 0:17:23.439 crisis of the third century, and his two is a 0:17:23.480 --> 0:17:26.280 tale of blood and doom, but also a good deal more. 0:17:26.480 --> 0:17:28.320 And and don't worry if you're out there, I know, 0:17:28.480 --> 0:17:30.679 listening to the show and thinking, well, I wonder if 0:17:30.680 --> 0:17:33.159 there'll be any science in this. Don't worry. We do 0:17:33.320 --> 0:17:36.680 have a short science paper that ties into everything later on. Alright, 0:17:37.040 --> 0:17:39.320 I'm going to read another quote from Will Durant, because 0:17:39.359 --> 0:17:41.359 that was another one that I thought was was rather nice. 0:17:42.240 --> 0:17:44.320 And this is again from the Collapse of the Empire 0:17:44.400 --> 0:17:47.560 and the Story of Civilization Part three. Quote the New 0:17:47.600 --> 0:17:51.719 Emperor Valerian, already sixty and facing war at once with 0:17:51.800 --> 0:17:56.800 the Franks, the Alamanni, the Marcomanni, the Goths, the Scythians, 0:17:56.920 --> 0:17:59.760 and the Persians, made his son ruler of the Western 0:17:59.800 --> 0:18:02.960 in higher, kept the East for himself and led an 0:18:03.040 --> 0:18:07.640 army into Mesopotamia. He was too old for his tasks 0:18:07.720 --> 0:18:11.960 and soon succumbed. Okay, so he's going east to fight, right, 0:18:12.080 --> 0:18:16.320 and it's not gonna end well. And granted durance covering 0:18:16.560 --> 0:18:19.000 a lot of territory in these books. So that's basically 0:18:19.040 --> 0:18:22.000 all he has to say about the episode with Valerian 0:18:22.160 --> 0:18:25.440 right there. But but there are other histories, of course 0:18:25.440 --> 0:18:28.240 that give us a lot more details, and and also 0:18:28.480 --> 0:18:31.840 some questionable details as we'll get into. So the crisis 0:18:31.840 --> 0:18:34.200 of the third century against all, a number of would 0:18:34.240 --> 0:18:37.159 be emperors rise up through the military ranks, and of 0:18:37.160 --> 0:18:38.720 a lot of a lot of them were purely of 0:18:38.760 --> 0:18:43.520 military stock. Valarian, however, actually came from the senatorial class, 0:18:43.640 --> 0:18:46.040 so he would he was essentially a nobleman, and his 0:18:46.200 --> 0:18:49.760 roles in the state were largely more political for the 0:18:49.800 --> 0:18:52.199 most part earlier on, and it was only later that 0:18:52.280 --> 0:18:56.240 he was appointed as a ducks or leader in the military, 0:18:56.400 --> 0:19:02.040 and he had two sons, uh Galinus and Licinius. Now 0:19:02.119 --> 0:19:04.720 to set the stage for Valerian's rule, here's how the 0:19:04.800 --> 0:19:09.280 three previous rules ended. First of all, there's Emperor Decius, 0:19:09.560 --> 0:19:13.480 who reigned to forty nine through to one died at 0:19:13.480 --> 0:19:17.119 the Battle of Verona, one of the worst military disasters 0:19:17.200 --> 0:19:21.240 in Roman history. According to Durrant, either of wounds sustained 0:19:21.280 --> 0:19:24.800 against the enemy or he was assassinated by his own troops. 0:19:25.040 --> 0:19:29.440 There's there's some discussion over which it was. At home, 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:32.960 he had sought to restore Roman morality and ordered the 0:19:32.960 --> 0:19:37.040 destruction of Christianity. This will become important later on. Oh yeah, 0:19:37.040 --> 0:19:41.159 because so there, uh there. There has long been a 0:19:41.200 --> 0:19:46.160 sort of meme among Christians that Christianity was just fundamentally 0:19:46.240 --> 0:19:50.159 like illegal in the Roman Empire and constantly totally persecuted, 0:19:50.200 --> 0:19:53.479 which is not actually true. I mean Romans, the Romans 0:19:53.480 --> 0:19:57.800 were absolutely evil, and you wouldn't say tolerant generally, but 0:19:57.880 --> 0:20:01.199 they were broadly religiously tolerant. They didn't care what people's 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:04.159 religion was most of the time, but there would be occasional, 0:20:04.240 --> 0:20:09.520 sporadic outbreaks of persecution of Christians for various reasons. They 0:20:09.520 --> 0:20:13.040 were accused of being responsible for various calamities because they 0:20:13.040 --> 0:20:15.479 were They were accused of being atheists, as in not 0:20:15.600 --> 0:20:19.160 believing in the Roman gods and not making sacrifices to them, 0:20:19.160 --> 0:20:21.960 and so you know, not contributing basically to the quid 0:20:21.960 --> 0:20:24.720 pro quo that kept the gods happy and kept everybody's 0:20:24.760 --> 0:20:27.600 fate good. But also I think they were sometimes accused 0:20:27.600 --> 0:20:30.080 of sort of disloyalty to the emperor if they wouldn't 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:34.600 make a burned offering to Caesar Um. So occasionally these 0:20:34.600 --> 0:20:38.600 persecutions would break out, and I think under Decius was 0:20:38.600 --> 0:20:43.240 was if I recall some of the worst persecution of Christians. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 0:20:43.280 --> 0:20:45.320 like you said, it kind of goes emperor to emperor, 0:20:45.800 --> 0:20:48.399 so you'll you'll have a period of and some of 0:20:48.440 --> 0:20:51.200 these periods, these rules are pretty brief, especially during this period, 0:20:51.240 --> 0:20:54.439 this this time period. But yeah, one emperor may just 0:20:54.480 --> 0:20:58.359 be like, oh, you know, it's all right whatever Judaism, Christianity, Uh, 0:20:58.440 --> 0:21:01.359 it's all good. I I'm busy with other things. And 0:21:01.359 --> 0:21:03.359 then someone will come along and say, well, one of 0:21:03.359 --> 0:21:05.480 the problems here is we have to return to Roman 0:21:06.160 --> 0:21:09.680 moral values or Roman traditions and Roman rights need to 0:21:09.720 --> 0:21:12.600 be preserved all right, So that that was one of 0:21:12.640 --> 0:21:15.840 the three preceding Valerian. The other was Gallus, who lived 0:21:15.880 --> 0:21:18.400 who have not lived, but reigned to fifty one through 0:21:18.440 --> 0:21:22.879 two fifty three. He was definitely murdered by his own troops. Uh. 0:21:23.080 --> 0:21:27.040 He also had two co emperors that died of plague 0:21:27.200 --> 0:21:29.960 or murder, We're not sure which. And then there's a 0:21:30.000 --> 0:21:33.639 Milianus who reigned June through September in the year to 0:21:33.840 --> 0:21:37.240 fifty three. That's a nice short one. He was, guess what, 0:21:37.520 --> 0:21:40.280 murdered by his own troops. So this is just a 0:21:40.280 --> 0:21:43.119 taste of how unstable again the position of emperor was 0:21:43.160 --> 0:21:47.040 at this time, as Valerian himself is named emperor by 0:21:47.080 --> 0:21:51.680 a Millanius, his own defecting legions. But even as internal 0:21:51.680 --> 0:21:56.720 strife at least temporarily slightly settled around this new emperor Valerian, 0:21:57.119 --> 0:21:59.240 and you have uh, you know, I guess a cessation 0:21:59.359 --> 0:22:02.520 of just in civil war. Uh, there are still plenty 0:22:02.560 --> 0:22:06.280 of would be usurpers in the Roman ranks. Plus Rome 0:22:06.400 --> 0:22:10.600 still faces threats from all of its external enemies, including 0:22:10.800 --> 0:22:14.320 the Sasanian Empire in the east. So Valerian he puts 0:22:14.359 --> 0:22:17.800 his son uh Galinas in charge of the West and 0:22:17.840 --> 0:22:21.040 occupies himself with the East and the threat posed by 0:22:21.080 --> 0:22:25.879 the Sasanians in Persia. And meanwhile at home, we should 0:22:25.880 --> 0:22:27.919 also know, coming back to the issue of of of 0:22:28.000 --> 0:22:32.600 Christian persecution, that Valerian is also remembered for the persecution 0:22:32.600 --> 0:22:35.640 of Christians in Rome. Uh. He had ordered that all 0:22:35.800 --> 0:22:41.240 must conform to Roman ceremonials and that Christian assemblages are forbidden. 0:22:41.520 --> 0:22:45.359 And then when Pope Sixtus the Second resists, the Pope 0:22:45.400 --> 0:22:48.359 is beheaded and seven of his deacons are executed as well. 0:22:48.640 --> 0:22:52.080 Christians at the time and even in times thereafter, really 0:22:52.119 --> 0:22:55.119 have a hard time letting this one go. Yeah, yeah, no, 0:22:55.119 --> 0:23:03.720 no pity for the pope killer. Now, at this point, 0:23:04.080 --> 0:23:08.359 I'd like us to turn to the Sasanian Empire, because 0:23:09.600 --> 0:23:12.160 a number of you might not be very familiar with 0:23:12.280 --> 0:23:15.200 what we're talking about here, and uh, and I wasn't 0:23:15.200 --> 0:23:17.760 that familiar with the Sasanian Empire either prior to to 0:23:17.840 --> 0:23:21.080 this research. So I turned in part to a book 0:23:21.520 --> 0:23:26.480 titled Sasanian Iran to twenty four through six one c 0:23:27.359 --> 0:23:32.080 by Turaj dari On, Iranian ironologist and historian at the 0:23:32.119 --> 0:23:35.439 University of California, Irvine. Um, he's published a number of 0:23:35.440 --> 0:23:37.800 books over the years, and you also, you know, can 0:23:37.800 --> 0:23:41.040 find very speaking engagements and and whatnot that he's um 0:23:41.040 --> 0:23:44.240 he's done concerning not only ancient Iran, but also the 0:23:44.280 --> 0:23:47.600 modern state or of Iran and global affairs and so forth. 0:23:47.960 --> 0:23:50.880 So in the openings of the book, um Dari points 0:23:51.840 --> 0:23:56.159