18.4. THE REIGN OF DECIUS. THE EMPEROR MOVES TO THE LOWER DANUBE.
Finally, Decius left Rome and marched to the Danube. His elder son Herennius Etruscus had perhaps preceded him and his presence in Lower Pannonia is attested in an inscription by men of
Legio II Adiutrix at
Aquincum; based on this inscription celebrating him as
caesar, some scholars have dated his appointment as such to a timeframe between May and September 250 CE. Father and son probably met there (Lower Pannonia was their main powerbase, and the Pannonian legions had raised Decius to the purple) and prepared a counterattack. Decius must’ve taken with him the central Roman army (Praetorian Guard,
Legio II Parthica,
Equites Singulares Augusti and other assorted units) as well as the Danubian forces which won the battle of Verona for him. The state of the central reserve, given that it had been recently defeated in battle less than a year before, cannot have been very good. We can’t know if they had suffered many casualties, and if that was the case, if there had been time to cover them with new recruits, and if these new recruits were really up to the task in front of them. It’s probable that auxiliary units and legionary
vexillationes from the Pannonian legions also joined the army then.
The first task undertaken by the two Decii must’ve been delivering Dacia from invaders (probably Carpi), as three inscriptions found at
Carthago Nova in
Hispania Tarraconensis (
CIL II, 4949; 4957; 4958) honor Decius as
Dacicus Maximus, and one of them (
CIL II 4949) attests Decius with the further titles TRIB.POT.II COS.II, pointing to a date between mid-June and November/December 250 CE (we know from ancient sources that Decius assumed the consulate during every year of his short reign). In his
De mortibus persecutorum, the early IV century Christian author Lactantius also wrote that Decius had made war against the Carpi who had occupied Dacia and Moesia. It’s important though to notice that Lactantius did not name the Goths, and that the inscriptions from Hispania only acclaim Decius as
Dacicus Maximus, and not
Germanicus/Gothicus Maximus. This probably implies that after hearing of the defeat of their Carpi allies by the approaching imperial army, Argaith and Guntheric decided to accept a ransom from the inhabitants of
Marcianopolis (modern Devnya, in Bulgaria) and retreated to the northern bank of the Danube, as stated by the
Getica during the fall/winter of 250 CE, thus ending the second Gothic invasion.
Then, if we follow the tale of the
Getica, in late winter or early spring of 251 CE, another very large army of “Skythians” led by the Gothic king Cniva crossed the lower Danube at
Oescus (now ruined, near the Bulgarian village of Gigen) and invaded Lower Moesia. According to the
Getica, this would have been the third Gothic invasion. The current scholarly consensus is that this was the only Gothic invasion, as it is the only one explicitly described in the extant fragments of the
Skythica and in other ancient sources (although that’s not saying, much, as all of them are telegraphically short). According to Herwig Wolfram, Cniva’s army must have included Goths, Carpi, Bastarni and Vandals (notice though that according to the
Getica, it was only in the second invasion when these allies/subject peoples joined the Goths).
After crossing the Danube, according to the
Getica Cniva divided his army:
After his death (Note: Ostrogotha’s), Cniva divided the army into two parts and sent some to waste Moesia, knowing that it was undefended through the neglect of the emperors. He himself with seventy thousand men hastened to Euscia, that is, Novae. When driven from this place by the general Gallus (…)
Syvänne considers that the Gothic army must’ve been formed by a large contingent of cavalry, but he bases this assertion on the tactics of the Goths in later times; which don’t have to be necessarily the same tactics they used in the III century. The Goths, like other “barbarians” of the III century CE were completely inept at siege warfare, which means that Trebonianus Gallus’ decision of barricading himself inside the province’s main fortified cities was a safe course of action in this situation; the
Getica’s account confirms it: Trebonianus Gallus was able to resist Cniva’s attack and the Goths raised the siege and went looking for easier prey. The other part of the army that Cniva sent to “waste Moesia” must’ve been a smaller force and given that Cniva himself was operating in Lower Moesia, this sentence of the
Getica only makes sense if this force went somewhere else; and the
Getica accounts that this “somewhere” was Moesia. If Cniva was in Lower Moesia, this second force must’ve raided Upper Moesia, and perhaps one of its goals would have been to act as a shield against any approaching Roman army from the west. For some reason though, modern scholars state that this second force crossed the Balkan mountain range and invaded the province of Thrace, besieging
Philippopolis (its main city, corresponding to modern Plovdiv in Bulgaria). Let’s follow though with the account of the
Getica:
When driven from this place (Note: Novae) by the general Gallus, he approached Nicopolis (Note: Nicopolis ad Istrum, now Nikyup), a very famous town situated near the latrus river. This city Trajan built when he conquered the Sarmatians and named it the City of Victory. When the Emperor Decius drew near, Cniva at last withdrew to the regions of Haemus (Note: the Balkan range), which were not far distant.
This fragment bears forward an important problem with the
Getica’s narrative: if there’d been already previous fighting against the Goths in 250 CE, the imperial army and Decius must’ve remained in the area. How can it be explained then that Cniva was able to cross the Danube and move freely around the province?
The modern consensus, as I wrote before, is that there was just one Gothic invasion, led by Cniva. And that this invasion began in the winter or early spring of 250 CE and ended in the summer of 251 CE. This modern alternative though also raises another problem: that the Goths would’ve spent a year and a half within the empire with a large army, and given the nature of “barbarian” societies, it’s doubtful if that would have been feasible (to say nothing about logistic issues). Also, none of th extant sources states or implies that the Goths spent a winter within the empire. But it fits better with the known movements of Decius. On the other side, the
Getica’s account of Cniva’s invasion gives a more realistic timeframe for the invasion (half a year) but then there’s the problem of accounting for Decius’ actions between the end of the 250 CE invasion and Cniva’s attack.
I’ll leave the chronology aside for the time being and go ahead with the account of the campaign, for from this point onwards there seems to be some agreement in all surviving accounts, including the extant fragments of Dexippus’
Skythica.
If we follow the
Getica’s tale, Decius would’ve had to defeat the second (and smallest) Gothic force in Upper Moesia before being able to approach Nicopolis and force Cniva to lift the siege. Zosimus wrote than in his fight against the Goths Decius “won all the battles” which is a blatant lie because we know from the
Skythica and the
Getica that Decius suffered two major defeats at Cniva’s hands. The modern account of events though ignores this and haves Decius going straight against Cniva in the spring or early summer of 250 CE after arriving to the war theater.
Map of Lower Moesia and northern Trace with the main cities mentioned in the text.
Ilkka Syvänne though provides an unexpected source that could confirm that Decius did indeed defeat a second Gothic army in Moesia (although he adheres to the modern chronology of events). This source is the VI century CE military manual attributed to the Eastern Roman emperor Maurice, the
Strategikon. This does not mean that Decius’ victory happened according to the sequence of events presented by the
Getica, but I agree with Syvänne that having this encounter just before Decius’ first major clash with Cniva is the most probable setting for it:
The Skythic tribes of the Goths employed this tactic against the Roman emperor Decius when they crossed the Danube and invaded Thrace and made war against him in Moesia. At the time, Decius was successful with the same stratagem, feigning flight in an intense combat that he did start to slay many of them.
This passage of the
Strategikon gives some important information. First, that Decius did indeed win at least one victory against the Goths. And second, that he managed to win it by means of a feigned retreat. Syvänne takes this as clear evidence that Decius was employing himself a mainly cavalry army, just as the Goths did, which is one of his most controversial assertions. But if this passage from the
Strategikon is read within its context, it becomes clear that the author is not dealing specifically with cavalry tactics, but with ambushes in general, by infantry and/or cavalry, and specifically ambushes in swamps and marshes; what the passage in my opinion seems to imply is that Decius employed against the Goths an ambush similar to the one that they would later use against him. At the time of his death, Decius had assumed the title of
Germanicus Maximus, he probably took this title between the lifting of the siege of
Marcianopolis and this hypothetic victory.
That the Goths employed a mainly cavalry army and used typical steppe tactics could also be deduced from a fragment in Syncellus’ account of the invasion:
Scythians, those called Goths, when they had crossed the Ister river (Note: the Danube) in very large numbers under Decius, began occupying the dominion of Rome. They surrounded the Mysians, who were fleeing towards Nicopolis.
This fragment describes probably a grand encirclement by Gothic cavalry of numbers of Moesian (“Mysians”) fugitives that were trying to seek refuge within the walls of Nicopolis, just like steppe peoples did in large scale hunts or when herding their large cattle or horse herds.
After the defeat of the shielding Gothic force (Syncellus states that Decius killed thirty thousand Goths), Decius approached Nicopolis. It’s unclear what happened with the city, but the extant sources don’t report it falling to the Goths. And now, according to the
Getica and the other sources, instead of retreating to the north (as would be expected of a frightened army menaced by a victorious and more powerful enemy) Cniva marched south and crossed the Balkan range through the Shipka pass. This could mean two things: either Decius had cut off Cniva’s line of retreat northwards, or he was not afraid in the least of Decius; if this were the case then it would be possible that he’d indeed managed to take Nicopolis (in his
Res Gestae, Ammianus Marcellinus wrote that Nicopolis had indeed been destroyed) and now, more confident than ever, he decided to cross to the rich province of Thrace.
Aerial view of the remains of Nicopolis ad Istrum, Bulgaria.
Decius, elated by his recent victory (and perhaps angered by the events at Nicopolis) followed straight after him. At this point, I would like to make some comments about Decius and about what the scarce sources available let us know about this man’s character. Decius was a hyper-conservative character. His name seems to suggest an Italian provenance (
Decius and
Messius are ancient Oscan names), and although he was born in the Balkans, either his family was Italian and his father had been just deployed there, or they belonged to the considerable number of descendants of Italian soldiers who’d settled the area after service in the legions. Anyway, he probably considered himself to be more Roman than the Romans themselves and the second coming of Romulus. He believed in ancient Roman customs (including ancient Roman religion), the role of the Senate and in the Roman way of waging war. Which consisted in seeking a pitched battle whenever possible even at unfavorable odds, relying on the supposed superiority of Roman training, discipline and weaponry. Decius seems to have been deeply assured about the superiority of Roman arms, to the point of blindness and arrogance; the cunning Cniva beat him twice by using surprise and ambush, and both times Decius fell spectacularly in the trap; the second time with catastrophic results. Let’s retake the account of the
Getica:
Thence he (Note: Cniva) hastened to Philippopolis, with his forces in good array. When the Emperor Decius learned of his departure, he was eager to bring relief to his own city and, crossing Mount Haemus, came to Beroe. While he was resting his horses and his weary army in that place, all at once Cniva and his Goths fell upon him like a thunderbolt. He cut the Roman army to pieces and drove the Emperor, with a few who had succeeded in escaping, across the mountains again to Euscia (Note: Novae) in Moesia, where Gallus was then stationed with a large force of soldiers as guardian of the frontier.
Syncellus also agrees with this, although with much less detail:
Decius, after he had attacked them (the Goths) as Dexippus records, and had killed thirty thousand, was beaten in battle, with the result that Philippopolis, when it had been taken by them, was sacked and many Thracians were killed.
Syncellus’ quote about thirty thousand Goths killed by Decius at Nicopolis is indeed taken straight from Dexippus, for it appears in one of the surviving fragments from the
Scythica, the Letter of Decius, in which Decius promises help to the inhabitants of Philippopolis and boasts of his victory at Nicopolis. To summarize: Decius crossed the Shipka pass and reached the environs of the Thracian city of
Colonia Augusta Traiana Beroea (the modern Bulgarian city of Stara Zagora) at top speed to try to stop the Goths before they advanced too deep into Thrace; he probably did so without taking the most elementary military precautions: without proper scouting and without setting up a proper encampment with proper guards. And Cniva, who had been laying in ambush waiting for Decius’ army to emerge from the mountain pass, attacked the Romans by surprise and cut them to pieces, with Decius having to flee for his life across the mountains, and not stopping until he reached
Novae and met the governor of Lower Moesia Trebonianus Gallus.
View from the Shipka pass, looking south towards the ancient Roman province of Thracia.
This defeat is also attested by one of the extant fragments of Dexippus’
Scythica. It’s one of the two fragments from the
Scythica Vindobonensia, in which Decius gives a (fictional) speech to his troops when they are to confront the victorious Gothic army which is returning north after the fall of
Philippopolis, and he mentions a previous defeat:
Men, I wish the military force and all the provincial territory were in a good condition and not humiliated by the enemy. But since the incidents of human life bring manifold sufferings (for such is the fate of mortals), it is the duty of prudent men to accept what happens and not to lose their spirit, nor become weak, distressed by the mishap in that plain or by the capture of the Thracians—in case any of you has been disheartened by these things. For each of these two misfortunes offers arguments against your discouragement: the former (Note: the defeat at Beroe) was brought about by the treachery of the scouts rather than by any deficiency of ours, and the Thracian town (Note: Philippopolis) they (Note:the Goths) took by ambushes rather than through prowess, having failed in their attacks.
In other words, Decius blamed his defeat to “treachery” by the scouts of his army, admitting no fault of his own.
It’s impossible to know the scale of Decius’ defeat at
Beroe. The
Getica states that it was a slaughter, but the fact that the
Getica was basically a panegyric written by Cassiodorus to exalt the Gothic people and its king Theodoric the Great automatically makes this assertion suspicious. But the events that followed seem to vindicate the
Getica’s depiction. Decius, who until then had acted impetuously and had sought direct battle with the Goths whenever possible, changed his ways, took refuge at
Novae with Trebonianus Gallus and did absolutely nothing while Cniva and his Goths pillaged Thrace and besieged
Philippopolis. This implies that Decius’ martial ardor must’ve cooled down considerably and that his army had suffered serious losses. The
Getica also says that Trebonianus Gallus stood at
Novae with large numbers of soldiers guarding the border. In my opinion, this means that, fearing more Gothic attacks or reinforcements from the north, Decius had left at least the complete garrison of Lower Moesia (two legions plus auxiliaries) under Gallus’ command, and he’d followed Cniva just with the central reserve and
vexillationes (or complete legions) and auxiliary forces drawn from other Danubian provinces (probably Lower Pannonia, Upper Moesia and perhaps Dacia). But again, it’s impossible to know how many men Decius had led through the Shipka pass and how many were lost at
Beroe.