How successful could Julian the Apostate of been?

Seraphiel

Banned
Inspired by thinker1200's thread, if Julian had not died campaigning against the Persians how successful could his pagan reforms have been and the man himself? Could he have plausibly destroyed or greatly damaged the Sassanids, as I imagine success here goes hand in hand with partial success with his religious and social reforms.
 
He probably could have done better against Persia but I doubt there will be a massive conquest more like Permanent control of Armenia and a port in the gulf.

As for his religious reforms I am doubtful. Pagans in general were too disparate to unite them into a state within a state like the Church was. That being said it could lead to more religious diversity as the Church could no longer use imperial power to crush rivals and fund its dealios
 

Seraphiel

Banned
He probably could have done better against Persia but I doubt there will be a massive conquest more like Permanent control of Armenia and a port in the gulf.

As for his religious reforms I am doubtful. Pagans in general were too disparate to unite them into a state within a state like the Church was. That being said it could lead to more religious diversity as the Church could no longer use imperial power to crush rivals and fund its dealios

Thats what I thought as well, the Church probably wouldnt be as powerful so early on, though I think eventually it would get over the effects of Julian. However do you think there is no chance that Julian's platonic type of paganism would have survived for hundreds of years longer as a viable alternative to Christianity? After all the struggles between religions such Hinduism/Buddhism or Confucianism/Buddhism show that a failing religion can make a dramatic comeback.
 
Considering even the pagans were confused about what the hell he was doing, the likelyhood of Julian succeding is the wrong question, we must first ask what the hell did he want in the first place. The guy's idea of elevating paganism (his own brand of neo-whatever) is to rebuild the Jewish Temple...wha...?

At best, he could maybe strengthen Arianism, he seems to be fond of helping minority (heretical?) Christain sects in some grand plan of formenting Christian disunity or whaatever. At worst, Julian who lives a few more years will unite both pagans and Christians to kill him because he pissed off everyone.

Julian died early in his reign, easy to see him in a heroic light. But considering the nonsense he did in such short time, I think he'd end up with an even worse reputation if he had lived longer. Even without religous controversy, the guy could esily lead Rome to more wasteful wars.
 
Considering even the pagans were confused about what the hell he was doing, the likelyhood of Julian succeding is the wrong question, we must first ask what the hell did he want in the first place. The guy's idea of elevating paganism (his own brand of neo-whatever) is to rebuild the Jewish Temple...wha...?

At best, he could maybe strengthen Arianism, he seems to be fond of helping minority (heretical?) Christain sects in some grand plan of formenting Christian disunity or whaatever. At worst, Julian who lives a few more years will unite both pagans and Christians to kill him because he pissed off everyone.

Julian died early in his reign, easy to see him in a heroic light. But considering the nonsense he did in such short time, I think he'd end up with an even worse reputation if he had lived longer. Even without religous controversy, the guy could esily lead Rome to more wasteful wars.

Who? Who was confused? The Cult of the Unconquered Sun was a pre-existing cult, the same cult that Constantine himself had been a part of before his conversion. Julian had a lot of innovations he wanted to heap on top of it but, ultimately, it wasn't something entirely new.

There's really no reason to be so pessimistic about everything Julian. He was more than capable of leading a strong counter-veiling wind against the Christian ship that was setting out in this time period. It's status as an official, state-sponsored organization was very fresh and it contained extremely powerful schismatic tendencies that would rip and tear at its structure for centuries to come.

If Julian is successful in Persia and returns to Constantinople in triumph there is no real reason to think he wouldn't be able to be at least semi-successful in his religious goals. A Roman Empire where Julian dies after twenty or thirty years in office is going to be a much more religiously diverse place than the one we got in our own timeline. I also suspect it would remain so for quite some time: While his work establishing a pagan religious bureaucracy certainly contains the foundations of a more centralized state religion, it feels wrong to say that it would enjoy the successes of Christianity IOTL.

His political reforms, too, are interesting, in the sense that they roll back a lot of the work of Constantine and Diocletian. The lands of the various cities and the role of the city councils remained a political hot potato for a few decades following Julian's death: A situation where the issue is settled early and on the opposite side from which it settled IOTL is a fascinating avenue to explore. A sleeker, more austere Imperial administration is also a very counter-tendency to what actually happened in real history.

He was young, he had dynastic legitimacy, he was intelligent and capable, of course Julian attracts a lot of attention. He really is a magnetic possibility. I don't see a lot of reason to think otherwise.

He attempted to rebuild the Jewish temple to refute a Christian prophecy, by the way.
 
I remember having quite an interesting back-and-forth discussion with BG regarding the viability of the local city councills - boy, those were the times...

Regarding the most succesfull Julian can get:

Family life
- he changes his mind about marriage after falling in love with a handsome and smart woman from a pretigious and powerful family
- sires a single boy with her, which will be his heir, along with multiple daughters which he gets to marry off in order to solidify his position
- said boy is tall, strong, healthy and smart. He is educated well in philosophy, war and administration. He is made co-emperor after reaching maturity and is seen by all as a strong heir who will succeed his father without any problems. When it comes to leading and inspiring armies, juggling the demands and paperwork of administration, negotiating with powerfull individuals or giving rousing public speeches, the boy is a natural

War against Persia
- the expedition against Persia goes much better than expected, in that all the minor delays which could have been avoided are indeed avoided. Thus, after achieving victory outside Ctesiphon, Julian and his commanders feel confident about assaulting the city and then returning along the route they came, safely returning without confronting Shapur's army and bringing back all of their loot from sacking his capital and the other wealthy cities they took over in Mesopotamia
- a new expedition is launched in 364, this time into Armenia. Shapur's army is again out of position, this time having concentrated in the south. Julian returns back after a bunch of minor battles and sieges without any sort of decisive engagement having taken place, again carrying significant loot
- in 365, Julian again campaigns in the south, but Shapur is waiting for him from the start, and is unwilling to once again see his lands pillaged. The opening engagement sees Julians trade-mark pincer attacks defeat Shapur's flanks. This is then followed up by Shapur constantly harrassing Julian form afar. Suffering from a minor injury incurred as part of his reckless, leading-from-the-front style of command, Julian retreats back home. He is lucky, since Shapur felt compelled to confront him so close to the border, making the retreat much easier for the Roman force
- by January 366, news of the Allemani crossing the frozen Rhine has reached Julian, who concludes a peace treaty with Shapur: Arsaces II of Armenia is confirmed as a vassal of Rome, various border towns and forts in upper Mesopotamia, taken 3 years prior, remain Roman and no side pays any tribute to the other

War against the Barbaians
- Julians Gallic legions, who had been growing restless over the past two and a half years, are happy to finally return home, though not so happy to once again face the Allemani. They spend the following two years once again chasing the Allemani tribes out of Gaul and then launching punitive exeditions against them
- during some of the last punitive expeditions into southern Germany, Britain is attacked on all sides in what gets termed "The Great Conspiracy". Julian is forced to conclude peace with the Allemani and sends a force north, into Britain (which he also briefly leads until Londinium is re-taken). It will be two years until order is fully restored there
- tension also grows along the Danube, where Quadi and Gothic tribes clash with the local Roman garrisons. Julian is forced to campaign in the area for the next two years
- no sooner has Julian achieved some semblance of order along the Danube that Saxons tribes begin raiding northern Gaul. He hurries west, defeats the Saxons in battle and forces them to provide him with troops. Much to his dismay, he is again forced to return to the middle Danube for the rest of 372 to once again deal with the Quadi and others.

Diplomatic offensives
- frustrated at not having enough time to focus on his domestic agenda, Julian concludes peace with the tribes along the Danube in 373. He then travels to Rome, where he mediates a dispute that was brewing in North Africa between the local governor and the Moorish tribes.
- after 3 days of meeting with the Senate, Julian is once again forced to sail east, where the Persian King is preparing to invade Armenia. Mustering his forces in Antioch (a city for which he had no love whatsoever), Julians' emissaries reach an agreement with the Sassanids and war is averted

Administering the Empire
- for the next 3 years, Julians Empire is at peace and stable, allowing him to focus more on domestic concerns, with mixed result - despite his best efforts to administratively harrass it, Christianity continues to grow and thrive, though it is far less united then before. The army and an increasing proportion of central and regional administration though sees more and more pagans being appointed to positions of power
- Julians project for a pagan charity organisation finally takes off around this time, with full backing from state coffers
- With Julian micro-managing numerous disputes and problems, the administration continues its path towards increasing efficiency, although the improved collection rate of taxes doesn't seem to cheer up anyone

Gothic War
- by 376, the Goths have settled south of the Danube, driven by the advancing Huns. With famine, disease and Roman oppression, war erupted. Julian however decided against taking to the field in Thrace, instead opting to order local forces to adopt a defensive stance whilst he moved his armies east, where an Arab revolt, led by queen Mavia, had taken place in conjunction with a Persian invasion
- in 377 Julian concludes peace with Persia, agreeing to pay a 10-year tribute, whilst the Arabs are placated by being offered increased privileges
- heading a mixed Roman-Arabic force, Julian arrives in Thrace in early 378 and rendezvous with reinforcements advancing from the west; over the next five years, he will campaign against the Goths and their coalition, more or less destroying Thrace in the process. In the end, he will earn the cognomen Gothicus as a result of his victory. The remaining Goths stil left alive are either sent east or sold as slaves in small groups throughout the Empire

Succession
By now, Julian's son had been more or less in charge of state affairs for some years, occasionaly campaigning alongside his father, other times taking to the field by himself, where he enjoyed his fair share of military victories in what were no more than minor engagements. During the last year of his life, Julian had been racked by illness, which, while it did occasionaly subside, allowing him to appear in public from time to time, ultimately took its toll on him. This process thrust his son more and more into a leadership role, until he eventually assumed full power in 384, when Julian finally drew his last breath, aged 53.
 
Christianity continues to grow and thrive, though it is far less united then before.

Surely having Julian around would make it more united rather than less. In the 50 years since the Conversion of Constantine, it had been free to indulge in disunity simply because the Pagans were too feeble to matter, and the only serious opponents were internal dissenters; but any hint of a Pagan revival would push it back together.
 
Surely having Julian around would make it more united rather than less. In the 50 years since the Conversion of Constantine, it had been free to indulge in disunity simply because the Pagans were too feeble to matter, and the only serious opponents were internal dissenters; but any hint of a Pagan revival would push it back together.

OTOH, it had the backing of the state, meaning that dissent was first of all discouraged by the threat of loosing your funding, your see or even your life. Secondly, if you did speak out against the status quo, the same problems as above meant it was harder to get people to follow you.

In his Tolerance Edict of 362, Julian allowed Christian Bishops who had previously been exiled to return.

=> now, if you as a Christian bishop disagreed with the Christian Church, not only were you not persecuted, you were in a sense supported.

This is my reasoning why Christianity would be more theologically disunited after 23 years of his administration.
 
Julian's administrative policies would have been a disaster of epic proportions for the empire had he lived. His romanticizing of the Principate and attempt to bring Rome back to its "glory days" were the exact opposite of what the Empire needed. When I get home I'll dig through my stuff and find the thesis paper I wrote about the Dominates role in prolonging the life of the Roman Empire so that I can be fairly more precise about why it's a good thing Julian didn't live longer. I'd also like to point out that Julian being successful in Persia is very unlikely. The Sassanian Empire was in the midst of its first golden age and is in a very strong position.
 
I tend to agree with ManintheField there on religion. At this point Christianity was a bit bogged down by its adaptation into an imperial cult (and would really cease to be at the very end of the IVth century to me).

I could see the cracks between the East and the West appearing quite earlier ITTL, would it be only because the West was far less Christianised at this point and could revert to another kind of imperial cult without too much fuss.
In the Eastern part, however, I'm less sure about his success : Christianity was simply too much ingrained in all level of societies to be really rooted out. At very best, "divide and rule" would be the rule with different branchs of Christianism (not unlike how different regional branches appeared by the Vth century), but it would only delay things by coming back to the IIIrd situation (only with more Christians).

For reversing Diocletians reforms, I'm far less sure. At this point, the municipal powers were vanishing, not only due to reforms but to an undergound re-structuration of roman society (demographical decline, lack of manpower in countryside, appearance of a military elite, Barbarians, etc.)

Military wise, I'm not sure why would be deeply changed compared to IOTL.

A passing remark Magnum : if we base ourselves on OTL, and use the historical deportation of Franks Julian decided, I don't think Goths would be enslaved and sold separatly, but rather sumbited as laeti, in order to both repopulate countryside and to form a defense layers on the borders, here Danubian.
Of course, if Julian tries to micro-manages the border matters, the situation is not doomed to end with a Gothic war.

Heck, Goths could not cross the Danube ITTL (or at very least not as it happened) : Fritigern did arguing of being a religious brethern to Romans, and an ally of Valens. This being butterflied away, I don't think Athanaric would do the exact same thing instead. Argurably, Athanaric did went in Romania in the 380's but that alone would change the Gothic War (and, from a personal viewpoint, I'd tend to think that without Fritigern's exemple or religious-political rebellion, Athanaric could remain a less contested ruler and try to do something in Pannonia instead).

Of course butterflies of no Gothic Wars at all, regardless if successful or not for Romans, could be really interesting.
 
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I'll probably respond to the rest tomorrow - who doesn't love a good Julian discussion, right ? :)

Anyway, regarding this:
A passing remark Magnum : if we base ourselves on OTL, and use the historical deportation of Franks Julian decided, I don't think Goths would be enslaved and sold separatly, but rather sumbited as laeti, in order to both repopulate countryside and to form a defense layers on the borders, here Danubian.
Of course, if Julian tries to micro-manages the border matters, the situation is not doomed to end with a Gothic war.

I did state (checks to see if that's actually the case...) that the remaining Goths are either (1) settled East, which, IIRC, was an OTL plan or (2) sold as slaves. Given the economic interests of some of the major slave traders at play, I don't think it's something Julian would have a problem with not resettling the entire population - certainly, he would have seen how dangerous the Goths could be in large numbers and, unlike the Franks in the west, you already had Huns etc moving into that area, making the possibility of a Gothic rebellion quite real.

Certainly the local Thraco-Romans would no be very happy about having the source of their nightmares for the past 5 years continue to live on THEIR land.
 
Given the economic interests of some of the major slave traders at play, I don't think it's something Julian would have a problem with not resettling the entire population
Given that the aformentioned slave traders did caused the crisis IOTL, the skilled emperor you described in your list would certainly not indulge into the same behaviour than the people that caused the problem to appear.

I'd think, furthermore, it would be contradictory with his psychology and the behaviour and policies he demonstrated so far.

certainly, he would have seen how dangerous the Goths could be in large numbers
At this point, rebelling Goths weren't in that large numbers IOTL (unless counting women, child and old people as being similar to adult men). Somewhere around 20 000 men (counting not only Fritigern, but as well Alaviv and Greuthingi), not larger than the army of Chrodomar.

I'd point the existance of Gothic laeti in Pannonia at the same time, as something that wasn't that implausible after all.
Assuming Romans had really a choice in this matter : they lacked men to work on fields and to protect the borders, and Barbarians were there to be used as such (with more or less success, but frankly, I don't know of a natural law preventing Goths to act as loyally, relativly speaking, than Frankish laeti and foederati did)

and, unlike the Franks in the west, you already had Huns etc moving into that area, making the possibility of a Gothic rebellion quite real.
Isn't that a bit contradictory?
If Huns are moving, and assuming Julian sees the threat, dividing definitely gothic groups as laeti settled in Thracian regions better controlled by Rome to protect the Danubian region would only makes more sense.

Critically with Athanaric still in the game, and maybe not weakened by the IOTL Roman attacks from one hand, and by support of Homean factions from the other.

Certainly the local Thraco-Romans would no be very happy about having the source of their nightmares for the past 5 years continue to live on THEIR land.
Given that emperors made an habitude to host refugees or deportees from Barbaricum inhabiting in the borders regions, I don't think Julian is going to ask their permission.

All of that still assuming things go as IOTL, as mentioned above : the absence of a religious relationship between christianized Tervingi and Greutingi groups would probably prevent the situation to appear, Athanaric eventually preferring to fight on as IOTL (critically he reigns on a less weakened and divided kingdom).
 
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Who? Who was confused? The Cult of the Unconquered Sun was a pre-existing cult, the same cult that Constantine himself had been a part of before his conversion. Julian had a lot of innovations he wanted to heap on top of it but, ultimately, it wasn't something entirely new.

There's really no reason to be so pessimistic about everything Julian. He was more than capable of leading a strong counter-veiling wind against the Christian ship that was setting out in this time period. It's status as an official, state-sponsored organization was very fresh and it contained extremely powerful schismatic tendencies that would rip and tear at its structure for centuries to come.

If Julian is successful in Persia and returns to Constantinople in triumph there is no real reason to think he wouldn't be able to be at least semi-successful in his religious goals. A Roman Empire where Julian dies after twenty or thirty years in office is going to be a much more religiously diverse place than the one we got in our own timeline. I also suspect it would remain so for quite some time: While his work establishing a pagan religious bureaucracy certainly contains the foundations of a more centralized state religion, it feels wrong to say that it would enjoy the successes of Christianity IOTL.

His political reforms, too, are interesting, in the sense that they roll back a lot of the work of Constantine and Diocletian. The lands of the various cities and the role of the city councils remained a political hot potato for a few decades following Julian's death: A situation where the issue is settled early and on the opposite side from which it settled IOTL is a fascinating avenue to explore. A sleeker, more austere Imperial administration is also a very counter-tendency to what actually happened in real history.

He was young, he had dynastic legitimacy, he was intelligent and capable, of course Julian attracts a lot of attention. He really is a magnetic possibility. I don't see a lot of reason to think otherwise.

He attempted to rebuild the Jewish temple to refute a Christian prophecy, by the way.
Yeah, I agree with this. It should be also noted that a little less than a century previously, Aurelian appeared to be gearing up to do something similar to Julian as far as promoting one centralized Pagan cult goes (that Pagan cult also being Sol Invictus). And nobody ever seems to talk about that as being a ridiculous attempt that had no chance of success, and indeed Aurelian is probably one of the most liked emperors on here (and for good reason).
 
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