As inquired by the title, what would be the most realistic location for a roman rump state, more specifically, a rump state for the western empire.
Roman rump state
- Thread starter Etruscan-enthusiast35
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The Byzantines can be included in this, but honestly I find the idea of the western empire surviving in some way shape or form to be more interesting.
just shooting ideas:
Justinian leveled the entire Italian countryside during his Renovatio Imperii, so if you wanted a western Rump State just have it in Italy between 550's and the early 1000's
Justinian leveled the entire Italian countryside during his Renovatio Imperii, so if you wanted a western Rump State just have it in Italy between 550's and the early 1000's
If the Vandals weren't a thing (and ironically), Carthage and North Africa.
I don't think sending the space bats after an entire group of people is necessary, just some area the western empires government could flee to and be safe.
Or did you mean figure out a way to keep them out of roman north africa?
Dalmatia was, very briefly, this for the latter part of the Vth century until the death of Julius Nepos in 480. We could see, given right circumstances, the fiction of a WREmpire located there lasting a bit more than IOTL with the dalmatian emperor having a very technical claim of dominance over Italy.
That could work, though it would be interesting to see how they respond to Slavic migrations or Muslim invasions, assuming that Islam manages to come into existence in this timeline.
If Carthage and North Africa remains under WRE control, we're less talking about a rump WRE, but rather a possibly surviving WRE that still could count on its fiscal and productive income, tough.
To be honest, I'd be surprised that it would even manage to hold past the late Vth century : if Dalmatia isn't taken over by whoever rules in Italy, then sooner of later the fiction of an WREmperor would be terminated by Constantinople.
Or maybe the Byzantines could make a vassal out of them, though the Byzantines doing that and the Dalmatians agreeing to such a situation may or may not require some semblance of compromise or condition.
They didn't claimed or searched to be the successor or the continuation of the Roman state (which they couldn't, not being Roman citizens), while essentially being its political and institutional successors, as virtually all the Barbarian kingdoms.
They rather considered themselves being in the technical obedience of the sole imperial authority of Constantinople (while claiming a special relationship, especially Ostrogoths, as lieutenants of Constantinople for the West) and understood themselves as parts of the Empire.
Dalmatian's independence and claims essentially depended from Constantinople's good will. Nepos' claims were essentially empty, while Odoacer acknowledged him, very symbolically as emperor. I can't see any good reason why Constantinople would really bother supporting much longer the fiction of an WRE for the sake of it if there's no real hope of having the Dalmatian ruler being reinstalled on Ravenna ultimately.
Now, we could see in a TL where Marcian manages to overthrow Zeno in 479, either Procopius Anthemius or Romulus being named WREmperor and sent into Dalmatia, the situation lasting as long Marcian remains emperor in Constantinople and he might send some resources to his brother to support a bit this claim. But Odoacer would be most please to take the mentle of 'restorer of imperial legality" once more and take Dalmatia at the first opportunity. How it ends is anybody's guess although it could technically lead to Odoacer's patrician Italy survival, and then a possible (but probably temporary) claimant to WRE pulled out of Odoacer's hat if Marcian is still in charges and disagrees.
Surprised nobody has mentioned my boy Syragrius and his domain up in Soissons. Have him repulse the Franks and maneuver the tricky politics of post-Roman Gaul and you could easily have a surviving Gallo-Roman rump state.
Perhaps after the definitive fall of Italy, Syragrius proclaims sovereignty over the Western Empire and tries his hand at restoring Imperial borders (not gonna judge his chances of success though.) Lending a hand to the Romano-Britons once he is secure is also interesting. The British could exploit Badon Hill to the fullest if a relatively friendly nation lies just across the channel. Maybe Syragrius can even achieve suzerainty over parts of Britain if he plays his cards right. Dumnonia is a likely candidate.
Perhaps after the definitive fall of Italy, Syragrius proclaims sovereignty over the Western Empire and tries his hand at restoring Imperial borders (not gonna judge his chances of success though.) Lending a hand to the Romano-Britons once he is secure is also interesting. The British could exploit Badon Hill to the fullest if a relatively friendly nation lies just across the channel. Maybe Syragrius can even achieve suzerainty over parts of Britain if he plays his cards right. Dumnonia is a likely candidate.
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The main problem there is that Syagrius' domain might simply not have existed as such.
All we know about it comes from Gregory of Tours' account and it's very short lines about how he was ruling around Soissons, after his father ruled part of northern Gaul and was defeated by Clovis. And that's it.
Now, it's perfectly agreeable that Syagrius ruled a reduced territory in northern Gaul (generally considered to be formed out of a Noyon-Soisson-Senlis territory) but the idea that he might have ruled directly or indirectly a region between Brittany and Meuse basin is mostly coming from XIXth cartographers attempting to "fill the void" of the period. Probably, and this might be pointed out by the gradual Frankish takeover of northern Gaul, Syagrius was only but one of the regional Roman dukes/commanders that were enjoying a local power in the wake of Roman state collapse and that either joined up Barbarians (Vicentius in Tarraconensis, Namatius and Victorius in Aquitaine, another Syagrius and Avitus in Provence, etc.) or briefly fought and were defeated and integrated (Apollinaris Sidonius and Ecdicius in Auvergne, etc.) or relatively autonomous (Riothamus-Ambrosius Aurelianus or Vortigern in Britain).
These local rulers ended up invested or self-invested with civilian/military power either by former imperial authority (Vicentius and Aegidius being possibly trusted with regional military command by Majorian) or trough episcopal authority (Sidonius Appolinaris, most notably) letting them as semi-legitimate / semi-roguish authority depending of the circumstances (and Syagrius was more on the roguish side since he were at odds with Odoacer and Constantinople; while Clovis could have appeared as a more officially sanctioned authority).
Syagrius best chance would be a Visigothic defeat at Déols in 470, preventing the rupture of what we could consider as a Britto-Gallo-Frankish continuum (on which Franks played a major role due to their regional presence and influence since the IVth century, so you'd really need to deal with Chilpéric in the same period)
.I doubt we'll see Syagrius as a WREmperor wannabee ITTL, as he's too far removed from Ravennian and Constantinople's court to really hope so, but rather as a lasting local leader n the lines of what happened in southern Britain but with surviving Roman structures.
Such a maintained ensemble, beside its disunity, would lack a real legitimized leadership (something that plagued provincial Romans up to the end) but you might end up with a strong figure emerging out of the PoD : maybe Riothamus/Ambrosius Aurelianus turning into a King Arthur equivalent but rather based in northern-western Gaul ITTL. How long could it be held in one piece is still largely debatable, and it's probably going to split away at the first chance, but that's the closer thing of a rump state (without it being one and more of a loose coalition) you could get in the region at this point.
And, really, if Chilpéric and Merovingian still roams free (or if they don't but get swallowed up by Alamans), even with this PoD, Syagrius is toasted anyway.
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Now, my knowledge of the situation only really comes from Oxford’s Late Roman Warlords, but I’d dispute that Syragrius was simply one of many local warlords in Northern Gaul. Here’s just a bit of argument from the book, although I grant you that it’s primarily from Gregory of Tours. Scholars have reason to believe that information about Syragrius’ situation can be gleaned from Gregory’s writings though, and the book dedicates some time disputing the thesis laid forth by Edward James in his book The Franks that Syragrius’ kingdom was merely a convienent map fill and that he was likely a local ruler.
“According to Gregory, Syagrius met Clovis in open battle, although he would surely have been safer remaining within the walls of his city and letting Clovis undertake a siege. Kurth thought this was because Gregory's story was taken from oral tradition, with its convention of single combat between opposing leaders but the alternative, a successful storming of the city of Soissons, would surely have been remembered, and such an action was, in any case, extremely rare in this period. Syagrius was, it seems, confident that he could defeat Clovis in open battle, which suggests that their forces were fairly evenly matched (see Ch. 10 on this), and that Clovis' victory was not assured. That some Frankish kings remained neutral substantiates this. At least two refused to join Clovis against Syagrius, and later paid dearly for it. It is very possible that there was an alliance between Syagrius and Franks unfriendly to Clovis.
Clovis clearly went to some trouble to get Syagrius back into his own hands, but why did he wait to kill him in secret later? This aspect of the story would not seem to come from oral tradition glorifying Clovis, in which one might expect Clovis to kill Syagrius heroically in battle. Behind this account may be complex political manoeuvring concerned with the consolidation of the Frankish conquest and Clovis' position. It is possible that Syagrius was not surrendered by the Goths until some years after his defeat (Gregory giving no date), perhaps in AD 493, when a marriage alliance was arranged between Theoderic of Italy and the sister of Clovis, with the Visigoths making overtures of peace to Clovis and handing Syagrius over.488 There seems no overwhelming reason to date the surrender of Syagrius to AD 493; however, it certainly remains true that we do not know when exactly it took place.”
“In connection with this question there is another ancient source which, just conceivably, relates to Syagrius. The eastern historian Candidus wrote that: ‘After the assassination of Nepos and the expulsion of Augustulus, Odovacer in his own person ruled Italy and Rome ‘... When the Gauls of the West revolted against Odovacer both they and Odovacer sent an embassy to Zeno. He preferred to support Odovacer.’
These cannot be the same embassies which reached Zeno simultaneously from both Odovacer and Nepos as Candidus would hardly confuse an ex-emperor's ambassadors from Salona in Dalmatia with Gallicones. Even if there is careless condensation by Photius here, and the embassy from Odovacer in Candidus is the same as the one in Malchus, this still leaves an otherwise unknown Gallic embassy. Some Gallic authority that did not accept the overlordship of Odovacer had a reason (and the resources) to send representations to Constantinople. As far as is known, Odovacer did not make any claims or efforts to rule outside Italy, so an actual rebellion cannot have taken place; but someone in Gaul may, it seems, have wanted to reject any idea of formal allegiance to him in favour of the eastern emperor. Southern Gaul was in the hands of the Visigoths and Burgundians. It is difficult to imagine who in Gaul would have contacted Constantinople in this way if not Syagrius.”
There’s more arguments laid out by the book pertaining to the historical evidence of Syragrius’ domains being decently sizable but I’m not going to quote them all in this thread. Later on, it refers to the sloppy Roman coins found in northern Gaul in the late 5th century that were being minted by somebody, which could plausibly be the continuation of Roman administration through Syragrius. If you haven’t checked it out already, I suggest you give it a read, it’s interesting stuff.
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Ah, but here's where an allohistorical perspective comes in. Imagine a world where the Eastern Roman Empire had never invaded the Ostrogothic Kingdom, or else failed early and decisively in the attempt, leading to the Gothic ruling class in Italy remaining in power but culturally, linguistically, and religiously Romanizing over a century or so. Perhaps they even consolidate the Visigothic and Vandalic realms under their rule (again assuming Byzantine forces aren't sent West), largely recreating the Western Roman Empire, at least briefly.
In a world where the Ostrogothic Kingdom of Italy hadn't been killed in the cradle by Justinian and where the elite had become Roman over time (just as the Visigoths had assimilated into the majority culture in Iberia over time), wouldn't scholars in the year 2018 probably come to think of such a polity as a continuation of the Roman Empire?
It's quite unconvincing, to say the least : most sieges in Vth century Gaul were generally open field battles ending up with cities opening their walls to the victor.. That Syagrius opted for not remaining in a city (especially as his loyalties might be judged not that firm) when Gundobald is said, later in the text, to be uncomfortable being so due to logistical matters, doesn't strikes me as a strong evidence about his political power.
It's really a sur-interpretation of not a sentence, but part of it : while Syagrius did "not put off" a fight against Franks as he was not afraid, according Gregory, he quickly changed his mind at the defeat of his army : since there is no mention of reinforcements from other regions or men (as Gregory points Clovis had or expected), the only information we have was that Syagrius that ruled from Soissons (a former imperial arsenal) had this army and that's it.
That it was evenly matched (or not) can't be found or implied in the original text.
Again, this is a sur-interpretation IMO : Clovis as the leader of the Roman army of Belgica was certainly gathering it (including other foedi, on which Merovingian seems to have some ascendent). We do know, by other documents, that Clovis did have the military command of this region, something we don't have for Syagrius and is not attestable from the text.
With this kind of wild guessing, we could as well imply that Goths had a smaller army than Franks because they were afraid of Franks as Grégory puts it.
It's possible, although not mentioned in the text which would be weird coming from Grégory which tries pretty much to put Clovis in the best light possible without outright lying : Chararic is literally said to have waited for the victor, and that's it.
But even an alliance doesn't imply at the latest a form of regional dominance from Syagrius, even less in Belgica.
It's not what appear from the text at all : Gregory stress the relative easiness of Syagrius being sent back to Clovis in chains, when Franks couldn't have been yet a threat to Goths.
That's a good question : there's no clear answer. My take on this was that the judicial power of Clovis over Franks was clearly established and acknowledged, but as a Barbarian regulus not yet acknowledged by Gallo-Roman nobility wholly before his conversion, he might not had the legal right to execute or punish Syagrius.
Nothing attested in the text, of course; although the proclamation of Clovis as honorary consul and "glorious king" in Orléans might echo this change of status.
Gregory generally follows a chronological narrative there, and he gives in the text some markers for this. "Meanwhile a lot of churches were plundered of his armies" and a bishop ask that a rich object be given back to him, Clovis asking him to follow him to Soissons. Either Gregory completely changes his style at this point, either we assume that the plundering of Soissons lasted for years, either it's in the right chronological order and the execution of Syagrius happened roughly at the same time than Clovis' conquest of the region.
As for why Gregory doesn't hesitate to put Clovis in a bad light : his work was essentially a didactic history for the grandsons of Clovis, hoping to point why a Christian conduct is preferable for a ruler, with a contrast with Clovis' attitude before and even after his conversion : trying to lying would have weakened his objective, if not conscience.
If we take in account what follows, that in the tenth year of his reign Clovis took Tongres, it most probably took place before 491. At this point, any reason why it should have happened later than how Gregory tells us how it happened seems a bit moot.
The use of the plural may simply hints as several local rulers. I do not disagree that Syagrius might have enjoyed some sort of ascendency over other Gallo-Romance dux and leaders, but there is simply nothing hinting at that specifically.
In 476? It could as well be Sidonius Appolinaris which beneficied from strong ties with senatorial elites in Italy.Again, I really don't think it's the case myself, but with this kind of meager sources only, any claim can be made.
It's not because they controlled the region that local Gallo-Roman nobility ceased to be a thing : if anything, the Gondovald's revolt one century later does points at its dynamism and political activity.
Mostly because it's the only name we got in Northern Gaul, which is not the same than an actual mention or knowledge there was no one else : at this point we could argue that southern Britain was unified because we only have an handful of names succeeding each other.
More seriously, that Gregory specifically mentions Syagrius and no one else in Northern Gaul certainly points that he might have beneficied from a special ascendent in the region, probably out of his familial ties and power in the region. And that Chilperic does supports eventually Odoacer's while Syagrius would not is a good explanation as for the break of the alliance tied with Aegidius in the 460's.
It's quite possible than defeating Syagrius really helped Clovis to enforce his rule over Saxons and Alans of the north-western shores : but it's not clear how quickly or nt Clovis did so. One of the few names we got outside the Frankish feodus and its extension in Northern Gaul is in Trier with the count Arbogast. He was not under Chilpéric or Clovis' dominance originally as far as it can be told, but it was eventually part of the Frankish kingdom in the VIth without any indication how and when. Similarily, the Frankish expansion west of Seine and north of Loire isn't really well attested: Gregory simply doesn't mention anything besides the takeover of Soissons itself.
For all we know, after the Battle of Déols, Armorican region was let to itself between remaining Gallo-Romance leadership, remaining Bretons, Saxons and Alans : the attested Frankish presence and projection beyond their foedus is a valid explanation to a quick but gradual expansion in Northern Gaul, more than the conquest of an non-attested Gallo-Roman polity from Brittany to Rhine.
There's at least one logical step that got passed by there : somebody minted coins -> Syagrius maintained administration where they were found. Maybe there's more to it, but I don't have the book right now : I'll try finding it.
I'd want to mention that Clovis doesn't seem to have taken most of Northern Gaul after his victory against Syagrius : Soissons, obviously,