So the years of 235 to 284 were really not kind to the Roman Empire. Nearly bankrupt, facing internal strife, external invasion, plague, and near total collapse of the bureaucracy Rome honestly shouldn't have recovered. At one point it was even split into three different empires, the Gallic Empire that control Spain, Gaul, and Britain, Rome which had Italy, Greece, and the Balkans, and the Palmyrene Empire that controlled Egypt, Syria, and parts of Turkey. There were something like 25 Emperors during this time and most ruled for less than a decade. So what if Rome doesn't get back on its feet and the system totally collapses with the three Empires becoming successor kingdoms to Rome. What would be the biggest changes to the Western World? The biggest I can think of is that Christianity might never rise beyond a popular lower class cult as there'd be no legitimizing force like Constantine to spread it all over the Empire.
WI Rome falls in the 3rd century
- Thread starter volantredx
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You're over estimating Constantine's role in the spread of Christianity. He only acknowledged the popularity of the religion and ended the Persecutions. Some people even doubt that he Converted sincerely.
Christianity might still become notable religion in large areas of Europe. Middle East and North Africa and perhaps even official religion. But there would be several forms of the faith.
The Huns, Franks, Goths, Lombards, Avars, Norse, Khazars and Saxons hadn't formed yet, so what is going to replace all those people that are no longer Roman? If we say that the 3 Empires stick around, then one of them will claim to be the 'true Rome' (much like Byzantium), and there will probably be a big fight between them until one rules supreme again.
Also the 'biggest change to the western world' is the fact that it is completely unrecognisable. The Franks were what made France after all, and France/Francia was pretty important after the 5th century.
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Also the 'biggest change to the western world' is the fact that it is completely unrecognisable. The Franks were what made France after all, and France/Francia was pretty important after the 5th century.
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The Franks and the Goths still existed. Their invasions were some of the instigating factors of the Crisis.
Merovech was living (if the legends are reliable) around 360, and he is sort of the Frankish 'founding father', whose descendants made the Franks into the unified force that took over Gaul. So, the Franks might have existed as a tribe (pretty much all of the above did in some form or other), but not as an idea and group that was unified under one person (Merovech or later Clovis) that could do anything more than cause a bit of trouble. Merovech's grandfather or something was a Roman who lived after the 3rd century crisis, so it will be difficult to have a skilled military leader just pop up in Bavaria and say "let the Franks march forward!"
AFAIK 'Goth' is just a general term for people in that part of the world at the time, but again I don't think there was any single leader for them before Alaric and his group, and that was 410.
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The Franks and the Goths were confederations of tribes. It's true they lacked the unity they'd later have but they were a force led by a single leader. The Goths for instance were led by by Cniva in the early 250s and they were able to not only defeat the legions but killed the Emperor at the time, Decius, which lead to the elevation of Gallus as well as the break aways of the West and East.
It already had spread all over the Empire (though in smaller numbers than a century later). There was a persecution at Lugdunum (Lyons) in Marcus Aurelius' reign.
Moving on, one major change that a fall in the 3rd century might have is that it might prevent or at least minimize the feudal period. The major splits of the Empire had a more centralized authority based on the Roman system.
No, he did much more than that. He gave enormous privileges to bishops which allowed them to become quite powerful. Apart from granting large amounts of land, buildings, revenues, and provisions, he also gave them powers that allowed them to outstrip decurions. They could give judgement on civil cases (that were backed up by the Empire), could manumit slaves, and had the right to use the public posting system for travel. All of these were previously restricted to provincial magistrates. One of the most coveted privileges though, was an exemption from the usually obligatory curial service. This was so attractive that later Christian-friendly emperors actually reigned it in (they didn't eliminate it though). He convened Christian councils (like Nicaea) He favored Christian cities over there more powerful pagan neighbors, he confiscated pagan temple property and civic estates for the Imperial purse. This was the start of a process which beggared traditional cults. All of this meant that bishops were able to monopolize civic and regional politics.
Basically, the notion that Constantine just recognized Christians is severely misleading. I think there's a very strong case to be made that the only reason he didn't go for the whole hog and make Christianity official because paganism was still so strong. If a pagan reformer came onto the scene- like say Maximinus Dias- who knows what could have happened...
EDIT: I think Julian was too late, had too short a reign, and didn't go about reforming paganism/fighting Christianity in a smart way. Constantine permanently stabilized the convulsions of the 3rd century and had a long successful reign. I think someone needs to take his place.
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I am afraid, you are underestimating Constantines role. At least you underestimate the role of the roman empire dramatically. Constantine made christianity acceptable in polite society. His successors were christians, and therefore the sycophantic roman elite started to convert. Much faster than this would have been possible without a central roman superstate with just one single point of attack. It does not matter at all, if he himself was a christian and when, or if he just instrumentalized christianity.
In a world without a central unified roman empire, christianity has a much harder time to grow and reach the upper classes. And it has almost no chance to not become heavily diversified. It already was intially very diveersified. But it would become even more; not less as in OTL. And last but not least, christianity became heavily romanized. Romanization changed christianity almost to an unrecognizable state. Without the roman empire, this might probably not happen, and you would get a christianity which is beyond your imagination. Imagine a more gnostic christianity. More like buddhism. No need for priests, a church or even an active god. Because every human is godly and humanity itself is god according to e.g. the Gospel of Iudas. And of course Maria Magdalena was the 1st apostle. Not Petrus. Without the heavy romanization of chistianity things could be fully different.
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It'd certainly be more egalitarian towards women. Rome was largely the driving force into imposing their own patriarchal leanings into the church.
Not only this. Roman magistrates became christian priests and christian priests became magistrates. There was a need to fill this gap. But they never should had gone this way according to Jesus' initial words. It is even unclear, if he asked for priests at all. Early christianity, which is the time BEFORE the gospels were written (80-130 AD), is much different to what the romans made out of christianity.
Christianity as we know it today would not even exist without Romanitas. The pope, bishops, dioceses, the way the church works, churches itself, priests, and this perverse patriacharlism ... its all roman, not christian.
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Actually a split up Roman empire might preserve Classical society and culture much better then a unified Empire would. All you would need is perhaps two of the miniature to acknowledge the other or something, I admit would have a very low chance of succeeding but get the right people in the right place at the right time and it could work.
I think that even without Constantine, the Christian Church would eventually be Romanized. Why?
Because Christians are Roman Citizens, living in the Roman Empire, and most accepted the legitimacy of the Roman Empire as such, because they could conceive of no other state or condition in their lives. So their organization and the way they conducted their hierarchy would be influenced by Rome simply because Christians were Romans. They don't even consciously try to impose their Romanness of Church organization. They simply do so, without much thinking, because it was the natural thing for them to do, and try to adapt it to Christianity.
Furthermore, before Constantine, Christians did not want or attempt to destroy Roman Civilization or society. They simply wanted to be accepted by the state and not persecuted. To them, there was no conflict between being a loyal Roman, and a Christian.
If Christianity emerged in Persia, Christianity would copy the Persian Imperial Structure. If it merged in Germany, Christianity would copy Germanic practices in their organization.
It's the same way Greek philosophy was wedded to Christian thought. Greek philosophy was in fashion among the intellectuals of the Empire, and when those elite and intellectual converted, they would try to see how the new religion would fit their intellectual heritage from the Greeks.
I remember hearing that the condition of women in Rome was slowly improving until the patriarchal system of the time was made into religion. Once that happened, it was unfortunately set in stone. In the ATL, Christianity would never absorb this patriarchy and thus would be more egalitarian (after all, Christianity spread within Rome largely by appealing to women), while the successor states to Rome would (hopefully) not have patriarchy set into their religion (whatever religion(s) become popular there) and thus might also become egalitarian much sooner than OTL.
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I mean by the third century there were priest and Bishops. IIRC there were even popes in Rome though they weren't called that. I could be wrong or it could be a matter of later church leaders giving themselves more legitimacy by saying their positions existed for a lot longer than it did.
So a much less centralised Christian Church. Maybe Iona (or its TTL analogue) counts for more than Rome in this world.
Likely, it'd also be sharing the stage with a bunch of Pagan traditions and a growing cult of Sol Invictus especially in the East.
Also, if the successor states were separated, wouldn't they, over time, while sharing a Roman background over time empathise local customs re imagined through a Romanised lense? For example, seeing Epona as a guardian of the Gallic Emperors or Punic customs starting to re emerge in North Africa though not child sacrifice because that is un Roman.
Over a century of that wouldn't the localization of values be a big check on the spread of a religion with universalist claims like Christianity or Manicheanism?
Couldn't some areas, be falling out of the Roman cultural orbit? For example, Palestine and Syria having fifty years of Persian governors and Northern Gaul/Britain starting to become German to the same extent England did otl?
Wouldn't under these circumstances, Christianity might become dominant in say, Egypt, but it's chances of becoming more universally dominant would be virtually nil.