Gotland
The homeland of the Gothic tribes was Gotland - Gutland, the land of the Gutes. It is a large island (2,994 km²) on the east cost of Sweden. The region has been inhabited since prehistoric times. They called themselves Gothiscandza which has an echo of Scandinavia.
Ancient local history is preserved in a valuable collection of poetry known as Gutasaga.
"The Gutasaga contains legends of how the island was settled by Þieluar and populated by his descendants. It also tells that a third of the population had to emigrate and settle in southern Europe, a tradition associated with the migration of the Goths, whose name has the same origin as Gutes, the native name of the people of the island." (wikipedia)
Gothic clouds at the borders of Rome
Goths mingled with the local people on their way through East Germany. At the beginning of the 3rd century A.D. we meet them in historical sources living in Dacia at the borders of the Late Roman Empire. From Dacia they crossed the river Danube and entered Roman territory. Their fearsome multitudes raided Moesia Inferior in 238 AD.
At this time Rome was weakened by devastating power struggles in the capital and serious problems both in Roman North Africa and with the mighty Sassanian Persia.
When retreating from the first raid the Goths took from Moesia many captives. These first prisonsers were, however, later returned home for good ransom. The negotiations for their return gave the troubled Romans the chance to develop relations with the Goths and they succeeded in getting them to join the campaign of the teen-age Emperor Gordian III (225-244) against Shapur I the Great of Persia.
The battles against Shapur I ended badly for the Romans and Gordian III was either killed or died from fever in 244 AD. With this the military pact made with the Goths was ended and the brave warriors were sent home to their great disappointment. It turned out that this was not a very smart move from the Roman generals who seriously underestimated the threat posed by the Gothic tribes.
Emperor Decius - enemy of Christ
The death of the Gordian III in 244 led to power struggles in Roman empire. Aristocratic Decius (201-251) usurped power from Philip the Arab who had trusted him with the task to lead the campaign against the Goths in Moesia.
...in late 249, when Decius returned to Rome, he embarked
upon an active building program in the capital. After a destructive fire,
he extensively restored the Colosseum. He later commissioned the opulent
Decian Baths along the Aventine. He perhaps also was responsible for the
construction of the Decian Portico.
...
Another possible aspect of this conservatism was a reported wide-scale attack on the growing Christian minority. The third century saw the slow creation of sizeable communities in the Empire's urban populations. For the first time, if we are to believe Christian sources, an Empire-wide persecution of Christians was begun under Decius.
The state required all citizens to sacrifice to the state gods and be in receipt of a libellus, a certificate from a temple confirming the act. The rationale for the emperor's actions, however, is not entirely clear. Eusebius writes he did so because he hated, who purportedly was a secret Christian. Probably the enmity was real, but it seems unconnected to the introduction of these policies. More likely, if Decius did indeed seek to persecute Christians, he was reacting to the growing visibility of the religion, especially in the city of Rome itself. One of the more prominent martyrs of the age was Fabian, the bishop of the imperial capital.
(De Imperatoribus Romanis).
...
Another possible aspect of this conservatism was a reported wide-scale attack on the growing Christian minority. The third century saw the slow creation of sizeable communities in the Empire's urban populations. For the first time, if we are to believe Christian sources, an Empire-wide persecution of Christians was begun under Decius.
The state required all citizens to sacrifice to the state gods and be in receipt of a libellus, a certificate from a temple confirming the act. The rationale for the emperor's actions, however, is not entirely clear. Eusebius writes he did so because he hated, who purportedly was a secret Christian. Probably the enmity was real, but it seems unconnected to the introduction of these policies. More likely, if Decius did indeed seek to persecute Christians, he was reacting to the growing visibility of the religion, especially in the city of Rome itself. One of the more prominent martyrs of the age was Fabian, the bishop of the imperial capital.
(De Imperatoribus Romanis).
St. Fabian, Bishop of Rome and Martyr
Catholic Encylopedia tells about Pope Fabianus
Pope (236-250), the extraordinary circumstances of whose election is related by Eusebius (Church History VI.29). After the death of Anterus he had come to Rome, with some others, from his farm and was in the city when the new election began. While the names of several illustrious and noble persons were being considered, a dove suddenly descended upon the head of Fabian, of whom no one had even thought. To the assembled brethren the sight recalled the Gospel scene of the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Saviour of mankind, and so, divinely inspired, as it were, they chose Fabian with joyous unanimity and placed him in the Chair of Peter.
...
Fabian died a martyr (20 Jan., 250) at the beginning of the Decian persecution, and was buried in the Crypt of the Popes in the catacomb of St. Callistus, where in recent times (1850) De Rossi discovered his Greek epitaph (Roma Sotterranea II, 59): "Fabian, bishop and martyr."
(Catholic Encyclopedia)
...
Fabian died a martyr (20 Jan., 250) at the beginning of the Decian persecution, and was buried in the Crypt of the Popes in the catacomb of St. Callistus, where in recent times (1850) De Rossi discovered his Greek epitaph (Roma Sotterranea II, 59): "Fabian, bishop and martyr."
(Catholic Encyclopedia)
Gothic invasion of Moesia
Gothic invasion of Moesia 249-251
Disappointed with Rome after the Sassanid war 244 the Goths decided to take the initiative. Only six years later, in 250 AD, a mighty coalition had been formed led by the Gothic king Cnifa "the Knife". The military force included warriors from the fearsome Vandali, Taifalae, Bastarnae and Carpi tribes.
Cniva began the invasion of the Roman Empire when he crossed the Danube in the third century. He sent detachments throughout the Roman province of Moesia with forces of Goths, Germans and Sarmatians. His considerable forces demanded the attention of the emperor Decius. While Cniva was laying siege to the city of Nicopolis,
Decius arrived, and the Goths left and headed towards Philippopolis.
Decius and his troops pursued Cniva through the difficult terrain, but
soon, after many forced marches, Cniva turned his troops on Decius, who
thought he was further away from the Goths. The Roman camp was surprised
and Decius fled while his army was defeated. Then Cniva laid siege to Philippopolis and, after a long resistance, he conquered the city, slaying one hundred thousand people, and taking many prisoner.
The sack of Philippopolis invigorated Decius, who intercepted several parties of Germans, and repaired and strengthened his fortifications along the Danube, intending to oppose Cniva’s forces. The Romans in time, with their superior numbers, surrounded the Goths, who attempted now to retreat from the empire. But Decius, seeking revenge and confident of victory, attacked the Goths at a small town called Forum Terebronii. The Roman army was caught in a swamp when they attempted to attack the Gothic army, and both the emperor Decius and his son Herennius Etruscus were slain in this battle, known as the Battle of Abrittus. After the battle, the new emperor, Trebonianus Gallus, let Cniva leave with his spoils, and aided the Goths' departure. He even promised to pay a tribute to Cniva in order to keep him from invading the empire again.
(wikipedia)
Oh, those women!
Goths were a deadly threat that was not so easily to be put off with some money - but the near future was not known to the rulers of the Roman empire in mid 3rd century. (Visigoth king Alaric I took the capital Rome itself 410 AD)
The ruler of the Kingdom of Heaven had better information and took a marvellous and strange step in Moesia and the surrounding regions in order to reach the hearts of the Goths before the historic fall of eternal Rome would take place (Alaric was Christian!).
Decius, the persecutor of the lambs of the Good Shepherd, was surprisingly killed against all odds with his son in a nasty swamp during the battle of Abrittus. His time for punishment had come like it came to those arch-persecutors of Christians, emperors Maxentius and Diocletian, later on.
In addition, our Lord let thousands of His own to be captured by the pagan Goths. Imagine the cries of terror and tears when mostly women are taken by force from their burning villages and towns littered with the corpses of humans. Ravished, pulled away from their homes and families, these women are taken as captives across Danube. What worse fate could we imagine for a defenceless women in the hands of pagan barbarians who can do to them whatever they want.
What is this God that lets such things happen to His own?
Well, things went quite differently from what we imagine and what the Enemy of Christ would have hoped. For these captive women turned out to be not just innocent civilian victims of a cruel war - but with the help of the Good Shepherd they turned the darkest situation of life into a great victory for the Kingdom of Heaven. Through the Moesian Christian women Jesus reached the hearts of Gothic men and the rest is history!
The sack of Philippopolis invigorated Decius, who intercepted several parties of Germans, and repaired and strengthened his fortifications along the Danube, intending to oppose Cniva’s forces. The Romans in time, with their superior numbers, surrounded the Goths, who attempted now to retreat from the empire. But Decius, seeking revenge and confident of victory, attacked the Goths at a small town called Forum Terebronii. The Roman army was caught in a swamp when they attempted to attack the Gothic army, and both the emperor Decius and his son Herennius Etruscus were slain in this battle, known as the Battle of Abrittus. After the battle, the new emperor, Trebonianus Gallus, let Cniva leave with his spoils, and aided the Goths' departure. He even promised to pay a tribute to Cniva in order to keep him from invading the empire again.
(wikipedia)
Oh, those women!
Goths were a deadly threat that was not so easily to be put off with some money - but the near future was not known to the rulers of the Roman empire in mid 3rd century. (Visigoth king Alaric I took the capital Rome itself 410 AD)
The ruler of the Kingdom of Heaven had better information and took a marvellous and strange step in Moesia and the surrounding regions in order to reach the hearts of the Goths before the historic fall of eternal Rome would take place (Alaric was Christian!).
Decius, the persecutor of the lambs of the Good Shepherd, was surprisingly killed against all odds with his son in a nasty swamp during the battle of Abrittus. His time for punishment had come like it came to those arch-persecutors of Christians, emperors Maxentius and Diocletian, later on.
In addition, our Lord let thousands of His own to be captured by the pagan Goths. Imagine the cries of terror and tears when mostly women are taken by force from their burning villages and towns littered with the corpses of humans. Ravished, pulled away from their homes and families, these women are taken as captives across Danube. What worse fate could we imagine for a defenceless women in the hands of pagan barbarians who can do to them whatever they want.
What is this God that lets such things happen to His own?
Well, things went quite differently from what we imagine and what the Enemy of Christ would have hoped. For these captive women turned out to be not just innocent civilian victims of a cruel war - but with the help of the Good Shepherd they turned the darkest situation of life into a great victory for the Kingdom of Heaven. Through the Moesian Christian women Jesus reached the hearts of Gothic men and the rest is history!
The conversion of the Goths to Christianity was a relatively swift
process, facilitated on the one hand by the assimilation of (primarily
female) Christian captives into Gothic society and on the other by a general equation of participation in Roman society with adherence to Christianity.
Within a few generations of their appearance on the borders of the
Empire in 238 AD, the conversion of the Goths to Christianity was nearly
all-inclusive. The Christian cross appeared on coins in Gothic Crimea
shortly after the Edict of Tolerance was issued by Galerius in 311 AD, and a bishop by the name of Theophilas Gothiae was present at the Council of Nicaea in 325 AD. However, fighting between Pagan and Christian Goths continued throughout this period, and religious persecutions - echoing the Diocletianic Persecution (302-11 AD) - occurred frequently. The Christian Goths Wereka, Batwin and others were martyred by order of Wingourichos ca. 370 AD, and Saba was martyred by order of Athanaric in 372 AD.
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