Jordanes and the End of the Roman Empire

Abstract

Abstract This chapter explores the legacy of emperors and the end of Roman imperial rule in the works of the sixth-century author Jordanes. It argues that Jordanes’ two contributions to historical writing, the Getica and the Romana, operate in tandem with each other to produce a narrative of Roman and Gothic history that is reflective of a contemporary discourse for both the end of the western Roman empire and the potential for crisis in the eastern empire. According to Jordanes’ narrative, Roman emperors are primarily culpable for crisis in the imperial state as agents of tyranny and civil war. In the Romana, Jordanes attributes Roman imperial success to specific political virtues and institutions, especially the republican institution of the consulship, which become eclipsed by the rise of government by emperors. The Getica provides a narrative for translatio imperii by which the Goths acquire the same political virtues lost by Roman emperors, thereby positioning the Gothic Amal family of Italy as potential sponsors for the rejuvenation of the western Roman empire. This configuration of the Roman and Gothic past is sensitive to both the outcome of the Gothic War in Italy and discourses of political decline current in Justinian’s Constantinople.