Christopher
L. Bennett
Frontiers
in World History
NOBLE
SAVAGES: Tacitus' View of Frontier Peoples
How one views other cultures can reveal
much about how one sees one's own.
Cornelius Tacitus' essays Agricola and Germania, completed
c. 98 C.E., provide valuable insights into the Roman Empire's views of frontier
peoples as well as the Romans' own values and self-perception.
As a Roman, Tacitus sees the world in
martial terms. His people are on a
campaign of conquest, and any peoples not subordinate to Roman will are enemies
for that sole reason. Frequently they
are more than that; they are "barbarians" (p. 61) and
"savage[s]" (p. 137), leading wild, strange, uncivilized lives.
In Germania he refers to the
Fenni, evidently a Stone Age hunter-gatherer population from his description,
as "astonishingly savage and disgustingly poor" (p. 141). He repeatedly characterizes the Germans as
"indolent" (p. 139), and as poor farmers who "do not work
sufficiently hard" (p. 123) at agriculture (a biased interpretation of a
pastoralist culture with less agricultural knowledge than the Romans). He stresses the contentiousness of German and
British tribes, stating in Agricola that "nothing has helped us
more in fighting [them] ... than their inability to co-operate" (p. 62).
Still, Tacitus hardly condemns the
"barbarians." To a
considerable degree, he uses his descriptions of them to criticize Roman
failings by stressing the nobility, strength and morality of the primitives. Though backward and ignorant in his view, the
barbarians possess a warlike nobility, and are weakened when introduced to
Roman civilization. In Agricola
he writes of conquered British tribes: "And so the population was
gradually led into the demoralizing temptations of arcades, baths and sumptuous
banquets. The unsuspecting Britons spoke
of such novelties as `civilization,' when in fact they were only a feature of
their enslavement" (p. 73). What Tacitus
seems to condemn is leisure and self-indulgence. The Roman feels that honor is derived from
combat and challenge. He describes in Agricola
how "the Gauls... had their hour of military glory; but since that time a
life of ease has made them unwarlike: their valor perished with their
freedom" (p. 62). Note that at this
time the Gauls were a conquered people integrated into the Roman Empire and its
lifestyle.
Tacitus also perceives the primitives as
possessing a superior sexual morality, as described in Germania on pp.
116-118. He describes them as cracking
down severely on adultery and devoid of the seductive games Tacitus sees as
fashionable in Rome. German women, he
says, are not pampered but expected to share in their husbands' hardships and
preserve their legacies; "they live uncorrupted by the temptations of
public shows or the excitements of banquets" (p. 117), which the informed
reader may extrapolate as being perhaps of Bacchanalian character. Again, the indulgences of a wealthy,
comfortable civilization are met with Tacitus' scorn. The barbarians may lead simple, ignorant
lives, but "ignorance is here a surer defence than any prohibition"
(p. 123, in re usury but more broadly applicable).
Nonetheless, Tacitus accepts and
celebrates Roman wars and conquests against these populations, even if it will
ultimately mean the deterioration of a noble, martial way of life. He feels no need to justify Roman conquests
as an act undertaken for the benefit of the conquered. To the Roman, war is its own justification,
an essential part of manhood and honor.
There is no ideology behind it save machismo. Tacitus condemns neither side in the wars;
indeed, in Agricola he gives the conquered a voice, on two occasions
(pp. 65-66 and pp. 80-83) dramatizing speeches wherein the Britons express
their grievances against Roman tyranny and oppression. The British chief Calgacus is even portrayed
as dismissing Roman military capability, crediting their victories to
dissension among their opposition: "The reputation of the Roman army is built
up on the faults of its enemies" (p. 82).
This is followed with a speech (preceding the same battle) wherein
Agricola, the admired subject of Tacitus' eulogy, dismisses the rival army as
"runaways" and "cowards" (pp. 85-6) and urges his troops to
fight for honor, valor and duty.
Agricola is also described as slaughtering enemies ruthlessly and
striking fear into the Britons through military campaigns in order to subjugate
their spirits. As much as Tacitus
sympathizes with the barbarians, he still identifies with and approves of their
conquerors. War is not directed against
monsters to be loathed or lost souls to be elevated; it is done simply because
it must be, because it is the source of strength, character and valor. To battle a foe with the same virtues is to
honor him and to share a common tradition.
But did Tacitus himself live up to these
martial ideals? Late in Agricola,
he turns to the tyranny of the late emperor Domitian. He describes how he and his fellow senators cooperated
with Domitian's abuse of the charge of high treason to condemn his political
rivals, and took no action to stop the injustice. He cites Agricola's own inaction during this
reign of terror as yet another mark of nobility, asserting that "a decent
regard for authority... can reach that peak of distinction which most men
attain only... by an ostentatious self-martyrdom" (p. 95). In essence, he seems to be saying that it is
better to wink at tyranny to save one's own skin than to risk oneself with open
defiance. This is difficult to reconcile
with Tacitus' professed love of warlike virtues and the glory of combat. Or perhaps not; perhaps he extolled those
virtues in order to compensate for his own unwillingness to fight. Perhaps this is the fundamental role the
barbarian played to the imperial Roman: an easy target on which to take out
aggression, to give a sense of victory and strength to those lacking the
courage to confront the enemies among their peers.
Bibliography
Tacitus,
Cornelius, The Agricola and the Germania, tr. Harold Mattingly, revised
S. A. Handford. London: Penguin Books,
1970.