Bryan McEntire

History 4020

14 April 2005

Britain as a Model for Roman Acculturation

 

            The 18th century French essayist Marquis de Vauvenargues wrote that “servitude debases men to the point where they end up liking it.”  The forcible rule of one person over a group of others is a pattern common to all cultures and has been analyzed in nearly every area of academia.  A complete study of the intricacies of human subjugation of this kind would span the breadth of recorded history and be beyond the reach of this work.  This task has been made easier, however, with the study of Empires in history.  It is in the arena of Empire that major patterns in the success or failure of differing methods of conquest can be seen. Of the many recorded Empires throughout history, there is one that left an indelible mark upon the western mind; this Empire, one of the most successful, longest lived, and geographically expansive, was the Roman Empire.

            A great deal of effort has been expended in trying to understand why the Roman Empire “fell”, but a lesser studied question and one that this paper will focus on is in trying to understand why it lasted so long?  What methods did the Romans employ that enabled them to assimilate numerous ethnic and cultural groups into a foreign system yet also have them willingly accept this way of life? 

            Underlying this question and the key to Roman success is the concept of ideology; by itself ideology is more an abstraction that a useful term for analysis, but it is helpful when used to define a complex system of Romanization.  Clifford Ando has suggested that Roman ideology was so successful because the “Roman State successfully invoked the obedience of its subjects by appealing to several principles of legitimation concurrently” (5).  The end product of this legitimation was an Empire inhabited by people from a wide range of locations who all viewed themselves as Romans.  It would be naďve to suggest that this acceptance was universal across the Empire and that the three stages that will be discussed here were the only factors influencing Romanization, but for a general understanding of this process they will suffice.

            Britain is an ideal site for the study of this process of Romanization because there is ample documentation for each step, and its entrance into the Empire coincided with the theological evolution of the Imperial Cult that proved crucial to provincial acculturation.  This paper will discuss Ando’s two main stages along with the requisite economic developments that would lead to Roman cultural assimilation using examples from Britain from the time of Caesar’s invasion to the height of British Romanization in the 3rd and 4th centuries A.D. 

            The Romanization process as it applies to Britain can be outlined as follows.       Economic ties between Rome and the culturally inferior British tribes created personal relationships that were exploited by the rhetoric of Imperial expansion.  Once this expansion began, political structures were introduced in order to maintain these personal, or client, relationships.  The coercion of native tribes into accepting these new political demands occurred through a flexible system of religious and iconographic measures which were adaptable to regional beliefs while concurrently reinforcing loyalty to Imperial rule.       

            Before looking into the specifics of the acculturation process outlined above, it will be beneficial to note several factors that greatly contributed to the success British Romanization.  Charles Issawi noted that much of Rome’s success can be attributed to the primitive nature of the people it was conquering (184)[1].  Another advantage the Romans had over later empires was their lack of concern for racial purity.  He also notes that since they did not suffer from the same racial biases prevalent in later Empires, this allowed for more intermarriage and stability within the conquered provinces (193).  Both of these factors were present in Britain and contributed to the success of Romanization there.

            The basic economic links that existed between Britain and Rome before the invasions of Caesar and Claudius created relationships between inter-tribal groups and the Roman state that allowed further Roman expansion into the area.  The major economic developments of pre-invasion Britain were linked with the Belgae tribes that migrated there from Gaul in the 1st century A.D.  They are attributed with introducing the first coins to Britain (Creighton  286), the influence of which will be discussed later.  Extensive imports to Britain during this period were commodities like “wheat, cattle, gold, silver, iron, hides, slaves and hunting dogs. . . jewellery [sic] and glass. . . wine, many fine bronze vessels and sometimes pieces of bronze furniture” (Liversidge 3).  The luxurious nature of these trade items is illustrative of the positive economic state that existed among some of the tribes encountered by Caesar.  This state of well-being, which was fostered partially by the trade of Roman goods through Gaul, was even the source of salvation for Caesars Legions when his fleet was nearly destroyed in his first invasion (Caesar 102, IV.31). 

            A good illustration of how economic ties and the relationships they engendered influenced the Romanization process comes from Caesars account of his first invasion of Britain.  When Caesars designs on Britain “had become known in the meantime, and when the news was brought by traders to the Britons, envoys were sent by a number of tribes, offering to give hostages and submit to Rome” (Caesar 97, IV.21).  Although these promised hostages were late in coming, sufficient division existed among the tribes that all it took for the Romans was their protection of the Trinovantes tribe in their plight against the aggressive Cassivellaunus for several others to accept Roman protection as well.  This put Caesar in a strategic position to accept the surrender of the Cassivellaunus and in a situation secure enough to leave for the winter confident in the personal terms that had been reached (113-114, V 20-21).  The wealth and status of all tribes, however, was not created equal.  It was the aggressive actions of the Belgae during the interim period when Caesar left that caused them to be surrounded by Roman allies.  Liversidge aptly sums up this state of affairs:     

the Britain the Romans found in A.D. 43 was a country split up among warring tribes, some of whom could find men and money with which to build extensive defences and engage in foreign trade, even though they lived in flimsy huts in rather sordid conditions.  In some areas conquered groups nursed vengeance in their hearts and bided their time, ready to turn on their oppressors, while others lived in fear of imminent attack (5).

These divisions are important to Romanization because they gave the Legions the freedom to focus their energies on subduing natives with irreconcilable hostilities. 

            Before proceeding with the discussion of how the military and subsequent political systems influenced British provincial acceptance of Roman rule, it is necessary to determine why Rome needed to conquer Britain to begin with.  The above examples have shown that although Caesar’s account of his invasion paints a victorious if hurried end, the reality was far from secure.  Britain was not unified enough to serve as a good client kingdom at the time, and Caesars caricature of the barbaric, painted-faced island inhabitants instilled in the Roman people an aggressive fascination with a culture foreign to their own yet within their realm of experience. 

            This idea of “Roman ness” and the difference between those who had it and those who did not played a pivotal role in how independent, conquered, and fully Romanized groups interacted with each other and with the State.  Since Romanization was a transitional process that occurred over time, not all areas of the Empire were as suffuse with Roman culture as were others.  While Roman culture in some areas may have been more of a construct than a reality, P.C.N. Stewart makes the argument that “to assert the existence of somewhere that is not Roman is to reinforce the existence of Roman culture as a construct” (Stewart 6).  In order to maintain unity and control in areas shaken by civil war, it was necessary in the case of neglected Britain to create a cultural icon that represented things decidedly un-Roman (ibid 9).  Augustus used Britain’s cultural differences and the possibility of an imminent invasion[2] as a cathartic exercise to unify the Empire and “correct the wrongs of the Civil War by directing violence against and external enemy” (ibid 7).  It is ironic that the discussion of invasion by Augustus, and the actual one by Claudius proceeded as if the first invasion by Caesar had not even happened, yet it was his own records that made the discussion possible.

            With the impetus for Romanization created in the aftermath of the Civil War, Claudius became the first to bring the foreign Britons under Roman jurisdiction.  In order to understand why the Britons eventually accepted Roman rule it is important to understand the economic role the military played in changing the lives of those they conquered.  The specifics of military conquest will not be dealt with here as they are not immediately relevant to understanding the process of Romanization; it should be sufficient to mention, however, that while the Roman Legions and auxiliary troops combated hostile natives, they acted as a powerful economic force.  Legion camps often grew into civitates and important centers of rule, as in the cases of London and York.  London is generally believed to have originally been the site of various military supply dumps and due to its superior geographic location became a major trading center and the site for the provincial administration (Wacher 80, 87).  The town of Eboracum, the town outside the fortress of York, was not a planned development, but rather a spontaneous civilian settlement (Liversidge 25). 

            Developments of this kind are significant because towns as the Romans knew them were virtually unknown in Britain before 43 A.D.  For those who accepted Roman rule the benefits were tremendous, especially in primitive areas.  These included: 

“Better ploughs and mattocks and scythes, and iron spades to dig drainage ditches, and stronger draft animals to make headway in the heavier soil of the valley bottoms. . . All this reflected the stimulation radiating outward from the tents of two or three hundred cavalry-men” (MacMullen 339).

It is easy to see how Roman presence would be beneficial to the common people in terms of technology and quality of life. 

            Military influence over an area paved the way for the introduction of more sophisticated measures of social control.  Such an increase in control, however, must be accompanied by an increase in benefits for all involved if the native tribes were to willingly accept a foreign yoke.  For those who ruled over their tribes, physical improvements and niceties would not have been enough to offset the disturbance created by Roman occupation.  It is to these upper classes that the Roman social system appealed.  Roman political changes within indigenous populations were accepted because they left existing political structures intact but only Latinized them (Bradley 260).  By the time of the British occupation this process was well understood and employed effectively.

            Important to the Romanization of Britain and their acceptance of Imperial political systems was their own belief in the validity of the Empire and the ideals it represented.  Ando argued that Rome’s true strength stemmed from her rule over her subjects sense of communis patria and not by violent force.  Although “no date identifies that moment when Rome ceased to rule her subjects through coercion and began to rely on their good will” (19), the degree to which tribal Chieftains accepted Roman law is a testament to the strength of Roman legitimacy, at least in the eyes of those who were conquered.

            Roman political structures played an important role in the acculturation of a province such as Britain.  Even a native born provincial, given the right resources, could attain Roman citizenship and rise to positions of power in the Empire through established governments and military posts.  All of these were based upon and subject to Roman Law.  The complex bureaucratic system that was necessary to support the governance of a province gave ample opportunity for someone of ambition to attain a level of Empire- wide respect that would have been impossible otherwise.  A good example of how important Rome became to the overall administration of the empire is when York became the seat for the two highest tribunals in the Empire.  Charles P. Sherman makes the comparison that “it was as if the United States Supreme court were to hold sessions in Alaska” (318).  It was the respect for and belief in the law that engendered a predictable stability that people could use to further the happiness of themselves and their families.

            The single most influential factor in transitioning the British tribes from independent existence to Roman subjects was the use of iconography and religion to reinforce loyalty.  The introduction of the Imperial Cult concurrently with political rule marked a crucial phase in the deliberate Romanization of Britain.

            The reason why the Imperial Cult was so successful in fostering loyalty in British subjects was due to the highly adaptable nature of Roman religion.  Cromer argued that the Romans “succeeded far better partly because they had an easier task and partly because they showed greater powers of assimilation”, and that where they encountered “an unassimilative religion [the Jewish] their failure was complete” (qtd in Issawi 188-89).  The numen Augusti was viewed by provincials as a Guardian deity or the spiritual power of the Emperor (Fishwick 169).  The deification of the Emperor was an important step because it allowed the people to associate him with their own familiar deities.  This merging of identities helped loyalty in subjects.  The focus on the Emperor as divine and the representative of the gods on the earth helped to create an image of Roman superiority in the minds of the British.  If the Emperor could vanquish their native gods, then surely it would be wise to appease this greater power. 

            In spite of the Iceni revolt that resulted in the disaster at Camulodunum, which Tacitus attributes to Boudiccea’s view of the Imperial cult as “a blatant stronghold of alien rule” (328, XIV 30), there is ample evidence that the worship of the numen Augusti was incorporated into local religious traditions.    

            A good example of this is an inscription found in Caerwent that records the gratitude of Marcus Nonius, presumably a student, in the assistance of Mars in his admittance to college.  The numinibus Augustorum in this case are assosciated with the many guises of Mars to which the inscription is dedicated- including the Rhenish god Lenus and the Celtic gods Ocelus and Vellaunus (Fishwick 169).  There are several public monuments and accompanying inscriptions that show evidence of Roman acculturation.  In Chichester authority was granted by the client king Tiberius Claudius Cogidubnus to a guild of Smiths to record the dedication of a temple to Neptune and Minerva.  This inscription: [pr]o salute do[mus] divinae, illustrates “Cogidubnus’ gratitude for his Roman citizenship and legatine authority” (ibid 171).  Settlements did not always wait for official direction to honor the Emperor, however.  This is evident in an altar dedicated to Vulcan in Chesterholm, which reads: pro domu divina et numinibus Augustorum.  This shows that although it was only a minor vicus, the people seemed to have adopted the worship of the Emperor into their own practices (ibid 172).  Fishwick notes that the Imperial Cult even took hold in Britain earlier than on the continent.  That the characteristics of the Imperial Cult in Britain were geared more towards loyalty to the Emperor than to any strict adherence to dogmatic practices is a testament to the importance of the cult for “swift and effective Romanization” (ibid 173).

            A significant factor in the popularization of the Imperial Cult and to the loyalty to the Emperor was the use of coinage in propagating his likeness and virtues.  Coins were “a symbol of loyalty to a political system that provided stability and order” (Ando 232).  They were everywhere and when combined with larger images of the Emperor carried by the Legions in frequent victory celebrations held to commemorate the vanquishing of an enemy were efficient tools of spreading loyalty.  The widespread and uniform distribution of Imperial images in coinage, statues, and Legion banners familiarized the people with who the Emperor was and the virtues he represented.  When this was combined with the dominion he had with their own gods, they could not help but accept his clemency over their lives.

            Rome was extremely successful in creating in Britain a microcosm of the Empire.  That they were able to transform an island full of warring tribes into a province capable of supporting the most powerful courts in the empire speaks to the great sense of belonging to something greater than oneself.  The process of Romanization was not a quick or painless one and it involved much bloodshed, but it worked because in addition to the forces of coercion, there were others in play.  The greatness of the human spirit and hunger for glory and ambition were fueling fires for provincial inhabitants to seek citizenship and the benefits that went along with it.   K. R. Dark has suggested that in light of the declining fortunes of the Empire in the 3rd centuty, that the Romans were perhaps too successful in acculturating Britain into their system since the fortunes of the island remained strong while the fires of Rome sputtered out.  As Theodor Mommsen wrote,“It was not Britain that gave up Rome, but Rome that gave up Britain” (194).

             

     

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

 

Ando, Clifford.  Imperial Ideology and Provincial Loyalty in the Roman Empire.  Berkley: University of California Press,  2000.

 

Bradley, Guy Jolyon.  Ancient Umbria : State, Culture, and Identity in Central Italy from the Iron Age to the Augustan Era.  New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.

 

Caesar.  The Conquest of Gaul.  1951.  London: Penguin Books,  1982.

 

Creighton, John.  “Visions of Power: Imagery and Symbols in Late Iron Age Britain.”  Britannia.  26 (1995):  285-301.

 

Dark, K. R.  Civitas to Kingdom.  London: Leicester University Press,  1994.

 

Fishwick, Duncan.  “The Imperial Cult in Roman Britain.”  Phoenix 15.3 (1961): 159-173.

         “The Imperial Cult in Roman Britain (Continued).”  Phoenix 15.4 (1961): 213-229.         

 

Issawi, Charles.  “Empire Builders, Culture Makers, and Culture Imprinters.”  Journal of Interdisciplinary History   20.2 (1989):  177-196.

 

Liversidge, Joan.  Britain in the Roman Empire.  1968.  London: Butler & Tanner Limited, 1970.

 

MacMullen, Ramsay.  “Rural Romanization.”  Phoenix  22.4 (1968):  337-341.

 

Mommsen, Theodor.  The Provinces of the Roman Empire.  Vol I.  1885.  New York: Barnes and Noble Books,  1996.

 

Sherman, Charles P.  “The Romanization of English Law.”  The Yale Law Journal.  23.4 (1914):  318-329.

 

Stewart, P.C.N.  “Inventing Britain: The Roman Creation and Adaptation of an Image.”  Britannia  26  (1995):  1-10.

 

Tacitus.  The Annals of Imperial Rome.  1956.  London: Penguin Books,  1996.

 

Wacher, John.  The Towns of Roman Britain.  London:  B.T. Batsford,  1975.

 

Wells, Peter S.  The Barbarians Speak: how the conquered peoples shaped Roman Europe.  Princeton, N.J.:  Princeton University Press, 1999.

 

 


[1] Although he was specifically referring to the inhabitants of the Mediterranean, this is especially true in the case of Britain where small settlements and isolated farms were the norm before 43 A.D. (Liversidge 19). 

[2] Whether or not Augustus actually planned on invading Britain is a matter of debate.