Although we do not know many details of his life , Charieto represents very well what the modus vivendi was of many of the frontiersmen of the fourth century , straddling the barbarian world and the Roman. We do not know the date of his birth, although he was undoubtedly of German origin, he alone is described to us as a man of imposing size and great value (3). He had probably joined the Roman army in the late 340s, and was part of the troops that supported the assassination of Emperor Constans on January 18, 350 in Gaul; a coup d'état engineered by Constante's finance master, Marcelino, and which led to the commander of the imperial guard Magnentius to usurp the purple(4).
After the brief reign of this usurper, who became extinct in 353 after the disastrous battle of Mursa (351), Charieto decided to settle with other Germans in Augusta Treverorum, current Trier, probably already out of service in the Roman army. The situation in the province was not good at that time, the Franks and Alemanni had long since intensified their plundering operations on the west bank of the Rhine , causing a good part of the Roman defensive system to collapse. At this point, our hero decided to take advantage as well, and surprisingly, he began attacking the barbarian raiders at night to steal their loot!(5) Although not directly reflected in the sources, it is likely that he also blackmailed the Gallic provincials, either directly or in exchange for protection.
After the Battle of Strasbourg (357), and by the time Caesar Julianus arrived in Trier, Charieto already had an important number of followers, surely attracted by the possibility of loot. During the campaigns of the previous years, Juliano had discovered the difficulty of facing the German looters, so he decided to enlist Charieto to fight them, also putting under his command troops from the Salian Franks to devastate the territory of the Quadi, beyond the Rhine. Once again, Charieto and this new group began to develop a series of night attacks, during which they managed to take prisoner the son of one of the Quadi kings, thus managing to sign peace with them.
In the year 358 A whole series of operations were carried out at the mouth of the Rhine to subdue the last hostile groups , attacking there the territory of the Germanic king Hortario, who had fought against Juliano in Strasbourg. During this campaign Charieto acted accompanied by Nestica, tribune of the Squires (tribunus Scutariorum ), one of the units of the imperial guard, who was also of German origin(6). At this point, the story of Ammiano Marcelino highlights how the Roman soldiers dedicated themselves to the burning of the fields, the theft of cattle and the murder of those who lived beyond the Rhine.
From the limes Roman to Sassanian Persia
After these campaigns on the Rhenish border we lose track of our protagonist, so it is unlikely that he followed Julian on his expedition against Sassanian Persia, although the emperor was indeed accompanied by a host of other generals (and future consuls) of German origin such as Flavio Nevita and Dagalaifo , or the Sarmatian Victor. However, he must not have remained idle for too long, because when we hear of him again in 365, almost seven years later and after the deaths of the emperors Julian first and Jovian later. At that time he already held the bombastic position of comes per vtramqve germaniam (count of both Germanias), a title for which there is no other reference apart from this(7).
In the month of January 365 the Alamanni seemed to have recovered from Julian's harsh trans-Rhenish campaigns, again beginning to penetrate the Roman shore of the Rhine and plundering new parts of Gaul in midwinter. Charieto rallied the Roman troops in the area, joined by Count Severiano, a man who at the time is described as weak and old (invalido et longaevo )(8), with the units of the Divitenses and of the Tongrecani , two high-ranking palatine legions from Italy(9), whose name could well also have a German origin.
Once the troops were gathered, a bridge was built over one of the tributaries of the Rhône, which gives an example of how far the assailants were able to penetrate. The Alemanni remained divided into three large groups and the Roman counts resolved to advance in compact formation to face the first of them. The Roman forces soon sighted the Germans in the vicinity of the town of Cabillona , present-day Chalons-sur-Saône, beginning the battle with the traditional exchange of projectiles. We do not know in detail the composition of either of the two armies, nor do we have any very detailed account of the confrontation, but from the scant mentions we can deduce that unlike Strasbourg (357) where the cavalry played an essential role, this confrontation featured especially by the infantry, with a minimal presence of horsemen on both sides(10).
The melee clash of both formations did not take long, the Romans being repelled by the harsh harassment inflicted on them by the Alamanni troops, who in the meantime ended the life of the Count Severiano after throwing him from his horse, and seized the banners of the Batavi and of the Heruli . These two palatine auxilia units, the highest ranking within the army, had already faced the Alemanni in Strasbourg, the role of the Batavi being particularly prominent in that battle. in closing the gap opened in the center of the Roman formation.
At that moment, Charieto threw himself into combat to stop the general Roman rout, trying with his resistance to sow shame among the troops, although he himself ended up falling in combat . The Battle of Cabillona It was thus a very heavy defeat for the Roman forces, who were unable to restore peace in Gaul until the beginning of 366 when Jovinus defeated the Alemanni divisions in three successive battles(11).
Charieto's life ended after years of service in the Roman army, leaving perhaps a son also named Charieto(12), who became magister militum in Gaul around 389. His life and work serve to show us a good example of what life was like for frontiersmen, individuals for whom notions such as barbarian or Roman should not be categories as rigid as we can conceive, or as some sources from the Roman elite have wanted to convey. These people had to overcome a whole series of social, economic, military, political, etc. vicissitudes. very complicated, because we cannot lose sight of the fact that our protagonist today served under the orders of five emperors and a usurper (or two) in just fifteen years of military service approximately. Their lives and the solutions brought to the problems, therefore, must often be unorthodox, sometimes even extreme to some extent; but they constitute an indelible testimony that we cannot consider these spaces and their occupants in Manichaean or bipolar terms.
Notes
(1) CYL III, 3576
(2) PLRE I, p. 200.
(3) Zosimo New Story , III.7.1.
(4) Libanian, Prayers , XVIII.104.
(5) Zosimo New Story , III.7.2 – 3.
(6) Ammiano Marcelino, Res Gestae , XVII.10.5.
(7) Ibid , XXVII.1.2.
(8) Ibid , XXVII.1.2 – 3.
(9) Notitia Dignitatum Occ. V .
(10) The main source is, again, Ammianus Marcellinus, Res Gestae XXVII.1.4 – 6.
(11) Ibid XXVII.2.
(12) PLRE I, p. 200.
Bibliography
- Amiano Marcelino, Res Gestae , ed. Maria Luisa Harto Trujillo. Madrid:Akal, 2002.
- Martindale, J.R., Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire . Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 1971.
- Notitia Dignitatum. In Concepcion Neira Faleiro. 2006. La Notitita Dignitatum:new critical edition and historical commentary . Madrid:CSIC.
- Zósimo, New Story , ed. Jose Maria Candau Moron. Madrid:Editorial Gredos, 1992.