Romanus (Exarch)
Romanus was an Eastern Roman Patricius and Exarch of Ravenna from 589/590 to 595/597.
Romanus followed Smaragdus in exarchate 589/590. The schismatics claimed in a letter they wrote to the emperor in early 591 that the favorable situation in Italy was due to Romanus. And from two letters from Romanus himself we know that he directed the attack carried out against the Longobards since the beginning of 590 in conjunction with the Frankish king Childebert II , through which the Byzantines took over most of eastern northern Italy with the towns of Altinum in the north, Modena and Mantua to the northwest, regained. The successes of Romanus were favored not only by the rebellion of some Lombard dukes (Parma, Reggio, Piacenza and Friuli), but also by the situation in the east, where the Byzantines had lived in peace with the Sassanids since 591 and only against the peoples fighting in the north of the Balkans . Now the greatest value was apparently placed on the one hand to maintain the area around Ravenna, the center of Byzantine rule in Italy, as a base of operations, on the other hand to leave the connection with Illyria on the mainland safe.
As a result, Romanus had to neglect the south and west of Italy, so that Rome was continually in need. And since the energetic action against the Lombards necessarily entailed compliance with the schismatic bishops, whose support the emperor and his exarch could not do without, a natural contrast arose between the exarchs and Pope Gregory I. The Pope, who with the schismatics, The enemies in their own country, who could never get along, began to pursue an independent policy, the aim of which was to bring peace to the area around Rome by means of separate agreements with the Lombards and to slowly draw them over to Catholicism.
Through the campaign of the years 592-593 Romanus succeeded in recapturing the cities of Sutrium (Sutri), Polimartium (Bomarzo), Hortas (Orte), Tuder (Todi), Ameria (Amelia), Perusia (Perugia), Luceolis (Cantiano) from the Longobards.
Romanus died in office, Callinicus was his successor . Romanos is mentioned for the last time in June 595 and Callinicus as Exarch in June 597.
literature
- John Robert Martindale: Romanus 7. In: The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire (PLRE). Volume 3B, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1992, ISBN 0-521-20160-8 , pp. 1092-1093.
- Ludo Moritz Hartmann : Studies on the history of the Byzantine administration in Italy . Leipzig 1889, p. 10f.
- Ludo Moritz Hartmann: History of Italy in the Middle Ages . Volume 2, part 1. Wigand, Leipzig 1900, p. 72ff.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d Hartmann: History of Italy in the Middle Ages. Volume II, Part 1, pp. 72f.
- ^ Hartmann: History of Italy in the Middle Ages. Volume II, Part 1, pp. 90ff.
- ^ Paulus Diaconus, Historia Langobardorum IV, 8
| predecessor | Office | successor |
|---|---|---|
| Emeraldus |
Exarch of Ravenna-Italy 589/590-around 596 |
Callinicus |
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Romanus |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Romanos |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Byzantine exarch of Ravenna |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 6th century |
| DATE OF DEATH | at 596 |