Battle of the Milvian Bridge

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Battle of the Milvian Bridge
The Milvian Bridge today
The Milvian Bridge today
date October 28, 312
place Milvian Bridge , Rome
output Decisive victory of Constantine I.
Parties to the conflict

Army of Constantine I.

Army of Maxentius

Commander

Constantine I.

Maxentius

Troop strength
about 40,000 men (at the beginning of the campaign) approx. 100,000 men (at the beginning of the campaign)
Depiction of the battle at the Milvian Bridge ( proelium ) on the Arch of Constantine
Constantine
Maxentius

In the battle of the Milvian Bridge (also Battle of Saxa Rubra ) on October 28, 312 , Constantine I defeated his rival Maxentius and thus became the sole ruler of the western Roman Empire. Due to the later government measures of Constantine, the battle is of a far greater significance.

prehistory

After the death of Emperor Galerius in 311, Constantine was one of the four emperors of the Roman tetrarchy, alongside Maxentius (306-312), Maximinus Daia (310-313) and Licinius (308-324), and ruled mainly Gaul and Britain. Like Constantine, Maxentius was the son of an emperor ( Maximian ) who did not want his inheritance claims to be restricted by the regulation of the tetrarchy.

In the spring of 312 Constantine invaded Italy. Maxentius was well prepared for this; he had several cities in northern Italy fortified. Numerically his troops were well superior; he is said to have had over 100,000 men, some of whom had gathered in northern Italy. Because of the endangerment of the Rhine border, Constantine was only able to carry a quarter of his entire army, i.e. around 40,000 men. After Constantine had won several victories in Northern Italy, Maxentius awaited him in Rome with the Praetorian Guard and troops, which were probably still superior in number to Constantine's army.

Course of the battle

The Milvian Bridge , Latin Pons Milvius , now Italian Ponte Milvio , was the Tiber bridge of the Via Flaminia directly in front of Rome. The battle took place on October 28, 312 ; Constantine was victorious and Maxentius drowned in the Tiber, making Constantine the sole ruler of the west.

Probably the actual battle did not take place at the bridge, but about 7 kilometers further north at Saxa Rubra . The troops of Maxentius, who himself remained in Rome, apparently wanted to allow Constantine's army to make an apparent breakthrough in order to be able to encircle it. The Milvian Bridge had previously been torn down and an auxiliary bridge was built next to it . But when Maxentius' vanguard withdrew to the river , open panic broke out among his troops .

If Maxentius 'plan of battle had worked, Constantine would have been caught between the Tiber and Maxentius' army. This would also explain the otherwise completely incomprehensible destruction of the bridge by the troops of Maxentius. Instead, there was a disorderly escape. When Maxentius found out about this, he left Rome and tried to stabilize the situation with his elite units . This failed and he perished in the Tiber. On the Tiber itself there was probably no battle in the real sense.

consequences

The Edict of Tolerance passed by Emperor Galerius in 311 essentially ended the persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire. For Maxentius , too, contrary to what the Constantine-friendly sources suggest, no anti-Christian politics can be proven. From a later point of view, the Battle of the Milvian Bridge, together with the Milan Agreement, marks the transition to a Christian-friendly policy, since Constantine apparently attributed the victory to the work of the God of Christians . However, until his death the emperor tried to accommodate the different cults of his empire in his "inclusive rhetoric". So it is possible (but only in isolated cases) to date to 325 Sol-Comes coins , which depict Constantine together with the sun god Sol Invictus . Nor does the Sunday decree of 321 contain any explicit references to Christianity. After 312 there is no longer any indication of the promotion of pagan cults. In the west, Constantine had to adapt to the circumstances anyway and, since his sole rule in 324, promoted Christianity more than before. It is likely that Constantine finally found Christianity through the sun god, although it remains open who Constantine specifically meant by “his God”.

Constantine's vision

About the Vision of Constantine on the eve of the battle, there are different views at each other partially disagree.

Lactantius in de mortibus persecutorum (Lact. Mp 44.1–9) provides a representation written relatively shortly after the events, around the year 317 : He reports on a dream of Constantine who caused him to have a staurogram affixed to the shields.

The best-known version is given by Eusebius of Caesarea in the Vita Constantini (Eus. V. C. 1.27–32): On a march sometime before the battle, Constantine and his army would have a cross of light over the sun with the words at noon (or a corresponding symbol?) " Eν τούτω νίκα " ( En touto nika , Greek: "In this [sign] siege") seen. Constantine had not understood this symbol for a long time, which is why Jesus Christ appeared to him with the symbol he had seen on the night before the battle and instructed him to use it as a symbol of protection and victory. Then the labarum , a cross-shaped vexillum decorated with a Christogram , was made and used.

The portrayal of Eusebius, which probably goes back to statements made by Constantine himself, was not made until later, around the mid-320s. The Labarum was only introduced at this time. Another report can be found u. a. in the church history of Eusebius (Eus. he 9,9,1–5). A Latin panegyric of the year 310 or 313 offers a description of the vision from a pagan point of view .

ChiRho on Roman coin from the 4th century

A real core of the reports cannot be ruled out, for example a natural phenomenon such as a halo , in which sunlight is refracted under certain atmospheric conditions and thus circular and cross structures become visible. In this sense, the “Miracle of Grand” in Gaul from the year 310, which Constantine saw, could be classified in another source: a heavenly phenomenon that an anonymous panegyricist - probably in coordination with the imperial court - as a divine symbol (here still with reference to Apollo ). After all, under Christian influence, Constantine may actually have believed that the God of Christians was at his side and that he was fulfilling a divine destiny. With this in mind, the later reports were additionally embellished and served the Constantinian rule propaganda.

Several researchers assume that the solar vision of 310 was decisive for Constantine. Accordingly, in his imagination, Sol and Christian God were initially united, before he definitely traced the appearance in Grand back to Christian God and "solar elements" receded. What is certain is that Constantine ultimately attributed his victory at Milvian Bridge 312 to the assistance of the Christian God and now ruled unreservedly in the west.

literature

  • Wolfgang Kuhoff : A Myth in Roman History. The victory of Constantine the Great over Maxentius at the gates of Rome on October 28, 312 AD In: Chiron . Volume 21, 1991, pp. 127-174.
  • Wolfgang Kuhoff: The Battle of the Milvian Bridge. An event of world-historical importance . In: Gregor Weber , Kay Ehling (Hrsg.): Konstantin der Große. Between Sol and Christ. Mainz 2011, pp. 10-20.

For further literature see also Constantine the Great .

Web links

Commons : Battle of the Milvian Bridge  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. Panegyrici Latini 12, 3.
  2. The figures vary in modern literature, not least due to the rather imprecise sources. See Joseph Vogt: Constantine the Great . 2nd edition, Munich 1960, p. 158 (about 40,000 men) and Elisabeth Herrmann-Otto : Konstantin der Große . Darmstadt 2007, p. 39 (25,000 to 30,000 men). For the course of the campaign, see the very detailed description by Oliver Schmitt: Constantin the Great . Stuttgart 2007, p. 138ff.
  3. See also Bruno Bleckmann: Konstantin der Große . Reinbek 1996, pp. 53-57; Oliver Schmitt: Constantin the Great . Stuttgart 2007, pp. 150-154.
  4. Representing this widespread view in research see Hartwin Brandt: Konstantin der Große. Munich 2006, p. 56. Klaus Martin Girardet: The Kaiser and his God. Berlin / New York 2010, p. 44 ff., On the other hand, already saw signs of a turn to Christianity.
  5. Cf. generally now Klaus Martin Girardet: The Emperor and his God . Berlin / New York 2010.
  6. See also Peter Weiß: Die Vision Constantin . In: Jochen Bleicken (Ed.): Colloquium on the occasion of the 80th birthday of Alfred Heuss . Kallmünz 1993, pp. 143-169. This theory has been discussed in isolated cases before, see Nikolaus Staubach : In hoc signo vinces. Declaration of miracles and criticism of miracles in the premodern discourse of knowledge . In: Frühmittelalterliche Studien 43, 2009, pp. 1–52, here p. 4. Cf. also Arnold Hugh Martin Jones : Constantine and the conversion of Europe . London 1948 (reprint 2003), pp. 85f.
  7. See also Klaus Martin Girardet: The Emperor and his God . Berlin / New York 2010, p. 35ff.
  8. ^ Elisabeth Herrmann-Otto: Constantine the Great . Darmstadt 2007, p. 56f.

Coordinates: 41 ° 56 ′ 7.8 "  N , 12 ° 28 ′ 1.1"  E