Honors Theses

Document Type

Thesis

Date of Completion

Spring 4-30-2026

Academic Year

2025-2026

Department

History & Political Science

Academic Major

History

Faculty Advisor

Julie E. Harris, Ph.D.

Abstract

The fourth and fifth-century migrations of “barbarian” peoples from beyond the Roman frontier to the heart of the Empire exacerbated an already unparalleled crisis of self in Roman society. With the settlement of these “barbarians” in the West, the facade of Roman dominion over its own territory and institutions had crumbled. In Italy, the Roman Senate, along with the Catholic Church and the Eastern Roman Emperor, became essential to the peninsula’s “barbarian” kings. At the same time, post-Roman monarchs were obliged to patronize their own nobility—the elite military class. This work evaluates the trilateral negotiation of power between post-Roman monarchs, the senatorial aristocracy, and the Gothic elite through a case study of the Ostrogothic Kingdom in the Balkans and Italy. It argues that throughout much of the kingdom’s history, Gothic monarchs facilitated the power exercised by both the senatorial aristocracy and the Gothic nobility. Under Theodoric’s early reign and during Amalasuintha’s regency, members of the senatorial aristocracy received preferential treatment, occasionally to the detriment of Gothic elites. Shifting ideological tides in Theodoric’s late reign, embodied by the abandonment of his civilitas philosophy, along with political crises, such as Theodahad’s deposition of Amalasuintha and Witigis’s capitulation in 540, directed the flow of power toward the Gothic elite. Following continuous warfare and dynastic conflict in the 530s and 540s, the Gothic nobility asserted itself as the new mediator of power in the kingdom until its conquest in 553 and dissolution in 554.

Download

Share

COinS