Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 10.djvu/875

Rh GOTHS rule of the prince over two distinct nations in the same land was necessarily despotic; the old Teutonic freedom was necessarily lost. Such a system as that which Theodoric established needed a Theodoric to carry it on. It broke in pieces after his death. On the death of Theodoric (526) the East and West Goths were again separated. The few instances in which they are found acting together after this time are as scattered and incidental as they were before. Amalaric succeeded to the West—Gothic kingdom in Spain and Septimania. Provence was added to the dominion of the new East-Gotliic king Athalaric, the grandson of Theodoric through his daughter Anialasontha. The weakness of the East-Gothic position in Italy now showed itself. The long wars of Justinian’s reign (535-555) recovered Italy for the empire, and the Gothic name died out on Italian soil. The chance of forming a national state in Italy by the union of Roman and Teutonic elements, such as those which arose in Gaul, in Spain, and in parts of Italy under Lombard rule, was thus lost. The East-Gothic kingdom was destroyed before Goths and Italians had at all mingled together. The war of course made the distinction stronger; under the kings who were chosen for the purposes of the war national Gothic feel- ing had revived. The Goths were now again, if not a wander- ing people, yet aii armed host, no longer the protectors but the enemies of the Roman people of Italy. The East-Gothic dominion and the East-Gothic name wholly passed away. The nation had followed Theodoric. It is only once or twice after his expedition that we hear of Goths, or even of Gothic leaders, in the eastern provinces. From the soil of Italy the nation passed away almost without a trace, while the next Teutonic conquerors stamped their name on the two ends of the land, one of which keeps it to this day. The West—Gothic kingdom lasted much longer, and came much nearer to establishing itself as a national power in the lands which it took in. But the difference of race and faith between the Arian Goths and the Catholic Romans of Gaul and _Spain inﬂuenced the history of the Vest—G0thic kingdom for a long time. The Arian Goths ruled over Catholic subjects, and were surrounded by Catholic neighbours. The Franks were Catholics from their first conversion; the Suevi became Catholics much earlier than the Goths. The African conquests of Belisarius gave the Goths of Spain, instead of the Arian Vandals, another Catholic neighbour iii the form of the restored Roman power. The Catholics everywhere preferred either Iloman, Sueviaii, or Frankish rule to that of the heretical Goths; even the unconquerable mountaineers of Caiitabria seem for a while to have received a Frankish governor. In some other mountain districts the Roman inhabitants long maintained their independence, and in 534 a large part of the south of Spain, including the great cities of Cadiz, Cordova, Seville, and New Carthage, was, with the good will of its Roman inhabitants, reunited to the empire, which kept some points on the coast as late as 6:24. That is to say, the same work which the empire was carrying on in Italy against the East—Goths was at the same moment carried on in Spain against the West—Goths. But in Italy the whole land was for a while won back, and the Gothic power passed away for ever. In Spain the Gothic power outlived the Roman power, but it outlived it only by itself becoming in some measure Roman. The greatest period of the Gothic power as such was in the reign of Leovigild (2)67-586). He reunited the Gaulish and Spanish parts of the kingdom which had been parted for a moment; he united the .Suevian dominion to his own; he overcame some of the independent districts, and won back part of the recovered Roman province in southern Spain. He further established the power of the crown over the Gothic nobles, who were beginning to grow into territorial lords. 851 The next reign, that of his son Recared (586-601), was marked by a change which took away the great hindrance which had thus far stood in the way of any national union between Goths and Romans. The king and the greater part of the Gothic people embraced the Catholic faith. A vast degree of inﬂuence now fell into the hands of the Catholic bishops ; the two nations began to unite; the Goths were gradually lloinanized, and the Gothic laiigiaage began to go out of use. In short, the Romance nation and the Romance speech of Spain began to be formed. The Goths supplied the Teutonic infusion into the Roman mass. The king- dom, however, still remained a Gothic kingdom. “Gothic,” not “Roman” or “Spanish,” is its formal title; only a single late instance of the use of the formula “regnum Hispaniae” is known. In the first half of the 7th century that name became for the first time geographically applicable by the conquest of the still Roman coast of southern Spain. The empire was then engaged in the great struggle with the Avars and Persians, and, now that the Gothic kings were Catholic, the great objection to their rule on the part of the Roman inhabitants was taken away. The Gothic nobility still remained a distinct class, and held, along with the Catholic prelacy, the right of cboosiiig the king. Union with the Catholic Church was accompanied by the introduction of the ecclesiastical ceremony of anointing, a change de- cidedly favourable to elective rule. The growth of these later ideas which tended again to favour the hereditary doc- trine had iiot time to grow up in Spain before the Maho- nietaii conquest (Tll). The West—Gothic crown therefore remained elective till the end. The modern Spanish nation is the growth of the long struggle with the Mussuliiiaiis; but it has a direct connexion with’ the West-Gothic king- dom. Ve see at once that the Goths hold altogether a different place in Spanish memory from that which they hold in Italian memory. In Italy the Goth was but a momentary invader and ruler ; the Teutonic element in Italy comes from other sources. In Spain the Goth sup- plies an important element in the modern nation. And that element has been neither forgotten nor despised. Part of the unconquered region of northern Spain, the land of Asturia, kept for a while the name of Gothia, as did the Gothic possessions in Gaul and in Criiii. The name of the people who played so great a part in all southern Europe, and who actually ruled over so large a part of it, has now wholly passed away; but it is in Spain that its historical impress is to be looked for. Of Gothic literature in the Gothic language we have _tlie Bible of Ulﬁla, and some other religious writings and frag- ments (see notice of Gothic Language below). Of Gothic legislation in Latin, we have the edict of Theodoric of the year 500, lately edited by Bluliiiie in the Jlonumenla Ger- manic: Ilistorica; and the books of l'arice of Cassiodorus may pass as a collection of the state papers of Theodoric and his immediate successors. Among the ‘Vest-Goths written laws had already been put forth by Euric (466-484). The second Alaric (484-507) put forth a I}rcvim'imn of Roman law for his I-loman subjects; but the great collection of West- Gotliic laws dates from the later days of the monarchy, being put forth by King Rekisvinth about 654. This code gave occasion to some well-known comments by Mont- esquieu and Gibbon, and have been discussed by Savigiiy (Ge.sc/ziclztc des Ii’iJnzi'srIzen I?ccIzt.e, ii. 65) and various other writers. They are printed in the old collections of Linden- brog and Heinecciiis. They do not seem to have been yet repriiitediii the illonmnenta Germam'cc. Of special Gothic histories, besides that of J ordaiiis, already so often quoted, there is the Gothic history of Isidor, archbishop of Seville, a special source of the history of the West—Gothic kings down to Siunthala (621-631). But all the Latin and Greek writers contemporary with the days of Gothic pre-