Page:Outlines of European History.djvu/384

 322 Otctlmes of E?iropeaii History Cassiodorus and his manuals Ravenna, which Theodoric chose for his capital, beautiful build- ings still exist that date from his reign. -^ While Theodoric had been establishing his kingdom in Italy in this enlightened way, Gaul, which we now call France, was coming under the control of the most powerful of all the bar- barian peoples, the Franks^ who were to play a more important role in the formation of modern Europe than any of the other German races (see next section). Besides the kingdom of the East Goths in Italy and of the Franks in Gaul, the West Goths had their kingdom in Spain, the Burgundians had established themselves on the Rhone River, and the Vandals in Africa. Royal alliances were concluded be- tween the various reigning houses, and for the first time in the history of Europe we see something like a family of nations, liv- ing each within its own boundaries and dealing with one another as independent powers (see map). It seemed for a few years as if the new German kings who had divided up the western por- tion of the Empire among themselves would succeed in keeping order and in preventing the loss of such civilization as remained. But no such good fortune was in store for Europe, which was now only at the beginning of the turmoil which was to leave it almost completely barbarized, for there was little to encourage the reading or writing of books, the study of science, or attention to art, in a time of constant warfare and danger. Theodoric had a distinguished Roman counselor named Cassi- odorus (d. 575), to whose letters we owe a great part of our knowledge of this period, and who busied himself in his old age 1 The headpiece of this chapter represents the tomb of Theodoric. Emperors and rich men were accustomed in Roman times to build handsome tombs for themselves (see Fig. 131). Theodoric followed their example and erected this two- storied building at Ravenna to sei"ve as his mausoleum. The dome consists of a single great piece of rock 36 feet in diameter, weighing 500 tons, brought from across the Adriatic. Theodoric was a heretic in the eyes of the Catholic Church, and not long after his death his remains were taken out of his tomb and scattered to the winds, and the building converted into a church. The picture represents the tomb as it probably looked originally ; it has been somewhat altered in modern times, but is well preserved.