The Powerful Military Group That Would Decide The Fate Of The Roman Empire.

When we think about the most evil and power-hungry people of the Roman Empire, we immediately think of people such as Riccima or brutal emperors such as Commodus or Caligula. But we sometimes tend to forget that for 340 years there was a military organization within Rome that rose to such power that it really at times would decide the fate of the entire empire. They would at times murder emperors with whom they weren't content. At other times they would choose new emperors with whom they were more content. And if they stopped being happy with that particular emperor, they would not hesitate to eliminate him and choose another one. At one point they even sold the title of emperor to the highest bidder. They were sometimes protectors of the emperor, sometimes some sort of secret police. At other times they were ruthless kingmakers. And at other times they would act as regular soldiers accompanying their emperors on campaigns fighting against the enemies of Rome. For 340 years the Praetorian Guard was an integral part of the Roman military structure. But then in 312 AD their time had come and their long history came to an abrupt end. It was really the end of an era. But how exactly did that happen and what impact would this have on the Roman Empire? When I said that the Praetorians had a 340 year long history, I was actually not entirely accurate. Because they can actually be traced back to the days of the Republic. The first historical record of the Praetorians as a bodyguard unit is from 275 BC, when they acted as bodyguards for the Scipio family. So actually we are talking about a 600 year long history. They continued to protect high-ranking members of the Roman Republic until the times of Caesar, Octavian and Marcus Antonius. They all had their own Praetorian units. Octavian, residing in Rome, created the first permanent garrison of the Praetorians in Rome proper, so therefore within the legal boundaries of the city of Rome, within the so-called Pomerium. After the victory over his rival Marcus Antonius, he retained the Praetorians as his imperial bodyguard. And this was the birth of the imperial Praetorian guard as we know it. Nine cohorts or around 4,500 men was its initial size, and the Praetorians, whose gear was very similar to the legionaries, were not only made up of infantry, but they also had a cavalry arm, the equites singulares augusti, or sometimes also called equites singulares imperatores. Being a Praetorian came with quite some interesting benefits. First of all, the duration of service was shorter for Praetorians as compared to the legions. After 5 BC, this was 16 years of service instead of 20 for the regular legions. Their pay was also higher. Under Nero, the salary of a Praetorian was in fact three and a half times that of a legionary, of course augmented by additions of donativum that were normally granted by each new emperor. Now you would assume that it would take quite a long time until the Praetorians started doing bad stuff and plotting intrigues, but no, this happened actually surprisingly early, as soon as under the emperor Tiberius. Under emperor Tiberius, a man named Sejanus rose to power and became Praetorian prefect, the highest ranking member of the Praetorians and therefore their leader. It is him who had the Castra Praetoria built in 23 AD, the permanent barracks and training grounds of the Praetorians, where the Praetorians would be stationed for the next three centuries. The Castra Praetoria was huge, measuring 440 times 380 meters, which is more ground area than any other building complex in Rome. Sejanus was very good at intrigues and he of course wanted to become the heir of Tiberius, so to become the next emperor himself, which actually he almost achieved. His plot though was discovered and then he was executed. Needless to say that the Praetorians weren't super popular by this point neither with the senate nor with the population of Rome itself, but the example of Sejanus made them even more unpopular. If you are a fan of Roman history and you would want to buy an item for yourself or someone else as a present, then you might want to consider the SPQR shop. They produce incredible replicas of Roman history with a very high attention to detail. All their items are carefully handcrafted and I think it will be difficult to find that level of craftsmanship anywhere else. They handcraft Roman coin replicas, rings, pendants, attributes and many other items of Roman history. If you want to support the channel or if you want to buy a present for someone who likes Roman history, please go and check out their excellent site, link in the description. If you buy over this link, you will receive a 20% price reduction, which I personally find very generous. Thank you very much for your consideration and back to the video. Under Caligula, the Praetorians grew to a massive size of 12 cohorts, which is almost 6,000 men permanently stationed at Rome. Of course, it was the Praetorians who were instrumental in killing the tyrant emperor Caligula in 41 AD and it was again also the Praetorians who chose Claudius as the new emperor. It is quite incredible that just a few decades after the emperor Augustus had installed them permanently at Rome as his personal bodyguard, that they were already instrumental in deciding the fate of the empire and who would be emperor or who would cease to be emperor. The Praetorians were of course also involved in battles in the year of the four emperors after Nero's reign, where they again played a key role in the accession of the emperor Vespasian. It was during the reign of the five good emperors that the Praetorians finally showed themselves from their best side. Here, they were finally useful in actually accompanying the emperors on their respective campaigns. They fought in the Dacian wars of Trajan, and they accompanied Lucius Verus against Persia, and they accompanied Marcus Aurelius on his campaigns against the Marcomanni in Germania. But then came Commodus, and this is really when the Praetorians would start to see their absolute low point. For as long as there were good emperors on the throne who kept them occupied, such as happened in the time of the five good emperors, taking them with them on campaigns far away from Rome, they obviously couldn't do bad stuff, they were occupied. Also, if there was a strong and good emperor at Rome while they were stationed there, this would also work. But what would absolutely not work was if there was either a very bad emperor or a weak emperor while the Praetorians were stationed at the Castra Praetoria, because of course, they would immediately start conspiring again. Under Commodus, a certain Praetorian prefect named Cleander rose to power, and he was extremely brutal and ruthless. In 188 AD, he ordered a massacre of civilians, and there was even a battle between the Praetorians and the urban cohorts. These Cohortis Urbanae were created by Augustus to serve as some sort of counterbalance against the huge power of the Praetorians, but also to serve as effectively the police of Rome. They were under command of the urban prefect of Rome, the Praefectus Urbi. It was of course also the Praetorians then who were in large parts responsible for killing the emperor Commodus. But as soon as we think that they did Rome a service by ridding the empire of the brutal tyrant Commodus, they fell instead to their lowest lows. Because the reign of Commodus was so bad that any respect for the position of emperor had eroded. And so they killed the emperor Publius Helvius Pertinax, because the state finances had been ruined by Commodus' extravagant reign. And so the poor guy thought that saving some money would be a good idea in order to make the army more economical and in order to restore the finances of the empire. He thus refused to further increase the pay of the Praetorians, which was already very high in the first place. The Praetorians had been so spoiled that this made them very angry, and so a hundred of them stormed the imperial palace on the Palatine hill and killed the emperor. This was the absolute low point of the Praetorians. Pertinax was a good emperor who might have done some interesting things with the Roman empire, but I guess we'll never find out what those things would have been. Under Septimius Severus, they again went on campaigns. It was then again the Praetorians who ended the emperor Caracalla. It was also the Praetorians that ended Ilagabalus. Under Maximus Trax, the Praetorians were again actively campaigning, this time deep into Germania. During the crisis of the 3rd century, the Praetorians again did some noteworthy things. In 249, it was them who assassinated Philippus II, the son of Philippi Arab. Under the emperor Aurelian, they were suddenly useful again, because they were with him fighting against the split-away Palmyrene empire, and thus helping to secure an important victory for the Roman empire. It was under the emperor Diocletian in 284 AD that the Praetorians would, for the first time in 300 years, lose a significant portion of their power. Diocletian chose not to reside in Rome, maybe because he might have been not too fond to live close to the Praetorians. He certainly remembered that many emperors had met an untimely demise at the hands of those feared troops. Nonetheless, despite this loss of power, they still continued on. In 297, they accompanied the emperor Maximian on his campaign against the Berbers, where he ventured deep into enemy territory, devastating the heartlands of the Berber tribes and driving them back into the Sahara desert. There was a triumphal entry in 298 into Carthage to commemorate this victory, in which the Praetorians participated as well. In the early 300s, Galerius attempted to disband the Praetorian guard, and so he ordered his junior emperor Severus to fulfill this need. It was now another noteworthy act of the Praetorians that would make history. In order to avoid their dissolution on the orders of Galerius, they turned to Maxentius and proclaimed him new emperor on October 28, 306 AD. It was then during these years that once again, as in the old days, the Praetorians were fully stationed at the Castra Praetoria. We can assume a total of probably around 5000 men, so about the size of an entire legion. It was during these years, from 306 to 312 AD, that it seemed as if Rome would return to its former past. It was almost as if the time had been turned back to the days of Augustus himself. An entire Praetorian legion was stationed at the Castra Praetoria, and there was a huge building activity in Rome not seen since the days of the emperor Trajan. And the Praetorians were extremely loyal to Maxentius, which is quite surprising given their volatile nature. This means that Maxentius must have been quite an impressive character to command their total loyalty. But it was not to last. By 312, the relations between Maxentius and Constantine had deteriorated, and Constantine famously marched on Rome, bringing along many of his battle-hardened Frankish foederati. Maxentius met Constantine on the exact day of his ascension to the throne, October 28, and so the legendary Battle of the Milvian Bridge ensued. This was not only a battle between old and new, but really a battle for the survival of Rome itself as a center of the world. It was also a fight for the Praetorians, who had dominated Roman history for 340 years. They were really fighting for their survival, and they would fight until the bitter end. It is said that they stood their ground in the battle, not fleeing, fighting for the honor of Maxentius, the emperor whom they had to thank for their continued existence. But Constantine's battle-hardened foederati troops from the Rhine just had seen more fighting in their days and were thus more experienced. And therefore the larger part of the Praetorians were killed on that fateful day on October 28, 312 AD. Thus was not only the fate of the city of Rome itself sealed as a center of power in the empire, but also the fate of the Praetorians. Because the remainder of them that survived was deemed too dangerous by Constantine, as they remained still loyal to Maxentius. And so he disbanded them, sending the surviving Praetorians far out to different parts of the empire, incorporating them into various other legions. And the Castra Praetoria he razed to the ground, and in that area he ordered the building of at least one new church. Thus ended the regime of the Praetorians, who were sometimes feared soldiers on the battlefields, at other times emperor-makers, but at other times again emperor-enders. They had dominated Roman politics for centuries, shaping the Roman empire that we know. The Scolai Palatinae, about which I made another video, would now be the personal bodyguard of the emperor. But did the meddling of military power in Roman politics now end with the disbandment of the Praetorians? Well, this could have been it, this could have been the moment where Rome would have rid itself from some sort of military dictatorship. But Constantine made a critical mistake. Yes, he did end the Praetorians, but he created the position of Magister Militum, supreme general of the Roman troops. And unfortunately in the west, there would be only one Magister Militum, as per Constantine's decree. And so what happened now was that instead of Praetorians forging the fate of emperors, there would be a powerful general forging the fate of emperors. Already by the early 390s, a Magister Militum called Arbogast was acting as emperor-maker in the west. Stilicho, on the other hand, proved to be a very capable Magister Militum, as was Constantius III or Flavius Aetius. But then, Riccima rose to become Magister Militum, and this is where things turned south very quickly for the Roman Empire. In the best tradition of the Praetorians, Riccima killed emperors, proclaimed new ones, and thus absolutely destabilized the western Roman Empire in a time when stability would have been direly needed. I think the Praetorians would have been very proud of Riccima. And so we see that ultimately the meddling of the military in Roman politics, at first the Praetorians for over three centuries, then the Magister Militum for another hundred years, would prove fatal for the Roman Empire. Because as long as Rome was strong, this meddling could be absorbed by the empire. But when Rome was weak, it would prove disastrous. If you liked this video, please consider supporting this channel via Patreon or via YouTube membership, because it is your support which makes this channel possible. You would have my utmost gratitude. And I would especially like to thank our new Kaisar member, LJ Gaming. Thank you so much, LJ Gaming, for supporting this channel. Majorian himself would be proud. And of course, I want to thank everybody who support my videos in any way. You people are amazing. And if you want to learn more about Riccima, you can watch this video in the upper right corner. But if you want to learn more about the emperor Maxentius, Rome's last hope, a very underrated emperor, you can watch the other video in the lower right corner. I say thanks again to all friends of Roman history. Gratias, ti biago, and benevalete.