Military and political strategy of emperor Theodosius I in the northern Black Sea region

Yartsev Sergey Vladimirovich

The article deals with the complex topic of the military and political strategy of Emperor Theodosius I in the Northern Black Sea region. Based on a thorough study of the sources, the author offers a new concept of the history of the region in the 80's of 4th century AD, in the context of the foreign policy of the Roman Empire. According to the researcher, the close relations with the Huns established by Theodosius I indicate the Emperor's desire to restore the buffer zone of the Roman Empire, consisting of nomad hordes and dependent agricultural Gothic population, in the Northern Black Sea region. At the same time, it is possible that the submission of the settled population to the North of the Lower Danube by the Huns could have been sanctioned by the Romans and have been a kind of compensation to the nomads for the loss of a part of their dependent agricultural population during the treaty with the Goths in 382. In order to prevent the Huns from uniting into one powerful force and perhaps for the purpose of contrasting different groups of barbarians with each other, a strictly differentiated policy was applied to them. Relations with the Western Huns were established in the areas of the Danube Limes while the Romans' contacts with the Eastern nomads were taking place in the Bosporan Tanais. The restored buffer zone passed the test of strength when the usurper Maximus managed to provoke the Goths of the Northern Black Sea region into making a speech against Theodosius I. At the same time, it is obvious that Maximus did not overlook the Bosporus as well as the barbarians who lived on the perimeter of its borders. Probably, the destruction layers of the end of the 4th century AD, known in the Bosporus, were relevant not to the attack of the Huns in 395 but to the events of the 80s of 4th century AD. What is more there is a possibility that at that time the Bosporus state administration reorganization happened and included the promotion of noble Huns and Alans to high positions which could be a kind of payment to the allied barbarians for help in suppressing the rebellion.

Keywords:Roman Empire, Bosporan Kingdom, Northern Black Sea region, Emperor Theodosius I, Emperor Maximus, Goths, Huns.