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• The Works of Edward Gibbon
• The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
• Chapter Xxvii
• Chapter Xxviii
• Chapter Xxix
• Chapter Xxx
• Chapter Xxxi
• Chapter Xxxii
• Chapter Xxxiii
• Appendix Additional Notes By the Editor
• 1.: Theology In the Market-places of Constantinople — ( P. 13 )
• 2.: Did Theodosius Visit Rome In 394? — ( P. 66 )
• 3.: The Libraries of Alexandria — ( P. 85 , 87 ) 1
• 4.: Worship of Relics — ( P. 98 , 99 )
• 5.: Stilicho In Inscriptions — ( P. 119 , 134 , 159 )
• 6.: The Two Eastern Expeditions of Stilicho and His Illyric Policy — ( P. 122 , 144 )
• 7.: Alaric In Greece — ( P. 140-143 )
• 8.: Penetrabis Ad Urbem — ( P. 148 )
• 9.: Alaric’s First Invasion of Italy — ( P. 148 , 151 Sqq. )
• 10.: Radagaisus — ( P. 167 )
• 11.: The Second Carausius — ( P. 178 )
• 12.: The Tyrant Constantine — ( P. 178 )
• 13.: “the Statue of a Poet Far Superior to Claudian” — ( P. 191 )
• 14.: Death of Maximus — ( P. 266 )
• 15.: Septimania — ( P. 286 )
• 16.: Rate of Travelling By Sea — ( P. 289 )
• 17.: Armenian Affairs — ( P. 331 , 333 )
• 18.: Procopian Legends — ( P. 354 , and Vol. Vi . P. 80 )
• 19.: The “egyptian” of Synesius — ( P. 304 )

7.

ALARIC IN GREECE — (P. 140-143)

Though no record tells that Alaric burnt down the Temple of Eleusis, it is certain that the invasion of the Goths was coincident with the end of the Eleusinian mysteries. The sanctuary of the two goddesses must have already suffered much under Jovian and Theodosius. The cult, restored by Julian, was suppressed by Jovian, but renewed again under Valentinian through the intervention of Praetextatus, proconsul of Achaia. It must have been affected by the intolerant edicts of Theodosius; certainly the demonstration of the Christian section of the Athenian community forced the last Eumolpid high priest to resign. Subsequently — probably on the death of Theodosius — the pagan party felt themselves strong enough to appoint, as hierophant, a priest of Mithras from Thespiae, and he persided at Eleusis at the time of Alaric’s invasion.

See Gregorovius, Hat Alarich die Nationalgötter Griechenlands zerstört? (Kleine Schriften, vol. i.), and Geschichte der Stadt Athen im Mittelalter, i. p. 35 sqq.

As for Athens, there is no doubt that it capitulated and was spared by Alaric, and that the Goths did not destroy or rob its art treasures. Athens suffered, as Gregorovius remarks, less in the invasion of Alaric than in the invasion in the time of Dexippus. There were of course acts of cruelty; some are recorded in the Vita Prisci of Eunapius. But we must not press the words of Claudian (in Rufin. ii. 189): nec fera Cecropiae traxissent vincula matres, further than at the most to interpret it of the rural inhabitants of Attica. Gregorovius observes that in the other passages where the devastation of Greece is mentioned (iv. Cons. Hon. 471, Eutrop. 2, 199, cons. Stil. i. 180), there is not a word about Athens.

As to the Zeus-temple of Olympia, it is supposed that the Phidiac statue of Zeus had been removed about two years before the Gothic invasion (in 394, when Theodosius suppressed the Olympic games) to Constantinople and was afterwards burned in the Palace of Lausus. Cp. Cedrenus, i. p. 364 (Gregorovius i. p. 43). The temple of Olympia was burnt down in the reign of Theodosius ii.

The general conclusion of Gregorovius is that it is a gross exaggeration to ascribe to the Goths the deliberate destruction of the temples and sanctuaries of Greece.