Page 136 - Envoys and Political Communication in the Late Antique West 411 - 533

Envoys and Political Communication,411–533

The juxtaposition of Avitus with Aetius entails not criticism of the
generalissimo, but rather the acceptance of communication and negotia-
tion as complements to military engagement. Avitus’ dealings with the
Goths had to be cast in an acceptable formula to dismiss open charges
of usurpation by sheer force or subordination to barbarian interests, but
Sidonius did not seek or need to justify provincial relations with barbar-
ian rulers in general. Rather he exploited these contacts, showing Avitus
as an emperor able to muster the force needed to resist the Vandals, by
ensuring the active support of the Goths and the quiescence of other
barbarians. In its fictitious as much as its historical elements, the Panegyric
is evidence of the rising status of envoys in the politically fragmented
West.

As a basis for panegyric, Sidonius’ portrait of Avitus finds no echo in
subsequent extant imperial panegyric, despite his influence on later Latin
writers. His letters and poems, however, all written later than the Panegyric
to Avitus, contain intermittent references to envoys and political com-
munication, which are analogous to the positive image of envoys from
which Sidonius constructed his portrait of Avitus.
Sidonius refers several times to the functions and high status both of
envoys dispatched by city or provincial councils, and of palatine legates. In
a letter encouraging a fellow townsman, Pastor, to accept his nomination
by the city council of Clermont for a legation to the praetorian prefect
of Gaul in Arles, Sidonius describes the competition and intrigue carried
out in order to secure such nominations by those seeking the popularitas
which attends the completion of an embassy. 108 Nevertheless, provincial
embassies could be viewed as a burden, notwithstanding the availability
of official transport and travel costs. 109 Sidonius himself performed atleast
one embassy to the imperial court, using official transport, on behalf of
the Auvergne. His well-known description of the Gothic king Theoderic
II is written from the point of view of a petitioner, though whether on his
own or others’ behalf is unclear. 110 He describes one provincial council
in the 470s as having notonly a supervisory role in embassies between

108
Sid. Ap., Ep. v, 20 to Pastor (not in PLRE ii). Loyen’s identification of Pastor’s proposed embassy
with that of Sidonius to the emperor Anthemius in Rome in 467 is erroneous; Loyen, Sidoine
ii, 208, 257. Sidonius does not intend to accompany Pastor (who is missus a nobis), and the
mission is to Arles, not Rome. Loyen underestimates the frequency of traffic between provincial
communities and governmental authorities.
109
Evectio and sumptus:Sid.Ap., Ep. v, 20.2–3; onus: v, 20.1.
110
Embassy to court: in 467, to the emperor Anthemius: Sid. Ap., Epp. i, 5.2 (cursus publicus),
9.5 (provincial embassy); PLRE ii, 117. Itis notclear in whatcapacity Sidonius acted when
pleading to Majorian in 458 for relief from punishments imposed for rebellion; Sid. Ap., Carm.
v, 574–603. To Theoderic II: Sid. Ap., Ep. i, 2.8.
110