Page 198 - Envoys and Political Communication in the Late Antique West 411 - 533

Chapter 5

CASSIODORUS AND SENARIUS

Hydatius, Sidonius, Constantius, and Ennodius are concerned with the
activities and status of legates acting on behalf of provincial councils,
cities, and other regional communities. The two authors discussed here
speak from the point of view of the royal court of post-imperial Italy. The
status and rewards of palatine emissaries differ from those of provincial
legates: they look to achieve status not only within their local community,
but also within the ranks of their professional peers, and to gain more
tangible returns in terms of career path and financial reward. Cassiodorus
and Senarius, demonstrating their part in political communication in the
late antique West before the time of Justinian, display a court official’s
professional ethos. They provide a thumbnail sketch of the career of a
courtservantwho was well seasoned in foreign embassies, and of certain
aspects of his public life: the qualities for which he was chosen for such
tasks; the nature and scale of the journeys he undertook; the rewards he
gained within the civil bureaucracy; and the social capital accrued by suc-
cess. Some of the intellectual and spiritual concerns which occupied such
a Roman official while at the royal court of Ostrogothic Italy can also be
glimpsed. Senarius and others like him were not professional ambassadors
in the modern sense. They undertook important embassies, at the direc-
tion of emperors or kings, as an adjacent duty to their proper palatine
office, whether in financial or other administrative posts. Their careers
and honours illustrate the fluid structures of late Roman government
adapting to the sharply increased necessity for political communication
during the fifth and sixth centuries.
Like Hydatius and Sidonius, these two Italian authors attest the im-
portance and frequency of diplomatic communication throughout the
Mediterranean world. They present, however, different perspectives, and
must be studied in different contexts, from that of their older con-
temporaries. Whereas Hydatius is almost the sole witness for many of
the events he describes, and Sidonius’ Gaul is only sporadically illumi-
nated for us, Italy under the Ostrogoths is the best-documented western

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