Page 79 - Envoys and Political Communication in the Late Antique West 411 - 533

The provincial view of Hydatius

The ceremonial forms of legations ensured that they acted as a pub-
lic medium for dissemination of information. Towards the end of the
Chronicle, Hydatius specifies other information acquired from Suevic en-
voys returning to Gallaecia from missions abroad: the prodigies seen by
Suevic envoys atToulouse, and political and military events witnessed or
heard of by Suevic envoys to the emperor Anthemius (some of these re-
ports were inaccurate or already outdated). Exactly how Hydatius learnt
of news brought back to Gallaecia by the Suevic envoys to Gaul and Italy
remains problematic. 62 His care to specify the source of his information
here and elsewhere, however, suggests that it is unlikely that embassies
served as the basis of his information for chapters where they are not
specified; his other sources remain unknown. The proclamations of vis-
iting and returning envoys in Gallaecia is evidence of the public role
of embassies as a medium for political communication, propaganda, and
even disinformation.

Hydatius’ attention to embassies is itself testimony to the frequency, im-
portance, and public nature of diplomatic communication in the fifth-
century West. The predominance of embassies in the Chronicle is a sub-
stitute for documentary sources, such as diplomatic archives, as evidence
that formalised diplomatic exchange was a characteristic feature of public
life at the time of the break-up of the Roman West. Hydatius’ indepen-
dent approach to describing public events captures the diplomatic infra-
structure of political developments almost unseen in other contemporary
chronicles. His provincial position shapes his outlook: he is freed from
intentionally propagandistic purposes; he is a member of the provincial
episcopacy increasingly shouldering legations along with other imperial
and municipal duties. His record is the product of a provincial bishop
who knows that security, both for his own provincial community and
in the wider arena of the empire and barbarian kingdoms, depends on
the outcome of such missions. Like warfare and imperial dynastic events,
embassies are major political events. Hydatius brings us closer than any
other western author to the actual conduct of relations between powers.

patterns of contact

The numerous embassies in the Chronicle were partof a complex network
of contact throughout the West. The modern tendency to envisage po-
litical relations in the fifth century as radiating out from the two imperial
62
Hyd., cc. 242–4, 247 [238, 241]. Inaccuracy: Thompson, Romans and Barbarians, 223–6. Hydatius
and Suevic envoys: cf. Cardelle de Hartmann, Philologische Studien, 137–8, perhaps overestimating
factors preventing contact.
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