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A barracks emperor (also called a "soldier emperor") was a Roman emperor who seized power by virtue of his command of the army. Barracks emperors were especially common in the period from 235 through 284 AD, during the
Crisis of the Third Century The Crisis of the Third Century, also known as the Military Anarchy or the Imperial Crisis (AD 235–284), was a period in which the Roman Empire nearly collapsed. The crisis ended due to the military victories of Aurelian and with the ascensio ...
that began with the assassination of
Severus Alexander Marcus Aurelius Severus Alexander (1 October 208 – 21/22 March 235) was a Roman emperor, who reigned from 222 until 235. He was the last emperor from the Severan dynasty. He succeeded his slain cousin Elagabalus in 222. Alexander himself wa ...
. Beginning with
Maximinus Thrax Gaius Julius Verus Maximinus "Thrax" ("the Thracian";  – 238) was Roman emperor from 235 to 238. His father was an accountant in the governor's office and sprang from ancestors who were Carpi (a Dacian tribe), a people whom Diocleti ...
, there were approximately fourteen barracks emperors in 33 years, producing an average reign of a little over two years apiece. The resulting instability in the imperial office and the near constant state of civil war and insurrection threatened to destroy the Roman Empire from within and left it vulnerable to attack from external adversaries.


Style of the 3rd century

Unlike previous emperors who had seized power in military ''coups d'état'' (
Vespasian Vespasian (; la, Vespasianus ; 17 November AD 9 – 23/24 June 79) was a Roman emperor who reigned from AD 69 to 79. The fourth and last emperor who reigned in the Year of the Four Emperors, he founded the Flavian dynasty that ruled the Emp ...
and
Septimius Severus Lucius Septimius Severus (; 11 April 145 – 4 February 211) was Roman emperor from 193 to 211. He was born in Leptis Magna (present-day Al-Khums, Libya) in the Roman province of Africa. As a young man he advanced through the customary suc ...
, both from traditional middle-class
Equestrian The word equestrian is a reference to equestrianism, or horseback riding, derived from Latin ' and ', "horse". Horseback riding (or Riding in British English) Examples of this are: *Equestrian sports *Equestrian order, one of the upper classes in ...
stock), the barracks emperors tended to be low-class commoners (often from outlying parts of the empire); the first barracks emperor,
Maximinus Thrax Gaius Julius Verus Maximinus "Thrax" ("the Thracian";  – 238) was Roman emperor from 235 to 238. His father was an accountant in the governor's office and sprang from ancestors who were Carpi (a Dacian tribe), a people whom Diocleti ...
, had begun his military career as an enlisted soldier. A barracks emperor could not boast of a distinguished family name or a successful career as a statesman or public servant; rather, he had only his military career to recommend himself, and his only influence had been though the soldiers loyal to his command. Some of these soldier emperors were members of the equestrian class who had worked their way up to a sufficient position of influence within their legion that the soldiers would support a bid for power, although this was a risky undertaking because the soldiers could withdraw their support at any time and perhaps shift it to another military leader who looked more promising at the time. Because the barracks emperors were frequently border commanders, the act of overthrowing the reigning emperor and seizing power for themselves left large gaps in the empire's border defenses, gaps that could be exploited by Rome's enemies, leading to the Germanic incursion into Roman territory in the 260s and resulting in the construction of the Aurelian Walls around
Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus ( legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...
. The barracks emperors also used state money to pay their troops – no emperor who had come into power by force of arms could afford to allow his soldiers to become disaffected – and public works and infrastructure fell into ruin. To accommodate the vast demands of buying off their soldiers, the state often simply seized private property, damaging the economy and driving up inflation.


Transition to the Dominate era

In 284, a barracks emperor named
Diocletian Diocletian (; la, Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus, grc, Διοκλητιανός, Diokletianós; c. 242/245 – 311/312), nicknamed ''Iovius'', was Roman emperor from 284 until his abdication in 305. He was born Gaius Valerius Diocles ...
, a cavalry commander, seized power. Diocletian instituted a number of reforms designed to stabilize the empire and the imperial office, bringing an end to the Third Century Crisis and inaugurating the Dominate era of Roman history. Although further emperors would don the purple on the basis of military power (e.g.,
Constantine I Constantine I ( , ; la, Flavius Valerius Constantinus, ; ; 27 February 22 May 337), also known as Constantine the Great, was Roman emperor from AD 306 to 337, the first one to convert to Christianity. Born in Naissus, Dacia Mediterran ...
,
Valentinian I Valentinian I ( la, Valentinianus; 32117 November 375), sometimes called Valentinian the Great, was Roman emperor from 364 to 375. Upon becoming emperor, he made his brother Valens his co-emperor, giving him rule of the eastern provinces. Val ...
, and
Theodosius I Theodosius I ( grc-gre, Θεοδόσιος ; 11 January 347 – 17 January 395), also called Theodosius the Great, was Roman emperor from 379 to 395. During his reign, he succeeded in a crucial war against the Goths, as well as in two ...
), the phenomenon of the barracks emperors died out, to be replaced in the late imperial era by shadow emperors like
Stilicho Flavius Stilicho (; c. 359 – 22 August 408) was a military commander in the Roman army who, for a time, became the most powerful man in the Western Roman Empire. He was of Vandal origins and married to Serena, the niece of emperor Theodosiu ...
,
Constantius III Constantius III was briefly Western Roman emperor of the West in 421. He earned his position as Emperor due to his capability as a general under Honorius, achieving the rank of ''magister militum'' by 411. That same year, he suppressed the r ...
,
Flavius Aëtius Aetius (also spelled Aëtius; ; 390 – 454) was a Roman general and statesman of the closing period of the Western Roman Empire. He was a military commander and the most influential man in the Empire for two decades (433454). He managed pol ...
, Avitus, Ricimer,
Gundobad Gundobad ( la, Flavius Gundobadus; french: Gondebaud, Gondovald; 452 – 516 AD) was King of the Burgundians (473 – 516), succeeding his father Gundioc of Burgundy. Previous to this, he had been a patrician of the moribund Western Roman Em ...
,
Flavius Orestes OrestesNo other names are known, according to J.R. Martindale ''The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire'' vol. II pp. 811–812. Cambridge University Press, 1980 (died 28 August 476) was a Roman general and politician of Pannonian ancestr ...
, and
Odoacer Odoacer ( ; – 15 March 493 AD), also spelled Odovacer or Odovacar, was a soldier and statesman of barbarian background, who deposed the child emperor Romulus Augustulus and became Rex/Dux (476–493). Odoacer's overthrow of Romulus August ...
, military strongmen who effectually ruled the empire as imperial generalissimos controlling weak-willed puppet emperors rather than taking the title themselves.


List


Earlier barracks emperors

When the notion of a barracks emperor is extended to any emperor that was appointed by the army, more emperors whose reign predates the 3rd century can be included: *The first known emperor appointed by the
Praetorian Guard The Praetorian Guard (Latin: ''cohortēs praetōriae'') was a unit of the Imperial Roman army that served as personal bodyguards and intelligence agents for the Roman emperors. During the Roman Republic, the Praetorian Guard were an escort fo ...
s was
Claudius Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (; 1 August 10 BC – 13 October AD 54) was the fourth Roman emperor, ruling from AD 41 to 54. A member of the Julio-Claudian dynasty, Claudius was born to Drusus and Antonia Minor ...
, who was appointed after the murder of
Caligula Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (31 August 12 – 24 January 41), better known by his nickname Caligula (), was the third Roman emperor, ruling from 37 until his assassination in 41. He was the son of the popular Roman general Germani ...
. *A notable case took place after the murder of emperor
Pertinax Publius Helvius Pertinax (; 1 August 126 – 28 March 193) was Roman emperor for the first three months of 193. He succeeded Commodus to become the first emperor during the tumultuous Year of the Five Emperors. Born the son of a freed slav ...
. Praetorian Guards had come to the point where they simply sold the throne off, by auctioning it to the highest bidder, selling it to one of the richest Romans at the time,
Didius Julianus Marcus Didius Julianus (; 29 January 133 or 137 – 2 June 193) was Roman emperor for nine weeks from March to June 193, during the Year of the Five Emperors. Julianus had a promising political career, governing several provinces, including D ...
. {{DEFAULTSORT:Barracks Emperor Roman emperors Military of ancient Rome