Produced by Ted Garvin, Leonard Johnson and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team.
RAVENNAA STUDY
BYEDWARD HUTTON
ILLUSTRATED IN COLOUR AND LINEBYHARALD SUND
1913
TO MY FRIENDARTHUR SYMONSIN AFFECTIONATE HOMAGE
PREFACE
My intention in writing this book has been to demonstrate the uniqueimportance of Ravenna in the history of Italy and of Europe, especiallyduring the Dark Age from the time of Alaric's first descent into theCisalpine plain to the coming of Charlemagne. That importance, as it seemsto me, has been wholly or almost wholly misunderstood, and certainly, as Iunderstand it, has never been explained. In this book, which is offered tothe public not without a keen sense of its inadequacy, I have tried to showin as clear a manner as was at my command, what Ravenna really was in thepolitical geography of the empire, and to explain the part that positionallowed her to play in the great tragedy of the decline and fall of theRoman administration. If I have succeeded in this I am amply repaid for allthe labour the book has cost me.
The principal sources, both ancient and modern, which I have consulted inthe preparation of this volume have been cited, but I must here acknowledgethe special debt I owe to the late Dr. Hodgkin, to Professor Diehl, toDr. Corrado Ricci, and to the many contributors to the various ItalianBollettini which I have ransacked.
E.H.
March 1913.
CONTENTS
CHAP.
I. THE GEOGRAPHICAL AND POLITICAL POSITION OF RAVENNA
II. JULIUS CAESAR IN RAVENNA
III. RAVENNA IN THE TIME OF THE EMPIRE
IV. THE RETREAT UPON RAVENNA Honorius and Galla Placidia
V. THE FALL OF THE EMPIRE IN THE WEST
VI. THEODORIC
VII. THE RECONQUEST Vitiges, Belisarius, Totila, Narses
VIII. MODICA QUIES The Pragmatic Sanction and the Settlement of Italy
IX. THE CITADEL OF THE EMPIRE IN ITALY The Lombard Invasion
X. THE PAPAL STATE Pepin and Charlemagne
XI. THE CATHOLIC CHURCHES OF THE FIFTH CENTURY The Cathedral, Baptistery,
Arcivescovado, S. Agata, S. Pietro Maggiore, S. Giovanni Evangelista, S.
Giovanni Battista, and the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia
XII. THE ARIAN CHURCHES OF THE SIXTH CENTURY The Palace of Theodoric,
S. Apollinare Nuovo, S. Spirito, S. Maria in Cosmedin, the Mausoleum of
Theodoric
XII. THE BYZANTINE CHURCHES S. Vitale and S. Apollinare in Classe
XIV. RAVENNA IN THE MIDDLE AGE
XV. DANTE IN RAVENNA
XVI. MEDIAEVAL RAVENNA The Churches
XVII. RAVENNA IN THE RENAISSANCE The Battle of 1512
XVIII. RENAISSANCE RAVENNA Churches and Palaces