What about Stilicho?

In reading Brian T. Allen’s review of Ravenna: Capital of Empire, Crucible of Europe, by Judith Herrin (“Jewel amid the Ruins,” February 22), I was struck by Allen’s, and what I can only infer is Herrin’s, ungenerous treatment of Flavius Stilicho, the parens principis of the emperor Honorius — a man who prevented Italy’s conquest at Verona in 402 and again at Florentia in 406, and whose political dealings are open to multiple interpretations based on the contradictory and politically motivated nature of the ancient-source authors. I would recommend to your readers Ian Hughes’s Stilicho biography, which, while written with an emphasis on military history, makes clear the first-generation Roman’s contributions to imperial perseverance.

Allen also writes: “The Gauls sacked [Rome] in 390, then the Goths in 410. The city that had once conquered the world was itself laid low.” What is left out is that the Gauls, who were thoroughly Romanized by late antiquity, sacked Rome in 390 b.c., a neat 800 years before it would again fall into enemy hands, an impressive feat for an ancient city, which should serve to emphasize Rome’s safety in imperial times prior to Alaric’s actions. It is worth noting that power had been drifting away from a still safe and secure Rome since the fall of the republic and long before it found its way to Ravenna.

Dennis A. Garcia Vernal, Utah

Brian T. Allen responds: All your points are well taken. My challenge was my word count. At 1,400 words, I did the best I could for Stilicho, who was indeed a fine general and worthy politician.

The book covers 500 years, though. I wrote about Stilicho to show Galla Placidia’s circuitous life. She is, art-history-wise, the star of the show because of her tomb, but in the book she gets only 50 pages of 600. I think Stilicho is important, too, and wanted to get him in the story.

Correction

Because of an editing error, the Long View column of February 18 referred to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 as “HIPPA.” As the reader may verify, the correct acronym is “HIPAA.”