Editing Trajan (section)

=== After Rome ===

During the [[Middle Ages]], some theologians such as [[Thomas Aquinas]] discussed Trajan as an example of a [[virtuous pagan]]. In the ''[[Divine Comedy]]'', [[Dante]], following this legend, sees the spirit of Trajan in the Heaven of [[Jupiter (mythology)|Jupiter]] with other historical and mythological persons noted for their justice. Also, a mural of Trajan stopping to provide justice for a poor widow is present in the first terrace of [[Purgatory]] as a lesson to those who are purged for being proud.<ref>Dante 1998, p. 593. David H. Higgins in his notes to Purgatorio XI.75 says: "Pope Gregory the Great (d. 604) was held to have swayed the justice of God by prayer ('his great victory'), releasing Trajan's soul from Hell, who, resuscitated, was converted to Christianity. Dante accepted this, as Aquinas before him, and places Trajan in Paradise (Paradiso XX.44-8)."</ref>

<blockquote><poem>
I noticed that the inner bank of the curve...

Was of white marble, and so decorated
With carvings that not only Polycletus
But nature herself would there be put to shame...

There was recorded the high glory
Of that ruler of Rome whose worth
Moved Gregory to his great victory;

I mean by this the Emperor Trajan;
And at his bridle a poor widow
Whose attitude bespoke tears and grief...

The wretched woman, in the midst of all this,
Seemed to be saying: 'Lord, avenge my son,
Who is dead, so that my heart is broken..'

So he said: 'Now be comforted, for I must
Carry out my duty before I go on:
Justice requires it and pity holds me back.'

''Dante, The Divine Comedy, Purgatorio X, ll. 32 f. and 73 f.''<ref>Dante 1998, pp. 239–40.</ref>
</poem></blockquote>

[[File:Archaeological Museum of Pythagoreio - Statue of Trajan 2.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|Statue of Trajan depicting him in [[heroic nudity]], [[Samos]], [[Greece]].]]

In the [[Renaissance]], [[Niccolò Machiavelli|Machiavelli]], speaking on the advantages of adoptive succession over heredity, mentioned the five successive good emperors "from Nerva to [[Marcus Aurelius|Marcus]]"<ref>[[Discourses on Livy]], I, 10, 4.</ref>{{snds}}a [[Trope (literature)|trope]] out of which the 18th-century historian [[Edward Gibbon]] popularized the notion of the [[Five Good Emperors]], of whom Trajan was the second.<ref>{{cite book |last=Nelson |first=Eric |title=Idiots guide to the Roman Empire |publisher=Alpha Books |year=2002 |pages=207–209 |isbn=978-0-02-864151-5}}</ref>

In the 18th century, King [[Charles III of Spain]] commissioned [[Anton Raphael Mengs]] to paint ''The Triumph of Trajan'' on the ceiling of the banquet hall of the [[Royal Palace of Madrid]]{{snds}}considered among the best works of this artist.<ref>''Europe, 1450 to 1789: Encyclopedia of the Early Modern World.'' Ed. Jonathan Dewald. Vol. 4. New York, NY:Charles Scribner's Sons, 2004. p 94-96.</ref>

[[File:La justice de Trajan.jpg|thumb|upright=1.2|''[[The Justice of Trajan]]'' by [[Eugène Delacroix]], 1840]]
It was only during the [[Age of Enlightenment|Enlightenment]] that this legacy began to be contested, when Edward Gibbon expressed doubts about the militarized character of Trajan's reign in contrast to the "moderate" practices of his immediate successors.<ref>Robert Mankin, "Edward Gibbon: Historian in Space", ''A Companion to Enlightenment Historiography'', Leiden: Brill, 2013, p. 34.</ref> [[Theodor Mommsen|Mommsen]] adopted a divided stance towards Trajan, at some point of his posthumously published lectures even speaking about his "vainglory" (''Scheinglorie'').{{sfn|Mommsen|1999|p=488}} Mommsen also speaks of Trajan's "insatiable, unlimited lust for conquest".<ref>''Römische Kaisergeschichte''. Munich: 1992, p. 389.</ref> Although Mommsen had no liking for Trajan's successor Hadrian{{snds}}"a repellent manner, and a venomous, envious and malicious nature"{{snds}}he admitted that Hadrian, in renouncing Trajan's conquests, was "doing what the situation clearly required".{{sfn|Mommsen|1999|p=290}}

It was exactly this military character of Trajan's reign that attracted his early twentieth-century biographer, the Italian historian Roberto Paribeni, who in his 1927 two-volume biography ''Optimus Princeps'' described Trajan's reign as the acme of the Roman principate, which he saw as Italy's patrimony.<ref>A. G. G. Gibson, ed. ''Robert Graves and the Classical Tradition''. Oxford University Press, 2015, {{ISBN|978-0-19-873805-3}}, pp. 257/258.</ref> Following in Paribeni's footsteps, the German historian Alfred Heuss saw in Trajan "the accomplished human embodiment of the imperial title" (''die ideale Verkörperung des humanen Kaiserbegriffs'').<ref>{{Cite book|title = Römische Geschichte|last = Heuß|first = Alfred|publisher = Westermann|year = 1976|location = Braunschweig|pages = 344ff|volume = 4}}</ref> Trajan's first English-language biography by [[Julian Bennett (archaeologist)|Julian Bennett]] is also a positive one in that it assumes that Trajan was an active policy-maker concerned with the management of the empire as a whole{{snds}}something his reviewer Lendon considers an anachronistic outlook that sees in the Roman emperor a kind of modern administrator.<ref>J.E. Lendon, "Three Emperors and the Roman Imperial Regime", ''The Classical Journal'' 94 (1998) pp. 87–93.</ref>

During the 1980s, the Romanian historian Eugen Cizek took a more nuanced view as he described the changes in the ''personal'' ideology of Trajan's reign, stressing the fact that it became ever more autocratic and militarized, especially after 112 and towards the Parthian War (as "only an universal monarch, a ''kosmocrator'', could dictate his law to the East").<ref>Richard Jean-Claude, "Eugen Cizek, ''L'époque de Trajan. Circonstances politiques et problèmes idéologiques''" [compte rendu]. ''Bulletin de l'Association Guillaume Budé'', Année 1985, Volume 44,  Numéro 4 pp. 425–426. Available at [http://www.persee.fr/doc/bude_1247-6862_1985_num_44_4_1698_t1_0425_0000_2]. Retrieved 13 December 2015.</ref> The biography by the German historian Karl Strobel stresses the continuity between Domitian's and Trajan's reigns, saying that Trajan's rule followed the same autocratic and sacred character as Domitian's, culminating in a failed Parthian adventure intended as the crown of his personal achievement.<ref>Jens Gering, Rezension zu: Karl Strobel, Kaiser Traian{{snds}}Eine Epoche der Weltgeschichte,''Frankfurter elektronische Rundschau zur Altertumskunde'' 15 (2011), [http://s145739614.online.de/fera/ausgabe15/Gering.pdf]. Retrieved 15{{nbsp}}December 2015.</ref> It is in modern French historiography that Trajan's reputation becomes most markedly deflated: Paul Petit writes about Trajan's portraits as a "lowbrow boor with a taste for booze and boys".<ref>Petit, ''Histoire Générale de L'Empire Romain, 1: Le Haut Empire (27 av. J.C.- 161 apr. J.C.)''. Paris: Seuil, 1974, {{ISBN|978-2-02-004969-6}}, p. 166.</ref> For [[Paul Veyne]], what is to be retained from Trajan's "stylish" qualities was that he was the last Roman emperor to think of the empire as a purely Italian and Rome-centred hegemony of conquest. In contrast, his successor Hadrian would stress the notion of the empire as ecumenical and of the emperor as universal benefactor and not ''kosmocrator''.{{sfn|Veyne|1976|pp=654/655}}