Peter Heather

{{Infobox historian | honorific_prefix =  | name = Peter Heather | honorific_suffix = | image = | image_size = | alt = Peter Heather near King’s College Campus, February 2024 | caption = Heather in February 2024 | native_name = | native_name_lang = | birth_name =  | birth_date = {{birth date and age|1960|6|8|df=y}} | birth_place = [[Northern Ireland]], United Kingdom | death_date = | death_place = | death_cause = | citizenship = | other_names = | occupation = | period = | known_for = | home_town = | title = | boards =  | spouse = | partner = | children = | parents = | relatives = | awards = | website = | education = {{Plainlist| * [[Maidstone Grammar School]] * [[New College, Oxford]] ([[MA (Oxon)|MA]], [[DPhil]]) }} | thesis_title = The Goths and the Balkans | thesis_url = | thesis_year = 1987 | school_tradition = [[Vienna School of History#Oxford historians|Oxford School]] | doctoral_advisor = | academic_advisors = {{Plainlist| * [[John Matthews (historian)|John Matthews]] * [[James Howard-Johnston]] }} | influences = {{Plainlist| * [[Edward Gibbon]] * [[E. A. Thompson]] }} | era = | discipline = {{Plainlist| * History }} | sub_discipline = | workplaces = {{Plainlist| * [[Worcester College, Oxford]] * [[Yale University]] * [[University College London]] * [[King's College London]] }} | doctoral_students = | notable_students = | main_interests = [[Late Antiquity]] | notable_works = | notable_ideas = | influenced = | signature = | signature_alt = | signature_size = | footnotes = }}

'''Peter John Heather''' (born 8 June 1960) is a British historian of [[late antiquity]] and the [[Early Middle Ages]]. Heather holds the statutory Chair of Medieval History in the Department of History at [[King's College London]]. He specialises in the [[fall of the Western Roman Empire]] and the [[Goths]], on which he for decades has been considered the world's leading authority.<ref name="Humphries"/>

==Biography== Heather was born in [[Northern Ireland]] on 8 June 1960. He was educated at [[Maidstone Grammar School]],{{sfn|King's College}} and received his [[Master of Arts (Oxford, Cambridge and Dublin)|M.A.]] and [[Doctor of Philosophy|D.Phil.]] from [[New College, Oxford]].{{sfn|Contemporary Authors}} Among his teachers at Oxford were [[John Matthews (historian)|John Matthews]] and [[James Howard-Johnston]].{{sfn|Humphries|2007|p=126}} Heather subsequently lectured at [[Worcester College, Oxford]], [[Yale University]] and [[University College London]]. In January 2008, Heather was appointed professor of medieval history at [[King's College London]].{{sfn|The Writer's Directory}}

==Research== As a historian, Heather specialises in [[late antiquity]] and the [[Early Middle Ages]], especially the relationships between the [[Roman Empire]] and "[[barbarian]]" peoples, and on the ethnicity of [[Germanic peoples]]. His extensive works on the [[Goths]] are considered as the best available on the subject.<ref name="Humphries">{{harvnb|Humphries|2007|p=126}}. "For about twenty years now, the study of the Goths in English has been associated, above all, with the name of Peter Heather... for the formative period of Romano-Gothic relations from the third century to the fifth, Heather's remains the most concerted contribution..."</ref>{{sfn|King's College}}{{sfn|Contemporary Authors}}<ref name="Kulikowski_2006_206">{{harvnb|Kulikowski|2006|pp=206, 208}}. "Peter Heather's ''Goths and Romans, 332–489'' (Oxford, 1991) is the best treatment of its subject available in any language... Unfortunately, Heather's more recent works... [advocate a] neo-Romantic vision of mass migrations of free Germanic peoples... [Heather] lack[s] theoretical rigour in relating archaeological and historical evidence.</ref><ref name="Murdoch_166">{{harvnb|Murdoch|2004|p=166}}. "The best modern general history in English is Peter Heather's ''The Goths'' (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996), replacing the pioneering one by Henry Bradley, ''The Goths'' (London:Fisher-Unwin, 1888)."</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Halsall|1999|p=132}}. "Heather... is a counter-revisionist, attempting to reinstate traditional views of Barbarian Migrations on more sophisticated foundations, using recent developments in archaeology, anthropology and history. His important book, in size and content, represents the best overview of a particular barbarian group... It clearly replaces H. Wolfram's ''History of the Goths''..."</ref>

In his earliest works, Heather mostly rejected the ''[[Getica]]'' of [[Jordanes]] as a valuable source on early Gothic history. In later years, as a result of advances in archaeology, Heather has largely retreated from that position, and now considers the ''Getica'' to be partially based on Gothic traditions, and that the archaeological evidence confirms a Gothic origin on the [[Baltic Sea|Baltic]].<ref>{{harvnb|Halsall|1999|p=134}}. "In his excellent ''Goths and Romans'', Peter Heather demolished the idea that the Getica's picture of Gothic history could be projected further back than about 376 for the later Visigoths, or beyond the break-up of the Hunnic Empire for the Ostrogoths... However, Heather seems to have retreated slightly from his earlier position. Partly this is because he wishes to show that archaeology might indeed prove than Jordanes was right to trace Gothic origins to the Baltic. Consequently, perhaps, he seems readier than before to see genuine Gothic traditions among those employed by Ablabius, Cassiodorus and then Jordanes... His analyses irreparably damaged the Getica's value for Gothic 'prehistory' yet, to reinstate the Gothic migration from the Baltic, he has to accept the value of at least a kernel of Jordanes' account; he accepts this on the basis of a reading of archaeological data which is itself driven by the uncritical 'pre-Heatherian' interpretation of Jordanes."</ref>

Heather disagrees with the core-tradition ({{langx|de|Traditionskern}}) theory pioneered by the [[Vienna School of History]],{{sfn|Humphries|2007|p=129}}{{sfn|Kulikowski|2002|pp=71-73}} which contends that Germanic tribes were constantly changing, multi-ethnic coalitions held together by a small warrior elite. Instead, Heather contends that it was the freemen who constituted the backbone of Germanic tribes, and that the ethnic identity of tribes such as the Goths was stable for centuries, being held together by the freemen{{clarify|date=May 2023}}.{{sfn|Halsall|2007|pp=19-20}}<ref>{{harvnb|Halsall|2007|p=472}}. "Peter Heather... sees the 'Germanic' ethnic units—the 'peoples'—of this period as largely constituted by a numerous and politically important stratum of freemen. The cohesion of this group acted as a check, he argues, on ethnic change, although it did not prevent it. This is an interesting and solidly argued case and not, in itself, implausible."</ref><ref>{{harvnb|Halsall|1999|p=139}}. "Heather refutes the idea of the ''Traditionskern'', the core of tradition, 'borne' by a small, royal and aristocratic nucleus within the larger 'ethnic' group: myths which unified a greater body, composed of people of diverse origins... Heather deploys this refutation of the Traditionskern to argue that Gothic identity was not restricted to a small core but was widespread among a large body of freemen."</ref>

Heather has written several works on the [[fall of the Western Roman Empire]].<ref>{{cite news |last1=Mason |first1=Ian Garrick |date=August 27, 2005 |title=The barbarians move in |url=https://www.spectator.co.uk/2005/08/why-rome-fell/ |publisher=[[The Spectator]] |access-date=January 27, 2020 }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Napier |first1=William |author-link=Christopher Hart (novelist) |date=July 3, 2005 |title=The Fall of the Roman Empire by Peter Heather |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/the-fall-of-the-roman-empire-by-peter-heather-296513.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220526/https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/the-fall-of-the-roman-empire-by-peter-heather-296513.html |archive-date=26 May 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live |work=[[The Independent]] |access-date=January 27, 2020 }}</ref><ref>{{cite news |last1=Man |first1=John |author-link=John Man (author) |date=December 17, 2005 |title=The barbarians move in |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/dec/17/featuresreviews.guardianreview9 |work=[[The Guardian]] |access-date=January 27, 2020 }}</ref><ref>{{cite magazine |last1=Law |first1=Sally |date=June 11, 2010 |title=Ask an Academic: The Fall of Rome |url=https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/ask-an-academic-the-fall-of-rome |magazine=[[The New Yorker]] |access-date=January 27, 2020 }}</ref> Contrary to several historians of the late 20th century, Heather contends that it was the movements of "barbarians" in the [[Migration Period]] which led to the collapse of the [[Western Roman Empire]].{{sfn|Contemporary Authors}} He accepts the traditional view that it was the arrival of the [[Huns]] on the [[Pontic steppe]] in the late 4th century which set these migrations in motion. Heather's approach differs from many of his predecessors in the late 20th century, who have tended to downplay the importance migration played in the fall of the Western Roman Empire.{{sfn|Halsall|2007|pp=19-20}} [[Guy Halsall]] groups Heather together with [[Neil Christie]] and [[E. A. Thompson]] as being among the so-called ''Movers'', who trace the collapse of the Western Roman Empire to external migration. These are contrasted with the ''Shakers'', including [[Patrick Amory]] and [[Jean Durliat]], who trace the collapse to internal developments within the empire, and contend that the barbarians were wilfully but peacefully integrated into the empire by the Romans. The ''Movers'' and ''Shakers'' are largely divided, as the [[Germanic philology|Germanists]] and [[Classical studies|Romanists]] were in the early 20th century.{{sfn|Wood|2013|p=311}} According to Heather, the idea that the invading barbarians were peacefully absorbed into Roman civilisation "smells more of wishful thinking than likely reality".{{sfn|Heather|2018|pp=80-100}}

Along with [[Bryan Ward-Perkins]] and other scholars affiliated with the [[University of Oxford]], Heather belongs to a new generation of historians who beginning in the early 2000s started to challenge theories on Late Antiquity that had been prevalent since the 1970s. These older theories generally denied the importance of ethnic identity, barbarian migrations and Roman decline in the collapse of the Western Roman Empire.{{sfn|Gillett|2017}} According to Andrew Gillet, Heather's works have been championed by (especially British) academics as a "new, definitive narrative" on the fall of Rome.<ref>{{harvnb|Gillett|2017}}. "Heather's book was quickly championed, by British academics in particular, as a new, definitive narrative of the Fall of Rome..." [[Mischa Meier]] 2019, p. 35, however, challenges Heather's authority.</ref>

==Reception== Peter Heather has been criticised by members of the [[Toronto School of History]]. [[Michael Kulikowski]], who is sometimes associated with this group, has said Heather promotes a "[[neo-Romantic]] vision of mass migrations of free Germanic peoples" and wishes "to revive a biological approach to ethnicity".<ref name="Kulikowski_2006_206"/>{{sfn|Kulikowski|2002|pp=71-73}}{{sfn|Kulikowski|2002|p=83}} According to Kulikowski, Heather "comes perilously close to recreating the old, ''[[volkisch]]'' notion of an inherent "Germanic" belief in freedom."{{sfn|Kulikowski|2011|p=278}} On the other hand, Kulikowski has praised Heather for his works on [[Goths|Gothic]] history, calling him "the most subtle modern interpreter of Gothic history."{{sfn|Kulikowski|2006|p=64}}

Guy Halsall has identified Peter Heather as the leader of a "counter-revisionist offensive against more subtle ways of thinking" about the Migration Period. Halsall accuses this group, which is associated with the University of Oxford, of "bizarre reasoning" and of purveying a "deeply irresponsible history".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://600transformer.blogspot.com/2011/07/why-do-we-need-barbarians.html |title=Why do we need the Barbarians? |last=Halsall |first=Guy |author-link=Guy Halsall |date=July 15, 2011 |website=Historian on the Edge |publisher=[[Blogspot.com]] |access-date=January 27, 2020 }}</ref> Halsall writes that Heather and the Oxford historians have been responsible for "an academic counter-revolution" of wide importance, and that they deliberately provide "succour" to [[far-right politics|far-right extremists]] such as [[Anders Behring Breivik]].{{sfn|Halsall|2014|p=517}} Similar criticism has been levelled by [[Andrew Gillett]], another associate of the Toronto School, who laments Heather's "biological" approach and lists Heather's research as an "obstacle" to the advance of multicultural values.{{sfn|Gillett|2017}}

==Selected works== *Peter Heather, ''The Goths and the Balkans, A.D. 350-500''. [[University of Oxford]] DPhil thesis 1987. *Peter Heather and John Matthews, ''The Goths in the Fourth Century''. Liverpool: [[Liverpool University Press]], 1991. *Peter Heather, ''Goths and Romans 332-489''. Oxford: [[Clarendon Press]], 1991. *Peter Heather, 'The Huns and the End of the Roman Empire in Western Europe', ''English Historical Review'' cx (1995): 4-41. *Peter Heather, ''The Goths''. Oxford: [[Blackwell Publishing]], 1996. *Peter Heather, ed. ''The Visigoths from the Migration Period to the Seventh Century: an ethnographic perspective''. Woodbridge: Boydell, 1999. *Peter Heather, 'The Late Roman Art of Client Management: Imperial Defence in the Fourth Century West', in ''The Transformation of Frontiers: From Late Antiquity to the Carolingians'', eds. Walter Pohl, Ian Wood, and Helmut Reimitz. Leiden–Boston: [[Brill Publishers|Brill]], 2001, pp. 15–68. *Peter Heather, 'State, Lordship and Community in the West (''c''. AD 400-600)', in ''The Cambridge Ancient History, Volume xiv, Late Antiquity: Empire and Successors, A.D. 425-600'', eds. [[Averil Cameron]], [[Bryan Ward-Perkins]], and [[Michael Whitby]]. Cambridge: [[Cambridge University Press]], 2000, pp. 437–468 *Peter Heather, ''The Fall of the Roman Empire: a New History of Rome and the Barbarians''. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005. *Peter Heather, ''Empires and Barbarians: Migration, Development and the Birth of Europe''. London: [[Macmillan Publishers|Macmillan]], 2009. *Peter Heather, ''The Restoration of Rome: Barbarian Popes and Imperial Pretenders''. London–New York: [[Oxford University Press]], 2014. *Peter Heather, ''Rome Resurgent: War and Empire in the Age of Justinian''. Oxford University Press, 2018. *Peter Heather, ''Christendom: The Triumph of a Religion, AD 300-1300''. Knopf, 2023. *Peter Heather and John Rapley, ''Why Empires Fall: Rome, America, and the Future of the West''. Yale University Press, 2023.

==References== {{Reflist|2}}

==Sources== {{Refbegin|2}} * {{cite journal |last1=Gillett |first1=Andrew |author-link1=Andrew Gillett |date=November 3, 2017 |title=The fall of Rome and the retreat of European multiculturalism: A historical trope as a discourse of authority in public debate |journal=Cogent Arts & Humanities |publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]] |volume=4 |issue=1 |pages=? |doi=10.1080/23311983.2017.1390915 |doi-access=free }} * {{cite journal |last1=Halsall |first1=Guy |author-link1=Guy Halsall |date=March 1999 |title=Review article: Movers and Shakers: the Barbarians and the Fall of Rome |journal=[[Early Medieval Europe (journal)|Early Medieval Europe]] |publisher=[[John Wiley & Sons]] |volume=8 |issue=1 |pages=131–145 |doi=10.1111/1468-0254.00041 |doi-access= }} * {{cite book |last=Halsall |first=Guy |author-link=Guy Halsall |year=2007 |title=Barbarian Migrations and the Roman West, 376–568 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gbkLAQAAQBAJ |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=9781107393325 }} * {{cite journal |last1=Halsall |first1=Guy |author-link1=Guy Halsall |date=December 2014 |title=Two Worlds Become One: A 'Counter-Intuitive' View of the Roman Empire and 'Germanic' Migration |url=https://academic.oup.com/gh/article-abstract/32/4/515/602058 |access-date=January 17, 2020 |journal=[[German History (journal)|German History]] |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |volume=32 |issue=4 |pages=515–532 |doi=10.1093/gerhis/ghu107 |url-access=subscription }} * {{cite book |last1=Heather |first1=Peter |year=2018 |chapter=Race, Migration And National Origins |title=History, Memory and Public Life |chapter-url=https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781351055581 |publisher=[[Routledge]] |pages=80–100 |isbn=9781351055581 }} * {{cite journal |last1=Humphries |first1=Mark |year=2007 |title=Rome's Gothic Wars: From the Third Century to Alaric |journal=Classics Ireland |publisher=Classical Association of Ireland |volume=14 |pages=126–129 |jstor=25528487 }} * {{cite book |last=Kulikowski |first=Michael |author-link=Michael Kulikowski |year=2002 |chapter=Nation versus Army: A Necessary Contrast |editor-last=Gillett |editor-first=Andrew |title=On Barbarian Identity: Critical Approaches to Ethnicity in the Early Middle Ages |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FcdmAAAAMAAJ |publisher=[[Brepols|ISD]] |pages=69–85 |isbn=9782503511689 }} * {{cite book |last=Kulikowski |first=Michael |author-link=Michael Kulikowski |year=2006 |title=Rome's Gothic Wars: From the Third Century to Alaric |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QXM9SH4EALgC |publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-1139458092 }} * {{cite journal |last1=Kulikowski |first1=Michael |author-link1=Michael Kulikowski |date=August 8, 2011 |title=Peter Heather, Empires and Barbarians |journal=[[Journal of Interdisciplinary History]] |publisher=[[MIT Press]] |volume=42 |issue=2 |pages=277–279 |doi=10.1162/JINH_r_00217 |doi-access= }} * {{cite book |last1=Meier |first1=Mischa |author-link1=Mischa Meier |year=2019 |title=Geschichte der Völkerwanderung. Europa, Asien und Afrika vom 3. bis zum 8. Jahrhundert |publisher=[[C.H. Beck]] |isbn=9783406739590 }} * {{cite book |last1=Murdoch |first1=Brian |author-link1=Brian O. Murdoch |year=2004 |chapter=Origo Gentis: The Literature of Germanic Origins |editor1-last=Murdoch |editor1-first=Brian |editor1-link=Brian O. Murdoch |editor2-last=Read |editor2-first=Malcolm |title=Early Germanic Literature and Culture |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PHqzR1XoV0QC |publisher=[[Boydell & Brewer]] |pages=149–170 |isbn=157113199X }} * {{cite book |last=Wood |first=Ian |author-link=Ian N. Wood |year=2013 |title=The Modern Origins of the Early Middle Ages |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=4X1pAgAAQBAJ |publisher=[[OUP Oxford]] |isbn=9780191654770 }} * {{cite web |url=https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/H1000186788/BIC?u=wikipedia&sid=BIC&xid=df4e414d |title=Peter Heather |year=2012 |website=Gale Literature: Contemporary Authors |publisher=[[Gale (publisher)|Gale]] |access-date=January 26, 2020 |ref={{sfnRef|Contemporary Authors}} }} * {{cite web |url=https://www.kcl.ac.uk/people/peter-heather |title=Professor Peter Heather |publisher=[[King's College London]] |access-date=January 26, 2020 |ref={{sfnRef|King's College}} }} * {{cite web |url=https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/K1649582741/BIC?u=wikipedia&sid=BIC&xid=8834f613 |title=Peter Heather |year=2018 |website=The Writer's Directory |publisher=[[St. James Press]] |access-date=January 26, 2020 |ref={{sfnRef|The Writer's Directory}} }} {{Refend}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Heather, Peter}} [[Category:1960 births]] [[Category:Living people]] [[Category:Academics of King's College London]] [[Category:Academics of University College London]] [[Category:Alumni of New College, Oxford]] [[Category:20th-century British historians]] [[Category:21st-century British historians]] [[Category:Fellows of Worcester College, Oxford]] [[Category:Historians from Northern Ireland]] [[Category:Male non-fiction writers from Northern Ireland]] [[Category:People educated at Maidstone Grammar School]] [[Category:Yale University faculty]] [[Category:Historians of the University of Oxford]]