[8] In 394 Arcadius briefly exercised independent power with the help of his advisors in Constantinople, when his father Theodosius went west to fight Arbogastes and Eugenius.

[11] However, when the prefect was called away to business in Antioch (where according to Zosimus, Rufinus had Lucianus, the comes orientis, flogged to death with whips loaded with lead),[12] Arcadius was shown a painting of Aelia Eudoxia, the daughter of the deceased Frankish magister militum per orientem, Bauto.

[16] The first crisis facing the young Arcadius was the Gothic revolt in 395, under the command of Alaric I (r. 395–410), who sought to take advantage of the accession of two inexperienced Roman emperors.

[17] As Alaric marched towards Constantinople, plundering Macedonia and Thrace, the eastern court could offer no response, as the majority of its army had gone to Italy with Theodosius and was now in the hands of Stilicho.

He traveled eastward, ostensibly to face Alaric, leading both his own forces and the Gothic mercenaries whom Theodosius had taken west in the civil war with Eugenius.

[25] At Eutropius's urging, Arcadius declared Stilicho to be a hostis publicus, and came to an arrangement with Alaric, making him magister militum per Illyricum.

[29] In the autumn of 397 he issued a law in Arcadius's name, targeting the Roman military, where any conspiracy involving soldiers or the barbarian regiments against persons holding the rank of illustris was considered to be treason, with the conspirators to be sentenced to death, and their descendants to be deprived of citizenship.

[32] Arcadius viewed this proposal with displeasure, but was convinced to support it by Eudoxia, who wished to take Eutropius's place as the main influence upon the emperor.

We have added to our treasury all the property of Eutropius, who was formerly the Praepositus sacri cubiculi, having stripped him of his splendour, and delivered the consulate from the foul stain of his tenure, and from the recollection of his name and the base filth thereof =; so that, all his acts having been repealed, all time may be dumb concerning him; and that the blot of our age may not appear by the mention of him; and that those who by their valour and wounds extend the Roman borders or guard the same by equity in the maintenance of law, may not groan over the fact that the divine reward of consulship has been befouled and defiled by a filthy monster.

That all the statues, all the images—whether of bronze or marble, or painted in colours, or of any other material used in art—we command to be abolished in all cities, towns, private and public places, that they may not, as a brand of infamy on our age, pollute the gaze of beholders.

[38][39] Arcadius also acquiesced when Gainas asked for the dismissal of further officials, such as the urban prefect Aurelianus, as well as a place for settlement for his troops in Thrace.

[41] By July 400, the actions of Gainas had irritated a significant portion of the population of Constantinople to the point that a general riot broke out in the capital.

[43] As many as 7,000 Goths were killed in the rioting; those who took refuge in a church were stoned and burned to death, after they received the emperor's permission, nor was it condemned by the Archbishop of Constantinople, John Chrysostom.

[44] Although initially staying his hand (probably through the intervention of the new Praetorian Prefect of the East Caesarius),[45] Gainas eventually withdrew with his Gothic mercenaries into Thrace and rebelled against Arcadius.

He attempted to take his forces across the Hellespont into Asia, but was intercepted and defeated by Fravitta, another Goth who held the position of magister militum praesentalis.

Arcadius procrastinated, but by 20 June 404, the emperor finally managed to get the Archbishop to submit, and he was taken away to his place of banishment, this time to Abkhazia in the Caucasus.

Stilicho, however, had lost patience with the eastern court, and in 407 encouraged Alaric and the Visigoths to seize the Praetorian prefecture of Illyricum and hand it over to the western empire.

Bury described him and his abilities thus: He was of short stature, of dark complexion, thin and inactive, and the dullness of his wit was betrayed by his speech and by his sleepy, drooping eyes.

[60]Traditional interpretations of the reign of Arcadius have revolved around his weakness as an Emperor, and the formulation of policy by prominent individuals (and the court parties that formed and regrouped round them) towards curtailing the increasing influence of barbarians in the military, which in Constantinople at this period meant the Goths.

[61] So, the revolt of Gainas, and the massacre of the Goths in Constantinople in 400, have traditionally been interpreted by scholars (such as Otto Seeck) as violent anti-barbarian reactions that prevented the rise of all-powerful Romanised barbarian military leaders—such as Stilicho was, in the West—in what has been termed the victory of anti-Germanism in the eastern empire.

[64] Recent scholarly research has revised this interpretation, and has instead favoured the interaction of personal ambition and enmities among the principal participants as being the leading cause for the court intrigue throughout Arcadius's reign.

[65] The current consensus can be summarised by the historian Thomas S. Burns: "Despite much civilian distrust and outright hatred of the army and the barbarians in it, there were no anti-barbarian or pro-barbarian parties at the court.