Trump, Zelenskyy, and a Late Ancient Diplomatic Spat

In the wake of the now infamous Trump-Zelenskyy spat, this post looks at how a diplomatic encounter from Late Antiquity similarly turned ugly.

Last Friday evening (28th February 2025) I was in a London pub with some friends when the TV on the wall above us began to play, without sound, images of US President Donald Trump’s Oval Office meeting with Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the President of Ukraine. Though we could not hear what was being said, from the body language of the two leaders we could all see that discussions were not going well for Zelenskyy, with an irate-looking Trump jabbing his finger repeatedly at the Ukrainian leader. As it happened, things had certainly not proceeded according to Zelenskyy’s plans. Vice President JD Vance attacked him for perceived ingratitude and disrespect, while Trump was riled when the Ukrainian (perhaps ill-advisedly) seemed to suggest that the United States could also be affected by the conflict with Russia. Zelenskyy was then asked to leave the White House, with a proposed deal involving American investment in Ukrainian minerals being left unsigned.

Such scenes are shocking to modern eyes. While discussions can undoubtedly become tense and heated behind the scenes, world leaders today tend to present a visage of calmness and mutual respect when facing the cameras. In the Late Ancient world, there was of course no media to disseminate the contents of such discussions to the wider populace, but interactions between foreign dignitaries and royal or imperial potentates were nevertheless usually carefully stage-managed within the framework of formulaic court ritual. And yet despite the rigidity of this ceremonial, we see instances of diplomatic spats that may very well have shocked those present just as much as Trump and Zelenskyy’s confrontation left global audiences aghast today. Not only that, but these ancient encounters can to some extent serve as reminders of how little things have changed.

One such encounter, the subject of today’s post, occurred on the 17th November 375 CE, at the frontier fortress of Brigetio (modern Szőny, Hungary) on the Danube. Here, the notoriously ill-tempered Roman Emperor Valentinian I received a delegation from a local people known to the Romans as the Quadi. Responding to raids into the empire, Valentinian had been campaigning against them for two years, a war of terror that had even involved the murder of a Quadi chieftain at a banquet. The contemporary historian Ammianus Marcellinus (30.6) tells us that the Quadi envoys were seeking peace, promising to provide recruits for the Roman army in return. The Quadi were not an insignificant force, but the gulf in their political and military strength compared to that of the Romans was certainly huge, perhaps not dissimilar to that between the United States and Ukraine today. Like Zelenskyy, the Quadi ambassadors had arrived in Brigetio essentially as supplicants, in desperate need of a favour from a greater power in order to secure the survival of their people (though of course the US has not been attacking the Ukraine like the Romans were the Quadi).

The envoys were admitted into Valentinian’s presence, allegedly ‘stricken by fear.’ Meeting a Late Roman emperor was somewhat of an event in itself, involving specific rituals of approach and the performance of ceremonial obeisance all before an audience of courtiers and guardsmen. This is unlikely to have been just another day for the envoys, who would have not only had to perform for the imposing Valentinian, but also to other significant political figures such as the magister militum Aequitius, who Ammianus names as being there. Parallels might tentatively be drawn to the Oval Office meeting, where Zelenskyy sat surrounded by pro-Trump media (“Why don’t you wear a suit?” asked Brian Glenn of Real America’s Voice), whilst facing Trump’s top ‘courtiers’, including Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

Once before the Emperor, according to Ammianus the Quadi began making excuses for their raiding that had provoked Roman aggression. They claimed that their chieftains had not sanctioned the attacks, but that they had been carried out by ‘foreign brigands’ who dwelt near the Danube. The envoys then made a diplomatic error by suggesting that the raids had been somewhat justified anyway, as Valentinian himself had been building threatening fortifications in the region. Spoken to an infamously combative emperor, the remark belied the envoys’ inability to present their proposition in an appealing manner to their audience. Indeed, the quick-tempered Valentinian immediately began yelling at the Quadi, accusing them and their people of being ungrateful – they had forgotten how ‘kind’ the Romans had been to them in the past. This was surely a terrifying moment. In a letter written by Theodoret of Cyrrhus, speaking of a meeting he had with Emperor Theodosius II in 431, Theodoret pointedly remarks how Theodosius showed his displeasure and shock by stepping backwards and shaking out his purple robes (Acta Conciliorum Oecumenicorum 1.1.7, p.77). That this relatively subdued physical display received comment highlights how even a subtle expression like this could inform onlookers exactly how an emperor was feeling and how the audience was going. Valentinian’s vitriolic outburst must therefore have been truly shocking to onlookers and the nervous envoys, though perhaps some of the emperor’s courtiers were used to this sort of behaviour by now.

Like the Quadi, Zelenskyy was lectured by Vance on his ungratefulness towards a hegemonic United States. And, just as the envoys drew the wrath of Valentinian through their complaints about Roman fortifications, Zelenskyy managed something similar through his statement that, “first of all, during war, everyone has problems – even you, but you have a nice ocean and don’t feel it now, but you will feel it in the future.” This could be construed as somewhat of a veiled threat and it was certainly viewed as such by Trump who, having sat impassively during Vance’s accusations of ingratitude, began to lambast his counterpart, lecturing Zelenskyy on how he could not tell America how it would feel; how he had allowed himself to get into a bad position; and how he was gambling with World War Three. All the while, the Ukrainian Ambassador, Oksana Markarova, sat with her head in her hands. While many observers have justifiably argued that Zelenskyy was ambushed and treated with outright hostility by Trump and his hangers on, he was also unable to bring the right level of tactful brownnosing to the discussions (he should have perhaps looked to the sickening but effective example set by Britain’s Keir Starmer a few days earlier). Ultimately, both the Quadi and Zelenskyy failed to approach and engage with their respective despotic egomaniacs in the ‘correct’ manner.

It is here that our narratives diverge somewhat. So animated did Valentinian become in his outburst that he appears to have had a haemorrhage of some kind, possibly a stroke. Ammianus tells us that the Emperor became flushed and speechless and, before he could fall down in front of the court, his servants quickly pulled him away to an inner chamber where, after several attempts to treat him, he died. This of course did not happen in the Oval Office last week, and, in apparent good health, Donald Trump continues to criticise and berate Zelenskyy.

Time will tell whether Ukraine’s president is able to patch up his spat with Trump and get the support from the US that his country requires, although at the time of writing this seems somewhat unlikely. For the Quadi, whose mistake may have potentially led to more misery and suffering for their people (be it harsher terms or continued war), the sudden death of Valentinian allowed them to breathe a sigh of relief. The court and army decided to halt further operations against them, tearing down a bridge that had been built over the Danube and recalling the general Merobaudes. Gratian, Valentinian’s son and successor, did not campaign against them during his reign, being instead preoccupied with operations against the Alamanni and the Goths.

The scenes that the world witnessed in the Oval Office last Friday have heralded a fresh wave of trepidation amongst not only Ukrainians, but many people across Europe. The footage has shocked many and yet the interaction has been played out many times before, happening in the ancient world as well. Looking at the account of Valentinian and the Quadi there are several parallels: the power imbalance between the ‘weaker’ nation and the hegemon it is approaching; the importance of said hegemon’s ego and how that must be assuaged; and the rhetoric of attack and complaint employed by those negotiating. No comparison between current events and those of 1700 years ago will ever be perfect, but I think it has been illustrated that we are likely not as far removed from a world of imperial courts and all their rituals of power and ceremony as we might think we are.

Dr Henry Anderson, Teacher in Late Antiquity