ABSTRACT
The peace treaty that the emperor Commodus concluded with the Germans in the year 180 certainly banished external threats from Noricum's Danubian frontier for several decades. The consequences of the Marcomannic Wars could not, however, be ignored. The revolutionary changes in the economic, sodal and political structure of the Roman empire, which in the third century were to produce a situation of general and continuing crisis, made a difference to life in Noricum no less than elsewhere. The period in the history of the province from the Marcomannic Wars to the reign of Diocletian saw conditions change in many respects. Noricum did not remain unaffected by the crisis in the empire. The political, military and finandal administration was to take new forms. The appearance of the Alamanni not far from the north-western sector of the frontier was soon to bring dangers to the province, increasing thereby its strategie significance; in the third century Noricum was frequently the scene of military action. Town and country, the sodety and the economy, all presented a changed picture with the onset of the crisis. There were, too, changes in the spirituallife of the people.
