Res Gestae

After the survival of the events of an unendurable campaign,[*](Against Magnentius, who in 350 had assumed the rank of an Augustus in the west, with Veteranio; but was defeated, in 351, by Constantius at Mursa, on the river Drave, a tributary of the Danube and in the passes of the Cottian Alps in 353. His followers then abandoned him and he committed suicide. See Index.) when the spirits of both parties, broken by the variety of their dangers and hardships, were still drooping, before the blare of the trumpets had ceased or the soldiers been assigned to their winter quarters, the gusts of raging Fortune brought new storms upon the commonwealth through the misdeeds, many and notorious, of Gallus Caesar.[*](The title of Augustus was lawfully held only by the reigning emperor, or emperors. Caesar was the title next in rank and was conferred by the emperor on one or more of the imperial family; see Introd. p. xxiv.) He had been raised, at the very beginning of mature

To his cruelty his wife was besides a serious incentive, a woman beyond measure presumptuous because of her kinship to the emperor, and previously joined in marriage by her father Constantine with his brother’s son, King Hanniballianus.[*](Constantine had given him the rule of Pontus, Armenia Minor, and Cappadocia, but Constantius II., soon after his accession, had caused his assassination.) She, a Megaera[*](One of the Furies.) in mortal guise, constantly aroused the savagery of Gallus, being as insatiable as he in her thirst for human blood. The pair in process of time gradually became more expert in doing harm, and through underhand and crafty eavesdroppers, who had the evil habit of lightly adding to their information and wanting to learn only what was false and agreeable to them, they fastened upon innocent victims false charges of aspiring to royal power or of practising magic.

There stood out among their lesser atrocities, when their unbridled power had already surpassed the limits of unimportant delinquencies, the sudden and awful death of one Clematius, a nobleman of Alexandria. This man’s mother-in-law, it was said, had a violent passion for her son-in-law, but

After the perpetration of this impious deed, which now began to arouse the fears of others also, as if cruelty were given free rein, some persons were adjudged guilty on the mere shadow of suspicion and condemned. Of these some were put to death, others punished by the confiscation of their property and driven from their homes into exile, where, having nothing left save tears and complaints, they lived on the doles of charity; and since constitutional and just rule had given place to cruel caprice, wealthy and famous houses were being closed.

And no words of an accuser, even though bribed, were required amid these accumulations of evils, in order that these crimes might be committed, at least ostensibly, under the forms of law, as has sometimes been done by cruel emperors; but whatever the implacable Caesar had resolved upon was rushed to fulfilment, as if it had been carefully weighed and determined to be right and lawful.