Res Gestae

When affairs had reached this stage in Isauria, the king of Persia,[*](Sapor, see Index.) involved in war with his neighbours, was driving back from his frontiers a number of very wild tribes which, with inconsistent policy, often make hostile raids upon his territories and sometimes aid him when he makes war upon us. One of his grandees, Nohodares by name, having received orders to invade Mesopotamia whenever occasion offered, was carefully reconnoitring our territory, intending a sudden incursion in case he found any opening.

And as all the districts of Mesopotamia, being exposed to frequent raids, were protected by frontier-guards and country garrisons, Nohodares, having turned his course to the left, had beset the remotest parts of Osdroene, attempting a novel and all but unprecedented manœuvre; and if he had succeeded, he would have devastated the whole region like a thunderbolt. Now what he planned was the following.

The town of Batne, founded in Anthemusia in early times by a band of Macedonians, is separated by a short space from the river Euphrates; it is filled with wealthy traders when, at the yearly festival, near the beginning of the month of September, a great crowd of every condition gathers for the fair, to traffic in the wares sent from India and China, and in other articles that are regularly brought there in great abundance by land and sea.

This district the above-mentioned leader made ready to invade, on the days set for this celebration, through the wilderness and the grass-covered banks of the river Abora; but he was betrayed by information

The Saracens, however, whom we never found desirable either as friends or as enemies, ranging up and down the country, in a brief space of time laid waste whatever they could find, like rapacious kites which, whenever they have caught sight of any prey from on high, seize it with swift swoop, and directly they have seized it make off.

Although I recall having told of their customs in my history of the emperor Marcus,[*](In one of the lost books.) and several times after that, yet I will now briefly relate a few more particulars about them.

Among those tribes whose original abode extends from the Assyrians to the cataracts of the Nile and the frontiers of the Blemmyae all alike are warriors of equal rank, half-nude, clad in dyed cloaks as far as the loins, ranging widely with the help of swift horses and slender camels in times of peace or of disorder. No man ever grasps a plough-handle or cultivates a tree, none seeks a living by tilling the soil, but they rove continually over wide and extensive tracts without a home, without fixed abodes or laws; they cannot long endure the same sky, nor does the sun of a single district ever content them.

Their life is always on the move, and they have mercenary wives, hired under a temporary contract. But in order that there may be some semblance of matrimony, the future wife, by way of dower, offers

Moreover, they wander so widely as long as they live, that a woman marries in one place, gives birth in another, and rears her children far away, without being allowed any opportunity for rest.

They all feed upon game and an abundance of milk, which is their main sustenance, on a variety of plants, as well as on such birds as they are able to take by fowling; and I have seen many of them who were wholly unacquainted with grain and wine.

So much for this dangerous tribe. Let us now return to our original theme.

While this was happening in the East, Constantius was passing the winter at Arelate, where he gave entertainments in the theatre and the circus with ostentatious magnificence. Then, on the 10th of October, which completed the thirtieth year of his reign,[*](This dates his reign from A.D. 323, when he and his brothers Constantine and Crispus were appointed Caesars by Constantine the Great. He became an Augustus with Constantine II. and Constans in 337, and reigned alone, after the death of Magnentius, from 353 to 361. The actual date seems to have been November 8th, 323; see Dessau, Inser. Lat. 708, note 2, and cf. De Jonge, p. 124, citing Seeck.) giving greater weight to his arrogance and accepting every false or doubtful charge as evident and proven, among other atrocities he tortured Gerontius, a count of the party of Magnentius,[*](See note, p. 1 and Index.) and visited him with the sorrow of exile.

And, as an ailing body is apt to be affected even by slight annoyances, so his narrow and sensitive mind, thinking that every sound indicated something done or planned at the expense of his safety, made his

For if anyone of the military commanders or ex-officials,[*](The honorati were former civil officials; cf. xxix 1, 9, abunde honoratum; Asiam quippe rexerat pro praefectis. ) or one of high rank in his own community, was accused even by rumour of having favoured the party of the emperor’s opponent, he was loaded with chains and dragged about like a wild beast. And whether a personal enemy pressed the charge or no one at all, as though it was enough that he had been named, informed against, or accused, he was condemned to death, or his property confiscated, or he was banished to some desert island.

Moreover his harsh cruelty, whenever the majesty of the empire was said to be insulted, and his angry passions and unfounded suspicions were increased by the bloodthirsty flattery of his courtiers, who exaggerated everything that happened and pretended to be greatly troubled by the thought of an attempt on the life of a prince on whose safety, as on a thread, they hypocritically declared that the condition of the whole world depended.

And he is even said to have given orders that no one who had ever been punished for these or similar offences should be given a new trial after a writ of condemnation[*](That is, a tablet on which the charge and the punishment were recorded. This was sometimes handed to the emperor by a judge, cf. Suet., Calig. 27, 1, sometimes issued by the emperor himself; see Amm. xiv. 7, 2; xix. 12, 9.) had once been presented to him in the usual manner, which even the most inexorable emperors commonly allowed. And this fatal fault of cruelty, which in others sometimes grew less with advancing age, in his case became more violent, since a group of flatterers intensified his stubborn resolution.

Prominent among these was the state secretary[*](See Introd., p. xxx.) Paulus, a native of Spain, a kind of viper, whose countenance concealed his character, but who was extremely clever in scenting out hidden means of danger for others. When he had been sent to Britain to fetch some officers who had dared to conspire with Magnentius, since they could make no resistance he autocratically exceeded his instructions and, like a flood, suddenly overwhelmed the fortunes of many, making his way amid manifold slaughter and destruction, imprisoning freeborn men and even degrading some with handcuffs; as a matter of fact, he patched together many accusations with utter disregard of the truth, and to him was due an impious crime, which fixed an eternal stain upon the time of Constantius.

Martinus, who was governing those provinces as substitute for the prefects, deeply deplored the woes suffered by innocent men; and after often begging that those who were free from any reproach should be spared, when he failed in his appeal he threatened to retire, in the hope that, at least through fear of this, that malevolent man-hunter might finally cease to expose to open danger men naturally given to peace.

Paulus thought that this would interfere with his profession, and being a formidable artist in devising complications, for which reason he was nicknamed The Chain, since the substitute continued to defend those whom he was appointed to govern, Paulus involved even him in the common peril, threatening to bring him also in chains to the emperor’s court, along with the tribunes and many others. Thereupon Martinus, alarmed at this threat, and thinking

After perpetrating these atrocious crimes, Paulus, stained with blood, returned to the emperor’s camp, bringing with him many men almost covered with chains and in a state of pitiful filth and wretchedness. On their arrival, the racks were made ready and the executioner prepared his hooks and other instruments of torture. Many of the prisoners were proscribed, others driven into exile; to some the sword dealt the penalty of death. For no one easily recalls the acquittal of anyone in the time of Constantius when an accusation against him had even been whispered.