Res Gestae

But while the emperor rushed hither and thither amid the foremost ranks of the combatants, our light-armed forces leaped forth upon them, and as the Persians turned in flight, they hacked at their legs and backs, and those of the elehants.

Julian, careless of his own safety, shouting and raising his hands tried to make it clear to his men that the enemy had fled in disorder, and, to rouse them to a still more furious pursuit, rushed boldly into the fight. His guards,[*](See Index II., vol. i, s.v. candidati; cf. xv. 5, 16.) who had scattered in their alarm, were crying to him from all sides to get clear of the mass of fugitives, as dangerous as the fall of a badly built roof, when suddenly—no one knows whence[*](Libanius said that he was killed by some Christian in his own army, but some other writers agree with Ammianus.) —a cavalryman’s spear grazed the skin of his arm, pierced his ribs, and lodged in the lower lobe of his liver.