Res Gestae

Ammianus Marcellinus

Ammianus Marcellinus. Ammianus Marcellinus, with an English translation, Vols. I-III. Rolfe, John C., translator. Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press; W. Heinemann, 1935-1940 (printing).

Symmachus was succeeded as prefect of the city by Lampadius,[*](In 365.) a former praetorian prefect, a man who took it very ill if even his manner of spitting was not praised, on the ground that he did that also with greater skill than anyone else; but yet he was sometimes strict and honest.

When this man, in his praetorship, gave magnificent games and made very rich largesses, being unable to endure

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the blustering of the commons, who often urged that many things should be given to those who were unworthy of them,[*](Such as mimes, actors, and charioteers; cf. xiv. 6, 14.) in order to show his generosity and his contempt of the mob, he summoned some beggars from the Vatican[*](The Vatican hill, where there was an Apostles’ Church before whose doors the people begged for alms.) and presented them with valuable gifts.

But of his vanity, not to digress too far, it will suffice to give this single instance, insignificant indeed, but something to be shunned by high officials. For through all quarters of the city which had been adorned at the expenses of various emperors, he had his own name inscribed, not as the restorer of old buildings, but as their founder. From this fault the emperor Trajan also is said to have suffered, and for that reason he was jestingly called wall-wort.[*](Pseud.-Aurel. Victor, Epit. 41, 13, says that Constantine gave this name to Trajan, because he had his name put on many buildings (ob titulos multis aedibus inscriptos).)

As prefect, Lampadius was disturbed by frequent outbreaks, the greatest of all being when a mob, composed of the dregs of the populace, by throwing fire-brands and fire-darts upon his house near the Baths of Constantine would have burned it, had not his friends and neighbours quickly rushed to the spot and driven them off by pelting them with stones and tiles from the house-tops.

He himself, terrified by such violence in the first stages of a growing tumult, fled to the Mulvian bridge[*](See Livy, xxvii. 51, 2, for the first reference to this bridge (207 B. C.).) — which the elder Scaurus[*](So also Pseud.-Aur. Vict., De Viris III. 72, 8. This is M. Aemilius Scaurus, censor in 110 B.C., but the Pons Mulvius (Ponte Molle) must have been built as early as 220 B.C., to carry the Via Flaminia across the Tiber, and Scaurus restored it. Mulvius is unknown.) is said to have built—as though to wait there for the cessation of the tumult,

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which a serious cause had aroused.

For when preparing to erect new buildings or restoring old ones, he did not order materials to be obtained from the usual taxes,[*](I.e., a fund set aside for such purposes; see Exc. 67. For tituli see xxx. 5, 6.) but if there was need of iron, lead, bronze, or anything of the kind, attendants were set on, in order that they might, under pretence of buying the various articles, seize them without paying anything. In consequence, he was barely able by swift flight to avoid the anger of the incensed poor, who had repeated losses to lament.