Res Gestae

At the end of the winter Sapor, king of the[*](371 A.D.) Persian nations, made immoderately arrogant by the confidence inspired by his former battles, having filled up the number of his army and greatly strengthened it, had sent his mailed horsemen, archers, and mercenary soldiers to invade our territories.

To meet these forces the general Trajanus and Vadomarius, the former king of the Alamanni,

When they had come to Vagabanta,[*](In Mesopotamia.) a favourable place for the legions, they met unwillingly the swift attacks of the enemy’s cavalry fiercely rushing upon them, and purposely retreated, in order not to be first to wound anyone of their adversaries and thus be judged guilty of violating the treaty; but at last, driven by extreme necessity, they engaged in battle, and, after slaying many of the Persians, came off victorious.

But during the delay which followed, several skirmishes were tried by both sides, which ended with varying results; and an armistice having been concluded by common consent, and the summer having ended, the leaders of both sides departed in different directions, still at enmity with each other. Now the king[*](Sapor.) of the Parthians returned home, to spend the winter in Ctesiphon; but the Roman emperor entered Antioch. And while the latter was staying there, free from anxiety from foreign foes for the time, he almost fell victim to domestic treason, as an account of the series of events will show.

A certain Procopius, a turbulent man, always[*](371–2 A.D.) given over to a lust for disturbances, had charged two courtiers named Anatolias and Spudasius, about whom orders had been given that money of which they had defrauded the treasury be exacted of them, with having attempted the life of Count Fortunatianus, notorious as being a tiresome dunner. He, being hot-tempered, was immediately aroused to a mad degree of wrath, and by the authority of the office

But when they came to a vigorous investigation of the deed, or the attempt, Palladius boldly cried out that those matters about which they were inquiring were trivial and negligible; that if he were allowed to speak, he would tell of other things more important and fearful, which had already been plotted with great preparations, and unless foresight were used would upset the whole state. And on being bidden to tell freely what he knew, he uncoiled an endless cable of crimes,[*](Cf. Cic., De Div. i. 56, 127, est quasi rudentis explicatio. ) declaring that the ex-governor Fidustius, and Pergamius, with Irenaeus, by detestable arts of divination, had secretly learned the name of the man who was to succeed Valens.

Fidustius was seized on the spot—for he chanced to be near by —and was brought up secretly, and on being faced with the informer, he did not attempt to veil with any denial a matter already publicly known, but disclosed the deadly details of the whole plot; he freely admitted that he had, with Hilarius and Patricius, men skilled in divination, of whom the former had served in the household troops, sought information about the succession, and that the predictions inspired by secret arts had both foretold the naming of an excellent prince, and for the questioners themselves a sad end.

And while they were in doubt who there was at the time

Fidustius, already tortured almost to death, also added to this that Theodorus had learned all these prophecies from information which he himself had given him through Euserius, a man of remarkable learning and highly honoured; for shortly before that he had governed Asia with the rank of vice-prefect.

When Euserius also was put in prison, and the record of what had been done had been read to the emperor as usual, Valens’ monstrous savagery spread everywhere like a fiercely blazing torch, and was increased by the base flattery of many men, and in particular by that of Modestus,[*](Because of his services in these inquiries he was made consul by Valens in the following year. Greg. Naz. also charges him with servile flattery of the emperor.) who was then praetorian prefect.

This man, being daily terrified by the thought of a successor, by tricking Valens, who was somewhat simple-minded, with veiled but clever flattery tried to wheedle over the emperor’s favour in various ways, calling his rough, crude words

Accordingly, orders were given that Theodorus also should be with swift dispatch hurried there[*](That is, to Antioch, where Valens was.) from Constantinople, to which he had gone on domestic business, and while he was being brought back, as the result of sundry preliminary trials, which were carried on day and night, a number of men, conspicuous for their rank and high birth, were brought from widely separated places.

And, since neither the public dungeons, already full to overflowing, nor private houses could contain the throngs of prisoners, although they were crammed together in hot and stifling crowds, and since the greater number of them were in irons, they all dreaded their own fate and that of their nearest relatives.

Finally Theodorus himself also arrived, half dead with fear and in mourning garb, and when he had been hidden in a remote part of the country,[*](I.e., the country about Antioch.) and everything was ready that the coming inquiries required, the trumpets were already sounding the signal for the murder of citizens.

And because that man does not seem less deceitful who knowingly passes over what has been done, than one who invents things that never happened, I do not deny—and in fact there is no doubt about it—that Valens’ life, not only often before through secret conspiracies, but also on this occasion, was plunged into extreme danger, and that a sword was almost driven into his throat by the soldiers; it was thrust away and turned aside by the hand of Fate only because she had destined him to

For when he was quietly sleeping after midday in a wooded spot between Antioch and Seleucia, he was attacked by Sallustius, then one of the targeteers; but although at other times many men often eagerly made plots against his life, he escaped them all, since the limits of life assigned him at his very birth curbed these monstrous attempts.

The same thing sometimes happened during the reigns of Commodus and Severus, whose life was often attempted with extreme violence, until finally the one, after escaping many varied dangers within the palace, as he was entering the pit of the amphitheatre to attend the games, was dangerously wounded with a dagger by the senator Quintianus, a man of unlawful ambition, and almost disabled;[*](Ammianus agrees with Herodian, i. 8, 5, but Dio, Epit., lxxiii. 4, 1–5; Lamprid., Comm., 4, 2–4, and Zonaras, xii. 41 (p. 598) call him Claudius Pompeianus. Apparently his name was Quintianus Pompeianus.) the other, when far advanced in years, would have been stabbed by the centurion Saturninus (who at the instigation of the prefect Plautianus made an unexpected attack on him as he lay in bed) had not his young son borne him aid.

Therefore Valens also deserved excuse for taking every precaution to protect his life, which treacherous foes were trying in haste to take from him. But it was inexcusable that, with despotic anger, he was swift to assail with malicious persecution guilty and innocent under one and the same law, making no distinction in their deserts; so that while there was still doubt about the crime, the emperor had made up his mind about the penalty, and some learned that they had been condemned to death before knowing that they were under suspicion.

This persistent purpose of his increased, spurred on as it was both by his own greed and that of persons who frequented the court at that time, and opened the way to fresh

For he was exposed and open to the approach of plotters through his dangerous tendency to two faults: first, he was more prone to intolerable anger, when to be angry at all was shameful; secondly, in his princely pride he did not condescend to sift the truth of what, with the readiness of access of a man in private life, he had heard in secret whispers, but accepted as true and certain.