Res Gestae

While all scattered in flight over unknown paths, the emperor, hedged about by dire terrors, and slowly treading over heaps of corpses, took refuge with the lancers and the mattiarii,[*](See xxi. 13, 16, note) who, so long as the vast numbers of the enemy could be sustained, had stood unshaken with bodies firmly planted. On seeing him Trajanus cried that all hope was gone, unless the emperor, abandoned by his body-guard, should at least be protected by his foreign auxiliaries.

On hearing this the general called Victor hastened to bring quickly to the emperor’s aid the Batavi, who had been posted not far off as a reserve force; but when he could find none of them, he retired and went away. And in the same way Richomeres and Saturninus made their escape from danger.

And so the barbarians, their eyes blazing with frenzy, were pursuing our men, in whose veins the blood was chilled with numb horror: some fell without knowing who struck them down, others

Besides all this, the roads were blocked by many who lay mortally wounded, lamenting the torment of their wounds; and with them also mounds of fallen horses filled the plains with corpses. To these ever irreparable losses, so costly to the Roman state, a night without the bright light of the moon put an end.

At the first coming of darkness the emperor, amid the common soldiers as was supposed (for no one asserted that he had seen him or been with him), fell mortally wounded by an arrow, and presently breathed his last breath; and he was never afterwards found anywhere.[*](Libanius Orat. xxiv. II, p. 515 (Foerster), agrees with this account, but adds that the emperor might have saved himself on horseback, but did not wish to survive the defeat of his army, and died fighting. The other authorities agree with the following account of Ammianus.) For since a few of the foe were active for long in the neighbourhood for the purpose of robbing the dead, no one of the fugitives or of the natives ventured to approach the spot.

The Caesar Decius, we are told, met a similar fate;[*](Cf. Zosimus, iv. 24.) for when he was fiercely fighting with the barbarians and his horse, whose excitement he could not restrain, stumbled and threw him, he fell into a marsh, from which he could not get out, nor could his body be found.

Others say that Valens did not give up the ghost at once, but with his bodyguard[*](See Index II, Vol. I.) and a few eunuchs was taken to a peasant’s cottage near by, well fortified in its second storey; and while he was being treated by unskilful hands, he was surrounded by the enemy, who did not know who he was, but was

For while the pursuers were trying to break open the bolted doors, they were assailed with arrows from a balcony of the house; and fearing through the inevitable delay to lose the opportunity for pillage, they piled bundles of straw and firewood about the house, set fire to them, and burned it men and all.

From it one of the bodyguard leaped through a window, but was taken by the enemy; when he told them what had happened, he filled them with sorrow at being cheated of great glory, in not having taken the ruler of the Roman empire alive. This same young man, having later escaped and returned secretly to our army, gave this account of what had occurred.

When Spain had been recovered, with a similar disaster the second of the Scipios,[*](I.e., Cn. Cornelius Scipio Calvus, 212 B.C. Livy, xxv. 36, 13.) we are told, was burned with a tower in which he had taken refuge and which the enemy had set on fire.[*](Cf. Livy, xxv. 36, 13; Appian, Bell. Hisp. 3, 16 (Rom. Hist. vi. 3, 16).) This much, at any rate, is certain, that neither Scipio nor Valens had the fortune of burial[*](Cf. Iliad, 456; Virg., Aen. xi. 22; Val. Max. iv. 4, 2.) which is death’s final honour.

Amid this manifold loss of distinguished men, the deaths of Trajanus and Sebastianus stood out. With them fell thirty-five tribunes, without special assignments, and leaders of bodies of troops,[*](On numeri, see xiv. 7, 19; on vacantes, Introd., Vol. I, p. xliv.) as well as Valerianus and Aequitius, the one having charge of the stables, the other, of the Palace. Among these also Potentius lost his life in the first flower of his youth; he was tribune of the promoti,[*](See xv. 4, 10, note 3, and Index II, Vol. I.) respected by all good men and honoured both for his own services and those of his father Ursicinus, formerly a commander-in-chief. Certain

The annals record no such massacre of a battle except the one at Cannae, although the Romans more than once, deceived by trickery due to an adverse breeze of Fortune, yielded for a time to illsuccess in their wars, and although the storied dirges of the Greeks have mourned over many a contest.

Thus then died Valens, at the age of almost fifty and after a reign of a little less than fourteen years.[*](As a matter of fact, he reigned four months more than fourteen years, having been made Augustus by his brother in March of the year 364. He lost his life Aug. 8, 378. Pseud.-Aur. Vict. Epit. 46, gives 13 years and 5 months; Socrates and Sozomenus give 16 years.)

Of his merits, as known to many, we shall now speak, and of his defects. He was a firm and faithful friend, severe in punishing ambitious designs, strict in maintaining discipline in the army and in civil life, always watchful and anxious lest anyone should elevate himself on the ground of kinship with him; he was excessively slow towards conferring or taking away official positions,[*](Cf. xviii. 6, 22; xxiii. 5, 15; xxvii. 6, 4.) very just in his rule of the provinces, each of which he protected from injury as he would his own house, lightening the burden of tributes with a kind of special care, allowing no increase in taxes, not extortionate in estimating the indebtedness from arrears,[*](To the crown in payment for supplies; cf. xvi. 5, 15, tributariae rei reliqua; Spart. Hadr. 6, 5; 21, 7 and 12.) a harsh and bitter enemy of thievish officials and of those

Besides all this, he combined liberality with moderation, and although there are many instances of such conduct, yet it will suffice to set forth one. Since there are always at court some men who are greedy for others’ possessions, if anyone, as often happens, claimed a lapsed estate[*](I.e., one which had fallen to the emperor for lack of heirs.) or anything else of the kind, he distinguished clearly between justice and injustice, allowing those who intended to protest[*](That is, the former owners or other interested parties.) a chance to state their case; and if he gave it to the petitioner, he often added as sharers in the gifts gained three or four absentees, to the end that restless people might act with more restraint, when they saw that by this device the gain for which they were so greedy was diminished.

As to the public buildings which he restored or built from their very beginning in various cities and towns, in order not to be prolix I say nothing, but leaving this matter to the objects themselves to demonstrate it more obviously than I can. Such conduct is worthy, I think, of emulation by all good men; let me now run through his defects.

He was immoderately desirous of great wealth, and impatient of toil, rather affecting awesome austerity than possessing it, and somewhat inclined to cruelty; he had rather an uncultivated mind, and was trained neither in the art of war nor in liberal studies; he was ready to gain advantage and profit at the expense of others’ suffering, and more intolerable when he attributed offences that were committed to contempt of, or injury to, the imperial dignity; then he vented his rage in