CHAPTER IX . THE IMPERIAL RECOVERY

I.

AURELIAN ‘RESTITUTOR ORBIS’

 

WHEN plague laid low the conqueror of the Goths at Sirmium in the January of a.d. 270, his task was still far from ended and the choice of a successor was of vital importance, Quintillus, own brother of Claudius, was the nominee of the Senate, supported no doubt by that part of the army that was with him at Aquileia. But neither legitimacy of succession nor integrity of character could long sustain his position. After a reign of a very few months, of which we know as good as nothing, he succumbed to the man of destiny, Aurelian, who had only to show himself at army-headquarters at Sirmium to secure the voice of the troops. At the death of Claudius he had been engaged in the operations against the Goths, and this preoccupation gave Quintillus time to issue coins in all the imperial mints except Antioch, which, under orders from Zenobia, suspended issue. The news of Aurelian’s elevation was the death-warrant of Quintillus, whether or no the sentence was carried out by his own hand.

The new Emperor was of humble birth, perhaps a native of Sirmium, a tough soldier of the new school, trained in the camp and imbued with its ideals. His nickname, ‘Hand on hilt’ (‘Manu ad ferrum’), gives a vivid idea of the impression that he made on his contemporaries. A man of great strength of body and mind, a fine soldier and disciplinarian, he was as deficient in tact and flexibility as he was firm in courage and purpose. The long account of his early career in the Augustan History makes heavy demands on our credulity, but certainly by the end of the reign of Gallienus he was a leading figure among the Illyrian officers and took a prominent part in the plot against Gallienus and the subsequent execution of Aureolus. Appointed master of the horse by Claudius, he distinguished himself in the great Gothic war and, whether or not marked out by him for the succession, had, as we have seen, no difficulty in securing it after his death. The task awaiting him was one to tax even his powers. The restoration of the Empire, begun by Claudius, was as yet far from complete. The Gallic Empire in the West, the Palmyrenes in the East still marred the imperial unity. If the Danube front was assured, Italy was still exposed to invasion from north and north-east. Behind the problems of military recovery lay those of political and economic life. The government of the provinces, the relation of Emperor and Senate, the ruined coinage—all these demanded attention, as soon as a breathing-space could be obtained from war. The Empire was in a state of transition. The old Empire of the princeps and Senate, of Rome and Italy as queens of the provinces, was dead or dying; a new society, with new social and new religious ideals, was being born. If Aurelian was only partially successful, the wonder remains that in so few years, with such limited natural gifts, he could accomplish so much.

For the moment it seemed doubtful whether the new emperor was to be allowed to approach his major tasks. The Juthungi (Scythians) had invaded Italy through Raetia, and Aurelian had to march direct from Sirmium against them. He caught them on their retreat and defeated them as they crossed the Danube. They then sent envoys to minimize this reverse and to demand the customary subsidies. Dexippus well describes their reception in state by Aurelian, in the presence of statues of the deified emperors and of the insignia of the Roman army, and the resolute answer given to their elaborate and sophisticated pleadings. In the end, it seems, they were glad to return home without further loss. It appears that Aurelian now visited Rome and received the recognition of the Senate, but that almost immediately afterwards an invasion of Vandals called army and emperor to Pannonia. Over this enemy Aurelian gained no uncertain victory. An embassy was heard by Aurelian and peace was granted by the will of the army; but, to secure supplies and safe return, the Vandals bound themselves to give 2000 cavalry to the Roman service. A body of 500 that broke faith was summarily destroyed. Meanwhile the Juthungi (‘Marcomanni’), unconvinced by Aurelian’s arguments or arms, again invaded Italy, and, this time, the danger was acute. Aurelian, coming on them near Placentia, dared to propose their capitulation, but was caught in an ambush and so heavily defeated that his cause seemed almost hopeless. The barbarians, however, scattered to plunder, while Aurelian put the cities of Northern Italy in a state of defence and concentrated his forces. Three striking victories—on the Metaurus, at Fanum Fortunae and near Ticinum—completed their discomfiture, and all that was left of the great host wandered home. The favour of the gods, sought by the consultation of the Sibylline books, had again saved Rome. Aurelian was to have time to show his true worth.

The Senate had looked on without enthusiasm at the first labours of an emperor who was not of its own choice. Some of its members had even ventured to conspire against him. Now it could only accept him for better or worse: thanksgivings were decreed for his victories, and none dared question the stern revenge which he took on his enemies. The one challenge to his authority came from a different quarter. The mint-officials, who had ‘debased the coinage,’ rose in revolt under Felicissimus, the master of the mint. If the story of the 7000 soldiers lost in the bitter fighting on the Caelian Mount is even remotely true, we must suppose that the grievances of the moneyers were shared by many outside their ranks and that Aurelian had to deal with something like a civil war. The mint of Rome was reduced in size and, perhaps, for a short time even closed, while something was done to improve the faulty coinage, though it hardly merits as yet the name of a reform. One step now taken by Aurelian gave evidence of his sound judgment and care for the State. To guard Rome against any repetition of such a threat as the invasion of the Juthungi, he surrounded the capital with new walls. The work, undertaken in consultation with the Senate and with the assistance of guilds of City workmen, was begun in 271 but only ended under Probus. The new walls were not elaborate fortifications designed to stand a long siege, but a barely adequate defence against sudden barbarian attack. The total length was twelve miles, the normal height twenty feet, the width twelve. There were eighteen gates, single or double, frequent sally-ports and towers for artillery. The walls in general followed the old Customs boundary. The plan of the work shows clearly that it was built by civilian labour: the hands of the soldiers were needed for other tasks. Meanwhile the authority of Aurelian was challenged abroad. Septimius in Dalmatia, Urbanus and Domitianus in places unknown, revolted, but were speedily crushed.

On the Danube frontiers an important change was made during this year. Aurelian withdrew Roman troops and civilians from Dacia, ‘desperans earn posse retineri,’ and formed a new province of Dacia on the right bank of the Danube, comprising parts of Moesia, Dardania and Thrace and with its capital at Serdica. Allusions to ‘Dacia Felix’ on coins of Milan and the coinage of a new mint at Serdica itself prove the date a.d. 271 to be pre­ferable to 275.

Aurelian was now free to turn his attention to the major problems of imperial restoration. The Gallic Empire, under Tetricus I, was pacific and threatened no immediate danger: it was essentially Roman and its interests in the main were those of Rome. But the Palmyrenes, even if nominally loyal subjects, were in fact a foreign people, threatening, under diplomatic forms, to undermine all Roman authority in the East. The concordat between Zenobia and Claudius had broken down even before his death. The Palmyrenes had gained a hold on Egypt, even if not full control of Alexandria, and Zenobia was pushing her occupation of Asia as far north as the Hellespont. The coins that appear in the first year of Aurelian both at Antioch and Alexandria, with head of Aurelian on one side balanced by head of Vaballathus on the other, have been claimed as evidence of the recognition of the Palmyrene prince by Rome. The titles ‘vir clarissimus rex imperator dux Romanorum’ define the place of Vaballathus under the new concordat. When we reflect, however, that this ‘Concordia’ coinage leads on directly to independent issues of Vaballathus and Zenobia, that the mint-mark below the head of Aurelian marks his as the reverse (secondary) side of the Antioch coins, and that there are no certain allusions to Vaballathus on the coins of any of Aurelian’s own mints, we are led to a different view. The concordat represents either a one-sided offer on the part of Palmyra alone, or, at most, a grudging concession by Aurelian, like the brief toleration extended later as a temporary necessity by Diocletian and Maximian to the British Empire of Carausius. No sooner was Aurelian free in Italy than he produced his own solution of the Palmyrene problem.

In the summer of a.d. 271 Aurelian marched by land through the Balkans, collecting his forces as he went and stopping for a moment to destroy a Gothic raider, Cannabas (Cannabaudes), and 5000 men on the far side of the Danube. The outlying provinces added by Zenobia to her Empire were soon recovered. Egypt, too, returned to her allegiance, whether coerced by a separate expedition or not. The joint coinage of Aurelian and Vaballathus at Alexandria was struck in two years, 269—70, 270—1; early in 271—after March 11th—followed the independent coinage of Vaballathus and Zenobia, but, before the end of August, the mint was again striking for Aurelian alone. As Aurelian advanced, the Palmyrenes withdrew from the Hellespont. He moved from Byzantium to Ancyra and found none to challenge him till Tyana closed her gates against him. A short siege was ended by the treachery of a native, Heraclammon, and Aurelian, moved even more by motives of State than by a vision of the seer, Apollonius, spared the city. The serious fighting was still to come.

Zenobia is one of the most romantic figures of history. As consort of Odenathus and then as regent for her little son, Vaballathus, she showed the spirit and courage of a man in the great crisis of her country’s destiny. She had a taste for Greek culture, drew such a famous rhetorician as Longinus to her court, and sought to win the favour of the Greek element among her subjects. To Egypt she was attached not only by political and commercial connections, but also by a deep knowledge of Egyptian letters and a special devotion to Cleopatra, whom she set before her as an example. Through her patronage of Paul of Samosata, who contended with Domnus for the possession of the see of Antioch, she could bid for the support of the Christian population. Now, as Aurelian approached, the fear of his wrath and the example of his mercy at Tyana drew the Greeks from her cause. The oracles of Seleuceia and Aphaca returned discouraging answers to her inquiries. The priests were probably good judges of politics, and condemned Zenobia for her rashness in challenging rather than conciliating her great antagonist.

Egypt had surrendered without a blow, and it was at Antioch in Syria that Zabdas, Palmyra’s best general, had concentrated his forces. Now, as Aurelian approached, he marched out northwards to meet him on the banks of the Orontes. Aurelian brought with him troops from Raetia, Noricum, Dalmatia, Pannonia and Moesia, with barbarian auxiliaries, while local levies, including ‘clubmen’ from Palestine, joined him later. Zabdas had the remains at least of two Roman legions among his infantry, but rested his hopes even more on the Palmyrene archers and the heavy cavalry, the clibanarii—mounted on huge horses, in armour that covered man and beast. Aurelian himself was a professional commander of cavalry and disposed of an excellent corps of Moorish and Dalmatian light horse. At his express orders, these gave way before the first onslaught of the mailed knights. Only when these were exhausted by their exertions did they turn back on them and discomfit them. The decision thus won, Aurelian sent his infantry across the Orontes on the left flank of the enemy and completed the rout. Zabdas retired to Antioch, parading a false Aurelian as his captive, evacuated the city without further disaster and left a small garrison in a strong post at Daphne. Aurelian was welcomed by the Antiochenes and requited their surrender with mercy. He confirmed the claims of Domnus as against those of Paul, on the ground that it was he who was endorsed by the bishops of Rome and Italy, and thus won the goodwill of a part at least of the Christian community. Aurelian then stormed the post at Daphne, and followed Zabdas, by way of Apamea, Larisa and Arethusa, to Emesa, whither Zabdas had withdrawn, instead of by the direct route to Emesa, in order to gain time for Persian assistance to arrive. The Emperor was now joined by troops from Mesopotamia, Syria, Phoenicia and Palestine and in the plain before Emesa repeated his victory of the Orontes over a force estimated at 70.000 omen, using similar tactics, but incurring even greater risks than before from the Palmyrene clibanarii. Palestinian ‘ clubmen ’ played an important part in the victory, beating down the riders whose armour they could not pierce. While the issue still hung in the balance, Aurelian, we hear, was conscious of a divine helper in his army, whom he afterwards recognized as the Sun-God, Elagabalus, of Emesa.

Zenobia’s wider ambitions had sustained a decisive check, but she could still claim that almost all the fallen were Romans and might even hope to tire out her conqueror, till he should be recalled by troubles on the Danube and North Italian front. She withdrew 80 miles to Palmyra and prepared for a siege. An expeditionary force from Egypt may now have joined Aurelian, while Persian assistance may have attempted to reach Zenobia. Aurelian, in his pursuit, was harried by the nomads of the desert, and was himself wounded in the fighting round the walls of Palmyra. For a moment he hesitated and offered moderate terms of surrender which Zenobia was unwise enough to decline in undiplomatic language. He now bent his will to the task. The desert tribes were beaten or bribed into submission; Aurelian seems to have entrusted them with the profitable task of furnishing his army with supplies. The Persian relief force did not appear—perhaps it was actually defeated by the Romans. Zenobia herself escaped on a dromedary to seek the hoped-for help, but was overtaken by Roman cavalry at the Euphrates and brought back captive. The peace party in Palmyra gained the upper hand and opened the gates of the city. Its imperial power was, of course, at an end, but it was spared from pillage and had only to receive a garrison of 6oo archers under Sandarion. An able officer, Marcellinus, was left in general control as prefect of Mesopotamia and governor totius Orientis.

Aurelian, now adding the title of ‘Parthicus Maximus’ to those of ‘Germanicus’ and ‘Gothicus Maximus’ that he already bore, moved to Emesa and there held a trial of Zenobia and her counsellors. The Queen, humbled at last, condescended to save herself by casting the blame on her advisers, and the noble Longinus met his death with a courage that shamed his mistress. With a long train of captives, Aurelian retraced his steps to the Propontis, but, in the crossing, lost most of the Palmyrenes, but not their queen, by accidental drowning. By the autumn of 272 Aurelian had moved north to the Danube to repulse an invasion of the Carpi and gain the new title of ‘Carpicus Maximus.’ It was there that ill news from Palmyra reached him. The city had risen under a certain Apsaeus and set up a king Antiochus, who claimed kinship with Zenobia, after an attempt to induce Marcellinus to betray his master had failed. Sandarion and his archers were massacred. Aurelian from the first had relied on speed of movement, and this resource did not fail him now. He marched post haste to the rebel city and struck down resistance before it had had time to take root. Judgment this time was stern and final. Antiochus was spared, more in contempt than mercy, but Palmyra was pillaged, its treasures carried off, its walls dismantled, and it was left to relapse into a little desert village. It had flashed like a meteor across the political firmament and like a meteor it passed into night.

Egypt, meanwhile, had felt the impulse of the revolt. A certain Firmus, a man of great wealth and wide commercial connections, whose personality seems to have made a great impression on his age, established himself for a moment less as emperor than as governor in another’s interest—perhaps for Marcellinus, should he desert Aurelian, or, failing him, for Antiochus. His aim certainly was ‘to defend what was left of the cause of Zenobia.’ The troublesome tribe of the Blemmyes lent some support to his revolt. Aurelian moved at once against this new enemy, besieged him at Bruchium and forced him to commit suicide. The first part of Aurelian’s programme was at last complete. The ‘restitutor Orientis’ could now think of completing his claim to be ‘restitutor orbis,’ by bringing the West back to its allegiance.

Little is recorded of the Gallic empire from the death of Postumus in A.D. 268 to the defeat of Tetricus in 274. There may, indeed, have been an unwritten compact between the Roman and Gallic rulers to maintain the status quo while Claudius dealt with the Goths. Victorinus, the successor of Postumus, issued, apparently towards the close of his reign, a series of coins commemorating legions of the Rhine, Danube, Palestine and Egypt but not of Italy or Raetia, and these may reflect a definite move not against Claudius but against his successor Quintillus and an offer of friendship to Aurelian and the Palmyrenes. Quintillus’ short reign may well have been taken up with steps to meet the new menace. The barbarian invasions of Italy by way of Raetia may even have been instigated by the Gallic emperors. But, even if this reading of the coins is correct, Victorinus had miscalculated. Aurelian would hear nothing of a divided Empire, and the death of Victorinus, which probably followed close on that of Quintillus, may have been due to something more than private vengeance.

Of the mysterious Victoria or Vitruvia, mother of Victorinus and maker of the new emperor, Tetricus, sober history has hardly a word to say. Tetricus, formerly governor of Aquitania, was a mild and pacific ruler who was content to hold his Empire in quiet, while Aurelian safeguarded Italy and recovered the East. He had a son of the same name, who was first Caesar and then, for a very short period, Augustus. It was his fate to see Gaul harried by barbarian invaders by land and sea, and to suffer much from the insubordination of his troops and the machinations of one of his governors, Faustinus. Only the coins, with their references to the ‘Pax’ and other virtues of the Emperor, suggest that his reign had a more satisfactory content than this. Judging the future of the Gallic Empire to be desperate, he appealed to Aurelian to resume control—‘Eripe me his, invictemalis.’ Aurelian was not slow to respond. Early, it would seem, in a.d. 274, he marched into Gaul, encountered Tetricus in the ‘campi Catalaunii’ near Chalons, and, when Tetricus came over during the battle, broke the gallant but hopeless resistance of the Gallic army. Gaul returned to her allegiance and the mint of Lugdunum celebrated the ‘Pacator Orbis’ and his mercy to his defeated rivals, while some provision was made for the future government of the province as well as of Britain. Britain, from its position, seems bound to have followed in the main the fortunes of Gaul, but the fact that coins of Claudius II and Quintillus reached the island without delay, suggests that it may, to some extent, have pursued a course of its own.

Aurelian could now return to Rome to celebrate a magnificent triumph as ‘restorer of East and West.’ While the crowds applauded the procession, in which Zenobia walked in golden chains, the senators groaned to see their fellow-senators, Tetricus and his son, submitted to the same indignity. Aurelian, however, was magnanimous in his victory. He settled Zenobia at Tibur and gave her in marriage to a senator—a strange end to a strange career—and ‘promoted’ Tetricus to be ‘corrector Lucaniae.’ For the rest of the year 274 Aurelian could devote his energies to internal reform. The coinage had sunk into the deepest degradation, and the first reform of 271 had hardly gone below the surface. Aurelian now called in the old money and issued new. The new billon piece, superior in appearance, but little better in its metal than the old, received a definite value—xx or xx. 1—perhaps 2 sestertii of 10 ‘libellae’ each. There was a subsidiary coinage of bronze, no longer bearing the mark of the senate, S.C., but issues of gold were relatively scanty and of pure silver there was none at all. The reform, therefore, was from the first imperfect. The new billon did indeed receive a fixed value and was more securely based on the old unit of reckoning, the sestertius, than on the ruined denarius. But what guarantee was given, that the new coinage had a solid backing and that the old evil of the issue of masses of almost worthless billon would not again bring chaos into commercial life?

In other ways Aurelian showed his regard for the material well-being of his subjects. He punished with exemplary severity informers and peculators and burned the bonds of masses of old debts in the Forum of Trajan. He controlled the price of bread in Rome and, for the old distribution of corn, he substituted a dole of two pounds of baked bread, adding one ounce to the ration from a special tax on Egypt. He made also free distributions of pork, oil and salt, and is even credited with a scheme for distributing free wine as well, and with planning extensive plantations in the east and north-east of Italy to supply it. On three occasions he gave largess, to the value of 500 denarii in all. The clearing of the bed and the repair of the banks of the Tiber and the building of new barracks—perhaps for the ‘collegia suariorum’—in the ‘Campus Agrippae,’ all attest the same range of interests. Two lasting effects of these policies were the extension of the powers of the ‘praefectus annonae,’ and possibly the establishment on a public footing of such guilds as the butchers and bakers of Rome and the ‘navicularii’ of the Nile and Tiber.

It is definitely stated that Aurelian consulted the Senate about the building of the walls of Rome. But the senators, excluded from the camps by Gallienus, were losing their grip of public life, while, in the provinces, knights were replacing them not only in the command of the army, but also in the civil government. Perhaps Aurelian, busied as he was with wars, simply allowed these tendencies to follow their natural course. Of the defence of the frontiers again only too little is known. Though Probus was left in Gaul in a.d. 274, the Alemanni again appear in the agri decumates in the following year. The ‘limes Raeticus’ was apparently restored and Vindelicia, as we hear vaguely, was freed from ‘obsidio barbarica.’ On the Danube old Dacia had been abandoned as a dangerous liability and the legions, XIII Gemina and V Macedonica, went to their new stations at Ratiaria and Oescus. As late as 274 Aurelian had to drive back barbarians from the Danube. To the East two new legions, I Illyricorum and IV Martia, were sent, the one to Syria Phoenice, the other to Arabia, to strengthen the Roman grip on lands where the old corps had suffered heavily under the Palmyrene rule and the war of recovery. Egypt continued restless to the end of the reign and in 275 Probus was dispatched to deal with a new incursion of the Blemmyes.

Of the dangers arising from the arrogance and insubordination of the armies Aurelian seems to have been fully conscious, and it may well be that he anticipated Diocletian in the attempt to remove them. It is said that Aurelian began to introduce the Eastern forms of royalty and roundly told his troops that it was not they, but the god who assigned the imperial power. Herein may be seen one of the springs of that religious policy which Aurelian followed throughout his reign and crowned in 274 by the erection in Rome of a magnificent temple to the Sun-God and the establishment of a new college of senators as pontifices del Solis. Sol ‘dominus imperii Romani’ was to be the centre of revived and unified paganism and the guarantor of loyalty to the Emperor, whose companion and preserver he was. So far as he can be identified with any one figure of worship, the Sol of Aurelian was the Elagabalus of Emesa, who had helped him in his decisive battle and now returned, after the tragic fiasco of the Emperor Elagabalus, to enjoy the reverence of Rome. But it was clearly the intention of Aurelian to make the most of the breadth and inclusiveness of his worship, in which Greek and Roman worshippers of Apollo might unite with Eastern devotees of Mithras or Elagabalus, while, on the other hand, the form of the cult was Roman. The inauguration of a State cult of the ‘Genius Populi Romani’ shows the development of religious ideas which reached their full development under Diocletian. Towards Christianity Aurelian maintained a negative attitude which was passing at the time of his death into positive hostility. His whole experience of life must have inclined him rather to the persecuting policy of Decius and Valerian than to the ‘universal peace’ of Gallienus. Persecution of the chief enemies of paganism might well seem to be the necessary counterpart to the establishment of the new solar monotheism. But the trial of strength against the new foe was reserved for a later Emperor: Aurelian ‘inter initia sui furoris exstinctus est.’

Late in 274 Aurelian was called to Lugdunum to suppress some obscure disorders and turned an invasion of Juthungi and Alemanni from Raetia. His eyes were however set towards the East, where the conquest of Mesopotamia was still to be accomplished and at the end of the year he set out on his last journey. At Caenophrurium, between Perinthus and Byzantium, Aurelian’s confidential secretary, Eros, incurred the displeasure of his master by a lie, and, to save his skin, forged a list of prominent soldiers, who with himself were marked for execution, and showed it to the supposed victims. The threatened men knew only too well the merciless severity of Aurelian and proceeded direct to his murder, only to find out the deception when it was too late. The guilty Eros was executed, but his crime could not be undone. In a fit of penitence and self-distrust, the army refused to appoint any of Aurelian’s murderers to succeed him and referred the choice of a new emperor to the Senate. For some six months, from about April to September 275, embassies passed to and fro—the army appealing to the Senate to resume its old function, the Senate shrinking from so perilous a responsibility. At last in September the aged Tacitus was induced to accept an honour that was almost a sentence of death. The fact of any interregnum of more than a few weeks has been disputed by many modern authorities, but the coinage shows clearly that for some considerable period government was carried on in the name of the Empress Severina for the dead Aurelian, and that the five years and six months of the reign are reckoned not to the death of Aurelian, c. April, but to the accession of Tacitus in September. Coins of Severina struck in all officinae of several mints, with types of ‘Concordia Augg.’ and ‘Concordia Militum,’ bear witness to the conditions of the interregnum. It was yet to be seen how this ‘Concord of the troops’ would stand the test of time.

The defects of the literary tradition for a remarkable reign are partly remedied by the evidence of a large and varied coinage. Aurelian strikes at the mints of Rome, Milan, Siscia and Cyzicus, though in 274 Ticinum takes the place of Milan. It is thus possible to trace the decline of the mint of Rome after the revolt of the moneyers, the concentration on military interests at Milan and Siscia, the extensive issues at Cyzicus to meet the needs of Aurelian’s Eastern campaigns. At Milan the types (c. 271) ‘Dacia Felix,’ ‘Genius Illurici’ and ‘Pannoniae’ attest the interest in the new order on the Danube. In 271, indeed, Serdica comes into activity as a mint for the new Dacia and thereafter shows its devotion to the Emperor and Sol, his divine patron. In the east new mints were opened at Tripolis in Phoenicia and at an unknown city with a dolphin as mint-mark. Lugdunum in 274 honours the restorer of the West, while Antioch strikes first for Vaballathus and Aurelian, then for Vaballathus alone, and finally for Aurelian alone, the restorer of the East. More than all this, the coins reveal the emotional background of the reign. After a short first period in which the tradition of Quintillus prevails, the dominant notes of Aurelian’s own coins ring clear in the ‘Concord of the Armies,’ ‘the restoration of the world,’ the ‘lordship of Sol,’ master of the Roman Emperor and protector of his chosen, the Emperor.

 

II.

TACITUS AND FLORIAN: SENATORIAL INTERLUDE

 

The appeal of the army to the Senate to nominate Aurelian’s successor might conceivably have led to a serious revival of senatorial influence. Aurelius Victor asserts that the edict of Gallienus could have been revoked, and that the senators could have recovered their place in the camps. The army, in a mood of self-restraint and self-denial, would have raised no objection, had the Senate only acted with sufficient firmness. But the condition was unfulfilled. Such honours as military command had to offer were too perilous to tempt men who attached more and more value to the uninterrupted enjoyment of their hereditary dignity and wealth. The Augustan History enlarges on the rejoicings of the Senate, both in private and public, over the universal right of hearing appeals now granted to the praefectus urbis and the recovery of the ius proconsular. How much is really implied in these high claims it is not easy to gauge. The new emperor himself was a senator, so too, no doubt, was his half-brother, Florian, whom he made Praetorian Prefect, and his kinsman, Maximinus, whom he appointed governor of Syria. But we have no real evidence of any general restoration of senatorial privilege. To take one small test, the mark of senatorial control, S.C., does not appear at all on the bronze coinage of Tacitus and not always on that of Florian.

It was in September 275 that Tacitus at last yielded to pressure and accepted nomination as Emperor. He was seventy-five years of age, a heavy handicap even for a man who was ‘egregie moratus et rei publicae gerundae idoneus.’ He had already been consul under Aurelian in 273. Of his short reign we know little of any moment. He asked for divine honours for Aurelian, punished some of his murderers, and built a temple of the deified emperors. He himself held the consulship for the second time in 276; when he requested the same office for Florian, the Senate refused his request and he expressed himself delighted with its independence. He made over his own ‘patrimonium’ to the State, but, in the six months of his rule, ‘congiarium vix dedit’—whatever that may mean. He set a good example in his private life and attempted sundry reforms which tended to improve morals and restrict extravagance. The statement that he forbade the debasement of the metals—gold, silver and bronze—perhaps veils a policy which had real economic importance. Old as he was, Tacitus showed himself ready to bear the burdens of his office. The Maeotidae, the Goths from the northern shores of the Black Sea, who claimed to have been called in to assist Aurelian in his campaign against Persia, invaded Asia Minor and penetrated as far as Cilicia. Tacitus took the field against them and actually reached Tyana, while Florian gained a victory (‘Victoria Gothica’), which is commemorated on coins. But the indulgence of Tacitus to his kindred, already shown in his favouring of Florian, bore evil fruit. A kinsman, Maximinus, appointed to the governorship of Syria, made himself hated by his oppressions and was murdered. The discontent spread to the entourage of Tacitus. We must suppose that the army was already repenting of its moderation and turning its eyes towards Probus, the natural successor of Aurelian, who held a high command in Syria and Egypt. The strain was too much for the aged Emperor, who collapsed and died at Tyana, c. April 276.

Florian, without waiting for the approval of the Senate, snatched the Empire as his natural inheritance, and was generally recognized, except in Syria and Egypt, which now came out openly in defence of their own candidate, Probus. The usurpation of Florian was necessary if he was to have any chance of holding power, and would no doubt have been condoned had it been successful. He led his army to Tarsus, in the hope that the numbers and quality of his troops would be decisive. But Probus cleverly delayed the decision, and the soldiers of Florian, suffering severely from an uncongenial climate, began to waver in their loyalty. After a bare three months of rule, during most of which Probus had contested his claim, he died at Tarsus, betrayed by his own men (c. end of June, 276).

The coinage of these two short reigns, which seemed little more than an interregnum between Aurelian and Probus, has a life and colour of its own. The Golden Age, always hoped for and never realized, is characterized in new terms. The Sun-God is less prominent than under Aurelian, though he still appears as the director of the loyal troops in their allegiance. The stress falls more on the old divine protectors of Rome, and particularly on ‘ Roma Aeterna’ herself. ‘Clementia Temporum,’ a watchword of the two reigns, perhaps alludes directly to the influence of the ‘ clemency’ of the Senate. The coinage of Florian, withits emphasis on ‘Perpetuitas,’ ‘Securitas’ and ‘Victoria Perpetua,’ betrays some anxiety about the durability of the ‘gentle times.’ Of neither emperor can we form any very clear conception. Whatever their personalities and policies, they were not given opportunity to translate them into lasting fact.

 

III.

PROBUS: ‘PACATOR ORBIS’

 

With the accession of Probus the Senate sank into the back­ground and the balance of power shifted again to the camps. However loyally Probus might seek the approval of the Senate and deplore the precipitancy of Florian, which had driven him to seek a decision by force, it was on the consent of the armies that his rule actually rested. A native of Sirmium, trained like Claudius II and Aurelian in the school of war, he is said to have been foremost in the service of Aurelian against Palmyra and Tetricus, and had, according to one account, been appointed by Tacitus to be ‘dux totius Orientis.’ Aurelian had restored the Roman Empire. Probus conceived it to be his task to complete the restoration by re-establishing order throughout the provinces, and, at the same time, by bringing the troops back to a proper discipline and love of hard work. In this task he was brilliantly successful and deserves a large measure of the praise which our authorities lavish on him. Almost the equal of Aurelian in military capacity, his superior in balance and moderation of character, he holds an honourable place among those who paved the way for the great re-organization of the State by Diocletian.

A settlement with Persia was still to be made, but for the moment no danger threatened from that quarter, while the presence of the Emperor was urgently demanded in the Western provinces of the Empire. After executing vengeance on such as still survived of the murderers of Aurelian, Probus moved northward and then westward, perhaps defeating the Goths in Illyricum on the way, and paid a short visit to Rome to receive the approval of the Senate. He then led his army into Gaul. Hordes of Germans—Franks in the north, Longiones (Lugii) and Alemanni in the south—had burst over the Rhine frontier and penetrated into the whole of Gaul. The story of the invasion in its detail is entirely lost. There may not have been one sudden in­cursion so much as a gradual worsening of an evil, which had begun soon after the strong hand of Postumus was removed and now only reached its crisis. The burial of hoards of coins of Gallienus, Claudius II and the Gallic emperors, which are commonly attributed to the German terror, may perhaps represent rather the ineffectual protest of the provincials against the unpopular reform of Aurelian. Such hoards occur too freely in Britain to be attributed to a cause that operated only in Gaul, and the fact that the Gallic coins of Aurelian’s reform do not bear his mark of value, suggests that the reform was not as fully carried through in that province as it was in the rest of the Empire.

In the course of little more than a year’s hard fighting, Probus completed the deliverance of Gaul. He himself took the field against the Longiones and captured Semnon, their chief, and then, when his lieutenants had defeated the Franks on the lower Rhine, he joined them in a victorious attack on the Burgundians and Vandals. Sixty famous cities of Gaul were freed from the barbarian, tens of thousands of Germans were killed, forts were established across the Rhine ‘in solo barbarico,’ and Probus could even play with the idea of establishing a new province of Germany. Nine chiefs knelt for mercy at his feet, hostages were demanded and 16,000 Germans were distributed in small bodies over the Roman army. The Germans had to supply corn and cattle and submit to disarmament; it was for the Roman Empire that they were now to till their soil, to Roman arms that they were to look for protection and the decision of their internal quarrels. One body of prisoners was sent to Britain, where they were later to render valuable service to their captor.

Early in 278 Pro bus could regard the Gallic danger as ended and turn his attention to other problems. He pacified Raetia, and repulsed an invasion of Vandals from Illyricum. A rebellion in the East was already over before Probus himself could arrive to suppress it. A certain Julius Saturninus, an able soldier, who is said to have held high command under Aurelian and to have enjoyed the full confidence of Probus himself, was forced by his troops in Syria to assume the purple, and, after a brief usurpation, perished at Apamea. Troubles in the south of Asia Minor now claimed the attention of Probus. Lydius (or Palfuerius?), a brigand of daring and capacity worthy of a better cause, seized

Cremna and held it till his death in a long and desperate siege. The unruly Isaurians were kept in check by fortresses, and were perhaps recruited into the new legions, I to III Isaura. Ptolemais revolted in alliance with the Blemmyes and attacked Coptos; but the revolt was suppressed without the personal intervention of Probus. Against Persia the Emperor made no move as yet, but he haughtily declined presents from the Persian king (Vahram II) and may perhaps have granted a truce on terms favourable to Rome. In the course of 279-80 Probus returned homewards, by way of Illyricum, and, as he passed through Thrace, settled 100,000 Bastarnae within the Empire a policy convenient for the moment but fraught with peril for the future.

The closing years of the reign were marred by military insurrections which perhaps testify to deeper discontents and more serious ills than the disordered ambitions of a few generals and the dislike of the troops for too firm a discipline. Proculus, a native of Albingaunum (Albenga), south-west of Genoa, a hardy but licentious soldier, was spurred on by his virago wife, Samso, to assume the purple. Lugdunum, moved by unknown grievances, abetted his revolt but was powerless to sustain him. The Franks, to whom he tried to flee, with their native perfidy betrayed him to Probus. More serious was the revolt of Bonosus, the commander of the Roman fleet at Colonia Agrippina. Married, it is said, to a Gothic wife, he was in dose touch with the barbarians and used his unrivalled powers of drinking to extract secrets from his boon­companions. He was born in Spain of a Gallic mother, but traced his descent from Britain. Now, having by his carelessness allowed the Germans to burn some ships of his fleet, he took refuge in revolt, but, after serious fighting, he despaired of success and hanged himself. The whole West seems to have been in a state of unrest. The deletion of the name of Probus on an inscription of Valentia suggests some trouble in Spain, while in Britain a governor who threatened rebellion was forestalled by the mission of Victorinus, a Moor, the very man who had recommended him to Probus. By the help of the German captives who had been sent to the island he nipped the revolt in the bud. In default of precise evidence, it may be suspected that economic causes were at the root of these troubles. Coins of the reform of Aurelian are definitely rare in British deposits and, when Carausius seized the island in 286, he began by overstriking coins of the Gallic emperors. This seems to suggest a disinclination on the part of the province to accept the new coinage, with all that it implied.

Reaching Rome at the turn of the years 281-2, Probus cele­brated a magnificent triumph, which made a vast impression as much by the ingenuity of its display, as by the variety of conquered enemies that it paraded for the delight of the mob of Rome.

Peace seemed now to be assured within the empire, and Probus could at last turn his attention to the war against Persia. But he had erred in judgment, if not in intention, in his treatment of the troops. Not only had he made heavy demands on their services in war, but he had not even allowed them to relax in the intervals of peace. Everywhere they were set to useful work, and, in the West particularly, where Probus wished to encourage the culture of the vine, they had been employed on clearing the ground for new vineyards. Even worse than this, perhaps, Probus had pacified the empire and, in his delight at the success achieved, had spoken too optimistically of a time when an army would no longer be required. Such remarks could very easily be misunderstood. All these discontents grew to a head and culminated in one final revolt that proved fatal to the Emperor. He had gone forward to Sirmium to superintend the recovery for cultivation of the ‘Mons Alma,’ when his own soldiers suddenly turned against him and killed him in the ‘iron tower,’ to which he had fled for refuge. The movement was not so local as some authorities incline to represent it. Carus, Prefect of the Guard, who had been left to muster the troops in Raetia, was pressed by his men to revolt. Like Decius with Philip he seems to have tried to keep faith with Probus. But the troops sent by Probus against him deserted, and

Carus was then forced to assume the purple. The death of Probus removed the occasion of a civil war. Our tradition, out of kindness to the memory of both men, tries to veil the tragedy, but there can hardly be a doubt that the ‘Concordia Militum’ had once more failed in the moment of crisis. Senate and People mourned their loss and awarded to Probus the posthumous honour of consecration; but the decision of the troops could not now be questioned and Carus was accepted as the new ruler of the Roman world.

Of few reigns of such note as that of Probus have we so slight and unsatisfactory a record. A little longer than that of Aurelian and almost as notable, it can be told today in half the space. The eulogies lavished on Probus are poor compensation for the lack of detailed account of his administration. To the Senate Probus from the first showed all possible respect. He sought its approval for his elevation, and, if his biographer is correct, allowed it to hear appeals from the more important provincial governors, to appoint proconsuls, to assign legates from among the consulars, to bestow the ius praetorium on equestrian governors and to set the seal of its own decrees on the laws which he himself proposed. It seems probable that the Historia Augusta preserves, with a false show of precision, some memory of an actual attempt by Probus to obtain assistance from the Senate in governing. It is likely enough that Probus was sincere in his wish to strengthen the civil government and that he conceived of himself, as Aemilian had done before him, as general of the State, not as the autocrat, free to deal at will with all problems of administration. But as regards the final issue, the judgment of Aurelius Victor stated in a highly significant passage of his De Caesaribus is certainly correct. The Senate, partly by its own fault, failed to regain its place in the camps and the ‘militaris potentia convaluit.’ The senators, over-fond of luxury and security, ‘munivere militaribus et paene barbaris viam in se ac posteros dominandi.’ Helpers in his labours Probus must have had, but they will have been soldiers and knights rather than senators.

The four rebellions that marred the reign are certain evidence of something rotten in the state of the army. Probus may have been unwise to re-impose discipline too suddenly and unre­mittingly on troops that had half forgotten how to obey: it is possible that he was not quite fortunate in the choice of his assistants. In the main, however, the difficulties lay beyond his control and were only capable of solution by the drastic reforms imposed later by Diocletian. The Emperor’s policy of settling barbarians in the Empire had its dangers as well as its advantages, as was instanced by the exploit of Franks, thus settled, who broke loose and after plundering Greece, Sicily and Africa, finally made their way safely home. A gladiatorial revolt of some magnitude also disturbed the peace of the reign.

The coinage offers some compensation for the defects of the literary tradition. The market continued to be flooded with the base billon of the reform, still marked xx, xx.i, and the vast issues were used to present to the public a wealth of reverse types and an unprecedented richness of variety in the presentation of the Emperor himself. ‘ Virtus Probi Aug.’ is freely used as a sort of alternative to the normal title. Dated coins are rare, but establish one detail of interest—that Probus could reckon his tribunician power ‘a die in diem,’ from the date of its first con­ferment, and not renew it on December 10th. Lugdunum strikes in great abundance, celebrating the divine powers Hercules, Mars, Sol, Victoria and Virtus, that bless the Emperor’s labours, and the new Golden Age of peace, assured by his triumphs in the field. The gods come more and more to be viewed as the divine ‘protectors’ or ‘companions’ of the Emperor—a heavenly ‘comitatus’ analogous to the earthly. The mint of Rome con­centrates attention on the personality and achievement of Probus, the universal victor crowning the ‘restoration of the world’ that had been won by Aurelian. The symbolism of the Golden Age is employed with even more than the customary fervour. The Empire has recovered faith in its destiny, in its emperor and his divine helpers. The loyalty of the army is, as ever, a keystone of the Imperial system; but the insistence on it suggests an ardent hope rather than a settled confidence. Sol still enjoys a large measure of the honour to which he had been advanced by Aurelian and still directs the loyalty of the troops, but he has already lost his primacy in the Pantheon. The mint at Ticinum, as usual, has much to say of the loyal and harmonious army and strikes the type of ‘Princeps Iuventutis,’ which seems to emphasize the relation of the Emperor to the Imperial cavalry. In loyalty to the Emperor, a native of Sirmium, the mint-city of Siscia, throned between her two streams, boasts herself as ‘Siscia Probi Aug.’ Hercules, who laboured in the service of Juppiter for the good of the human race, supplies a series of symbols fit to represent the work of the new Hercules, the Emperor: an old theme of the Imperial coinage, brought to the fore by Postumus in Gaul, is now taken up by the Imperial mints and prepares the way for the Herculian dynasty of Maximian. Types of imperial virtues, such as Abundantia, Felicitas and Ubertas, probably reflect the policy of land-reclamation and planting of vineyards. Serdica dis­tinguishes itself, as under Aurelian, by a certain exuberance of feeling acclaiming the ‘Invictus,’ the ‘Bonus,’ the ‘Perpetuus imperator Probus.’ Probus, like Aurelian, is even hailed as ‘Deus et Dominus.’ In religious fervour and devotion to the person of the Emperor this mint stands out above all the rest. Late in the reign its staff was transferred to Siscia, not to Rome by Carus, as was once supposed¹. At Cyzicus the themes of loyalty and discipline in the army are very fully handled². Antioch and Tripolis have a much narrower range than the other Imperial mints, and concentrate on a few main themes—the Victory of the Emperor, the Sun-God his preserver, the restoration of the world and the ‘ Clemency of the Times.’ There is clear reflection of a difference in temper in the public that used the coins. Other provinces claim from the coinage a detailed comment on each single aspect of the Emperor’s activities, the East is content to contemplate him under a few aspects that know no change.

The coinage proves beyond doubt that the panegyrics of the historians have their foundations in fact. The personality of the Emperor stands out as the vital factor in the recovery of Rome. The moods of depression and uncertain hope are over. As the forces inimical to the Empire ebb, the forces of recovery flow in an ever increasing tide. Greater triumphs are still in store, if the soldiers can but be taught to use their swords only in their country’s service, if their ‘Concord’ and ‘Fidelity’ can be so assured, that they will not need to be invoked unceasingly on the coinage.

IV.

CARUS AND HIS SONS: ‘PRAESIDIA REIPUBLICAE’

 

The new emperor was emphatically a creation of the army, nor did he deny the source of his power. In reporting to the Senate his elevation by the troops, he was nominally asking for its approval, but in reality presenting it with an accomplished fact. There are so many accounts of his birthplace that we might suspect it to be entirely unknown, but it is probable that he was a native of Narona in Illyricum. Like most of his immediate predecessors, he was a soldier by education and trade. His conduct of the Persian War, which seemed to him the main object of his reign, proves that he was no mean general. Apart from that, we have no material for judging his character as emperor, beyond the general opinion of our authorities that he stood ‘medius,’ between good and bad emperors. One great natural advantage, denied to most of the emperors just before him, he certainly enjoyed; he had two sons of full age, capable of receiving at once the rank of Caesar and of sharing in some measure in the burden of Empire. Carinus, the elder, was left as virtual governor in the West and was sent in the first place to defend Gaul. Supreme power brought out all the baseness and meanness of his character, but it is hardly probable that Carus really thought of substituting his younger son Numerian or Constantius Chlorus for Carinus or even of putting the latter to death. Numerian had an excellent reputation as a poet, an orator and a man of the best intentions. Whether he was in any way fitted to rule the State must remain uncertain.

It was early in the autumn of 282 that Probus had met his death. Preparations for the Persian war were at once pushed forward, but some delay was caused by an incursion of Quadi and Sarmatae across the Danube. Carus at once showed his professional ability by defeating the invaders with heavy loss in killed and captured and thought fit to advertise this initial success by some notable coin-types. It was early in 283 that Carus marched east to take the field against Persia, but of the details of his journey we know nothing. Persia had declined while Rome had recovered and Vahram II, who now sat on the throne, was no Shapur. Carus crossed the Euphrates, defeated Vahram, took Seleuceia and was accepted throughout Mesopotamia. He then crossed the Tigris and crowned his triumph by taking the capital, Ctesiphon, and thus fairly earning the title of ‘Parthicus Maximus.’ It is note­worthy that Rome still applied the old name to the new enemy, even as she continued to call the Goths Germans. The Persians were distracted by factions, and Carus, urged on, it may be, by the perfidious advice of Aper, his Praetorian Prefect, who nursed his own secret ambitions, refused to rest on his laurels and tried to pass the bounds set by fate for Roman conquest eastward. Near Ctesiphon he met his death under circumstances that arouse grave suspicion—according to the official version, by a stroke of lightning, more probably by the treachery of Aper. Carus has no Alexandrian coins of the year 283—4, and his death must, therefore, fall at about the end of July 283. He had reigned a little over ten months.

The two Caesars, sons and natural heirs of Carus, succeeded unopposed, the one in the East, the other in the West. The Persian war was brought to an end, possibly after a minor reverse; Mesopotamia, at least, remained under Roman rule. Numerian, who appears to have been entirely under the influence of his father-in-law, Aper, had no thought but to bring his army safely home. On the journey, he began to suffer from an inflammation of the eyes, which gave an excuse for conveying him in a closed litter. When the army had reached the neighbourhood of Nicomedia, the stench of corruption from the litter betrayed to the troops the fact that their young Emperor was dead. Aper had no doubt hoped that the death would be attributed to natural causes and that he would succeed to the vacant throne. But the officers of the Eastern army had other views. On Carinus they based no hopes—now, if not earlier, his true character as an emperor was fully realized. But they had a rival claimant to Aper in their own midst in the person of Diodes, commander of the protect ores domestici. A council of the army appointed him its emperor to avenge the death of Numerian, and his first act was to brand Aper as the murderer and strike him down with his own hand—‘Gloriare, Aper, Aeneae magni dextra cadis.’

Diodes had many years before received an oracle from a Druidess in Gaul that he would be emperor, ‘when he had killed his boar.’ Superstitious as he certainly was, he may have brooded long over the oracle and come to the conclusion that the ‘fatalis aper’ was none other than the Praetorian Prefect. In striking him down he fulfilled the omen of his rule. The date will be late in the autumn of 284—probably November 17.

Carinus in the West had ruled with little opposition from home or abroad, but had alienated men’s sympathies by his cruelty and lust. The magnificent shows with which he delighted the mob of Rome were a poor substitute for sound government. The new threat to his position roused him to a display of unexpected energy and resource. Even before the elevation of Diodes, Julianus ‘corrector Venetiae’ had revolted and extended his power as far as Siscia. His coins of that mint promise ‘Libertas Publica,’ constitutional government in place of the tyranny of Carinus, and acclaim the ‘Happiness of the Age,’ ‘the Victory of the Augustus,’ ‘Juppiter the Preserver,’ and ‘the Pannoniae of Au­gustus.’ He fell without any serious struggle in the fields of Verona and left the stage clear for the dash of two mightier rivals. Diodes marched west and encountered Carinus in the valley of the Margus. The decisive battle was fiercely contested and the advantage rested with the troops of Carinus, but the Emperor was killed in the hour of victory by an officer whose wife he had seduced, and Diodes was accepted by the leaderless army. The war had been difficult and laborious, and Diodes was politic enough to avert further bloodshed by a generous pardon of the hostile faction (spring 285). The dynasty of Carus, surely founded as it seemed on his two sons, had passed away, and the fate of the Empire was in the hands of an almost unknown officer. But the Roman destiny was making no mistake. The man had at last been found with the right qualities of mind and character to set the seal of completion on the great task of restoration for which Claudius, Aurelian and Probus had spent their last breath.

The coins of the dynasty of Carus hold out to the world a new vision of the Golden Age, blessed in the plenty and security of its peace and safeguarded by the valour and victory of the emperor, and the loyalty of his troops. Lugdunum, Rome, Siscia and Cyzicus, each presents its own picture of the promise of the reign. The mint of Serdica, which had already been closed towards the end of the reign of Probus, strikes no coins. Antioch and Tripolis celebrate the new dynasty with a narrow range of types. The coinage of Carinus and Numerianas Augusti—Carinus seems to have borne the title a little before his father’s death— continues to celebrate the same themes, with increasing stress on the winning of universal peace by the victories in Persia and on the eternity of Rome assured by the dynasty. The last phase of Carinus, when threatened by the elevation of Diodes, is marked by an in­sistence on the ‘Loyalty of the Troops’ and the ‘Peace of the Army.’ An ‘adventus’ type at Ticinum may mark a stage of his advance to take the field against his rival². Perhaps the most marked feature of the whole coinage is the stress laid on the security of the house of Carus, with his two young sons, the hope of the State and the principes iuventutis. Diodes, as he pondered the problems of imperial government, will not have failed to contrast the strength of Carus, with his two heirs, with the loneliness of Claudius, Aurelian and Probus, and, when the time came, found means to provide himself with a like protection.

 

V.

DIOCLETIAN: ‘PARENS AUREI SAECULI

 

The new emperor Diocletian, as he now chose to call himself, was a Dalmatian by birth, of humble parentage. A persistent tradition makes him originally the son of a ‘scribe’ or a freedman of a senator named Anullinus³. He had risen like most emperors of the age through service in the army, and had served, we are told, in minor posts in Gaul under Aurelian and as governor in Moesia under Carus, before he was called to the command of the Emperor’s bodyguard. He had also held the office of consul. His service had hardly trained him in the arts of generalship and his military talents when tested proved to be respectable rather than brilliant. But he had a sound knowledge of the requirements of the army and a good eye for the larger aspects of strategy.

Perhaps his training, as contrasted with that of an Aurelian or a Probus, had helped to develop in him that subtlety, which, as Tacitus has reminded us, is often lacking in the born soldier. Yet if he ranks in history as statesman more than general, this is due rather to his eminence in the former capacity than to his weakness in the latter.

To his contemporaries he was an object of intense admiration, tinged with a certain uneasiness and distrust. It was certainly by divine favour that he had been elected by the army. He was a notable personality, wise and subtle, but, withal, a man who would satisfy his own severity, while leaving its cost in un­popularity to be paid by his assistants. A judgment in the Historia Augusta strikes a truer note than is usual in that work: ‘ consilii semper alti, nonnumquam tamen (ferreae) frontis, prudentia et nimia pervicacia motus inquieti pectoris comprimentis.’ Though he decked himself with kingly display and hung about his person a religious awe and sanctity, his busy brain was ever scheming for the welfare of his Empire, and the lord and master conducted himself as a father of his people.

During the long years through which he had been waiting for the ‘fateful boar’, he had clearly pondered the problems of his age and had reached certain conclusions, which, as emperor, he was quick to put to the proof. The Empire was too heavy a burden for any one man to bear. Diocletian therefore took care to provide himself with helpers, and nothing showed his genius better than his power to choose them well. The men of his choice accepted his moral ascendency and did his work. Again, the emperor was continually exposed to the jealousy of his generals. Diocletian made his helpers actual partners in the imperial power and, by multiplying the imperial persons, left no prospect of final success to any local rebellion. The Empire had been passing by a slow transition from the old Augustan order into something of a very different character. Diocletian saw that the time had now come to abandon the old and to accept the new with all that it might imply.

This principle extends over the entire life of the State and conditions the whole of Diocletian’s work. The Empire was too large for one emperor to administer: there must, then, be several rulers, each with his own administrative staff. The provinces had been unwieldy and, at times, dangerous in the hands of ambitious governors. They must be divided into smaller units. The civil and military commands had begun to be separated, and knights had been replacing senators in camp and court alike. In both these cases, the new idea must be allowed free development. In all but a few provinces equestrian ‘dux’ and ‘praeses,’ now entirely distinct in function, replace ‘proconsul’ or ‘legatus.’ The frontier armies had given way repeatedly under the great bar­barian invasions, and the emperors had been compelled to scrape together a field-army, with cavalry as an important and inde­pendent arm. This essential force must be strengthened and made permanent. The ‘loyal and harmonious’ troops had come to be a menace to peaceful society. They must be brought back to the old Roman discipline. Emperor after emperor had fallen by the swords of his ‘commilitones.’ His person must be withdrawn from all vulgar contacts, and surrounded with the outward prestige of kingship and the mystical sanctity of religion. The basis of authority in the State had come to be questioned. The Senate had outlived its ancient dignity and worth, but the Imperial office had not been strong enough to dispense with its moral support. For the Empire, at large, then, not for the army only, the Imperial office must be reinterpreted and re-established as the centre of the national life. Neglect of the gods had brought down their displeasure, attested by many a national disaster. Rome must return to that reverence for the divine which had made her great. The meaning of the name ‘Rome’ was no longer centred in the capital or even in Italy. The provinces, then, and the great provincial capitals must receive equal recognition. Economic life and the State ‘annona’ had been subject to serious disturbances. In both spheres, order and balance must be re­stored. Taxation, based on an obsolescent system, had ceased to yield the necessary quota. A new basis for a sufficient revenue must be discovered. The old system of one imperial mint, with occasional auxiliaries in the provinces, and a multitude of local mints for token-money, was already almost superseded. The change must be completed and the needs of the Empire must be met uniformly by local mints, all striking the same Imperial coinage. The detail of all that makes up the new constitution of Diocletian is reserved for special treatment elsewhere, but without some mention of it here the external history of the reign could not be understood.

The prospects of the reign might at first seem favourable, if Diocletian could quickly heal the wounds of civil war. What he could do, he did—as it seems with good effect. He showed mercy to the friends and adherents of Carinus and actually con­tinued in office his Praetorian Prefect, Aristobulus. After some fighting on the Moesian and Pannonian front, which earned him the title of ‘Germanicus Maximus,’ he may have visited Rome as some think in the summer of 285 and received the recognition of the Senate. But the apparent calm of the Empire was not yet to be trusted, and Gaul at once offered an ugly problem in the revolt of the Bagaudae, bands of peasants, who, driven from their homes by the double terror of barbarian and tax-collector, had set up two emperors of their own, Aelian and Amandus. Here was the first opportunity for Diocletian to test his new plan. He had at his side Maximian, an old comrade in arms, brave and vigorous in action, lacking in originality but entirely loyal. He now gave him the commission to pacify Gaul. Maximian more than fulfilled the hopes set on him. The Bagaudae were no match for a skilled general, and were quickly tamed in a series of light skirmishes, but the rapid victory was more merciful than a pro­tracted war would have been. Maximian seems to have received at first the title of Caesar, or second in command, but certainly for no long time, as it is never found on the coins. Early in a.d. 286 Diocletian advanced him to the rank of Augustus, perhaps subject to some restriction that we cannot precisely define, which was only removed at the appointment of the Caesars in 293. Maximian had excelled all expectation and his troops were no doubt forward in pressing his claims to reward, but it is unlikely that Diocletian acted on anything but his own better judgment.

The Empire now rested on the ‘Concord’ of its two emperors and each found his own sphere for service. In defeating the Bagaudae, Maximian had gained some successes over the Franks and directed Carausius, who distinguished himself in the war, to take over command by sea against Frankish and Saxon pirates. Carausius revolted and, as we shall see later, gave Maximian full occasion to be busy in the north of Gaul and Britain. Meanwhile in 286 and 287 Maximian had to repel an incursion of Alemanni and Burgundians on the Upper Rhine and, two years later, found the Alemanni again troublesome. In 288 Maximian, by the victory of his Praetorian Prefect, Constantius, pushed the Franks back to the ocean and concluded a treaty, restoring to their king Gennoboudes his kingdom. A revolt of the Moors in Africa in 289—90 was suppressed by Maximian’s generals. Diocletian was more diversely employed. In 286, if not earlier, he won the title of ‘Germanicus Maximus’ on the borders of Pannonia and Moesia. In 288 he induced the Persian king, Vahram, to sur­render all claim to Mesopotamia, perhaps also to Armenia, and became ‘Persicus Maximus.’ In the same year he set up his nominee, Tiridates III, as king of Armenia. In the same year again he was in Raetia, aiding Maximian against the Chaibones and Heruli. In 289 and again in 292 he fought the Sarmatians, in 290 he turned back a Saracen invasion of Syria, in 291 he put down a revolt of Coptos and Busiris in Egypt⁴. In all these years the Augusti had met but once, at Milan, in the winter of 289 to 290 when their arrival drew envoys from Rome to congratulate them on their concord and their triumphs. An ‘adventus imperatorum’ at Massilia, spoken of in the Acts of the Martyrs, cannot be identified and may be entirely unhistorical.

Diocletian had by now matured his schemes for the division of imperial power and chosen the right men for his purpose, perhaps as early as 292, or even 291, though the formal act of investiture seems to have fallen in 293. Constantius Chlorus, a Dardanian nobleman of high repute and tried merit, was ap­pointed Caesar to Maximian in the West, while Galerius, a rough but able soldier, took the same rank under Diocletian in the East. To bind both Caesars to himself and his colleague, Diocletian required them to put away their wives and marry the crown princesses. Constantius put away Helena, mother of Constantine, and married Theodora, daughter of Maximian, while Galerius gave up his former wife to marry Diocletian’s daughter, Valeria. Thus was established the famous Tetrarchy of Diocletian. One Augustus, Diocletian, held the East with Egypt, Libya, Arabia and Bithynia under his own hand, and Illyricum and, it would appear, the western part of Asia under the care of his Caesar, Galerius. The other, Maximian, held the West, with Rome, Italy, Sicily, Africa, and perhaps Spain under his control, while Gaul and rebel Britain were assigned to the Caesar, Constantius. Each Caesar held the tribunician power, but was subject in all things to his own Augustus, while Diocletian, by his wisdom and ‘auctoritas,’ dominated all alike. Our authorities, throwing the history of many years together, represent the choice of Caesars as due to a dire conjunction of present perils—Narses in Persia, Achilleus in Egypt, Julianus and the Quinquegentanei in Africa, Carausius in Britain. It has been well observed that there is serious confusion here The appointments were actually made in an interval of quiet, when the first problems of the reign were well on the way to settlement and others had barely risen on the horizon. The main crisis of the reign fell in the years 295 to 298, and by that time the Tetrarchy was in full working order and was ready to give a dazzling proof of its worth.

The team of four was finer than its individual members. It was strong in union and deserved the eulogy pronounced on it in the Historia Augusta, ‘quattuor sane principes mundi, fortes, sapientes, benigni et admodum liberates, unum in rem publicam sentientes, perreverentes Romani senatus, moderati, populi amici, persancti, graves, religiosi, et quales principes semper oravimus.’ In the end, it is true, the expenses of four courts proved a heavy burden, but in the first stages it was mitigated by the moderation of the rulers. Diocletian came more under the reproach of avarice than Maximian, who held the wealth of Rome and Italy, white Con­stantius enjoyed a unique reputation for restraint and generosity.

Omitting nothing that could strengthen his work, Diocletian consecrated the Tetrarchy by placing it under the direct pro­tection of the great gods—his own dynasty, the Jovian, under Juppiter, that of Maximian, the Herculian, under Hercules. Elite corps of Illyrian troops bore the proud names of ‘Iovii’ and ‘Herculii? In Diocletian resided the divine wisdom, the ‘providentia’ of the supreme god, in Maximian the willing obedience and heroic energy of his great coadjutor in the service of men. If we may hazard a guess at the exact sense in which Diocletian and Maximian were related to their divine patrons, we may say that the Genius of each emperor, itself divine and an object of worship, was now declared to be the very Genius of Juppiter and Hercules themselves. Juppiter and Hercules are actually at work, as Victoria and Virtus had long been, in the spirits of their earthly representatives.

Although we are still three years short of the reform of Dio­cletian, this is probably the best place at which to review his pre-reform coinage. It was essentially a continuation of the previous reign. The mints were the same, except that Heraclea and Treveri were added just before the reform. The main issue was still that of the base billon xx. 1 piece. No silver was struck, but gold appeared in moderate quantities, at first on the standard of 70 to the pound, later at 60. For a very short period at the outset there is one Augustus, Diocletian, alone; of Maximian as Caesar there is no trace. Then come the two Caesars in 293, commonly acclaimed as ‘Principes Iuventutis’ or ‘praesidia rei-publicae.’ While the types still bear on such natural themes as the imperial vows, the Golden Age, the eternity of Rome, the virtues and exploits of the emperors, the religious interest is definitely to the fore, and, as we should expect, is focussed on the two figures of Juppiter and Hercules. Other deities—Mars, Minerva, Sol—have their honours, but of a lower order. The labours of Hercules are once more used as symbols of the exertions of Maximian for the good of the Empire, and Juppiter and Hercules are commonly associated in a single type, as the divine patterns of the two Emperors on earth. Not far behind in importance is the ‘Concordia Augustorum,’ the keystone of Diocletian’s building—a legend especially common in the Eastern mints, which prefer to concentrate on a few themes of central importance. The unusual type of the three Fates, ‘Fatis Victricibus,’ reflects the superstition which lay deep in the character of Diocletian. He had a firm belief in divination, he loved to probe into the future and he attributed his own rise to the mysterious workings of destiny. The divine world is related very closely to the human, and the divine powers appear again and again as ‘Preservers’ or ‘Companions’ of the Emperors. The old paganism had always been weak in theory, and even the elaborate reinterpretation which the new Pythagoreans were applying to it could hardly produce a satisfactory system of thought. It was not on its in­tellectual side a creed for which any sensible government would persecute. But paganism as a background to the historical mission of Rome and her emperors had an altogether different power. For this paganism the most religious emperors might one day strike a blow.

 

VI.

‘QUATTUOR PRINC1PES MUNDI'

 

Armed with the strength of the two new Caesars Diocletian could face with confidence the trials that yet awaited him. The problem for the moment was that of Carausius in Britain. A Menapian of the lowest birth, but of an ability and energy quite above the average, he had won distinction in the wars with Bagaudae and Franks in 286 and had been appointed by Maximian to command the Channel fleet and clear the seas of the Frankish and Saxon pirates. Suspected of being less anxious to check the pirates than to relieve them of their plunder and to convert it to his own uses, he was sentenced to death by his master, but, receiving timely warning, revolted together with his fleet and maintained a hold on the north coasts of Gaul, while the island of Britain hastened to welcome him as a deliverer (late 286 or early 287)2. Maximian was still on the Lower Rhine in 286 to 288, and, by April 21, 289, was in readiness to deliver a decisive blow against the ‘arch-pirate.’ But the attack Was launched in vain on an admiral ‘perfectly skilled in the art of war.’ Carausius seems to have gained a decisive victory at sea. But he aspired to something more than a precarious independence as a rebel. He offered and obtained peace and celebrated a triumph, greater than any success of his arms, by striking coins for ‘Carausius and his brothers,’ Diocletian and Maximian. As a token of reconciliation he abandoned his first irregular coinage on the model of the Gallic Empire and struck the base billon xx. 1 piece like the rest of the Empire. Aurelius Victor tells us that he was permitted to rule Britain, because he seemed fit to deal with the warlike nations that threatened the island. The peace, however, though loyally celebrated by Carausius with British issues for his colleagues, was not acknowledged on the coins of any Imperial mint. The Empire was only biding its time. In 293 Constantius set to work and blockaded Gesoriacum (Boulogne) by a great mole drawn across its harbour. Carausius was powerless to protect the town, and Gesoriacum fell; but victory was won by a mere hair’s breadth, for the first tide after its capture broke the mole and opened it once more to the sea.

Gaul was now lost to the rebel and, even in Britain, the authority of Carausius was severely shaken. Allectus, his chief minister, killed his master (293) and took over the defence of the island realm. Constantius was resolved to make no mistake. He spent two full years on his preparations, subduing the sym­pathizers with the rebels among the Menapii, while Maximian brought up an Illyrian corps, the ‘Virtus Illurici,’ to prevent any possible diversion on the Rhine. In 296, the Roman fleet was ready for action. It put to sea in two detachments, under Con­stantius himself and his Praetorian Prefect, Asclepiodotus. A fog that separated the two squadrons enabled Asclepiodotus to slip past the main fleet of Allectus, which was waiting for him near Clausentum (Bitterne by Southampton). Asclepiodotus landed near the Isle of Wight, burnt his boats to. commit his troops to the adventure, and encountered and routed Allectus somewhere in Hampshire. Allectus, flying from the lost battle, was killed and only the wrecks of his army succeeded in reaching London. The city was in danger of being sacked by this rabble, when the fleet of Constantius, which had been lost in the fog, sailed up the Thames and delivered the port of London from this peril. Constantius was hailed as the ‘restorer of the eternal light’ of Rome, and extended his mercy to the repentant Britons. The attempt to make Britain an independent power, behind the wall of its fleet, had ended as it was bound to end, in failure, but it had been a gallant adventure.

The coinage of the British Empire throws some light on the character and policy of its rulers as well as on the spirit and hopes of the ruled. Carausius is revealed as a man of original genius. He began by striking base billon, like that of the Gallic Empire, without the mark of value, xx. 1, but struck beside it the first good silver to appear from any Roman mint for many a long day. Diocletian paid him the compliment of borrowing this change in his reform of 296. Britain, it seems, was unwilling to accept the coinage of Aurelian’s reform, and Carausius yielded to its wishes, but, under the peace of 290, sacrificed financial independence and came into the general Imperial system. Carausius struck at a number of British mints—Londinium, Clausentum and prob­ably Rutupiae (Richborough). On the continent, he struck at Gesoriacum and, perhaps, even inland at Rotomagus (Rouen). Considering himself a true Roman, he maintained the Roman tradition and claimed to be a restorer of Rome. He honoured legions under his command and others, stationed in the Empire, from which he can hardly have had actual support. He dwelt with justifiable pride on his fleet, claimed the protection of Juppiter, Mars, Minerva and Neptune, boasted of his victories but, even more, of his most glorious achievement, the honourable peace with the Empire. It is a notable fact that the only quotation from Virgil on a Roman coin occurs on the issues of this low-born Menapian rebel—‘expectate veni’ are the words of welcome with which Britain greets her deliverer. The coinage of Allectus is less varied and interesting. It is confined to the two British mints, Londinium and Clausentum, and is mainly concerned with the virtues of the Emperor, notably his ‘Pax’ and his ‘Providentia,’ and the prowess of his fleet. A remarkable series of coins of the fleet, ‘Laetitia Augusti’ and ‘Virtus Augusti,’ with the type of a galley—perhaps the very names of Allectus’s flagships—is struck in a much smaller size than the xx. 1 pieces of Carausius and bears the signatures, q.l. and q.c. This perhaps represents an attempt to launch a new denomination, the ‘quinarius,’ beside the larger piece. But even on that larger piece, the mark of value, xx. 1, had disappeared with the breach with Rome, and the British coinage was again independent. The smaller piece, which seems to belong mainly to the end of the reign, may be due to a reform and reduction of the coinage, possibly in some relation to the reform of Diocletian. The great gold hoard of Arras has recently revealed something of the impression made by the triumph of Constantius and his merciful restoration of the blessings of Roman rule to a humbled and contrite province.

Maximian, as has been said, had appeared in Gaul to ensure its peace while the great expedition sailed to Britain. After success in Britain was assured, the Emperor was called away on an errand of his own. In Africa a troublesome confederacy of Moorish tribes, the Quinquegentanei, had risen in revolt, and the local forces proved insufficient to suppress them. Late in 297 Maximian marched to Africa by way of Spain, and made a speedy end of the rebellion. He was in Carthage on March 10, 298 and, later in that year, seems to have visited Rome for the first time in his reign. Constantius was for a while detained by the affairs of Britain: indeed, it is obvious that after the ten years of the British Empire there were many things that needed attention and cor­rection. He reorganized the defences of the island and laid the foundations of a new age of prosperity. The Saxon pirates in particular, who had been allied to the British emperors, were now fended off by a Count of the Saxon Shore with an efficient fleet and strong, well-distributed forts behind him. It must have been in this new settlement of Constantius that Britain was divided into the four provinces of Flavia Caesariensis, Maxima Caesariensis and Britannia Prima and Secunda. In 297 the Western Caesar established the Salian Franks on the island of the Batavians. A little later, perhaps in 298, Constantius is found again in Gaul, heavily engaged with a marauding horde of Alemanni. He ended the campaigns by a brilliant and spectacular victory near the ‘city of the Lingones,’ made all the more notable by a sudden reversal of fortune. Beaten at first in the field and narrowly rescued by ropes thrown down from the walls of the city, he received reinforcements the same day and led them out to break and scatter the enemy. After this exploit, the West enjoyed some years of uninterrupted peace.

Diocletian and his Caesar had been equally busy in Illyricum and the East. Galerius was set to serve his apprenticeship on the banks of the Danube, warding off invaders and clearing ground for cultivation by deforestation and irrigation. In 294 and 295 he had to deal with Goths on the move westwards towards the territory of the Burgundians. At about this time forts were built at Aquincum and Bononia on the Danube. In 296 or 297 there was fighting against various peoples—Marcomanni, Sarmatae, Bastarnae and Carpi—and the whole of the last-named people was transferred to settlements within the Empire. It was no doubt to make room for such new immigrants as these that Galerius spent his labours on land-reclamation³ that does honour to this rough soldier, but seems to have embittered his spirit, as he saw others enjoying higher honours at less cost.

Diocletian, no doubt, was in the background, directing and encouraging his Caesar: we find him wintering at Nicomedia, 294-295. In 296-297 Egypt demanded his personal intervention. That turbulent province had already needed correction earlier in the reign; now, the capital, Alexandria, broke out in revolt and created an. emperor of its own. The Achilleus of our literary authorities is undoubtedly the Domitius Domitianus of the coins, who interrupts the coinage of Diocletian in its twelfth year, 295-6, and strikes in two distinct years himself, 295—6 and 296-7. His revolt is not clearly distinguished from the earlier revolt of Coptos and Busiris, and it is, of course, possible that the same man was concerned in both. But it is hardly to be imagined that there was actually rebellion in Egypt from 293 to 296; it is far more probable that the events of several years have been care­lessly thrown together. Diocletian invested Alexandria and forced its surrender after eight months, c. November 296—June 297. The exact causes of the rebellion are unknown, but they presumably had something to do with economic discontents in connection with the monetary reform of Diocletian. That reform had not been long in working when Domitianus revolted, and he himself struck coins of the old Alexandrian pattern as well as the new. Those of the old pattern he may have issued to please the Alexandrians, those of the new were needed to keep in touch with the rest of the empire: on them he seems to have struck for Diocletian, Maximian and the Caesars, claiming a partnership in Empire as Carausius had claimed it in Britain. After his first anger had abated, Diocletian spent some time in Egypt, re-ordering its affairs and making useful arrangements, which were still in force when Eutropius wrote his ‘Breviarium.’ It is probable that Diocletian drew some ideas to be applied more generally throughout the Empire from Egypt, the most highly organized of all the provinces.

In the summer of 296 a more dangerous enemy threatened the Empire. Narses of Persia, succeeding Vahram III in 293, brought back something of the spirit and energy of the great Shapur to the Persian kingdom. Weary of subordination to Rome and at variance with Tiridates, the vassal king in Armenia, he took advantage of Diocletian’s preoccupation in Egypt and invaded Syria. Galerius was called up from Illyricum and forced the invader to retire towards Carrhae, but, following up his success too impetuously, he was caught in an ambush at Callinicus and heavily defeated. Diocletian had moved up to Antioch to support his Caesar, and it will have been at this time that factories of arms were established in Antioch, Edessa and Damascus. He re­ceived Galerius with a scorn deliberately calculated to inflame his proud spirit, and made him follow on foot behind his chariot. At the same time he accorded him the opportunity to repair his fault. Galerius brought up reinforcements from the Danube countries, veterans of such legions as V Macedonica and XIII Gemina and Gothic auxiliaries from Dacia. Confident in his new strength, he marched into Greater Armenia and, by strategy as able as it was bold, outgeneralled and routed Narses and captured a huge booty, including the wives and children of the Great King. Narses retired into the heart of his kingdom and Galerius pushed on and captured Ctesiphon.

Galerius was in a mood to exploit his success to the full and establish a new Roman province, but Diocletian ‘cuius nutu omnia gerebantur’ prepared a less showy, but more permanent settlement. The captives, hostages of the highest value, were treated with all honour and lodged at Daphne near Antioch. Narses renounced his ambitions and bent his policy to the re­covery of his wives and children. His envoy, Appharban, pleaded for a joint recognition of Rome and Persia by one another as co­ordinate great powers. He was roundly rebuked by Galerius for a false moderation of tone that accorded ill with the violently aggressive policy of Persia. But, in the end, he was sent back with some hope of a friendly settlement and, not long afterwards, an Imperial Secretary, Sicorius Probus, met Narses on the river Asprudas and concluded peace. The great difficulties raised by the terms of this treaty cannot be discussed here; it must suffice to say that Mesopotamia was definitely surrendered and a Roman protectorate over Armenia was acknowledged. Five small pro­vinces across the Tigris were ceded to Rome—Intilene (Ingilene), Sophene, Carduene, Arsanene, and Zabdicene—and Nisibis was fixed as a centre for the commercial relations between the two empires. In return for all these concessions Narses received back his captives, but nothing more. In order to avoid the appearance of complete surrender, he raised objections to the clause touching Nisibis, but here too, after mild pressure, he gave way. The triumph of Roman arms and diplomacy made an immense im­pression. ‘Circenses Adiabenicis victis’ were celebrated at Rome, from May 13 to 17, and an arch, that still stands, was erected at Thessalonica, to immortalize the victory. Galerius boasted himself a son of Mars and, forgetting something of his old sub­servience to Diocletian, began to force his claims and policies on the senior Emperor. The Persian victory was to bear fruit in other fields.

The middle period of the reign of Diocletian (c. 293 to 299) saw the crucial test of his policy and administration. The Tetrarchy sustained the trial as perfectly as its author could have desired. Augusti and Caesars loyally supported one another in all diffi­culties, distributing labours and covering one another’s rear during campaigns. The recovery of Britain, the crushing of re­volts in Mauretania and Egypt, and the crowning victory over Persia, established confidence in the government and raised Roman prestige to a height which it had not reached since the days of Septimius Severus. The divine splendours of Juppiter and Hercules already invested the two imperial houses. To these were now added the glories of the kingdoms of this earth. Though, as has been recently shown, Oriental forms had already invaded the Roman court, Diocletian took some decisive step in this direction which struck the imagination of his own and later times. He appears against a background of ceremonial and adoration as of the Persian palace, arrayed in garments embroidered with gold and jewelry, and gives full official recognition to practices which before had been experimental. Persian kings were not as readily murdered by their bodyguards as the Roman imperatores, who were only marked out by the purple cloak and mixed freely with their comrades. Diocletian was astute enough to be taught by an enemy and to add to the mysterious awe of religion the splendours of Persian royalty.

Even before the conclusion of the great wars those changes in administration which support Diocletian’s claim to be the second founder of the Empire had begun to take shape. These changes are described and discussed elsewhere in this volume, but it is to be remembered that they were the con­stant preoccupation of the Emperor. One side of this activity was directed towards the economic problems besetting the Empire which were a legacy from his predecessors. It is for this reason that they are reviewed in a separate chapter VII, together with the epidemic of high prices which Diocletian sought, though with small success, to remedy by his famous Edict de maximis pretiis. It may not, however, be out of place to point out here the possibility that the Emperor himself had unwittingly helped to produce the disease for which he sought to find a remedy. Towards the end of a.d. 295 he added to the aureus a coin of pure silver. He further made a billon piece, usually called a follis, which was superior in size and weight to the xx. 1 coin of Aurelian and his successors. The follis was now the first coin below the precious metals, and may be regarded as equivalent to the old sestertius, one-fourth of the silver piece. On the other hand the xx. 1 coin was now to be reckoned at a half-sestertius. Thus there was created a stable currency, but at the cost of a very drastic devaluation of the xx. 1 piece, the. coin with which the market had been flooded during the past reigns. If we may apply to this date the evidence of an important papyrus¹ this measure had an unexpected, but not unnatural result. The news that the old coin was to be reduced in value led to a rush to exchange it for commodities at any price, and in view of the vast masses of it in circulation it is easy to see why there was a great rise in prices which continued, only partly checked by the Edict, until the effect of the devaluation had worked itself out. The Edict was issued in a.d. 301. Two years later other forces challenged his statecraft, and claim some attention here.

Diocletian’s name has been traditionally associated with the last and greatest persecution of the Christians, and his evil reputa­tion has been only partially redeemed by his fame as administrator and reformer. That persecution is considered elsewhere in this volume, but its place in the political history of the Empire must here be briefly defined. During the years which followed the attempt of Decius and Valerian to break the strength of the Church the Christian faith had secured its position: it was now ‘a State within the State,’ too strong and too well disciplined to be ignored. Could Diocletian in his devotion to the old sanctities of public life and in his revival of pagan worship main­tain a strict neutrality in face of a growing and ambitious Church?

At first the problem was not urgent: the Church had lost some­thing of its fighting spirit and was not quick to give provocation. When about 29 y Diocletian began something like a purge of the army, seeking to remove from it its Christian elements, it was still doubtful whether that repression would be further extended, though it may be suggested that the coinage of the reform with the type of Genius Populi Romani on its commonest denomina­tion, the follis—a type which continued unchanged into the period of the persecution—shows the presence of ideas which were later to declare themselves in action.

If it is sought to find reasons for the violent change in policy which was effected by the edicts of 303 it can be urged that in the early years of the reign military problems perforce took pre­cedence : the religious issue was deferred till the end of the great wars. Peace with Persia once concluded, Diocletian was free to turn his mind to the completion of his task of internal re-organization. Anxious to secure the foundations on which imperial authority was in future to rest, he may well have come slowly to the conclusion that the Christian Church must bow to his will. The Emperor’s personal conviction inspired the edict against the Manichaeans: the gods of Rome had made Rome great; senseless innovation might bring divine wrath upon the Empire. The Christian in thought and social custom was a revolutionary, regarding as evil demons the gods of the Empire’s worship. Diocletian might thus with reason come of his own accord to the reluctant conclusion that the peace of Gallienus had conceded too much, that the Church must be coerced. And yet the sudden­ness of the change in policy can hardly in this way be adequately explained: pressure must have been brought to bear upon the Emperor by representatives of a more aggressive and intolerant type of paganism, and of these the leader was undoubtedly the Caesar Galerius. His influence vastly strengthened by his Persian victory, Galerius, with the enthusiastic support of Neoplatonist champions of the older faith, compelled Diocletian to admit that the challenge of the Christian Church must be boldly met. Diocletian yielded to the insistence of his Caesar; his efforts to prevent the shedding of blood proved fruitless, and at length the task of suppressing the Church was left to those whose heart was set upon the bloody work. Amongst the Christians there were countless defections, but those who withstood the will of the rulers of the Roman world were numerous enough to defeat the imperial purpose. Diocletian found, like many a statesman both before and after his day, that he had entered into conflict with forces which did not obey the laws with which statecraft had made him familiar.

 

VII

‘PROVIDENTIA DEORUM, QUIES AUGUSTORUM’

 

On November 20, a.d. 303 Diocletian appeared in Rome with Maximian to celebrate his vicennalia, give largesse to the people and enjoy the acclamations of the old capital on his accomplished work. He was uneasy, however, in mind and found the licence of the Roman mob little to his taste. Even before the end of the year he withdrew to Ravenna and entered on the consulship of 304 in that city. Early in 304, on his journey to Nicomedia, he suffered some form of nervous breakdown, which incapacitated him for all public duties and seemed likely at one time to end in death. Presently he recovered health, but let himself be convinced that the State needed the sendees of younger men. On May 1, 304,  he made a solemn act of abdication at Nicomedia, while Maximian, from whom he had extracted a promise to retire with him, abdicated at Milan. Constantius succeeded in the West, as senior Augustus, Galerius as junior in the East. For the vacant posts of Caesars, there were two natural claimants, Constantine, son of Constantius, and Maxentius, son of Maximian. Both, however, were passed over, on whatever pretext, and Severus and Maximin Daia, both proteges of Galerius, the latter a relative also, were appointed, the one for the West, the other for the East. These two appointments must have excited comment, not all of a favourable character. But of definite opposition there was none. The system of Diocletian had sustained its decisive test; the transition from First to Second Tetrarchy was accomplished with­out hindrance. Diocletian withdrew to his palace at Salonae to grow vegetables, Maximian to a life of self-indulgence on his country estates in Lucania. The gods had watched faithfully over the succession, and our ‘lords and masters, the most happy and blessed senior Augusti,’ could enter on their well-earned rest.

These events, if accepted at their face value, imply that Diocletian was carrying out in its due time a scheme pre-arranged many years before, when the Caesars were first appointed. That abdication had been considered as a possibility from the outset need not be denied. The whole purpose of the office of Caesar was to train men for the chief rank, and such training would lack half its meaning if promotion were to be indefinitely deferred. Galerius, too, an even more ardent supporter of the scheme of the Tetrarchy than its founder, contemplated retirement at the com­pletion of his own vicennalia. But it is improbable that any special terminus was fixed in advance. The most natural, the vicennalia of Diocletian, passed without a change, and there is much to show that the actual occasion was rather forced on Diocletian than chosen by him. For several years before 305 Galerius had been claiming the full recognition of his great services. He had forced on Diocletian the dangerous step of persecuting the Christian Church, and had set up internal conflicts in his mind which must have contributed to his collapse of 304. The choice of the new Caesars has no meaning except as an illustration of the personal likes and dislikes of Galerius. Christian writers concluded that Diocletian abdicated because he despaired of success in the struggle he had forced on the Christians. Aurelius Victor records that Diocletian, ‘imminentium scrutator,’ sought to escape that internal discord and general crash, which, as he learned from his researches, was impending. Some modern scholars have supposed that he would have repented at the last of his original intention to abdicate, had not Galerius brought such pressure to bear as his weary mind could not resist.

The verdict of history on the character and achievement of Diocletian has on the whole been favourable. He vindicated the majesty of Rome and carried her arms victoriously into every quarter of the empire. He rebuilt the State on new foundations and gave her under changed forms a new lease of life. He con­trived an ingenious system of government which successfully escaped the dangers to which his predecessors had succumbed. He established a new basis of authority which finally ended military anarchy. His one conspicuous failure lay in his religious policy which may be contrasted with what Constantine achieved. But nothing less than a deep change of heart could have turned Diocletian from his innate conservatism and love of the old religion to a frank acceptance of the new, and for such a change he was too old. Constantine came to the task in the freshness of youth, and he had Diocletian’s failure before him as a guide and as a warning. Here, as elsewhere, it was given to him to complete the work that Diocletian had begun. But the Empire had cause to be thankful for Diocletian, as one ‘born for the good of the State.’ He had served Rome loyally according to the light that was in him, and he had fulfilled the tasks to which he had set his hand; he was able to commit the burden of Empire to a system of his own making and to carry into retirement the love and admiration of his subjects. It is a wonderful path that leads from Diodes, the low-born freedman, to Diocletian, ‘Iovius,’ ‘felicissimus senior Augustus.’ Even if much of his building collapsed in that fatal crash he had foreseen, there was that in his work that had the quality to endure.

 

VIII

THE SECOND TETRARCHY: GALERIUS IN POWER

 

The abdication of Diocletian, even if pressed on him at the last against his own will, must have appeared to his subjects an act of noble renunciation which set the seal on his life-work. The Empire was still under the system that he had devised, and Diocletian could hope to spend his declining years as most honoured of ‘Elder Statesmen,’ watching it enjoy the peace and security that he had won for it. Maximian laid aside the purple in quite another mood, loyal to the last to his great colleague, but openly fretting at the unwelcome necessity. His talents and inclinations were all for an active life: retirement for him meant stagnation. There seemed to be little danger, however, that, after once having been persuaded to enter on his rest, he would force a way back into public life.

Constantius Chlorus, Augustus of the West, was now senior emperor, though Galerius, his colleague of the East, assumed the leading position in all but name. The sons of Constantius himself and of his former senior, Maximian, had both been passed over, and Severus, the new Caesar of the West, no less than Daia in the East, was Galerius’ man. Constantius held only Gaul, Britain and Spain, while Severus held Italy, Africa and Pannonia. In the East, Maximin governed Egypt and the provinces as far north as Taurus, while Galerius himself held the rest of Asia, Greece, and Eastern Illyricum. The facts are too eloquent to be misunderstood. The actual arrangements represented the interests and wishes of Galerius, and of Galerius alone. Constantius found himself in a position where he must either accept virtual subordination to his junior or hazard a civil war. It was not merely his gentle and merciful disposition, but also sound judgment that made him hold his hand.

The new Augusti were men tried and approved by long and successful service. Both were distinguished soldiers and administrators, both loyal adherents of the new imperial system. Beyond this the resemblance ceases, even if we make allowance for the strength of the Christian tradition which glorifies Constantius, the friend, and blackens Galerius, the enemy. Constantius was a man or breeding and culture, of strong and refined religious sense, with more of the old Roman humanitas than the ordinary Illyrian captain. Galerius, though himself ‘probe moratus,’ was uncompromising, merciless and excessively ambitious; a more fatal defect was his false standard of values as seen most tragically in his religious policy. The new Caesars were both unknown to the world at large. Severus was a good soldier but nothing more, if we rule out his notable qualities as a boon-companion. Maximin was a half-barbarous lad, a kinsman of Galerius, who perhaps thought to use him as Diocletian had used Maximian, as a clumsy but effective tool. He was afterwards to reveal qualities, if not virtues, that surprised his maker.

Whether the unbroken peace of the new regime would have endured for long cannot be decided, for, after little more than a year of rule, Constantius died at York on July 25, 306. Signs of troubles to come were not wanting. Early in the year Constantius, who was preparing an expedition against the Picts, sent a direct request to Galerius to dispatch Constantine to his assistance. Constantine, the son of Constantius by Helena, the low-born wife whom he had put away to marry Fausta—according to some born out of wedlock—had been brought up in the East at the courts of Diocletian and Galerius and had shown early signs of ambition and energy. Diocletian may have seen in him a kindred spirit and trained him for future service. But this is nowhere recorded and is certainly not proved merely by the fact that Constantine lived to complete the reforms of Diocletian; the completion too often looked like drastic revision. To Christians writing at a later date Constantine’s boyhood seemed comparable to that of Moses among the Egyptians, while Galerius appears as the brutal tyrant who tries him with dangerous ordeals from which only divine grace and his own courage deliver him. After the abdication of Diocletian, his position, however honourable in name, was that of a hostage. The story of the flight of Constantine to his father, travelling by forced marches and killing the post-horses behind him to defeat pursuit, is undisputed. The secret history of the event is less certain. Galerius may have suggested delay, but he certainly did not refuse the request of Constantius outright and finally gave Constantine his passport. Yet Constantine flies like an escaped convict. The true explanation can be guessed, if not proved. Constantius, in demanding back his son on a colourable excuse, was trying to recover his freedom oi action. Galerius, if he refused point-blank, would put himself completely in the wrong in any quarrel that might arise from his refusal. But between Galerius and Constantius lay Severus, through whose territories Constantine must travel, and Severus, the natural rival of Constantine, would hardly need a hint to detain him on any excuse that might be found. Galerius would be able to profess complete innocence and readiness to negotiate, but Constantine would remain a hostage. This was the subtle design that was defeated by Constantine’s amazing energy and foresight. He found his father still at Bologne and crossed with him to Britain, where he conquered ‘Britannicas gentes in intimo oceani recessu sitas.’ Very soon afterwards Constantius died.

The meaning of the diplomacy of Constantius was now re­vealed. Without thinking of waiting for the decision of Galerius, the army, largely swayed by the counsels of the German allied king, Crocus, acclaimed Constantine as its new ruler of the West. His age and even more his abilities demanded that the defence of the house of Constantius should be entrusted to him rather than to his half-brothers, the sons of Theodora. Laureate images of Constantine were sent to Galerius, to announce what had taken place and to ask for his approval. The implications of the mission were obvious to Galerius—‘We recognize your supremacy, we accept the requirements of the imperial system, we want no civil war: but we will not submit to complete elimination.’ Galerius was statesman enough to curb the paroxysm of anger into which the news threw him, before he gave his reply. He accepted Constantine as Caesar and advanced Severus to be Augustus of the West. He may have hoped thus to render Constantine harm­less, until he could be dealt with later; he may even have made an honest sacrifice of his personal resentment, in order to maintain the order of the Tetrarchy without a civil war.

 

IX.

CONSTANTINE AND MAXENTIUS: FILII AUGUSTORUM

 

The elevation of Constantine may have shaken, but certainly did not overthrow the system of government by tetrarchy. It had, however, an immediate consequence which at once had that effect. There was living in the neighbourhood of Rome one who had even better claims to the succession than Constantine—Maxentius, son of Maximian, born of no dubious or morganatic match, but in lawful wedlock. It was only later that rumours spoke of him as a supposititious child. If Constantine was to be placed in his lawful position by the troops, why should not Maxentius hope for the same justice? Had there been no public wrongs to reinforce a private grievance it is doubtful if Maxentius would have had the energy to enforce his own claim. But Rome and southern Italy were already bitter over their loss of privilege and subjection to taxation, and, above all, over the suppression of the Praetorian Guard—a step taken by Severus at the instigation of Galerius. A conspiracy led by Marcellianus, Marcellus and Lucianus, the officer in charge of the pork market, was supported by the Guard and gained immediate success. There was little resistance, but Abellius, the ‘vicarius’ of the City Prefect, lost his life. Maxentius was proclaimed princess and acknowledged in Rome and South Italy, while the North still held to Severus, who had his seat at Milan. Africa at once joined Maxentius and relieved him of anxiety about the food-supply. But his position was precarious and, with the approval of the Senate, he sent the imperial insignia to his father, who left his retirement in Lucania to rally the army in his support. But it was in vain that Maximian tried to draw Diocletian with him into the vortex.

Galerius had accepted one compromise, but he was in no mood to accept a second. Apart from his personal aversion to Maxentius and Maximian, he saw in the new move a deadly threat to the whole imperial system for which he stood. He declined to recognize Maxentius and ordered Severus to march against him. Severus, like a loyal colleague, obeyed and led his army up to the walls of the capital. But from this point the campaign would not go according to plan. Rome kept her gates stubbornly shut, and secret agents were soon at work in the ranks of Severus, whose soldiers had served long under Maximian and felt the call of the old loyalty. Judicious bribery completed what diplomacy had begun, and Severus had no choice but to retire rapidly on Ravenna. Maximian, who had by now resumed his position as Augustus, followed him and succeeded in inducing him, on the promise of his life, to commit himself into his hands (early 307). Severus was imprisoned and kept as a hostage against Galerius, while Maxentius assumed the title of Augustus. But Galerius still remained to be dealt with. It could not be hoped that he would tolerate the indignities that Severus had suffered, and it became necessary to seek all possible reinforcement against him. While Maxentius stayed in Rome, Maximian travelled to Gaul to sound the intentions of Constantine, who was already showing great vigourin his administration. Maximian offered him in marriage his own daughter, Fausta, to whom Constantine had already been betrothed some years earlier. The two motives—to secure his own position and to weaken the dangerous might of Galerius—proved sufficient. Constantine received Fausta in marriage, acknowledged Maxentius as Augustus and himself accepted promotion to that rank at the hands of Maximian.

Meanwhile the storm broke on Italy. By the summer of 307 Galerius had completed his preparations and, leaving his comrade Licinius to hold Illyricum for him, he marched into Italy and reached Interamna without a battle. Much to his surprise and dismay he soon detected symptoms of that same disaffection among his troops that had been the undoing of Severus. Giving up the countryside of Italy to his men to plunder, he withdrew in baffled rage to Pannonia to reconsider his plans. The invasion of Galerius had been fatal to Severus. Probably during the absence of Maximian in Gaul he was put to death at Tres Tabernae in defiance of the agreement. The hold of Galerius on the West was completely lost. What part Constantine played in these machinations remains uncertain, but he certainly refused the opportunity to join in crushing Galerius on his retreat.

Late in 307 Maximian re-appeared in Rome and proceeded to embroil matters still further by a coup d'état of his own. For whatever reason—personal ambition, anger at the treachery shown to Severus, or intrigue in the interests of Constantine, now his son-in-law—he summoned the troops to a meeting and tried to tear the purple from the shoulders of his son. But the scheme miscarried. Maxentius took refuge with the soldiers, who refused to listen to the father and drove him out, ‘like a second Tarquin,’ to seek refuge in exile at the court of Constantine.

Galerius then proceeded to seek a solution on his own lines. The whole system of Diocletian was threatened, now that the West had broken away under two Augusti and one senior Augustus of its own. What more fitting than that the authority and wisdom of Iovius himself should be called in to safeguard what he had built? Diocletian was nominated to the consulship of 308 with Galerius and was called to a conference at Carnuntum at which Maximian also was present. Diocletian would neither return to the helm himself nor suffer Maximian to remain there. Licinius, a trusted comrade-in-arms of Galerius, was set up as the second Augustus at his side; Maximin Daia was still to be the Caesar of the East, while Constantine was reduced to the same rank in the West. Maxentius was declared a public enemy (November 308). The forms of the Tetrarchy were thus restored, but the restoration was as short-lived as it was artificial. Maximian fled once more to Constantine in Gaul. Maxentius maintained himself in Rome and Italy. Constantine refused to submit to degradation, and Maximin Daia, hitherto a submissive follower of Galerius, protested against the promotion of Licinius over his head. Galerius tried to satisfy their claims by bestowing on them the title of ‘filii Augustorum’ in place of that of Caesar. The concession was only accepted as a step to full recognition, and both Constantine and Maximin are soon found claiming the title of Augustus. The system of two Augusti and two Caesars was at an end, and six Augusti together divided amongst themselves the rule of the Roman world. The primacy of Galerius, it is true, remained unquestioned, but the new system, resting on no general basis of agreement, was obviously unstable and only needed some slight shift of the balance of power to break down completely. The fatal crash that Diocletian had foreseen was impending; it was not merely the love of the simple life that made Diocletian prefer to cultivate his garden at Salonae.

It was rapidly becoming clear that Diocletian’s elaborate scheme to subordinate persons to his system must ultimately prove a failure. The marvellous ‘Concordia’ of the First Tetrarchy had been a lucky accident. The system was too complicated to escape disturbance from conflicting claims of heredity or service and clashes of temperament and will. It was on the personalities of its six rulers that the future of the Empire now mainly depended. Increasing years and responsibilities did something to steady and deepen Galerius’ character, but nothing to enlarge his sympathies or his understanding. He was loyal to what he knew, but incapable of fresh learning. The old Maximian returned to Empire worse than he had left it. He was almost purely mischievous and destructive, ‘vir ad omnem acerbitatem saeviti-amque proclivis, infidus, incommodus, civilitatis penitus expers.’ Maxentius, his son, was apparently a man of no especial force of character. Under the influence of supreme power he seems to have yielded to licentiousness and cruelty, and to have alienated the personal sympathy he had once enjoyed. His real importance lay in the fact that he represented the old claim of Rome to especial honour. When men could hope for a better champion of the same claim in Constantine, they soon abandoned Maxentius. Maximin Daia developed a strength and independence of character that could hardly have been expected of him. His personal character was bad and he bears the same stigma of cruelty as the other persecutors. But there are still left one or two indications of a more favourable side to his character, and it was something that a persecutor should advance as did Maximin from mere repression to a deliberate attempt to reform paganism on lines suggested by the persecuted religion. Licinius appears first as a mere piece in the game of Galerius, a good soldier devoted to his cause. But, as his later career was to show, he was perhaps the most detestable of all the hard men of his age, self-seeking, unimaginative and coldly cruel.

Finally, in Constantine we meet one of those rare personalities who leave a decisive mark on history. His great vigour of mind and body, his personal courage and soldierly ability were in themselves enough to bring him to the fore. But to these were added gifts of a rarer quality. He was a born organizer and leader of men, with an immense capacity for forming schemes and finding the means of carrying them out. It is with full justice that he ranks with Diocletian as joint founder of the new Empire. But he had something beyond this that Diocletian never had. Like Diocletian, he could meditate on the causes of social and political events and devise new solutions for old problems. Unlike him, he could submit to the influence of new ideals on his own inner thought and life. All this still lay in the future, but as early as 308 he was marked out as the coming man on whom rested the hopes of the many who had seen the promise of Diocletian’s Golden Age recede and die away.

For a time the six Augusti ruled side by side, untroubled by any serious disturbances from without—so sure was the peace that Diocletian had established. Constantine in Gaul had campaigns to fight against barbarians on the Rhine and gladdened the hearts of his subjects by exhibiting captive Germans as gladiators in the arena. But the initiative, as it seems, lay with him. He was practising his soldiers and training his own vast energies for greater tasks to come. After Carnuntum the old Maximian returned to his court, still in name senior Augustus, but without any real imperial function. Restless and ambitious to the last, he sought means to overthrow Constantine and tried in vain to use his daughter, Fausta, against her husband. Finally, when Con­stantine was marching Rhinewards he revolted and seduced a body of troops; but he was besieged and captured at Massilia and died by his own hand (early 310). It was a serious step for Constantine to take—to be consenting to the death of the once great ‘Herculius,’ the father of his wife and the first bestower of the Augustus title on himself, but it is hard to see how he could have escaped the necessity. The link with the Herculian dynasty was now broken and Constantine, to find a new basis for his authority, encouraged the legend that his father, Constantius, was descended from Claudius II. Sol Invictus was adopted as the patron deity of the dynasty and began to appear in great prominence on Constantine’s coins.

Maxentius meanwhile remained in undisturbed possession of Italy, expressing himself according to his own ideas of govern­ment. Though no persecutor on principle he made himself hated by his cruelty, lust and greed, but the Praetorians were committed to his cause so that no attempt to dislodge him without external aid could hope to succeed. His ambitions to found a dynasty, however, were blighted by the death of his son Romulus in 309. On one occasion when a great fire broke out in the city and, in the confusion, the soldiers came to blows with the people, a serious massacre was only narrowly averted by the intervention of the Emperor. A rebellion in Africa threatened the corn­supply of Italy and might have proved fatal to Maxentius had any of his rivals chosen to abet it. The details are obscure. A body of troops favouring Galerius deserted the service of Maxentius. Maxentius, in alarm, demanded as hostage the son of Alexander, who was acting for him as prefect in Carthage. Alexander, a Phrygian by birth, an old man of weak and irresolute character, still found the courage to refuse this demand and declared himself emperor. Rufius Volusianus was sent to Africa by Maxentius with a few cohorts and soon made an end of Alexander and his cause, the city of Carthage paying heavily for her treason (311). It was not in Africa or by Alexander that Maxentius was to be overthrown. Now that Maximian was dead and disowned by Constantine, Maxentius rediscovered his filial loyalty and struck coins in honour of him as ‘Divus.’ What is even more remarkable, he struck also in honour of ‘Divus Constantius Cognatus,’ seeking thus to establish a double claim to the Empire of the West.

Galerius was now looking forward to his vicennalia, the cele­bration of which was due to begin on May 1, 311, and was levying taxes unmercifully to fill his coffers. It had been his intention earlier to use the occasion for his own abdication and to hand over the government to Severus and Licinius as Augusti, and Candidianus, his son, and Maximin Daia as Caesars. But circumstances had proved refractory, and retirement now would have meant the death-blow to that system of government to which he still clung as an ideal. But the solution of the problem was taken from his hands. He fell ill of a terrible and disgusting malady and died within a month of the celebrations on which he had expended so much anxious care. The death of the first Augustus was bound to have serious consequences, and did in fact almost lead to a direct outbreak of civil war. Maximin Daia, who from 308 had been asserting his individual rights against Galerius, occupied Asia and marched north to the Bosphorus. Licinius hastened to meet him on the other side of the Straits, but, at the last moment, the two rivals agreed to accept the delimitation of their powers as actually determined at the moment. But a decisive struggle was impending. The four Augusti were no longer bound together in one system of loyalty, and their number was not a strength but a weakness. Constantine began to turn decidedly against Maxentius, branding him as a tyrant and seeking the support of the Christians in his dominions. Licinius, who had at least some sense of political strategy, drew closer to Con­stantine and became betrothed to his sister, Constantia. It was inevitable that Maxentius and Maximin should seek alliance to protect themselves against a coalition that threatened them both. The invasion of Italy, and the battle of the Milvian bridge were soon to free Rome of her tyrant, and Maximin was to die soon after a broken fugitive from Licinius at Tarsus. A few more years and Constantine was to be ruler over a united Empire.

The coinage of the period has a double interest apart from the economic political quarrels and alliances, the return of Maximian as senior Augustus, the new mint of Maxentius at Ostia, the coinage of the pretender, Alexander, at Carthage. The types throw light on the last phases of dominant paganism, with Juppiter and Mars still high in honour, Hercules, receding with the collapse of the Herculian line, Sol returning to supremacy in the coinage of Constantine. Maxentius, as might be expected, concentrates attention on the old sanctities of Roman religion and particularly on the worship of Roma herself. But it was under the concept of Genius, in his various aspects, that paganism fought its decisive battle with Christianity. ‘Genius Populi Romani,’ ‘Genius Imperatoris,’ ‘Genius Augusti’—these are the types that fill the token coinage which passed through all men’s hands. It was the creative spirit, immanent in ruler and people, that was set against the spirit of Christ, working through the Church. The ‘Sol invictus comes’ of Constantine was carried over from his pagan to his Christian period. Sol might become to the world, as he had become to Constantine himself, a symbol of Christ.

Diocletian, watching from Salonae the final breakdown of his system after the death of Galerius, may well have felt that his life­work had been in vain. Nor would such a feeling have been without its deeper justification. However much of the body of his reforms might be carried over into the system of Constantine, the spirit was changed. A new conception of the relation of the temporal world to the divine had won its way to triumph. The gods were no more to be mere expressions of the forces that moved in human government. The eternal was now recognized to be the real, of which even the majesty of eternal Rome was but a reflection. Christianity had proved its power of disruption in shattering the old foundations of the Roman State. Would it now prove equally capable of providing a new spiritual basis for the secular power, or was the strife of Church and State henceforward to be a constant factor of political life? Here were questions to stir the passionate interest of the new generation of Constantine. The older generation, with its great representative, Diocletian, must have closed its eyes wearily on a new world that it could no longer understand.