After the killing of Gallus and his son Volusianus, who had reigned for two years, and of Aemilianus, who after them had tyrannically invaded the empire and reigned for three months, Valerian and his son Gallienus assumed the empire.
[Running head: Seventh Title.]
Valerian was called Augustus by the army in Greece [read: in Raetia], while Gallienus was called Caesar at Rome by the senate. According to Eusebius in the Chronicles, they began to reign in the year of the Lord 256 [read: 253].
According to Eusebius in Book Seven of the Ecclesiastical History, Valerian was marvelously humane and kind toward the servants of God beyond all those who had preceded him. At the beginning he seemed far more kindly toward them even than men who were called Christians at least in name. He so greatly revered God’s servants that his whole household was a church of God.
In a certain chronicle it is also read concerning his earlier goodness that his life was praiseworthy among the Romans. So much was this so that, by Decius’s decree and everyone’s desire, he was made censor in order to reform the fallen morals of the commonwealth for the better. This dignity had been used at Rome in ancient times and was never imposed except upon holy and grave men.
When Emperor Decius imposed this office upon Valerian, then a noble citizen, he used these words:
“Happy Valerian, by the judgment of the whole senate, receive the censam [read: censuram, censorship] of the entire Roman world, which the Roman commonwealth confers upon you. Today you alone among mortals are commanded to judge the morals of all.
“You will judge who ought to remain in the senate house or the palace. You will also restore the equestrian order to its ancient state. You will set limits upon assessments and arrange the revenues. Authority to write laws is given to you. You must judge the ranks of soldiers. You will inspect arms. You will judge concerning our palace, the judges, and the most eminent prefects, except the prefect of the city of Rome, the ordinary consuls, the king of sacred rites, and the chief virgin of the Vestals, if she has remained uncorrupted. Yet even those whom you cannot judge will labor to please you.”
Valerian, declining the burden of so great a dignity, answered the emperor:
“I beg you, most holy emperor, do not bind me to this dignity so that I must judge the Roman people, the senate, the soldiers, and the judges of the whole world. These are matters that belong to the name of Augustus.
“Among us [read: among you], emperor, the censorship has ceased; a private man cannot after this [read: cannot] fulfill it. I therefore ask pardon from this title [read: that honor], for my life is unequal to it, my confidence is unequal to it, and the times themselves resist it, since human nature cannot bear [read: does not seek] a censorship of humankind.”
When they heard this, the emperor and senate said with one voice: “Valerian’s life is a censorship. Let him judge everyone, for he is better than everyone, has no crime, and can have nothing objected against him by others. From boyhood he was always grave, prudent, modest, and a friend of good men. He is foremost in birth, improved in life, illustrious in learning, and singular in character.”
On account of this reputation and the character that preceded him, Valerian was afterward made emperor. As was said above, at the beginning of his reign he was exceedingly kind toward the worshipers of Christ. At last, however, he was corrupted and cast down from the truth by a certain most wicked teacher, the master and teacher of the Egyptian magicians. He then ordered just and holy men persecuted and killed as though they opposed the magical arts to which Valerian himself had submitted.
He came to such madness and cruelty that he first expelled from the palace those who were defenders of Christ’s name. Then at Rome and throughout the whole world, as the eighth persecutor from Nero, he stirred up an exceedingly grievous persecution against Christ’s Church. In this persecution Pope Stephen received martyrdom at Rome. Sixtus II succeeded him, as has been said.
§ I: The Several Men Called Decius
It must be carefully considered here who suffered under Decius, for there were several men named Decius.
The first was the emperor who followed Philip after killing him and was called by no other name. Some say that Pope Sixtus suffered with Lawrence his archdeacon under this man. They were asked for the Church’s treasures—that is, those of Emperor Philip. After his father was killed by Decius, Philip’s son feared for himself and entrusted the treasure to blessed Sixtus, who presided over the Roman Church, to be distributed to the poor.
This assertion is contradicted, however, because that Decius reigned, as appears above, for a year and a half, and Pope Fabian suffered under him. Between Fabian and Sixtus there were several years and several pontiffs—namely, Cornelius, Lucius, Stephen, and afterward Sixtus. From this it appears that Sixtus and Lawrence did not suffer under that first Decius.
There was another Decius, an emperor who was more commonly called Gallienus, under which name he is placed here in the number of emperors. He was the son of Valerian, of whom the present account speaks. For he was called both Gallienus and Decius [read: Gallienus and Decius were distinct rulers], and it seems more likely that Sixtus and Lawrence suffered under him.
Nor does the inquiry concerning Philip’s treasures present an obstacle. Because they were great and were known to have been entrusted to the pontiff of the Christians, it could be supposed that they had passed through his predecessors to Sixtus and thus were sought from him.
In another chronicle, however, I found that this Decius under whom Sixtus and Lawrence suffered was not the emperor but merely the prefect of the city or a Caesar. By the command of the aforementioned Emperor Valerian, he caused the aforesaid martyrs Sixtus and Lawrence to suffer.
Helinand says that Emperor Gallus, who preceded Valerian, was also called Decius because he had two names [read: Trebonianus Gallus and Decius were distinct rulers]. Vincent says in the Historical Mirror that the histories disagree marvelously concerning the martyrs who suffered under Decius. Pope Cornelius is said to have suffered under him, and the virgin Eugenia, who lived in Cornelius’s time, is read to have suffered under Valerian and Gallienus, who reigned after Decius and even after Volusianus and Gallus.
But if it is considered that there were several men called Decius—two or three, although only the first was styled emperor under that name—it will be easy to reconcile the accounts. For these two, Valerian and his son Gallienus, were also called Decius [read: Valerian, Gallienus, and Decius were distinct rulers]; or another prefect or Caesar was so called. By their command a dire and lengthy persecution was stirred up throughout the world against the Christians. They held the empire for fifteen years and both were ill-fated.
When Sapor, king of the Persians, was warring against the Roman provinces of Syria, Cilicia, and Cappadocia, Emperor Valerian heard of it, gathered innumerable thousands of armed men from every side, and came to Antioch. Arranging war there against the Persians, he crossed the Euphrates and arrived in Mesopotamia.
After he had fought minor battles there with sufficient success, a battle was finally joined in that place by the ordering of divine counsel, in which neither military strength nor discipline was of any use. Defeated and put to flight, he lost nearly his whole army. At last Valerian himself, fleeing while the Persians pursued him, was captured and handed over to the king of the Persians, who eum ignominiosa consenuit servitute [read: in his power he grew old in such ignominious slavery].
As long as Valerian, emperor and ruler of the Roman Empire, lived, he endured this punishment of an infamous office: huni [read: humi, on the ground], bending down, he carried King Sapor upon his shoulders whenever the king was about to mount his horse.
[Running head: Chapter Eight, Folio 237.]
As Orosius says, by God’s just judgment the author of so nefarious a crime against the saints—namely, the persecution of Christ’s worshipers—was punished with a shameful death.
When Valerian had been captured, the surrounding nations were suddenly released on almost every side by God’s permission. Loosening their reins, they invaded all the territories of the Romans. First the Germans penetrated the Alps, burst into Italy, and advanced as far as Ravenna. The Alemanni roamed through the Gauls and plundered everything with slaughter, flame, and rapine. Macedonia, Pontus, and Asia were devastated by an inundation of Goths. The Sarmatians depopulated the Pannonias. The Germans, after ravaging Further Spain, gained possession of it.
Moreover, tyrants arose by an internal conspiracy, and civil wars broke out. Roman blood was poured out everywhere—the blood of those who had poured out the innocent blood of Christians—as Romans and barbarians alike raged.
§ II: Gallienus and the Captivity of Valerian
Gallienus, the son of Valerian, was also called Decius according to some. After he alone obtained the direction of affairs when his father was captured, he was terrified by God’s clear judgment and moved by the example of his father and colleague. He began to act more mildly and gently toward the Christians. Issuing decrees, he ordered the punishments stopped and the persecutions ended, and with anxious amends restored peace to the churches.
While a Persian prison held Emperor Valerian confined, many kings and princes who had brought aid to King Sapor against the Romans in the war advised him to return Valerian to the Romans and use so great a victory prudently.
Among the others, Vesonius, a most powerful king, wrote in these words:
“Vesonius to Sapor, king of the Persians.
“If I knew that the Romans could be completely conquered, I would rejoice in so great a victory as the gods have given you. But because that nation cannot be conquered either by deeds [read: by fate] or by courage, take care lest the fact that you defeated and captured an old emperor should in the future turn to evil for you and yours.
“Consider what nations the Romans made tributary after those nations, as enemies, had defeated them in war: the Gauls, the Carthaginians, and King Mithridates. Therefore use the opportunity for peace and return Valerian to the Romans.”
Finally, foreign nations—namely, the Bactrians, Iberians, Albanians, and commanders of other peoples—wrote to Gallienus and the Romans, promising aid so that Valerian might be freed from captivity.
Gallienus, Valerian’s son, was by nature a rather wanton man. When he learned of his father’s captivity, he rejoiced and joked, although there was immense grief among everyone because the prince of the Romans was held in Persian captivity and his son was leaving him unavenged.
His heart stupefied by pleasures, he was not moved by his father’s miseries or so great a disgrace to the Roman Empire. Instead he asked those around him: “What do we have for dinner today, and what pleasures have been prepared for us?” As though secure, he occupied himself with luxury, although in contempt for him many men in different provinces had called themselves emperors.
Meanwhile Macrinus [read: Macrianus]—or, as others write, Macianus [read: Macrianus]—governed the Syrian armies. After Valerian’s misfortune, when the leading men of the orders asked what needed to be done, a certain Ballista, one of the legates, said in the assembly of all:
“Fellow soldiers, I seek a good prince who may restore the falling commonwealth. But who, I ask, can fill Valerian’s place except Macrinus [read: Macrianus]? The most ample order of the senate and Emperor Valerian entrusted Egypt and Syria, a great part of the Roman Empire, to him. He is brave, steadfast, and upright, and—what pertains still more to imperial power—rich.”
Turning to Macrinus [read: Macrianus], he then said: “Receive the position owed to your merits, Macrinus [read: Macrianus], and conduct yourself so that the Roman people may rejoice that you have been made prince.”
Macrinus [read: Macrianus] answered him: “It is exceedingly blameworthy to desire imperial power solely in order to rule. It should instead be sought so that a man may be useful not only to himself and his children but also to the commonwealth. I receive the empire with the intention of aiding the Roman commonwealth and removing that plague of the human race, Gallienus, from the helm.”
As the historians hold, no one at that time was more suited to governing the commonwealth. Added to this was the fact that his two sons, Macrinus [read: Macrianus] the Younger and Quietus, were exceedingly brave men and rushed into battle with their whole minds, so that they were examples to the legions.
§ III: Macrinus [read: Macrianus], Aureolus, Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus], and Zenobia
Macrinus [read: Macrianus] therefore, having assumed the empire, sought aid from every side. After assembling a very large and most valiant army, he undertook the march against Gallienus.
When this was heard, Aureolus, who governed the Illyrian armies, was compelled by his soldiers to assume the empire himself in contempt for Gallienus. He met the approaching Macrinus [read: Macrianus] with very great forces. When battle was joined, after grievous slaughter in both armies, Macrinus [read: Macrianus] was finally defeated, captured in flight, and killed.
Aureolus, having gained the victory, took possession of the entire surviving army of Macrinus [read: Macrianus]. Powerful in military strength, he ruled in Illyricum and compelled the whole surrounding region to obey him.
Obolenachus [read: Odaenathus] the Palmyrene, who governed the eastern armies on behalf of the Romans, hoped to join to himself the legions that Macrinus [read: Macrianus] had left with his son to defend Syria. Gathering the eastern forces, he crossed into Syria and defeated and besieged Quietus, Macrinus [read: Macrianus]’s son.
When the soldiers with Quietus had for some time been tormented by exceedingly powerful hunger, they killed the young man at Ballista’s instigation, cast his body over the wall, and all surrendered themselves to Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus].
After this victory Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus] therefore obtained almost the entire East. Thus at that time Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus] held the East, Aureolus Illyricum, and Gallienus Italy.
After obtaining the East, Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus] saw himself made strong by so many legions and resolved to wage war against the Persians in order to free Valerian. Gathering auxiliaries from almost the whole East, he advanced against the Persians in battle, defeated them, besieged and captured the most noble cities Nisibis and Carrhae, and recovered all Mesopotamia, which they had occupied.
Finally, engaging the king of the Persians himself in a most difficult battle, he routed and defeated him. In this battle he captured the king’s treasures. Thus Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus] restored Roman affairs in the East to their former condition.
Because he did nothing except labor to free Valerian, he burned with zeal every day and, on foreign soil amid the difficulties of the places, labored most faithfully for the commonwealth as an excellent emperor.
When Gallienus learned this, he shared the imperial power with Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus] and called him Augustus. The senate and Roman people gratefully accepted what had been done.
At last Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus], after successfully conducting affairs in the East and winning many wars, was killed with his son Herodes by his cousin Maeonius, who also aspired to the empire. This was a great loss to the empire.
Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus] was, as cannot be denied, a man singular in strength of hand, eloquence, and prudence, and most skillful and fortunate in military affairs. In his youth he was also greatly devoted to hunting. He killed lions, leopards, and bears after engaging them in combat.
The wife of this Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus] was Zenobia, a marvelous woman who is said to have been braver than her husband. She was chaste, sober, and prudent. Her voice was clear and her severity manly. Where necessity demanded, she possessed the severity of tyrants; where piety required, the clemency of good princes. She had a firm command of histories, especially eastern ones, so much so that she is said to have abridged them. Moreover, she was most skilled in every language.
When her husband died, she did not occupy herself with weeping, as women are accustomed to do. With a manly spirit she pursued and killed her husband’s murderers. After they had been killed, she came helmeted to the assembly, wearing a purple veil with gems hanging from it.
In this assembly, detesting the luxury of Gallienus, she caused the armies to swear allegiance to her sons Timolaus and Terremanius [read: Herennianus]. Because they were boys, she herself held the rule of the East against Gallienus.
Gallienus, occupied at Rome with luxury and feasting, heard that Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus] had been killed and resolved to make war upon the Persians, seeking vengeance for his father far too late. He gathered forces and entrusted the conduct of the war against the Persians to a certain Heraclianus, one of his commanders.
When Zenobia heard that he had come into those regions, she feared that, after defeating the Persians, he would take the empire of the East away from her sons. She met him in battle and either killed or captured his entire army. Hearing this, Gallienus abandoned his plan.
§ IV: Aemilianus and the Usurpers in the Provinces
During the same time Aemilianus assumed the empire in Egypt. He was exceedingly experienced in war. Eastern commanders who had survived the wars or were in the provincial garrisons compelled him, because of their hatred of Gallienus, to accept the empire.
Immediately, although unwilling, he assumed the empire and traversed the Thebaid and Egypt. With great military courage he moved the nations of barbarians that had poured themselves through the Roman provinces.
Moreover, by seizing the granaries where a great quantity of grain was kept for the city’s support, he afflicted the city of Rome with a dreadful famine. Theodorus [read: Theodotus], one of Gallienus’s commanders, afterward captured this Aemilianus after fighting a most bloody battle with him and sent him to Gallienus at the city bound in chains.
After him a certain Alexander named himself emperor in Egypt. He was captured and killed by the same Theodorus [read: Theodotus].
While such varied events occurred in the East, men in whom the desire for ever-new dominions was innate saw Gallienus persist in the depravity of luxury and called a certain Postumius, one of the Roman commanders, to the empire.
This man was exceedingly brave in war, exceedingly steadfast in peace, and most grave in all his actions. So true was this that Gallienus entrusted his son Salenius [read: Saloninus] to Postumius for upbringing, as though to a guardian of his life and an instructor of his character and imperial conduct.
As some report, Postumius broke faith, killed Salenius [read: Saloninus], and assumed the empire. Others relate that the Gauls called him emperor and killed Gallienus’s son through soldiers they sent.
When Gallienus afterward perceived these things, he made peace with Aureolus, who had made himself emperor in Illyricum, in his zeal to oppose Postumius, who governed Gaul after it had been occupied by barbarians and then freed from them.
As Aureolus and Postumius waged war against one another, they acted sometimes successfully and sometimes unsuccessfully. Finally, after Gallienus had been expelled from the empire, Postumius—who had previously been greatly loved—conducted himself with excessive harshness and severity. He was killed by a certain commander named Lollianus with the consent of a great part of the army.
After Postumius’s death, Lollianus was substituted in his place and assumed the empire offered to him by the Gallic armies. He defeated and expelled the Germans who had poured into Gaul and restored it to peace. While he remained in this peace, however, he was treacherously killed by Victorinus, the son of Victoria.
Victorinus therefore assumed the empire in the Gauls. He was exceedingly brave in war and, apart from his lust, an excellent emperor. Lust and pleasure in women so completely destroyed him, however, that none of the ancient writers dared to commit his life to letters, for it is established by everyone’s judgment that he deserved punishment for his unbridled lust. Not long after assuming the empire, he was suddenly pierced with a sword and died at the hand of a man whose wife he had violated.
After Victorinus was killed in the Gauls, the Gallic armies wavered for some time concerning the election of an emperor. At last a certain Marius was made emperor in a military tumult. Although he was the son of a blacksmith, he was called to several dignities and finally to the imperial dignity because of his enormous bodily strength. He was killed by a certain soldier who had once been his servant in a blacksmith’s workshop.
A certain Roman commander named Ingenuus, who governed the army in Pannonia, was also made emperor by the Moesian legions. Because of his singular courage of mind and body, Gallienus had always regarded him with suspicion, especially because he was exceedingly acceptable to the soldiers.
When Gallienus heard this, although ruined by luxury, he was nevertheless energetic, swift, and brave whenever necessity threatened. Gathering an army from Italy, he advanced against Ingenuus. After fighting a most difficult battle with him, Gallienus defeated, routed, and killed him.
In this appeared the cruelty and bestial rage of Gallienus. He ordered all the soldiers captured in that war killed and, raging against the cities that had favored Ingenuus, left them empty of the male sex.
Nor were the Africans lacking. When they heard that Gallienus was disputing among taverns and baths with pimps, they too proclaimed emperor a certain proconsul named Celsus. On the seventh day of his rule he was killed by Galliena, Gallienus’s cousin.
Amid the many military disasters that arose under Gallienus, there was also an exceedingly severe earthquake. Many towns and cities in the East collapsed, crushing their inhabitants. For many days exceedingly dense darkness covered the earth. A very great thunder was heard, not from the thundering sky but from the bellowing earth, and many people died from terror at it. Rome itself was also shaken by a violent movement.
Moreover, the sea burst beyond its limits and boundaries and submerged many cities. The pestilence that had begun under Volusianus and Gallus so wearied Rome that five thousand people perished from the same disease in a single day.
The most noble city of the Byzantines in Trahie [read: Thraciae, of Thrace], most renowned for naval wars, was so devastated by Gallienus’s soldiers that absolutely none of its citizens survived except for a few dispersed throughout the world. It was nevertheless afterward restored by Constantine the Great.
Wearied and battered by such great evils, the commonwealth could not endure that most depraved plague, Gallienus. Although he was a most renowned poet and exceedingly gifted in every art, luxury corrupted everything. He always turned his nature toward the worse and, being prone to cruelty, killed many citizens for the aforesaid reason.
[Running head: Chapter Eight, Folio 238.]
When Gallienus had now become hateful to the senate and the Roman people, they considered summoning Aureolus, who ruled in Illyricum, to the city so that he might assume the empire and remove Gallienus. To accomplish this, Aureolus entered Italy with his armies. When Gallienus learned of it, he met him with his forces near Milan so that they might wage war against one another. But there Gallienus himself was killed by certain of his own commanders.
§ V: Cyprian
While the aforesaid Valerian and Gallienus ruled, many people in various places were crowned with martyrdom. For after Valerian, who had already possessed the empire for seven years, was captured by the king of the Persians, as has been said, his son Gallienus afterward ruled alone for eight years; he was also called Decius.
Among the others, the distinguished doctor Cyprian was crowned with martyrdom in his time. It must be observed that this Cyprian is not the man who, after having once been a magician, was later converted to the faith, eventually became a bishop, and suffered martyrdom with Saint Justina. For that man lived in the time of Diocletian, as is stated below; this one lived in the time of this Gallienus, who was also called Decius.
Jerome therefore says as follows about him in his Book of Illustrious Men:
“Cyprian the African, bishop of Carthage, at first taught rhetoric with distinction. Then, through the persuasion of the presbyter Caecilius—from whom he also received his surname—he became a Christian, distributed his entire substance to the poor, and, not long afterward, was chosen as a presbyter and also appointed bishop of Carthage. It is superfluous to compose a judgment [read: draw up a catalogue] of his genius, since his works are clearer than the sun.
“He suffered under the persecution of the princes Valerian and Gallienus, the eighth persecution, on the same day as Cornelius but not in the same year. For while, as is contained in his Acts, he devoted himself to preaching at Carthage, he was presented to the proconsul Patrinus [read: Aspasius Paternus]. Because he could not be moved from the faith, he was sent into a long exile. But at the command of the proconsul Astasius [read: Galerius Maximus], who succeeded Patrinus [read: Aspasius Paternus] in office, he was recalled from exile and beheaded by him. When the sentence of condemnation against him had been read, he said, ‘Thanks be to God,’ and ordered his people to give a fixed sum of money to the executioner.”
He wrote many short works arranged in a most eloquent style and approved by the Church, Distinction 15, Sancta Romana. He wrote one book On the Twelve Abuses of the World; one book to Donatus, On the Grace of God; one book On the Lapsed; one book On Gamblers; one book On the Unity of the Catholic Church; one book On the Lord’s Prayer; one book On Mortality; one book On Work and Almsgiving; one book On the Good of Patience; one book On Jealousy and Envy; one book to Demetrius; one to Fortunatus; one to Quirinus; one to Antonianus; one to Julianus; one to Caecilius; one to Cornelius; three books On the Praise of Martyrdom; one On the Sacred Chalice; one On the Two Mountains; and many letters to various persons.
In the book entitled On the Grace of God and the Abundance of the World’s Malice, he says among other things:
“The Spirit, flowing forth abundantly, is confined by no boundaries and restrained by no fixed limits. He flows continually and overflows copiously. Only let our breast thirst and lie open: as much capacious faith as we bring there, so much of the flood of grace do we draw.
“Imagine for a little while that you have been withdrawn to the higher summit of a lofty mountain. From there look upon the faces of the things lying beneath you and, with your eyes extended in different directions, yourself free from earthly contacts, behold the whirlwinds of the wavering world. You will now pity the world itself, and, mindful of yourself, more grateful to God and with greater joy, you will rejoice that you have escaped.
“Alas [read: Now], among the innocent [read: among the guilty] it is a crime to be harmless. Whoever does not imitate the evil gives offense. The laws have consented to sins, and what is forbidden [read: what is publicly practiced] has begun to be lawful. For what shame concerning affairs, what integrity can exist there, where those who would condemn the wicked are absent and only those who are condemned present themselves?
“Moreover, those whom you imagine rich are themselves anxious amid their riches, and the solicitude of uncertain thought tears them apart: lest a robber lay waste their goods, lest an assailant attack them, or lest the hostile envy of someone richer disturb them with calumnious lawsuits. Neither food nor sleep comes securely. gemat. licet bibat in convivio suspirat [read: he sighs at the banquet, though he drinks from a gemmed cup]; and when a softer bed has enclosed in its deep hollow his body languid from feasts, he lies awake upon the featherbed. The wretched man does not understand that these splendid things are punishments to him, that he is held bound to gold and possessed, and more to possess riches [read: to be possessed rather than to possess riches].
“O detestable blindness of minds and deep darkness of mad greed! Although a man could unburden and relieve himself of his weights, he goes on reclining all the more upon the fortunes that oppress him and clinging to his penal heaps. There is no generosity toward dependents, no sharing with the needy. They call that money their own which, as though it belonged to another, they guard shut up at home with anxious labor. From it nothing is imparted to friends, to children, or finally to themselves; they possess it only so that another may not be permitted to possess it.
“Or do you think at least those men secure in stable firmness amid the insignia of honors or abundant resources—those who, shining with the splendor of the royal court, are surrounded by the protection of watchful arms? Their fear is greater than that of others, for they are compelled to fear as much as they are feared. Exalted rank likewise exacts punishments from the more powerful man.
“There is therefore one placid and faithful tranquility, one solid and firm security: if a man, drawn away from these whirlwinds of a disquieting world, takes his station in the refuge of the saving harbor, raises his eyes from earth to heaven, and, admitted to the gift of God and already near to his God in mind, glories that whatever among others appears lofty and great in human affairs lies beneath his own conscience. He who is greater than the world can no longer seek anything from the world.”
The same man says in the book On Gamblers:
“If the sheep sin and the shepherds pardon those who sin, do they not burden themselves with the weight of those who sin? Why, I ask, faithful ones, does the hand which has been purified from human injuries and admitted to the Lord’s sacrifice, which rises in the oratory to praise the Lord, and which marks upon the forehead the sign of Christ by which it is protected—why, I say, does it, by practicing the game of dice, again entangle itself in the snares of the devil from which it was freed?
“For gaming is the devil’s hunting snare and an incurable wound of sin. There the devil is at hand, crouching to seize; there are treachery, false testimony, fury of mind, and perjury for sale; there is serpentine speech; there are raging friendship and discordant brotherhood; there are insults and savage audacity, fierce impatience, and the loss of possessions.
“O idle wickedness of gamblers! O cruel hand, armed to its own peril, which squanders with shameful zeal paternal goods and resources acquired by the sweat of others!
[Running head: Seventh Title.]
“Gaming is a channel of evil and the supplanting of a friend. It brings no profit [variant: grief], but consumes everything. From this men finally become poor; here, when all their possessions have been consumed, they overwhelm themselves with borrowed money; from this they lose a patrimony without receiving any market money [read: without any legal claim in court].
“Indeed, the man who first invented this game, filled by the devil’s prompting with his arts, established that his imitators should worship and sacrifice to him, so that anyone who wished to adhere to his pursuit should not first extend his hand to the gaming board unless he first sacrificed to its author. But whoever you are, Christian, who plays at the gaming board: although you do not sacrifice, you nevertheless share in the law of this crime, and certainly you are not a Christian.
“O what madness of gamblers, who rage, swear falsely, curse, and, blinded by the devil’s darkness, lay hands upon one another, devote one another to destruction, and dishonor their parents’ origin in the presence of the crowds! A man who has already been defeated repeatedly is again incited by the devil’s persuasion toward the harmful pursuit. It is an art hostile to its students and a lustful pursuit that supplies not riches but nakedness and want.” Thus he speaks.
The same Cyprian says in a certain book to Julianus [read: Pope Nicholas I writes to Emperor Michael III, adapting Gelasius I]:
“The one mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus, thus distinguished by his own acts and dignities the offices of each power. He wished his own people to be lifted upward by medicinal humility, not to be submerged again into the infernal regions by human pride, so that Christian emperors should need pontiffs for eternal life, while pontiffs should use imperial laws only for the course of temporal affairs. Thus spiritual action would stand apart from carnal incursions; a man serving God would by no means entangle himself in secular business; and, conversely, one who was entangled in secular business would not appear to preside over divine things.” Thus he speaks, Distinction 10, Quoniam.
There the gloss says that the papacy and the empire have one principle, namely Christ, who was pontiff and King of Kings, and that those dignities are distinct. Nevertheless, the pope possesses both swords and sometimes uses each of them. Therefore, although they are distinct, in their exercise they are nevertheless subordinated, so that the imperial dignity is subject to the papal as an inferior to a superior, Distinction 96, Duo sunt. Just as there is one prince in the universe, God, so in the Church there is one monarch, namely the pope, to whom the Lord of both the earthly and the heavenly empire granted their rights, as is stated in Distinction 22, chapter 1.
§ VI: Dionysius of Alexandria
Under this same Decius Gallienus, Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, also suffered exile in various places. For, as Eusebius writes in Book Seven of the Ecclesiastical History, while Valerian and Gallienus persecuted the saints, this Dionysius declared that the one God who made heaven and earth alone must be adored, while the others were neither gods nor to be adored. He was sent into exile in a certain encampment in the desert called Cetro [read: Cefro (Cephro)]. It was chosen especially because the inhabitants of the place were gentiles and greatly devoted to the superstitions of idols.
Although they at first received Dionysius with a hostile spirit and a very adverse mind, afterward, when by God’s grace he gradually began to sow the word of the Lord among them, the greater part of that savage and barbarous people abandoned the idols, was converted to the true God, and was subjected to Christ.
When this was discovered, they transferred him again to another place near Alexandria but deserted by its inhabitants and almost empty of residents. Yet there, because of its proximity to the city, crowds of our people frequented him, and the flock, as though receiving the fragrance of its shepherd, was made more joyful and constant in its contests.
Again, soldiers sent with a centurion bound Dionysius himself, and with him Gaius and Peter, in chains, afflicted them with various torments, and dragged them into a certain desert of Libya, a most squalid place, parched and deprived of every use of human kindness. There they left them bound in fetters.
Finally, he is reported to have answered certain men who were pursuing him: “Why do you weary yourselves by pursuing me? Take my head, for whose sake you labor so greatly, severed from my shoulders, and carry a great gift to the tyrant.”
Jerome says of him in his Book of Illustrious Men:
“Dionysius, bishop of the city of Alexandria, as a presbyter, directed the catechetical school under Heraclas and was a most distinguished pupil of Origen. Agreeing with the doctrine of Cyprian and the African synod on baptizing heretics, he sent very many letters to various people, which survive to the present day. To Fabian, bishop of the city of Antioch, he writes on penance, and another letter to the Romans through Hippolytus; two letters to Pope Sixtus, who had succeeded Stephen; and two to Philemon and Dionysius, presbyters of the Roman Church. He also wrote to the same Dionysius, afterward bishop of the Roman Church, on Easter; two books against Bishop Nepos, who had asserted in his writings a corporeal kingdom of a thousand years, in which books he discusses the Apocalypse of John most diligently; and four books to Dionysius, bishop of the city of Rome.”
This Dionysius also says of himself in the third book On Baptism, which he wrote to Philemon:
“I both read the treatises of heretics and investigate their traditions, even if for an hour I seem to be polluted by their words. Yet this very thing is of much benefit to me, because from their words I can refute them. Finally, when one of my fellow-presbyter brothers forbade me to be polluted by heretical reading as though by the stench of some sceni [read: coeni, mud or filth], a certain vision was shown to me by God to strengthen me, and a word came to me: ‘Read everything whatsoever comes into your hands, for you are able to test and discern each thing, since from the beginning this was the cause of your believing.’” Thus he speaks.
At last he rested in peace in the twelfth year of Gallienus.
§ VII: Gregory of Neocaesarea
Jerome says as follows about Gregory, bishop of Neocaesarea, in his Book of Illustrious Men:
“Theodorus, who was afterward called Gregory, bishop of Neocaesarea in Pontus, while still a very young man passed from Cappadocia to Birritum [read: Berytus] and from there to Caesarea in Palestine for the study of Greek and Latin letters, accompanied by his brother Theodorus [read: his brother Athenodorus]. When Origen saw their excellent natural ability, he exhorted them to philosophy. By gradually introducing the faith of Christ into it, he also made them his followers.
“After being instructed by him for five years, they were sent back to their mother. Of these, Theodorus, when departing, wrote a panegyric of thanksgiving to Origen and, after a great multitude had been summoned, recited it in Origen’s own presence. It survives to this day. He wrote a paraphrase of Ecclesiastes, brief indeed but very useful, and other letters of this kind are commonly attributed to him. Above all, however, are the signs and miracles which, when he was already bishop, he performed to the great glory of the churches.”
Hence Eusebius says of him as follows. A certain lake situated in the regions of Pontus was rich in fish, from whose catch very rich revenues were rendered to its owners. This possession had fallen by hereditary lot to two brothers.
[Running head: Chapter Eight, Folio 239.]
But greed for money, which overcomes the hearts of almost all mortals, also violated the reciprocal bond of brotherhood. At fishing time the property was occupied by the brothers, not so much to catch fish as to ensnare men. Slayings of men stirred up wars; human blood was poured out for fish.
At length, however, God’s providence supplied aid. When Gregory arrived, he saw battles and the deaths of men. He asked the brothers, who were brothers by birth, what cause existed for which brothers would be inflamed to the destruction of themselves and their people. He found nothing but the catch of fish.
Then, after both parties had fallen silent for a little while out of respect for him, he said: “My little sons, do not violate rational souls for the sake of mute animals, dissolve fraternal peace by greed for gain, and violate together the laws of God and of nature. But come with me to the shore of the death-dealing lake. Through the Lord’s power I shall now absolve you from every contest of bloody strife.”
When he had said this, in the sight of everyone he fixed the staff that he held in his hand at the edge of the shore’s waters. Bending his knees, he extended his hands to heaven and supplicated the exalted God. As soon as he finished praying, the water immediately withdrew itself and, fleeing with swifter ausu [read: cursu, course] from sight above, returned, commanded from above to discere [read: discedere, withdraw] from sight, to its abysses. It left a dry field to the brothers, who were now in concord. Even to the present day the soil that had formerly been rich in boats is said to be rich in crops.
Another deed, more illustrious and divine, is also recalled as having been done by him. In a certain narrow rural place, when circumstances required a church to be built, a rock from a neighboring mountain obstructed the site on the eastern side, while on the other side a river flowing past denied as much space as would suffice for the church. Since there was no other place at all and everyone was sorrowful that they had no ground on which to build a church, he is said, full of faith, pernoctatione [read: pernoctasse, to have spent the night] in prayer. He faithfully reminded the Lord Jesus of his promise: “If you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Take yourself away and mittere [read: mitte te, cast yourself] into the sea,’ and it will surely happen.” When he sought this with devotion full of faith, at daylight, when the people assembled, the obstructing rock was found to have withdrawn by precisely as much space as was required for founding the church. Very many other deeds are also attributed to him.
Haymo says as follows about the same man. When this Gregory was once crossing the Alps, compelled by the necessity of the snow, he turned aside to a shrine of Apollo and spent the night there. When he departed in the morning, the demon also departed. It was asked to give responses as before, but it remained mute. When the priest consulted it, Gregory’s arrival was given as the reason.
The priest immediately occupied the road, came to Gregory, stated his complaint about the expelled divinity, and lamented his lost gain. Gregory wrote a letter in these words: “Gregory to Apollo. I permit you to return to your place and do what you were accustomed to do.” The priest carried this letter to the shrine and placed it beside the image. The demon was present again and again gave responses.
Then the priest, turning within himself, said: “How is Gregory not much better than this Apollo, who obeys his commands?” Descending in the same hour to Gregory, he returned the letter, disclosed the sequence of events, and asked to offer himself to God. Then, abandoning paganism, he was made a catechumen by Gregory. When he had committed himself to a most chaste and abstinent life, he also received baptism. He advanced so far in the power of faith that he became Blessed Gregory’s successor in the episcopate.
§ VIII: Sixtus and Lawrence
Thus, during the rule of Decius—not the first, who ruled for two years and six months, as some say, because Sixtus was not pope at that time; nor the second, Gallus, who ruled with Volusianus and was called Decius through him according to Helinand, for the same reason; but under the third Decius, who by the more customary name was called Gallienus and ruled with his father Valerian for fifteen years [read: fifteen years in all—seven with his father and eight alone], in whose time Sixtus was made pope; or, as certain others hold, under another, a fourth Decius, who was not emperor but was made Caesar by Gallienus, and with Valerian, not the aforesaid Gallienus’s father but then prefect of the city—Pope Sixtus and his archdeacon Lawrence suffered.
This Sixtus, born at Athens and devoted to studies, was a philosopher. When Decius Caesar heard that many people were being converted or confirmed in the faith of Christ through Pope Sixtus, he ordered Sixtus to be presented to him. When Sixtus was led before him with his deacons Felicissimus and Agapitus and he could not be moved from his holy purpose by any blandishments, Decius commanded that he be led to the temple so that he might either sacrifice to the gods or be thrust into prison.
As Sixtus was being dragged to prison because he scorned to sacrifice, Lawrence heard of it and approached him, saying: “Where are you going without your son, father? Where are you hastening, holy priest, without your minister? You were never accustomed to offer sacrifice without a minister. What, therefore, in me has displeased your fatherhood? Have you found me degenerate, I to whom you entrusted the dispensing of the Lord’s blood?”
Sixtus answered him: “I do not abandon or forsake you, son, but greater contests are owed to you. We indeed, like old men, receive the course of a lighter battle, but a more glorious triumph over the tyrant awaits you as a young man. After three days, you, the Levite, will follow me, the priest.”
He therefore entrusted to him the distribution to the poor of the treasures of the Church—namely, whatever remained either from the offerings of Emperor Philip or from other rich men converted to the faith. Lawrence did so, seeking out needy Christians who were in hiding and dispensing alms to them. Entering the house of a widow in which many of the faithful remained hidden, he gave alms and cured her of a headache that had afflicted her for a long time; in the house of another worshiper of Christ he gave sight to a blind man.
Sixtus was again presented to Decius. When he would not assent to him, the prefect Valerian decreed that he be led to the temple of Mars and, if he would not offer sacrifice there, be punished by beheading. While Sixtus was being led away, Lawrence, stirred by the fervor of the Spirit, began to cry after him: “Do not forsake me, holy father, for I have already spent the treasures that you handed to me.”
When the soldiers heard treasures mentioned, they seized Lawrence and brought him to Decius. Sixtus, however, was beheaded with Agapitus and Felicissimus.
Lawrence was therefore presented to Decius, who handed him over to the prefect Valerian so that he might demand the Church’s treasures from him and, if he refused to sacrifice, kill him with various torments. Valerian handed him over to the jailer Hippolytus for custody.
Entering the prison, Lawrence found there a certain man named Lucillus who had lost his sight through excessive weeping. Lawrence promised to restore his sight if he believed in Christ. Thus, after Lucillus was converted to the faith and baptized, Lawrence suddenly gave him sight.
[Running head: Seventh Title.]
He also restored sight to many other blind people who came to him. Seeing this, Hippolytus said, “Show me the treasures.” Lawrence said to him: “Hippolytus, I shall not only show you a treasure, but, if you believe in Christ, I promise you eternal life.”
Hippolytus believed and was baptized. He said, “I saw the souls of the innocent rejoicing in gladness.” Hippolytus therefore had his entire household baptized.
After this Valerian commanded Hippolytus to present Lawrence. When Lawrence was brought before him and questioned about the treasures, he asked for a delay of three days in order to reveal them. Departing from his presence, within the three days he gathered all the poor whom he found throughout the world [read: throughout the city] and to whom he had given alms, and brought them together before Valerian in the palace, saying: “Behold the eternal treasures that never fail. For the hands of the poor have carried the treasures you seek into the heavenly treasuries.”
When Decius Caesar questioned him and he blasphemed the gods, Decius ordered him beaten with scorpion scourges and every kind of instrument of torture brought before him. When Decius ordered him to sacrifice to his gods in order to escape those things, Lawrence answered: “Wretched man, I have always desired these feasts.” Decius said to him: “If you glory in this, tell us where your companions are hidden, so that they too may feast with you.” He answered, “He is not worthy [read: You are not worthy] to be presented to their sight.”
Then Decius, angered, ordered him beaten for a very long time with leaded scourges. Blessed Lawrence prayed, saying, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Immediately a voice came from heaven, saying: “Many contests for Christ are still owed to you.”
Hearing this, Decius said: “Men of Rome, you have heard the demons comforting this sacrilegious man, who rejects the gods and despises the commands of princes.” Again he had Lawrence severely beaten with scorpion scourges.
One of the soldiers standing by, named Romanus, while Lawrence was being beaten, cried out, converted to the faith: “I see a most beautiful young man standing before you and wiping your limbs with a linen cloth. Therefore I adjure you by the Lord who sent his angel: do not forsake me.”
Decius, troubled by this, ordered Lawrence taken down and returned to custody, saying, “I think that we have now been defeated by magic art.” Romanus approached Lawrence with a pitcher of water and had himself baptized by him. When Decius heard this concerning Romanus, he had him led before him after a beating. When Romanus cried, “I am a Christian,” Decius ordered him beheaded.
That same night Decius and Valerian said to Lawrence, who had been brought before them: “Sacrifice to the gods; otherwise this night will be spent in your torments.” Lawrence said to them: “My night has no darkness, but all things shine brightly in the light.”
After they had cruelly struck his mouth with a stone, they stripped him and had him stretched upon an iron gridiron beneath which were coals of fire, and they had his body pressed down with iron forks. While he was roasted there for a long time, as the attendants supplied coals beneath the gridiron, he gave thanks to God. With so joyful a face that he seemed to feel no pain, he turned to Decius and said: “Behold, wretch, you have roasted one side. Turn the other and eat. I now see what I have long desired.”
Then, raising his eyes to heaven, he said: “I give thanks to you, Lord Jesus Christ, because I have merited to enter your gates.” Thus he breathed forth his spirit.
Decius and Valerian, confounded, departed, leaving his body burned upon the gridiron. Hippolytus and Justin, however, received Lawrence’s body and buried it honorably.
§ IX: Hippolytus and His Household
On the third day after Lawrence’s passion, Decius heard that Hippolytus had buried his body and ordered him summoned. He said to him: “Have you too become a magician, because you carried away Lawrence’s body?” Hippolytus replied: “I did this not as a magician but as a Christian.”
Filled with fury, Decius ordered him stripped, beaten with clubs, and also torn with iron combs. At this Hippolytus cried all the more that he was a Christian. When he was clothed in military dress and admonished to acknowledge the military service and friendship of Decius, he answered that in good military service he followed Christ.
Decius commanded the prefect Valerian to seize his possessions and kill him with various tortures. When Valerian heard that Hippolytus’s whole household was Christian, he had them all led before him with Concordia, his nurse. He told them to worship the gods lest they perish by an evil death with their master. Concordia answered on behalf of all: “We prefer to die chastely with our master Hippolytus rather than live unchastely.”
Valerian had her beaten with leaded scourges until she breathed forth her spirit. Hippolytus gave thanks to God that he had sent his nurse before him, and he strengthened his household in the Lord. Seeing their constancy, Valerian had them all beheaded in Hippolytus’s sight. Afterward he had Hippolytus bound by the feet to the necks of untamed horses and dragged through thorns and briars. Giving thanks to God, he rendered his unconquered spirit to the Lord.
Concordia’s body had been cast into a sewer. Irenaeus, a sewer worker and a Christian in secret, drew it out at the request of a certain soldier named Porphyrius, because the soldier thought that gold and gems were kept in her clothing. Finding nothing of that sort in her garments, however, he and the Christian Abundius carried the body to the presbyter Justin, and it was buried beside the bodies of the others. Irenaeus and Abundius were crowned with martyrdom for this.
Decius and Valerian themselves, when they wished to enter the theater to torture the faithful, were seized by demons and cried publicly. Decius cried: “O Hippolytus, bound with harsh chains, you drag me!” Valerian cried: “O Lawrence, you drag me with fiery chains!” Valerian breathed his last in Decius’s presence. Decius himself, tormented for three days, finally failed, and his soul descended into hell.
Triphonia, the wife of Decius, terrified by these things, had herself and her daughter Cyrilla baptized by Justin. While engaged in prayer, she migrated to the Lord. When the soldiers heard of the conversion of Triphonia and Cyrilla, they too, with their wives, received baptism from Dionysius, the successor of Pope Sixtus. Claudius, the successor of Gallienus in the empire, ordered all of them beheaded together with Cyrilla, the daughter of Decius, because she would neither marry nor sacrifice.
Among the faithful, however, the martyr Lawrence is held in great veneration above the other martyrs after Stephen, and his feast is solemnly celebrated by the Church: both because he suffered in the city of Rome while others dominante [read: dominantibus, ruled]; because he was the supreme pontiff’s archdeacon—the first and the last—about whose martyrdom Pope Sixtus himself also prophesied; because he faithfully distributed the treasures of the Church to the poor; and because after many most bitter torments he ended his life with the greatest fervor, most joyfully enduring everything.
[Running head: Chapter Eight, Folio 240.]
Hence the ancient doctors—Augustine, Pope Leo, Ambrose, and Maximus—also commend Lawrence greatly in their sermons. By the threefold fire that lay hidden within him, namely, the greatness of faith, the fervor of love, and the irradiation of God, he extinguished every evil fire: the material flame of Gehenna, carnal desire, worldly greed, and tyrannical anger. He possessed refreshment from the heavenly consolation of the reward obtained, from meditation on God’s law, and from the sincerity of conscience.
Hence Maximus, or Ambrose, says: “Blessed Lawrence could not feel the torments of the fires in his entrails, because in his senses he possessed the refreshment of paradise.” The same author says: “While he considers Christ’s commandments, everything he suffers becomes cold to him.” The same author says: “The most valiant martyr assuredly burns with all his entrails and is scorched, but, contemplating the kingdom of heaven, he exults as victor in the refreshment of conscience.” Thus he speaks.
He is therefore worthily turned into an exceptional memorial among men, for, crowned with glory and honor, he attained the joys of the angels. While dwelling on earth, he was made wondrous by God not only in giving sight to the blind and relieving the poor; after being taken up into heaven, he did not cease to furnish his patronage to those invoking him, and by a trembling he showed that he was to be venerated.
For, as Gregory of Tours relates, when a certain poor priest decided to repair a church dedicated in Lawrence’s honor that had collapsed from age, one of the beams brought to repair the roof was found to be too short and therefore unfit for the work. But after the priest directed a prayer to Saint Lawrence that he would aid his poverty, it was lengthened so much that it had to be shortened. The part cut away as superfluous was divided into pieces and, by contact with it, brought a remedy of health to many.
Gregory the Great also relates in his Dialogue that, when workers hired by Sanctulus for the restoration of Saint Lawrence’s church lacked food, he poured out prayers to the martyr for aid. Bread sent from heaven was found in an oven near the church, and it refreshed the laborers for many days.
When a deacon was carrying a most beautiful crystal chalice to the altar and it fell to the ground and was broken into little pieces, the distinguished martyr restored it through a prayer directed by him in a church near Milan.
When Emperor Henry migrated from this world, and his good and evil deeds were being weighed before the judge above, the evil outweighed the good. Lawrence suddenly cast into the scale or balance of the good deeds a golden chalice of wondrous size that Henry had offered to the church of Merseburg in honor of Saint Lawrence. From this the good deeds outweighed the evil, and Henry was judged unto salvation.
As Gregory says, when a certain predecessor of his had determined to make improvements at Saint Lawrence’s tomb, many men dug in the pavement to find the body itself, since its location was unknown. It was unexpectedly revealed. The workmen were terrified by this, and all of them died within ten days, so that none of those who saw the body survived. Thus the work was abandoned.
The body of Stephen, the protomartyr and first Levite, brought from Constantinople, is said to rest with him in the same mausoleum.
The report spread among little women that Blessed Lawrence frees certain souls from purgatory every Wednesday, or even that anyone who visits the threshold of any church constructed in Saint Lawrence’s honor every Wednesday for an entire year frees the soul of some deceased person from the punishments of purgatory. This is rejected by the very facility with which it is claimed. Neither history teaches it nor reason commends it. Indeed, it appears superstitious that suffrages on Wednesday should benefit the dead more than on another day, or that Blessed Lawrence should accomplish liberation on that day more than on another.
It is piously granted concerning Christ that, ascending from limbo at the Resurrection, he brought forth from purgatory, on that single occasion, some souls that had few or easily expiable faults. But the servant is not greater than his lord. We therefore do not reprehend visits to churches of Saint Lawrence or prayers to him for the living or the dead, but we do not accept the observance of days and unknown fables.
§ X: The Persecution of Decius
Decius, therefore, as Jerome says—the persecutor of martyrs, according to the testimony of Cyprian, who suffered under him—would not permit those wishing to die to be killed. Thus, when a certain martyr persevered in the faith and remained victorious between the rack and the metal plates, Decius ordered him smeared with honey and laid on his back beneath the most burning sun, his hands bound behind him, so that he might yield to the stings of flies after having overcome fiery braziers.
He ordered another man, flourishing in youthful age, to be led into most pleasant gardens. There, amid shining lilies and red roses, with a stream creeping nearby with a gentle murmur and the wind raising the leaves of the trees with a soft whisper, he had the young man laid on his back upon a bed built up with feathers. He left him so entangled in the soft bonds of garlands that he could not shake himself free.
When everyone had withdrawn, a beautiful prostitute came. She began to bind his neck in delicate embraces and—what is a crime even to say—to handle his genitals with her hands, so that, when his body had been moved to lust, the shameless prostitute might throw herself upon him. What was Christ’s soldier to do? He did not know where to turn. Pleasure was overcoming the man whom torments had not conquered. At last, inspired from heaven, he bit off his tongue and spat it into the face of the woman kissing him. Thus the greatness of the pain that was kindled [read: the ensuing magnitude of pain] crushed the sensation of lust.
At that time Paul, the first hermit, while avoiding the storm of persecution and fearing that he would be unable to endure such horrible tortures, entered the desert in the sixteenth year of his age. But more concerning him below.
As Eusebius attests in Book Six of the Ecclesiastical History, so dreadful was the persecution against Christians under Decius that not even the smallest path was open to the faithful, and passage through no street was permitted; neither by day nor by night was there free opportunity to proceed. For whenever any Christian appeared in public, an outcry and riot of the populace immediately arose, so that the person who had been seen would either be dragged by the feet or burned with fire.
Almost everyone was terrified by this. Some of the nobles immediately and voluntarily thrust themselves into these very acts. Others merely came when summoned, and some were betrayed by members of their own households; they hastened to the execrable sacrifices and unclean victims. Some of them were pale and trembling, so that they seemed rather to be sacrificed than themselves to sacrifice to the idol. Thus they were mocked by the watching crowd because they appeared equally fearful both of dying and of sacrificing. Others leapt so shamelessly to the altars that they strove to assert that they had never been Christians.
Those, however, who were made blessed stood like most steadfast columns. Confirmed by the gifts of the Spirit himself, through the power received from the Lord according to the merit of their faith, they offered to God and the angels the wondrous spectacles of their martyrdom.
The first of these was a certain Julian, who was constrained by gout and could neither walk nor stand. He was presented to the judge with the men who carried him in a small chair. One of them immediately denied the faith; the other persevered in the faith with Julian and was made a martyr.
How great were the multitudes who wandered through desert mountains and were consumed by hunger, thirst, cold, sickness, robbers, and wild beasts! All of them were crowned with the glory of martyrdom. Many, seeing some people fail amid the torments, also tried to raise and comfort them by nods, gestures, or words. When they were revealed to be Christians, they too obtained the crown of martyrdom.
Dionysius of Alexandria also relates that among the other faithful tortured at Alexandria for the faith of Christ was a certain consecrated virgin of advanced age, Apollonia. Because she refused to sacrifice to the idols, they first knocked out all her teeth. Then, gathering wood, they built a pyre around her and threatened to burn her alive unless she agreed with them in blaspheming God. When she saw the pyre, she deliberated for a short time within herself, then suddenly tore herself from the hands of the impious men and leapt voluntarily into the fire. Thus even the authors of the cruelty were terrified, because the woman was found readier for death than the persecutor for punishments.
Eusebius relates in Book Seven of the Ecclesiastical History that at that time [read: during the persecution under Valerian] in Caesarea of Palestine three admirable young men—Priscus, Malchus, and Alexander—were kindled by the divine ardor of faith. They began to reproach themselves for cowardice and sluggishness, because, while heavenly crowns of martyrdom were being offered in the city, they did not desire them and did not seize them, although the Savior says, “The kingdom of heaven suffers violence.”
Inciting themselves by these mutual speeches, they sought the city. Before the savage judge they accused him of why he raged so greatly against the blood of the pious. He immediately rewarded the noble spirits of the young men with fitting words: “Let those who are displeased that the blood of the pious is shed be raised up to be devoured by beasts.” A certain woman is also said to have followed the example of the audacity and magnanimity of the aforesaid young men and to have obtained almost the same end.
§ XI: Marinus and Asterius
Marinus was a military man, a citizen of Jerusalem, distinguished in honor and riches. When in the said city a certain military honor corresponding to the order of his rank fell to him among his colleagues, as was customary, envy suddenly seized the colleague following him. The colleague cried out that Marinus could not obtain the higher rank because he was a Christian.
When questioned on this matter, Marinus did not deny it. The judge gave him a space of three hours in which to choose either to sacrifice to the gods and obtain that honor or to be killed with the Christians.
As he left the tribunal, Theoticinus [read: Theotecnus], bishop of the place, led him into the church. After exhorting him beforehand to constancy in the faith, the bishop showed him before the altar both the sword with which Marinus was girded and the Holy Gospel, asking which of these two he preferred to receive. With most ready faith Marinus took up the book of the Gospels.
The bishop encouraged him, saying: “Excellent, my son. What you have read, holding [read: Pursue what you have chosen], despise the present life, hope for the eternal, go forward confidently, and receive the crown prepared for you by God.” Marinus immediately returned to the judge’s tribunal and asserted that one ought to obey God rather than men. For that answer he was immediately beheaded.
Among them, however, Asterius is remembered as clearer than all in merit and distinguished above the others in faith. He was a senator and patrician of the city of Rome, sufficiently renowned for nobility, resources, even royal kinship, and the reputation of every good quality. When he attended the final rites of the aforesaid martyr, he received upon his shoulders the corpse that had been beheaded, placing his own garment beneath it after removing the clothing he wore. He immediately attained for himself the honor that he had rendered to the martyr.
He is also said to have shone in the faith of Christ through many other illustrious deeds, especially at Caesarea Philippi beneath the foot of the mountain from which the first waters of the River Jordan spring forth. There it was the custom of gentile error on a certain solemn day to sacrifice a victim which, when placed there, appeared nowhere through the art of a demon.
When Asterius was once present and observed the error, everyone marveled as though the victim had been taken by God into heaven. But when he prayed with tears that the demon’s deception might be uncovered, it happened that the offered victim, which was thought to have been invisibly taken up, was seen to be carried upon the waters and was restored to everyone’s sight. Thus such superstition and error were taken away from them.
When Decius, established upon a journey, remained at Florence for several days, as a most bitter persecutor of Christians he had inquiry made whether anyone under that name served Christ. When he was informed about a certain noble young man named Miniate, he had him brought before him. Unable to recall him from constancy in the Christian faith either by blandishments or threats, Decius sent a leopard to kill him, but the leopard suddenly died of itself.
Then Miniate was cast into a burning furnace but, comforted by an angel, emerged unharmed. He was exposed to a lion to be devoured, but the roaring lion itself expired. Stretched upon the rack, he was made stronger while giving thanks to God. Molten lead was poured through his ears, but he remained unharmed. Awls or sharp reeds were driven into his fingers between the nails and the flesh, but he was strengthened by God’s power. Finally he was condemned to be beheaded. His body is said to rest in the major church of Florence.
§ XII: Claudius
Claudius, the twenty-eighth emperor of the Romans, reigned for almost two years according to Eusebius in the Chronicle. He began to reign in the year of the Lord 271 [read: 268] and in the year of the world 5,470. He overcame the Goths, who had been devastating Illyricum and Macedonia for sixteen years, and destroyed them with incredible slaughter. Therefore a golden shield and an equestrian statue were decreed to him by the senate. After the Alemanni were defeated, he died.
According to some he was a Dardanian, according to others a Dalmatian. He was a good man—except, nevertheless, for the killing of the saints—dear to everyone, a lover of the laws, most acceptable to the senate and the Roman people, sparing of wine, and especially distinguished in military affairs.
Aureolus, who had made himself emperor in Illyricum and had already entered Italy to fight against Gallienus, heard of Gallienus’s death and Claudius’s succession to the empire. Fearing Claudius, he sent envoys to him, negotiating peace with a share in the imperial power. Claudius refused. When they fought one another, Claudius emerged victorious after Aureolus was killed, and the surviving army of Aureolus surrendered itself to him.
When this civil war had ended, Claudius undertook another, foreign war. For the Scythian peoples—namely, the Pethini [read: Peucini], Thurnigi [read: Greuthungi], Astrogoths [read: Austrogoths or Ostrogoths], Miletingi [read: Tervingi], and others—poured into Roman territory from every side in hope of plunder, devastating everything like locusts.
[Running head: Chapter Eight, Folio 241.]
There were three hundred thousand [read: three hundred twenty thousand] armed men, besides servants and an unarmed populace. The most sagacious Claudius advanced against them. Although he was far inferior in strength, namely in numbers, he wore them down with such great slaughter that scarcely a messenger survived to report it. Never in one battle had so much barbarian blood been poured out. Then, because the air was infected by the corpses of the slain, a very great pestilence followed, which took many thousands of the people of that region from their midst.
Having gained this victory, Claudius assembled a multitude of ships from all Italy, placed an army upon them, and prepared to meet the Goths who had poured themselves forth by sea and land. After they had fought for a long time in a naval war with varying fortune, the Goths, although more numerous, were finally defeated and cut down almost to annihilation. As Trebellius Pollio relates, apart from the ships captured, Claudius sank two thousand ships of the barbarians in this war.
In these two wars many kings of the barbarians were captured, as were noble barbarian women who, in the manner of Amazons, were not inferior to the men. So many were captured that Roman cities and towns were filled with Goths as slaves and barbarians as farm laborers.
At that time [read: about 259/260, under Valerian and Gallienus] Paul of Samosata succeeded Bishop Demetrius [read: Demetrianus] at Antioch. Thinking unworthy things concerning Christ, as a swollen and proud heretic, he preached that Christ had been merely a man of common nature. This Paul was condemned by the whole council of Antioch. When he refused to leave the church, he was cast out by public force at Aurelian’s command, as Helinand says.
At last, after Claudius died, his brother Quintillus was elected by the army and raised to the imperial throne. As Hugo of Fleury relates, he was killed on the seventeenth day of his rule because he was severe.
§ XIII: Aurelian
Aurelian, the twenty-ninth emperor of the Romans, reigned for five years and six months according to Eusebius in the Chronicle. He began in the year of the Lord 273 [read: 270] and, according to the lesser computation, in the year of the world 4,236, but according to the greater computation, 5,472.
As Hugo says, Aurelian was exceedingly skilled in military endeavor. He overthrew the nation of the Goths in hard battles and established Roman dominion within its ancient boundaries. He also claimed for himself the whole of Syria after recovering it. Hence he triumphed with great glory at Rome and afterward established the city with stronger walls.
Moreover, the state of the Church was at this time growing daily through more prosperous advances. Hence a celebrated council was assembled at Antioch, in which the aforesaid heretic Paul was convicted and most manifestly condemned for his heresy, chiefly through the persistence of Melchion, presbyter of the church of Antioch and a most learned man. The entire council of bishops commissioned him to dispute with Paul while notaries took down the proceedings.
But Paul, cut off from the priesthood and deprived of communion, refused to leave the house of the church. Therefore Emperor Aurelian was petitioned to compel him to depart. Aurelian immediately commanded that he be expelled by public force and, being at that time adorned with many virtues, that the house be handed over to the Church. For Aurelian had not yet been corrupted by the evil counsels of others, through which, as time proceeded, he changed his good purpose and afterward aroused a most harsh persecution against the churches.
At that time many people in various provinces died for Christ after completing diverse contests. Indeed, when Aurelian had begun a persecution against us, as Eusebius says in the Chronicle, a thunderbolt fell beside him and his companions. Not long afterward he was killed between Constantinople and Heraclea.
As James of Colonna relates, this Aurelian was handsome in face, rather tall in stature, and exceedingly strong in sinews; somewhat too desirous of wine and food, rarely given to lust, of immense severity, and most zealous for discipline of conduct. He was naturally savage and cruel, bloodthirsty beyond human measure, so much so that when certain hostile cities were captured he ordered all the children, old men, and women killed.
He ordered offending slaves beaten in his presence for the sake of maintaining severity. When he was ill, he never wished to use the counsels of physicians but believed abstinence alone sufficient for curing his illness. He was sparing in pleasures.
Even before assuming the empire he performed many distinguished deeds. In Illyricum he met the Sarmatians who had burst forth with only three hundred garrison soldiers, and with his own hand he killed forty [read: forty-eight] in one day. He wore down the Franks in many wars. Hence he deservedly received many military commands and the consulship.
At the beginning of Aurelian’s empire, all the nations that face the northern region conspired against the Roman Empire. With an incredible multitude they entered Italy through the part of Italy that faces Alemania, devastating everything by fire, slaughter, and plunder in the manner of locusts.
When Aurelian met them, the barbarians wished to engage him in open battle, but then withdrew into the densest forests. While the emperor prepared not to meet them from the front but merely to pursue them from behind, suddenly, as the day was already declining, that mass of barbarians burst from the woods and invaded the Roman camp. The Romans could not sustain their assault. They were driven into flight, and such slaughter of the Romans followed that the Roman Empire was almost dissolved; the emperor himself fled and scarcely escaped with a few men.
The city, overwhelmed by this calamity, was so terrified that many people abandoned the walls and tried to flee, everyone fearing that the barbarians would come to the city like the Senonian Gauls and deliver it to the flames.
The senators therefore assembled and deliberated what should be done in so great a danger. Then Vulpius Sillanus [read: Ulpius Silanus], who among the fathers held the first rank in giving an opinion, rose in their midst and said among other things:
“Conscript Fathers, we consult far too late about the commonwealth’s safety. You remember that I often said in this sanctuary, as soon as it was first reported that the barbarians had penetrated Italy, that the Sibylline decrees ought to be consulted. But some of you refused with enormous slander, saying flatteringly that our prince’s courage was so great that there was no need to consult the gods. Yet you have seen the letters in which the emperor requests the aid of the gods, which is never in any way shameful.
“Act therefore, pontiffs, and with consecrated hands unroll the books. Seek the deeds of our commonwealth that exist [read: Seek the fates of the commonwealth, which are eternal], and aid our prince, who labors under public necessity.”
He spoke of the Sibylline books, which the Sibyl sold to Priscus Tarquin [read: Tarquin the Proud], king of the Romans, and for which she received a price, as was said above.
Aurelian, after having been defeated by the barbarians, returned to meet them in battle. Through the operation not of false gods but of the true God, although unknown to them, he defeated them in three exceedingly difficult battles: the first not far from Placentia, the second beside the River Metaurus, and the third in the fields of Ticinum.
In this last battle he raged with such great slaughter of the barbarians that, because of the multitude of the slain, the victors were hindered from pursuing the vanquished. They were destroyed almost to annihilation, so that scarcely a sixth part survived out of six hundred thousand armed men.
After the barbarians in Italy had been defeated, Aurelian returned to Rome. When he had devoted himself for some time to the care of civil business, his fierce spirit could not rest. He was ashamed that, although distinguished by so great a victory, Thetricus [read: Tetricus] still possessed Gaul, a great part of the empire.
This Thetricus [read: Tetricus], a man of great and severe spirit, after Victorinus, who had occupied Gaul, was killed, put on the purple under compulsion from the army and named himself emperor. After doing many things successfully against the Alemanni, so that he even rendered the Romans formidable, he held Gaul for a long time.
But because, as a severe man, he could not endure the pride and shamelessness of his soldiers, he planned to restore Gaul to the Roman commonwealth. When he heard that Aurelian was ruling at Rome and, after defeating the barbarians, was coming after him, he implored Aurelian by secret letters not to desist at all from his undertaking but to reduce that most proud and intolerable army to his power.
Aurelian therefore arrived. When Thetricus [read: Tetricus] betrayed the army, Aurelian easily recovered Gaul without battle. Having recovered it, he removed the entire army that had served as the defense of the Gauls and enrolled a new one. He made Thetricus [read: Tetricus] prefect of Lucania, considering it safer for himself and the commonwealth that a man of great spirit govern some part of Italy than that he reign beyond the Alps among the Gauls, who are always eager for revolutions.
Seeing himself victorious in the West and fortune smiling upon him, Aurelian crossed to the East against Zenobia. He drew with him many German and Gallic auxiliaries for this war. Before coming to the East, however, he first completed many wars. In Thrace and Illyricum he laid low the forces of barbarians that met him. Moreover, in battle he defeated and killed a commander of the Goths who met him beyond the Danube with fifty thousand men.
Having gained these victories, he besieged and captured the most noble city of Tyana, in which he seized large garrisons of Zenobia. Although this city was fortified with every supply, he received its surrender through the treachery of Catho [read: Heraclammon], a citizen of that city. As soon as the emperor obtained the city, he ordered Catho [read: Heraclammon] killed, saying: “I could not love the betrayer of his own country. Nor indeed could the man who did not keep faith with his country have kept faith with me.”
He restored Catho [read: Heraclammon]’s goods to his sons, lest anyone complain that he had caused a very rich man to be killed for the sake of his riches.
After receiving Tyana, he besieged Antioch, which Zenobia had taken into her power after the killing of Obdenachus [read: Odaenathus]. Within three days he received the city itself when the Romans who were in it handed it over. After Antioch was thus captured, he allowed his army to recover there for a little while and then advanced against Zenobia.
Zenobia had anticipated his approach and met Aurelian with her forces. She engaged him in a most difficult battle. In it the Roman soldiers, overwhelmed by the multitude of enemies, were already failing and turning their backs when, as the historians report, a certain divine form appeared and commanded the Romans to renew the battle and attack the enemy again. As though divinely inspired, they turned their reins and attacked the enemy with such force that they compelled those from whom they had at first fled in defeat to flee. In addition, on another side the army was restored by infantry and cavalry. Thus a great part of Zenobia’s army was cut down; its ranks dissolved, it sought safety in flight.
Aurelian ordered his men to rest for several days. On the fifth day he finally pursued Zenobia and came to Palmyra, where she had fled, and surrounded it on every side. On the journey, however, he suffered many difficulties from Syrian robbers.
Zenobiam [read: Zenobia], believing that the city itself would be besieged, fortified it with an incredible apparatus of war. For there was no part of the wall that she left immunitatem [read: immunem, unprotected] by two or three ballistas. During this siege Aurelian himself was almost imperiled by the blow of an arrow, while Zenobia defended herself within the walls not as a woman and wearied Aurelian’s army by frequent sorties.
After the siege had already lasted a long time, during which the besiegers suffered no less than the besieged from hunger and cold, Aurelian wrote Zenobia a letter approximately as follows:
“Aurelian, emperor of the Roman world and recoverer of the East, to Zenobia and the others whom the fellowship of war holds. You ought voluntarily to have done what you are now commanded by my letter to do. For I command surrender, with impunity of life offered, so that you, Zenobia, may live with your people wherever the senate’s sentence shall place you. You shall bring your gems, gold, and silver into the Roman treasury.”
After receiving this letter, Zenobia wrote back more insolently and proudly than her condition then required. Angered by this, Aurelian immediately enlarged and fortified his army so that they might suffer no attack from outside. He prepared to invade the city with all his strength and intercepted the auxiliaries sent by the enemy, destroying them to annihilation.
Terrified by this, the innumerable forces of Saracens and Armenians who were coming to Zenobia’s aid returned to their own lands. With these adverse auxiliaries, in whom Zenobia had placed her greatest hope, she despaired of being able to resist Aurelian. Therefore, fearing for herself and her sons and greatly dreading Aurelian’s severity, she secretly left the city by night with those dearest to her and planned to flee to the Persians.
When Aurelian heard this, he ordered swift horsemen to pursue her. They captured her and brought her to Aurelian. A great mutiny arose among the soldiers, who demanded Zenobia for punishment. Aurelian, however, judging it unworthy of a Roman prince to kill women, checked the soldiers’ tumult with a very grave speech.
Within a few days he captured the city and spared the multitude. He ordered only those men killed by whose counsel Zenobia had moved the Romans to war. Among those killed was the philosopher Longinus, whom she had used as her teacher in Greek letters. Aurelian therefore preserved Zenobia for his triumph so that she might be exhibited to the eyes of the Roman people.
When the East had thus been pacified and Aurelian was preparing to return to the city, while he was in Thrace, a certain Firmus, who governed Egypt, made himself emperor against Aurelian. Aurelian turned back to suppress him, and his customary success did not fail him. Firmus was defeated in one battle and fled. When he wished to restore his forces but could not, he took his own life with a noose.
Thus Prince Aurelian, after the entire world had been pacified and reduced to his dominion, returned victorious to Rome for a triumph. This triumph was the most splendid of all those that had previously been held at Rome.
In it there were three royal chariots: one of Odonechus [read: Odaenathus]; a second given to Aurelian by the king of the Persians; and a third belonging to Zenobia, adorned with gold, silver, and precious gems. A fourth is said to have belonged to the king of the Goths, in which Aurelian rode to the Capitol.
Twenty elephants covered in gold preceded him, along with seven hundred [read: eight hundred] pairs of gladiators. Then came captives of diverse nations: the Brevi [read: Blemmyes], Exonitae [read: Axumites], Indians, Batria [read: Bactrians], Arabs, Hiberians, Saracens, Persians with their women, Goths, Alans, Rossolani [read: Roxolani], Sarmatians, Franks, Suevi, Vandals, and Marchomanni. Aurelian had joined battle with banners meeting against all these nations.
[Running head: Chapter Eight, Folio 242.]
Many women were also captured among the Goths in male attire, and it was believed that they descended from the race of the Amazons. Last of all came Zenobia herself, adorned with gold and enormous gems, so heavily burdened by the weight of her ornaments that she staggered. Her feet, however, were bound with gold, her hands were fastened with iron manacles, and a little golden chain was not lacking from her neck. At the very end came Aurelian in his triumphal chariot, with the senate and Roman people surrounding him. The standards of the guilds and the legions followed him, and after all these came the victorious army with palms and olive branches.
They say that after the triumph this Zenobia lived for a long time among the Romans, held in great honor together with her sons. An estate was given to her at Tibur, which even today is called Zenobia.
At that time, as Eutropius relates, a certain Septimus [read: Septimius] assumed the imperial power among the Dalmatians. While Aurelian was preparing an army against him, Septimus [read: Septimius] himself was killed by his own men.
When, therefore, Aurelian had rested from the tumult of wars after his triumph, he began to devote himself to civil affairs with great spirit. He surrounded the city with stronger walls and constructed a most magnificent temple of the Sun. He issued excellent and exceedingly strict laws. He was the first of the Roman princes to place a diadem upon himself in royal fashion and to use gems and gilded clothing, almost all of which had been foreign to Roman custom. He was the first to institute the distribution of pork to the Roman people.
But after so many civil and foreign victories, his spirit became so elated that he killed many nobles and even some members of the senate through mere harshness of temper. For this reason, through that great military glory, he either equaled or surpassed both Alexander the Great and Gaius Julius Caesar. One of these men penetrated as far as India through twelve years [read: thirteen years] of military victories; the other subjected the Gauls in ten years and contended against his fellow citizens for four years. Aurelian, however, recovered the Roman Empire from its invaders in only three years, yet stained it with excessive cruelty, so that this excellent prince began to be feared rather than loved.
Nevertheless, he exercised such careful economy that, after becoming emperor, he enriched his friends honorably but moderately, so that they escaped only the miseries of poverty and, through the modest size of their patrimonies, avoided the envy provoked by riches. He diligently provided for bringing grain into the city so that the people would not suffer hunger. For he used to say what is most true even today: that nothing can be more delightful than the Roman people when they are well fed.
In the sixth year of his reign, after he had equipped great forces for a Parthian war and had already crossed into Greece to carry it out, Aurelian became angry with one of his ministers. Fearing for himself, this man made a book in which were written the names of many men, including powerful ones, whom he falsely alleged Aurelian intended to kill. When he showed it to them, they believed him and killed Aurelian.
After Aurelian died without leaving a son, the army that was in Thrace referred the choice of an emperor to the senate, because it thought that none of those who had killed a prince so necessary to the commonwealth ought to be made emperor. The senate, however, returned the same election to the army, knowing that soldiers do not willingly accept emperors whom the senate has chosen. This exchange was made a third time, so that for six months the Roman world lacked an emperor.
At last the senate was assembled. Velius Gordianus [read: Velius Cornificius Gordianus], the consul, was the first in the council to deliver an exhortation concerning the choice of a prince, explaining that it was necessary. After him Tacitus, the oldest of the senators, spoke. He commended Aurelian’s virtues in a remarkable manner and grieved over the death of so useful a prince. While he was still attempting to speak, the whole senate cried with one voice: “Tacitus Augustus, may the gods preserve you! We all choose you. We make you prince. To you we entrust the care of the commonwealth and the world.”
Tacitus excused himself on the ground that he was an old man and not suited to so great a dignity. Then Mentius Falconius [read: Maecius Faltonius Nicomachus], who sat after him, a man most renowned for prudence and eloquence, rose and said that the senate had never given a better judgment than this: that an older man should be made prince, a man who would provide for everyone like a father. Nothing immature, nothing hasty, nothing harsh, and nothing needing correction would be found in him. Thus he encouraged Tacitus to accept the empire.
Afterward the prefect of the city left the senate house and told the people who were waiting that Tacitus had been made prince by the will of all the senators.
This Tacitus lived most sparingly, was highly skilled in construction works, was fond of marble, and was devoted to hunting. He never passed a night without reading or writing something. After becoming emperor, he assigned all his possessions to the temples and the treasury. For he said that, since the emperor is a public person, he ought to possess nothing privately.
When he requested the consulship from the senate and people for his brother Florian, certainly a man of great ability, and did not obtain it, he showed no displeasure. In the sixth month of his reign, however, he was killed through a military plot, or, according to others, died of disease. Because of the brevity of his time, he was able to accomplish nothing magnificent.
His brother Florian succeeded him in the empire, without any authority from the senate but on his own initiative, as though the empire were hereditary. He scarcely held it for two months. He was killed by the soldiers at Tarsus in Cilicia when they heard that Probus had been created emperor at Rome by the senate and soldiers. This Florian was very like his brother Tacitus in character.
§ XIV: Probus
Probus, therefore, a man distinguished by military glory, received the Roman Empire after Florian. He began to rule in the year of the Lord 280 [read: 276] and ruled for six years and ten months [read: six years and four months]. He was a native of Eparmonia [read: Pannonia, from the city of Sirmium] but had always been raised at Rome. Though his patrimony was not great, he was illustrious in virtue and great in spirit.
While he was still a youth, he so abounded in military virtues that, by the judgment of the most serious emperor Valerian, he received a military tribunate while still beardless. In the course of time he first governed the Gauls with great strictness and moderation. There, after routing the Alemanni, he compelled them to flee across the Rhine. He next governed proconsular Africa, where in war he laid low the people of the Normandi [read: Marmaridae] when they burst into the province. Afterward he was transferred to the Pannonias, where he afflicted the Sarmatians and Goths with great disasters.
When Probus was made emperor while in the East, he offered many excuses, but was compelled to accept the empire. Coming to Rome, he was received by everyone as emperor. Considering the senate’s kindness toward him, he wrote a law by which he permitted the senators themselves to hear appeals from the greater judges, something that previously belonged to the princes alone. They were also to appoint proconsuls for the provinces and to give legates in place of consuls. He further wished that no law enacted by the emperors should have the force of law unless first confirmed by the senate.
[Running head: Seventh Title.]
He granted the senate many other powers that the emperors had previously exercised.
After arranging public affairs at Rome, Probus assembled a great army and went to Gaul, which the Germans had occupied after Aurelian’s death. When he arrived, he fought so many battles, and so successfully, against the barbarians themselves that within a short time he recovered sixty cities after expelling the barbarians from them.
Then, not far from the city of Reims, he afflicted the Germans with such slaughter in a general battle that scarcely a third of four hundred thousand remained. When this was accomplished and his legions had recovered a little, he pursued the barbarians across the Rhine. By setting up Roman camps in Germany, he so terrified them that nine of their petty kings voluntarily came to Emperor Probus, prostrated themselves before his feet, and sought pardon. He ordered them to give hostages, restore the booty taken from the Gauls, and rebuild the cities they had destroyed. They fulfilled all these commands, and with their consent Germany itself was reduced to the form of a province.
He then went to Illyricum, where he so crushed the Sarmatians and the other peoples that almost without a war he recovered everything they had taken from the Romans. Afterward he traveled through Thrace, where Probus received all the Goths, terrified by the fame of his deeds, either into surrender or into friendship.
When these things had been accomplished, he went toward the East. On the way he killed in war a certain Palsurius [read: Palfuerius], a most powerful robber, and liberated all Isauria. Finally he performed so many and such great deeds in the East that the Parthians sent ambassadors to him humbly requesting peace. To their king Narseus, who had sent him magnificent gifts through his ambassadors, Probus replied: “We marvel that your king has sent so little out of all the things that are going to be ours.” Terrified by this reply, they sent hostages and sought peace.
Probus then turned his arms against Saturninus, who had claimed Egypt together with part of Africa. Saturninus was descended from the Gauls, but contrary to their custom he was very wise and highly experienced in military affairs. Though unwilling, he was acclaimed emperor by the army. He delivered a fine speech to them, revealing the dangers and deaths attached to imperial power, all of which came upon him. For, defeated by Probus in a single battle, he lost both his life and his empire.
After Probus had quieted everything in the East, Proculus and Bonosus, whom he had left in Gaul for its defense, meanwhile usurped the empire with one accord at the city of Agrippina. They occupied the trouser-wearing Gauls and then, in addition, Spain and Britain.
When Probus learned this, he raised a large army, crossed from Italy and Rome into Gaul, and in the first battle stripped them of their troops. In a second, after they had rebuilt their army with barbarians, he defeated them and killed both of those princes. Returning from there to the city, Probus was received most festively by the senate and people and triumphed most gloriously for five days, with many spectacles presented.
After this, having made great preparations against the Parthians, he proceeded through Illyricum and afterward came to Smirnum [read: Sirmium]. While wintering there, he desired to drain a certain marsh in order to make that soil fertile, and for several months he occupied the entire army with this work. The soldiers bore this very badly, because during peacetime Emperor Probus would not allow them to be idle, asserting that a soldier ought not to consume a free grain allowance.
To these words he added that most weighty saying: “If ever a salutary time should come to the commonwealth, soldiers will no longer be necessary.” He had conceived this thought in his mind. The soldiers, who because of the frequency of wars arranged everything in the Roman commonwealth according to their pleasure, feared that they were being despised, and now began to deliberate about Probus’s death.
Thus they stirred up a tumult one day and killed Probus in a certain tower to which he had fled. Nevertheless, they constructed a most splendid tomb for him there. The senate and Roman people bore his death with the deepest grief. For, as Vespicus [read: Vopiscus] says, Probus promised a golden age in which there would be no wars.
§ XV: Charus [read: Carus]
After Probus was killed, Charus [read: Carus] succeeded him. He sprang from noble Roman blood and was distinguished in character and life. Through civil and military offices he had reached the prefecture, and in that office he gained everyone’s love. He began to reign in the year of the Lord 285 [read: 282] and ruled with his sons, Charinus and Numerianus, for two years.
After naming these sons, Charinus and Numerianus, Caesars, he sent Charinus with chosen men to protect Gaul. Numerianus, as the younger man, he took with him as he advanced to the Parthian war already prepared by Probus. Before setting out for it, however, he crushed in a single battle the Sarmatians, who had been made so bold by Probus’s death that they mirarentur [read: minarentur, threatened] to invade not only Illyricum but also Italy. Forty thousand [read: sixteen thousand] of them were killed and very many [read: twenty thousand] captured.
When that war was finished, he entered the kingdoms of the Parthians with a great apparatus. First he recovered Mesopotamia, which the Parthians had occupied, and then captured Carrhae [read: advanced as far as Ctesiphon], a most populous city. But, greedy for glory, he advanced onward in pursuit of the Parthians and died, as some say, from a thunderbolt, but according to others from disease. For while he lay sick in his tent, so great a storm of whirlwind arose that everything grew dark and one man could not see another. So much thunder sounded that many were terrified out of their senses.
After his death his son Numerianus was acclaimed emperor by everyone. Although his brother Charinus was older in age, Numerianus was far more illustrious in virtue, very obliging, and supreme in eloquence; in composing verse he surpassed all the poets of his time.
Having thus become emperor by universal consent, he was leading the victorious army back to the city when he began to suffer pain in his eyes. He was therefore carried in a litter closed on every side, lest the sight of the sun or dust injure him. While he was being carried in this way, he was secretly killed through the plot of Aper, his father-in-law, who intended to usurp the Roman Empire. Thus for many days his death remained hidden from the troops who followed the litter.
Whenever Aper was asked about Numerianus’s condition, he answered that he was well but could not yet be seen, lest the air injure his eyes. After several days, however, the stench of the corpse disclosed the matter. Aper, by whose deceit Numerianus was thought to have been killed, was seized and slain by Diocletian’s own hand before the standards of the legions.
Charinus, the son of Charus [read: Carus] and brother of Numerianus, was living in Gaul and had surrendered his spirit to every crime and pleasure. He made a most wicked man prefect of the praetorium, one whom he had always kept as his companion in debauchery and lust.
When his father Charus [read: Carus] heard of his disgraceful life, he said that Charinus was not his son. He had resolved to substitute for his son in the western regions Constantius, the father of Constantine the Great, who was then governor of Dalmatia and an excellent man, and to kill his own son Charinus. Prevented by death, however, he could not carry out the plan.
After Diocletian was made emperor following Numerianus and was returning from the eastern regions, Charinus himself met him with great forces, wishing to defend the empire for himself. After many battles had been fought between them in Dalmatia [read: near Margum in Moesia], Charinus was finally betrayed by his own army, since he was hated by it, and fell; his army surrendered itself to Diocletian.
[Running head: Chapter Eight, Folio 243.]
§ XVI: The Supreme Pontiffs
Turning our pen to the supreme pontiffs who held the chair of Peter from the times of the emperors Valerian and Gallienus down to the time of Dyocletianus [read: Diocletian]: after Pope Sixtus had consummated his martyrdom under Decius [read: under Valerian] in the manner described above—his deacon was the blessed Lawrence—Dyonisius [read: Dionysius] succeeded to the papacy.
Dyonisius [read: Dionysius] divided the parishes. Hence he himself says in Cause 13, Question 1: “We have given churches and parishes to individual presbyters, and we have divided the cemeteries among them. We have decreed that each should possess his own right, so that no one may invade the boundaries or right of another’s parish, but each should be content with his own boundaries. Let each govern and guard the church and people committed to him in such a way that before the tribunal of the eternal Judge he may render an account of everything entrusted to him and receive not judgment but glory for his deeds.” Thus far he. After two years and six months, Dionysius was crowned with martyrdom in the city.
Felix I, a Roman by nation, succeeded him. He decreed that Masses should be celebrated over the memorials of the martyrs. He sat for two years and ten months. He was the son of Constantius and came from the region of Capri Tauri. He built a basilica on the Aurelian Way, one milestone from the city; crowned with martyrdom, he was buried there.
After him Euticianus [read: Eutychianus], a Tuscan by nation from the city of Luna, received the chair of Peter and held the pontificate for eight years, ten months, and three days [read: eight years, eleven months, and three days]. He decreed that crops or first fruits should be blessed upon the altar. As a most holy and humble man, he buried with his own hands in diverse places the bodies of 363 martyrs. He further ordained that whoever buried a martyr should not bury him without a dalmatic or colobium. Finally, crowned with martyrdom, he was buried on the Appian Way in the cemetery of Calixti [read: Callistus].
Gayus [read: Gaius], a Dalmatian by nation, followed him in the Church’s supreme priesthood. He decreed that clerics should ascend gradually through all the orders, with intervals of time between them. He also says in Cause 2, Question 7: “Pagans, heretics, or even Jews cannot accuse Christians or bring a charge of infamy.” He likewise decreed that no one should presume to accuse clerics before secular judges, as is found in Cause 11, Question 1, No One. He further decreed that more difficult questions, such as questions of faith, should always be referred to the apostolic see for decision. After eleven years, nine months, and eleven days, he was crowned with martyrdom.
Pope Macellinus [read: Marcellinus], a Roman by nation, succeeded him. During the persecution of Dyocletianus [read: Diocletian] and Maximus [read: Maximian], he was seized by pagans at Rome and led to a temple to sacrifice to idols. Overcome by fear, he placed incense before the idols. Departing and recognizing his sin, he assembled a council of certain bishops and priests, publicly confessed his sin, and submitted himself to their judgment.
They answered: “The first see will be judged by no one. Judge your own case with your own mouth. By your mouth you will be justified, and by your mouth you will be condemned. Do not be judged by our judgment. You denied; Peter your master also denied. And who among the apostles dared to judge him? But he went outside and wept bitterly. Therefore, gather your case within yourself.” This is found in Distinction 21, But Now.
When it is said there that he was compelled to place incense before the idols, this must be understood of conditional compulsion, not absolute compulsion, as the gloss says; otherwise he would not have sinned.
Marcellinus therefore said in the council: “Because of the crime of idolatry I judge that I must be deposed, and I anathematize everyone who delivers my body to burial.” Going to Dyocletianus [read: Diocletian], he confessed that he was a Christian. For this he was crowned with martyrdom after holding the chair of Peter for seven years, seven months, and twenty-five days.
When his body had lain unburied for thirty days, blessed Peter appeared in a vision to Marcellus, his successor, and said, “Why do you permit my body to lie unburied?” When Marcellus replied that Peter’s body had long ago been laid in the earth, Peter explained that he was speaking of Marcellinus. Marcellus said to him, “Lord, he himself anathematized those who buried him.” Peter replied, “Do you not know that it is written, ‘He who humbles himself will be exalted’? Go, therefore, and bury him beside me.” This was done.
This Marcellinus, as is found in Cause 25, Question 1, says: “The Catholic Church defends everything that is irreprehensible. Let neither an unjust judgment nor an unjust definition arranged by judges through royal fear or command have any validity. Nothing done contrary to evangelical or prophetic teaching, apostolic doctrine or their constitutions, or sanctorum petrum [read: sanctorum patrum, of the holy fathers] shall stand. And whatever has been done by heretics or unbelievers shall be annulled altogether.” Thus far he.
Marcellus succeeded Marcellinus. Vincent says, however, in the Speculum Historiale that, according to the chronicles of the Roman pontiffs, after Marcellinus was taken away through martyrdom the papacy remained vacant for seven years because of the savagery of Dyocletianus [read: Diocletian]’s persecution.
Afterward Marcellus was created pope and instituted fifteen cardinal titles. He was a Roman by nation. He also decreed that a cleric should not be dragged by anyone before a secular court, as is found in Cause 11, Question 1, A Cleric.
One day, as Emperor Dyocletianus [read: Diocletian] proceeded through the city with solemn display, Marcellus reproved him modestly and complained of the unjust persecution against the Christians, who prayed for the commonwealth. Dyocletianus [read: Diocletian] ordered him beaten with clubs. He commanded that the house of the venerable woman Lucina, which Marcellus himself had consecrated as a church at her request, be made into a stable, and that Marcellus be assigned there to care for the animals. After five years and twenty-five days, Marcellus departed to the Lord.
After him Eusebius, a Roman by nation, undertook the government of the Church. According to some, during his pontificate the holy cross of Christ was found at Jerusalem. Hence he is said to have instituted the feast of the Finding of the Cross, as is found in On Consecration, Distinction 3, The Cross. Others, however, say it was found in the time of Pope Sylvester.
Among other things Eusebius decreed: “First, everything must be restored to those despoiled by laws, and the churches that have been taken from them must be restored with every privilege. Afterward, not under augusto [read: angusto, a narrow time limit], let a period of time be granted to ei [read: eis, them].” See Cause 3, Question 2, and the gloss there. After two years, eleven months, and twenty-five days, he departed to the Lord.
Pope Melchiades, an African by nation, received his see. He decreed that the faithful should not fast on Sunday or Thursday—not because this is evil in itself, but in order to remove the superstition of the gentiles and the vain observance of the heretics—as is found in Distinction 30, If Anyone. After three years, six months, and eight days, he suffered martyrdom.
[Running head: Seventh Title.]
It should be noted that, in calculating the number of years during which the aforesaid men held the pontificate, Vincent in the Speculum Historiale disagrees with Martin in the Chronicle. Where Vincent says that Pope Stephen, who preceded Sixtus, sat for seven years, Martin gives four years. Where Vincent asserts that Dionysius presided for six years, Martin gives two years. Where Vincent assigns one year to Euticianus [read: Eutychianus], Martin writes seven years and ten months. Where Vincent says that Eusebius held the chair for seven years, Martin says two years.