No More Learning

So not only was the intriguer condemned by his own patrons, but also Alexander's policy of clemency, which he particularly desired to maintain, was duly upheld.

6 In the Forum of Nerva112 (which they call the p235 Forum Transitorium) he set up colossal statues of the deified emperors, some on foot and nude, others on horseback, with all their titles and with columns of bronze containing lists of their exploits, doing this after the example of Augustus, who erected in his forum113 marble statues of the most illustrious men, together with the record of their achievements. 7 He wished it to be thought that he derived his descent from the race of the Romans, for he felt shame at being called a Syrian,114 especially because, on the occasion of a certain festival, the people of Antioch and of Egypt and Alexandria had annoyed him with jibes, as is their custom, calling him a Syrian synagogue-chief and a high priest. 115

The Two Maximini

1 1 [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] Lest it should be distasteful to Your Clemency, great Constantine, to read the several lives of the emperors and the emperors' sons, each in a separate volume, I have practised a certain economy, in that have compressed the two Maximini, father and son, into one single book. 2 And from this point onward I have kept this arrangement, which Your Holiness wished also Tatius Cyrillus,1 of the rank of the Illustrious, to keep in his translation from Greek into Latin. 3 And I shall keep it, indeed, not in one book alone, but in most that I shall write hereafter, excepting only the great emperors; for their doings, being greater in number and fame, call for a longer recounting.

4 Maximinus the elder2 became famous in the reign of Alexander; but his service in the army3 began p317 under Severus. 5 He was born in a village in Thrace bordering on the barbarians, indeed of a barbarian father and mother, the one, men say, being of the Goths, the other of the Alani. 4 6 At any rate, they say that his father's name was Micca, his mother's Ababa. 5 7 And in his early days Maximinus himself freely disclosed these names; later, however, when he came to the throne, he had them concealed, lest it should seem that the emperor was sprung on both sides from barbarian stock. 6

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 2 1 In his early youth he was a herdsman and the leader of a band of young men, a man who would waylay marauders and protect his own folk from forays. 2 His first military service was in the cavalry. 7 For certainly he was strikingly big of body, and notable among all the soldiers for courage, handsome in a manly way, fierce in his manners, rough, haughty, and scornful, yet often a just man.

3 It was in the following way that he first came into prominence in the reign of Severus. 4 Severus, on the birthday of Geta, his younger son, was giving military games, offering various silver prizes, arm-rings, that is, and collars, and girdles. 5 This youth, half barbarian and scarcely yet master of the Latin tongue, speaking almost pure Thracian, publicly besought the Emperor to give him leave to compete, and that with men of no mean rank in the service. 6 Severus, struck with his bodily size, pitted him first against sutlers — all very valorous men, none the less — in order to avoid a rupture of military discipline. 7 Whereupon p319 Maximinus overcame sixteen sutlers at one sweat, and received his sixteen prizes, all rather small and not military ones, and was commanded to serve in the army. [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 3 1 The second day thereafter, when Severus had proceeded to the parade-ground, he happened to espy Maximinus rioting in his barbarian way among the crowd, and immediately ordered the tribune to take him in hand and school him in Roman discipline. 2 And he, when he perceived that the Emperor was talking about him — for the barbarian suspected that he was known to the Emperor and conspicuous even among many —, came up to the Emperor's feet where he sat his horse. 3 And then Severus, wishing to try how good he was at running, gave his horse free rein and circled about many times, and when at last the aged Emperor had become weary and Maximinus after many turns had not stopped running, he said to him, "What say you, my little Thracian? Would you like to wrestle now after your running? " And Maximinus answered, "As you please, Emperor. " 4 On this Severus dismounted and ordered the most vigorous and the bravest soldiers to match themselves with him; 5 whereupon he, in his usual fashion, vanquished seven at one sweat, and alone of all, after he had gotten his silver prizes, was presented by Severus with a collar of gold; he was ordered, moreover, to take a permanent post in the palace with the body-guard. 6 In this fashion, then, he was made prominent and became famous among the soldiers, well liked by the tribunes, and admired by his comrades. He could obtain from the Emperor whatever he wanted, and indeed Severus helped him to advancement in the service when he was still very young. In height and size and proportions, in his p321 great eyes, and in whiteness of skin he was pre-eminent among all.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 4 1 It is agreed, moreover, that often in a single day he drank a Capitoline amphora8 of wine, and ate forty pounds of meat, or, according to Cordus,9 no less than sixty. 2 It seems sufficiently agreed, too, that he abstained wholly from vegetables, and almost always from anything cold, save when he had to drink. 3 Often, he would catch his sweat and put it in cups or a small jar, and he could exhibit by this means two or three pints of it.

4 For a long time under Antoninus Caracalla he commanded in the ranks of the centuries10 and often held other military honours as well. But under Macrinus, whom he hated bitterly because he had slain his Emperor's son,11 he left the service and acquired an estate in Thrace, in the village where he was born, and here he trafficked continually with the Goths. He was singularly beloved by the Getae, moreover, as if he were one of themselves. 5 And the Alani, or at least those of them who came to the river-bank,12 continually exchanged gifts with him and hailed him as friend.

6 When Macrinus and his son were slain, however, and he learned that Elagabalus was reigning as Antoninus' son,13 he went to him, being now of mature age, and besought him to hold the same opinion of him that his grandfather Severus had done. But he could have no influence with that filthy man. 7 For Elagabalus is said to have made sport of him p323 most foully, saying, "You are reported, Maximinus, to have outworn at times sixteen and twenty and thirty soldiers; can you avail thirty times with a woman? " 8 And when Maximinus saw the disgraceful prince beginning thus, he left the service. 9 In the end, however, the friends of Elagabalus retained him, lest this also be added to Elagabalus's ill-fame, that the bravest man of his time — whom some called Hercules, others Achilles, and others Ajax — had been driven from his army. [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 5 1 Under this filthy creature, therefore, he held only the honour of a tribuneship; but never did he come to take the Emperor's hand and never did he greet him, but during the whole of three years he was always hastening from one place to another; 2 now he was occupied with his fields, now with resting, now with feigned illnesses.

3 On the death of Elagabalus, as soon as he learned that Alexander was proclaimed emperor, he hastened to Rome. 4 And Alexander received him with marvellous joy and marvellous thanksgiving; indeed, in the senate he used expressions like these: "Maximinus, Conscript Fathers, the tribune to whom I have given the broad stripe,14 has taken refuge with me — he who could not serve under that foul monster, and who, under my deified kinsman Severus, was what you know him to have been by report. " 5 He at once made him tribune of the Fourth Legion,15 which he p325 himself had formed out of recruits,º giving him his promotion with the following words: 6 "I have not entrusted veterans to you, my most dear and loving Maximinus, because I feared that you cannot root out the faults that have grown in them under other commanders. 7 You have fresh recruits; after the pattern of your habits, your courage, your industry, make them learn their service, so that from yourself, who are one, you can make me many Maximini, men most desirable for the state. "

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 6 1 Having therefore accepted the legion, he immediately began to train it. 2 On every fifth day he had his men parade in armour and fight a sham battle against one another. Their swords, corselets, helmets, shields, tunics, in fact all their arms, he inspected daily; 3 indeed, he himself provided for their boots, so that he was exactly like a father to the troops. 4 And when certain tribunes remonstrated with him, saying, "Why do you work so hard, now that you have attained a rank where you can become a general? " he replied, it is said, "As for me, the greater I become, the harder I shall work. " 5 He was wont also to join the soldiers at their wrestling, and he stretched them on the ground by fives, sixes, and sevens, though now an old man. 6 Now every one became jealous, and one insolent tribune, a man of great size and proved courage, and therefore the bolder, said to him, "You do nothing very great, if you vanquish your own soldiers, being a tribune yourself. " Maximinus replied, "Would you like to fight? " 7 And when his opponent nodded assent and advanced against him, he smote him on the breast with the palm of his hand and knocked him flat on his back, then said, "Give me another, and this time a real tribune".

p327 8 He was of such size, so Cordus reports, that men said he was six inches over eight feet in height;16 and his thumb was so huge that he used his wife's bracelet for a ring. 9 Other stories are reported almost as common talk — that he could drag waggons with his hands and move a laden cart by himself, that if he struck a horse with his fist, he loosened its teeth, or with his heel, broke its legs, that he could crumble tufaceous stone and split saplings, and that he was called, finally, by some Milo of Croton, by others Hercules, and by others Antaeus.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 7 1 When these things had now made him a distinguished man, Alexander, a good judge of great worth, to his own destruction put him in command of the entire army. 17 Everyone, everywhere, was pleased — tribunes, generals, and men. 2 So now Alexander's whole army, which had fallen into a lethargy to a great extent under Elagabalus, Maximinus brought back to his own standard of discipline. 3 And this, as we have said, proved a very serious thing for Alexander — a very good emperor, to be sure, but one whose youth from the very beginning could readily make him an object of contempt. 4 For when he was in Gaul, and had pitched camp not far from a certain city,18 of a sudden the soldiers were incited against him — some say by Maximinus, others say by the barbarian tribunes —, and as he fled to his mother he was slain, while Maximinus had already been hailed emperor. 19 5 And, indeed, some say the cause of Alexander's death was one thing, others say another. For some maintain that Mamaea was the prime cause, p329 as she wished her son to leave the Germanic war and go to the East, and on that account the soldiers broke out in mutiny. 20 6 Others say that Alexander was too strict and had wished to discharge the legions in Gaul as he had done in the East. 21

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 8 1 However that may be, after Alexander was killed, Maximinus was the first man from the body of the soldiers and not yet a senator to be acclaimed Augustus by the army without a decree of the senate,22 and his son was made his colleague. 23 And about the latter we shall tell later on24 the few things that we know. 2 Now Maximinus was always clever enough not to rule the soldiers by force alone; on the contrary, he made them devoted to him by rewards and riches. 3 He never took away any man's rations; 4 he never let any man in his army work as a smith or artisan, which most of them are, but kept the legions busy only with frequent hunting. 5 Along with these virtues, however, went such cruelty that some called him Cyclops, some Busiris,25 and others Sciron,26 not a few Phalaris,27 and many Typhon28 or Gyges. 29 6 The senate was so afraid of him that prayers p331 were made in the temples both publicly and privately, and even by women together with their children, that he should never see the city of Rome. 7 For they kept hearing that he hung men on the cross, shut them in the bodies of animals newly slain, cast them to wild beasts, dashed out their brains with clubs, and all this for no desire for personal authority but because he seemed to wish military discipline to be supreme, and wished to amend civil affairs on that pattern. 30 8 All of which does not become a prince who wishes to be loved. As a matter of fact, he was convinced that the throne could not be held except by cruelty. 9 He likewise feared that the nobility, because of his low barbarian birth, would scorn him, 10 remembering in this connection how he had been scorned at Rome by the very slaves of the nobles, so that not even their stewards would admit him to their presence; 11 and as is always the way with fatuous beliefs, he expected them to be the same toward him now that he was emperor. So powerful is the mere consciousness of a low-born spirit. [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 9 1 For to hide the lowness of his birth he put to death all who had knowledge of it, some of whom, indeed, were friends who had often pitied him for his poverty and made him many presents. 2 And never was there a more savage animal on earth than this man who staked everything on his own strength, as though he could not be killed. 3 Eventually, indeed, when he almost believed himself immortal because of his great size and courage, a certain actor, they say, recited Greek verses in a theatre p333 while he was present, the sense of which in Latin was this:

4 And he who cannot be slain by one, is slain by many.
The elephant is huge, and he is slain!
The lion is brave, and he is slain!
The tiger is brave, and he is slain!
Beware of many together, if you fear not one alone.
5 And this was recited while the Emperor himself was present. But when he asked his friends what the clown on the stage had said, they told him that he was simply singing some old verses written against violent men, and he, being a Thracian and a barbarian, believed them. 6 He suffered no nobleman at all to be near his person, ruling in this respect precisely like Spartacus31 or Athenio. 32 7 He put all of Alexander's ministers to death in one way or another and disregarded his directions. 33 8 And while he held Alexander's friends and ministers under suspicion, he became more cruel.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 10 1 And now when he had already taken on the life and character of a wild beast, he was made still harsher and more savage by a revolt which Magnus, a certain man of consular rank, plotted against him. 34 2 This man had entered into a conspiracy with a number of soldiers and centurions to stab Maximinus, p335 wishing thereby to get the imperial power for himself. It was a conspiracy of this sort: Maximinus wished to make a bridge and cross over against the Germans, and it was resolved that the conspirators should cross over with him and then, breaking the bridge behind them, surround Maximinus on the barbarians' side and kill him, while Magnus seized the throne. 3 For Maximinus had begun waging all manner of wars — and very valiantly, too — as soon as he had been made emperor, inasmuch as he was skilled in the art of war and wished, on the one hand, to guard the reputation he had already won, and, on the other, to surpass in everyone's eyes the glory of Alexander, whom he had slain. 4 For this reason, even as emperor he engaged his soldiers in exercise every day, and, indeed, himself appeared in armour and demonstrated many points to his army with his own hand and body. 5 But about that revolt it is asserted that Maximinus himself invented it in order to make an occasion for barbarity. 6 At any rate, without judge, prosecutor, or defence he put all of them to death and confiscated their property, and even after slaying over four thousand men he was not yet content.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 11 1 There was also in his reign a revolt of Osroënian bowmen,35 who rebelled against him through love of Alexander and regret for his loss, having agreed among themselves that Maximinus had certainly slain him; nor could they be persuaded otherwise. 2 They accordingly made one of their number, a certain Titus, whom Maximinus had already discharged from the army, their general and emperor. 3 Indeed, they girt him with the purple, furnished him with royal pomp, and barred access to him like the soldiers of a king, p337 all, it must be said, against his will. 4 But while this Titus was sleeping at his home, he was slain by one of his friends, Macedonius by name, who resented his preferment above himself, and so betrayed him to Maximinus and brought the Emperor his head. 5 And at first Maximinus gave him thanks, but later on, hating him as a traitor, he killed him. 6 Through these events, then, he became fiercer day by day, as wild animals grow more savage with their wounds.

7 After these events he crossed over into Germany36 with the whole army and with the Moors, Osroënians, Parthians, and all the other forces that Alexander took when he went to war. 37 8 He took these eastern auxiliaries with him chiefly for the reason that no forces are more useful against Germans than light bowmen. 9 And truly Alexander had constructed a splendid war-machine, and Maximinus, they say, greatly added to it. [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 12 1 He marched, then, into Germany across the Rhine, and throughout thirty or forty miles of the barbarians' country38 he burned villages, drove away flocks, slew numbers of the barbarians themselves, enriched his own soldiers, and took a host of captives, and, had not all the Germans fled to the swamps and forests, he would have brought all Germany under Roman sway. 2 He himself did much with his own hand, especially when he rode into a swamp39 and would have been cut off by the Germans had not his men extricated him as he was mired with his horse. 3 For he had that barbaric rashness which p339 made him think that even the emperor always owed the help of his own hand. 4 In the end, a sort of naval battle was fought in the swamp, and very many were slain.

5 And when he had thus conquered Germany,40 he despatched a letter,41 written to dictation, to the senate and people at Rome, the purport of which was this: 6 "We cannot, Conscript Fathers, tell you all that we have done. Throughout an area of forty or fifty miles we have burned the villages of the Germans, driven off their flocks, carried away captives, killed men in arms, and fought a battle in a swamp. And we should have pushed on to the forests, had not the depth of the swamps prevented our crossing. " 7 Aelius Cordus says that this oration was entirely his own; 8 and it is easily believed. For what is there in it of which a barbarian soldier were not capable? 9 He wrote likewise to the people, to the same effect but with greater respect, this because of his hatred of the senate, by which, he believed, he was mightily despised. 10 He gave orders, furthermore, for pictures to be painted and hung up before the Senate-house, illustrating the conduct of the war, in order that the art of painting, too, might tell of his exploits. 11 But after his death the senate caused this pictures to be taken down and burned.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 13 1 There were many other wars and battles in his reign, and from them all he always returned triumphant with immense plunder and numerous captives. 2 We have an oration of his, sent to the senate, whereof this is a sample: "In a short time, Conscript Fathers, I have waged more wars than any p341 of the ancients ever did. I have carried away more plunder than a man could hope for, and I have brought back so many captives that the lands of Rome scarce suffice to hold them. " The rest of the oration is unnecessary for this narrative.

3 Germany now being set at peace, he went to Sirmium42 with the intention of waging war against the Sarmatians;43 indeed in his heart he desired to bring all the northern regions up to the Ocean under Roman sway. 4 And he would have done it had he lived, so Herodian says;44 though Herodian was always well disposed to Maximinus, through hatred, as far as we can see, of Alexander.

5 But by this time the Romans could bear his barbarities no longer — the way in which he called up informers and incited accusers, invented false offences, killed innocent men, condemned all whoever came to trial, reduced the richest men to utter poverty and never sought money anywhere save in some other's ruin, put many generals and many men of consular rank to death for no offence, carried others about in waggons without food and drink,45 and kept others in confinement, in short neglected nothing which he thought might prove effectual for cruelty — and, unable to suffer these things longer, they rose against him in revolt. 46 6 And not only the Romans, but, because he had been savage to the soldiers also, the armies which were in Africa rose in sudden and powerful rebellion p343 and hailed the aged and venerable Gordian47 who was proconsul there, as emperor. This rebellion came into being in the following manner. 48

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 14 1 There was a certain imperial steward in Libya, who in his zeal for Maximinus had despoiled every one ruthlessly, until finally the peasantry, abetted by a number of soldiers, slew him, after overcoming those who out of respect for Maximinus defended the agent of the privy-purse. 49 2 But soon the promoters of this murder saw that they must seek relief through sharper remedies, and so, coming to the proconsul Gordian, a man, as we have said, worthy of respect, well-born, eminent in every virtue, whom Alexander had sent to Africa by senatorial decree, and threatening him with swords and every other kind of weapon, they forced him, though he cried out against it and cast himself on the ground, to assume the purple and rule. 3 In the beginning, it is true, Gordian took the purple much against his will; but later, when he saw that this course was unsafe for his son50 and family, he willingly undertook to rule, and at the town of Thysdrus51 he, together with his son, was proclaimed Augustus by all the Africans. 4 From here he went speedily to Carthage with royal pomp and guards and laurelled fasces, and sent letters to the senate at Rome. And the senate, after the murder of Vitalianus,52 the prefect of the guard, received these with rejoicing because of their hatred for Maximinus,53 5 and proclaimed both the elder and p345 the younger Gordian Augusti. [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 15 1 Then all the informers and accusers and Maximinus' friends were put to death, and Sabinus, the prefect of the city, was beaten by the populace and slain.

2 And when this had been done, the senate, now fearing Maximinus all the more, openly and freely proclaimed him and his son enemies of the state. 54 3 It next despatched letters to all the provinces, asking their aid for their common safety and liberty; and all of them gave heed. 4 Lastly Maximinus' friends and administrators, generals, tribunes, and soldiers were everywhere put to death. 5 A few communities, however, remained loyal to the public enemy; these betrayed the messengers who had been sent to them and promptly handed them over to Maximinus by means of informers.

6 The following is a specimen of the letters that the senate sent out:55 "The senate and Roman people, now beginning to be delivered from a most savage monster by the two princes Gordian, to the proconsuls, governors, legates, generals, tribunes, magistrates, and several states, municipalities, towns, villages, and fortified places, with prosperity, which they are just now beginning to regain for themselves. 7 With the help of the gods we have obtained the proconsul Gordian, a most righteous man and eminent senator, as emperor. We have given to him the title of Augustus, and not only to him, but also, for the further safeguarding of the state, to that excellent man Gordian his son. 8 It is now your part to unite, that the state may be made secure, that evil doings may be repelled, and that the monster and his friends, p347 wherever they be, may be hunted down. 9 We have pronounced Maximinus and his son enemies of the state. "

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 16 1 This was the senate's decree: After they had assembled in the Temple of Castor and Pollux56 on the sixth day before the Kalends of July,57 Julius Silanus, the consul, read the letter which had been received from Africa from Gordian the proconsul, emperor and father of his country: 2 "Conscript Fathers, the young men, to whom was entrusted Africa to guard, against my will have called on me to rule. But having regard to you, I am glad to endure this necessity. It is yours to decide what you wish. For myself, I shall waver to and fro in uncertainty until the senate has decided. " 3 As soon as the letter was read the senate forthwith cried out:58 "Gordian Augustus, may the gods keep you! May you rule happily; you have delivered us. May you rule safely; you have delivered us. Through you the state is made safe. All of us, we thank you. " 4 So then the consul put the question: "Concerning the Maximini, Conscript Fathers, what is your pleasure? " They replied, "Enemies, enemies! He who slays them shall have a reward. " 5 Again the consul spoke: "Concerning the friends of Maximinus, what seems good? " And they cried out, "Enemies, enemies! He who slays them shall have a reward. " 6 And then they cried out: "Let the foe of the senate be hanged on a cross. Let the senate's enemy everywhere be smitten. Let the senate's foes be burned alive. Gordiani Augusti, may the gods keep you! 7 Luckily may you live! Luckily may you rule! We decree the grandson of Gordian59 the praetorship, we promise the grandson of Gordian the consulship. Let the p349 grandson of Gordian be called Caesar. Let the third Gordian take the praetorship. "

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 17 1 When this decree of the senate reached Maximinus, being by nature passionate, he so flamed with fury that you would have thought him not a man but a wild beast. 60 2 He dashed himself against the walls, sometimes he threw himself upon the ground, he screamed incoherently aloud, he snatched at his sword as though he could slaughter the senate then and there, he rent his royal robes, he beat the palace-attendants, and, had not the youth retreated, certain authorities affirm, he would have torn out his young son's eyes. 3 He was enraged with his son, as it happened, because he had ordered him to go to Rome when he was first declared emperor, and this the youth, because of his excessive fondness for his father, had not done. And now Maximinus imagined that if he had been at Rome the senate would have dared none of this. 4 Blazing with rage, then, his friends got him to his room. 5 But still he could not control his fury, and finally, to get oblivion from his thoughts, he so soaked himself with wine on that first day, they say, that he did not know what had been done. 6 On the next day, admitting his friends — and they indeed could not bear to see him, but stood silent and silently commended what the senate had done, — he held a council as to what he should do. 7 From the council he proceeded to an assembly, and there said much against the Africans, much against Gordian, and more against the senate, urging his soldiers to avenge their common wrongs.

p351 18 1 [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] His speech was altogether that of a soldier,61 this being the general purport of it: "Fellow soldiers, we are revealing something you already know. The Africans have broken faith. When did they ever keep it? 62 Gordian, a feeble old man on the brink of death, has assumed the imperial office. 2 Those most sacred Conscript Fathers, who murdered Romulus63 and Caesar, have pronounced me a public enemy, me, who fought for them and conquered for them too; and not only me but you also, and all who stand with me. The Gordians, both father and son, they have called Augusti. 3 If you are men, then, if there is any might in you, let us march now against the senate and the Africans, and you shall have the goods of them all. " 4 He then gave them a bounty — and a huge one, too — and turning towards Rome began to march thither with his army.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 19 1 But now Gordian began to be harassed in Africa by a certain Capelianus,64 whom he had deposed from the governorship of the Moors. 2 And when finally he sent his son against him, and his son after a desperate battle was killed, the old man hanged himself, well knowing that there was much strength in Maximinus and in the Africans none, nay rather only a great faculty for betraying. 3 And forthwith Capelianus, the victor, in the name of Maximinus slew and outlawed all of the dead Gordian's party in Africa, sparing none. Indeed, he seemed to perform these duties quite in Maximinus' own temper. 4 He overthrew cities, ravaged shrines, divided gifts among his p353 soldiers, and slaughtered common folk and nobles in the cities. 5 At the same time he strove to win over the affections of his soldiers, playing for the imperial power himself in the event that Maximinus perished.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 20 1 When news of these events was brought to Rome, the senate, fearing Maximinus's barbarity — natural at all times and inevitable now that the two Gordians were dead, — elected two other emperors,65 Maximus,66 who had been prefect of the city and had held many other offices with distinction before that, humble by birth but eminent by his virtues, and Balbinus,67 who was somewhat fonder of pleasure. 2 These were acclaimed Augusti by the people; and by the soldiers and the same people the little grandson of Gordian68 was hailed as Caesar. 3 With three emperors, therefore, was the state propped against Maximinus. 4 Maximus, however, was the most rigorous of life, the most sagacious, and the most uniformly courageous of the three, 5 so finally both the senate and Balbinus entrusted the war against Maximinus to him. 6 But after Maximus had set out to war against Maximinus, Balbinus was beset with civil war and domestic disturbances at Rome,69 especially after two soldiers of the praetorian guard were slain by the populace at the p355 instigation of Gallicanus and Maecenas. The populace, indeed, were cruelly butchered by the guard when Balbinus proved unable to quell the uprising. And in the end a great part of the city was burned.

7 Meanwhile the Emperor Maximinus had been greatly cheered by hearing of the death of Gordian and Capelianus' victory over his son. 8 But when he received the second decree of the senate, in which Maximus, Balbinus, and Gordian were declared emperors, he then realized that the senate's hatred for him was never to end and that everyone really considered him an enemy. [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 21 1 Hotter than ever, then, he pushed on into Italy. He then learned that Maximus had been sent against him, and in a violent rage came up to Emona70 in line of battle. 2 But the plan agreed on for all the provincials was this:71 that they should gather up everything that could be useful for the commissariat and retire within the cities in order that Maximinus and his army might be pinched by famine. 3 And, indeed, when he pitched camp on the plain for the first time and found no provisions, his army was incensed at him because they suffered from hunger even in Italy, where they expected to be refreshed after the Alps, and they began at first to murmur and then indeed to speak out openly. 4 And when Maximinus attempted to punish this, the army was much inflamed, but silently stored up its hate for the moment and produced it again at the proper time. 5 Many authorities say that Maximinus found Emona empty and abandoned, and foolishly rejoiced because the entire city, as it seemed, had retreated before him. 72

p357 6 After this he came to Aquileia, which shut its gates against him and posted armed men about the walls.
Nor did the defence lack vigour, being conducted by Menophilus and Crispinus,73 both men of consular rank. [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 22 1 So when Maximinus found he was besieging Aquileia in vain, he sent envoys to the city. And the people had almost yielded to them, had not Menophilus and his colleague opposed it, saying that the god Belenus74 had declared through the soothsayers that Maximinus would be conquered. 2 Whence afterwards the soldiers of Maximinus boasted, it is said, that Apollo must have fought against them, and that really victory belonged not to the senate and Maximus but to the gods. 3 But, on the other hand, it is said that they advanced this theory because they blushed, armed men as they were, to have been defeated by men practically unarmed. 4 At any rate, after making a bridge of wine-casks, Maximinus crossed the river75 and began to invest Aquileia closely. 5 And terrible then was both the assault and the danger, for the townsmen defended themselves from the soldiers with sulphur, fire, and other defensive devices of this same kind;76 and of the soldiers some were stripped of their arms, others had their clothing burned, and some were blinded, while the investing engines were completely destroyed. 6 Amid all this Maximinus, with his young son whom he had entitled Caesar, strode about the walls, just far enough off to be safe from the throw of javelins, and besought now p359 his own men, now the men of the town. 7 But it profited him nothing. For against him, because of his cruelty, and against his son, who was a most beautiful creature, the townsmen merely hurled abuses.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 23 1 And so now Maximinus, flattering himself that the war was being prolonged by the cowardice of his men, put his generals to death, just at the time when he could least afford to do so; by which act he made his soldiers still further enraged against him. 2 In addition to that, he now ran short of provisions, because the senate had sent letters to all the provinces and to the overseers of ports to prevent any provisions coming into Maximinus' power. 3 It had sent praetors and quaestors throughout all the cities, moreover, to keep guard everywhere and defend everything against Maximinus. 77 4 Finally, it came to pass that he himself, while besieging, suffered the distress of one besieged. 5 At this juncture it was announced that the whole world was agreed in hatred of Maximinus. 6 And so some of the soldiers, whose wives and children were on the Alban Mountain,78 becoming fearful, in the middle of the day, when they rested from the fighting, slew Maximinus and his son as they lay in their tent,79 and putting their heads on poles, showed them to the citizens of Aquileia. 7 And thereupon in the neighbouring town the statues and portraits of Maximinus were immediately thrown down and his prefect of the guard, together with his more notable friends, were slain. Their heads were sent to Rome.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 24 1 This was the end of the Maximini, worthy the cruelty of the father, unworthy the goodness of the son. Among the provincials there was tremendous rejoicing at their death, but among the barbarians80 the most grievous sorrow.

p361 2 And now that the public enemies were slain, the soldiers were taken in by the townsfolk at their own request — but on condition that they would worship before the portraits of Maximus and Balbinus and also of Gordian, for all told them that the elder Gordians had been placed among the gods. 81 3 This done, a mighty store of provisions was speedily carried from Aquileia to the camp, which was suffering from hunger, and after the soldiers were refreshed, on a later day they came to an assembly. And there they all swore allegiance to Maximus and Balbinus, and hailed the elder Gordians as divine.

4 One can scarcely describe how great the joy was when the head of Maximinus was carried through Italy to Rome. From all sides folk came running as to a public holiday. 5 Maximus, whom many call Pupienus,82 was at Ravenna, preparing with the aid of German auxiliaries for war;83 but when he learned that the army had come over to himself and his colleagues, and that the Maximini were slain, 6 he at once dismissed the German auxiliaries,84 whom he was getting ready against the enemy, and sent a laurelled letter85 to Rome. And this caused unbounded rejoicing in the city; indeed at altars, temples, shrines, and holy places everywhere, everyone offered up thanks. 7 As for Balbinus, a somewhat timid soul by nature, who trembled when he heard Maximinus' very name, he sacrificed a hecatomb86 and gave orders that the gods should be worshipped with an equal sacrifice in every town. 8 Soon thereafter Maximus came to Rome,87 and after going into the senate,88 p363 where thanks were offered him, he held an assembly, whence he and Balbinus and Gordian victoriously betook themselves to the Palace.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 25 1 It is of interest to know what sort of decree the senate passed and what the day was in the city, when it was announced that Maximinus was slain. 2 For, in the first place, the messenger who had been sent to Rome from Aquileia, by changing his horses managed to gallop with such speed that he reached Rome on the third day after leaving Maximus at Ravenna. 3 As it happened, games were being held that day, when suddenly, while Balbinus and Gordian were seated, the messenger entered the theatre; and at once, before he uttered a word, the people cried out with one voice, "Maximinus is dead! " 4 Thus the messenger was anticipated and the Emperors, who were present, by nodding in assent expressed the public rejoicing. 5 The performance, then, being brought to a close, everyone immediately rushed to his religious duties, and thereafter the nobles sped to the Senate-house, the people to the assembly.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 26 1 The decree of the senate was as follows:89 After the Emperor Balbinus Augustus had read the letter, the senate cried: 2 "The gods take vengeance on the foes of the Roman people. Most great Jupiter, we give you thanks. Revered Apollo, we give you thanks. Maximus Augustus, we give you thanks. Balbinus Augustus, we give you thanks. We decree temples for the Deified Gordians. 3 The name of Maximinus, previously expunged,90 is now to be stricken from our hearts. Let the head of the public foe be cast into running water. Let no man bury his body. p365 He who threatened death to the senate is slain as he deserved. He who threatened chains for the senate is killed as he deserved. 4 Most reverend Emperors, we offer you thanks. Maximus, Balbinus, Gordian, may the gods keep you! victorious over your foes, we all desire your presence. We all desire the presence of Maximus. Balbinus Augustus, may the gods keep you! Honour the present year by being this year's consuls. In the place of Maximinus let Gordian be chosen. " 5 After this, Cuspidius Celerinus,91 being asked for his opinion, spoke thus: "Conscript Fathers, having expunged the name of the Maximini and deified the Gordians, in honour of the victory we decree to our princes Maximus, Balbinus, and Gordian statues with elephants, triumphal cars, equestrian statues, and trophies of victory. " 6 After this, the senate being dissolved, supplications were ordered throughout the whole city. 7 The princes betook them victoriously to the Palace, but of their lives we shall write later in another book.

MAXIMINUS THE YOUNGER

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 27 1 The descent of the younger Maximinus92 has been related above. He himself was so beautiful that the more wanton of women loved him indiscriminately, and not a few desired to be gotten with child by him. 2 He gave such promise of height, moreover, that he might have reached his father's stature had he not perished in his twenty-first year, in the very flower of his youth, or, as some say, in his eighteenth. 3 Even so, he was well versed in Greek and Latin p367 letters, for he got his first schooling under the Greek man of letters Fabillus,93 many of whose Greek epigrams are extant today, chiefly on statues of the boy himself. 4 This Fabillus also made Greek verses from those Latin lines of Vergil, meaning to describe this same boy:

"Like to the star of the morning when he, new-bathèd in Ocean,
Raises his holy face and scatters the darkness from heaven,94
So did the young man seem, fair-famed in the name of his father. "
5 Latin grammar he studied under Philemon, jurisprudence under Modestinus,95 and oratory under Titianus, the son of that elder Titianus96 who wrote a very beautiful work on the provinces and was called the ape of his age because he imitated everything. He employed also the Greek rhetorician Eugamius, who was famous in his day.

6 Junia Fadilla,97 the great-granddaughter of Antoninus, was betrothed to him; but afterwards she was espoused by Toxotius, a senator of the same family, who died after serving his praetorship, certain poems of his being extant today. 7 The regal betrothal-gifts that he had presented her with, however, she kept. Junius Cordus, who was an investigator of these things, p369 says that they were such as these: a necklace of nine pearls; a net-work cap with eleven emeralds; a bracelet with a row of four sapphires; and besides these, gowns worked with gold, all of them royal, and other betrothal pledges.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 28 1 The young man Maximinus was most excessively insolent; indeed, when even his father, a very hard man, rose to greet many distinguished men, he remained seated. 2 He was fond of gay living, very sparing in the use of wine, but voracious in respect to food, especially game, eating only boar's flesh, ducks, cranes, and everything that is hunted. 3 The friends of Maximus, Balbinus, and Gordian, and particularly the senators, spoke ill of him because his excessive beauty; for they were not willing that his beauty, fallen, as it were, from heaven, should be pure. 4 Indeed, that time when he walked about the walls of Aquileia with his father, asking its surrender, nothing but filthy insinuations were hurled at him,98 — though far removed from his real life. 5 He was very careful of his dress, and no woman was more elegantly groomed. 6 It was monstrous how his father's friends fawned on him, in hopes chiefly of gifts or largess. 7 For he was exceedingly haughty at his levees — he stretched out his hand, and suffered his knees to be kissed, and sometimes even his feet. This the elder Maximinus never permitted; for he said "God forbid that any free man should ever print a kiss on my feet". 8 And while we are speaking of the elder Maximinus we should not forbear to mention this amusing thing: as we have said,99 Maximinus was almost eight and a half feet tall; and certain men deposited a shoe of his, p371 that is, one of his royal boots, in a grove which lies between Aquileia and Arcia,100 because, sooth, they agreed that it was a foot longer than the measure of any foot of man. 9 Whence also is derived the vulgar expression, used for lanky and awkward fellows, of "Maximinus' boot". 10 I have put this down lest any one who reads Cordus should believe that I have overlooked anything which pertained to my subject. But now let me return to the son.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 29 1 Aurelius Alexander101 wished to give him his sister Theoclia in marriage and wrote to his mother Mamaea these words concerning the youth: 2 "Mother, were there not an element of the barbarian in the character of the elder Maximinus — he who is out general, and a very good one, too — I had already married your Theoclia to Maximinus102 the younger. 3 But I am afraid that such a product of Greek culture as my sister could not endure a barbarian father-in‑law, however much the young man himself seems handsome and learned and polished in Greek elegance. This is what I think; 4 but nevertheless I ask your advice. Tell me, do you wish Maximinus, the son of Maximinus, for a son-in‑law, or Messalla, who is a scion of a noble house, a very powerful speaker, very learned, and, if I mistake not, a man who would prove himself gallant on the field if occasion should arise? " 5 Thus Alexander on Maximinus. As for us, we have nothing further to say of him.

6 And yet — lest we seem to have omitted anything at all — I have set down a letter written by his father Maximinus, when he had now become emperor, in p373 which he says that he had proclaimed his son emperor in order to see, either in painting or actuality, what the younger Maximinus would look like in the purple. 7 The letter itself was of this nature: "I have let my Maximinus be called emperor, not only because of the fondness which a father owes a son, but also that the Roman people and that venerable senate may be able to take an oath that they have never had a more handsome emperor". 8 After the fashion of the Ptolemies this youth wore a golden cuirass; he had also a silver one. He had a shield, moreover, inlaid with gold and jewels, and also a gold-inlaid spear. 9 He had silver swords made for him, too, and gold ones as well, everything, in fact, which could enhance his beauty — helmets inset with precious stones and cheek-pieces done in the same fashion.

10 These are the facts which can be known and related of the boy with propriety. But whoever desires to know the rest, about sexual and amorous affairs with which Cordus bespatters him, let him read Cordus; as for us, we make an end of our book here, and hasten on, as though bidden by a public duty, to other things.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 30 1 The omens that he would be emperor were these: A snake coiled about his head as he was sleeping. A grape-vine which he planted produced within a year huge clusters of purple grapes, and grew to an astounding size. 2 His shield blazed in the sun. A small lance of his was split by lightning and in such a manner that the whole of it, even through the iron, was cleft and fell into two halves. And from this the soothsayers declared that from the one house there would spring two emperors of the same name, whose reign would be of no long duration. p375 3 His father's cuirass — many saw it — was stained not with rust, as is usual, but all over with a purple colour. 4 These omens, moreover, occurred for the son: When he was sent to a grammarian, a certain kinswoman of his gave him the works of Homer all written in letters of gold on purple. 5 And while he was yet a little boy, he was asked to dinner by Alexander as a compliment to his father, and, being without a dinner-robe, he wore one of Alexander's. 6 When still an infant, moreover, he mounted up into a carriage of Antoninus Caracalla's that unexpectedly came down the public way, seeing it empty, and sat down; and only with great ado was he routed out by the coachmen. 7 Nor were there lacking then those who told Caracalla to beware of the child. But he said, "It is a far chance that this fellow will succeed me. " For at that time he was of the undistinguished crowd and was very young.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 31 1 The omens of his death were these: When Maximinus and his son were marching against Maximus and Balbinus they were met by a woman with dishevelled hair and woeful attire, who cried out, "Maximini, Maximini, Maximini," and said no more, and died. She wished to add, it seemed, "Help me! " 2 And at their next halting-place hounds, more than twelve of them, howled about his tent, drawing their breath with a sort of sobbing, and at dawn were found dead. 3 Five hundred wolves, likewise, came in a pack into that town whither Maximinus had betaken himself — Emona,103 many say, others Archimea;104 at any rate, it was one which was left abandoned by its inhabitants when Maximinus approached. 4 It is a lengthy business to enumerate all these things; and if anyone desires to know them, let him, as I have p377 often said, read Cordus, who has related them all, to the point of telling idle tales.

5 They have no tombs. For their corpses were cast into running water and their heads, while the mob capered, were burned in the Campus Martius.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 32 1 Aelius Sabinus105 has written, and we must not omit it, that such was the beauty of the son's face that even in death his head, now black, and dirty, shrunken, and running with putrid gore, seemed still the shadow, as it were, of a beautiful face. 2 And indeed, though there was great joy at seeing the head of Maximinus, there was almost equal grief when the son's head was carried with it. 3 Dexippus106 says that Maximinus was hated so thoroughly that when the Gordians perished the senate elected twenty men to oppose him. 107 Among these were Maximus and Balbinus, and these two they made emperors against him. 4 This same Dexippus says also that Maximinus' prefect of the guard and his son were slain before their eyes, after his soldiers had deserted him. 5 And there are not lacking historians who say that Maximinus also, after he had been deserted and had seen his son slain before his eyes, killed himself with his own hand,108 that nothing womanish might attach to him.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 33 1 Nor can we fail to mention the extraordinary loyalty displayed by the Aquileians in defending the senate against Maximinus. For, lacking bow-strings with which to shoot their arrows, they made cords of the women's hair. 109 2 It is said that this once happened at Rome as well, whence it was that p379 the senate, in honour of the matrons, dedicated the temple of Venus Calva. 110

We can by no means be silent about the following point. For although Dexippus, Arrianus,111 and many other Greek writers have said that Maximus and Balbinus were set up as emperors against Maximinus, and that Maximus, being sent out with the army, prepared for war at Ravenna, and did not see Aquileia until after he was victorious,112 Latin writers have said that it was not Maximus but Pupienus who fought Maximinus at Aquileia and beat him. 3 Whence this error arose I cannot say, unless it be that Maximus and Pupienus were one and the same. 113 4 At any rate, I have set this statement down with its authorities, in order that no one may believe that I did not know it — which indeed would cause great wonder and amazement!

The Three Gordians

1 1 [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] It had been my plan, revered Augustus, following the example of many writers, to present each separate emperor to Your Clemency, each in a separate book. 2 For I have either seen for myself that many writers have done this, or I have so understood from my reading. 3 It did not seem proper, however, either to perplex Your Piety with a multitude of books or to expend my labour on many volumes. 4 For this reason in this book I have bound the three Gordians together, having a care both for my own labour and for your reading, lest you be compelled to unroll many volumes and yet read scarcely one story. 5 But let not me, who have always fled long books and many words, seem to run into the very thing I pretend cleverly to avoid; and so to my subject!

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 2 1 There were not, as certain uninformed writers maintain, two Gordians, but three. 1 These writers might have learned this from Arrianus,2 the writer of Greek history, and likewise from Dexippus,3 the p383 Greek writer, both of whom have investigated the whole question, briefly perhaps, but still conscientiously. 2 Of the three, Gordian the elder,4 that is the first, was the son of Maecius Marullus and Ulpia Gordiana. On his father's side he traced his descent from the house of the Gracchi, on his mother's from the Emperor Trajan. His own father, his grandfather, and his great-grandfather, his wife's father and grandfather, and likewise another of his wife's grandfathers and two of her great-grandfathers, were consuls. 3 He himself as consul was most rich and powerful; at Rome he owned the House of Pompey,5 and in the provinces more land than any other subject. 4 After his consulship, which he served with Alexander,6 he was sent out as proconsul to Africa by decree of the senate.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 3 1 But before I tell of his rule, I shall speak a little of his character. 2 When the Gordian of whom we are speaking was a young man, he wrote poetry, all of which has been preserved. 7 As a matter of fact, all the subjects were those which Cicero also treated, that is, Marius, Aratus, Alcyonae, Uxorius and Nilus. 8 And he wrote these in order that Cicero's poems might seem out of date. 3 Besides these, just as p385 Vergil wrote an Aeneid, Statius an Achilleid, and many others Alexandriads, he wrote an Antoniniad — the lives, that is, of Antoninus Pius and Marcus Antoninus, most learnedly versified in thirty books, wherein he recounted their wars and other doings both public and private. 9 4 And all this he did as a young boy. Later on, when he grew to manhood, he declaimed and disputed at the Athenaeum,10 at times in the presence of his emperors.

5 He served his quaestorship most splendidly. When he was aedile he gave the Roman people twelve exhibitions, that is one for each month, at his own expense; at times, indeed, he provided five hundred pairs of gladiators, and never less than a hundred and fifty. 6 He produced a hundred wild beasts of Libya11 at once, and likewise at one time a thousand bears. There exists also today a remarkable wild-beast hunt of his, pictured in Gnaeus Pompey's "House of the Beaks";12 this palace belonged to him and to his father and grandfather before him until your privy-purse took it over in the time of Philip. 13 7 In this picture at the present day are contained two hundred stags with antlers shaped like the palm of a hand, together with stags of Britain, thirty wild horses, a hundred wild sheep, ten elks, a hundred Cyprian bulls, three hundred red Moorish ostriches, thirty wild asses, a hundred and fifty wild boars, two hundred chamois, and two hundred fallow deer. 8 And all these he handed over to the people to be killed on the day of the sixth exhibition that he gave.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 4 1 He served a famous praetorship. Then, after administering the law, he entered upon his first p387 consulship with Antoninus Caracalla, his second with Alexander. 14 2 ºHe had two children, one the son who attained consular rank and was named Augustus with himself15 and perished in the war in Africa near Carthage,16 the other a daughter, Maecia Faustina by name17 who was married to Junius Balbus, a man of consular rank. 3 His consulships were more brilliant than that of any other man of his time; even Antoninus envied him, admiring now his togas, now his broad stripe,18 and now his games, which surpassed the imperial games themselves. 4 He was the first Roman subject to possess for his own a tunic embroidered with palms19 and a gold-embroidered toga; for previously even the emperors had gotten theirs either from the Capitol or the Palace. 20 5 With the emperors' permission he distributed a hundred Sicilian and a hundred Cappadocian horses among the factions. 21 And he endeared himself greatly to the people, who are always touched by acts of this nature. 6 Cordus22 says that he gave stage-plays and Juvenalia23 in all the cities of Campania, Etruria, Umbria, Flaminia, and Picenum, for four days at his own expense. 7 He wrote prose eulogies also of all the p389 Antonines who had preceded him. He admired the Antonines marvellously;24 many say that he himself assumed the name Antoninus or, as more declare, Antonius. 25 8 And certainly there is no doubt that he embellished his son with the name Antoninus, when, after the Roman custom, he acknowledged him before the prefect of the Treasury and entered his name in the public records. 26

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 5 1 After his consulship he was appointed proconsul of Africa27 through the efforts of all those who desired Alexander's reign to seem and to be brilliant in Africa through the splendour of its proconsul. 2 Indeed there still exists a letter of Alexander's in which he thanks the senate for electing Gordian proconsul for Africa. 3 It runs in this style: "You could have done nothing more pleasing or agreeable to me, Conscript Fathers, than to send Antoninus28 Gordian as proconsul to Africa, for he is well-born, high-minded, eloquent, just, moderate, virtuous," and so on. 4 It is clear from this how great a man Gordian was even at that time. 5 He was beloved by the Africans as no other proconsul had ever been before; some called him Scipio, others, Cato, and many, Mucius,29 Rutilius,30 and Laelius. 31 6 An acclamation of theirs which Junius32 noted down has been preserved. 7 For when on one occasion he was p391 reading an imperial act and began with the mention of the proconsuls Scipio, the people shouted, "The new Scipio, the true Scipio, the proconsul Gordian". He was often greeted with these and similar acclamations.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 6 1 In height he was characteristically Roman. He was becomingly gray, with an impressive face, more ruddy than fair. His face was fairly broad, his eyes, his countenance, and his brow such as to command respect. His body was somewhat stocky. 2 In character he was temperate and restrained; there is nothing you can say that he ever did passionately, immoderately, or excessively. 3 His affection for his kin was remarkable, for his daughter and granddaughter most devoted. 4 He was as deferential to his father-in‑law Annius Severus33 as though he considered that he had passed over into his family as a son; he never washed himself in his company, he never sat in his presence until he became praetor. 5 And when he was consul either he always remained at the old man's house, or, if he stayed at the House of Pompey, he went either at morning or evening to see him. 6 He was sparing in the use of wine, very sparing in the use of food. His dress was elegant. He was fond of bathing; indeed, during the summer, he would bathe four or five times a day, in the winter twice. 7 His love of sleep was enormous; he would doze off even at table, if he were dining with friends, and without any embarrassment. This he seemed to do at nature's bidding and not because of intoxication or wantonness.

[Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 7 1 But all his virtuous behaviour profited him nothing. For this old man, worthy of respect as such a life had made him, who passed his days with Plato p393 and Aristotle, Cicero and Vergil, finally suffered an end other than that he deserved.

2 For, in the time of Maximinus, a grim and savage man, he was ruling Africa as proconsul,34 and his son was with him as his legate, having been so appointed by the senate from among the consuls. Now there was a certain agent of the privy-purse,35 who ran riot against a great number of Africans even more violently than Maximinus himself allowed. He outlawed a great many, he put many to death, he assumed all powers in excess even of a tax-gatherer's; and when he was finally restrained by the proconsul and legate he threatened those noble consular men with death. The Africans at length were unable to suffer these unwonted injuries any longer, and so, with the aid of a number of soldiers, they first killed him. 3 Then, after he was killed and while the whole world was blazing with hatred of Maximinus, his slayers began to take counsel how this conflict which had arisen between the agents of Maximinus and the peasants, or rather the Africans, might go unpunished. 4 Then a certain fellow, Mauritius36 by name, a municipal councillor,37 who had great influence with the Africans, held a sort of assembly on his farm near Thysdrus38 and made a most notable oration to the people of the town and the country, saying: [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 8 1 "Let us give thanks to the immortal gods, citizens, that they have given us a chance, and truly a needed one, of protecting ourselves against that madman Maximinus. 2 We have slain a tax-gatherer of his, one patterned after himself in character and conduct, and unless we make an emperor of our own we are lost. 3 Wherefore, since p395 not far off there is a man of noble blood, a proconsul, and with him his son, a consular legate, both of whom that pest has threatened with death, we shall hail them emperors, if it please you, taking the purple from the standards, and giving them their proper trappings make them secure by Roman law. " 4 Whereupon they shouted, "It is good, it is right. Gordian Augustus, may the gods keep you safe! Rule happily, rule with your son. "

5 Upon this, they came hastily to the town of Thysdrus, and there they found the venerable old man returned from the law-courts and lying on a couch. They girt him straightway with the purple, but he would have none of it and cast himself on the ground; and they lifted him up still refusing. 6 But when he saw that he could do nothing else, for the sake of escaping from a danger which threatened him for certain at the hands of his supporters and only doubtfully from the Maximinians, the old man suffered himself to be acclaimed emperor. [Legamen ad paginam Latinam] 9 1 He was then eighty years of age,39 and, as we have said,40 had ruled many provinces before; and he had so commended himself to the Roman people by his conduct in these that they thought him worthy of ruling the whole empire. 2 With regard to the killing of the agent, Gordian had had no previous knowledge. But when he learned of the fact, being now near to death and fearing greatly for his son, he preferred to die honourably rather than be handed over to the chains and prison-cell of Maximinus.

3 However, having now acclaimed Gordian emperor, the young men who were the authors of the deed proceeded to cast down the statues of Maximinus, break his busts, and publicly erase his name. p397 They also gave Gordian the name Africanus. 41 4 Some add that he was granted this honorary name, not because he became emperor in Africa, but because he was descended from the family of the Scipios.