[1: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 222. Aurelius Victor
mentions a formal deputation from the troops to the senate.]
[2: Vopiscus, our principal authority, wrote at Rome,
sixteen years only after the death of Aurelian; and, besides the
recent notoriety of the facts, constantly draws his materials
from the Journals of the Senate, and the original papers of the
Ulpian library. Zosimus and Zonaras appear as ignorant of this
transaction as they were in general of the Roman constitution.]
[A: The interregnum could not be more than seven months;
Aurelian was assassinated in the middle of March, the year of
Rome 1028. Tacitus was elected the 25th September in the same
year. - G.]
[3: Liv. i. 17 Dionys. Halicarn. l. ii. p. 115.
Plutarch in Numa, p. 60. The first of these writers relates the
story like an orator, the second like a lawyer, and the third
like a moralist, and none of them probably without some
intermixture of fable.]
[4: Vopiscus (in Hist. August p. 227) calls him "primae
sententia consularis;" and soon afterwards Princeps senatus. It
is natural to suppose, that the monarchs of Rome, disdaining that
humble title, resigned it to the most ancient of the senators.]
[5: The only objection to this genealogy is, that the
historian was named Cornelius, the emperor, Claudius. But under
the lower empire, surnames were extremely various and uncertain.]
[6: Zonaras, l. xii. p. 637. The Alexandrian Chronicle,
by an obvious mistake, transfers that age to Aurelian.]
[7: In the year 273, he was ordinary consul. But he
must have been Suffectus many years before, and most probably
under Valerian.]
[8: Bis millies octingenties. Vopiscus in Hist. August
p. 229. This sum, according to the old standard, was equivalent
to eight hundred and forty thousand Roman pounds of silver, each
of the value of three pounds sterling. But in the age of
Tacitus, the coin had lost much of its weight and purity.]
[9: After his accession, he gave orders that ten copies
of the historian should be annually transcribed and placed in the
public libraries. The Roman libraries have long since perished,
and the most valuable part of Tacitus was preserved in a single
Ms., and discovered in a monastery of Westphalia. See Bayle,
Dictionnaire, Art. Tacite, and Lipsius ad Annal. ii. 9.]
[10: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 227.]
[11: Hist. August. p. 228. Tacitus addressed the
Praetorians by the appellation of sanctissimi milites, and the
people by that of sacratissim. Quirites.]
[12: In his manumissions he never exceeded the number of
a hundred, as limited by the Caninian law, which was enacted
under Augustus, and at length repealed by Justinian. See
Casaubon ad locum Vopisci.]
[13: See the lives of Tacitus, Florianus, and Probus, in
the Augustan History; we may be well assured, that whatever the
soldier gave the senator had already given.]
[14: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 216. The passage is
perfectly clear, both Casaubon and Salmasius wish to correct it.]
[15: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 230, 232, 233. The
senators celebrated the happy restoration with hecatombs and
public rejoicings.]
[16: Hist. August. p. 228.]
[B: On the Alani, see ch. xxvi. note 55. - M.]
[17: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 230. Zosimus, l. i.
p. 57. Zonaras, l. xii. p. 637. Two passages in the life of
Probus (p. 236, 238) convince me, that these Scythian invaders of
Pontus were Alani. If we may believe Zosimus, (l. i. p. 58,)
Florianus pursued them as far as the Cimmerian Bosphorus. But he
had scarcely time for so long and difficult an expedition.]
[18: Eutropius and Aurelius Victor only say that he
died; Victor Junior adds, that it was of a fever. Zosimus and
Zonaras affirm, that he was killed by the soldiers. Vopiscus
mentions both accounts, and seems to hesitate. Yet surely these
jarring opinions are easily reconciled.]
[19: According to the two Victors, he reigned exactly
two hundred days.]
[20: Hist. August, p. 231. Zosimus, l. i. p. 58, 59.
Zonaras, l. xii. p. 637. Aurelius Victor says, that Probus
assumed the empire in Illyricum; an opinion which (though adopted
by a very learned man) would throw that period of history into
inextricable confusion.]
[21: Hist. August. p. 229]
[22: He was to send judges to the Parthians, Persians,
and Sarmatians, a president to Taprobani, and a proconsul to the
Roman island, (supposed by Casaubon and Salmasius to mean
Britain.) Such a history as mine (says Vopiscus with proper
modesty) will not subsist a thousand years, to expose or justify
the prediction.]
[23: For the private life of Probus, see Vopiscus in
Hist. August p. 234 - 237]
[24: According to the Alexandrian chronicle, he was
fifty at the time of his death.]
[25: This letter was addressed to the Praetorian
praefect, whom (on condition of his good behavior) he promised to
continue in his great office. See Hist. August. p. 237.]
[26: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 237. The date of the
letter is assuredly faulty. Instead of Nen. Februar. we may read
Non August.]
[27: Hist. August. p. 238. It is odd that the senate
should treat Probus less favorably than Marcus Antoninus. That
prince had received, even before the death of Pius, Jus quintoe
relationis. See Capitolin. in Hist. August. p. 24.]
[28: See the dutiful letter of Probus to the senate,
after his German victories. Hist. August. p. 239.]
[29: The date and duration of the reign of Probus are
very correctly ascertained by Cardinal Noris in his learned work,
De Epochis Syro-Macedonum, p. 96 - 105. A passage of Eusebius
connects the second year of Probus with the aeras of several of
the Syrian cities.]
[30: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 239.]
[31: Zosimus (l. i. p. 62 - 65) tells us a very long and
trifling story of Lycius, the Isaurian robber.]
[32: Zosim. l. i. p. 65. Vopiscus in Hist. August. p.
239, 240. But it seems incredible that the defeat of the savages
of Aethiopia could affect the Persian monarch.]
[33: Besides these well-known chiefs, several others are
named by Vopiscus, (Hist. August. p. 241,) whose actions have not
reached knowledge.]
[34: See the Caesars of Julian, and Hist. August. p.
238, 240, 241.]
[C: It was only under the emperors Diocletian and
Maximian, that the Burgundians, in concert with the Alemanni,
invaded the interior of Gaul; under the reign of Probus, they did
no more than pass the river which separated them from the Roman
Empire: they were repelled. Gatterer presumes that this river
was the Danube; a passage in Zosimus appears to me rather to
indicate the Rhine. Zos. l. i. p. 37, edit H. Etienne, 1581. -
G.
On the origin of the Burgundians may be consulted Malte
Brun, Geogr vi. p. 396, (edit. 1831,) who observes that all the
remains of the Burgundian language indicate that they spoke a
Gothic dialect. - M.]
[35: Zosimus, l. i. p. 62. Hist. August. p. 240. But
the latter supposes the punishment inflicted with the consent of
their kings: if so, it was partial, like the offence.]
[36: See Cluver. Germania Antiqua, l. iii. Ptolemy
places in their country the city of Calisia, probably Calish in
Silesia.
Note: Luden (vol ii. 501) supposes that these have been
erroneously identified with the Lygii of Tacitus. Perhaps one
fertile source of mistakes has been, that the Romans have turned
appellations into national names. Malte Brun observes of the
Lygii, "that their name appears Sclavonian, and signifies
'inhabitants of plains;' they are probably the Lieches of the
middle ages, and the ancestors of the Poles. We find among the
Arii the worship of the two twin gods known in the Sclavian
mythology." Malte Brun, vol. i. p. 278, (edit. 1831.) - M.
But compare Schafarik, Slawische Alterthumer, 1, p. 406.
They were of German or Keltish descent, occupying the Wendish (or
Slavian) district, Luhy. - M. 1845.]
[37: Feralis umbra, is the expression of Tacitus: it is
surely a very bold one.]
[38: Tacit. Germania, (c. 43.)]
[39: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 238]
[40: Hist. August. 238, 239. Vopiscus quotes a letter
from the emperor to the senate, in which he mentions his design
of reducing Germany into a province.]
[41: Strabo, l. vii. According to Valleius Paterculus,
(ii. 108,) Maroboduus led his Marcomanni into Bohemia; Cluverius
(German. Antiq. iii. 8) proves that it was from Swabia.]
[42: These settlers, from the payment of tithes, were
denominated Decunates. Tacit. Germania, c. 29]
[43: See notes de l'Abbe de la Bleterie a la Germanie de
Tacite, p. 183. His account of the wall is chiefly borrowed (as
he says himself) from the Alsatia Illustrata of Schoepflin.]
[44: See Recherches sur les Chinois et les Egyptiens,
tom. ii. p. 81 - 102. The anonymous author is well acquainted
with the globe in general, and with Germany in particular: with
regard to the latter, he quotes a work of M. Hanselman; but he
seems to confound the wall of Probus, designed against the
Alemanni, with the fortification of the Mattiaci, constructed in
the neighborhood of Frankfort against the Catti.
Note: De Pauw is well known to have been the author of this
work, as of the Recherches sur les Americains before quoted. The
judgment of M. Remusat on this writer is in a very different, I
fear a juster tone. Quand au lieu de rechercher, d'examiner,
d'etudier, on se borne, comme cet ecrivain, a juger a prononcer,
a decider, sans connoitre ni l'histoire. ni les langues, sans
recourir aux sources, sans meme se douter de leur existence, on
peut en imposer pendant quelque temps a des lecteurs prevenus ou
peu instruits; mais le mepris qui ne manque guere de succeder a
cet engouement fait bientot justice de ces assertions hazardees,
et elles retombent dans l'oubli d'autant plus promptement,
qu'elles ont ete posees avec plus de confiance. Sur les l angues
Tartares, p. 231. - M.]
[45: He distributed about fifty or sixty barbarians to a
Numerus, as it was then called, a corps with whose established
number we are not exactly acquainted.]
[46: Camden's Britannia, Introduction, p. 136; but he
speaks from a very doubtful conjecture.]
[47: Zosimus, l. i. p. 62. According to Vopiscus,
another body of Vandals was less faithful.]
[48: Hist. August. p. 240. They were probably expelled
by the Goths. Zosim. l. i. p. 66.]
[49: Hist. August. p. 240.]
[50: Panegyr. Vet. v. 18. Zosimus, l. i. p. 66.]
[51: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 245, 246. The
unfortunate orator had studied rhetoric at Carthage; and was
therefore more probably a Moor (Zosim. l. i. p. 60) than a Gaul,
as Vopiscus calls him.]
[52: Zonaras, l. xii. p. 638.]
[53: A very surprising instance is recorded of the
prowess of Procufus. He had taken one hundred Sarmatian virgins.
The rest of the story he must relate in his own language: "Ex his
una necte decem inivi; omnes tamen, quod in me erat, mulieres
intra dies quindecim reddidi. Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 246.]
[54: Proculus, who was a native of Albengue, on the
Genoese coast armed two thousand of his own slaves. His riches
were great, but they were acquired by robbery. It was afterwards
a saying of his family, sibi non placere esse vel principes vel
latrones. Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 247.]
[55: Hist. August. p. 240.]
[56: Zosim. l. i. p. 66.]
[57: Hist. August. p. 236.]
[58: Aurel. Victor. in Prob. But the policy of
Hannibal, unnoticed by any more ancient writer, is irreconcilable
with the history of his life. He left Africa when he was nine
years old, returned to it when he was forty- five, and
immediately lost his army in the decisive battle of Zama.
Livilus, xxx. 37.]
[59: Hist. August. p. 240. Eutrop. ix. 17. Aurel.
Victor. in Prob. Victor Junior. He revoked the prohibition of
Domitian, and granted a general permission of planting vines to
the Gauls, the Britons, and the Pannonians.]
[60: Julian bestows a severe, and indeed excessive,
censure on the rigor of Probus, who, as he thinks, almost
deserved his fate.]
[61: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 241. He lavishes on
this idle hope a large stock of very foolish eloquence.]
[62: Turris ferrata. It seems to have been a movable
tower, and cased with iron.]
[63: Probus, et vere probus situs est; Victor omnium
gentium Barbararum; victor etiam tyrannorum.]
[64: Yet all this may be conciliated. He was born at
Narbonne in Illyricum, confounded by Eutropius with the more
famous city of that name in Gaul. His father might be an
African, and his mother a noble Roman. Carus himself was
educated in the capital. See Scaliger Animadversion. ad Euseb.
Chron. p. 241.]
[65: Probus had requested of the senate an equestrian
statue and a marble palace, at the public expense, as a just
recompense of the singular merit of Carus. Vopiscus in Hist.
August. p. 249.]
[66: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 242, 249. Julian
excludes the emperor Carus and both his sons from the banquet of
the Caesars.]
[67: John Malala, tom. i. p. 401. But the authority of
that ignorant Greek is very slight. He ridiculously derives from
Carus the city of Carrhae, and the province of Caria, the latter
of which is mentioned by Homer.]
[68: Hist. August. p. 249. Carus congratulated the
senate, that one of their own order was made emperor.]
[69: Hist. August. p. 242.]
[70: See the first eclogue of Calphurnius. The design
of it is preferes by Fontenelle to that of Virgil's Pollio. See
tom. iii. p. 148.]
[71: Hist. August. p. 353. Eutropius, ix. 18. Pagi.
Annal.]
[D: Three monarchs had intervened, Sapor, (Shahpour,)
Hormisdas, (Hormooz,) Varanes; Baharam the First. - M.]
[72: Agathias, l. iv. p. 135. We find one of his
sayings in the Bibliotheque Orientale of M. d'Herbelot. "The
definition of humanity includes all other virtues."]
[E: The manner in which his life was saved by the Chief
Pontiff from a conspiracy of his nobles, is as remarkable as his
saying. "By the advice (of the Pontiff) all the nobles absented
themselves from court. The king wandered through his palace
alone. He saw no one; all was silence around. He became alarmed
and distressed. At last the Chief Pontiff appeared, and bowed
his head in apparent misery, but spoke not a word. The king
entreated him to declare what had happened. The virtuous man
boldly related all that had passed, and conjured Bahram, in the
name of his glorious ancestors, to change his conduct and save
himself from destruction. The king was much moved, professed
himself most penitent, and said he was resolved his future life
should prove his sincerity. The overjoyed High Priest, delighted
at this success, made a signal, at which all the nobles and
attendants were in an instant, as if by magic, in their usual
places. The monarch now perceived that only one opinion
prevailed on his past conduct. He repeated therefore to his
nobles all he had said to the Chief Pontiff, and his future reign
was unstained by cruelty or oppression." Malcolm's Persia, - M.]
[73: Synesius tells this story of Carinus; and it is
much more natural to understand it of Carus, than (as Petavius
and Tillemont choose to do) of Probus.]
[74: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 250. Eutropius, ix.
18. The two Victors.]
[75: To the Persian victory of Carus I refer the
dialogue of the Philopatris, which has so long been an object of
dispute among the learned. But to explain and justify my opinion,
would require a dissertation.
Note: Niebuhr, in the new edition of the Byzantine
Historians, (vol. x.) has boldly assigned the Philopatris to the
tenth century, and to the reign of Nicephorus Phocas. An opinion
so decisively pronounced by Niebuhr and favorably received by
Hase, the learned editor of Leo Diaconus, commands respectful
consideration. But the whole tone of the work appears to me
altogether inconsistent with any period in which philosophy did
not stand, as it were, on some ground of equality with
Christianity. The doctrine of the Trinity is sarcastically
introduced rather as the strange doctrine of a new religion, than
the established tenet of a faith universally prevalent. The
argument, adopted from Solanus, concerning the formula of the
procession of the Holy Ghost, is utterly worthless, as it is a
mere quotation in the words of the Gospel of St. John, xv. 26.
The only argument of any value is the historic one, from the
allusion to the recent violation of many virgins in the Island of
Crete. But neither is the language of Niebuhr quite accurate,
nor his reference to the Acroases of Theodosius satisfactory.
When, then, could this occurrence take place? Why not in the
devastation of the island by the Gothic pirates, during the reign
of Claudius. Hist. Aug. in Claud. p. 814. edit. Var. Lugd. Bat
1661. - M.]
[76: Hist. August. p. 250. Yet Eutropius, Festus,
Rufus, the two Victors, Jerome, Sidonius Apollinaris, Syncellus,
and Zonaras, all ascribe the death of Carus to lightning.]
[77: See Nemesian. Cynegeticon, v. 71, &c.]
[78: See Festus and his commentators on the word
Scribonianum. Places struck by lightning were surrounded with a
wall; things were buried with mysterious ceremony.]
[79: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 250. Aurelius Victor
seems to believe the prediction, and to approve the retreat.]
[80: Nemesian. Cynegeticon, v 69. He was a
contemporary, but a poet.]
[81: Cancellarius. This word, so humble in its origin,
has, by a singular fortune, risen into the title of the first
great office of state in the monarchies of Europe. See Casaubon
and Salmasius, ad Hist. August, p. 253.]
[82: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 253, 254. Eutropius,
x. 19. Vic to Junior. The reign of Diocletian indeed was so
long and prosperous, that it must have been very unfavorable to
the reputation of Carinus.]
[83: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 254. He calls him
Carus, but the sense is sufficiently obvious, and the words were
often confounded.]
[84: See Calphurnius, Eclog. vii. 43. We may observe,
that the spectacles of Probus were still recent, and that the
poet is seconded by the historian.]
[85: The philosopher Montaigne (Essais, l. iii. 6) gives
a very just and lively view of Roman magnificence in these
spectacles.]
[86: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 240.]
[87: They are called Onagri; but the number is too
inconsiderable for mere wild asses. Cuper (de Elephantis
Exercitat. ii. 7) has proved from Oppian, Dion, and an anonymous
Greek, that zebras had been seen at Rome. They were brought from
some island of the ocean, perhaps Madagascar.]
[88: Carinus gave a hippopotamus, (see Calphurn. Eclog.
vi. 66.) In the latter spectacles, I do not recollect any
crocodiles, of which Augustus once exhibited thirty-six. Dion
Cassius, l. lv. p. 781.]
[89: Capitolin. in Hist. August. p. 164, 165. We are
not acquainted with the animals which he calls archeleontes; some
read argoleontes others agrioleontes: both corrections are very
nugatory]
[90: Plin. Hist. Natur. viii. 6, from the annals of
Piso.]
[91: See Maffei, Verona Illustrata, p. iv. l. i. c. 2.]
[92: Maffei, l. ii. c. 2. The height was very much
exaggerated by the ancients. It reached almost to the heavens,
according to Calphurnius, (Eclog. vii. 23,) and surpassed the ken
of human sight, according to Ammianus Marcellinus (xvi. 10.) Yet
how trifling to the great pyramid of Egypt, which rises 500 feet
perpendicular]
[93: According to different copies of Victor, we read
77,000, or 87,000 spectators; but Maffei (l. ii. c. 12) finds
room on the open seats for no more than 34,000. The remainder
were contained in the upper covered galleries.]
[94: See Maffei, l. ii. c. 5 - 12. He treats the very
difficult subject with all possible clearness, and like an
architect, as well as an antiquarian.]
[95: Calphurn. Eclog vii. 64, 73. These lines are
curious, and the whole eclogue has been of infinite use to
Maffei. Calphurnius, as well as Martial, (see his first book,)
was a poet; but when they described the amphitheatre, they both
wrote from their own senses, and to those of the Romans.]
[96: Consult Plin. Hist. Natur. xxxiii. 16, xxxvii. 11.]
[97: Balteus en gemmis, en inlita porticus auro
Certatim radiant, &c. Calphurn. vii.]
[98: Et Martis vultus et Apollinis esse putavi, says
Calphurnius; but John Malala, who had perhaps seen pictures of
Carinus, describes him as thick, short, and white, tom. i. p.
403.]
[99: With regard to the time when these Roman games were
celebrated, Scaliger, Salmasius, and Cuper have given themselves
a great deal of trouble to perplex a very clear subject.]
[100: Nemesianus (in the Cynegeticon) seems to
anticipate in his fancy that auspicious day.]
[101: He won all the crowns from Nemesianus, with whom
he vied in didactic poetry. The senate erected a statue to the
son of Carus, with a very ambiguous inscription, "To the most
powerful of orators." See Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 251.]
[102: A more natural cause, at least, than that assigned
by Vopiscus, (Hist. August. p. 251,) incessantly weeping for his
father's death.]
[103: In the Persian war, Aper was suspected of a design
to betray Carus. Hist. August. p. 250.]
[104: We are obliged to the Alexandrian Chronicle,
p. 274, for the knowledge of the time and place where Diocletian
was elected emperor.]
[105: Hist. August. p. 251. Eutrop. ix. 88. Hieronym.
in Chron. According to these judicious writers, the death of
Numerian was discovered by the stench of his dead body. Could no
aromatics be found in the Imperial household?]
[106: Aurel. Victor. Eutropius, ix. 20. Hieronym. in
Chron.]
[107: Vopiscus in Hist. August. p. 252. The reason why
Diocletian killed Aper, (a wild boar,) was founded on a prophecy
and a pun, as foolish as they are well known.]
[108: Eutropius marks its situation very accurately; it
was between the Mons Aureus and Viminiacum. M. d'Anville
(Geographic Ancienne, tom. i. p. 304) places Margus at Kastolatz
in Servia, a little below Belgrade and Semendria.
Note: Kullieza - Eton Atlas - M.]
[109: Hist. August. p. 254. Eutropius, ix. 20.
Aurelius Victor et Epitome]