¹ Throughout I give two numbers in referring to the Panegyrici Latini, first that of the edition of Galletier, E.Panégyriques latins (Collection des Universités de France) (Paris 1952),Google Scholar who disposes them chronologically, secondly that of the edition of Mynors, R.A.B.XII Panegyrici Latini (OCT) (Oxford 1964),Google Scholar who follows the order of the manuscripts. Text OCT unless otherwise specified.

² No visit from Constantine had taken place when Pan. VII (VI) was delivered in late summer 310 (22. 4).

³ 5:‘ne … te uno die de salute nostra multa tractantem moraretur oratio’.

⁴ I here cite the reading of the manuscripts, as does Galletier, who translates ‘bien que cinq ans soient achevés’. E. Baehrens emended ‘etiam’ to ‘set iam’ for reasons which will become apparent, and Mynors follows him (‘sed iam’). A neat emendation suggested to me by T.D. Barnes, ‘et iam’, would remove any implication that the Quinquennalia were not complete, if indeed that is necessarily implied by ‘etiam’. Bruun, P. ‘Constantine’s Change of Dies Imperii’, Arctos 9 (1975), 25 n. 52 writes: ‘to me the text “etiam perfecta celebranda sunt” points to the future’, but several considerations suggest that this is not the case. In the passage under consideration the phrase ‘nobis haec (i.e. haec Quinquennalia contrasted with ilia… quinto (anno) incipiente) propria quae plena sunt” would be odd on Bruun’s view that the fifth year was not yet complete. Furthermore at 13. 3–4 after an allusion to Cato (‘in illa vetere re publica ad censorum laudem pertinebat, si lustrum felix condidissent…’) the tenses used (‘quid ergo nos convenit gratulari de hoc indulgentiae tuae lustro? — lustro quo, licet nulla frugum cessarit ubertas, fecisti tamen ut omnia largiora videantur fuisse quam fuerint’) are much more appropriate if the lustrum has already been brought to a close. The ‘aside’ at 8. 2 points to the same conclusion. The speaker has been describing Constantine’s recent visit to Autun: ‘Omnes enim ex agris omnium aetatum homines convolaverunt, ut vidèrent quem superstitem sibi libenter optarent’ (8.1). ‘Quem superstitem sibi libenter optarent’ — surely a curious transition? By no means. It is the entrée to the flattery: ‘Quod enim ad propagandos <annos> aliorum principum sollemni verborum more iuratur, tibi, Constantine, soli ultra omnium nostrum fata victuro securi vovemus, cui tam longa aetas propria debetur’ (8. 2), which is particularly appropriate to a speech delivered on a quinquennial anniversary when vota would be formally proffered for the length and success of the reign. Finally, if the Quinquennalia were not the occasion of the speech, what occasion brought such a crowd of city representatives and petitioners to Trier to join the Emperor and his whole court (2. 1)?Google Scholar

⁵ E. Galletier (note 1 above)2. 73n. 5. Recognition of the double celebration goes back at least as far as Maurice, Jules who described it as an innovation of Constantine, Numismatique Constantinienne 1 (Paris 1908), 165.Google Scholar

⁶ Fauré, EdgarEtude de la capitation de Dioclétien d’après le Panégyrique VIII (Institut de Droit Romain de l’;Université de Paris, XX, Varia, Etudes de Droit Romain, Tome IV) (Paris 1961), 29.Google Scholar H. Mattingly, too, after a close examination of the vota coinage, writes:‘Maurice … possibly goes too far in assuming that there was, normally, a double celebration — that does not necessarily follow from the acknowledged fact that votive celebrations regularly lasted over a year from their beginning’: ‘The Imperial Vota’, Second Part, Proc. Brit. Acad. 37 (1951), 257 n. 85; cf. 258 n. 89.

⁷ Lactantius, Mort. Pers. 17 (Diocletian), 33 (Galerius). (The juggling of the evidence by Cataudella, M.R. ‘La data dell’ editto di Serdica e i Vicennalia di Galerio’, Riv. di cult-class, e medioevale 10 (1968), 269–86,Google Scholar I find perverse at many points.) For Constantine’sdecennalia, cf. CIL 8. 8477 (ILS 695): TRPXIMPIXCOSIV(315)VOT X MULT XX, which appears to demonstrate its celebration ‘in anticipation’. For the date, see the Table and supporting argument, pp. 160–1 (with η. 14) and pp. 167–8 below. Panegyric Χ (IV) of Nazarius was delivered in March 321 to celebrate the Quinquennalia of the Caesars Crispus, Licinius and Constantine II in anticipation (1. 1; 2. 3 etc.). Constantine I was in his fifteenth year in power (ibid. 2. 2). The Caesars were promoted on 1 March 317 (Cons. Const, a. 317: ‘His conss. levati tres Caes. Crispus Licinius et Constantinus die k. Mart.’; Chron. Min. 1, p. 232 = MGH (AA) 9, ed. Mommsen, T. [Berlin 1892]).Google Scholar

⁸ Jerome, Chronicle, a. 2342 (A.D. 325). Maurice, observed the large number of Constantinian medallions from Nicomedia, NC (1903), 263–77.Google Scholar

⁹ Chron. Min. l,p. 232.

¹⁰ Ibid. p. 235: ‘His conss. tricennalia edidit Constantinus Aug. die VIII K. Aug.’

¹¹ Drake, H.A. ‘When was the “De Laudibus Constantini” delivered?’, Historia 24 (1975), 345–56.Google Scholar Problems remain, as Drake recognizes, for example, Eusebius’ failure to mention here the wedding of Constantius (cf.Eusebius, , Vit. Const. 4. 49)Google Scholar but words such as συντελεί (2. 5) and àπoπληρotrvτα(6. 18; cf. Pan. Vili [V] 13. 2: ‘quae plena sunt’) make his case very plausible; cf. too Drake, In Praise of Constantine: a Historical Study and New Translation of Eusebius’ Tricennial Orations (University of California Publications: Classical Studies, Vol. 15) (Berkeley & Los Angeles 1976), Ch. 3.Google Scholar

¹² For the distinction, cf. (forexample).Pan.III (XI) 1. 3: ‘sed earn (orationem) reservo ut quinquennio rursus exacto decennalibus tuis dicam’; (he missed the quinquennalia, so termed, 1. 1). That Lactantius, uncharacteristically I might add, errs in this passage, attributing events of 312 to the year 311, even Bruun would now concede, NC 1969, 200.

¹³ I shall argue elsewhere the case for 21 July 291, Maximian’s actual birthday, being the occasion for Panegyric III (XI).

¹⁴ It is even possible that Constantine celebrated his decennalia at Rome. Entries in Philocalus’ Calendar (of A.D. 354) for 18, 21 July and 29 Oct. read adventus d(ivi) c(ircenses) m(issus) XXIV. The last is likely to refer to Constantine’s triumphant adventus into the city after the defeat of Maxentius in 312; Mommsen, (CIL 1. 2, p. 397)Google Scholar suggests the other two may refer to adventus for the decennalia in 315 and vicennalia in 326 (Jerome, Chron. A.D. 325, cited above). The evidence of the Codes provides some support for the imperial presence on 25 July 326 (6 July, Milan; 8 July, Rome; 24 Sept., Spoletium; 23 Oct., Milan; references in Mommsen; Seeck, Regesten, loc. cit., does not accept the 8 July date) and does not rule it out for 315 (2 June, Sirmium; 18 July, Aquileia; 3 August, Trier; 13, 25, 29 August, 13 Sept., Rome; 18 Sept., Naissus; so Mommsen. But Seeck dates Philocalus’ Calendar entry for 27 Sept., aprofectio, to this year, locating it in Rome. 18 Oct., Murgillo; 19 Oct., Milan).

¹⁵ 25 July is explicitly attested for the tricennial (Cons. Const. Chron. ΜίηΛ,ρ. 235)and the combination of the evidence of the Calendar of Philocalus and of the codes (v. preceding note) suggests it for the Vicennial.

¹⁶ E.g. H. Mattingly (note 6 above) 220–l1.

¹⁷ Seston, W. ‘Recherches sur la chronologie du règne de Constantin le Grand’, REA 39 (1937), 197–218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The inscriptions are AE 1904 (not 1905, as cited), 174 (= CIL 8. 23897 = ILS 8941) and AE 1890, 21 (= CIL 8. 18905). The anomaly is in the titulature. Both read Τ RIB POT Villi COS III IMP VII. In all (?) other inscriptions of Constantine the TRIB POT is one figure higher than the IMP. This is traditionally and best accounted for by postulating that Constantine took the TRIB POT first on 25 July 306 at York, and for a second time on 10 Dec. 306. See Table, below. TRIB Villi would therefore be 10 Dec. 313–9 Dec. 314; COSI, 1 Jan. 313 ff.; IMP VII, July, 312–24 July 313. As Dessau remarks (ILS 8941), you would expect IMP VIII.

¹⁸ Lactantius, Mort. Pers. 25.

¹⁹ Sutherland, C.H.V.Roman Imperial Coinage 6 (London 1967), 13.Google Scholar Panegyric VI (VII), in celebrating the marriage, makes it abundantly clear that Constantine is now Augustus, even before naming him such at 8. l; cf. 1. 1:‘… huius propria laetitiae qua tibi Caesari additum nomen imperii et istarum caelestium nuptiarum festa celebrantur’. Constantine has just been addressed ‘oriens imperator’; cf. 2. 1,3. 2, 5. 2–3, 7. 2, 7. 4,13. 1,13. 3 and finally 14. 5, where Divus Constantius’ immortality is manifest in a son ‘similis adspectu, similis animo, par imperii potestate’. Imperator = Augustus is a common late Roman equation; cf. Lactantius, , Mort. Pers. 25. 5;Google Scholar Galerius makes Severus Augustus: ‘Constantinum vero non imperatorem, sicut erat factus,sed Caesar-em’, and elsewhere (e.g. 18. 4); cf. also ZLS 657 and the recently discovered inscription published by Crawford, Michael and Reynolds, JoyceJRS 65 (1975), 160,Google Scholar lines 3–4: βασιλέων τε καί Καισάρων.

²⁰ On the assumption that the natalis is a natalis or dies imperii, Constantine’s actual birthday being 27 Feb. Mommsen emended Constantini to Constantii on the strength of the entry in the accompanying list of Natales Caesarum ; see his commentary in CIL 1. 2 ad loc.

²¹ Maxentius’ coup, 28 October 306; Severus’ invasion, defeat (and death?), winter 306-7; Galerius’ response, spring 307.

²² It is accepted in toto, for instance, by Galletier, 2. 78, in dating Ρα/ι. Vili (V) to the period after 31 March 312, translating ‘etiam perfecta’ as ‘bien que cinq ans soient achevés’ (cf. note 4 above) and by E. Fauré (note 6 above) 30–1.

The view that Constantine at some point in his reign regarded the date of his promotion to Augustus as his dies imperii has been accepted by a much wider circle of scholars who, however, have not been satisfied with Seston’s date of 31 March for that promotion; e.g. Lafaurie, CRAI 1965 and Melanges André Piganiol, 1966; Bruun, NC 1969Google Scholar (full references below); Bastien, P. ‘Le début du monnayage de Constantin Auguste à l’atelier de Lyon’, RN 19 (1977), 62–7Google Scholar and elsewhere; Drake, Historia 24 (1975), 344 n. 2.Google Scholar

²³ But cf. pp. 163–4 below.

²⁴ Sydenham, E.A. ‘The Vicissitudes of Maximian after his Abdication’, NC sert. 5,14 (1934), 154–5.Google Scholar

²⁵ Strauss, P. ‘Les Monnaies divisionnaires de Trêves après la réforme de Dioclétien’, RN 16 (1974), 19–69, esp. 24–39.Google Scholar

²⁶ I reject Mattingly’s interpretation of the natalis of pliny’s, Panegyric to Trajan 92.Google Scholar 4 as a natalis imperii, Proc. Brit. Acad. 36 (1950), 183 n. 12. It is clearly his natalis genuinus (‘meliorem óptimo genuit’).

²⁷ Callu, J.P., Genio Populi Romani (Paris 1960), 70–1Google Scholar cites Zosimus 2. 10 in support of his numismatic arguments that the marriage with Fausta did not take place until some time after Maximian’s arrival in Gaul. On p. 77 he suggests Nov. 307 as the date of Constantine’s promotion.

²⁸ Lafaurie, J. ‘Dies Imperii Constantini Augusti: 25 décembre 307’, Melanges André Piganiol 2 (Paris 1966), 799;Google Scholar cf. id. ‘Remarques sur les dates de quelques inscriptions du début de IV^e siècle’, CRAI 1965, 201–2.

²⁹ Bruun, P. ‘Constantine’s Dies Imperii and Quinquennalia in the light of the early solidi of Trier’, NC (1969), 180;Google Scholar recently reaffirmed: ‘Constantine’s Change of Dies Imperii’, Arctos 9 (1975), 11–29.

³⁰ The Panegyrist’s claim to be speaking in the presence of the Emperor and his court (2.1) is no idle one. Our Panegyrics are occasional pieces, and not school exercises. If an Emperor is not present the fact is admitted (Nazarius, Pan. X[IV]3. 1 ); Mamertinus did not deliver his prepared speech on Maximian’s Quinquennalia because the Emperor was not there (III[XI] 1. 1–3). The changing treatment of Maximian and Constantine’s religious position is a guarantee of contemporaneity. No anachronisms mar their historical value, whatever else may be said of them!

³¹ For a detailed ‘narrative’, Pan. IX (XII) of 313 and X (IV) of 321.

³² Constantine was in Rome on 1 December 312 and 6, 13, 18 Jan. 313 (Cod. Theod. 15. 14. 3–4, 10. 10. 1–2, 13. 10. 1).

³³ These events were recent and the subject was a delicate one when Pan. VII (VI) was delivered c. August 310; see esp. 14. 1 : ‘de quo ego quemadmodum dicam adhuc ferme dubito et de nutu numinis tui exspecto consilium’. Bruun, Arctos 9 (1975),Google Scholar 18 has attempted to redate both Panegyric and Maximian’s death to Dec. 310; see below for a criticism of his case.

³⁴ Pan. VII (VI) 2. 4.

³⁵ Pan. Vili (V) 13. 2, cited above.

³⁶ Not on 31 March 312, or on any other day in 312, for that matter. Galletier was wrong to be influenced by Seston’s arguments. Mynors, op. cit. 299 also dates the Panegyric to 312.

^36a Pan VII (VI) 22. The date is Trier’s natalis dies (22. 4; cf. 1. 1), unfortunately unknown; shortly after 25 July (see above); hence c. 1 August.

³⁷ In fact the Codes reveal nothing of Constantine’s movements in 311. He was obviously based in Gaul, at Trier; cf. Pan. VII(VI) for 310, and Pan. IX (XII) 5. 5 for 312.

³⁸ Mynors ad loc., following Pichón.

³⁹ Cf. Bickerman, E.J.Chronology of the Ancient World (London 1968), 78.Google Scholar For the currency decree, see Erim, Kenan T.Reynolds, Joyce and Crawford, Michael ‘Diocletian’s Currency Reform: anew Inscription’, JRS 61 (1971), esp. 173,175.Google Scholar Part of it runs: …ut scilicet ex kal. Septembribus Titiano et Nepotiano cons, hit debitares quicumque/esse novi coeperint etiam fìsco geminata p[ote]ntia eandem tradant pecuniam.

Clearly some important currency reform is to take effect from 1 September.

⁴⁰ He continues: Nam cum praeteritum tempus pro modo suo longum futurum autem infinitum sit, praesens tempus breue et semper in partem utramque mutabile, cum et praeterito relinquatur et transeat in futurum, unus hie annus prope sensum non habet difficultatis duorum temporum indulgentiis coartatus et quasi terminus quidam positus felicitati utriusque confini, quae nos et praeterito ¡iberosfacit et in futuro secures (12. 6).

(‘For since, while past time is relatively long, and the future infinite, the present is brief, and ever changeable in either direction, as it both falls into the past and passes into the future, this year alone contains, so to speak, no sense of difficulty,abridged as it is by the concessions for two periods and forming a kind of boundary between your two acts of generosity which makes us both free from the past and secure for the future.’)

The words ‘unus hie annus’ if taken literally, or as an approximation to the truth, might be considered an impediment to my theory, as implying that considerably more than five weeks remained before the end of Autun’s current financial burden. But I take them to refer simply to the period after the end of the quinquennium of Constantine’s rule and before the new tax year in which Autun will be responsible for 7,000 fewer capita, viz. 26 July to 31 August, ‘minimum’ and ‘breue’ indeed.

Taken literally the words would also be a problem even if it were argued that the financial year ran from 1 January. They would fit better the notion I have discarded that Constantine’s anniversary was in December (25?) and the financial year January to January, with the new census coming into effect from January 312. But the Panegyrist elsewhere scarcely speaks as if the reduction in capita were so far in the future, and for the unlikelihood of a December dies imperii see below.

⁴¹ It is clear that Constantine’s beneficia to Autun were a special dispensation from a generally applied tax formula. This is explicitly stated for Gaul — ‘Gallicani census communi formula teneremur’ (5.5) — and can, I think, be assumed for the Empire as a whole; cf. not only Lactantius, Mort. Pers. 26Google Scholar for Rome, but Eusebius, Mart. Pal. 4.Google Scholar 8 for Palestine.I cannot understand why Ensslin, RE 14. 2526, s.v. ‘Maximianus Galerius’, and Moreau,£)eLa Mort 2. 333, for example, date Galerius’ census to 307 and divorce it from the revolt of Maxentius in Rome, which is to do defiance to Lactantius’ essentially chronologically ordered narrative (Mort. Pers. 19: abdication of Diocletian and Maximian and ensuing promotions, May 305; 23: new census; 24: flight of Constantine and death of Constantius.July 306; 25: grudging recognition of Constantine by Galerius, August (?) 306; 26: revolt of Maxentius, Oct. 306), not to mention the evidence of Panegyric Vili (V) itself.

⁴² This suggestion fits the metaphor of the lopping of limbs ( 11. 5); cf. too Fauré 50.

⁴³ I reproduce his table, Mel. Piganiol 799. The numbers correspond to numbers 2–4 and 6–7 in his list of Constantinian inscriptions on p. 797. Note that in No.3 in the text above DES UH appears in the inscription.

⁴⁴ A minor difficulty is that this seems early in the year for Constantine to appear as consul designatus.

⁴⁵ Lafaurie 802 for references.

⁴⁶ 5 n. 17.

⁴⁷ Lafaurie 797. The exception, Lafaurie’s no. 16, Not. Scav. (1933), 489–91 = AE 1934, 158), TR Ρ XXXIII IMP ΧΧΧΙΙ COS VIH (= post 10 Dec. 337!) is a puzzle which is not solved by Lafaurie’s theory of a December dies imperii. It is perhaps best explained by postulating the addition of a TR Ρ and IMP acclamation at some point in the second half of Constantine’s reign. (For a possible analogy cf. the adjustment of Maximian’s titulature in 303, Chastagnol, A. ‘Les années régnales de Maximien Hercule en Egypte et les fêtes vicennales du Novembre 303’, RN ser. 6, 9 [1967], 54–81.Google Scholar Admittedly this was a special case, Diocletian’s vicennalia.) Indeed there is no problem about such an addition as early as 316.

⁴⁸ See pp. 163–4 above.

⁴⁹ Lafaurie, CRAI 201–2 and 210. The truth lurks in his Table (208–9); cf. id. Mel. Piganiol 799–800, where discussion is confined to the years 312 and 313 and mention of the base date strangely avoided altogether.

⁵⁰ Bruun belatedly sees the problem in his article in Arctos 9 (1975), where he settles on 25 July, 306 as the date of Constantine’s first imperial acclamation but postulates that when rebuked by Galerius, Constantine ‘behaved more circumspectly in the summer of 307’(17–18);Google Scholar i.e. he did not take a second acclamation then. In this article Bruun argues for a 25 Dec. base date until Constantine’s decennalia in 315. I find his attempt to explain Constantine’s motivation for reckoning thus totally unconvincing (ibid. 121–4), and in any case I believe there is no evidence to support it even if it could be shown to be well motivated.

⁵¹ Cf. preceding note. Despite prolonged efforts I have not been able to obtain Baglivi, N. ‘Ricerche sul dies imperii e sulla celebrazione dei quinquennali di Costantino I’, Κοινωνία 1 (1977), 53–138.Google Scholar