¹ Lactantius, , Mort. Pers. 24, 8 ff.Google Scholar, with evidence from other sources collected in the excellent commentary of Moreau, J., Lactance De la Mort des Persécuteurs. Sources chrétiennes xxxix (1954), 341 ff.Google Scholar

² Thus the pagan Praxagoras of Athens, according to the summary of Photius, Bibl. lxii = FGrH 219 T 1. He was writing before 330, cf. Jacoby, F., FGrH ii D (1930), 632.Google Scholar

³ As he is known to have stated himself as early as 314: ‘ex quibus forsitan commoveri possit summa divinitas … etiam in me ipsum, cuius curae nutu suo caelesti terrena omnia moderanda commisit’ (Optatus, App. III. CSEL xxvi, 206, 16–18); ‘deus omnipotens in caeli specula residens tribuit, quod non merebar: certe iam neque dici neque enumerari possunt ea quae caelesti sua in me famulum suum benivolentia concessit’ (Optatus, App. V: CSEL xxvi, 208, 28–31).

⁴ Eusebius, , HE x, 8, 11 ff.Google Scholar, cf. ix, 11, 8. For the main manuscript variants, see Schwartz, E., GCS ix, 3 (1909), xlcii ff.Google Scholar

⁵ Now collected in two scholarly and critical catalogues: C.H.V. Sutherland, RIC vi: From Diocletian's Reform (A.D. 294) to the death of Maximinus (A.D. 313) (1967); P. Bruun, RIC vii: Constantine and Licinius A.D. 313–337 (1966). Too much modern scholarship has relied on erroneous dates and attributions, or sometimes even unverified types, in Maurice, J., Numismatique constantinienne i (1908)Google Scholar; ii (1911); iii (1912).

⁶ Respectively Pan.Lat. vii (vi); vi (vii); v (viii); xii (ix); iv (x). The best treatment of these speeches as a group remains that of Pichon, R., Les derniers écrivains profanes (1906), 36 ff.Google Scholar

⁷ Flaccinus and Priscillianus seem to be otherwise unknown. Hierocles produced an anti-Christian polemic (Lactantius, , Div. Inst. v, 2, 12 ff.Google Scholar; Eusebius, Contra Hieroclem) and later became prefect of Egypt (on his career, see PLRE i, 432).

⁸ On the details, see Moreau, o.c. 231 ff. Lactantius' accuracy on specific facts has often had to await very recent discoveries for decisive confirmation: e.g., that Diocletian's dies imperii was 20 November (17, 1, cf. P. Beatty Panop. 2, 162, etc.).

⁹ For a significant omission, see p. 42.

¹⁰ Galerius proposed to celebrate his vicennalia from 1 March 312 (Mort. Pers. 35, 4): therefore, his official dies imperii was 1 March 293. For the hypothesis that his actual investiture as Caesar occurred on 21 May 293, see Seston, W., Dioclétien et la Tétrarchie i (1946), 91 ff.Google Scholar

¹¹ Also reproduced, in Greek translation, by Eusebius, HE viii, 17, 3 ff.

¹² For these petitions, cf. OGIS 569; Eusebius, HE ix, 2, 1; 7, 12; 9 a, 4 ff.

¹³ For the epigraphic attestation of one such priest, Grégoire, H., Byzantion viii (1933), 49 ff.Google Scholar

¹⁴ On the site of the battle, see Grégoire, H., Byzantion xiii (1938), 585 f.Google Scholar Grégoire proposed to emend the ‘campus Severus’ to ‘Campus Ergenus’ (Mort. Pers. 46, 9). Perhaps unnecessary, cf. Franchi de' Cavalieri, P., Constantiniana. Studi e Testi clxxi (1953), 78 f.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Eusebius preserves substantially the same document with a different preamble (HE x, 5, 1 ff.).

¹⁶ i.e. Prisca, the wife of Diocletian (Mort. Pers. 15, 1).

¹⁷ The precise date would be worth knowing (PLRE i, 579, offers no opinion). It is usually held to be late summer, probably September (Sutherland, C.H.V., RIC vi, 35Google Scholar; Bruun, P., RIC vii, 76Google Scholar). But news of Maximinus' death had reached Karanis before 13 September 313 (SB 7675 = P. Cair. Isid. 103).

¹⁸ That is, reckoning something over fourteen months from Licinius' entry into Nicomedia, a few days after 30 April 313 (Mort. Pers. 47, 5 ff.). The argument perforce operates on the assumption (inevitable though not provable) that the Ins. ‘quindecim’ is what Lactantius wrote. Disproof would not surprise the present writer.

¹⁹ Roller, K., Die Kaisergeschichte in Laktanz ‘de mortibus persecutorum’ (Diss. Giessen, 1927), 18 ff.Google Scholar; Alföldi, A., The Conversion of Constantine and Pagan Rome (1948), 45.Google Scholar

²⁰ ‘Sur la date de la mort de Dioclétien il y a deux traditions: 316, que suit Zosime (cf. la corr. de Heyne) …, et 313, fondée sur Lact., Mort. 42, 3 …’ (Paschoud, F., Zosime i (Budé, 1971), 192 f.Google Scholar More erroneous still, ‘his death is dated 313 by Lact., Mort. Pers. 42, 3’ (Ridley, R. T., Byz. Zeitschr. lxv (1972), 288Google Scholar).

²¹ Schwartz, E., Nachr. Göttingen, Phil-hist. Kl. 1904, 536Google Scholar; Seeck, O., Regesten der Kaiser und Päpste für die Jahre 311 bis 476 n. Chr. (1919), 165Google Scholar; W. Ensslin, P-W vii A, 2493; Stein, E., Histoire du Bas-Empire i ² (1958), 93.Google Scholar Also, recently, PLRE i, 254.

²² Moreau, J., Lactance (1954), 421 ff.Google Scholar

²³ Cramer, J. A., Anecdota Graeca e codd. manuscriptis Bibliothecae Regiae Parisiensis ii (1839), 398Google Scholar, whence John of Antioch, frag. 167, 2 (FHG iv, 602).

²⁴ Frag. 167, 2: Διοκλητιανὸς καὶ Μαξιμιανὸς … τὴν βασιλείαν κατέθεντο. καὶ Διοκλητιανὸς μὲν δὼδεκα ἔτη πρωτεύσας ἀπέθανε· Μαξιμιανὸς δὲ βουληθεὶς πάλιν ἀναλαβέσθαι τὴν βασιλείαν καὶ ἀποτυχών ἀποτυχὼν ἀπήγξατο. W. Ensslin paraphrased ‘Johannes Antiochenus … gibt dem D. zwölf Jahre als Privatmann’ (P-W vii A, 2493).

²⁵ Cedrenus, p. 472 Bonn; [Leo the Grammarian], p. 82 Bonn.

²⁶ ii, 7, 2: 101 years between the Ludi Saeculares in 204 and Diocletian's ninth consulate (304), 110 between 204 and the third consulate of Constantine and Licinius (313).

²⁷ Hence ‘τρισἰν ἐνιαυτοϊς’ was emended to ‘ὀκτώ’ by C. G. Heyne, in Reitemeier, J. F., Zosimi Historiae (1784), 633.Google Scholar But note the Souda Δ 1156: Διοκλητιανὸς δὲ ἐν ἡσυχίᾳ κατεγήρα ἐν ἔτεσι τρισίν (ii, 104 Adler).

²⁸ GCS xlvi, 230; Mon. Germ. Hist., Auct. Ant. ix, 448; 643 (the ninth year of Constantine, which corresponds to 315 on Jerome's reckoning).

²⁹ GCS xlvi, 229.

³⁰ GCS xlvi, 6 f.; 231.

³¹ Chron. Pasch. p. 523 Bonn (Confusing him with Galerius), cf. pp. 526 f. (indicating use of Eusebius). The Armenian translation of Eusebius, which originally went to 325/6, breaks off at 301 (GCS xx, 227, cf. 34; 62).

³² A common enough phenomenon in chronicles, cf. Courtois, C., Byzantion xxi (1951), 23 ff.Google Scholar

³³ The Armenian translation of The Chronicle (GCS xx, 227) gives Diocletian twenty years (he ruled from 20 November 284 to 1 May 305), dating the proclamation of Constantius and Galerius to his seventh year, i.e. 290/1 (in fact, spring 293), and the beginning of the revolt in Egypt in which Achilleus was prominent to the ninth, i.e. 292/3 (it probably began in July 297, cf. -T.C. Skeat, Papyri from Panopolis (1964), xii; PLRE i, 6; 263, Domitianus 6).

³⁴ Mon. Germ. Hist., Auct. Ant. ix, 231. On the peculiar and diverse nature of the document, see T. Mommsen, ib. 199 ff. An apparent derivative exists in the fragment of a Greek chronicle, P. Berol. 13296, published by Lietzmann, H., Quantulacumque. Studies presented to K. Lake (1937), 339 ff.Google Scholar = Kl. Schr. i (Texte u. Unters. lxvii, 1958), 420 ff.

³⁵ These fasti offer 1 April 305 for the abdication of Diocletian (ib. 231). Lactantius' date of 1 May (Mort. Pers. 19, 1) appears to be confirmed by the inscription recording a senator's taurobolium in Rome ‘dd. nn. Constantio et Maximiano nobb. Caess. V. conss. xviii k. Mai.’ (ILS 4145). More serious, the same fasti have 314 (not 316) for the battle of Cibalae (o.c. 231).

³⁶ Moreau, J., Lactance (1954), 421 ff.Google Scholar

³⁷ The Epitome closes with the burial of Theodosius in Constantinople on 8 November 395 (48, 20), Socrates' narrative extends to Theodosius' seventeenth consulate in 439 (HE vii, 47).

³⁸ O. Seeck averred that Lactantius deliberately moved the death from 316 to 310/11 in order to make his (invented) story of suicide more plausible (Jahrb. für class. Phil. cxxxix (1889), 628 f.); PLRE cites the Epitome as giving a date of 316 and Lactantius, Mort. Pers. 42, 3 as supporting 313 (i, 254).

³⁹ Lactantius, , Mort. Pers. 42, 3 f.Google Scholar: ‘ita viginti annorum felicissimus imperator … in odium vitae deductus, postremo fame atque angore confectus est.

Unus iam supererat de adversariis dei <Maximinus> cuius nunc exitum ruinamque subnectam’.

⁴⁰ Habicht, C., Hermes lxxxvi (1958), 376 ff.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Epit. de Caes. 39,7.

⁴² Socrates, , HE i, 2, 10.Google Scholar

⁴³ The sources of neither the Epitome nor Socrates for the fourth century are easy to discover, cf. Schanz-Hosius, , Gesch. d. röm. Litt. iv, i² (1914), 76 f.Google Scholar: Winkelmann, F., Sb. Berlin, Klasse für Sprachen, Lit. u. Kunst 1965, Nr. 3, 25 ff.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ On the variant reports of how Diocletian died, see Moreau, o.c. 420. Eusebius believed that his death was caused by illness alone (HE viii, App. 3).

⁴⁵ So, recently, Palanque, J.-R., Mél. Carcopino (1966), 714.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Moreau, o.c. 418: ‘il semble que Constantin n'ait pas pris l'initiative de cette condamnation.’

⁴⁷ W. Ensslin, P-W xiv, 2515 f. For Gelasius, see Theophanes, a. 3796, p. 11 de Boor (with the name); Philippus of Side, frag. 3 (de Boor, C., Texte u. Unters. v, 2 (1888), 183Google Scholar) = Hansen, G.C., Theodoros Anagnostes Kirchengeschichte (GCS, 1971), 158§2.Google Scholar John of Nikiu alleged that the Senate exiled Diocletian after he was deposed (trans. Zotenberg, p. 418).

⁴⁸ Sutherland, C. H. V., RIC vi (1967), 33.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Pan. Lat. vi (vii), 2, 1 ff.

⁵⁰ Pan. Lat. vi (vii), 14, 1: ‘de quo ego quemadmodum dicam adhuc ferme dubito et de nutu numinis tui exspecto consilium.’ Such a performer was not long baffled: he adopted the principle ‘neminem hominum peccare nisi fato et ipsa scelera mortalium actus esse fortunae, contra autem deorum munera esse virtutes’ (14, 3).

⁵¹ Pan. Lat. vi (vii), 14, 5 ff.

⁵² For the σύγκρισις standard in encomia, cf. Struthers, L. B., Harv. Stud. xxx (1919), 52Google Scholar; 83 ff.

⁵³ Pan. Lat. xii (ix), 4, 3: ‘erat ille Maximiani suppositus, tu Constantii Pii filius’ 3, 4: ‘ipse denique qui pater illius credebatur discissam ab umeris purpuram detrahere conatus senserat in illud dedecus sua fata transisse.’

⁵⁴ Constantine addresses the people of Rome in front of five columns with statues, (of Jupiter and the four emperors) which were erected in the forum in 303 to commemorate the vicennalia of the Augusti and decennalia of the Caesars: Giuliano, A., Arco di Costantino (1955), plates 34; 40Google Scholar, cf. L'Orange, H. P., Röm. Mitt. liii (1938), 1 ff.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ The reverse legend proclaims ‘requies optimorum meritorum’, and the issues commemorate Claudius, Constantius and Maximian jointly: RIC vii, 180 (Trier); 252 (Arles); 310–312 (Rome: also with ‘memoriae aeternae’ as reverse legend); 394/5 (Aquileia); 429/30 (Siscia); 502/3 (Thessalonica). Maurice, J., Numismatique constantinienne i (1908), xcivGoogle Scholar; cxxvi, dated these coins to 314 and 324, regarding them as part of Constantine's preparations for the two wars against Licinius. The results were unfortunate for the understanding of Lactantius. For if Maximian was commemorated so honourably by Constantine in 314 and on the arch of 315, then it seemed that Lactantius must have written De Mortibus Persecutorum at a later date (Seston, W., Dioclétien et la Tétrarchie i (1946), 27Google Scholar; Moreau, o.c. 36 f.; Chastagnol, A., Rev. num. ⁶ iv (1962), 329Google Scholar).

⁵⁶ RIC vi, 381 ff. (Rome); 403 f. (Ostia). Probably late in 310, cf. C. H. V. Sutherland, ib. 347.

⁵⁷ Mon. Germ. Hist., Auct. Ant. ix, 67 (reading ‘Rufino et Eusebio’ in apparent confusion with the consuls of 347, cf. T. Mommsen, ad loc.); 76; 231; Liber Pontificalis pp. 74; 168 Duchesne (all with ‘Volusiano et Rufino’ or ‘Rufino et Volusiano’). For the identifications, see PLRE i, 775; 977. The consulate of Rufinus is not reported in Degrassi, A., Fasti consolari (1952), 78.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ The date of February 312 is stated, without argument, by Corsaro, F., Lactantiana (1970), 40.Google Scholar

⁵⁹ Moreau, o.c. 419, argues that Lactantius' order is logical rather than chronological. The mention of Diocletian's death, but not that of Maximinus Daia, in Eusebius, HE viii, App. may also be significant.

⁶⁰ A law which bears the date of 313 poses special problems: ‘Idem A. (i.e. Constantine) ad Eusebium v.p. praesidem Lyciae et Pamphyliae. Plebs urbana, sicut in orientalibus quoque provinciis observatur, minime in censibus pro capitatione sua conveniatur, sed iuxta hanc iussionem nostram immunis habeatur, sicuti etiam sub domino et parente nostro Diocletiano seniore Aug. eadem plebs urbana immunis fuerat. Dat. Kal. lun. Constantino A. III et Licinio III conss.’ (C. Th. xiii, 10, 2). Though the law appears to show Diocletian alive on 1 June 313 (Seston, o.c. 44 f.), something is clearly amiss with its attribution and date. In June 313 Constantine controlled neither Lycia and Pamphylia nor the diocese of Oriens. Accordingly, the law might be attributed to Licinius (Grégoire, H., Byzantion xiii (1938), 551 ff.Google Scholar). But, on 1 June 313, Licinius did not yet control the ‘orientales provinciae’, the law's reference to which surely designates Maximinus Daia as its promulgator (Seeck, O., Zeitschr. für Social- und Wirtschaftsgesch. iv (1890), 290 ff.Google Scholar; Regesten (1919), 52 f., cf. Jones, A.H.M., The Later Roman Empire i (1964), 63Google Scholar). What then is the date of the law? Hardly as late as 1 June 313, after Maximinus' invasion of Europe and defeat by Licinius. Possibly, therefore, 1 July 312 or 1 January 313, as proposed by Demandt, A., Gnomon xliv (1972), 693.Google Scholar Better, 1 June 311, which enables the law to be brought into connection with a measure recorded by Lactantius: after Galerius' death, Maximinus occupied Bithynia and ‘cum magna omnium laetitia sustulit censum’ (Mort. Pers. 35, 1). For a discussion, see Castritius, H., Studien zu Maximinus Daia. Frankfurter Althistorische Studien ii (1969), 9 ff.Google Scholar

⁶¹ viz. the Consularia Constantinopolitana and the Chronicon Paschale (Mon. Germ. Hist., Auct. Ant. ix, 232; the latter also p. 526 Bonn).

⁶² For 323, Mommsen, T., Codex Theodosianus i, 1 (1904), ccxviiGoogle Scholar; i, 2 (1904), 350, on CTh vii, 20, 1; Schwartz, E., Nachr. Göttingen Phil-hist. Kl. 1904, 540 ff.Google Scholar; Baynes, N.H., JRS xviii (1928), 218 f.Google Scholar In disproof, P. Osl. ii, 44, cf. Stein, E., Zeitschr. für d. neutest. Wiss. xxx (1931), 177 ff.Google Scholar

⁶³ Mon. Germ. Hist., Auct. Ant. ix, 231.

⁶⁴ Grégoire, H., Byzantion xiii (1938), 561 ff.Google Scholar

⁶⁵ Bruun, P., The Constantinian Coinage of Arelate. Finska Fornminnesföreningens Tidskrift lii:2 (1953), 17 ff.Google Scholar

⁶⁶ Kent, J.P.C., NC ⁶ xiv (1954), 225 fGoogle Scholar; xvii (1957), 30 f.; Callu, J. P., Genio populi Romani (1960), 87 ff.Google Scholar; Kienast, D., Hamburger Beiträge zur Numismatik v (1963), 687 f.Google Scholar

⁶⁷ Seston, W., Relazioni del x Congresso Int. di Scienze Storiche ii: Storia di Antichità (1955), 426Google Scholar; Andreotti, R., Diz. Epig. iv 1002 ff.Google Scholar; Latomus xxiii (1964), 543 ff.

⁶⁸ Habicht, C., Hermes lxxxvi (1958), 360 ff.Google Scholar

⁶⁹ Bruun, P., Studies in Constantinian Chronology. Numismatic Notes and Monographs cxlvi (1961), 10 ff.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ The battle of Cibalae is still dated to 314, not only in unscholarly works, but also by Jones, A. H. M., The Later Roman Empire i (1964), 82Google Scholar; MacMullen, R., Constantine (1969), 97Google Scholar; 107; Dörries, H., Constantine the Great (trans. Bainton, R. H., 1972), 232.Google Scholar The old date is also sometimes assumed by the editors of PLRE (e.g. i, 600, Mestrianus).

^7l PLRE i, 223: ‘Born Feb. 317 … probably illegitimate since his brother Constantius II was born to Fausta on 317 Aug. 7 while no source refers to his descent from Maximianus.’ In refutation, see Guthrie, P., Phoenix xx (1966), 330 f.Google Scholar Theophanes registers the relationship twice (pp. 5; 19 de Boor), an inscription explicitly describes Constantine as the son of Fausta (CIL xii, 688 = AE 1952, 107), and Julian states that Fausta was the daughter of one and mother of ‘many emperors’ (Orat. i, 9D). PLRE prints a stemma which shows Fausta as the mother of but two emperors (i, 1129), ascribes to Constans (220) an acephalous inscription perhaps better referred to Constantine (ILS 723: … nepoti M. Aureli Maximiani …), and has a separate entry for the invented mother (1040, Anonyma 25).

⁷² Caes. 41, 1 ff., cf. Habicht, o.c. 362 f.

⁷³ Not from the date at which Maximinus began to style himself Augustus (towards the middle of 310), as supposed by Andreotti, R., Latomus xxiii (1964), 543 f.Google Scholar

⁷⁴ Mon. Germ. Hist., Auct. Ant. ix, 231, cf. Pan. Lat. iv (x), 1, 1; 2, 2 ff.; 38, 2; P. Osl. 44, etc.

⁷⁵ Explicitly, but erroneously, dated to early 317 (41, 7). Victor must refer either to the eclipse on 6 July 316 or to that on 6 May 319 (F. Boll, P-W vi, 2362).

⁷⁶ For these two dates, see CIL i² p. 276; Mon. Germ. Hist., Auct. Ant. ix, 232.

⁷⁷ Habicht, o.c. 375 f.

⁷⁸ Bruun, P., RIC vii (1966), 66.Google Scholar Hence the younger Constantine cannot have been born as late as February 317, the date implied by Zosimus ii, 18, 1 ff.; Epit. de Caes. 41, 4-the only evidence cited by PLRE i, 223.

⁷⁹ Epit. de Caes. 41, 4; Zosimus ii, 20, 2.

⁸⁰ Exc. Vales. i, 17.

⁸¹ Chastagnol, A., Rev. num. ⁶ iv (1962), 328.Google Scholar

⁸² Vita Const. i, 48 ff. On which, see now Winkelmann, F., Klio xl (1962), 226 ff.Google Scholar

⁸³ Exc. Vales. i, 15.

⁸⁴ For the years 314–317, see Mommsen, T., Codex Theodosianus i, 1 (1904), ccx ff.Google Scholar

⁸⁵ Seeck, O., Regesten (1919), 162 ff.Google Scholar

⁸⁶ Seeck, ib. 65 f.; 154 f.

⁸⁷ PLRE i, 978; 68.

⁸⁸ C. Th. vi, 35, 1 (29 October); i, 2, 1 (30 December).

⁸⁹ C. Th. viii, 7, 1 (8 Maich); xi, 27, 1 (13 May); ii, 30, 1 (2 June). The third of these laws names no magistrate, so that its date is beyond the possibility of correction; but the first is addressed to a consularis aquarum, the second to Ablabius. They can accordingly be redated to 324 and 329, cf. PLRE i, 371; 3; 1048.

⁹⁰ C.Th. xi, 1, 1 (normally redated to 360, cf. PLRE i, 741, Proclianus 2); x, 14, 1 (of 346, cf. Seeck, o.c. 38; PLRE i, 614).

⁹¹ C.Th. ix, 40, 2.

⁹² For the first pair, PLRE i, 793; 777; for the second, ib. 383; 154.

⁹³ Habicht, o.c. 365 f.

⁹⁴ C. Th. viii, 12, 2 (apparently issued on 20 April 316 at Serdica); viii, 12, 3 (allegedly issued at Rome on 1 May 316). Both laws are addressed to magistrates who cannot have held office at the time: Aco Catullinus as proconsul of Africa, and Cassius as praefectus urbi, cf. Seeck, o.c. 165; 173; PLRE i, 187; 733 f., Probianus 3 (proconsul of Africa from August 315 to August 316); 184 f.

⁹⁵ C. Th. i, 22, 1 (11 January 316, Trier); ii, 6, 1 (6 May, Vienne); xi, 30, 5 f. (13 August, Arelate); ix, 1, 1 (4 December, Serdica); ix, 10, 1 (17 April 317, Serdica); xi 30.7 (6 June, Sirmium). P. Bruun, RIC vii, 76, also adduces Frag. Vat. 290 as showing Constantine in Verona on 20 September 316, and C.Th. viii, 7, 1 and the non-existent C. Th. vi, 1, 4 as showing him in Thessalonica on 8 March and 27 June 317. But the date in Frag. Vat. 290 is no longer fully extant (Data iii Kal. Oct. Verona …), C.Th. viii, 7, 1 is dated 8 March 315 (n. 89) and C. J. vi, 1, 4 (the correct reference) belongs rather to 330, cf. Seeck, o.c. 180; PLRE i, 938, Valerianus 4.

⁹⁶ Optatus, App. viii (CSEL xxvi, 212) = H. von Soden—H. von Campenhausen, Urkunden zur Entstehungsgeschichte des Donatismus ². Kleine Texte cxxii (1950), no. 22. For Petronius Annianus and Julius Julianus as colleagues in the pretorian prefecture, ILS 8938 (Tropaeum Traiani); AE 1938, 85 (Ephesus).

⁹⁷ CSEL xxvi, 212, 24 f.: ‘Hilarius princeps obtulit iiii Kal. Maias Triberis.’ Presumably Hilarius was princeps officii of the pretorian prefect at Trier (so PLRE i, 434).

⁹⁸ PLRE i, 195, Celsus 8. Seeck felt compelled to emend the date to 27 February, i.e. of 316, precisely because he believed that Constantine was not at Trier in April 315 (o.c. 142 f.; 164).

⁹⁹ Bruun, o.c. (1953), 17 ff.; o.c. (1961), 10 ff.

¹⁰⁰ RIC vii, 172 ff. (Trier); 240 ff. (Arles); 298 ff. (Rome); 366 ff. (Ticinum).

¹¹¹ RIC vii, 425 ff. (coinage in the name of Licinius alone, then of Constantine alone, before the Caesars appear); 498 ff.

^l02 RIC vii, 706. There seem to exist only two undoubtedly genuine types of Valens (RIC vii, 644 no. 7 (Cyzicus); 706 no. 19), but very many forgeries, cf. Carson, R. A. G., NC ⁶ xviii (1958), 55 ff.Google Scholar It is therefore unfortunate that PLRE i, 931, Valens 13, cites only Cohen, whose ‘inaccuracy or even negligence in even important details renders him useless for the purpose of modern numismatic research’ (Bruun, o.c. (1953), 56).

¹⁰³ Exc. Vales. i, 13.

¹⁰⁴ Eusebius, , HE ix, 11, 6.Google Scholar

¹⁰⁵ That is, once deductions from his alleged presence at Cibalae in October 314 are discarded (cf. O. Seeck, P-W xiii, 224 ff.).

¹⁰⁶ The Chronographer of 354 records ‘advent(us) divi’ on 18 and 21 July, and 29 October (CIL i², pp. 268; 274). Since the last entry refers to Constantine's entry into Rome in 312 (after the ‘evictio tyranni’, ib. 274), the others must refer to 315 and 326. It records ‘profectio divi’ on 27 September (ib. 272): almost certainly 315 rather than 326, cf. Seeck, , Regesten (1919), 164Google Scholar; 177.

¹⁰⁷ Augustine, , Epp. xliii, 7, 20Google Scholar; Frag. Vat. 273 (19 October 315, Mediolanum); C.Th. i, 22, 1 (11 January 316, Trier).

¹⁰⁸ Optatus, App. vii (CSEL xxvi, 211, 19 ff.).

¹⁰⁹ Epit. de Caes. 41, 4; Zosimus ii, 20, 2.

¹¹⁰ C.Th. xi, 30, 5 f. (13 August 316). Polemius Silvius enters ‘natalis Constantini minoris’ under 7 August (CIL i², p. 271). Since Constantius was certainly born on 7 August (CIL i², p. 270; C.Th. vi, 4, 10), this is normally taken as an error. Yet the coincidence does not surpass belief, and August is approximately the correct month, as was seen long ago by Stein, E., Zeitschr. für d. neutest. Wiss. xxx (1931), 183 f.Google Scholar; Palanque, J.-R., Rev. ét. anc. xl (1938), 249 f.Google Scholar Polemius Silvius, the only direct testimony to the exact day of his birth, is nowhere adduced in the articles on the younger Constantine by Moreau, J., JAC ii (1959), 160 f.Google Scholar; PLRE i, 223.

¹¹¹ Monceaux, P., Histoire littéraire de l'Afrique chrétienne iii (1905), 305 f.Google Scholar; Schanz-Hosius, , Gesch. d. röm. Litt. iii ³ (1922), 431.Google Scholar

¹¹² Görres, F., Philologus xxxvii (1877), 596 ff.Google Scholar

¹¹³ Brandt, S., Sb. Wien cxxv, 6 (1892), 107 f.Google Scholar

¹¹⁴ Ebert, A., Ber. Leipzig xxii (1870), 124Google Scholar; Harnack, A., Chronologie der altchristlichen Litteratur bis Eusebius ii (1904), 422 f.Google Scholar

¹¹⁵ O. Seeck gave the lead, mainly through the first volume of his Geschichte (first edition, 1895).

¹¹⁶ e.g., Quasten, J., Patrology ii (1953), 400Google Scholar; Moreau, J., Lactance (1954), 34 ff.Google Scholar; Seston, W., RAC iii (1957), 1037Google Scholar; McDonald, M. F., Lactantius, The Minor Works. Fathers of the Church liv (1965), 127Google Scholar; Stevenson, J., OCD ² (1970), 576.Google Scholar It has even been asserted that Lactantius' narrative continues to c. 318 (Vogt, J., Der Niedergang Roms (1965), 178Google Scholar).

¹¹⁷ Moreau claimed that the opening sentences are little more than a rhetorical commonplace, and that Lactantius was simply copying Cyprian, Laps. 1 and possibly also Curtius Rufus x, 9, 1 ff. (o.c. 190 f.).

¹¹⁸ Palanque, J.-R., Mél. Carcopino (1966), 711 ff.Google Scholar

¹¹⁹ p. 35.

¹²⁰ Jerome, De vir. ill. 80, also reporting other works now lost (for the fragments, CSEL xxvii, 155 ff.).

¹²¹ Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Ms. lat. 2627, ff. 1^r-16^r. The ms. is ascribed to the eleventh century by Brandt, S., CSEL xxvii, ixGoogle Scholar; Quasten, o.c. 401; Moreau, o.c. 73; to the ninth by Schanz-Hosius, o.c. 431; de Labriolle, P., Histoire de la littérature latine chrétiene i ³ (1947), 275.Google Scholar Professor L. E. Boyle advises me that the earlier date is palaeographically preferable.

¹²² For attestations of ‘Caecilius’, see S. Brandt's critical notes (CSEL xix, 94; 580; xxvii, 64; 132). It is held to be the correct form of Lactantius' nomen in Schanz-Hosius, o.c. 414, adducing CIL viii, 7241 (Cirta): D. M. L. Caecilius Firmianus v.a. xxv h.s.e. ‘Perhaps an ancestor’, according to PLRE i, 338.

¹²³ First edited by Baluzius, S., Miscellaneorum Liber Secundus (Paris, 1679), 1 ff.Google Scholar

¹²⁴ Observe the recent verdict that Baronius' Annales, published in Rome between 1588 and 1605, ‘remained till the nineteenth century the standard text of Catholic ecclesiastical history’ (Jedin, H., Handbook of Church History i (1965); 25Google Scholar).

¹²⁵ For the details, Corsaro, F., Lactantiana (1970), 6 ff.Google Scholar

¹²⁶ Pichon, R., Lactance. Étude sur le mouvement philosophique et religieux sous le règne de Constantin (1901), 337 ff.Google Scholar In a review, Brandt, S. conceded the case (Berl. phil. Wochenschr. xxiii (1903), 1257Google Scholar).

¹²⁷ Note the half-hearted attempt at disproof by Borleffs, J.W. P., Mnemosyne, N. S. lviii (1930), 223 ff.Google Scholar Most of the facts there adduced favour authenticity rather than the reverse, cf. Moreau, J., Lactance (1954), 25 ff.Google Scholar

¹²⁸ Div. Inst. v, 2, 2; 11, 15.

¹²⁹ Harnack, o.c. 417; Schanz-Hosius, o.c. 428. B. Altaner—Stuiber, A., Patrologie ⁷ (1966), 185Google Scholar state that he remained there continuously until c. 317.

¹³⁰ Pichpon, o.c. 359.

¹³¹ Lawlor, H. J., Eusebiana (1912), 242.Google Scholar

¹³² So Pichon playfully suggested (o.c. 358 f.). Lawlor advanced the same hypothesis seriously (o.c. 241), and a written source was invoked by Roller, K., Die Kaisergeschichte in Laktanz ‘de mortibus persecutorum’ (Diss. Giessen, 1927), 12 ff.Google Scholar

¹³³ Even the apparently explicit claim ‘vidimus’ need not always prove autopsy, cf. Tertullian (1971), 245 f.

¹³⁴ Div. Inst. v, 2, 2: ‘ego cum in Bithynia oratorias litteras accitus docerem …, duo extiterunt ibidem …’

¹³⁵ Div. Inst. vi, 17, 6: ‘spectatae sunt enim semper spectanturque adhuc per orbem poenae cultorum dei.’ A serious problem is posed by passages not included in all mss., particuarly two long invocations of Constantine (i, 1, 13 ff.; vii, 26, 11 ff.). Three, and only three, solutions can be devised. Either the passages are interpolations (Brandt, S., Sb. Wien cxviii, 8 (1889)Google Scholar; cxix, 1 (1889)—retracted in Berl. Phil. Wochenschr. xxiii (1903), 1225), or they belong to a second edition of the work by Lactantius himself (Piganiol, A., Rev. d'hist. et de phil. rel. xii (1932), 368 f.Google Scholar, dated i, 1, 13 ff. to 322 or 323, vii, 26, 11 ff. to the period between Licinius' defeat and his execution), or they originally stood in the sole edition which Lactantius published and were expunged by another hand (Pichon, o.c. 4 ff.).

¹³⁶ Jerome, Chronicle, under A.D. 317 (GCS xlvii, 230), De Vir. Ill. 80. Since Jerome merely appends the notice to Crispus' investiture as Caesar in 317, his date has no authority. Pichon argued that Lactantius left Nicomedia for Gaul, never to return, between 306 and 308 (o.c. 356 ff.).

¹³⁷ e.g. ‘Oratio’, in the sense of ‘prayer’, in the very first sentence (1, 1), which Lactantius avoids in his other works (Borleffs, o.c. 262). Hence the ‘candidati ministri’ seen by the blinded Maximinus (49, 5) are probably not angels, but elders or ‘those to whom judgement was committed’ (Rev. 4, 4; 20,4).

¹³⁸ For the extent of knowledge of Latin in the East, see the works cited by Christ, W.—Schmid, W.—Stählin, O., Gesch. d. griech. Litt. ii ⁶ (1924), 945 f.Google Scholar; 960f.; Stein, E., Historie du Bas-empire i ² (1958), 500 f.Google Scholar Observe that the town of Orcistes, on the borders of Galatia and Phrygia, petitioned Constantine in Latin (MAMA vii, 305).

¹³⁹ Piganiol, A., L'empereur Constantin (1932), 48Google Scholar; Moreau, J., Scripta minora (1964), 115.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁰ Grégoire, H., Byzantion xiii (1938), 566.Google Scholar

¹⁴¹ Moreau, J., Lactance (1954), 44.Google Scholar

¹⁴² On the possibility of reformulation, note Palanque, J.-R., Mél. Carcopino (1966), 715 f.Google Scholar

¹⁴³ The precise date diverges widely in modern treatments: PLRE dates the marriage to March (i, 325) and seems to express no opinion on Constantine's becoming Augustus (i, 223 f.); C. H. V. Sutherland dates the marriage to April and the investiture to the autumn (RIC vi, 12 ff.); J. Lafaurie both to precisely 25 December (CRAI 1965, 201 ff.; Mèl. Piganiol ii (1966), 799 ff.). December is probably too late, but the late summer or autumn of the year appears certain. The marriage and the investiture were contemporaneous (Pan. Lat. vii (vi), esp. 1, 1; 5, 3; 8, 1), and Constantine was still only Caesar on 25 July 307 (Strauss, R., Rev. Num. ⁵ xvi (1954), 26 ff.Google Scholar; RIC vi, 213, nos. 744–747).

¹⁴⁴ Moreau, o.c. (1954), 367; Sutherland, o.c. 14 f.

¹⁴⁵ Pan. Lat. vi (vii), 14, 3 ff.; 20, 3 ff. The speech was delivered in 310, on the ‘natalis dies’ of Trier (22, 4).

¹⁴⁶ No ancient writer other than Lactantius has both plots (Moreau, o.c. 373 ff.).

¹⁴⁷ p. 35. For a slightly different hypothesis of two successive stories, cf. Maddalena, A., Atti Ist. Veneto xciv, 2 (1934/1935), 575.Google Scholar

¹⁴⁸ An important distinction, cf. Moreau, o.c. 44 ff.

¹⁴⁹ For Galerius' view of the settlement of Carnuntum, note esp. ILS 658 f.; RIC vi, 514 (Thessalonica). Constantine (an important fact not made clear by PLRE i, 1043) refused, both in 309 and later, to recognise the consulate which Galerius gave him for that year: P. Cairo Isid. 47; 90; 91, cf. Mon. Germ. Hist., Auct. Ant. ix, 60; 76; 231 (post cons. x et septimum). Further, in the territory of Galerius and Maximinus, the dies imperii of Constantine was not 25 July 306, but the day (subsequent to 29 August) on which Galerius formally appointed him (P. Cairo Isid. 41, etc., confirming Mort. Pers. 25, 2 ff.).

¹⁵⁰ Which was, presumably, the legal basis of Constantine's claim, ratified by the Senate in November 312, to be the senior emperor (Mort. Pers. 44, 11).

¹⁵¹ Maximian's relations with the Roman Senate are not discussed in M. T. W. Arnheim, The Senatorial Aristocracy in the Later Roman Empire (1972).

¹⁵² RIC vii, 246 ff.; 305 ff.; 371 ff.; 393 (all Licinius or his son); 498 ff. (Constantine: Thessalonica, after it passed into Constantine's control in 316/7).

¹⁵³ Above, n. 54.

¹⁵⁴ Impossible, therefore, to suppose that ‘un des objectifs de Lactance … était de justifier l'attitude de Constantin a l'égard de Maximien’ (Moreau, o.c. 366).

¹⁵⁵ p. 34 f.

¹⁵⁶ Pan. Lat. xii (ix), 3, 6; 4, 3 ff.; Eusebius, HE viii, 14, 2 ff. On the conventional nature of the charges, cf. J. Ziegler, Zur religiösen Haltung der Gegenkaiser im 4 Jh. n. Chr. Frankfurter Althistorische Studien iv (1970), 9 ff.; 35 ff.

¹⁵⁷ ILS 687 ff.; RIC vi, 387 nos. 303/4: LIBERATORI URBIS SUAE.

¹⁵⁸ In fact, a full sister (Epit. de Caes. 40,12).

¹⁵⁹ Pan. Lat. xii (ix), 3, 4; 4, 3; Exc. Vaies. i, 12. Eutropia was a Syrian herself (Epit. de Caes. 40, 12).

¹⁶⁰ Note the allegations that Maximian intended to kill Galerius at Carnuntum (Mort. Pers. 29, 1) and to exterminate all the emperors except Diocletian, who was to be his sole colleague (43, 6).

¹⁶¹ For discussion of the real role of Galerius, see N. H. Baynes, CQ xviii (1924), 192 f.; M. Gelzer, Vom Wesen und Wandel der Kirche. Festschrift E. Vischer (1935), 35 ff. = Kl. Schr. ii (1963), 378 ff.; G. E. M. de Ste. Croix, HTR xlvii (1954), 108 f.

¹⁶² On the enforcement of the various edicts (four in number) in different areas, see de Ste. Croix, o.c. 75 ff. This fundamental study appears to be unknown to a recent writer on the subject (Molthagen, J., Der römische Staat und die Christen im zweiten und dritten Jahrhundert, Hypomnemata xxviii (1970), 101 ff.Google Scholar)

¹⁶³ Kraft, H., Kaiser Konstantins religiose Entwicklung (1955), 7.Google Scholar

¹⁶⁴ For a Greek translation, with the names and titles of the emperors (except Maximinus), see Eusebius, , HE viii, 17, 3 ff.Google Scholar It is not a necessary deduction from Eusebius' ‘ἤπλωτο κατὰ πόλεις βασιλικὰ διατάγματα’ (ib. 2) that the edict was published in the territory of either Maxentius or Constantine.

¹⁶⁵ Eusebius presents substantially the same document with a different preamble (HE x, 5, 1 ff.), presumably reproducing the version which Licinius dispatched to Palestine and which was published there. For modern discussion of the two versions, cf. Moreau, J., Scripta Minora (1964), 99 ff.Google Scholar

¹⁶⁶ For Africa, Pan. Lat. xii (ix), 16, 1; 25,2 f.

¹⁶⁷ R. Grosse, Fontes Hispaniae Antiquae viii: Las fuentas desde César hasta el siglo v d. de J. C. (1959), 55 f., cites only alleged coins of Tarraco, which were in fact minted at Ticinum (C. Sutherland, H. V., RIC vi, 6 f.Google Scholar; 266 ff). It thus becomes possible to draw the obvious deduction from the absence of any mention of Spain in Pan. Lat. xii (ix): Constantine ruled the peninsula from 306 in succession to his father (cf. Stein, E., Histoire du Bas-Empire i ² (1958), 435 f.Google Scholar).

¹⁶⁸ Optatus, i, 18. Usually dated to 311, as by von Schoenebeck, H., Beiträge zur Religionspolitik des Maxentius und Constantin. Klio, Beiheft xliii (1938), 4 ff.Google Scholar But Eusebius states explicitly that Maxentius began by pretending to be a Christian (HE viii, 14, 1, cf. Mart. Pal, 13, 12).

¹⁶⁹ Augustine, , Brev. coll. iii, 18, 34Google Scholar; Contra partem Donati post gesta 13, 17 (CSEL liii, 84; 113 f.).

¹⁷⁰ e. g. Dörries, H., Das Selbstzeugnis Kaiser Konstantins. Abh. Göttingen, Phil.-hist. Kl.³ xxxiv (1954).Google Scholar Nor is there any discussion of Mort. Pers. 24, 9 in the article ‘Constantinus der Grosse’, by Vogt, J., RAC iii (1957), 306–379.Google Scholar

¹⁷¹ Baynes, N. H., CAH xii (1939), 671.Google Scholar

¹⁷² Lot, F., The End of the Ancient World (trans. Leon, P. and M., 1931), 28.Google Scholar

¹⁷³ The term is conventionally applied to Mort. Pers. 48, 2 ff.-which, as O. Seeck pertinently remarked, is not an edict, was not published in Milan and was not issued by Constantine (Zeitschr. für Kirchengesch. xii (1891), 381 ff.).

¹⁷⁴ ‘The Edict of Milan may be a fiction, but the fact for which the term stood remains untouched’ (Baynes, N. H., Constantine the Great (1931), 11Google Scholar). For bibliography on the ‘Edict’ see Anastos, M. V., Rev. ét. byz. xxv (1967), 13 ff.Google Scholar That writer essays ‘a defence of its traditional authorship and designation’ and professes respect for contemporary evidence as his ‘cardinal principle’ (ib. 15), yet seems nowhere to mention Mort. Pers. 24, 9.

¹⁷⁵ Baynes, N. H., CAH xii (1939), 685 f.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁶ Moreau, J., Lactance (1954), 404 ff.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁷ Eusebius, , HE ix, 9, 12Google Scholar; 9a, 12. In favour of identifying the letter implied by Mort. Pers. 44, 11 and the ‘νόμος τελεώτατος’> Baynes, N. H., CQ xviii (1924), 193 f.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁸ Moreau, J., Scripta minora (1964), 121 f.Google Scholar

¹⁷⁹ CSEL xxvi, 25 f. The words ‘et ceteris episcopis partis Donati’ are Optatus' summary of an originally longer list, cf. Duchesne, L., Mél. d'arch. et d'hist. x (1890), 608 f.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁰ Grégoire, H., Byzantion vii (1932), 650.Google Scholar

¹⁸¹ As Duchesne unequivocally asserted (o.c. 598; 608).

¹⁸² So it is apparently taken by Piganiol, A., L'empereur Constantin (1932), 101.Google Scholar

¹⁸³ Vassall-Phillips, O. R., The Work of St. Optatus (1917), 43Google Scholar: ‘we beseech … that we be granted judges from Gaul; for between us and other Bishops in Africa disputes have arisen’.

¹⁸⁴ Jones, A. H. M., Constantine and the Conversion of Europe (1948), 104.Google Scholar ‘Nam’ is a coordinating, not a subordinating conjunction, cf. Leumann, — Hofmann, — Szantyr, , Lateinische Grammatik ii (1965), 504 ff.Google Scholar

¹⁸⁵ Frend, W. H. C., The Donatist Church (1952), 147.Google Scholar Similarly, Grégoire has ‘la Gaule est restée indemne’, with ‘donc’ for ‘nam’ (o.c. 650).

¹⁸⁶ Optatus ii, 23 (CSEL xxvi, 26): ‘quibus (i.e. the petition) lectis Constantinus pleno livore respondit. in qua responsione et eorum preces prodidit dum ait: petitis a me in saeculo iudicium, cum ego ipse Christi iudicium expectem.’

¹⁸⁷ The document quoted by Optatus can be identified as one of the two libelli which the proconsul of Africa forwarded to Constantine on 15 April 313 (Augustine, , Epp. lxxxviii, 2Google Scholar).

¹⁸⁸ Routh, M. J., Reliquiae Sacrae ² iv (1846), 293Google Scholar; CSEL xxvi, 203. 5 ff.

¹⁸⁹ Caspar, E., Geschichte des Papsttums i (1930), 581Google Scholar: Grégoire, H., Byzantion vii (1932), 648 f.Google Scholar Against this view, see also Palanque, J.-R., Byzantion x (1935), 607 ff.Google Scholar; Anastos, M. V., Rev. ét. byz. xxv (1967), 36 f.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁰ See Mauch, O., Der lateinische Begriff DISCIPLINA. Eine Wortuntersuchung (Diss. Freiburg in der Schweiz, 1941), 52 ff.Google Scholar; 66 ff.

¹⁹¹ Moreau, J., Lactance (1954), 405Google Scholar, assumes that Galerius' edict automatically replaced Maxentius' legislation relating to Christians.

¹⁹² i.e. by the ‘Edict of Milan’, as argued by Batiffol, P., La paix constantinienne et le catholicisme (1914), 240.Google Scholar

¹⁹³ p. 44.

¹⁹⁴ Note the emphasis on speed in the letter to Anullinus: Eusebius, , HE x, 5, 15 ff.Google Scholar

¹⁹⁵ Constantine enunciated the principle clearly: ‘tyranni et iudicum eius gestis infirmatis nemo per calumniam velit quod sponte ipse fecit evertere nec quod legitime gestum est’ (CTh xv, 14, 2); ‘quae tyrannus contra ius resripsit non valere praecipimus, legitimis eius resriptis minime impugnandis’ (CTh xv, 14, 3). These two laws bear the dates 12 February 325 and 8 July 326, but the latter should be redated to 6 January 313, and thus refers to Maxentius (Seeck, O., Regesten (1919), 64 f.Google Scholar; 160).