Cyprian & Lactantius · a new plain-English translation from the original language
But this was a public calamity and a grief shared by all: a census once sent out upon the provinces and cities. With assessors spread everywhere and rummaging through everything, there was the look of hostile invasion and dreadful captivity. Fields were measured clod by clod, vines and trees were counted, every kind of animal was registered, every human head was noted down. In the towns the city folk and the country folk were herded together, every marketplace was crammed with families in droves, each person present with his children, with his slaves; the sound of torture and of whips rang out; sons were strung up against their own parents. The most loyal slaves were hauled up against their masters, wives against their husbands. When every other means had failed, men were tortured against themselves, and once pain had overcome them, they were made to declare property they did not have. No excuse was allowed for age or for sickness. The sick and the feeble were carried in; the age of each person was assessed; years were added to little children and subtracted from the old. Everything was full of grief and mourning. What men of old had done by right of war against the conquered, this man dared to do against Romans and against those subject to Rome — because his own parents had once been reduced to a census, which Trajan, victor over the constantly rebelling Dacians, imposed as a penalty. After this, money was paid per head, and a price was set upon life. Yet the same assessors were not trusted; others were sent on top of others, as if to find still more, and the sum was always doubled — not because the first found too little, but because the newcomers added whatever they pleased, so as not to seem to have been sent for nothing. Meanwhile the animals were dwindling and people were dying, and yet the taxes were still paid for the dead, so that it was no longer possible even to live, much less to die, for free. Only beggars were left from whom nothing could be extracted — misery and misfortune had made them safe from every kind of wrong. But this pious man took pity on them, so that they should want for nothing: he ordered them all gathered together, carried out on boats, and drowned in the sea. Such a merciful man, who took care that no one should be wretched while he reigned! So it was that, guarding against anyone escaping the census by pretending to beg, he slaughtered a multitude of the truly wretched against every law of humanity.
By now God's judgment was drawing near him, and the time followed in which his affairs began to slip and dissolve. He had not yet set his mind on overthrowing or driving out Constantius, being occupied with the matters I have described above, and he was waiting for his death, though he did not think it would come so soon. When Constantius fell gravely ill, he sent letters asking that his son Constantine be sent back to him to see, whom he had long been demanding in vain. But the other wanted anything but that. He had often tried to get at the young man through ambush, since he dared nothing openly for fear of stirring up civil war against himself and, what he feared most, the hatred of the soldiers; and under the pretext of exercise and sport he had thrown him to wild beasts, but in vain, since the hand of God was protecting the man. It was God who freed him from those hands at the very turning point. For when he had been asked again and again and could no longer refuse, he gave him, as the day was already declining, the token of leave, and instructed him to set out the next morning after receiving his orders — meaning either to detain him on some pretext himself, or to send letters ahead so that Severus would hold him. Constantine, foreseeing this, while the emperor was resting after dinner, hurried to leave, and, taking all the post-horses at station after station, flew away. The next day the emperor, having deliberately slept until midday, ordered him to be summoned. He was told that Constantine had set off immediately after dinner the evening before. He began to rage and fume. He demanded post-horses, so that he might have him dragged back; he was told the public relay had been stripped bare. He could hardly hold back tears. But Constantine, moving with incredible speed, reached his father just as he was failing, who commended him to the soldiers and handed over the empire into his hands. And so, on his own bed, he found the rest from life that he had wished for. Once he had taken up the empire, Augustus Constantine did nothing before restoring the Christians to their worship and to their God. This was his first decree, the restoration of the holy religion.
A few days later the laurelled portrait of Constantine was brought to the wicked beast. He deliberated a long time whether to accept it. It came very close to his burning both the image and the man who had brought it, had not his friends turned him from that madness, warning him of the danger — that all the soldiers, against whose will unknown men had been made Caesars, would have welcomed Constantine and rushed to him with the greatest eagerness, had he come in arms. So he accepted the image, quite unwillingly, and sent Constantine the purple in return, so that he might seem to have admitted him into the partnership of his own accord. His arrangements were already thrown into confusion, and he could not name a second man outside the fixed number, as he had wished. But he devised this scheme: he named Severus, who was older, Augustus, but ordered Constantine to be called, not emperor as he had actually become, but Caesar, together with Maximin, so as to push him down from second place to fourth.
His affairs seemed to him already somewhat settled, when suddenly another terror was brought to him: that his own son-in-law Maxentius had been made emperor at Rome. The cause of this upheaval was this. Having decided, once the census had been established, to devour the whole world, he had leapt to such madness that he wished not even the Roman people to be exempt from this captivity. Assessors were already being arranged to be sent to Rome to register the populace. At about the same time he had also abolished the praetorian camps. And so the few soldiers who had been left in the camps at Rome, seizing the opportunity, killed certain officials, and with the people — who were themselves stirred up — not unwilling, they dressed Maxentius in the purple. When this news reached him, he was somewhat disturbed by its novelty, though not overly frightened. He hated the man, but he could not make three Caesars. It seemed enough to have done once what he had not wanted. He summoned Severus, urged him to take up the imperial power, sent him with Maximian's army to storm Maxentius, and sent him to Rome, where those soldiers, so often received with the greatest indulgence, wished not only that the city be safe but that they might live there. Maxentius, conscious of so great a crime — though by right of inheritance he could have won over his father's soldiers to himself — nevertheless, thinking it possible that Maximian, his father-in-law, fearing this very thing, might leave Severus in Illyricum and come himself with his own army to attack him, sought some way to protect himself from the looming danger. He sent the purple to his father, who was lingering in Campania after laying down the empire, and hailed him Augustus a second time. That man, eager for revolution and one who had laid down power unwillingly, gladly seized it. Meanwhile Severus advanced and approached the walls of the city under arms. At once the soldiers raised their standards and left, handing themselves over to the man against whom they had come. What remained for the deserted man but flight? But now Maximian, his power resumed, was already meeting him, and at his approach Severus fled to Ravenna and shut himself in there with a few soldiers. Seeing that he would inevitably be handed over to Maximian, he surrendered himself and returned the purple garment to the very man from whom he had received it. By this act he gained nothing but an easy death — for his veins were gently opened, and he was made to die a slow death. [From this point his own persecute.]
Herculius, knowing Maximian's madness, began to consider that he, on hearing of Severus's death, would come inflamed with anger, having taken up hostility, with his army, and perhaps, having joined with Maximin and doubled his forces, in a way that could not possibly be resisted. So, with the city fortified and everything carefully provided, he set out for Gaul, to win Constantine over to his side by the marriage of his younger daughter. Meanwhile Maxentius, having gathered an army, invaded Italy and approached the city, intending to wipe out the senate and slaughter the people; but he found everything shut and defended. There was no hope of forcing entry; the siege was difficult; there were not enough troops to surround the walls — for he had never seen Rome and reckoned it not much larger than the cities he knew. Then certain legions, abhorring the crime that a father-in-law should attack a son-in-law, and that Roman soldiers should abandon Rome, transferred their standards and left. And now the rest of the soldiers were wavering, when he, his arrogance broken and his spirits collapsed, fearing the fate of Severus, threw himself at the soldiers' feet and begged not to be handed over to the enemy, until with immense promises he won over their spirits and turned his standards back, taking to flight in a panic — in which he could very easily have been overwhelmed, had anyone pursued him even with a few men. Fearing this, he gave his soldiers license to scatter as widely as possible and plunder or ruin everything, so that if anyone wished to pursue, he would find no supplies. So that part of Italy through which that plague-bearing column passed was laid waste — everything stripped, women violated, virgins ravished, parents and husbands tortured to make them betray their daughters, their wives, their wealth. Herds of cattle and beasts of burden were driven off as from barbarians. In this fashion he made his way back to his own quarters, this man who, once a Roman emperor, was now a ravager of Italy, having assaulted everything with the fury of an enemy. Indeed, once he had taken the name of emperor, he had proclaimed himself an enemy of the Roman name, wishing its title changed, so that it should be called not the Roman empire, but the Dacian.
After this man's flight, when the elder Maximian had returned from Gaul, he held power jointly with his son. But the young man was obeyed more than the old, since his power was in fact prior and greater — indeed he had restored power to his father in the first place. The old man bore it ill that he could not do freely what he wished, and, with a childish rivalry, envied his own son. So he planned to expel the young man, to reclaim power for himself, which seemed easy, since he had soldiers who had abandoned Severus. He called together the people and the soldiers, as if to hold an assembly on the present ills of the state. Having said much on this subject, he turned his hands against his son, calling him the author of the evils, the source of the calamities the state was suffering, and tore the purple from his shoulders. Stripped of it, the young man threw himself headlong from the platform and was caught by the soldiers. Disturbed by their anger and outcry, the impious old man was driven out of the city of Rome, like a second Tarquin the Proud.
Returning again to Gaul, where he stayed a while, he set out to meet his son's enemy Maximian, ostensibly to discuss with him the settling of the state's affairs — but in reality, so that he might, under the pretext of reconciliation, kill him and seize his kingdom, since he himself had been shut out wherever he went. Diocletian was present there too, recently summoned by his son-in-law, so that — what he had not done before — he might, in Maximian's presence, grant power to Licinius as a substitute in Severus's place. So it was done with both present. Thus at one time there were six. His plans thwarted by this, the old Maximian was already scheming a third flight: he returned to Gaul full of evil intent and crime, meaning to entrap by treachery Constantine the emperor, his son-in-law, the husband of his daughter — and, so as to deceive him, he laid aside his royal robe. The nation of the Franks was in arms. He persuaded the unsuspecting young man not to take his whole army with him, saying that the barbarians could be defeated with a few soldiers, so that he himself might have an army to seize, and Constantine could be overwhelmed for lack of numbers. The young man, trusting him as an experienced elder, obeyed him as his father-in-law, and set out, leaving behind the greater part of his troops. Maximian let a few days pass, and once he judged that his son-in-law was now deep among the barbarian tribes, he suddenly seized the purple once more, seized the treasury, and gave out largesse in his usual lavish fashion; he made up stories about Constantine that promptly rebounded on himself. The events were quickly reported to the emperor. With astonishing speed he flew back with his army. The man was caught by surprise, not yet sufficiently prepared. The soldiers went back to their own emperor. He had occupied Marseille and barred the gates. The emperor approached and addressed him as he stood on the wall, not harshly nor as an enemy, but asking what he had meant by this, what he had lacked, why he did something particularly unbecoming to him. But the other hurled curses down from the walls. Then suddenly, behind his back, the gates were thrown open and the soldiers let in. The rebel emperor, the impious father, the treacherous father-in-law, was dragged before the emperor. He was made to hear the crimes he had committed; his robe was stripped from him, and, after being reproached, his life was spared.
Having thus lost the honor of emperor and of father-in-law, unable to bear his humble state, he plotted yet another treachery, since he had gone unpunished once before. He summoned his daughter Fausta and pressed her, now with entreaties, now with flattery, to betray her husband, promising her a worthier man; he asked that the bedroom door be left open and less carefully guarded. She promised to do it, and at once reported it to her husband. A scene was arranged in which the crime would be caught in the act. A worthless eunuch was substituted, to die in the emperor's place. Maximian rose in the dead of night and saw everything favorable for his ambush. The guards were few and stationed some way off; to them, however, he said he had had a dream he wished to tell his son. He went in armed, and, having cut down the eunuch, he leapt out exulting and proclaimed what he had done. Suddenly Constantine appeared from the other side with a band of armed men. The corpse of the murdered man was brought out of the room; the manifest murderer stood stock still and mute with astonishment, as if he were hard flint or a Marpesian crag; he was reproached for his wickedness and crime. Finally he was granted the power to choose his own death, and he tied the noose of an unseemly end from a beam on high. So that man, once the greatest emperor of the Roman name, who after a long interval had, with immense glory, celebrated the vows of his twentieth year, ended his detestable life by a shameful and ignominious death, his proud throat crushed and broken.
From this man God, the avenger of his religion and his people, turned his eyes to the other Maximian, the author of the wicked persecution, so as to show in him too the power of his majesty. He too was already thinking of celebrating his own twentieth-anniversary vows, and, having already for a long time afflicted the provinces with levies of gold and silver, promising to repay them, he now, even in the name of these anniversary celebrations, inflicted a second axe upon them. Who could adequately describe with what affliction of the human race this exaction was carried out, above all in the matter of the grain supply? Soldiers of every office — or rather executioners — clung to individuals. It was uncertain who should be satisfied first; there was no mercy for those who had nothing. Multiple tortures had to be endured unless what did not exist was produced at once. Hedged in by many guards, there was no chance to breathe, no rest at any time of year, however slight. There was constant strife over the same people between the officials themselves, or between the officials' soldiers. No threshing floor was without its collector, no vintage without its guard; nothing was left for those who labored, even for their own food. Though these things were hard to bear, still snatching food earned by labor from people's very mouths could somehow be endured, at least with hope for the future. But what of clothing of every kind? What of gold? What of silver? Must not these be obtained from the sale of produce? From what, then, most mad tyrant, shall I supply these, when you carry off all the produce, when you violently seize everything that grows? Who, then, was not ruined in his goods, so that the wealth that existed under his rule might be scraped together to satisfy a vow he was never going to celebrate?
So then, once Licinius had been proclaimed emperor, Maximin, in a rage, refused to be called Caesar or to be named in third place. He therefore sent envoys to him repeatedly, asking that he defer to him, respect his own seniority, yield to his age, and give honor to his gray hairs. But the other raised his horns still more boldly and fought on the ground of priority in time, arguing that he ought to be first, since he had taken up the purple first; he disregarded his entreaties and demands. The beast raged and roared, that although he had raised him from obscurity to Caesar precisely so that he should be obedient to him, this man, forgetting so great a benefit, impiously resisted his will and his requests. Beaten by this stubbornness, he dropped the title of Caesar and proclaimed himself and Licinius Augusti, and Maximin and Constantine sons of the Augusti. Afterward Maximin wrote, as if announcing, that he had recently been proclaimed Augustus by his army on the Field of Mars. Grieved and pained, he accepted this and ordered that all four be called emperors.
By now his eighteenth year was under way, when God struck him with an incurable affliction. An evil ulcer arose on the lower part of his genitals and spread ever wider. The doctors cut and treated it. But once the scar had already formed, the wound split open again, a vein burst, and blood flowed to the point of mortal danger. The bleeding was scarcely stopped. The treatment began afresh from the start. At last it was brought to a scar again. But at a slight movement of the body it was wounded once more, and more blood ran out than before. He himself grew pale and, his strength drained, wasted away, and then indeed the flow of blood was checked. The wound began to lose all feeling to medicine; a cancer invaded everything nearby, and the more it was cut around, the more fiercely it raged; the more it was treated, the more it grew. The master healers yielded — Chiron the son of Philyra, and Melampus the son of Amythaon. Famous doctors were brought in from everywhere; human hands accomplished nothing. Recourse was had to idols: Apollo and Asclepius were prayed to, a remedy demanded. Apollo prescribed treatment; the evil grew far worse. Now destruction was not far off, and it had already seized everything below. His innards rotted outwardly, and his whole frame dissolved into decay. Yet his unhappy doctors did not stop tending and treating the evil, even without hope of overcoming it. Driven back by the remedies, the disease recoiled inward and took hold of his inner organs, and worms were bred within. The stench spread not only through the palace but through the whole city. Nor was this strange, since by now the passages of excrement and urine were confounded together. He was eaten by worms, and his body dissolved into rot amid unbearable pains. At the same time he raised horrible cries to the stars, like the bellowing of a bull that flees the altar wounded. Cooked and hot animals were placed at the seat of the flow, so that the heat might draw out the worms. When these were opened up, an uncountable swarm poured forth, and yet the fertile ruin had bred a far greater quantity of rotting flesh still within. By now his body's parts, ravaged by the various evil, had lost their form altogether. The upper part, down to the wound, had withered, and the sallow skin, in pitiable emaciation, clung close about the bones far within. The lower part, without any shape of feet, had swollen and separated like a wineskin. And this went on for a whole year, until at last, subdued by his sufferings, he was forced to confess God. Amid the pressing pain of this fresh agony he cried out at intervals that he would restore God's temple and make full amends for his crime. And now, failing, he sent out an edict of this kind: