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| The Emperor Gratian is slain by the Treachery of the Usurper Maximus. From Fear of him Justina ceases persecuting Ambrose.
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Chapter XI.—The
Emperor Gratian is slain by the Treachery of the Usurper Maximus. From
Fear of him Justina ceases persecuting Ambrose.
Nearly at the same time with
the holding of these Synods at Constantinople, the following events
occurred in the Western parts. Maximus, from the island of Britain,
rebelled against the Roman empire, and attacked Gratian, who was then
wearied and exhausted in a war with the Alemanni.721
| 721Cf. Zosimus, IV. 35 seq.
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In Italy, Valentinian being still a minor, Probus, a man of consular
dignity, had the chief administration of affairs, and was at that time
prefect of the Prætorium. Justina, the mother of the young prince,
who entertained Arian sentiments, as long as her husband lived had been
unable to molest the Homoousians; but going to Milan while her son was
still young, she manifested great hostility to Ambrose the bishop, and
commanded that he should be banished.722
While the people from their excessive attachment to Ambrose, were
offering resistance to those who were charged with taking him into
exile, intelligence was brought that Gratian had been assassinated by
the treachery of the usurper Maximus. In fact Andragathius, a general
under Maximus, having concealed himself in a litter resembling a couch,
which was carried by mules, ordered his guards to spread a report
before him that the litter contained the Emperor Gratian’s wife.
They met the emperor near the city of Lyons in France just as he had
crossed the river: who believing it to be his wife, and not suspecting
any treachery, fell into the hands of his enemy as a blind man into the
ditch; for Andragathius, suddenly springing forth from the litter, slew
him.723
| 723The account of Gratian’s death given by
Zosimus, though not inconsistent with that of Socrates, does not
contain the details given by Socrates. Andragathius is simply said to
have pursued Gratian, and overtaking him near the bridge to have slain
him. Cf. Zosimus, IV. 35 end.
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Gratian thus perished in the consulate of Merogaudes and Saturninus,724
in the twenty-fourth year of his age, and the fifteenth of his reign.
When this happened the Empress Justina’s indignation against
Ambrose was repressed. Afterwards Valentinian most unwillingly, but
constrained by the necessity of the time, admitted Maximus as his
colleague in the empire. Probus alarmed at the power of Maximus,
resolved to retreat into the regions of the East: leaving Italy
therefore, he proceeded to Illyricum, and fixed his residence at
Thessalonica a city of Macedonia.
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