The success of the Persian arms inspired all the northern nations with the hopes of subjugating Rome. While the Goths and Scythians ravaged Pontus and Asia, the Franks and Alemanni carried fire and sword into Rhxtia, and advanced as far as Ravenna. The Sarmatians and the Quadi about the same time entered Dacia and Pannonia; and other barbarous tribes in vaded Spain, and took possession of many of their strongholds.
In this crisis Gallienus, the son of Valerian, ani mated with a passion for revenging the sufferings of his father, and punishing the insolence of the barba rians, was chosen emperor by universal consent. Has tening from Gaul into Italy he drove out the barbari ans, and delivered Rome from the terrors of an inva sion. Regillianus, who commanded in Dacia and Pannonia, was equally successful, and even beat them in several engagements in one day.
A general of the name of Ingenuus, who command ed in Pannonia, was proclaimed emperor by his troops; but Gallienus lost no time in marching against him, and having come up with him in Illyricum, he defeat ed his army, and Ingenuus was either slain by his troops after the battle, or took away his own life to avoid the enmity of Gallienus. The cruelties which the emperor exercised after this battle were of the most intolerable kind; he ordered all males, whether old or young, to be destroyed; he slew all who had either spoken ill of him, or had wished him ill; and he commanded one of his officers, Verianis Celis, in a letter which still exists, to tear, kill, and cut in pieces without mercy. In consequence of these cruelties, the soldiers who had served under Ingenuus, and the inhabitants of Mxsia, proclaimed Q. Nonius Regillia nus emperor.
This general, who was born in Dacia, is said to have been a descendant of king Decabalus, who was con quered by Trajan. He had acquired great reputation as a soldier, and had defeated the Sarmatians in seve ral battles after he was proclaimed emperor. He did not, however, possess long the imperial honours; hav ing been killed by his own troops in the year of our Lord 262.
The facility of now being made emperor, and the short period during which that honour was held, brought forward a number of generals who were pro claimed by their respective armies. These candidates for the imperial purple were nineteen, and they have received the name of the thirty tyrants. The follow ing is a list of them: Regillianus, Ingenuus, Cyriades, Macrinus, Balista, Udenatus, Zenobia queen of Pal myra, Posthumius Lollianus, Victorinus, and his mother Victoria, 1\Iarius and Tetricus, Aureolus, Sa turninus, Trebellianus, Piso, Valens, Ernilianus, and Celsus.
Though the name of tyrants has been applied to these aspiring individuals, yet their ambition was in general called forth by the infamous cruelties of Gal lienus, and many of them were men pre-eminent by their virtues as well as by their talents, who had been compelled by their soldiers to receive the empty title. The enemies of the emperor being thus divided, none of his rivals had strength enough to resist the arms of Gallienus, who still maintained the diadem, while all his nineteen opponents suffered by some violent death.
The defenders of the state being thus occupied with their own objects of ambition, the common enemies of Rome were permitted to ravage the empire on all sides; and the ablest and most patriotic of the Roman generals being thus left without support, and obliged to introduce barbarians into the service, were com pelled to enter into the most dishonourable treaties *with their invaders.
An unlooked-for event, however, restored for a while the drooping spirits of Rome. While Gallienus was besieging one of his rivals, Aureolus, in Milan, he was murdered by Martian, one of his own generals, and Flavius Claudius was nominated his successor,—an appointment which was gladly confirmed both by the senate and the people.
Flavius Claudius, supposed by some to be a Dal matian, by others to be a Trojan, and by some a son of the emperor Gordian. In the 55th year of his age, he had to retrieve the almost desperate affairs of the empire. Strong in body, vigorous in intellect, tempe rate in all his desires, an admirer of virtue, and a se vere dispenser of punishment, this great man seemed destined to reform the degeneracy of the age, as well as to recall the ancient glories of the Roman name. After defeating Aureolus near Milan, he conducted a numerous army against the Hcruli, the Trutangi, and the Virturgi, who had descended the Danube in 2000 ships, and being well supplied with ammunition and provisions, spread an universal alarm through all the adjacent provinces. The Goths had already desolated Greece, and pillaged Athens; and the cruelties and devastations which they there committed, inspired the Romans with fresh alarm. Claudius, however, marched against them with an army every way dis proportionate to theni, and he either cut to pieces, or took prisoners, the whole of their vast army, which amounted to above 300,000. Every province was sup plied with slaves from the captives, and every house was filled with the arms which were taken. Ills suc cess inspired courage into the Roman soldiers, and the Goths were defeated in all the frontiers of the empire. After subduing the revolted Germans, Claudius carried his arms against Tetricus and Zenobia, two of the nine teen sovereigns who still exercised a sort of imperial authority in the east. He was seized, however, with a pestilential fever near Sirmium, in Pannonia, where he died in a few days, after a virtuous and glorious reign of nearly two years. The historians of Rome represent Claudius as uniting the piety of Antoninus with the valour of Trajan and the moderation of Au gustus; and this exalted character is remarkably con firmed by the words which the senate addressed to him when alive, Mud/ .quguste, tu Prater, tu pater, tu amicus, tu bonus senator, tu vere princeps.