generals,[1] as the most deserving of the throne, and the best qualified to execute the great design which he himself had been permitted only to undertake. The virtues of Claudius, his valour, affability, justice, and temperance, his love of fame and of his country, place him in that short list of emperors who added lustre to the Roman purple. Those virtues, however, were celebrated with peculiar zeal and complacency by the courtly writers of the age of Constantine, who was the great-grandson of Crispus, the elder brother of Claudius. The voice of flattery was soon taught to repeat that the gods, who so hastily had snatched Claudius from the earth, rewarded his merit and piety by the perpetual establishment of the empire in his family.[2]
The attempt and fall of QuintiliusNotwithstanding these oracles, the greatness of the Flavian family (a name which it had pleased them to assume) was deferred above twenty years, and the elevation of Claudius occasioned the immediate ruin of his brother Quintilius, who possessed not sufficient moderation or courage to descend into the private station to which the patriotism of the late emperor had condemned him. Without delay or reflection, he assumed the purple at Aquileia, where he commanded a considerable force; and, though his reign lasted only seventeen days, he had time to obtain the sanction of the senate, and to experience a mutiny of the troops. As soon as he was informed that the great army of the Danube had invested the well-known valour of Aurelian with Imperial power, Aprilhe sunk under the fame and merit of his rival; and, ordering his veins to be opened, prudently withdrew himself from the unequal contest.[3]
Origin and services of AurelianThe general design of this work will not permit us minutely to relate the actions of every emperor after he ascended the- ↑ [L. Domitius Aurelianus.]
- ↑ See the life of Claudius by Pollio, and the orations of Mamertinus, Eumenius, and Julian. See likewise the Cæsars of Julian, p. 313. In Julian it was not adulation, but superstition and vanity.
- ↑ Zosimus, l. i. p. 42 [47]. Pollio (Hist. August. p. 206 [xxv. 12, 5]) allows him virtues, and says that like Pertinax he was killed by licentious soldiers. According to Dexippus [quoted by Pollio, Hist. Aug., but what he said was (not occisum but) mortuum ἀποθανέῑν nec tamen addit morbo, thus leaving it doubtful] he died of a disease. [M. Aurelius Claudius Quintilius (this is the form of his name on coins, and in best MSS. of Hist Aug.; Eckhel, vii. 478). It is to be noted that the Senate favoured his claims. He had been stationed to guard the Julian Alps and Aquileia, to cover the rear of Claudius in his Gothic war. He seems to have gained some victory, Cohen, 52.]
him with the purple; but this singular fact is rather contradicted than confirmed by other writers. [Zonaras says that Claudius recommended Aurelian to his officers, and that, according to some, he even proclaimed him emperor on the spot.]
