The greater part of 373 he spent in Italy, in which year the two emperors enjoyed their fourth consulship. In 374 he was again at Treves, his favourite residence. Here he heard of the Quadi invading Illyricum, and secured the friendship of Macrianus, king of the Alemanni. Quitting Treves in 375 he marched towards Illyricum, leaving Gratian behind. He died very suddenly on the 7th of November, 375, at Bregitis, after a reign of twelve years. His body was carried to Constantinople and interred there. The character of this emperor is not easily drawn with impartiality. He patronized the orthodox christian faith, but meddled little with religious disputes. Tolerant in some respects, he was cruel and intolerant in others. Though he did not persecute Arians or heathens, he was severe against Manicheans, Donatists, and others. His natural disposition does not seem to have been cruel, yet he committed many acts of undue severity. His character was pure and moral; he had good natural abilities, judgment, and discrimination, but no culture or learning. His reign was on the whole beneficial.—S. D.
VALENTINIAN II., Emperor, son of Valentinian I. At the age of four or five he was proclaimed emperor when his father died, though Gratian his brother was seventeen. The two brothers divided the West between them. Valentinian had Italy, Illyricum, and Africa; Gratian had Gaul, Spain, and Britain. But Gratian was really emperor till he was murdered at Lyons in 383. Valentinian II. resided chiefly at Milan; and his mother Justina, acting in his name, was somewhat intolerant, for she persecuted the catholic christians. When Maximus, who had usurped Gratian's title, marched towards Milan, 387, Valentinian and his mother fled to the Adriatic, and crossed to Thessalonica. But Theodosius defeated Maximus in 388. In 389 Valentinian went to Gaul, to proceed against the Franks on the Rhine. In 391 he left Treves for Italy in order to go to Milan. At Vienne Bishop Ambrose baptized him. He was strangled by order of Arbogast, who commanded the troops, and had been deprived of his military rank by the emperor, who did not like to be governed by him, on the 15th May, 392. His body was interred at Milan. Valentinian II. was too young to leave his stamp on the age for good or evil. Theodosius had the greatest influence over him.—S. D.
VALENTINIAN III., Emperor, was son of Constantius III., and was only five or six years old when he received the title of Cæsar at Thessalonica by order of Theodosius. The early part of his reign was disturbed by the usurper Joannes, who sent his general, Ætius, to get the aid of the Huns. But Theodosius II. sent Ardaburius and his son Aspar against the usurper, who was put to death at Aquileia. In 425 Valentinian received from Theodosius the title of Augustus, and his mother Placidia that of Augusta. In 435 he made peace with Genseric; but the Bagaudæ raised disturbances in Gaul. The Goths also invaded the western empire. In 437 Valentinian married Eudocia, daughter of Theodosius, and usually resided after this in Ravenna, leaving his generals to fight against the enemies of the empire—the Franks, Huns, and Vandals—who were gradually acquiring greater power, ravaging many countries, and taking possession of new territories. In 442 the emperor concluded a peace with the Vandals, and in 446 the Romans abandoned Britain. In 452 Attila invaded Italy and spread consternation over it; and Pope Leo was sent to beg for peace. In 454 Ætius, the general who had bravely fought the emperor's battles and withstood the formidable enemies of the empire, was basely murdered by Valentinian. Increasing power had rendered this general imperious and overbearing; he was inflamed by ambition, and urged the marriage of his son with the emperor's daughter, a request which cost him his life, and led also to the assassination of his friends. In consequence of the indignity offered by Valentinian to the wife of Petronius Maximus, the latter planned the death of the tyrant, which was effected in 455. Valentinian III. had no redeeming virtues in his character. He was effeminate, cruel, weak, but zealous for the catholic faith; Jews, heathens, Manicheans, and other heretics, being harshly treated in his constitutions.—S. D.
VALENTINUS, one of the Hellenistic gnostics of the second century, was born in Egypt, whence he went to Rome about 140. He there disseminated his heretical sentiments, having left the church because he had been disappointed of a bishopric. He died in Cyprus about 160. His scheme of the universe is very fanciful, partaking largely of Platonic ideas mixed up with others founded on scripture. Æons, the Demiurge, the Pleroma, &c., play a principal part in it. The Valentinian sect of the gnostics was the most influential of all; and continued, with some modifications, to exist till the fourth century.—S. D.
VALERE, Luke, a learned mathematician, called by Galileo the Archimedes of his age, was professor of geometry in the college of Rome. He wrote a book, "De centro gravitatis solidorum," which was printed in 1606; and another, "De Quadratura parabolæ per simplex falsum." He died in the house of the learned Sarrachia, with whom he had lodged all the time of his stay at Rome.—R. M., A.
VALERIA, Galeria, was a daughter of Diocletian and Prisca. On the reconstruction of the empire in 292, she married Galerius, one of the new Cæsars. After his death she was banished along with her mother and Candidianus, an illegitimate son of her husband's, for rejecting the hand of Maximinus. Diocletian interceded in vain on her behalf. On the death of her persecutor they repaired to the court of Licinius at Nicomedia, to whose care Valeria had been left by her husband. But they were soon forced, after witnessing the murder of Candidianus, to seek safety in flight. They wandered about for some time in a mean disguise, and were at length, in 315, discovered and put to death at Thessalonica. Having been the first persons whom Diocletian obliged to sacrifice to the pagan deities, some writers have conjectured that Valeria and Prisca may have been christians.—R. M., A.
VALERIANO, Giovanni Pierio (Pierius Valerianus), of the Bolzani family, author, born at Belluno in the Venetian states, 1477; died in Padua, 25th December, 1558. He has left a work on Egyptian hieroglyphics, in fifty-eight books; a treatise, "De infelicitate literatorum;" "Pro sacerdotum barbâ apologia;" "Antiquitates Bellunenses;" some lessons on Virgil; and some Latin poems.—C. G. R.
VALERIANUS, Publius Licinius, Emperor of Rome from 253 to 260, was of noble birth. He was early advanced to high public honours, and on the revival of the censorship by Decius he was chosen by the unanimous voice of the people to fill that office. Under the Emperor Gallus he commanded the army which was destined to oppose the insurrection of Æmilianus, but the death of both the emperor and the insurgent leader prevented any encounter between the two armies. Valerianus was proclaimed emperor by the troops in Rhætia, and his election was confirmed at Rome. He immediately took measures to oppose the hitherto victorious advance of the Persians, who were threatening under their king, Sapor, to expel the Romans from the East. At first Valerianus was successful; he regained possession of Antioch, which had been taken by the enemy, and drove the Persians across the Euphrates. But his good fortune deserted him when he attempted to penetrate beyond that river. He found himself surrounded with enemies far exceeding his army in numbers, and was at length taken prisoner while holding a conference with the Persian king. He was cruelly treated by the Persians during the rest of his life.—D. M.
VALERINI, Adriano, an Italian poet of the sixteenth century, was born at Verona. His collection of madrigals, one hundred in number, was published at Verona in 1572. Besides these he was author of a tragedy on the subject of Aphrodite, and of the "Bellezze di Verona," a composition occasioned by the death of a celebrated comedienne.—R. M., A.
VALERIUS, Cornelius, was born, according to some biographical writers, at Oudenwater (but if we may believe his epitaph he was a native of Utrecht) in 1512. He studied at Louvain, where afterwards (1557) he succeeded Peter Nannius as professor of Greek and polite literature. He was a very celebrated teacher. Among his pupils were Justus Lipsius, Canterus, Carrion, Giselinus, Schott, Delrio, Gifanius, and other famous scholars and critics. He died at Louvain in 1578. Valerius was a man of encyclopædic knowledge. He was author of "Tables of Rhetoric and Dialectic," Basle, 1545; "Four Books on Grammar," Paris, 1550; "Oratio funebris in obitum Petri Nannii," Louvain, 1557; "Oratio funebris in obitum Jacobi à Meloduno," Louvain, 1560; "Elementa Philosophiæ Moralis," Basle, 1566, and Antwerp, 1572; "Elementa Physices," Anvers, 1568, 1584, and 1595; "Animadversiones in Officia Ciceronis, cum notis Canteri et Cauchii," 1576; "De Prosodia," Jena, 1580; "Elementa Astronomiæ et Geographiæ," Anvers, 1593; "Colloquia Gallica Noëlis Barlemontii Latine reddita;" "Animadversiones in Lucretium," in the edition of that poet published by Gifanius at Anvers in 1566, &c.—R. M., A.
