"his anger, or to mitigate the pride, which always rifes in CHA P. "proportion to our fubmiffion?" They informed him that XxxvI. Epiphanius, bishop of Pavia (104), united the wisdom of the ferpent with the innocence of the dove; and appeared confident, that the eloquence of fuch an ambassador must prevail against the strongest opposition, either of intereft or paffion. Their recommendation was approved; and Epiphanius, affuming the benevolent office of mediation, proceeded without delay to Rome, where he was received with the honours due to his merit and reputation. The oration of a bishop in favour of peace, may be easily supposed: he argued, that, in all poffible circumftances, the forgiveness of injuries must be an act of mercy, or magnanimity, or prudence; and he seriously admonished the emperor to avoid a contest with a fierce Barbarian, which might be fatal to himself, and must be ruinous to his dominions. Anthemius acknowledged the truth of his maxims; but he deeply felt, with grief and indignation, the behaviour of Ricimer; and his paffion gave eloquence and energy to his difcourfe. "What favours," he warmly exclaimed, " have we refused to this ungrateful 66 man ? What provocations have we not endured? Re"gardless of the majefty of the purple, I gave my daughter "to a Goth; I facrificed my own blood to the fafety of the "republic. The liberality which ought to have fecured the "eternal attachment of Ricimer, has exafperated him against "his benefactor. What wars has he not excited against the "empire? How often has he inftigated and affifted the fury "of hoftile nations? Shall I now accept his perfidious friend"fhip? Can I hope that he will refpect the engagements of a "treaty, who has already violated the duties of a fon ?" But the anger of Anthemius evaporated in these paffionate exclamations: he infenfibly yielded to the proposals of Epiphanius; and the bishop returned to his diocese with the fatisfaction of restoring the peace of Italy, by a reconciliation (105),

of

this appellation to Anthemius himself. The emperor was probably born in the province of Galatia, whofe inhabitants, the Gallo-Grecians, were fuppofed to unite the vices of a favage, and a corrupted, people.

(104) Epiphanius was thirty years bishop of Pavia (A. D. 467-497; see Tillemont, Mem. Ecclef. tom. xvi. p. 788.). His name and actions would have been unknown to pofterity, if Ennodius, one of his fucceffors, had not written his life (Sirmond, Opera, tom. i. p. 1647-1692.); in which he reprefents him as one of the greatest characters of the age.

(105) Ennodius (p. 1659—1664.) has related this embassy of Epiphanius; and his narrative, verbofe and turgid as it nut appear, illuftrates fome curious paffages in the fall of the Weftern empire.

CHA P. of which the fincerity and continuance might be reasonably XXXVI. suspected. The clemency of the emperor was extorted from w his weakness; and Ricimer fufpended his ambitious designs

Olybrius

the Weft,

till he had fecretly prepared the engines, with which he refolved to fubvert the throne of Anthemius. The mafk of peace and moderation was then thrown afide. The army of Ricimer was fortified by a numerous reinforcement of Burgundians and Oriental Suevi: he difclaimed all allegiance to the Greek emperor, marched from Milan to the gates of Rome, and fixing his camp on the banks of the Anio, impatiently expected the arrival of Olybrius, his Imperial candidate.

The fenator Olybrius, of the Anician family, might efemperor of teem himself the lawful heir of the Western empire. He A. D. 472, had married Placidia, the younger daughter of Valentinian, March 23. after he was restored by Genferie; who ftill detained her

fifter Eudoxia, as the wife, or rather as the captive, of his fon. The king of the Vandals fupported, by threats and folicitations, the fair pretenfions of his Roman ally; and affigned, as one of the motives of the war, the refufal of the fenate and people to acknowledge their lawful prince, and the unworthy preference which they had given to a ftranger (106)! The friendship of the public enemy might render Olybrius ftill more unpopular to the Indians; but when Ricimer meditated the ruin of the emperor Anthemius, he tempted with the offer of a diadem the candidate who could justify his rebellion by an illuftrious name, and a royal alliance. The husband of Placidia, who, like moft of his ancestors, had been invefted with the confular dignity, might have continued to enjoy a fecure and fplendid fortune in the peaceful refidence of Conftantinople; nor does he appear to have been tormented by fuch a genius, as cannot be amused or occupied, unless by the administration of an empire. Yet Olybrius yielded to the importunities of his friends, perhaps of his wife; rafhly plunged into the dangers and calamities of a civil war; and with the fecret connivance of the emperor Leo, accepted the Italian purple, which was bestowed, and refumed, at the capricious will of a Barbarian. He landed without obftacle (for Genferic was master of the sea) either at Ravenna or the port of Oftia, and immediately proceeded

to

(106) Prifcus Excerpt. Legation. p. 74. Procopius de Bell. Vandal. I i, c. 6. p. 191. Eudoxia and her daughter were reftored after the death of Majorian. Perhaps the confulfhip of Olybrius (A. D, 464.) was bestowed as a nuptial prefent.

to the camp of Ricimer, where he was received as the fove-C HA P. reign of the Western world (107).

XXXVI.

Sack of

The patrician, who had extended his pofts from the Anio to the Milvian bridge, already poffeffed two quarters of Rome, Rome, and the Vatican and the Janiculum, which are separated by the death of Tyber from the reft of the city (108); and it may be con- Anthemius, jectured, that an affembly of feceding fenators imitated, in A. D. 472, july 11. the choice of Olybrius, the forms of a legal election. But the body of the fenate and people firmly adhered to the cause of Anthemius; and the more effectual fupport of a Gothic army enabled him to prolong his reign, and the public diftrefs, by a refiftance of three months, which produced the concomitant evils of famine and peftilence. At length, Ricimer made a furious affault on the bridge of Hadrian, or St. Angelo; and the narrow pass was defended with equal valour by the Goths, till the death of Gilimer their leader. The victorious troops, breaking down every barrier, rushed with irresistible violence into the heart of the city, and Rome (if we may use the language of a contemporary Pope) was fubverted by the civil fury of Anthemius and Ricimer (109). The unfortunate Anthemius was dragged from his concealment, and inhumanly maffacred by the command of his fonin-law; who thus added a third, or perhaps a fourth, emperor to the number of his victims. The foldiers, who united the rage of factious citizens with the favage manners of Barbarians, were indulged, without controul, in the licence of rapine and murder: the crowd of flaves and plebeians, who were unconcerned in the event, could only gain by the VOL. III. E e indifcriminate

(107) The hoftile appearance of Olybrius is fixed (notwithstanding the opinion of Pagi) by the duration of his reign. The fecret connivance of Leo is acknowledged by Theophanes, and the Pafchal Chronicle. We are ignorant of his motives: but, in this obfcure period, our ignorance extends to the most public and important facts.

(108) Of the fourteen regions, or quarters, into which Rome was divid ed by Auguftus, only one, the Janiculum, lay on the Tufcan fide of the Tyber. But, in the fifth century, the Vatican fuburb formed a confiderable city; and in the ecclefiaftical distribution, which had been recently made by Simplicius, the reigning pope, two of the seven regions, or parishes, of Rome, depended on the church of St. Peter. See Nardini Roma Antica, p. 67. It would require a tedious differtation to mark the circumftances in which I am inclined to depart from the topography of that learned Roman.

(109) Nuper Anthemii et Risimeris civili furore fubverfa eft. Gelafius in Epift. ad Andromach. apud Baron. A. D. 496, N° 42. Sigonius (tom, i 1. xiv. de Occidentali Imperio, p. 542, 543.) and Muratori (Annali d'Italia, tom. iv. p. 308, 309.), with the aid of a lefs imperfect MS. of the Hiftoria Mifcella, have illuftrated this dark and bloody transaction,

CHA P. indiscriminate pillage; and the face of the city exhibited the XXXVI. ftrange centraft of ftern cruelty, and diffolute intemperance (110) Forty days after this calamitous event, the fubject, Death Ricimer, not of glory, but of guilt, Italy was delivered, by a painful August 20, disease, from the tyrant Ricimer, who bequeathed the com mand of his army to his nephew Gundobald, one of the princes of the Burgundians. In the fame year, all the prin cipal actors in this great revolution, were removed from the and of Oly-stage; and the whole reign of Olybrius, whofe death does not betray any symptoms of violence, is included within the term of feven months. He left one daughter, the offspring of his marriage with Placidia; and the family of the great Theodofius, tranfplanted from Spain to Conftantinople, was propagated in the female line as far as the eighth generation (111).

brius, October 23.

Julius Nepos and Glycerius

-475.

Whilft the vacant throne of Italy was abandoned to lawless Barbarians (112), the election of a new colleague was feriemperors oufly agitated in the council of Leo. The emprefs Verina, of the Weft, ftudious to promote the greatness of her own family, had A. D. 472 married one of her nieces to Julius Nepos, who fucceeded his uncle Marcellinus in the fovereignty of Dalmatia, a more folid poffeffion than the title which he was perfuaded to accept, of Emperor of the Weft. But the measures of the Byzantine court were fo languid and irrefolute, that many months elapfed after the death of Anthemius, and even of Olybrius, before their destined fucceffor could fhew himself, with a refpectable force, to his Italian fubjects. During that interval, Glycerius, an obfcure foldier, was invested with the purple by his patron Gundobald; but the Burgundian prince was unable, or unwilling, to fupport his nomination by a civil war : the pursuits of domestic ambition recalled him be

yond

(110) Such had been the, fæva ac deformis urbe totâ facies, when Rome was affaulted and ftormed by the troops of Vefpafian (fee Tacit. Hift. iii. 82, 83.); and every cause of mifchief had fince acquired much additional energy. The revolution of ages may bring round the fame calamities; but ages may revolve, without producing a Tacitus to describe them.

(111) See Ducange, Familie Byzantin. p. 74, 75. Areobindus, whỏ appears to have married the niece of the emperor Juftinian, was the eighth defcendant of the elder Theodofius.

(112) The last revolutions of the Western empire are faintly marked in Theophanes (p. 102.), Jornandes (c. 45. p. 679.), the Chronicle of Marcellinus, and the Fragments of an anonymous writer, published by Valefius at the end of Ammianus (p. 716, 717.). If Photius had not been so wretchedly concife, we should derive much information from the contemporary hiftories of Malchus and Candidus. See his Extracts, p. 172-179.

yond the Alps (113), and his client was permitted to exchange C H A P. the Roman fceptre for the bishopric of Salona. After extin- XXXVI. guifhing fuch a competitor, the emperor Nepos was acknowledged by the fenate, by the Italians, and by the provincials of Gaul; his moral virtues, and military talents, were loudly celebrated; and those who derived any private benefit from his government, announced, in prophetic strains, the restoration of the public felicity (114). Their hopes (if fuch hopes had been entertained) were confounded within the term of a fingle year; and the treaty of peace, which ceded Auvergne to the Vifigoths, is the only event of his short and inglorious reign. The most faithful subjects of Gaul were facrificed, by the Italian emperor, to the hope of domeftic fecurity (115); but his repofe was foon invaded by a furious fedition of the Barbarian confederates, who, under the command of Oreftes, their general, were in full march from Rome to Ravenna. Nepos trembled at their approach; and, instead of placing a just confidence in the strength of Ravenna, he haftily escaped to his fhips, and retired to his Dalmatian principality, on the oppofite coaft of the Hadriatic. By this fhameful abdication, he protracted his life about five years, in a very ambiguous ftate, between an emperor and an exile, till he was affaffinated at Salona by the ungrateful Glycerius, who was tranflated, perhaps as the reward of his crime, to the archbishopric of Milan (116).

tes,

The nations, who had afferted their independence after The patri the death of Attila, were established, by the right of poffef- cian Oreffion or conqueft, in the boundless countries to the north of A. D. 475. the Danube; or in the Roman provinces between the river and the Alps. But the braveft of their youth enlisted in the E e 2 army

(113) See Greg. Turon. 1. ii. c. 28, in tom. ii. p. 175. Dubos, Hift. Critique, tom. i. p. 613. By the murder, or death, of his two brothers, Gundobald acquired the fole possession of the kingdom of Burgundy, whose ruin was haftened by their discord.

(114) Julius Nepos armis pariter fummus Auguftus ac moribus. Sidonius, 1. v. ep. 16. p. 146. Nepos had given to Ecdicius the title of Patrician, which Anthemius had promised, decefforis Anthemei fidem abfolvit. See 1. viii. ep. 7. p. 224.

(115) Epiphanius was fent ambaffador from Nepos to the Vifigoths, for the purpose of afcertaining the fines Imperii Italici (Ennodius in Sirmond, tom. i. p. 1665-1669.). His pathetic difcourfe concealed the disgraceful fecret, which foon excited the just and bitter complaints of the bishop of Clermont.

(116) Malchus, apud Phot. p. 172. Ennod. Epigram, lxxxii, in Sirmond Oper. tom. i. p. 1879. Some doubt may however be raised on the identity of the emperor and the archbishop.