Numerian

Numerian (Template:Langx;Template:Sfn died November 284) was Roman emperor from 283 to 284 with his older brother Carinus. They were sons of Carus, a general raised to the office of praetorian prefect under Emperor Probus in 282.<ref name="Leadbetter, Carus.">Leadbetter, "Carus."</ref>

Early life and Carus' reign

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Numerian was the younger son of Carus.<ref name="Leadbetter, Carus.">Leadbetter, "Carus."</ref> In 282, the legions of the upper Danube in Raetia and Noricum proclaimed as emperor Numerian's father, the praetorian prefect Marcus Aurelius Carus, after a mutiny against the emperor Probus, in which the latter was killed.<ref>Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 4; Leadbetter, "Carus"; Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, p. 39; Southern, Severus to Constantine, p. 132; Williams, Diocletian, p. 32.</ref> By one account, Carus had himself rebelled against the emperor, and Probus' army, stationed in Sirmium (Sremska Mitrovica, Serbia), decided they did not wish to fight Carus and assassinated their emperor instead.<ref>Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 4; Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, p. 39; Southern, Severus to Constantine, p. 132.</ref> According to the Historia Augusta, Carus was not responsible for Probus's death, and inflicted severe punishment upon the murderers.<ref>Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (The Modern Library, 1932), ch. XII., pp. 291, 292</ref> Carus, already sixty, wished to establish a dynasty<ref>Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, p. 39; Southern, Severus to Constantine, p. 132; Williams, Diocletian, p. 32.</ref> and immediately elevated Carinus and Numerian to the rank of Caesar.<ref>Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 4; Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, p. 39; Williams, Diocletian, p. 32.</ref>

In 283, Carus left Carinus in charge of the West and moved with Numerian and his praetorian prefect Arrius Aper to the East to wage war against the Sassanid Empire. The Sassanids had been embroiled in a succession dispute since the death of Shapur and were in no position to oppose Carus' advance.<ref>Leadbetter, "Carus"; Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, p. 39.</ref><ref>Gibbon, pp. 294, 295</ref>

According to Zonaras, Eutropius, and Festus, Carus won a major victory against the Persians, taking Seleucia and the Sassanid capital of Ctesiphon (near modern Al-Mada'in, Iraq), cities on opposite banks of the Tigris.<ref>Zonaras, 12.30; Eutropius, 9.14.1; Festus, 24; Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 4; Leadbetter, "Carus"; Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, p. 39; Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay, p. 279; Williams, Diocletian, p. 33.</ref> In celebration, Numerian, Carus, and Carinus all took the title Persici maximi.<ref>Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 4; Leadbetter, "Carus."</ref> Carus died in July or early August of 283,<ref name="Leadbetter, Carus."/> allegedly due to a strike of lightning.<ref>Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 4; Leadbetter, "Carus"; Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, p. 39; Southern, Severus to Constantine, p. 133; Williams, Diocletian, pp. 33–34.</ref>

Numerian and Carinus as Augusti

The death of Carus left Numerian and Carinus as the new Augusti. Carinus quickly made his way to Rome from Gaul, arriving in January 284, while Numerian lingered in the East.<ref name="BNSCE4">Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 4.</ref> The Roman retreat from Persia was orderly and unopposed, for the Persian King, Bahram II, was still struggling to establish his authority.<ref name="SSC133">Southern, Severus to Constantine, p. 133.</ref>

By March 284, Numerian had only reached Emesa (Homs) in Syria; by November, only Asia Minor.<ref>Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 4; Leadbetter, "Numerianus."</ref> In Emesa he was apparently still alive and in good health, as he issued the only extant rescript in his name there.<ref>Codex Justinianeus 5.52.2; Leadbetter, "Numerianus"; Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay, p. 279.</ref> Coins were issued in his name in Cyzicus at some time before the end of 284, but it is impossible to know whether he was still in the public eye by that point.<ref>Roman Imperial Coinage 5.2 Numerian no. 462; Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay, pp. 279–80).</ref>

After Emesa, Numerian's staff, including the prefect Aper, reported that Numerian suffered from an inflammation of the eyes and had to travel in a closed coach.<ref>Leadbetter, "Numerianus."</ref> When the army reached Bithynia,<ref name="BNSCE4"/> or Thrace,<ref name="Gibbon, p. 301">Gibbon, p. 301</ref> some of Numerian's soldiers smelled an odor reminiscent of a decaying corpse emanating from the coach.<ref name="SSC133"/> They opened its curtains and found Numerian dead.<ref>Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 4; Leadbetter, "Numerianus"; Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, p. 39; Williams, Diocletian, p. 35.</ref>

After Numerian's death

Aper officially broke the news of Numerian's death in Nicomedia (İzmit) in November 284,<ref name = "P280"/> and the discovery, which the prefect attempted to conceal, as due to the forwardness of the soldiery, who forced open the Imperial tent to investigate for themselves the situation of their invisible monarch.<ref name="Gibbon, p. 301"/> Numerian's generals and tribunes called a council for the succession, which met at Chalcedon across the Bosphorus, where they chose as emperor Diocletian, commander of the cavalry arm of the imperial bodyguard,<ref>Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 4; Barnes, New Empire, p. 31; Bowman, "Diocletian", p. 68; Mathisen, "Diocletian"; Williams, Diocletian, p. 33, 35-36.</ref> despite Aper's attempts to garner support.<ref name="P280">Potter, The Roman Empire at Bay, p. 280.</ref> The army of the east unanimously saluted their new Augustus. Diocletian accepted the purple imperial vestments and raised his sword to the light of the sun, swearing an oath denying responsibility for Numerian's death. He asserted that Aper had killed Numerian and concealed the deed. In full view of the army, Diocletian then turned and killed Aper, who had been hauled bound before the assembly.<ref>Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, pp. 4–5; Leadbetter, "Numerian"; Odahl, Constantine and the Christian Empire, pp. 39–40; Williams, Diocletian, p. 37.</ref>

Character

According to the Historia Augusta, Numerian was a man of considerable literary attainments, remarkably amiable, and known as a great orator and poet. Allegedly, the Senate raised him a statue, inscribed To the most powerful of orators.<ref>Gibbon, p. 300</ref>

References

Primary sources

• Aurelius Victor, Epitome de Caesaribus
• Eutropius, Template:Usurped
• Historia Augusta, Life of Carus, Carinus and Numerian
• Joannes Zonaras, Compendium of History extract: Zonaras: Alexander Severus to Diocletian: 222–284

Secondary sources

• Barnes, Timothy D. Constantine and Eusebius. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1981. Template:ISBN
• Barnes, Timothy D. The New Empire of Diocletian and Constantine. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1982. Template:ISBN
• Bowman, Alan K. "Diocletian and the First Tetrarchy." In The Cambridge Ancient History, Volume XII: The Crisis of Empire, edited by Alan Bowman, Averil Cameron, and Peter Garnsey, 67–89. Cambridge University Press, 2005. Template:ISBN
• Template:Cite book
• Leadbetter, William. "Carus (282–283 A.D.)." De Imperatoribus Romanis (2001a). Accessed 16 February 2008.
• Leadbetter, William. "Numerianus (283–284 A.D.)." De Imperatoribus Romanis (2001b). Accessed 16 February 2008.
• Leadbetter, William. "Carinus (283–285 A.D.)." De Imperatoribus Romanis (2001c). Accessed 16 February 2008.
• Mathisen, Ralph W. "Diocletian (284–305 A.D.)." De Imperatoribus Romanis (1997). Accessed 16 February 2008.
• Potter, David S. The Roman Empire at Bay: AD 180–395. New York: Routledge, 2005. Hardcover Template:ISBN Paperback Template:ISBN
• Southern, Pat. The Roman Empire from Severus to Constantine. New York: Routledge, 2001. Template:ISBN
• Williams, Stephen. Diocletian and the Roman Recovery. New York: Routledge, 1997. Template:ISBN

External links

• Leadbetter, William. "Numerianus (283–284 A.D.)", DIR (2001).