sought in vain for a diadem, as the badge of that highest imperatorial office, (so Ammianus Marcellinus tells the story,)' and when he had declined assuming his wife's head-band for a substitute, as being an ornament womanly and ill-omened, a military officer's honorary collar of merit, studded with gold-set stones, was taken and placed on his head; that he might thus wear the semblance at least of that emblem of the Augustan dignity.2 Soon afterwards he assumed a proper diadem, ambitiously set with pearls and brilliants.3 And, says Philostorgius,4 as he had been previously five years ev σxμATI Kaiapos, in the inferior Cæsarean office and habit, he lived two years and a half afterwards ev diadquaтı: i. e. in the state of imperial supremacy symbolized by the diadem.

All this, as I said, is admitted. But the questions remain ;-Had this distinction of symbols been introduced by Diocletian, on his original institution of the new form of government, under Augusti and Cæsars? Had the diadem been at all assumed by that time as a Roman imperatorial badge? Or, if first subsequently adopted by Constantine, then at what time of his reign? Before his first public act of profession of Christianity, or after it? before or after that conflict with Maximin, immediately following after Constantine's profession of Christianity, which I have supposed to be the event symbolized by the figuration of the woman and diademed Dragon in Apoc. xii? On these points different opinions have been held : and, with a view to a satisfactory judgment on them, it may be well to consider the evidence with reference separately to the times before Diocletian, those under Diocletian, and those immediately after him at the commencement of the reign of Constantine.

the same in his Ep. ad Athen. that he wrote Constantius the report of this his elevation in the name of Cæsar, not Augustus, with a view to conciliate him. Further Zosimus says that Julian declared to Constantius that he was ready, on his requiring it, TMŋy 1 xx. 4. το Καίσαρος εχειν αξίαν, αποθεις το διάδημα. So Spanheim.

2 "Uti coronatus speciem saltem obscuram superioris prætenderet potestatis." Amm. Marc. ib. It was the torques or collar of a draconarius,a dragon standard-bearer that was taken. Zonaras gives a precisely similar report: describing the collar at the same time more fully thus ; επει χρυσιον τις των ταξιαρχων εφορεί τρεπτον λίθες ἔχοντα χρυσοδετες.

8 So Ammianus xxi. 1; "Quinquennalia Augustus jam edidit: et ambitioso diademate utebatur, lapidum fulgore distincto; cum inter exordia principatus assumpti vili coronâ circumdatus erat."

4 Hist. Eccles. vii. 15.

1. As to the first æra enquired into, (passing over the case of Heliogabalus, whose wearing of a diadem is mentioned by Herodian as not his imperial, but his previous pontifical badge, viz. as Priest to the Sun,) Aurelian (A. D. 270-275) is the earliest Roman Emperor, whose assumption of it is directly asserted in history. Says the younger Victor of him; "He first among the Romans wreathed his head with a diadem, and used precious stones, and a gold-embroidered robe : "2 and so too Jornandes, with a slight addition of detail; "He first adorned his robes and shoes with precious stones, and his head with a diadem.” 3 An illustrative medal is given by Tristanus, exhibiting Aurelian diademed on its face, and on the reverse Vaballathus, an oriental Prince allied with, or who had submitted to him; 4 but whether unquestionably authentic, or not, I have not the means of ascertaining. There is also a diademed medal of him, says Rasche,5 (whether this same or another,) among the "Numi Ducis Arschotani." At any rate there exist many well-known medals of his, inscribed "Deo et Domino nostro Aureliano: "6 the memorials of his assumption to himself of the lordly and divine titles of oriental despotism; and consequently, pro tanto, giving support to the historic assertion of his having assumed the diadem and the dress characteristic of oriental Princes.

2. Turning to Diocletian, who succeeded to the Empire A.D. 285, only ten years after Aurelian, and who, with a view to the carrying out of his new constitution for the Roman Empire, took the first step at once in 286, by the appointment of Maximian as joint

1 Herodian (Β. v.) calls it σεφανον λιθων πολυτελων χροια διηνθισμένον ; and again, εις είδος τιαρης σεφανην χρυσω και λιθοις ποικίλην τιμιοις. It was not however properly a diadem; says Cuper on Lactant. M. P. xix. Patinus, p. 329, gives a medal representing this emperor sacrificing, with the inscription, sacerd. dei.

SOLIS. ELAGAB.

2 "Iste primus (sc. Aurelianus) apud Romanos diadema capiti innexuit, gemmisque et auratâ omni veste, quod adhuc fere incognitum Romanis moribus videbatur, usus est." Epitome.

3 "Is primus gemmas vestibus calceamentisque inseruit, diademataque in capite.” * See Spanheim's notice of this medal, ubi suprà; and Cuper's on Lactantius M. P. xix. p. 461. He refers to Tristanus iii. 211, for the medal. I speak doubtfully of it, because Patinus, p. 430, gives a similar medal, but with the Aurelian's head laurelled.

5 On the word Diadema.

6 See Eckhel viii, 365.

Augustus with himself, and in 292 completed it by that of Constantius and Galerius as the two Cæsars,-I do not find any direct historical statement as to his making the diadem the badge of the Augusti, the laurel of the Cæsars; or any indeed as to his having himself worn the diadem. But by both Eutropius and Jerome the fact is asserted of his having, as an imperial insigne, adorned his robes and shoes with gems, (the diadem's proper accompaniment,) just like Aurelian: and so too says the Author of the Evvaywyn '15wpy edited by Scaliger; assigning the date of his first so doing to the year 292, after Galerius' return from his victory over Narses, laden with precious gems as a part of the Persian spoils.2 In some of his extant medals, too, gems alternate with the laurel on his crown: 3 though on other and most of his medals the laurel appears simply and alone. Moreover it is clear from the nearly cotemporary Treatise ascribed to Lactantius, De Mortibus Persecutorum, as well as from other good evidence, that as the laurel had not been yet set aside, so the purple was also retained; indeed that this latter was in public a chief ensign of both the Augustan and the Cæsarean imperial dignity. So much as to Diocletian. With regard to his

1 "Diocletianus imperio Romano primus regiæ consuetudinis formam, magis quàm Romanæ libertatis, invexit; adorarique se jussit, cùm ante eum cuncti salutarentur; ornamentaque gemmarum vestibus calceamentisque addidit. Nam prius imperii insigne in chlamyde purpureâ tantùm erat; reliqua communia." So Eutropius ix. 26 and similarly Jerome in Chron. "Primus Diocletianus adorari se ut Deum, et gemmas vestibus calceamentisque inseri jussit; cùm ante eum omnes Imperatores more judicum salutarentur, et chlamydem purpuream à privato habitu plus haberent.” Victor too notices his introduction of the ceremony of adoration.-Lactantius, M. P. xviii, represents Diocletian to have objected to Maxentius (Maximian's son) that he was too proud to adore his father.

2 So Cuper on Lactant. M. P. ix. Η Auctor Συναγωγης Ιςωριων à Scaligero editus p. 395 narrat eum (Galerium) reversum fuisse Baλartia weñλnpwμeva exovтa λιθων τιμίων και μαργαρίτων: Diocletianumque tunc primum veste et calceis λίθοις τιμίοις και χρυσω κεκισμημένοις usum esse ; et eundem jussisse ut, spreto salutandi veteri more, adoraretur." He adds; "Sed Eusebius initium hujus moris refert ad ann. 295; victum vero Narsetem ad ann. 303."

3 "Cum coronâ ex lauro et gemmis, in auro, apud Banduri." So Eckhel viii. 5. I may observe that in medals of some of the Emperors following, as of Constans for example, (see Patinus 471,) the jewels which alternate with the laurel are so abundant, that it seems almost doubtful whether the imperial head-band might not be called a diadem, as well as a laurel crown.

▲ Lactantius M. P. ch. xix, speaks of Diocletian giving his own robe of purple to Maximin, on making him Cæsar: this showing, as the commentators observe, that the purple was the ensign of both the Augustan and the Cæsarean dignity. So

1

co-Augustus Maximian, there occurs in the Panegyric pronounced before him by the orator Mamertinus at Treves, in the year 289, the following allusive notice of his imperial insignia and pomp: "Your triumphal trabeæ, and consular fasces, and curule chairs, and splendid retinue of attendants, and that brilliant circle of light which surrounds your divine head, are but the fair and most august ornaments of your merit." A really remarkable sentence to our point and in which the brilliant circle of light (which cannot of course be meant of the lack-lustre laurel crown) may most fitly and naturally be explained of the diadem and its brilliants; SO as it is in fact explained by the learned Valesius.2 It is however a passage not quite decisive: as the language may also possibly be understood of the golden radiated crown, worn not infrequently by the Emperors at that time, so as Arndtzenius explains it; 3 though not I think of the nimbus, so as Eckhel suggests, somewhat inconsistently with himself.4 I say possibly understood of the radiated crown; not probably. For the word "augustissima," most august, makes it almost necessary that one at least of the insignia mentioned should be properly Augustan.5 This the circlet of light alone can be and so only if explained of the diadem; for the radiated crown was common to the Cæsars.-Yet once more, passing to Constantius and Galerius, (the two Cæsars till Diocletian's and Maximian's abdication in 304, then the two Augusti,) we find restoo ch. xxv. And in the cotemporary Panegyrics other examples occur; e. g. in that of Eumenius to Constantine, ch. viii. In ch. xxv. of the M. P. Constantine is said to have sent his laureata imago to Galerius, to apprise him of his elevation to the imperial dignity, (that of Cæsar, as it appears,) on his father's death.-Constantine seems to have united the purple with the diadem. For his wearing of the diadem was, we are told, customary with him: and in his Panegyric Eusebius speaks of his other dress thus ; τῳ της αμπεχονης εξαιρετῳ περιβλημματι δαιφαίνων, και την πρέπεσαν αυτῷ αλεργίδα βασιλικήν μονος επαξίως εμπεριειλημμένος.

"Trabeæ vestræ triumphales, et fasces consulares, et sellæ curules, et hæc obsequiorum stipatio et fulgor, et illa lux divinum verticem claro orbe complectens, vestrorum sunt ornamenta meritorum pulcherrima et augustissima." ch. 3.

2 Valesius thus explains it, in commenting on Ammianus Marcellinus' notice (xxi. 1) of Julian's diadem, " lapidum fulgore distincto." 3 Ad loc.

4 In Vol. viii. p. 503 he says; " Forte et nimbus est illud capitis ornamentum quod inter alia, tanquam Augustis proprium, sic describit Mamartinus; Illa lux, &c.' At p. 504 he speaks of the "nimbus purus," (the same, I suppose, that he meant at p. 503,) as first appearing on a gold coin of Constantine.

5 The reader will observe Eckhel's "tanquam Augustis proprium;" showing that he understands the augustissima as I do.

pecting the former the following very important statement made by Eusebius :-" Having been distinguished at the first by the diadem of the imperial Cæsars, and in that had his merit tested, he was afterwards adorned with the honor of the highest in rule among the Romans: " i. e. of the Augusti. A statement, says Spanheim, distinctly ascribing the diadem to Constantius, even when Cæsar : 2 and which implies a higher distinctive head-ornament to the Augusti; such as a diadem of superior value and lustre.3 Nay, even supposing that Eusebius used the word diadem in this passage largely and inaccurately, and meant by it the sepavos, or laurel crown of the Casarean dignity, still there is implied that the Augusti had some distinctive head-ornament: and that this could not be the radiated crown is evident from what Eckhel tells us, that for some time previous the radiated crown had been lower in dignity than the laurel.4-As to Galerius there exists among the still extant medals of that Emperor one diademed, according to Tristanus. But, as it refers to quite the later part of his reign, after the accession of Constantine to the Empire, it may be better to note it under my third and next head.

3. I now then pass on to Constantine. And here it becomes necessary to mark the dates of the chief epochs of his earlier years in the imperial office. In 306 then, on his father Constantius' death, he became Cæsar; (Galerius, who soon after associated Severus with himself, being the then only surviving Augustus ;) and in 307, on appointment by Maximian who had resumed the purple, Augustus. In 310 he put to death Maximian plotting against him: in 312 marched against Maxentius, son to Maximian, who had established himself as

1 After the abdication of Diocletian and Maximian, says he, in his V. C. i. 18, μονος λοιπον Κωνσαντιος πρωτος Αυγέρος και Σεβαςος ανηγορεύετο το μεν καταρχας το των αυτοκρατορων Καισαρων διαδηματι λαμπρυνόμενος, και τετων απειληφως τα πρωτα μετα δε την εν τέτοις δοκιμην, τῇ των ανωτάτω παρα Ρωμαίοις εκοσμειτο τιμη.

"Constantio certè, parenti Imperatoris Constantini, adhuc Cæsari diadema illi fastigio peculiare tribuit omnino Eusebius." Spanheim, ubi suprà.

3 It is in this way Spanheim explains two later medals of Constantine's two sons Crispus and Constantine; in which they appear wearing the diadem, though still Cæsars, as appears by the inscriptions. These are almost the only exceptions under the Constantinian dynasty to the usual rule of the diadem being confined to the Augusti.

4 "Coronam radiatam fuisse serius laureâ viliorem, (i. e. later than the times of Domitian,) argumentum certum est numus argenteus qui exhibet capita Balbini et Pupieni Augg. et Gordiani Cæsaris, laureatis illis, hoc radiato." viii. 362.