Maximinus’s Reign of Terror
By 369AD, the empire had not yet split but was being governed in two separate halves. In the east, in Constantinople, the Emperor Valens ruled. However, in the west, the imperial court under Valentinian had abandoned Rome, preferring instead to move between the other great imperial cities of Paris and Milan. Rome was left instead in the hands of the old, entrenched senatorial elite. It was no place for an ambitious, new man such as Maximinus of Valeria to find himself.
Maximinus came from a humble background in Pannonia. His father was a local accountant, and Maximinus managed to acquire sufficient education to become a local advocate “without acquiring distinction. “However, he had ambition in spades and using this, he propelled himself upwards, becoming Governor of Corsica, Sardinia, and Tuscia. Finally, he reached Rome as its deputy praetor. However, Maximinus could not have felt this was any particular advantage. He was far from the imperial court and surrounded by men who outclassed and outranked him in wealth, education and pedigree.
In 369AD, a former deputy governor called Chilo, complained to the prefect of Rome, Olybrius that a group of men was conspiring to poison him. Amongst those he accused was a soothsayer called Campensis. Olybrius however was ill and could not attend to the affair. So Maximinus took over instead. Sensing an opportunity, He tortured the witnesses who immediately began to tell of “certain nobles” who had made use of maleficium. Maleficium was magic. So Maximinus decided to make the most of what he had and approach the emperor, reporting that Rome was a hotbed of magical intrigue.
Too far away to know any better, Valentinian believed him. He promoted Maximinus to the acting prefect of Rome and empowered him to act as he saw fit. Anyone convicted of magic was also to be convicted of treason. It was the opportunity for which Maximinus had been waiting. He began to target those ‘conspicuous by their rank and birth, ” impeaching them for magic.
Numerous individuals were executed for poisoning, immorality and the black arts. Maximinus even executed the teenage son of an ex-prefect on the pretense that he had written a book on “the destructive magic arts”. Maximinus also used fear of impeachment to terrify a wealthy widow into falsifying her husband’s will so he inherited half the estate. Not satisfied with this, he also demanded the widow’s share of the inheritance- and her daughter in marriage. Maximinus managed to decimate the Roman aristocracy. There were two trials in particular that set the ball rolling.