Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 29, 2025
In A.D. 175, Avidius Cassius, a brave and skilful Roman commander who was at the head of the troops in Asia, revolted and declared himself Augustus. But Cassius was assassinated by some of his officers, and so the rebellion came to an end.
It was the first stroke of the cataclysm that sent Rome down. . . . Then came Quadi and Marcomans, Hun-impelled, thundering on the doors of Pannonia; and for the next eleven years Aurelius was busy fighting them. Then Avidius Cassius revolted in Asia; but was soon assassinated.
Avidius Cassius, to whom the Syrian legions were entrusted, had a hard task to bring them into proper discipline after their long period of inaction, but succeeded after a while by the use of almost unexampled severities.
Avidius Cassius, an able captain who had won renown in the Parthian wars, was at this time chief governor of the eastern provinces. By whatever means induced, he had conceived the project of proclaiming himself emperor as soon as Marcus, who was then in feeble health, should die; and a report having been conveyed to him that Marcus was dead, Cassius did as he had planned.
Marcus Aurelius, who died in 181 A.D., had pardoned the children of the rebel general Avidius Cassius, but Commodus began his reign by putting them to death; and, while thus disregarding the example and advice of his father, he paid his memory the idle compliment of continuing his series of dates on his own coins.
His father had been of knightly rank, and in the reign of Marcus Aurelius he had been in the service of Avidius Cassius, his fellow-countryman, the illustrious governor of Asia as 'procurator ab epistolis'. As holding this high post, he found himself involved in the conspiracy of Avidius against the emperor.
The palace of Volagases III. at Ctesiphon, which Avidius Cassius destroyed in his invasion, was most likely of the same general character a combination of lofty halls suitable for ceremonies and audiences with small and dark sleeping or living rooms, opening out of them, the whole placed in the middle of a paved court, and the male apartments carefully divided from those of the women.
The first species of evidence, which I shall produce to this point, may be found in the following facts, which reach from the year 169 to the year 198, Avidius Crassus had rebelled against the emperor Verus, and was slain in a short time afterwards. Clodius Albinus in one part of the world, and Pescenninus Niger in another, rebelled against the emperor Severus, and both were slain likewise.
When, about the year A.D. 174 or 175, Aurelius being occupied in the west with repelling the attacks of the wild tribes upon the Danube, Avidius Cassius assumed the purple in Syria, and a civil war seemed to be imminent, Volagases appears to have shown an intention of once more taking arms and trying his fortune. A Parthian war was at this time expected to break out by the Romans.
The towns upon the line of their retreat revolted and shut their gates, defying even such commanders as Severus and Trajan. Of the six great expeditions of Rome against Parthia, one only, that of Avidius Cassius, was entirely successful. In every other case either the failure of the expedition was complete, or the glory of the advance was tarnished by disaster and suffering during the retreat.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking