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Updated: May 15, 2025
But I waive this, for I am sensible it might be laid hold of by cavillers as carrying down my Castra to the time of Theodosius, sent by Valentinian into Britain as late as the year 367, or thereabout. No, my good friend, I appeal to people's eye-sight. Is not here the Decuman gate? and there, but for the ravage of the horrid plough, as a learned friend calls it, would be the Praetorian gate.
Moreover, however appearances might be maintained on the frontiers, the heart of the empire had begun patently to fail. The history of the next two centuries, the seventeenth and eighteenth, is one long record of praetorian tumults at home; and ever more rarely will these be compensated by military successes abroad.
Only a few among the more dignified senators, a few among the more sober praetorian tribunes, revolted in their heart at this insane exhibition of egoism, these perpetual outrages on common sense and dignity; but they were few and their influence small, and they were really too indolent, too comfortable in their luxurious homes to do aught but accept what they deemed inevitable.
The pedants of the Convention are not unlearned in the history of the Praetorian Bands and the omnipotence of armies; and an offensive war is undertaken to give occupation to the soldiers, whose inactivity might produce reflection, or whose discontent might prove fatal to the new order of things.
Cornificia more than any one had contrived to suggest to the praetorian guard that their interest might best be served some day by befriending Pertinax; she more than any one had disarmed Commodus' suspicion by complaining to him about Pertinax' lack of self-assertiveness, which had become Commodus' chief reason for not mistrusting him.
Of the hundreds of tents which till lately had covered it, only those of the seventh cohort of the praetorian guard remained; for these, having to protect the person of the emperor, had not been quartered in the town.
Nothing but calm demeanour and a proud show of loyalty would ensure his personal safety at this moment. The praetorian praefect knew enough of the imperial despot to appreciate the danger of this outwardly quiet mood, which hid the utter callousness of demoniacal cruelty.
Most visitors had been dismissed, by reason of the prefect's illness, and many of the acquaintances and supplicants who were generally to be found here were assembled in the imperial quarters, or in the rooms of the praetorian prefect and other powerful dignitaries in Caracalla's train.
He would have liked that they, too, should have seen the horses and the chariots and the "Blue" charioteer's turquoises and sapphires; although a decurion observed, as he saw them, that a Roman patrician would scorn to dress out his person with such barbaric splendor, and an Alexandrian of the praetorian guard declared that his fellow-citizens of Greek extraction thought more of a graceful fold than of whole strings of precious stones.
He quit the battle and galloped to his camp, where, addressing his centurions who were guarding the praetorian gate, he told them in a loud voice heard by the soldiers: 'Guard well the camp and defend it vigorously in case of attack; as for myself, I am going to make the tour of the other gates and assure their defense.
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