History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 2Gibbon, Edward
History
History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 2
Gibbon, Edward
Byzantine Empire -- History -- To 527; Rome -- History -- Empire, 30 B.C.-476 A.D.
58 (return) [ Sozomen, l. ii. c. 3. Philostorg. l. ii. c. 9.
Codin. Antiquitat. Const. p. 8. It appears by Socrates, l. ii. c.
13, that the daily allowance of the city consisted of eight
myriads of σίτου, which we may either translate, with Valesius, by the
words modii of corn, or consider us expressive of the number of
loaves of bread. * Note: At Rome the poorer citizens who received
these gratuities were inscribed in a register; they had only a
personal right. Constantine attached the right to the houses in
his new capital, to engage the lower classes of the people to
build their houses with expedition. Codex Therodos. l. xiv.—G.]
59 (return) [ See Cod. Theodos. l. xiii. and xiv., and Cod.
Justinian. Edict. xii. tom. ii. p. 648, edit. Genev. See the
beautiful complaint of Rome in the poem of Claudian de Bell.
Gildonico, ver. 46-64.——Cum subiit par Roma mihi, divisaque
sumsit Æquales aurora togas; Ægyptia rura In partem cessere
novam.]
5911 (return) [ This was also at the expense of Rome. The emperor
ordered that the fleet of Alexandria should transport to
Constantinople the grain of Egypt which it carried before to
Rome: this grain supplied Rome during four months of the year.
Claudian has described with force the famine occasioned by this
measure:—
Hæc nobis, hæc ante dabas; nunc pabula tantum Roma precor:
miserere tuæ; pater optime, gentis: Extremam defende famem. Claud.
de Bell. Gildon. v. 34.—G.
It was scarcely this measure. Gildo had cut off the African as
well as the Egyptian supplies.—M.]
60 (return) [ The regions of Constantinople are mentioned in the
code of Justinian, and particularly described in the Notitia of
the younger Theodosius; but as the four last of them are not
included within the wall of Constantine, it may be doubted
whether this division of the city should be referred to the
founder.]
61 (return) [ Senatum constituit secundi ordinis; _Claros_
vocavit. Anonym Valesian. p. 715. The senators of old Rome were
styled _Clarissimi_. See a curious note of Valesius ad Ammian.
Marcellin. xxii. 9. From the eleventh epistle of Julian, it
should seem that the place of senator was considered as a burden,
rather than as an honor; but the Abbé de la Bleterie (Vie de
Jovien, tom. ii. p. 371) has shown that this epistle could not
relate to Constantinople. Might we not read, instead of the
celebrated name of the obscure but more probable word Bisanthe or
Rhœdestus, now Rhodosto, was a small maritime city of Thrace. See
Stephan. Byz. de Urbibus, p. 225, and Cellar. Geograph. tom. i.
p. 849.]
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