Coinage from Maximinus Thrax to Aemilianus
He was also given as a colleague in the empire, his son Gaius Julius Verus Maximus, giving him the title princeps iuventutis (“prince of youth”).
The tools of traditional diplomacy, used since the time of Augustus and based on the threat of using force and the fomenting of internal dissensions among the various hostile tribes to keep them engaged against each other, now showed little effect.
[1][4] To this end between 235 and 236 the emperor conducted his first campaign against the Germanic federation of Alemanni,[17] using Mogontiacum as his “headquarters” and crossing the imperial borders in the Taunus area.
[18] Maximinus believed that it was a priority of the empire to wage “anti-Germanic” warfare,[3] he continued to fight the Alemanni, succeeding not only in repelling their incursions along the Limes Germanicus but also in penetrating Germania.
He went, then, to Pannonia, at Sirmium, for the winter of 235/236[17] and led new campaigns against the Iazyges Sarmatians of the Tisza plain, who had tried to cross the Danube after about fifty years of peace along their frontiers, and the neighboring Quadians (as some inscriptions found in the Brigetio area seem to testify).
[4] The reign of the first two Gordians was short-lived, as the governor of Numidia, Capelianus, who remained loyal to Maximinus Thrax,[17] invaded the province of Africa and headed for Carthage.
Having supported the cause of the two Gordians, and facing the threat posed by Maximinus who was coming from the frontier, the Senate was forced to continue the struggle, naming Pupienus and Balbinus as co-emperors in the Temple of Jupiter Optimus Maximus in April 22, 238.
[4] Pupienus, due to his military career, was sent against Maximinus as the head of the army,[4] while Balbinus remained in Rome to quell a plebeian revolt favorable to Gordianus III.
[1][3][4] Because of his youth (he ascended the throne at the age of thirteen and reigned until nineteen), the imperial government was in the hands of regents belonging to the senatorial aristocracy.
In fact, between late 240 and early 241, the emperor appointed Gaius Furius Sabinius Aquila Timesitheus prefect of the praetorium, taking his daughter as his wife.
[3] Roman sources, however, make no mention of the battle and suggest that Gordian died at Circesium, more than 300 km north of Peroz-Shapur, but do not report the cause of the emperor's death, although the prefect of the praetorium, Philip, who succeeded him on the throne, was often described as the instigator of his assassination.
[1][3][4] In late 240 and early 241 Emperor Gordian III appointed Gaius Furius Sabinius Aquila Timesitheus prefect of the praetorium and married his daughter, Furia Sabina Tranquillina, the following summer, as also celebrated in the coinage of that year.
[17] The military campaign proved successful for the Romans, however, as the territories lost in Mesopotamia in the course of the Sasanian advance in 229–230 were recaptured, and the Sasanids remained quiet until 239–240, while Alexander earned the titles of Parthicus Maximus and Persicus.
[4] Starting in 238/239, a new large-scale invasion by the Sasanian armies led them to lay siege to the fortress city of Dura-Europos, a Roman outpost on the Euphrates.
[4] Gordian III, after mobilizing the army, marched eastward, with the command of the campaign entrusted to his father-in-law Timesitheus, and the other prefect of the praetorium, Gaius Julius Priscus.
Roman sources, however, do not mention the battle and suggest that Gordian died near Circesium,[4] leaving the suspicion that he was killed by the praetorian prefect Philip the Arab, who later succeeded him on the throne.
[37] Sent to the region to punish and command the legions that had supported the usurpers, Decius was instead proclaimed emperor of the Danubian army in the spring of 249 and immediately marched to Rome.
[37] The Res gestae divi Saporis, a propaganda epigraph of the Sassanid emperor, recounts: Gordian Caesar was killed and the Roman armies were destroyed.
For this reason, we renamed the locality of Mesiche, Peroz-Shapur [i.e., 'Victory of Sapur']The Roman East was, therefore, entrusted by Philip to his brother, Gaius Julius Priscus, appointed Rector Orientis, while the defensive line in Mesopotamia was reorganized around the stronghold cities of Nisibis, Circesium, and Resaina.
In 248 there was a new incursion of Goths, who had been refused the annual contribution promised by Gordian III, and of the Carpi, their associates, to the province of Lower Moesia.
The invasion was eventually stopped by Philip the Arab's general, Decius Trajan, the future emperor, at the city of Marcianopolis, which had remained under siege for a long time.
[1] During his reign, Emperor Decius tried to lift the spirits of the empire, which had fallen into crisis in the third century, by relying on the restoration of tradition, but his choice was shown not suitable for a state that was changing rapidly.
He resumed, after twenty years, a public building program in Rome: he restored the earthquake-damaged Colosseum and built the Baths of Decius on the Aventine.
[3] He sought, finally, to establish a dynasty, as Philip had done before him: his sons Herennius Etruscus and Hostilianus received the title of caesar, with Erennius then elevated to the rank of Augustus in 251; Herennia Etruscilla was appointed Augusta.
