Hello, and welcome to the history of Rome, episode 114, The Nadia of our fortunes.

Last time, we left Rome in a state of disrepair.

The east had been invaded by the Sassanids, the Danube had been invaded by the Goths, Italy

had been invaded by the Alemani, and the west had been invaded by the Franks.

Unable to handle all of these foreign threats at once, and still reeling from the capture

of his father, Gallienus watched helplessly as the legions across the empire elevated their

own local commanders to the purple, breaking the empire into pieces.

The son of Valerian would never again rule a united empire, though he would spend the

rest of his life, vainly pursuing the dream of re-unification.

Though we know that the east eventually fell into the hands of Odinothus and his wife

Zenobia, when all the trouble began in 260, it actually looked like ex-treasure official

Macrionus would be the man calling the shots in Antioch.

You'll recall from last time that Macrionus and the general Ballista had organized a resistance

to the Sassanid invasion following Valerian's capture, and when the Persians were finally

pushed out, the eastern legions naturally looked to the man with the money to continue

leading them.

Ballista seems to have been content to support Macrionus rather than compete with him, and

so Macrionus became the dominant Roman official east of the Hellaspond.

But for some reason, possibly because he was a cripple, though I'm not entirely sure

that that's accurate, Macrionus did not himself assume the imperial dignities.

Instead, he induced the legions to elevate to the purple his two grown sons, quietists

and Macrionus the younger.

...