Ballista

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Ballista († 261 ) served as Praetorian prefect under Macrianus Minor . In some sources his name is also given as Callistus ; it is unclear whether this is his real name or a mistake in transmission.

Not many details are known about Ballista. The fact that he was Praetorian prefect of Emperor Valerian , as claimed in the Historia Augusta , is probably to be regarded as unhistorical. After Valerian's capture by the Persians in 260, Ballista succeeded in defeating a Persian force and relieving the besieged Pompeiopolis . The harem of the Persian king Shapur I was also captured by Ballista.

The turmoil after Valerian's capture now took advantage of a number of people in the east of the empire to dispute the rule of Gallienus , who was in the west. Ballista favored Macrianus Maior , who as procurator arcae et praepositus annonae had control of Valerian's state treasure, but waived due to his age and his health. However, he managed to have his two sons Macrianus Minor and Quietus elevated to emperors.

Quietus stayed in the east with Ballista and resided in Emesa while his brother and father marched west with their army to gain control of the rest of the Roman Empire . However, Macrianus Maior and Macrianus Minor were defeated in Thrace by Gallienus ' general Aureolus . Macrianus and his son Macrianus Minor were killed. Thus the usurpation in the east had in fact failed. Quietus was soon killed by the population in Emesa, while Ballista was able to save himself for a short time. According to the Late Antique Historia Augusta , Ballista was supposedly proclaimed emperor himself, but this is not credible; the emperor's rise of the ballista is therefore regarded as fiction by ancient historical research. Ballista himself was killed shortly afterwards by Septimius Odaenathus of Palmyra anyway .

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  • Historia Augusta , Thirty Tyrants 12.1; 12.3; 12.7; 12.9; 14.1; 15.4; 18th
  • Historia Augusta, Gallienus 1,2; 3.2; 3.4
  • Historia Augusta, Valerian 4.4
  • Zonaras 12: 23-24
  • Georgios Synkellos , p. 466 [page reference according to the edition Alden A. Mosshammer (Ed.): Georgii Syncelli Ecloga chronographica. Leipzig 1984]

literature

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ Cf. for example Bruno Bleckmann : Die Reichskrise des III. Century in late antique and Byzantine historiography. Investigations on the post-Dionic sources of the Chronicle of Johannes Zonaras. Munich 1992, p. 117, who argues against the form of the name Kallistos. This is followed by Anthony R. Birley in Der Neue Pauly (Volume 2, 1997, Col. 425f.).
  2. ↑ Cf. Fasti, PPO 14 in: Klaus-Peter Johne , Udo Hartmann, Thomas Gerhardt (eds.): The time of the soldiers emperors. Crisis and transformation of the Roman Empire in the 3rd century AD (235–284). Volume 2. Berlin 2008, p. 1073. Approving, however, Anthony Birley: Ballista. In: Der Neue Pauly 2, 1997, Col. 425f.
personal data
SURNAME Ballista
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Callistus
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Praetorian prefect of the Roman emperor Valerian
DATE OF BIRTH 2nd century or 3rd century
DATE OF DEATH 261