Res Gestae

This place, which was formerly small and exposed to danger, Diocletian, alarmed by a recent experience,[*](Detailed in § 3.) encircled with walls and lofty towers, at the time when he was arranging the inner lines of defence on the very frontiers of the barbarians, in order to prevent the Persians from overrunning Syria, as had happened a few years before with great damage to the provinces.

For once upon a time at Antioch, amid deep silence,[*](Or perhaps, in a time of profound peace. ) an actor of mimes, who with his wife had been presented in stage-plays, was presenting some scenes from everyday life. And while all the people were amazed at the charm of the performance, the wife suddenly cried: Is it a dream, or are the Persians here? Whereupon all the people turned their heads about and then fled in all directions, to avoid the arrows that were showered upon them from the citadel. Thus the city was set on fire, and many people who were carelessly wandering about, as in time of peace, were butchered; neighbouring places were burned and devastated, and the enemy, laden with plunder, returned home without the loss of a single man. Mareades, who had inconsiderately brought the Persians there to the destruction of his own people, was burned alive. This took place in the time of Gallienus.[*](260-268; according to others, it was in the time of his father Valerian.)

But while Julian was lingering at Cercusium, to the end that his army with all its followers might cross the Abora on a bridge of boats, he received a sorrowful letter from Sallustius, prefect of Gaul,

But the emperor, disregarding his cautious counsellor, pushed confidently on, since no human power or virtue has ever been great enough to turn aside what the decrees of fate had ordained. Immediately upon crossing the bridge he ordered it to be destroyed, so that no soldier in his own army might entertain hope of a return.