Julius Constantius

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Julius Constantius
Bornafter 293
Died337
SpouseGalla
Basilina
IssueUnnamed son[1]
Unnamed daughter
Gallus
Julian
DynastyConstantinian
FatherConstantius I
MotherTheodora

(Flavius) Julius Constantius (died September 337 AD) was a member of the Constantinian dynasty, being a son of Emperor Constantius Chlorus and his wife Flavia Maximiana Theodora, a younger half-brother of Emperor Constantine the Great and the father of Emperor Julian.

Biography[edit]

Constantine the Great, Julius Constantius' half-brother

Julius Constantius was the son of Constantius Chlorus and his wife Theodora. He had two brothers, Dalmatius and Hannibalianus, and three sisters, Constantia, Anastasia and Eutropia.[2] Emperor Constantine I was his half-brother, as he was the son of Constantius and Helena.

Julius Constantius was married twice. With his first wife, Galla, sister of the later consuls Vulcacius Rufinus and Neratius Cerealis,[3] he had two sons and a daughter. His eldest son, whose name is not recorded, was murdered in 337 together with his father.[4] His second son Constantius Gallus,[5] was appointed Caesar by his cousin Constantius II. His daughter was the first wife of Constantius II.[6] It has been proposed that Galla and Julius had another daughter, who may have been the mother of the empress Justina.[7]

After the death of his first wife, Julius Constantius married a Greek woman[8][9] Basilina, the daughter of the governor of Egypt, Julius Julianus.[10] Basilina gave him another son, the future emperor Julian the Apostate,[11] but died before her husband, in 332/333.[12] Allegedly at the instigation of Constantine's mother Helena, Julius Constantius did not live initially at the court of his half brother, but together with Dalmatius and Hannibalianus in Tolosa,[13] in Etruria, the birthplace of his son Gallus,[3] and in Corinth.[14] Finally, he was called to Constantinople,[15] and was able to build a good relationship with Constantine.[16]

Constantine favoured his half-brother, appointing him patricius and Consul for the year 335, together with Ceionius Rufius Albinus.[1] However, in 337, after the death of Constantine, several male members of the Constantinian dynasty were killed, among them Constantius (whose property was confiscated)[17] and his eldest son;[18] his two younger sons, however, survived, because in 337 they were still children. They would later be elevated to the rank of caesar and augustus, respectively.

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b Jones, Martindale & Morris, p. 226.
  2. ^ Jones, Martindale & Morris, p. 895.
  3. ^ a b Ammianus Marcellinus 14, 11, 27
  4. ^ Julian (emperor), Letter to the Athenians 270D.
  5. ^ Libanius, Orations, 18, 10
  6. ^ Eusebius, Life of Constantine 4, 49
  7. ^ Noel Emmanuel Lenski (2006). The Cambridge companion to the Age of Constantine, Volume 13. ISBN 0-521-52157-2, p. 97.
  8. ^ Bradbury, Jim (2004). The Routledge companion to medieval warfare. Routledge. p. 54. ISBN 0-415-22126-9. JULIAN THE APOSTATE, FLAVIUS CLAUDIUS JULIANUS, ROMAN EMPEROR (332–63) Emperor from 361, son of Julius Constantius and a Greek mother Basilina, grandson of Constantius Chlorus, the only pagan Roman Emperor after 313.
  9. ^ Norwich, John Julius (1989). Byzantium: the early centuries. Knopf. p. 83. ISBN 0-394-53778-5. Julius Constantius…Constantine had invited him, with his second wife and his young family, to take up residence in his new capital; and it was in Constantinople that his third son Julian was born, in May or June of the year 332. The baby's mother, Basilina, a Greek from Asia Minor, died a few weeks later…
  10. ^ Julian, Letters 60.
  11. ^ Libanius, Orations, 18, 9.
  12. ^ Julian, The Beard-Hater 352
  13. ^ Ausonius, Commemoratio professorum Burdigalensium 17, 11.
  14. ^ Julian, Letters 20.
  15. ^ Libanius, Orations 1, 434.
  16. ^ Libanius, Orations 1, 524.
  17. ^ Julian, Letter to the Athenians 273B.
  18. ^ Zosimus 2, 40, 2; Libanius, Orations 18, 31.

Sources[edit]

Political offices
Preceded by Roman consul
335
with Ceionius Rufius Albinus
Succeeded by