Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1827) Vol 2.djvu/388

 370 THE DECLINE AND FALL CHAP, from its size or sanctity, escaped for a long time the __^J^_ rapacious vanity of the conquerors. It was designed by Constantine to adorn his new city ^ ; and, after being removed by his order from the pedestal where it stood before the temple of the sun at Heliopolis, was floated down the Nile to Alexandria. The death of Constan- tine suspended the execution of his purpose ; and this obelisk was destined by his son to the ancient capital ' of the empire. A vessel of uncommon strength and capaciousness was provided to convey this enormous weight of granite, at least an hundred and fifteen feet in length, from the banks of the Nile to those of the Tiber. The obelisk of Constantius was landed about three miles from the city, and elevated, by the efibrts of art and labour, in the great circus of Rome ^ The Qua- The departure of Constantius from Rome was hast- (han and encd bv the alarming intelligence of the distress and Sarmatian •' . rr>i war. A.D. danger of the Illyrian provinces. Ihe distractions of 359' ^^^' c^vi^ va.Y,. and the irreparable loss which the Roman legions had sustained in the battle of Mursa, exposed those countries, almost without defence, to the light cavalry of the barbarians ; and particularly to the in- roads of the Quadi, a fierce and powerful nation, who seem to have exchanged the institutions of Germany for the arms and military arts of their Sarmatian allies". The garrisons of the frontier were insufficient to check their progress ; and the indolent monarch was at length compelled to assemble, from the extremities of his do- ' minions, the flower of the palatine troops, to take the field in person, and to employ a whole campaign, with the preceding autumn and the ensuing spring, in the y Ammian. Marcellin. 1. xvii. c. 4. He gives us a Greek interpretation of the hieroglyphics, and iiis commentator Lindenbrogius adds a Latin in- scription, which, in twenty verses of the age of Constantius, contain a short history of the obelisk. ' See Donat. Roma Antiqua, 1. iii. c. 14. 1. iv. c. 12. and the learned though confused Dissertation of J3arg£Eus on Obelisks, inserted in the fourth volume of Graevius's Roman Antiquities, p. 1897 — 1936. This dissertation is dedicated to pope Sixtus the fifth, who erected the obelisk of Constantius in the square before the patriarchal church of St. John Lateran. " The events of this Quadian and Sarmatian war are related by Ammi- anus, xvi. 10. xvii. 12, 13. xix. 1 1.