Roman power had suffered a severe blow, since the numbers that fell on each side were beyond reckoning. Many even of the victors deplored the disaster, for the entire plain was seen to be covered with the bodies of men and horses. Some of them lay there exhausted by many wounds, others thoroughly mangled, and still others unwounded but buried under heaps. Weapons had been tossed about and blood flowed in streams, even swelling the rivers. Albinus took refuge in a house located near the Rhone, but when he saw all its environs guarded, he slew himself. I am not telling what Severus wrote about it, but what actually took place. The emperor after inspecting his body and feasting his eyes upon it to the full while he let his tongue indulge in appropriate utterances, ordered it,--all but the head,--to be cast out, and that he sent to Rome to be exposed on a cross. As he showed clearly by this action that he was very far from being an excellent ruler, he alarmed even more than before the populace and us by the commands which he issued. Now that he had vanquished all forces under arms he poured out upon the unarmed all the wrath he had nourished against them during the previous period. He terrified us most of all by declaring himself the son of Marcus and brother of Commodus; and to Commodus, whom but recently he was wont to abuse, he gave heroic honors.
8
While reading before the senate a speech in which he praised the severity and cruelty of Sulla and Marius and Augustus as rather the safer course, and deprecated the clemency of Pompey and Caesar because it had proved their ruin, he introduced a defence of Commodus, and inveighed against the senate for dishonoring him unjustly though the majority of their own body lived even worse lives. "For if", said he, "this is abominable, that he with his own hands should have killed beasts, yet at Ostia yesterday or the day before one of your number, an old man that had been consul, indulged publicly in play with a prostitute who imitated a leopard. 'He fought as a gladiator,' do you say? By Jupiter, does none of you fight as gladiator? If not, how is it and for what purpose that some persons have bought his shields and the famous golden helmets?" At the conclusion of this reading he released thirty-five prisoners charged with having taken Albinus's side and behaved toward them as if they had incurred no charge at all. They were among the foremost members of the senate. He condemned to death twenty-nine men, as one of whom was reckoned Sulpicianus, the father-in-law of Pertinax.
All pretended to sympathize with Severus but were confuted as often as a sudden piece of news arrived, not being able to conceal the sentiments hidden in their hearts. When off their guard they started at reports which happened to assail their ears without warning. In such ways, as well as through facial expression and habits of behavior, the feelings of every one of them became manifest. Some also by an excess of affectation only betrayed their attitude the more.
LXXIV, 9, 5
Severus endeavored in the case of those who were receiving vengeance at his hands [Lacuna] [
] to employ Erucius Clarus [