Petronius Maximus

Petronius Maximus (c. 397 – 31 May 455) was Roman emperor of the West for two and a half months in 455. A wealthy senator and a prominent aristocrat, he was instrumental in the murders of the Western Roman magister militum, Aëtius, and the Western Roman emperor, Valentinian III.

After the assassination of Aëtius and the subsequent death of Valentinian III, Maximus secured the support of the Senate and utilized bribery to gain the favor of palace officials, enabling him to ascend to power. He strengthened his position by forcing Licinia Eudoxia, Valentinian's widow, to marry him and forcing her daughter Eudocia to marry his son, cancelling her betrothal to the son of the Vandal king Genseric. This infuriated both Eudocia and Genseric, who sent a fleet to Rome. Maximus failed to obtain troops from the Visigoths and he fled as the Vandals arrived, became detached from his retinue and bodyguard in the confusion, and was killed by fellow Romans. The Vandals thoroughly sacked Rome in their retaliatory invasion.

The reign of Petronius Maximus marked a significant period of instability and decline for the Western Roman Empire. His brief and controversial rule reflected the political fragmentation and lack of centralized authority that plagued the empire during its final years. The invasion and sacking of Rome by the Vandals underlined the growing vulnerability of the Western Roman Empire, which would ultimately culminate in its collapse in 476.

Petronius Maximus was born about 397. Although he was of obscure origin, it is believed that he belonged to the Anicius and Petronius families. Related to the later Emperor Olybrius, Maximus was the son of Anicius Probinus, and the grandson of Anicia Faltonia Proba and Sextus Claudius Petronius Probus, who was prefect of Illyricum in 364, prefect of Gaul in 366, prefect of Italy from 368 to 375 and again in 383 and consul in 371. Procopius claimed that he was a descendant of Emperor Magnus Maximus, but historians such as J. B. Bury consider this account "untrustworthy and improbable".

Maximus had a remarkable early career. His earliest known office was praetor, held in about 411; around 415 he served as a tribunus et notarius, which was an entry position to the imperial bureaucracy and led to his serving as comes sacrarum largitionum (count of the sacred largess) between 416 and 419. Maximus spent 4,000 gold librae on public games in 412 or 415. From January or February 420 to August or September 421, he served as praefectus urbi of Rome, granting him executive authority for much of the municipal administration of Rome; he held the office again sometime before 439. During his tenure as praefectus, he undertook the restoration of the Old St. Peter's Basilica. Additionally, He was also appointed praetorian prefect, a leading military and judicial position, sometime between 421 and 439. It was either while holding this post or during his second urban prefecture that he was appointed consul for the year 433. Attaining the position of consul was considered the highest honor in the Roman state.

From 28 August 439 to 14 March 441, Maximus held the praetorian prefecture of Italy, the most important administrative and judicial non-imperial position in the Western Empire, and succeeded in that office by Anicius Acilius Glabrio Faustus. He was awarded a second consulship in 443. In 445, he was granted the title of patrician, the empire's senior honorific title, which was limited to a very small number of holders. During this year he was briefly the most honoured of all non-imperial Romans until the third consulate of Flavius Aëtius, generalissimo, or magister militum, of the Western Empire, the following year. Between 443 and 445 Maximus built a forum, the Forum Petronii Maximi, in Rome, on the Caelian Hill between the via Labicana and the Basilica di San Clemente.

According to the historian John of Antioch, Maximus poisoned the mind of the Emperor against Aëtius, resulting in the murder of his rival at the hands of Valentinian III. John's account has it that Valentinian and Maximus placed a wager on a game that Maximus ended up losing. As he did not have the money available, Maximus left his ring as a guarantee of his debt. Valentinian then used the ring to summon to court Lucina, the chaste and beautiful wife of Maximus, whom Valentinian had long lusted after. Lucina went to the court, believing she had been summoned by her husband, but instead found herself at dinner with Valentinian. Although she initially resisted his advances, the Emperor managed to wear her down and succeeded in raping her. Returning home and meeting Maximus, she accused him of betrayal, believing that he had handed her over to the Emperor. Although Maximus swore revenge, he was equally motivated by ambition to supplant "a detested and despicable rival", so he decided to move against Valentinian.

According to John of Antioch, Maximus was acutely aware that while Aëtius was alive he could not exact vengeance on Valentinian, so Aëtius had to be removed. He therefore allied himself with a eunuch of Valentinian's, the primicerius sacri cubiculi Heraclius, who had long opposed the general, with the hope of exercising more power over the emperor. The two of them convinced Valentinian that Aëtius was planning to assassinate him and urged him to kill his magister militum during a meeting, which Valentinian did with his own hands, with the help of Heraclius, on 21 September 454.