VALENTE (F. Valens Augustus), ROMAN EMPEROR OF THE EAST. — Born in 328 at Cibalae in Pannonia
to the military tribune Graziano, who rose from humble circumstances to the highest offices of the imperial hierarchy.
He completed his military apprenticeship first in the armies of Giuliano l'Apostata and was then designated by his brother Valentiniano I to govern the affairs of the Eastern Empire. At the beginning of his reign he had to fight against Procopio, a usurper who claimed to be a relative of Costantino and had obtained the support of the Goths. The revolt was suppressed, but V. dealt with it cruelly, with a succession of executions and massacres, followed by a three-year war against the insurrection of the Goths who had aided Procopio. A palace conspiracy headed by a certain Teodoro, together with magical practices, gave him occasion to issue various death sentences; among those suspected was also the philosopher Massimo d'Efeso. He was fighting the Persians and their king Sapore II when the Goths, who in the past, driven by the Huns, had poured across the borders of the Empire and had been harassed in every way by the Roman officials, rebelled. Under the leadership of their chief Frigierno, they invaded Thrace, bringing mourning and devastation in their wake, and advanced to the very outskirts of Adrianopoli. V. hastened to conclude a truce with the Persians (Ammiano, XXXI, 7) and wished to confront the Goths without awaiting the reinforcements being prepared by his nephew Graziano, the new Roman emperor of the West. But he was defeated at Adrianopoli itself (cf. F. Runkel, Die Schlacht bei Adrianopel, Berlin 1903) and perished in that battle on 9 August 378. V. was a good administrator (Ammiano, XXXI, 14, 2), but of a coarse nature (ibid., 6). A follower of the moderate tendency of Arianism, he wished to intervene in the religious polemics and controversies of the time, but was bravely opposed by s. Basilio. Nevertheless, he also persecuted Christians (Gregorio Naz., Or., XX, 49-52; V. Fliche-Martin-Frutz, III, pp. 266-69). In Antiochia he had several of them drowned in the Orontes, sending various bishops of the place into exile; at Nicomedia he allowed eighty priests to be burned in a boat (Gregorio Naz., Or., XLIII, 46). Although he was somewhat tolerant of religious cults in general (Cassiodoro, Hist. trip., VIII, 3), he prohibited bloody sacrifices and the magical practices of the surviving pagan religion.