Biography
Nicomachus Flavianus was born in 334, and belonged to the Nicomachi, an influential family of senatorial rank. His father was Volusius Venustus, and from his wife, a pagan herself, he had a son also called Nicomachus Flavianus and maybe another son called Venustus; he was also grandfather of Appius Nicomachus Dexter and of Galla.
His career can be reconstructed from two inscriptions: one (CIL, VI, 1782) put up by his granddaughter's husband Quintus Fabius Memmius Symmachus and probably inscribed in 394, the other (CIL, VI, 1783) coming from the basis of a statue erected in 431 in Trajan's Forum by his nephew Appius Nicomachus Dexter, to celebrate his grandfather's memory after its restoration by the ruling emperors. Flavianus' cursus honorum included the following offices:
- quaestor,
- praetor,
- pontifex maior,
- consular of Sicilia (364/365),
- vicarius of Africa (376/377),
- quaestor sacri palatii,
- praetorian prefect of Illyricum and Italia (390–392),
- praetorian prefect of Illyricum and Italia for the second time (393–394),
- consul without a colleague (394).
During his office as vicarius Africae he received a law against Donatism; however it seems he somehow sided with Donatists, if in 405 Augustine of Hippo misbelieved him a Donatist. In this office he, together with Decimius Hilarianus Hesperius, was in charge of the investigations around a scandal involving the city of Leptis Magna, but his conclusions, included into a report, had the citizens not guilty; afterwards the citizens of Leptis Magna erected him a statue.
In 392 Flavianus had been praetorian prefect of Illyricum and Africa for two years, when the emperor of the western part of the Roman Empire, Valentinian II, died, either killed or committing suicide (15 May); his general Arbogast, with whom he had had a long conflict, was suspected of being involved in his death. As soon as he heard of Valentinian's death, eastern emperor Theodosius I nominated another praetorian prefect for Illyricum, Apodemius, who received also the praetorian prefecture of Africa in late 392/early 393. Arbogast, foreseeing an attack from Theodosius, put up a usurper, Eugenius, as emperor of the western part. As soon as Eugenius entered in Italy (his crowing had been in Lyon on 22 August 393), Flavianus went to him and was appointed praetorian prefect for the second time; his key role within Eugenius' administration was confirmed with Flavianus' election to the consulate of 394 without a colleague (this office was recognized only within Eugenius' territory).
There is another important aspect of Flavianus' activity under Eugenius, the one often referred to as the "pagan revival". Eugenius was a Christian, but choose several pagans within the aristocracy as his allies. Flavianus took the opportunity and renewed the public ceremonies of the Roman religion, without the opposition of Eugenius, who was, for this reason, scolded by Ambrose, bishop of Milan. Theodosian propaganda first and Christian sources later presented the fight between Theodosius and Eugenius as a struggle of Christian faith against a last-standing Paganism: for this reason the religious acts of Flavianus have been interpreted as a pagan revival supported, or at least allowed, by Eugenius; a typical example is the episode of the Vita Ambrosii by Paulinus the Deacon, in which Flavianus and Arbogast, leaving Milan to clash into Theodosius' army, promise to destroy the city basilica and to enlist the Christian clergy into the army after their victorious return. Modern historians believe that there was not such a "pagan revival", but that Flavianus took the chance of a power vacuum (both in politics and in religion, as there was not, at the time, a powerful Christian figure) to support Roman religion, but without any plan by Eugenius.
Flavianus encouraged Eugenius in his struggle against Theodosius claiming that sacrifices had indicated victory in the forthcoming war. However, Eugenius and Arbogast were killed in the decisive battle of the Frigidus against the army of Theodosius (5 September 394); few days later, Flavianus committed suicide, at the age of sixty.
Read more about this topic: Virius Nicomachus Flavianus
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