[Illustration:  CHAPTER-8]

“Constantius adversus Persas et Saporem, qui Mesopotamiam vastaverant, novem prasliis parum prospere decertavit.”—­Orosius, Hist. vii. 39.

The death of Constantine was followed by the division of the Roman world among his sons.  The vast empire with which Sapor had almost made up his mind to contend was partitioned out into three moderate-sized kingdoms.  In place of the late brave and experienced emperor, a raw youth, who had given no signs of superior ability, had the government of the Roman provinces of the East, of Thrace, Asia Minor, Syria, Mesopotamia, and Egypt.  Master of one third of the empire only, and of the least warlike portion, Constantius was a foe whom the Persian monarch might well despise, and whom he might expect to defeat without much difficulty.  Moreover, there was much in the circumstances of the time that seemed to promise success to the Persian arms in a struggle with Rome.  The removal of Constantme had been followed by an outburst of licentiousness and violence among the Roman soldiery in the capital; and throughout the East the army had cast off the restraints of discipline, and given indications of a turbulent and seditious spirit.  The condition of Armenia was also such as to encourage Sapor in his ambitious projects.  Tiridates, though a persecutor of the Christians in the early part of his reign, had been converted by Gregory the Illuminator, and had then enforced Christianity on his subjects by fire and sword.  A sanguinary conflict had followed.  A large portion of the Armenians, firmly attached to the old national idolatry, had resisted determinedly.  Nobles, priests, and people had fought desperately in defence of their temples, images, and altars; and, though the persistent will of the king overbore all opposition, yet the result was the formation of a discontented faction, which rose up from time to time against its rulers, and was constantly tempted to ally itself with any foreign power from which it could hope the re-establishment of the old religion.  Armenia had also, after the death of Tiridates (in A.D. 314), fallen under the government of weak princes.  Persia had recovered from it the portion of Media Atropatene ceded by the treaty between Galerius and Narses.  Sapor, therefore, had nothing to fear on this side; and he might reasonably expect to find friends among the Armenians themselves, should the general position of his affairs allow him to make an effort to extend Persian influence once more over the Armenian highland.

The bands of Sapor crossed the Roman frontier soon after, if not even before, the death of Constantine; and after an interval of forty years the two great powers of the world were once more engaged in a bloody conflict.  Constantius, having paid the last honors to his father’s remains, hastened to the eastern frontier, where he found the Roman army weak in numbers, badly armed and badly provided, ill-disposed towards