Zosimos is the author of New History on Constantine the Great which was written end of the 5th century to the beginning of the 6th century CE. In this text Zosimos relied heavily on Dexippus of Athens, Eunapius of Sardis and Olympiodorus of Thebes for his sources. Zosimos is credited with being one of the last pagan historians and one of the first to talk in terms of the fall of Rome. Throughout the text Zosimos chooses to use a specific tone and certain words to convey the history as he sees it. At the beginning of the passage he speaks to how the empire has “fallen” into Constantine’s hands and that he can no longer hide his “evil disposition and vicious inclinations”. Already it is clear to the reader that the author is portraying this …show more content…
That is about where even the mildest praise for Constantine’s projects as he goes onto critique the grandeur and unnecessary extravagance of the buildings being erected. Along with this Zosimos discredits Constantine as a good ruler as he claims he did little to protect his city and troops and simply “save[d] himself by flight” during the disaster of the Thaifalian plunder. Next comes the critique of Constantine altering what Zosimos defines as a “good institution”. He outlines the changes made by Constantine to the majesty and how he redistributed power. Instead of there being two prefects there were now four that had to share the power collectively but this was undermined by the splitting of the empire into sections. It was important for Zosimos to make his reader understand the complex nature of the governmental structures existing in the empire at the time as he then critiques these changes. He spends a paragraph accusing this redistribution of power as a technique to diminish the influence of the prefects and the failure of this system. Given the prefects were no longer needed for disciplining the soldiers, with the introduction of the Magistri Militum, there was a disassociation between punishment and pay making the punishment less effective in