Constantius II

Constantius was a son of Constantine. Socrates gives him a reign of thirty-eight years, thirteen as his father’s colleague and twenty-five after his father’s death, and says that he was baptised by Euzoius and died at Mopsucrene, on the border of Cappadocia and Cilicia, on 3 November in the consulship of Taurus and Florentius, which is 361 (Socrates, Church History 2.47). Ammianus, as his text stands, puts the death at the same place on 5 October (Ammianus Marcellinus 21.15.2–3).

He took a direct part in the disputes over the creed. A statement of faith was drawn up in his presence at Sirmium in May 359 (Athanasius, On the Councils 8), and he summoned the bishops of West and East to the councils of Ariminum and Seleucia in order, Socrates says, to bring them all to agree (Socrates, Church History 2.37). Athanasius calls him a heretic and says that bishops who would not sign the final creed were banished by him (Athanasius, On the Councils 1) (Athanasius, On the Councils 30). A letter of his to the rulers of Aksum orders that the same doctrine be professed in their churches as among the Romans and that their bishop Frumentius be sent to Egypt to be examined (Athanasius, Defence before Constantius 31); see King Ezana of Aksum Becomes Christian. Ammianus, who was not a Christian, judged that he had confused the plain and simple religion of the Christians with superstition, stirred up disputes where he should have settled them, and worn out the public post with bishops hurrying to synods (Ammianus Marcellinus 21.16.18).