Once the elder and younger Dalmatius, Hannibalianus, and the other victims of the Purge of 337 were cast into their dishonorable graves, there remained only the tasks of gouging out their names from inscriptions on public monuments around the Empire and dividing up their former domains among the three new Augusti.

Sometime in the fall of the year 337,[1] the three brothers made their way to Viminacium in Pannonia (modern Hungary) – with Constantius coming from Constantinople, Constantine II from Trier, and Constans perhaps from Milan. There is reason to believe that the exiled Bishop Athanasius of Alexandria was among the members of Constantine II's retinue, and Eusebius of Nicomedia is likely to have accompanied Constantius. Constans was between fifteen and seventeen years old; Constantine II and Constantius – who, curiously enough, seem to have shared the same birthday (August 7) – were twenty-one and twenty respectively.

We are left to wonder what attitude Constantine II and Constans adopted towards the purge in Constantinople. In all likelihood, they simply treated it as water under the bridge and got down to the division of the spoils. Constantius received Hannibalianus's former domains in Pontus and Roman Armenia. Constans, the youngest of the three brothers, somewhat surprisingly emerged as the biggest beneficiary of Dalmatius's fall, adding his former provinces of Moesia (the ripa Gothica), Macedonia, Greece, and Thrace to his existing rule over Italy, Sicily, Africa, and Illyricum. Constantine, who as the eldest of the brothers was accorded some limited or formal suzerainty over young Constans, benefited the least. He may have received some districts in Rhaetia that had previously been part of Constans's domain, and there is also a curious suggestion that he was given authority over Constantinople itself.

At first glance, it is surprising that Constantius did not benefit more substantially from the fall of Dalmatius, but rather chose to consign almost all of his dead cousin's former domains to his younger brother Constans. We might be tempted to wonder whether some pangs of conscience led Constantius to renounce his fair share of Dalmatius's inheritance. But the truth is probably more prosaic. Constantius had been living in and ruling from Antioch for two years already, and he planned to return there as soon as the uncertain situation at the Empire's heart was stabilized. Next year, he knew, he faced a war on the eastern frontier with Shapur of Persia, a powerful and dangerous adversary. Under these circumstances, the last thing that Constantius needed was responsibility for Dalmatius's former realm between the Julian Alps and the Propontis. This was particularly true in that the ripa Gothica, together with the Rhine and the eastern border in northern Mesopotamia, was one of the Empire's most dangerous and difficult frontiers. Even as the brothers met in Pannonia, it seemed clear that there would soon be trouble with the Sarmatians across the Danube. With Constantius fully occupied with the eastern frontier and Constantine II preoccupied with the defense of the Rhine, it made sense to require young Constans to assume responsibility for the defense of the middle and lower Danube.

The conference also resolved one other open piece of business. Constantine II apparently secured his brother Constantius's agreement that Bishop Athanasius could return to Alexandria and resume his former position. The bishop arrived back in his native city to a tumultuous welcome in November 337.

With the outstanding business between them thus resolved, the three Augusti set out to return to their distant capitals. Constantine's three sons would never meet together again.

Notes:

[1] The actual date of the conference is disputed, with some scholars arguing that it took place as late as June 338. However, it seems unlikely to me that the conference would have been postponed for as long as ten months after the death of Dalmatius the Younger, if only because it was necessary to determine who would take over the provinces he had been responsible for administering. I have therefore followed Timothy Barnes and Michael DiMaio in preferring a date in the fall of 337 for the Viminacium conference.

Sources:

Timothy Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius (1984), at 261-64

Timothy Barnes, The New Empire of Diocletian and Constantine (1982), at 84-87

Michael Di Maio & Fr. Arnold, "Per Vim, Per Caedem, Per Bellum: A Study of Murder and Ecclesiastical Politics in the Year 337 A.D.", 62 BYZANTION 158 (1992)

Edward Gibbon, The Decline & Fall of the Roman Empire ((J.B. Bury ed.), Volume II, at 237 and Appendix XIV