In 359 AD, the ancient city of Scythopolis (located in modern-day Israel, known today as Beit She’an) became the epicenter for one of the most disturbing episodes of political paranoia in the late Roman Empire. This was a time when men from across the eastern provinces of the Roman world were imprisoned, tortured, and sometimes executed over accusations of magic, divination and even treason.
The episode, known as the Scythopolis Trials, unfolded during the reign of Roman Emperor Constantius II and is described in remarkable detail by the fourth-century historian Ammianus Marcellinus in his major historical work, Res Gestae.
At the center of the ordeal was an oracle dedicated to the Egyptian deity Besa at the city of Abydos in Upper Egypt. People visiting the sanctuary would sometimes leave written questions concerning their hopes, plans and their future. Some of these parchments remained at the temple after the oracle had supposedly answered them.
According to Ammianus, several documents were eventually sent to Emperor Constantius II. Nothing suspicious so far, but Constantius was not an ordinary Emperor. His reign at thet time was defined bt hisw deep fear of conspiracies against his rule. This transformed, in his mind, what might otherwise have been private religious inquiries into evidence of possible treason.
The emperor dispatched an imperial official named Paulus, notorious for his ruthless investigations and later known as Paulus Catena, or “Paul the Chain,” to investigate what was going on in the eastern territories of the Empire.
Scythopolis was selected as the location for the proceedings. Ammianus explains that the city was relatively secluded while also lying conveniently between Antioch and Alexandria, two major centers from which many defendants were brought.
Greeks among those accused at the Roman trials of Scythopolis
Among the first defendants who were brought to explainwhat was going on was Simplicius, the son of a former prefect and consul. Simplicius was accused of asking an oracle how he might obtain imperial power. He escaped execution but was sent into exile.
Another defendant was Parnasius, a native of Patras in Greece and former prefect of Egypt. His alleged evidence of suspicious behavior was extraordinary: years earlier he had reportedly described a dream in which shadowy figures dressed as tragic actors accompanied him while he traveled from Patras to take up public office.
Parnasius was ultimately exiled.
The poet and scholar Andronicus was also brought before the tribunal but successfully maintained his innocence and was acquitted.
An elderly philosopher named Demetrius, surnamed Cythras, faced an even harsher ordeal. He admitted that he had performed traditional sacrifices but insisted that he had done so throughout his life simply to honor the gods and not to discover who might become emperor. Despite being tortured on the rack, he maintained the same explanation and was eventually released.
However, others were not so fortunate.
Ammianus describes in his Res Gestae, Book XIX (19.12.14) an atmosphere in which almost any unusual behavior could become evidence of forbidden magic.
“For if anyone wore on his neck an amulet against the quartan ague or any other complaint, or was accused by the testimony of the evil-disposed of passing by a grave in the evening, on the ground that he was a dealer in poisons…” he writes.
Wearing an amulet that was intended to protect against illness or even being reported walking near a grave after dark could lead to accusations and, in some cases, death. Property belonging to those convicted could also be confiscated.
The Scythopolis Trials reveal an empire increasingly haunted by fears of usurpation, a theme that would define the rest of Roman (be it Western or Eastern/Byzantine) history. What began with scraps of parchment left at an Egyptian oracle became a sweeping investigation in which religious practices, superstition, personal rivalries, and imperial politics combined with deadly consequences for many innocent people.
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