Kitap 31
13.12
At the first coming of darkness the emperor, amid the common soldiers as was supposed (for no one asserted that he had seen him or been with him), fell mortally wounded by an arrow, and presently breathed his last breath; and he was never afterwards found anywhere.Libanius Orat. xxiv. II, p. 515 (Foerster), agrees with this account, but adds that the emperor might have saved himself on horseback, but did not wish to survive the defeat of his army, and died fighting. The other authorities agree with the following account of Ammianus. For since a few of the foe were active for long in the neighbourhood for the purpose of robbing the dead, no one of the fugitives or of the natives ventured to approach the spot.
13.13
The Caesar Decius, we are told, met a similar fate;Cf. Zosimus, iv. 24. for when he was fiercely fighting with the barbarians and his horse, whose excitement he could not restrain, stumbled and threw him, he fell into a marsh, from which he could not get out, nor could his body be found.
13.14
Others say that Valens did not give up the ghost at once, but with his bodyguardSee Index II, Vol. I. and a few eunuchs was taken to a peasant’s cottage near by, well fortified in its second storey; and while he was being treated by unskilful hands, he was surrounded by the enemy, who did not know who he was, but was saved from the shame of captivity.
