ecame empress regnant, Leo was a
Thracian officer, a colonel of the service, and director of the general
Aspar's household. Aspar was an Arian Goth, commander of the troops, who
had influence enough to make another man emperor, but not to cancel the
double blot of barbarian and heretic in his own person. He made Leo, with
the intention to be his master. And Leo ruled for seventeen years with some
credit; and presently put Aspar and his son to death, in a treacherous
manner, but not without reason. He bore a good personal character, was
Catholic in his faith, and St. Leo lived on good terms with him during the
four years following his election. St. Leo, dying in 461, was succeeded by
Pope Hilarus, the deacon and legate who brought back a faithful report to
Rome of the violent Council at Ephesus, in 449, from which he had escaped.
Pope Hilarus was succeeded in 468 by Simplicius, and in 474 the emperor
Leo died, leaving the throne to an infant grandson of the same name, the
son of his daughter Ariadne, by an Isaurian officer Zeno, who reigned at
first as the guardian of his son, and a few months afterwards came by that
son's death to sole power as emperor. The worst character is given to Zeno
by the national historians. His conduct was so vile, and his government so
discredited by irruptions of the Huns on the Danube, and of Saracens in
Mesopotamia, that his wife's stepmother Verina, the widow of Leo I.,
conspired against him, and was able to set her brother Basiliscus on the
throne. Zeno took flight; Basiliscus was proclaimed emperor. He declared
himself openly against the Catholic faith in favour of the Eutycheans. But
Basiliscus was, if possible, viler than Zeno, and after twenty months Zeno
was brought back. The usurper's short rule lasted from October, 475, to
June, 477; exactly, therefore, at the time when Odoacer put an end to the
western empire. It was upon Zeno's recovery of the throne that he received
back from the Roman senate the sovereign insignia, and conferred the title
of Roman Patricius on Odoacer. In the following years Zeno had much to do
with Theodorich. He gave up to him part of Dacia and Moesia, and finally
he made, in 484, the king of the Ostrogoths Roman consul, as a reward for
the services to the Roman emperor. But, afterwards, Theodorich ravaged
Zeno's empire up to the walls of Constantinople, and was bought off by a
commission to march into Italy and to dethrone Odoacer. Zeno continued an
inglorious