Late Roman Army Grade/Rank List under Anastasius

[Robert Vermaat]

I think Milner's idea that the Flaviales were introduced by Constantine or his dynasty (rather than Vespasian, as V believes) seems quite convincing. Although they might have been just renamed, and the role existed before that, perhaps, as part of an enlarged century. I don't think either Augustales or Flaviales are attested before Vegetius's approximate time of writing though (a late 4th century Egyptian papyrus seems to be the earliest appearance of the Flavialis). So 'some time in the 4th century' might be the best we can say!

Which of course begs the question why neither appears in both Jerome's Contra Johannem Hierosolymilanum episcopum 19 (PL23, 370), written c.390, nor in Justinian's Codex (I.27.2:20-21).