ABSTRACT
The men whom Diocletian chose to promote were men accustomed to authority. Maximian, Constantius and Galerius were soldiers who had risen through the ranks in a hard school. The loyalty which they owed towards Diocletian was repaid by his trust, in particular in the exercise of command. While all of Diocletian's colleagues were in one sense his reflections, exercising power on his behalf, they were entrusted with tasks of great magnitude and given considerable freedom to act. In this they differed from their successors as Caesars, Gallus and Julian, who were fenced with the officials of the profoundly suspicious Constantius II. The scale of the commissions entrusted to Diocletian's colleagues has, in the past, led to the illusion that power was formally divided. It was argued in the last chapter that this was never the case during the First Tetrarchy. This proposition will be more fully explored in this chapter as Galerius' military activities in the years of his Caesarship (293–305) are examined.
