War: A History in 100 Battles

To oppose him, Maxentius had perhaps 100,000 men to call on, though many were less well-trained than those of his opponent, raised from levies forced on a reluctant population. He gathered stores of wheat and supplies to withstand a siege, as he had done successfully with Galerius. To hold up Constantine’s advance, he ordered the destruction of the wide stone Milvian Bridge across the Tiber, which lay on the path of his enemy’s army. But at the last moment he changed his mind and decided that his forces were large enough to secure a land victory. A new pontoon bridge was constructed, and Maxentius led his large army across it to Saxa Rubra. At the core were the famous Praetorian Guards (the elite imperial bodyguard), and on the flanks were the new heavy cavalry modelled on the Persian example. Opposed to them was a conventional force of Roman infantry supported to either side by experienced horsemen. Constantine’s forces, so it is said, were told to paint the ‘chi-rho’ sign on their shields to show that they were protected by the new Christian God. They marched into battle inspired by Constantine’s vision and the certainty of victory.

Victory was in fact far from certain, since Maxentius had the much larger force, but Constantine, in imitation of Alexander the Great, led his seasoned cavalry in a determined charge against the horsemen on the flanks of Maxentius’s army. Little is known in detail about the battle, and what is recorded comes from a later account by the Christian bishop Eusebius, based on conversations with Constantine, and cannot be regarded as reliable. However, the outcome is known with certainty. Constantine’s cavalry smashed their opponents and drove them back to the Tiber. The infantry lines of Maxentius were exposed to flank attacks and the line caved in. Panicking soldiers fled to the pontoon bridge or tried to cross the river, while the Praetorian Guard held its ground and was cut down rank by rank where it stood. Whether the pontoon bridge collapsed or the unruly crowd surging across it pushed others into the water, the fleeing Maxentius ended up drowned in the Tiber, weighed down by his armour. His body was dredged out and decapitated, and his head displayed on a lance as Constantine marched on into the city.

The extent to which Constantine’s army fought and won because of his vision is open to debate. His forces won notable military successes in northern Italy without the aid of divine inspiration, but with an astute and experienced commander to guide them. It is not clear how Constantine himself interpreted his vision, since he had previously claimed to see visions of pagan gods, particularly Apollo. After his capture of Rome, which left him as unchallenged ruler of the western part of the empire, he admitted to many subsequent visions of Jesus. Modern accounts suggest a possible atmospheric phenomenon which Constantine interpreted as he wished, but since he claimed to have had visions often, he may have been the victim of hallucinations caused, experts now think, by a particular form of migraine. Whatever the truth, Constantine knew how to use the vision to his advantage; in this case it must have reinforced the confidence of his men in a leader who had already proved his qualities on numerous occasions. There are times in battle when a perceptive leader can see how the supernatural might help, as Alexander had at Gaugamela.

The Battle of the Milvian Bridge became a reference point for the establishment of Christianity in the Western Roman Empire. A year after the battle, Constantine published an edict of religious toleration at Milan and, although only a small percentage of the Roman population was yet Christian, the victory at the bridge and the support of Constantine for Christianity worked rapidly to spread the religion, with its now protected status, across the Western Empire. The legends surrounding the Milvian Bridge were what counted, not the truth of a battle that was just one of many internecine conflicts in the fading years of Roman imperial rule, won by a man who had been happily pagan only years before.

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