Postumus

c. 3rd century–269

Postumus was a Roman commander who established the breakaway Gallic Empire around AD 260 during the wider third-century crisis. He controlled Gaul, Britain and parts of Spain and created an imperial administration with its own consuls and coinage while defending the Rhine frontier. Postumus did not attempt to conquer Rome, suggesting that regional security mattered more than universal rule. His own soldiers killed him after he refused to allow them to sack Mainz following a rebellion.

Postumus appears in Harry Sidebottom’s Warrior of Rome series and in other fiction about Gallienus and the fractured empire. Novelists can portray him as usurper, regional protector or both. His functioning government complicates the idea that every breakaway emperor was merely an ambitious rebel awaiting defeat.

In Harry Sidebottom’s Falling Sky, in AD 265 Emperor Gallienus moves against Postumus, ruler of the breakaway Gallic Empire.

Series

Series featuring Postumus (1 series)

Warrior of Rome in Order

by Harry Sidebottom 8 books 4.3

The Warrior of Rome series follows Marcus Clodius Ballista, an Angle raised within the Roman world who becomes a senior imperial commander during the Crisis of the Third Century. His service carries him from the Persian frontier to Palmyra, the Black Sea, the Eurasian steppe, Rome, Sicily and…

All books in this series