Laeta was a Roman empress as the second wife of the emperor

Gratian Gratian (; ; 18 April 359 – 25 August 383) was emperor of the Western Roman Empire from 367 to 383. The eldest son of Valentinian I, Gratian was raised to the rank of ''Augustus'' as a child and inherited the West after his father's death in ...

Empress

Gratian was first married to Constantia, who died at the age of 21. The ''

Chronicon Paschale ''Chronicon Paschale'' (the ''Paschal'' or ''Easter Chronicle''), also called ''Chronicum Alexandrinum'', ''Constantinopolitanum'' or ''Fasti Siculi'', is the conventional name of a 7th-century Greek Christian chronicle of the world. Its name com ...

'' dates the arrival of Constantia's remains in Constantinople to 31 August 383. She presumably died earlier in the same year, but the exact date and cause of her death are unknown. As Gratian was himself assassinated on 25 August 383, Laeta must have married him in the short period between the death of Constantia and his death.

Sozomen Salamanes Hermias Sozomenos (; ; c. 400 – c. 450 AD), also known as Sozomen, was a Roman lawyer and historian of the Christian Church. Family and home Sozoman was born around 400 in Bethelia, a small town near Gaza, into a wealthy Christia ...

seemed to be aware of their marriage, as he recorded that Gratian had gotten recently married in his account of the emperor’s demise.

Widow

After Gratian’s death, his co-emperor

Theodosius I Theodosius I ( ; 11 January 347 – 17 January 395), also known as Theodosius the Great, was Roman emperor from 379 to 395. He won two civil wars and was instrumental in establishing the Nicene Creed as the orthodox doctrine for Nicene C ...

granted a pension to both Laeta and her mother Pissamena. On his account of the first siege of

Rome Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2, ...

Alaric I Alaric I (; , 'ruler of all'; ; – 411 AD) was the first Germanic kingship, king of the Visigoths, from 395 to 410. He rose to leadership of the Goths who came to occupy Moesia—territory acquired a couple of decades earlier by a combine ...

, King of the

Visigoths The Visigoths (; ) were a Germanic people united under the rule of a king and living within the Roman Empire during late antiquity. The Visigoths first appeared in the Balkans, as a Roman-allied Barbarian kingdoms, barbarian military group unite ...

(dated to 408), Zosimus mentioned that the city faced a

famine A famine is a widespread scarcity of food caused by several possible factors, including, but not limited to war, natural disasters, crop failure, widespread poverty, an Financial crisis, economic catastrophe or government policies. This phenom ...

. The historian recorded how the two women used the money given to them by Theodosius to assist in supplying food to many people.

Zosimus Zosimus, Zosimos, Zosima or Zosimas may refer to: People * * Rufus and Zosimus (died 107), Christian saints * Zosimus (martyr) (died 110), Christian martyr who was executed in Umbria, Italy * Zosimos of Panopolis, also known as ''Zosimus Alch ...

, ''Historia Nova'' 5.39.4 This is the only mention of Laeta in primary sources.

References

External links

Translation of the 5th Book of Zosimus, our primary source for her existence
{{Roman empresses, state=collapsed 4th-century births 5th-century deaths Valentinianic dynasty 4th-century Roman empresses