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so -and I have no reasons to reject the theory of Alföldi - 67 Syria could not have been invaded and Antioch captured in A.D. 256, a date suggested by the combination of the data yielded by Shapuhr's inscription and by Dura. Antioch and Dura must have been captured either earlier or later. We have seen above that it could not have happened later. If so it must have happened earlier, before A.D. 254 according to the numismatic evidence. The date assigned to it by Zosimus and Orac. Sib. XIII is therefore in accordance with the numismatic evidence. Is this date reconcilable with the date of Dura's capture and destruction by Shapuhr, ascertained by the finds made in Dura?

On the face of it the two dates stand over against each other fixed and irreconcilable. However I see a possible way of their reconciliation. This way is of course very hypothetical. It is based on the interpretation and dating of a few literary texts, elusive and ambiguous, in combination with an equally hypothetical interpretation of some monuments found at Dura. The results of such a procedure are bound to be tentative, and I feel hesitant about suggesting my hypothesis even as a mere possibility. And yet it is perhaps better to mention it briefly, in order to make it easier for fellow students to find another way out of the impasse to which my analysis of the evidence has brought me.

I must begin by eliminating some attractive and obvious suggestions which may be regarded as a solution of the problem we are involved in. It may be assumed that the siege of Dura was laid by Shapuhr at the beginning of his campaign, that it made little progress in A.D. 253, and was carried on slowly and without energetic action on the part of the besiegers for three years, until in A.D. 256 it was brought to completion by more efficient siege operations resulting in the capture of the city. The evidence produced above contradicts sharply such a suggestion. According to Shapuhr all the cities captured by him were taken that is to say "in one campaign" which, as I have

shown above, is equivalent to "in one year." This is in full accord with the general character of Shapuhr's invasion, which was not a war of conquest but a pillaging raid on a large scale. If our Dura was taken by Shapuhr in his first Syrian invasion it must have happened therefore during the course of A.D. 253. Moreover the finds of coins in Dura show that Roman currency circulated freely in Dura in A.D. 254-256, and other finds testify to normal conditions of life in Dura in these years and to continued relations between Dura and Syria, and probably also Dura and the Sassanian Empire. This could not have happened had Dura been besieged in those years.

However the decisive argument against a protracted siege is yielded by the history

67. Professor A. R. Bellinger has been kind enough to check up the theory of Alföldi. The results are as follows. There are two emissions of Antoniniani of Valerian from Antioch which are dated: one is dated Dec. 10, 253-Jan. 1, 254 (Alföldi, Berytus, IV, 1937, Pl. V, 1, 2, cf. Gallienus with the same date, Alföldi, loc. cit. pl. VI, 17), the other has the date Jan. 1, 257-Dec. 10, 257 (Alföldi, loc. cit. pl. VIII, 16-19, cf. Gallienus, Alföldi, loc. cit. pl. VIII, 22). In addition, between the two dated emissions of

   

the end of 253 and beginning of 254 and 257 there are three abundant series of coins of Valerian emitted at Antioch but not dated. Such being the facts, it is hard for the present writer to suppose that none of those undated emissions was made in A.D. 255 and 256, and in fact they are ascribed by Bellinger and Alföldi to these years. It appears therefore that the conclusions of Alföldi about the continuous operation of the Antiochene mint are very probable though of course not entirely certain. Capture of Antioch in

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