LIFE
Marcus now first visited the East. He made a progress with the Empress, visiting Antioch and Alexandria and travelling, apparently, as far as Tarsus. On the return journey Faustina died at Halala in a.d. 176, at the foot of the Taurus range. Marcus raised the village to the status of a colony, Faustinopolis, allowed her memory to be consecrated, with the titles of Diva and Pia, raised a temple in her honour and instituted a kind of orphanage, Puellae Faustinianae, to her memory. Thus, if he was aware of them, he replied to the calumnies which had desecrated her fame. In his Meditations he speaks of her briefly: 'I owe it to the gods that my wife is what she is, so obedient, so naturally loving, so simple in her tastes.' In September 176 Marcus was initiated into the Eleusinian mysteries, and during his visit to Athens instituted new philosophic chairs in the University and received Athenagoras' Apology for Christianity. On December 23 he triumphed with his son Commodus, now joint Emperor, at Rome.
The war in the north breaking out again, the two Emperors went to the frontier, probably making headquarters at Sirmium (Mitrovitz on the Save). Here, after a successful campaign, Marcus Aurelius died, possibly of the plague, but more probably of exhaustion. His son succeeded to the throne without opposition. Mommsen summarizes the result of the long series of battles with the Germans and Sarmatians as follows: 'After fourteen years of almost ceaseless warfare, he who was a warrior in spite of his will had reached the goal; the Romans were a second time faced with the acquisition of the upper waters of the river Elbe; now all that remained to do was the proclamation of the wish to retain what he had won. Thereupon he died . . . not yet 60 years old, in the camp on March 17, a.d. 180. We must recognize not merely the ruler's resolution and tenacity, we must further admit that he did what right
