and, as Photius says (Cod. 86), the most useful. Some of them are consolatory and hortatory, composed in the manner of homilies, while others are very suitable for weaving together the history of his own tribulations. On the subject of this Olympias, Henry Savile writes as follows in his notes, p. 851: "Olympias—to whom these epistles, sweeter than honey dripping from the comb, are addressed—was the niece of Ablabius, who was praetorian prefect under Constantine the Great, being the daughter of Anysius, a count of the second rank. Whether she was the niece of Ablabius through his daughter Olympias, who first married the Augustus Constantius and then Arsaces, king of Armenia—whom Cardinal Baronius thinks for a third time married Anysius, and from whom she (our younger Olympias) was born—I would not say for certain. It seems likely to me that the authors of those times, being effusive enough in their praises of this woman, would not have remained silent about such great glory, had she been the daughter of that same Augusta and queen. Olympias had another sister, as is clear from the letter of Nazianzen to their father, Anysius, which begins, 'Behold, a second son-in-law for you,' and [she had] Theodosia, sister german of the great Amphilochius, as her guide and instructor in virtue during her tender years. Being of marriageable age, she was given by her father in marriage to Nebridius, one of the prefects. Nazianzen, having been invited to this wedding, excused himself to Anysius by a letter beginning, 'I feel the accusations,' etc., saying that, being gouty, he could neither conveniently attend the wedding nor would it be fitting; however, he sent an excellent poem, which is extant in Vol. 2, p. 132 of the Paris edition, as an epithalamium, or rather a moral exhortation to the new bride. From this it appears that these nuptials were celebrated before the conclusion of the Council of Constantinople, at which time Gregory had left his bishopric and retired into Cappadocia; and perhaps it was during the council itself—that is, in the year 381, in the consulship of Syagrius and Eucherius—since Gregory writes that a large number of bishops attended those nuptials, 'and there were present many bishops,' who, it was proper, should have flocked to the royal city on the occasion of the council. She lived in this marriage for twenty months, that is, until the year 383, in which Nebridius died. Thus, in the very flower of her youth, and amidst an abundance of all things, she was widowed of her husband, and she persevered most constantly in that same resolve of perpetual widowhood until her death; nor could she be moved by the prayers or threats of Theodosius the Great, the Emperor, who, because she was adorned with beauty, wealth, and a crown of all virtues, sought with the greatest force to betroth her to his kinsman Elpidius, a Spaniard. Offended by this refusal, the Emperor, before he set out against the tyrant Maximus—which occurred in the year 388—commanded the prefect of the city to find some pretext to hold all her property until she had completed her thirtieth year. She is said to have borne this plundering of her fortunes with a spirit so noble, and so virile for her sex, that she seemed even to consider the injury brought upon her by the Emperor as something welcome, remaining, as I said, in that same tenor of widowhood. For whoever reads with discernment that part of the second letter written to her by our John (see below, col. 559, no. 4 sqq.), will admit with Baronius that the claim of her perpetual virginity is fabulous. After his return from the war against Maximus—that is, in the year 391—Theodosius, having understood the constancy of Olympias, ordered that her possessions be returned to her. From that time she opened her home as a common lodging for all the bishops, monks, priests, and ecclesiastical men who came there. Among others, she donated money and estates to the great Amphilochius, to Optimus the bishop, to Peter the brother of Basil, and to Epiphanius the bishop of Cyprus; she also embraced Theophilus, Antiochus, Acacius, and Severianus with every kind of liberality and munificence. Thus, she was made a deaconess by Nectarius himself, the bishop of Constantinople; and she closed the eyes of both Nectarius and the bishop Optimus with her own hands when they were dying. How dear she was to John after Nectarius, and how dear John was to her, these epistles declare. And indeed, after the exile of John, she was dragged to judgment and accused, among other supporters of John, of the burning of the church of St. Sophia; though she replied most steadfastly to the inquisitors, she was nevertheless fined a not inconsiderable sum of gold and, leaving Constantinople, withdrew to Cyzicus to await milder times. These facts, and much more than these, the reader will find recorded about this divine woman in the writings of Gregory Nazianzen, Palladius, Sozomen, Ammianus, the Menologies, George of Alexandria, and other biographers. Although the things said here concerning the origin of Olympias are involved in some difficulties which it is not the present task to solve; but what Savile says, that Olympias married Nebridius in the year 381, in the consulship of Syagrius and Eucherius