The Sorcery of Maxentius, and Famine at Rome

But the height of the tyrant’s wickedness was that he turned to sorcery. For magic purposes he would sometimes cut open pregnant women, and at other times search the entrails of newborn babies. He also killed lions and practiced certain horrible arts for calling up demons and turning aside the coming war, hoping by these means to win the victory. In short, it is impossible to describe the many kinds of oppression by which this tyrant of Rome enslaved his subjects. By this time they had been reduced to the most extreme poverty and want of necessary food, a scarcity such as no one now living remembers ever having happened at Rome before. [a]