He chose Libius Severus to fill the place of Majorian and had him
proclaimed in Ravenna upon November 19, 461; and upheld him for nearly
four years till he died in Rome on August 15, 465, poisoned, men said,
by Ricimer. Then the "king-maker" allied himself with Constantinople
and placed Anthemius, son-in-law of Marcian, upon the throne of the
West, in 467, kept him there till 472, and then proclaimed Olybrius,
another Byzantine, emperor; laid siege to Anthemius in Rome, took the
City, slew Anthemius, and forty days later himself died, leaving the
command of his army to his nephew Gundobald, one of the princes of the
Burgundians. Seven months later Olybrius died.
The alliance Ricimer had made with Constantinople, though he repented
it, was the one hope of the future, and as a fact the future belonged
to it. For a moment Gundobald was able to place an obscure soldier
Glycerius upon the throne, but he soon exchanged the purple for the
bishopric of Salona, and the nominee of Constantinople, Julius Nepos,
reigned in Ravenna in his stead. But though the future belonged to
Constantinople, the present did not.
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