Editing Elagabalus (section)

=== Herodian ===
[[File:INC-1854-r Ауреус Элагабал ок. 218-219 гг. (реверс).png|thumb|Reverse of an ''aureus'' of Elagabalus, marked:{{Break}}{{Smallcaps|fides exercitus}} ("''the Faith of the Army''")]]
Another contemporary of Elagabalus was [[Herodian]], a minor Roman civil servant who lived from {{circa|170}} until 240. His work, ''History of the Roman Empire since Marcus Aurelius'', commonly abbreviated as ''Roman History'', is an eyewitness account of the reign of [[Commodus]] until the beginning of the reign of [[Gordian III]]. His work largely overlaps with Dio's own ''Roman History'', and the texts, written independently of each other, agree more often than not about Elagabalus and his short but eventful reign.{{sfn|Herodian}} Herodian may have used Dio's work as a source for parts of his account about Elagabalus.<ref name=":0" />

Arrizabalaga writes that Herodian is in most ways "less detailed and punctilious than Dio",<ref>Leonardo de Arrizabalaga y Prado, ''Varian Studies Volume One: Varius'' (2017), p. 131</ref> and he is deemed less reliable by many modern scholars, though Rowan considers his account of Elagabalus's reign more reliable than Dio's{{sfn|Rowan|2012|p=169}} and Herodian's lack of literary and scholarly pretensions are considered to make him less biased than senatorial historians.<ref>{{harvtxt|Sorek|2012|p=202}}: "Modern scholars have regarded Herodian as unreliable. However, [...] his lack of  literary and scholarly pretensions make him less biased than the senatorial  historians".</ref> He is considered an important source for the religious reforms which took place during the reign of Elagabalus,{{sfn|Sorek|2012|p=202}} which have been confirmed by [[numismatics|numismatic]]<ref>{{cite book |last=Cohen |first=Henry | author-link=Henry Cohen (numismatist) |title=Description Historiques des Monnaies Frappées sous l'Empire Romain |year=1880–1892 |location=Paris |page=40}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Babelon | author-link=Ernest Babelon |first=Ernest Charles François |title=Monnaies Consulaires II |year=1885–1886 |location=Bologna |publisher=Forni |pages=63–69}}</ref> and [[archaeology|archaeological]] evidence.<ref>''[[Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum]]'', {{CIL|02|1409}}, {{CIL|02|1410}}, {{CIL|02|1413}}, and CIL III: 564–589.</ref>