Note 17 — Chapter XIII · IN THE DAYS OF ELAGABALUS
Reading edition
It is difficult to imagine Elagabalus beginning his appalling career at such an age, and Gibbon, calculating from the age given to Alexander Severus in the “Historia Augusta” at the time of his death, changes the age to seventeen. But the “Historia Augusta” is very commonly wrong in the ages it ascribes to Emperors at their death. Professor Bury admits that Gibbon is probably wrong, and we may follow Herodian.