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[2] To besiege this city Valens sent, besides others skilled in that kind of fighting, Vadomarius, a former general and king of the Alamanni, 1 and went on himself to Nicomedia. Leaving that place, he carried on the siege of Chalcedon with great vigour, from the walls of which city insults were hurled at him and he was derisively addressed as Sabaiarius. Now sabaia is a drink [p. 625] of the poorer people in Illyricum, a liquor made from barley or some other grain. 2

1 Mentioned in xxi. 3, 5, as general in Phoenicia; cf. xxix. 1, 2.

2 A kind of beer.

Ammianus Marcellinus. With An English Translation. John C. Rolfe, Ph.D., Litt.D. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1935-1940.

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