[Carinus], son of the emperor Carus,[1] having come to power and [become] master of his desire, shot up [through] such great evil to tyranny, that to those who experienced it he made golden the tyranny acted out in tragic drama, and thus by his deeds far surpassed the name [sc. of tyrant]. For his rapes of [sc. well-]born[2] children, because they were customary, were not even regarded as rapes, but for him it was routine and easy to sin in such ways. And he would fabricate charges against the victims of injustice and judge them, and none of the judged would escape destruction. Since there was great and indescribable ruin, some of the wealthy were incidentally expended, like hens at public banquets, for the wanton luxury of Carinus. He would say that he remembered those being butchered: of some, that they had not praised his good looks; of others, that when he was speaking in his youth they had not admired him as he wished. Some also were slain who had at some time laughed in his presence; and all his [deeds] were more oppressive than omens from Zeus, and he would rage madly amidst his subjects.[3]
That Carinus, the son of Carus, after he became emperor, accomplished not one act leading to common welfare, but surrendered his affairs to wanton luxury and an undisciplined way of life, and would commit murders of innocent men--an incidental expenditure of his wanton luxury--who were thought in some way to have offended him. But, everyone being oppressed by a bitter tyranny, combined with [his] youth, and he doing everything discordantly and without reason . . . . [4]