Eutropia

1. A native of Syria, became, by her first husband, whose name is unknown, the mother of Flavia Maximiana Theodora, who was married to Constantius Chlorus upon the reconstruction of the empire under Diocletian. Eutropia was at that time the wife of Maximianus Herculius, to whom she bore Maxentius and Fausta, afterwards united to Constantine the Great. Upon the conversion of her son-in-law, Eutropia also embraced Christianity, and repaired to Palestine. In consequence of her representations, the emperor took measures for abolishing the superstitious observances which had for ages prevailed at the oak of Mamre, so celebrated as the abode of Abraham, and caused a church to be erected on the spot.

A medal published on the authority of Goltzius alone, with the legend GAL. VAL. EUTROP., is considered as unquestionably spurious. Further Information

Aurel. Vict. Epit. xl.; Euseb. Hist. Eccl. 3.52; Tillemont, Histoire des Empereurs, vol. iv. pp. 130, 244; Eckhel, vol. viii. p. 27.

2. Grand-daughter of the foregoing, being the daughter of Constantius Chlorus and Flavia Maximiana Theodora, and therefore the sister of Delmatius, Julius Constantius, Hannibalianus, Constantia, and Anastasia, and half-sister of Constantine the Great. (See the genealogical table prefixed to Constantinus I.) She is believed to have been the wife of Nepotianus, who was consul A. D. 301; but at all events she was certainly the mother of that Nepotianus who assumed the purple on the 3rd of June, A. D. 350, and she perished in the proscription which followed his death twenty-eight days afterwards. (Nepotianus.] (Aurel. Vict. Epit. xlii.; Zosim. 2.43; Athanas. Apolog. vol. i. p. 677, ed. Paris, 1627.) [W.R]