Scholars unearth mysteryVilla of Roman emperor raises new questions for researchers on dig in Italy Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius Valerius Maxentius is depicted on a coin. Print By Jim Erickson Rocky Mountain News February 13, 2006 In The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon portrays the pagan emperor Maxentius as a licentious youth and "a tyrant as contemptible as he was odious." Historians have long assumed that the reviled Roman emperor lived part-time at an 80-acre suburban villa complex until he was killed by his rival Constantine at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge in A.D. 312....