Some wealthy young men in the African province were being forced to give up their estates to fund the emperor’s treasury when they incited a riot, resulting in the death of the money collector. The rioters seized the town of Thysdrus and designated it as the center of a new rebellion against the emperor. The proconsul of Africa, Gordian, was pressured to accept the crown of emperor even though he was eighty years old. Descended from Trajan and the Gracchi, Gordian was one of the most respected men in Rome.
He sent embassies to Rome where the senate, delighted at the chance to reclaim the empire for the patricians, met secretly in the Temple of Castor and Pollux to consider the matter, and voted Gordian emperor. His son, Gordian II, was named co-emperor. To seal their authority the senate authorized the murder of the praetorian prefect, Vitalianus, a strong supporter of Maximinus.