63 (return) [ The series of the first Go_The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Table of Contents with links in the HTML file to the two Project Gutenberg editions (12 volumes)

by Procopius (l. i. c. 5—29, l. ii. c. l—30, l. iii. c. l) till

the captivity of Vitigas. With the aid of Sigonius (Opp. tom. i.

de Imp. Occident. l. xvii. xviii.) and Muratori, (Annali d’Itaia,

tom. v.,) I have gleaned some few additional facts.]

After Belisarius had left sufficient garrisons in Palermo and

Syracuse, he embarked his troops at Messina, and landed them,

without resistance, on the opposite shores of Rhegium. A Gothic

prince, who had married the daughter of Theodatus, was stationed

with an army to guard the entrance of Italy; but he imitated,

without scruple, the example of a sovereign faithless to his

public and private duties. The perfidious Ebermor deserted with

his followers to the Roman camp, and was dismissed to enjoy the

servile honors of the Byzantine court. 64 From Rhegium to Naples,

the fleet and army of Belisarius, almost always in view of each

other, advanced near three hundred miles along the sea-coast. The

people of Bruttium, Lucania, and Campania, who abhorred the name

and religion of the Goths, embraced the specious excuse, that

their ruined walls were incapable of defence: the soldiers paid a

just equivalent for a plentiful market; and curiosity alone

interrupted the peaceful occupations of the husbandman or

artificer. Naples, which has swelled to a great and populous

capital, long cherished the language and manners of a Grecian

colony; 65 and the choice of Virgil had ennobled this elegant

retreat, which attracted the lovers of repose and study, from the

noise, the smoke, and the laborious opulence of Rome.66 As soon

as the place was invested by sea and land, Belisarius gave

audience to the deputies of the people, who exhorted him to

disregard a conquest unworthy of his arms, to seek the Gothic

king in a field of battle, and, after his victory, to claim, as

the sovereign of Rome, the allegiance of the dependent cities.

“When I treat with my enemies,” replied the Roman chief, with a

haughty smile, “I am more accustomed to give than to receive

counsel; but I hold in one hand inevitable ruin, and in the other

peace and freedom, such as Sicily now enjoys.” The impatience of

delay urged him to grant the most liberal terms; his honor

secured their performance: but Naples was divided into two

factions; and the Greek democracy was inflamed by their orators,

who, with much spirit and some truth, represented to the

multitude that the Goths would punish their defection, and that

Belisarius himself must esteem their loyalty and valor. Their

deliberations, however, were not perfectly free: the city was

commanded by eight hundred Barbarians, whose wives and children

were detained at Ravenna as the pledge of their fidelity; and

even the Jews, who were rich and numerous, resisted, with

desperate enthusiasm, the intolerant laws of Justinian. In a much

later period, the circumference of Naples 67 measured only two

thousand three hundred and sixty three paces: 68 the

fortifications were defended by precipices or the sea; when the

aqueducts were intercepted, a supply of water might be drawn from

wells and fountains; and the stock of provisions was sufficient

to consume the patience of the besiegers. At the end of twenty

days, that of Belisarius was almost exhausted, and he had

reconciled himself to the disgrace of abandoning the siege, that

he might march, before the winter season, against Rome and the

Gothic king. But his anxiety was relieved by the bold curiosity

of an Isaurian, who explored the dry channel of an aqueduct, and

secretly reported, that a passage might be perforated to

introduce a file of armed soldiers into the heart of the city.

When the work had been silently executed, the humane general

risked the discovery of his secret by a last and fruitless

admonition of the impending danger. In the darkness of the night,

four hundred Romans entered the aqueduct, raised themselves by a

rope, which they fastened to an olive-tree, into the house or

garden of a solitary matron, sounded their trumpets, surprised

the sentinels, and gave admittance to their companions, who on

all sides scaled the walls, and burst open the gates of the city.

Every crime which is punished by social justice was practised as

the rights of war; the Huns were distinguished by cruelty and

sacrilege, and Belisarius alone appeared in the streets and

churches of Naples to moderate the calamities which he predicted.

“The gold and silver,” he repeatedly exclaimed, “are the just

rewards of your valor. But spare the inhabitants; they are

Christians, they are suppliants, they are now your

fellow-subjects. Restore the children to their parents, the wives

to their husbands; and show them by your generosity of what

friends they have obstinately deprived themselves.” The city was

saved by the virtue and authority of its conqueror; 69 and when

the Neapolitans returned to their houses, they found some

consolation in the secret enjoyment of their hidden treasures.

The Barbarian garrison enlisted in the service of the emperor;

Apulia and Calabria, delivered from the odious presence of the

Goths, acknowledged his dominion; and the tusks of the Calydonian

boar, which were still shown at Beneventum, are curiously

described by the historian of Belisarius. 70

64 (return) [ Jornandes, de Rebus Geticis, c. 60, p. 702, edit.

Grot., and tom. i. p. 221. Muratori, de Success, Regn. p. 241.]

65 (return) [ Nero (says Tacitus, Annal. xv. 35) Neapolim quasi

Graecam urbem delegit. One hundred and fifty years afterwards, in

the time of Septimius Severus, the Hellenism of the Neapolitans

is praised by Philostratus. (Icon. l. i. p. 763, edit. Olear.)]

66 (return) [ The otium of Naples is praised by the Roman poets,

by Virgil, Horace, Silius Italicus, and Statius, (Cluver. Ital.

Ant. l. iv. p. 1149, 1150.) In an elegant epistles, (Sylv. l.

iii. 5, p. 94—98, edit. Markland,) Statius undertakes the

difficult task of drawing his wife from the pleasures of Rome to

that calm retreat.]

67 (return) [ This measure was taken by Roger l., after the

conquest of Naples, (A.D. 1139,) which he made the capital of his

new kingdom, (Giannone, Istoria Civile, tom. ii. p. 169.) That

city, the third in Christian Europe, is now at least twelve miles

in circumference, (Jul. Caesar. Capaccii Hist. Neapol. l. i. p.

47,) and contains more inhabitants (350,000) in a given space,

than any other spot in the known world.]

68 (return) [ Not geometrical, but common, paces or steps, of 22

French inches, (D’ Anville, Mesures Itineraires, p. 7, 8.) The

2363 do not take an English mile.]

69 (return) [ Belisarius was reproved by Pope Silverius for the

massacre. He repeopled Naples, and imported colonies of African

captives into Sicily, Calabria, and Apulia, (Hist. Miscell. l.

xvi. in Muratori, tom. i. p. 106, 107.)]

70 (return) [ Beneventum was built by Diomede, the nephew of

Meleager (Cluver. tom. ii. p. 1195, 1196.) The Calydonian hunt is

a picture of savage life, (Ovid, Metamorph. l. viii.) Thirty or

forty heroes were leagued against a hog: the brutes (not the hog)

quarrelled with lady for the head.]

The faithful soldiers and citizens of Naples had expected their

deliverance from a prince, who remained the inactive and almost

indifferent spectator of their ruin. Theodatus secured his person

within the walls of Rome, whilst his cavalry advanced forty miles

on the Appian way, and encamped in the Pomptine marshes; which,

by a canal of nineteen miles in length, had been recently drained

and converted into excellent pastures. 71 But the principal

forces of the Goths were dispersed in Dalmatia, Venetia, and

Gaul; and the feeble mind of their king was confounded by the

unsuccessful event of a divination, which seemed to presage the

downfall of his empire. 72 The most abject slaves have arraigned

the guilt or weakness of an unfortunate master. The character of

Theodatus was rigorously scrutinized by a free and idle camp of

Barbarians, conscious of their privilege and power: he was

declared unworthy of his race, his nation, and his throne; and

their general Vitiges, whose valor had been signalized in the

Illyrian war, was raised with unanimous applause on the bucklers

of his companions. On the first rumor, the abdicated monarch fled

from the justice of his country; but he was pursued by private

revenge. A Goth, whom he had injured in his love, overtook

Theodatus on the Flaminian way, and, regardless of his unmanly

cries, slaughtered him, as he lay, prostrate on the ground, like

a victim (says the historian) at the foot of the altar. The

choice of the people is the best and purest title to reign over

them; yet such is the prejudice of every age, that Vitiges

impatiently wished to return to Ravenna, where he might seize,

with the reluctant hand of the daughter of Amalasontha, some

faint shadow of hereditary right. A national council was

immediately held, and the new monarch reconciled the impatient

spirit of the Barbarians to a measure of disgrace, which the

misconduct of his predecessor rendered wise and indispensable.

The Goths consented to retreat in the presence of a victorious

enemy; to delay till the next spring the operations of offensive

war; to summon their scattered forces; to relinquish their

distant possessions, and to trust even Rome itself to the faith

of its inhabitants. Leuderis, an ancient warrior, was left in the

capital with four thousand soldiers; a feeble garrison, which

might have seconded the zeal, though it was incapable of opposing

the wishes, of the Romans. But a momentary enthusiasm of religion

and patriotism was kindled in their minds. They furiously

exclaimed, that the apostolic throne should no longer be profaned

by the triumph or toleration of Arianism; that the tombs of the

Caesars should no longer be trampled by the savages of the North;

and, without reflecting, that Italy must sink into a province of

Constantinople, they fondly hailed the restoration of a Roman

emperor as a new aera of freedom and prosperity. The deputies of

the pope and clergy, of the senate and people, invited the

lieutenant of Justinian to accept their voluntary allegiance, and

to enter the city, whose gates would be thrown open for his

reception. As soon as Belisarius had fortified his new conquests,

Naples and Cumae, he advanced about twenty miles to the banks of

the Vulturnus, contemplated the decayed grandeur of Capua, and

halted at the separation of the Latin and Appian ways. The work

of the censor, after the incessant use of nine centuries, still

preserved its primaeval beauty, and not a flaw could be

discovered in the large polished stones, of which that solid,

though narrow road, was so firmly compacted. 73 Belisarius,

however, preferred the Latin way, which, at a distance from the

sea and the marshes, skirted in a space of one hundred and twenty

miles along the foot of the mountains. His enemies had

disappeared: when he made his entrance through the Asinarian

gate, the garrison departed without molestation along the

Flaminian way; and the city, after sixty years’ servitude, was

delivered from the yoke of the Barbarians. Leuderis alone, from a

motive of pride or discontent, refused to accompany the

fugitives; and the Gothic chief, himself a trophy of the victory,

was sent with the keys of Rome to the throne of the emperor

Justinian. 74

71 (return) [ The Decennovium is strangely confounded by

Cluverius (tom. ii. p. 1007) with the River Ufens. It was in

truth a canal of nineteen miles, from Forum Appii to Terracina,

on which Horace embarked in the night. The Decennovium, which is

mentioned by Lucan, Dion Cassius, and Cassiodorus, has been

sufficiently ruined, restored, and obliterated, (D’Anville,

Anayse de l’Italie, p. 185, &c.)]

72 (return) [ A Jew, gratified his contempt and hatred for all

the Christians, by enclosing three bands, each of ten hogs, and

discriminated by the names of Goths, Greeks, and Romans. Of the

first, almost all were found dead; almost all the second were

alive: of the third, half died, and the rest lost their bristles.

No unsuitable emblem of the event]

73 (return) [ Bergier (Hist. des Grands Chemins des Romains, tom.

i. p. 221-228, 440-444) examines the structure and materials,

while D’Anville (Analyse d’Italie, p. 200—123) defines the

geographical line.]

74 (return) [ Of the first recovery of Rome, the year (536) is

certain, from the series of events, rather than from the corrupt,

or interpolated, text of Procopius. The month (December) is

ascertained by Evagrius, (l. iv. v. 19;) and the day (the tenth)

may be admitted on the slight evidence of Nicephorus Callistus,

(l. xvii. c. 13.) For this accurate chronology, we are indebted

to the diligence and judgment of Pagi, (tom, ii. p. 659, 560.)

Note: Compare Maltret’s note, in the edition of Dindorf the ninth

is the day, according to his reading,—M.]

The first days, which coincided with the old Saturnalia, were

devoted to mutual congratulation and the public joy; and the

Catholics prepared to celebrate, without a rival, the approaching

festival of the nativity of Christ. In the familiar conversation

of a hero, the Romans acquired some notion of the virtues which

history ascribed to their ancestors; they were edified by the

apparent respect of Belisarius for the successor of St. Peter,

and his rigid discipline secured in the midst of war the

blessings of tranquillity and justice. They applauded the rapid

success of his arms, which overran the adjacent country, as far

as Narni, Perusia, and Spoleto; but they trembled, the senate,

the clergy, and the unwarlike people, as soon as they understood

that he had resolved, and would speedily be reduced, to sustain a

siege against the powers of the Gothic monarchy. The designs of

Vitiges were executed, during the winter season, with diligence

and effect. From their rustic habitations, from their distant

garrisons, the Goths assembled at Ravenna for the defence of

their country; and such were their numbers, that, after an army

had been detached for the relief of Dalmatia, one hundred and

fifty thousand fighting men marched under the royal standard.

According to the degrees of rank or merit, the Gothic king

distributed arms and horses, rich gifts, and liberal promises; he

moved along the Flaminian way, declined the useless sieges of

Perusia and Spoleto, respected he impregnable rock of Narni, and

arrived within two miles of Rome at the foot of the Milvian

bridge. The narrow passage was fortified with a tower, and

Belisarius had computed the value of the twenty days which must

be lost in the construction of another bridge. But the

consternation of the soldiers of the tower, who either fled or

deserted, disappointed his hopes, and betrayed his person into

the most imminent danger. At the head of one thousand horse, the

Roman general sallied from the Flaminian gate to mark the ground

of an advantageous position, and to survey the camp of the

Barbarians; but while he still believed them on the other side of

the Tyber, he was suddenly encompassed and assaulted by their

numerous squadrons. The fate of Italy depended on his life; and

the deserters pointed to the conspicuous horse a bay, 75 with a

white face, which he rode on that memorable day. “Aim at the bay

horse,” was the universal cry. Every bow was bent, every javelin

was directed, against that fatal object, and the command was

repeated and obeyed by thousands who were ignorant of its real

motive. The bolder Barbarians advanced to the more honorable

combat of swords and spears; and the praise of an enemy has

graced the fall of Visandus, the standard-bearer, 76 who

maintained his foremost station, till he was pierced with

thirteen wounds, perhaps by the hand of Belisarius himself. The

Roman general was strong, active, and dexterous; on every side he

discharged his weighty and mortal strokes: his faithful guards

imitated his valor, and defended his person; and the Goths, after

the loss of a thousand men, fled before the arms of a hero. They

were rashly pursued to their camp; and the Romans, oppressed by

multitudes, made a gradual, and at length a precipitate retreat

to the gates of the city: the gates were shut against the

fugitives; and the public terror was increased, by the report

that Belisarius was slain. His countenance was indeed disfigured

by sweat, dust, and blood; his voice was hoarse, his strength was

almost exhausted; but his unconquerable spirit still remained; he

imparted that spirit to his desponding companions; and their last

desperate charge was felt by the flying Barbarians, as if a new

army, vigorous and entire, had been poured from the city. The

Flaminian gate was thrown open to a real triumph; but it was not

before Belisarius had visited every post, and provided for the

public safety, that he could be persuaded, by his wife and

friends, to taste the needful refreshments of food and sleep. In

the more improved state of the art of war, a general is seldom

required, or even permitted to display the personal prowess of a

soldier; and the example of Belisarius may be added to the rare

examples of Henry IV., of Pyrrhus, and of Alexander.

75 (return) [ A horse of a bay or red color was styled by the

Greeks, balan by the Barbarians, and spadix by the Romans.

Honesti spadices, says Virgil, (Georgic. l. iii. 72, with the

Observations of Martin and Heyne.) It signifies a branch of the

palm-tree, whose name is synonymous to red, (Aulus Gellius, ii.

26.)]

76 (return) [ I interpret it, not as a proper, name, but an

office, standard-bearer, from bandum, (vexillum,) a Barbaric word

adopted by the Greeks and Romans, (Paul Diacon. l. i. c. 20, p.

760. Grot. Nomina Hethica, p. 575. Ducange, Gloss. Latin. tom. i.

p. 539, 540.)]

After this first and unsuccessful trial of their enemies, the

whole army of the Goths passed the Tyber, and formed the siege of

the city, which continued above a year, till their final

departure. Whatever fancy may conceive, the severe compass of the

geographer defines the circumference of Rome within a line of

twelve miles and three hundred and forty-five paces; and that

circumference, except in the Vatican, has invariably been the

same from the triumph of Aurelian to the peaceful but obscure

reign of the modern popes. 77 But in the day of her greatness,

the space within her walls was crowded with habitations and

inhabitants; and the populous suburbs, that stretched along the

public roads, were darted like so many rays from one common

centre. Adversity swept away these extraneous ornaments, and left

naked and desolate a considerable part even of the seven hills.

Yet Rome in its present state could send into the field about

thirty thousand males of a military age; 78 and, notwithstanding

the want of discipline and exercise, the far greater part, inured

to the hardships of poverty, might be capable of bearing arms for

the defence of their country and religion. The prudence of

Belisarius did not neglect this important resource. His soldiers

were relieved by the zeal and diligence of the people, who

watched while they slept, and labored while they reposed: he

accepted the voluntary service of the bravest and most indigent

of the Roman youth; and the companies of townsmen sometimes

represented, in a vacant post, the presence of the troops which

had been drawn away to more essential duties. But his just

confidence was placed in the veterans who had fought under his

banner in the Persian and African wars; and although that gallant

band was reduced to five thousand men, he undertook, with such

contemptible numbers, to defend a circle of twelve miles, against

an army of one hundred and fifty thousand Barbarians. In the

walls of Rome, which Belisarius constructed or restored, the

materials of ancient architecture may be discerned; 79 and the

whole fortification was completed, except in a chasm still extant

between the Pincian and Flaminian gates, which the prejudices of

the Goths and Romans left under the effectual guard of St. Peter

the apostle. 80

77 (return) [ M. D’Anville has given, in the Memoirs of the

Academy for the year 1756, (tom. xxx. p. 198—236,) a plan of Rome

on a smaller scale, but far more accurate than that which he had

delineated in 1738 for Rollin’s history. Experience had improved

his knowledge and instead of Rossi’s topography, he used the new

and excellent map of Nolli. Pliny’s old measure of thirteen must

be reduced to eight miles. It is easier to alter a text, than to

remove hills or buildings. * Note: Compare Gibbon, ch. xi. note

43, and xxxi. 67, and ch. lxxi. “It is quite clear,” observes Sir

J. Hobhouse, “that all these measurements differ, (in the first

and second it is 21, in the text 12 and 345 paces, in the last

10,) yet it is equally clear that the historian avers that they

are all the same.” The present extent, 12 3/4 nearly agrees with

the second statement of Gibbon. Sir. J. Hobhouse also observes

that the walls were enlarged by Constantine; but there can be no

doubt that the circuit has been much changed. Illust. of Ch.

Harold, p. 180.—M.]

78 (return) [ In the year 1709, Labat (Voyages en Italie, tom.

iii. p. 218) reckoned 138,568 Christian souls, besides 8000 or

10,000 Jews—without souls? In the year 1763, the numbers exceeded

160,000.]

79 (return) [ The accurate eye of Nardini (Roma Antica, l. i. c.

viii. p. 31) could distinguish the tumultuarie opere di

Belisario.]

80 (return) [ The fissure and leaning in the upper part of the

wall, which Procopius observed, (Goth. l. i. c. 13,) is visible

to the present hour, (Douat. Roma Vetus, l. i. c. 17, p. 53,

54.)]

The battlements or bastions were shaped in sharp angles; a ditch,

broad and deep, protected the foot of the rampart; and the

archers on the rampart were assisted by military engines; the

balistri, a powerful cross-bow, which darted short but massy

arrows; the onagri, or wild asses, which, on the principle of a

sling, threw stones and bullets of an enormous size. 81 A chain

was drawn across the Tyber; the arches of the aqueducts were made

impervious, and the mole or sepulchre of Hadrian 82 was

converted, for the first time, to the uses of a citadel. That

venerable structure, which contained the ashes of the Antonines,

was a circular turret rising from a quadrangular basis; it was

covered with the white marble of Paros, and decorated by the

statues of gods and heroes; and the lover of the arts must read

with a sigh, that the works of Praxiteles or Lysippus were torn

from their lofty pedestals, and hurled into the ditch on the

heads of the besiegers. 83 To each of his lieutenants Belisarius

assigned the defence of a gate, with the wise and peremptory

instruction, that, whatever might be the alarm, they should

steadily adhere to their respective posts, and trust their

general for the safety of Rome. The formidable host of the Goths

was insufficient to embrace the ample measure of the city, of the

fourteen gates, seven only were invested from the Proenestine to

the Flaminian way; and Vitiges divided his troops into six camps,

each of which was fortified with a ditch and rampart. On the

Tuscan side of the river, a seventh encampment was formed in the

field or circus of the Vatican, for the important purpose of

commanding the Milvian bridge and the course of the Tyber; but

they approached with devotion the adjacent church of St. Peter;

and the threshold of the holy apostles was respected during the

siege by a Christian enemy. In the ages of victory, as often as

the senate decreed some distant conquest, the consul denounced

hostilities, by unbarring, in solemn pomp, the gates of the

temple of Janus. 84 Domestic war now rendered the admonition

superfluous, and the ceremony was superseded by the establishment

of a new religion. But the brazen temple of Janus was left

standing in the forum; of a size sufficient only to contain the

statue of the god, five cubits in height, of a human form, but

with two faces directed to the east and west. The double gates

were likewise of brass; and a fruitless effort to turn them on

their rusty hinges revealed the scandalous secret that some

Romans were still attached to the superstition of their

ancestors.

81 (return) [ Lipsius (Opp. tom. iii. Poliorcet, l. iii.) was

ignorant of this clear and conspicuous passage of Procopius,

(Goth. l. i. c. 21.) The engine was named the wild ass, a

calcitrando, (Hen. Steph. Thesaur. Linguae Graec. tom. ii. p.

1340, 1341, tom. iii. p. 877.) I have seen an ingenious model,

contrived and executed by General Melville, which imitates or

surpasses the art of antiquity.]

82 (return) [ The description of this mausoleum, or mole, in

Procopius, (l. i. c. 25.) is the first and best. The height above

the walls. On Nolli’s great plan, the sides measure 260 English

feet. * Note: Donatus and Nardini suppose that Hadrian’s tomb was

fortified by Honorius; it was united to the wall by men of old,

(Procop in loc.) Gibbon has mistaken the breadth for the height

above the walls Hobhouse, Illust. of Childe Harold, p. 302.—M.]

83 (return) [ Praxiteles excelled in Fauns, and that of Athens

was his own masterpiece. Rome now contains about thirty of the

same character. When the ditch of St. Angelo was cleansed under

Urban VIII., the workmen found the sleeping Faun of the Barberini

palace; but a leg, a thigh, and the right arm, had been broken

from that beautiful statue, (Winkelman, Hist. de l’Art, tom. ii.

p. 52, 53, tom iii. p. 265.)]

84 (return) [ Procopius has given the best description of the

temple of Janus a national deity of Latium, (Heyne, Excurs. v. ad

l. vii. Aeneid.) It was once a gate in the primitive city of

Romulus and Numa, (Nardini, p. 13, 256, 329.) Virgil has

described the ancient rite like a poet and an antiquarian.]

Eighteen days were employed by the besiegers, to provide all the

instruments of attack which antiquity had invented. Fascines were

prepared to fill the ditches, scaling-ladders to ascend the

walls. The largest trees of the forest supplied the timbers of

four battering-rams: their heads were armed with iron; they were

suspended by ropes, and each of them was worked by the labor of

fifty men. The lofty wooden turrets moved on wheels or rollers,

and formed a spacious platform of the level of the rampart. On

the morning of the nineteenth day, a general attack was made from

the Praenestine gate to the Vatican: seven Gothic columns, with

their military engines, advanced to the assault; and the Romans,

who lined the ramparts, listened with doubt and anxiety to the

cheerful assurances of their commander. As soon as the enemy

approached the ditch, Belisarius himself drew the first arrow;

and such was his strength and dexterity, that he transfixed the

foremost of the Barbarian leaders.

A shout of applause and victory was reechoed along the wall. He

drew a second arrow, and the stroke was followed with the same

success and the same acclamation. The Roman general then gave the

word, that the archers should aim at the teams of oxen; they were

instantly covered with mortal wounds; the towers which they drew

remained useless and immovable, and a single moment disconcerted

the laborious projects of the king of the Goths. After this

disappointment, Vitiges still continued, or feigned to continue,

the assault of the Salarian gate, that he might divert the

attention of his adversary, while his principal forces more

strenuously attacked the Praenestine gate and the sepulchre of

Hadrian, at the distance of three miles from each other. Near the

former, the double walls of the Vivarium 85 were low or broken;

the fortifications of the latter were feebly guarded: the vigor

of the Goths was excited by the hope of victory and spoil; and if

a single post had given way, the Romans, and Rome itself, were

irrecoverably lost. This perilous day was the most glorious in

the life of Belisarius. Amidst tumult and dismay, the whole plan

of the attack and defence was distinctly present to his mind; he

observed the changes of each instant, weighed every possible

advantage, transported his person to the scenes of danger, and

communicated his spirit in calm and decisive orders. The contest

was fiercely maintained from the morning to the evening; the

Goths were repulsed on all sides; and each Roman might boast that

he had vanquished thirty Barbarians, if the strange disproportion

of numbers were not counterbalanced by the merit of one man.

Thirty thousand Goths, according to the confession of their own

chiefs, perished in this bloody action; and the multitude of the

wounded was equal to that of the slain. When they advanced to the

assault, their close disorder suffered not a javelin to fall

without effect; and as they retired, the populace of the city

joined the pursuit, and slaughtered, with impunity, the backs of

their flying enemies. Belisarius instantly sallied from the

gates; and while the soldiers chanted his name and victory, the

hostile engines of war were reduced to ashes. Such was the loss

and consternation of the Goths, that, from this day, the siege of

Rome degenerated into a tedious and indolent blockade; and they

were incessantly harassed by the Roman general, who, in frequent

skirmishes, destroyed above five thousand of their bravest

troops. Their cavalry was unpractised in the use of the bow;

their archers served on foot; and this divided force was

incapable of contending with their adversaries, whose lances and

arrows, at a distance, or at hand, were alike formidable. The

consummate skill of Belisarius embraced the favorable

opportunities; and as he chose the ground and the moment, as he

pressed the charge or sounded the retreat, 86 the squadrons which

he detached were seldom unsuccessful. These partial advantages

diffused an impatient ardor among the soldiers and people, who

began to feel the hardships of a siege, and to disregard the

dangers of a general engagement. Each plebeian conceived himself

to be a hero, and the infantry, who, since the decay of

discipline, were rejected from the line of battle, aspired to the

ancient honors of the Roman legion. Belisarius praised the spirit

of his troops, condemned their presumption, yielded to their

clamors, and prepared the remedies of a defeat, the possibility

of which he alone had courage to suspect. In the quarter of the

Vatican, the Romans prevailed; and if the irreparable moments had

not been wasted in the pillage of the camp, they might have

occupied the Milvian bridge, and charged in the rear of the

Gothic host. On the other side of the Tyber, Belisarius advanced

from the Pincian and Salarian gates. But his army, four thousand

soldiers perhaps, was lost in a spacious plain; they were

encompassed and oppressed by fresh multitudes, who continually

relieved the broken ranks of the Barbarians. The valiant leaders

of the infantry were unskilled to conquer; they died: the retreat

(a hasty retreat) was covered by the prudence of the general, and

the victors started back with affright from the formidable aspect

of an armed rampart. The reputation of Belisarius was unsullied

by a defeat; and the vain confidence of the Goths was not less

serviceable to his designs than the repentance and modesty of the

Roman troops.

85 (return) [ Vivarium was an angle in the new wall enclosed for

wild beasts, (Procopius, Goth. l. i. c. 23.) The spot is still

visible in Nardini (l iv. c. 2, p. 159, 160,) and Nolli’s great

plan of Rome.]

86 (return) [ For the Roman trumpet, and its various notes,

consult Lipsius de Militia Romana, (Opp. tom. iii. l. iv. Dialog.

x. p. 125-129.) A mode of distinguishing the charge by the

horse-trumpet of solid brass, and the retreat by the foot-trumpet

of leather and light wood, was recommended by Procopius, and

adopted by Belisarius.]

Chapter XLI: Conquests Of Justinian, Character Of Balisarius.—Part IV.

From the moment that Belisarius had determined to sustain a

siege, his assiduous care provided Rome against the danger of

famine, more dreadful than the Gothic arms. An extraordinary

supply of corn was imported from Sicily: the harvests of Campania

and Tuscany were forcibly swept for the use of the city; and the

rights of private property were infringed by the strong plea of

the public safety. It might easily be foreseen that the enemy

would intercept the aqueducts; and the cessation of the

water-mills was the first inconvenience, which was speedily

removed by mooring large vessels, and fixing mill-stones in the

current of the river. The stream was soon embarrassed by the

trunks of trees, and polluted with dead bodies; yet so effectual

were the precautions of the Roman general, that the waters of the

Tyber still continued to give motion to the mills and drink to

the inhabitants: the more distant quarters were supplied from

domestic wells; and a besieged city might support, without

impatience, the privation of her public baths. A large portion of

Rome, from the Praenestine gate to the church of St. Paul, was

never invested by the Goths; their excursions were restrained by

the activity of the Moorish troops: the navigation of the Tyber,

and the Latin, Appian, and Ostian ways, were left free and

unmolested for the introduction of corn and cattle, or the

retreat of the inhabitants, who sought refuge in Campania or

Sicily. Anxious to relieve himself from a useless and devouring

multitude, Belisarius issued his peremptory orders for the

instant departure of the women, the children, and slaves;

required his soldiers to dismiss their male and female

attendants, and regulated their allowance that one moiety should

be given in provisions, and the other in money. His foresight was

justified by the increase of the public distress, as soon as the

Goths had occupied two important posts in the neighborhood of

Rome. By the loss of the port, or, as it is now called, the city

of Porto, he was deprived of the country on the right of the

Tyber, and the best communication with the sea; and he reflected,

with grief and anger, that three hundred men, could he have

spared such a feeble band, might have defended its impregnable

works. Seven miles from the capital, between the Appian and the

Latin ways, two principal aqueducts crossing, and again crossing

each other: enclosed within their solid and lofty arches a

fortified space, 87 where Vitiges established a camp of seven

thousand Goths to intercept the convoy of Sicily and Campania.

The granaries of Rome were insensibly exhausted, the adjacent

country had been wasted with fire and sword; such scanty supplies

as might yet be obtained by hasty excursions were the reward of

valor, and the purchase of wealth: the forage of the horses, and

the bread of the soldiers, never failed: but in the last months

of the siege, the people were exposed to the miseries of

scarcity, unwholesome food, 88 and contagious disorders.

Belisarius saw and pitied their sufferings; but he had foreseen,

and he watched the decay of their loyalty, and the progress of

their discontent. Adversity had awakened the Romans from the

dreams of grandeur and freedom, and taught them the humiliating

lesson, that it was of small moment to their real happiness,

whether the name of their master was derived from the Gothic or

the Latin language. The lieutenant of Justinian listened to their

just complaints, but he rejected with disdain the idea of flight

or capitulation; repressed their clamorous impatience for battle;

amused them with the prospect of a sure and speedy relief; and

secured himself and the city from the effects of their despair or

treachery. Twice in each month he changed the station of the

officers to whom the custody of the gates was committed: the

various precautions of patroles, watch words, lights, and music,

were repeatedly employed to discover whatever passed on the

ramparts; out-guards were posted beyond the ditch, and the trusty

vigilance of dogs supplied the more doubtful fidelity of mankind.

A letter was intercepted, which assured the king of the Goths

that the Asinarian gate, adjoining to the Lateran church, should

be secretly opened to his troops. On the proof or suspicion of

treason, several senators were banished, and the pope Sylverius

was summoned to attend the representative of his sovereign, at

his head-quarters in the Pincian palace. 89 The ecclesiastics,

who followed their bishop, were detained in the first or second

apartment, 90 and he alone was admitted to the presence of

Belisarius. The conqueror of Rome and Carthage was modestly

seated at the feet of Antonina, who reclined on a stately couch:

the general was silent, but the voice of reproach and menace

issued from the mouth of his imperious wife. Accused by credible

witnesses, and the evidence of his own subscription, the

successor of St. Peter was despoiled of his pontifical ornaments,

clad in the mean habit of a monk, and embarked, without delay,

for a distant exile in the East. 9011 At the emperor’s command,

the clergy of Rome proceeded to the choice of a new bishop; and

after a solemn invocation of the Holy Ghost, elected the deacon

Vigilius, who had purchased the papal throne by a bribe of two

hundred pounds of gold. The profit, and consequently the guilt,

of this simony, was imputed to Belisarius: but the hero obeyed

the orders of his wife; Antonina served the passions of the

empress; and Theodora lavished her treasures, in the vain hope of

obtaining a pontiff hostile or indifferent to the council of

Chalcedon. 91

87 (return) [ Procopius (Goth. l. ii. c. 3) has forgot to name

these aqueducts nor can such a double intersection, at such a

distance from Rome, be clearly ascertained from the writings of

Frontinus, Fabretti, and Eschinard, de Aquis and de Agro Romano,

or from the local maps of Lameti and Cingolani. Seven or eight

miles from the city, (50 stadia,) on the road to Albano, between

the Latin and Appian ways, I discern the remains of an aqueduct,

(probably the Septimian,) a series (630 paces) of arches

twenty-five feet high.]

88 (return) [ They made sausages of mule’s flesh; unwholesome, if

the animals had died of the plague. Otherwise, the famous Bologna

sausages are said to be made of ass flesh, (Voyages de Labat,

tom. ii. p. 218.)]

89 (return) [ The name of the palace, the hill, and the adjoining

gate, were all derived from the senator Pincius. Some recent

vestiges of temples and churches are now smoothed in the garden

of the Minims of the Trinita del Monte, (Nardini, l. iv. c. 7, p.

196. Eschinard, p. 209, 210, the old plan of Buffalino, and the

great plan of Nolli.) Belisarius had fixed his station between

the Pincian and Salarian gates, (Procop. Goth. l. i. c. 15.)]

90 (return) [ From the mention of the primum et secundum velum,

it should seem that Belisarius, even in a siege, represented the

emperor, and maintained the proud ceremonial of the Byzantine

palace.]

9011 (return) [ De Beau, as a good Catholic, makes the Pope the

victim of a dark intrigue. Lord Mahon, (p. 225.) with whom I

concur, summed up against him.—M.]

91 (return) [ Of this act of sacrilege, Procopius (Goth. l. i. c.

25) is a dry and reluctant witness. The narratives of Liberatus

(Breviarium, c. 22) and Anastasius (de Vit. Pont. p. 39) are

characteristic, but passionate. Hear the execrations of Cardinal

Baronius, (A.D. 536, No. 123 A.D. 538, No. 4—20:) portentum,

facinus omni execratione dignum.]

The epistle of Belisarius to the emperor announced his victory,

his danger, and his resolution. “According to your commands, we

have entered the dominions of the Goths, and reduced to your

obedience Sicily, Campania, and the city of Rome; but the loss of

these conquests will be more disgraceful than their acquisition

was glorious. Hitherto we have successfully fought against the

multitudes of the Barbarians, but their multitudes may finally

prevail. Victory is the gift of Providence, but the reputation of

kings and generals depends on the success or the failure of their

designs. Permit me to speak with freedom: if you wish that we

should live, send us subsistence; if you desire that we should

conquer, send us arms, horses, and men. The Romans have received

us as friends and deliverers: but in our present distress, they

will be either betrayed by their confidence, or we shall be

oppressed by their treachery and hatred. For myself, my life is

consecrated to your service: it is yours to reflect, whether my

death in this situation will contribute to the glory and

prosperity of your reign.” Perhaps that reign would have been

equally prosperous if the peaceful master of the East had

abstained from the conquest of Africa and Italy: but as Justinian

was ambitious of fame, he made some efforts (they were feeble and

languid) to support and rescue his victorious general. A

reenforcement of sixteen hundred Sclavonians and Huns was led by

Martin and Valerian; and as they reposed during the winter season

in the harbors of Greece, the strength of the men and horses was

not impaired by the fatigues of a sea-voyage; and they

distinguished their valor in the first sally against the

besiegers. About the time of the summer solstice, Euthalius

landed at Terracina with large sums of money for the payment of

the troops: he cautiously proceeded along the Appian way, and

this convoy entered Rome through the gate Capena, 92 while

Belisarius, on the other side, diverted the attention of the

Goths by a vigorous and successful skirmish. These seasonable

aids, the use and reputation of which were dexterously managed by

the Roman general, revived the courage, or at least the hopes, of

the soldiers and people. The historian Procopius was despatched

with an important commission to collect the troops and provisions

which Campania could furnish, or Constantinople had sent; and the

secretary of Belisarius was soon followed by Antonina herself, 93

who boldly traversed the posts of the enemy, and returned with

the Oriental succors to the relief of her husband and the

besieged city. A fleet of three thousand Isaurians cast anchor in

the Bay of Naples and afterwards at Ostia. Above two thousand

horse, of whom a part were Thracians, landed at Tarentum; and,

after the junction of five hundred soldiers of Campania, and a

train of wagons laden with wine and flour, they directed their

march on the Appian way, from Capua to the neighborhood of Rome.

The forces that arrived by land and sea were united at the mouth

of the Tyber. Antonina convened a council of war: it was resolved

to surmount, with sails and oars, the adverse stream of the

river; and the Goths were apprehensive of disturbing, by any rash

hostilities, the negotiation to which Belisarius had craftily

listened. They credulously believed that they saw no more than

the vanguard of a fleet and army, which already covered the

Ionian Sea and the plains of Campania; and the illusion was

supported by the haughty language of the Roman general, when he

gave audience to the ambassadors of Vitiges. After a specious

discourse to vindicate the justice of his cause, they declared,

that, for the sake of peace, they were disposed to renounce the

possession of Sicily. “The emperor is not less generous,” replied

his lieutenant, with a disdainful smile, “in return for a gift

which you no longer possess: he presents you with an ancient

province of the empire; he resigns to the Goths the sovereignty

of the British island.” Belisarius rejected with equal firmness

and contempt the offer of a tribute; but he allowed the Gothic

ambassadors to seek their fate from the mouth of Justinian

himself; and consented, with seeming reluctance, to a truce of

three months, from the winter solstice to the equinox of spring.

Prudence might not safely trust either the oaths or hostages of

the Barbarians, and the conscious superiority of the Roman chief

was expressed in the distribution of his troops. As soon as fear

or hunger compelled the Goths to evacuate Alba, Porto, and

Centumcellae, their place was instantly supplied; the garrisons

of Narni, Spoleto, and Perusia, were reenforced, and the seven

camps of the besiegers were gradually encompassed with the

calamities of a siege. The prayers and pilgrimage of Datius,

bishop of Milan, were not without effect; and he obtained one

thousand Thracians and Isaurians, to assist the revolt of Liguria

against her Arian tyrant. At the same time, John the Sanguinary,

94 the nephew of Vitalian, was detached with two thousand chosen

horse, first to Alba, on the Fucine Lake, and afterwards to the

frontiers of Picenum, on the Hadriatic Sea. “In the province,”

said Belisarius, “the Goths have deposited their families and

treasures, without a guard or the suspicion of danger. Doubtless

they will violate the truce: let them feel your presence, before

they hear of your motions. Spare the Italians; suffer not any

fortified places to remain hostile in your rear; and faithfully

reserve the spoil for an equal and common partition. It would not

be reasonable,” he added with a laugh, “that whilst we are

toiling to the destruction of the drones, our more fortunate

brethren should rifle and enjoy the honey.”

92 (return) [ The old Capena was removed by Aurelian to, or near,

the modern gate of St. Sebastian, (see Nolli’s plan.) That

memorable spot has been consecrated by the Egerian grove, the

memory of Numa two umphal arches, the sepulchres of the Scipios,

Metelli, &c.]

93 (return) [ The expression of Procopius has an invidious cast,

(Goth. l. ii. c. 4.) Yet he is speaking of a woman.]

94 (return) [ Anastasius (p. 40) has preserved this epithet of

Sanguinarius which might do honor to a tiger.]

The whole nation of the Ostrogoths had been assembled for the

attack, and was almost entirely consumed in the siege of Rome. If

any credit be due to an intelligent spectator, one third at least

of their enormous host was destroyed, in frequent and bloody

combats under the walls of the city. The bad fame and pernicious

qualities of the summer air might already be imputed to the decay

of agriculture and population; and the evils of famine and

pestilence were aggravated by their own licentiousness, and the

unfriendly disposition of the country. While Vitiges struggled

with his fortune, while he hesitated between shame and ruin, his

retreat was hastened by domestic alarms. The king of the Goths

was informed by trembling messengers, that John the Sanguinary

spread the devastations of war from the Apennine to the

Hadriatic; that the rich spoils and innumerable captives of

Picenum were lodged in the fortifications of Rimini; and that

this formidable chief had defeated his uncle, insulted his

capital, and seduced, by secret correspondence, the fidelity of

his wife, the imperious daughter of Amalasontha. Yet, before he

retired, Vitiges made a last effort, either to storm or to

surprise the city. A secret passage was discovered in one of the

aqueducts; two citizens of the Vatican were tempted by bribes to

intoxicate the guards of the Aurelian gate; an attack was

meditated on the walls beyond the Tyber, in a place which was not

fortified with towers; and the Barbarians advanced, with torches

and scaling-ladders, to the assault of the Pincian gate. But

every attempt was defeated by the intrepid vigilance of

Belisarius and his band of veterans, who, in the most perilous

moments, did not regret the absence of their companions; and the

Goths, alike destitute of hope and subsistence, clamorously urged

their departure before the truce should expire, and the Roman

cavalry should again be united. One year and nine days after the

commencement of the siege, an army, so lately strong and

triumphant, burnt their tents, and tumultuously repassed the

Milvian bridge. They repassed not with impunity: their thronging

multitudes, oppressed in a narrow passage, were driven headlong

into the Tyber, by their own fears and the pursuit of the enemy;

and the Roman general, sallying from the Pincian gate, inflicted

a severe and disgraceful wound on their retreat. The slow length

of a sickly and desponding host was heavily dragged along the

Flaminian way; from whence the Barbarians were sometimes

compelled to deviate, lest they should encounter the hostile

garrisons that guarded the high road to Rimini and Ravenna. Yet

so powerful was this flying army, that Vitiges spared ten

thousand men for the defence of the cities which he was most

solicitous to preserve, and detached his nephew Uraias, with an

adequate force, for the chastisement of rebellious Milan. At the

head of his principal army, he besieged Rimini, only thirty-three

miles distant from the Gothic capital. A feeble rampart, and a

shallow ditch, were maintained by the skill and valor of John the

Sanguinary, who shared the danger and fatigue of the meanest

soldier, and emulated, on a theatre less illustrious, the

military virtues of his great commander. The towers and

battering-engines of the Barbarians were rendered useless; their

attacks were repulsed; and the tedious blockade, which reduced

the garrison to the last extremity of hunger, afforded time for

the union and march of the Roman forces. A fleet, which had

surprised Ancona, sailed along the coast of the Hadriatic, to the

relief of the besieged city. The eunuch Narses landed in Picenum

with two thousand Heruli and five thousand of the bravest troops

of the East. The rock of the Apennine was forced; ten thousand

veterans moved round the foot of the mountains, under the command

of Belisarius himself; and a new army, whose encampment blazed

with innumerable lights, appeared to advance along the Flaminian

way. Overwhelmed with astonishment and despair, the Goths

abandoned the siege of Rimini, their tents, their standards, and

their leaders; and Vitiges, who gave or followed the example of

flight, never halted till he found a shelter within the walls and

morasses of Ravenna. To these walls, and to some fortresses

destitute of any mutual support, the Gothic monarchy was now

reduced. The provinces of Italy had embraced the party of the

emperor and his army, gradually recruited to the number of twenty

thousand men, must have achieved an easy and rapid conquest, if

their invincible powers had not been weakened by the discord of

the Roman chiefs. Before the end of the siege, an act of blood,

ambiguous and indiscreet, sullied the fair fame of Belisarius.

Presidius, a loyal Italian, as he fled from Ravenna to Rome, was

rudely stopped by Constantine, the military governor of Spoleto,

and despoiled, even in a church, of two daggers richly inlaid

with gold and precious stones. As soon as the public danger had

subsided, Presidius complained of the loss and injury: his

complaint was heard, but the order of restitution was disobeyed

by the pride and avarice of the offender. Exasperated by the

delay, Presidius boldly arrested the general’s horse as he passed

through the forum; and, with the spirit of a citizen, demanded

the common benefit of the Roman laws. The honor of Belisarius was

engaged; he summoned a council; claimed the obedience of his

subordinate officer; and was provoked, by an insolent reply, to

call hastily for the presence of his guards. Constantine, viewing

their entrance as the signal of death, drew his sword, and rushed

on the general, who nimbly eluded the stroke, and was protected

by his friends; while the desperate assassin was disarmed,

dragged into a neighboring chamber, and executed, or rather

murdered, by the guards, at the arbitrary command of Belisarius.

95 In this hasty act of violence, the guilt of Constantine was no

longer remembered; the despair and death of that valiant officer

were secretly imputed to the revenge of Antonina; and each of his

colleagues, conscious of the same rapine, was apprehensive of the

same fate. The fear of a common enemy suspended the effects of

their envy and discontent; but in the confidence of approaching

victory, they instigated a powerful rival to oppose the conqueror

of Rome and Africa. From the domestic service of the palace, and

the administration of the private revenue, Narses the eunuch was

suddenly exalted to the head of an army; and the spirit of a

hero, who afterwards equalled the merit and glory of Belisarius,

served only to perplex the operations of the Gothic war. To his

prudent counsels, the relief of Rimini was ascribed by the

leaders of the discontented faction, who exhorted Narses to

assume an independent and separate command. The epistle of

Justinian had indeed enjoined his obedience to the general; but

the dangerous exception, “as far as may be advantageous to the

public service,” reserved some freedom of judgment to the

discreet favorite, who had so lately departed from the sacred and

familiar conversation of his sovereign. In the exercise of this

doubtful right, the eunuch perpetually dissented from the

opinions of Belisarius; and, after yielding with reluctance to

the siege of Urbino, he deserted his colleague in the night, and

marched away to the conquest of the Aemilian province. The fierce

and formidable bands of the Heruli were attached to the person of

Narses; 96 ten thousand Romans and confederates were persuaded to

march under his banners; every malcontent embraced the fair

opportunity of revenging his private or imaginary wrongs; and the

remaining troops of Belisarius were divided and dispersed from

the garrisons of Sicily to the shores of the Hadriatic. His skill

and perseverance overcame every obstacle: Urbino was taken, the

sieges of Faesulae Orvieto, and Auximum, were undertaken and

vigorously prosecuted; and the eunuch Narses was at length

recalled to the domestic cares of the palace. All dissensions

were healed, and all opposition was subdued, by the temperate

authority of the Roman general, to whom his enemies could not

refuse their esteem; and Belisarius inculcated the salutary

lesson that the forces of the state should compose one body, and

be animated by one soul. But in the interval of discord, the

Goths were permitted to breathe; an important season was lost,

Milan was destroyed, and the northern provinces of Italy were

afflicted by an inundation of the Franks.

95 (return) [ This transaction is related in the public history

(Goth. l. ii. c. 8) with candor or caution; in the Anecdotes (c.

7) with malevolence or freedom; but Marcellinus, or rather his

continuator, (in Chron.,) casts a shade of premeditated

assassination over the death of Constantine. He had performed

good service at Rome and Spoleto, (Procop. Goth l. i. c. 7, 14;)

but Alemannus confounds him with a Constantianus comes stabuli.]

96 (return) [ They refused to serve after his departure; sold

their captives and cattle to the Goths; and swore never to fight

against them. Procopius introduces a curious digression on the

manners and adventures of this wandering nation, a part of whom

finally emigrated to Thule or Scandinavia. (Goth. l. ii. c. 14,

15.)]

When Justinian first meditated the conquest of Italy, he sent

ambassadors to the kings of the Franks, and adjured them, by the

common ties of alliance and religion, to join in the holy

enterprise against the Arians. The Goths, as their wants were

more urgent, employed a more effectual mode of persuasion, and

vainly strove, by the gift of lands and money, to purchase the

friendship, or at least the neutrality, of a light and perfidious

nation.97 But the arms of Belisarius, and the revolt of the

Italians, had no sooner shaken the Gothic monarchy, than

Theodebert of Austrasia, the most powerful and warlike of the

Merovingian kings, was persuaded to succor their distress by an

indirect and seasonable aid. Without expecting the consent of

their sovereign, ten thousand Burgundians, his recent subjects,

descended from the Alps, and joined the troops which Vitiges had

sent to chastise the revolt of Milan. After an obstinate siege,

the capital of Liguria was reduced by famine; but no capitulation

could be obtained, except for the safe retreat of the Roman

garrison. Datius, the orthodox bishop, who had seduced his

countrymen to rebellion 98 and ruin, escaped to the luxury and

honors of the Byzantine court; 99 but the clergy, perhaps the

Arian clergy, were slaughtered at the foot of their own altars by

the defenders of the Catholic faith. Three hundred thousand males

were reported to be slain; 100 the female sex, and the more

precious spoil, was resigned to the Burgundians; and the houses,

or at least the walls, of Milan, were levelled with the ground.

The Goths, in their last moments, were revenged by the

destruction of a city, second only to Rome in size and opulence,

in the splendor of its buildings, or the number of its

inhabitants; and Belisarius sympathized alone in the fate of his

deserted and devoted friends. Encouraged by this successful

inroad, Theodebert himself, in the ensuing spring, invaded the

plains of Italy with an army of one hundred thousand Barbarians.

101 The king, and some chosen followers, were mounted on

horseback, and armed with lances; the infantry, without bows or

spears, were satisfied with a shield, a sword, and a double-edged

battle-axe, which, in their hands, became a deadly and unerring

weapon. Italy trembled at the march of the Franks; and both the

Gothic prince and the Roman general, alike ignorant of their

designs, solicited, with hope and terror, the friendship of these

dangerous allies. Till he had secured the passage of the Po on

the bridge of Pavia, the grandson of Clovis dissembled his

intentions, which he at length declared, by assaulting, almost at

the same instant, the hostile camps of the Romans and Goths.

Instead of uniting their arms, they fled with equal

precipitation; and the fertile, though desolate provinces of

Liguria and Aemilia, were abandoned to a licentious host of

Barbarians, whose rage was not mitigated by any thoughts of

settlement or conquest. Among the cities which they ruined,

Genoa, not yet constructed of marble, is particularly enumerated;

and the deaths of thousands, according to the regular practice of

war, appear to have excited less horror than some idolatrous

sacrifices of women and children, which were performed with

impunity in the camp of the most Christian king. If it were not a

melancholy truth, that the first and most cruel sufferings must

be the lot of the innocent and helpless, history might exult in

the misery of the conquerors, who, in the midst of riches, were

left destitute of bread or wine, reduced to drink the waters of

the Po, and to feed on the flesh of distempered cattle. The

dysentery swept away one third of their army; and the clamors of

his subjects, who were impatient to pass the Alps, disposed

Theodebert to listen with respect to the mild exhortations of

Belisarius. The memory of this inglorious and destructive warfare

was perpetuated on the medals of Gaul; and Justinian, without

unsheathing his sword, assumed the title of conqueror of the

Franks. The Merovingian prince was offended by the vanity of the

emperor; he affected to pity the fallen fortunes of the Goths;

and his insidious offer of a federal union was fortified by the

promise or menace of descending from the Alps at the head of five

hundred thousand men. His plans of conquest were boundless, and

perhaps chimerical. The king of Austrasia threatened to chastise

Justinian, and to march to the gates of Constantinople: 102 he

was overthrown and slain 103 by a wild bull, 104 as he hunted in

the Belgic or German forests.

97 (return) [ This national reproach of perfidy (Procop. Goth. l.

ii. c. 25) offends the ear of La Mothe le Vayer, (tom. viii. p.

163—165,) who criticizes, as if he had not read, the Greek

historian.]

98 (return) [ Baronius applauds his treason, and justifies the

Catholic bishops—qui ne sub heretico principe degant omnem

lapidem movent—a useful caution. The more rational Muratori

(Annali d’Italia, tom. v. p. 54) hints at the guilt of perjury,

and blames at least the imprudence of Datius.]

99 (return) [ St. Datius was more successful against devils than

against Barbarians. He travelled with a numerons retinue, and

occupied at Corinth a large house. (Baronius, A.D. 538, No. 89,

A.D. 539, No. 20.)]

100 (return) [ (Compare Procopius, Goth. l. ii. c. 7, 21.) Yet

such population is incredible; and the second or third city of

Italy need not repine if we only decimate the numbers of the

present text Both Milan and Genoa revived in less than thirty

years, (Paul Diacon de Gestis Langobard. l. ii. c. 38.) Note:

Procopius says distinctly that Milan was the second city of the

West. Which did Gibbon suppose could compete with it, Ravenna or

Naples; the next page he calls it the second.—M.]

101 (return) [ Besides Procopius, perhaps too Roman, see the

Chronicles of Marius and Marcellinus, Jornandes, (in Success.

Regn. in Muratori, tom. i. p. 241,) and Gregory of Tours, (l.

iii. c. 32, in tom. ii. of the Historians of France.) Gregory

supposes a defeat of Belisarius, who, in Aimoin, (de Gestis

Franc. l. ii. c. 23, in tom. iii. p. 59,) is slain by the

Franks.]

102 (return) [ Agathias, l. i. p. 14, 15. Could he have seduced

or subdued the Gepidae or Lombards of Pannonia, the Greek

historian is confident that he must have been destroyed in

Thrace.]

103 (return) [ The king pointed his spear—the bull overturned a

tree on his head—he expired the same day. Such is the story of

Agathias; but the original historians of France (tom. ii. p. 202,

403, 558, 667) impute his death to a fever.]

104 (return) [ Without losing myself in a labyrinth of species

and names—the aurochs, urus, bisons, bubalus, bonasus, buffalo,

&c., (Buffon. Hist. Nat. tom. xi., and Supplement, tom. iii.

vi.,) it is certain, that in the sixth century a large wild

species of horned cattle was hunted in the great forests of the

Vosges in Lorraine, and the Ardennes, (Greg. Turon. tom. ii. l.

x. c. 10, p. 369.)]

Chapter XLI: Conquests Of Justinian, Character Of Balisarius.—Part V.

As soon as Belisarius was delivered from his foreign and domestic

enemies, he seriously applied his forces to the final reduction

of Italy. In the siege of Osimo, the general was nearly

transpierced with an arrow, if the mortal stroke had not been

intercepted by one of his guards, who lost, in that pious office,

the use of his hand. The Goths of Osimo, 1041 four thousand

warriors, with those of Faesulae and the Cottian Alps, were among

the last who maintained their independence; and their gallant

resistance, which almost tired the patience, deserved the esteem,

of the conqueror. His prudence refused to subscribe the safe

conduct which they asked, to join their brethren of Ravenna; but

they saved, by an honorable capitulation, one moiety at least of

their wealth, with the free alternative of retiring peaceably to

their estates, or enlisting to serve the emperor in his Persian

wars. The multitudes which yet adhered to the standard of Vitiges

far surpassed the number of the Roman troops; but neither prayers

nor defiance, nor the extreme danger of his most faithful

subjects, could tempt the Gothic king beyond the fortifications

of Ravenna. These fortifications were, indeed, impregnable to the

assaults of art or violence; and when Belisarius invested the

capital, he was soon convinced that famine only could tame the

stubborn spirit of the Barbarians. The sea, the land, and the

channels of the Po, were guarded by the vigilance of the Roman

general; and his morality extended the rights of war to the

practice of poisoning the waters, 105 and secretly firing the

granaries 106 of a besieged city. 107 While he pressed the

blockade of Ravenna, he was surprised by the arrival of two

ambassadors from Constantinople, with a treaty of peace, which

Justinian had imprudently signed, without deigning to consult the

author of his victory. By this disgraceful and precarious

agreement, Italy and the Gothic treasure were divided, and the

provinces beyond the Po were left with the regal title to the

successor of Theodoric. The ambassadors were eager to accomplish

their salutary commission; the captive Vitiges accepted, with

transport, the unexpected offer of a crown; honor was less

prevalent among the Goths, than the want and appetite of food;

and the Roman chiefs, who murmured at the continuance of the war,

professed implicit submission to the commands of the emperor. If

Belisarius had possessed only the courage of a soldier, the

laurel would have been snatched from his hand by timid and

envious counsels; but in this decisive moment, he resolved, with

the magnanimity of a statesman, to sustain alone the danger and

merit of generous disobedience. Each of his officers gave a

written opinion that the siege of Ravenna was impracticable and

hopeless: the general then rejected the treaty of partition, and

declared his own resolution of leading Vitiges in chains to the

feet of Justinian. The Goths retired with doubt and dismay: this

peremptory refusal deprived them of the only signature which they

could trust, and filled their minds with a just apprehension,

that a sagacious enemy had discovered the full extent of their

deplorable state. They compared the fame and fortune of

Belisarius with the weakness of their ill-fated king; and the

comparison suggested an extraordinary project, to which Vitiges,

with apparent resignation, was compelled to acquiesce. Partition

would ruin the strength, exile would disgrace the honor, of the

nation; but they offered their arms, their treasures, and the

fortifications of Ravenna, if Belisarius would disclaim the

authority of a master, accept the choice of the Goths, and

assume, as he had deserved, the kingdom of Italy. If the false

lustre of a diadem could have tempted the loyalty of a faithful

subject, his prudence must have foreseen the inconstancy of the

Barbarians, and his rational ambition would prefer the safe and

honorable station of a Roman general. Even the patience and

seeming satisfaction with which he entertained a proposal of

treason, might be susceptible of a malignant interpretation. But

the lieutenant of Justinian was conscious of his own rectitude;

he entered into a dark and crooked path, as it might lead to the

voluntary submission of the Goths; and his dexterous policy

persuaded them that he was disposed to comply with their wishes,

without engaging an oath or a promise for the performance of a

treaty which he secretly abhorred. The day of the surrender of

Ravenna was stipulated by the Gothic ambassadors: a fleet, laden

with provisions, sailed as a welcome guest into the deepest

recess of the harbor: the gates were opened to the fancied king

of Italy; and Belisarius, without meeting an enemy, triumphantly

marched through the streets of an impregnable city. 108 The

Romans were astonished by their success; the multitudes of tall

and robust Barbarians were confounded by the image of their own

patience and the masculine females, spitting in the faces of

their sons and husbands, most bitterly reproached them for

betraying their dominion and freedom to these pygmies of the

south, contemptible in their numbers, diminutive in their

stature. Before the Goths could recover from the first surprise,

and claim the accomplishment of their doubtful hopes, the victor

established his power in Ravenna, beyond the danger of repentance

and revolt.

1041 (return) [ Auximum, p. 175.—M.]

105 (return) [ In the siege of Auximum, he first labored to

demolish an old aqueduct, and then cast into the stream, 1. dead

bodies; 2. mischievous herbs; and 3. quicklime. (says Procopius,

l. ii. c. 27) Yet both words are used as synonymous in Galen,

Dioscorides, and Lucian, (Hen. Steph. Thesaur. Ling. Graec. tom.

iii. p. 748.)]

106 (return) [ The Goths suspected Mathasuintha as an accomplice

in the mischief, which perhaps was occasioned by accidental

lightning.]

107 (return) [ In strict philosophy, a limitation of the rights

of war seems to imply nonsense and contradiction. Grotius himself

is lost in an idle distinction between the jus naturae and the

jus gentium, between poison and infection. He balances in one

scale the passages of Homer (Odyss. A 259, &c.) and Florus, (l.

ii. c. 20, No. 7, ult.;) and in the other, the examples of Solon

(Pausanias, l. x. c. 37) and Belisarius. See his great work De

Jure Belli et Pacis, (l. iii. c. 4, s. 15, 16, 17, and in

Barbeyrac’s version, tom. ii. p. 257, &c.) Yet I can understand

the benefit and validity of an agreement, tacit or express,

mutually to abstain from certain modes of hostility. See the

Amphictyonic oath in Aeschines, de falsa Legatione.]

108 (return) [ Ravenna was taken, not in the year 540, but in the

latter end of 539; and Pagi (tom. ii. p. 569) is rectified by

Muratori. (Annali d’Italia, tom. v. p. 62,) who proves from an

original act on papyrus, (Antiquit. Italiae Medii Aevi, tom. ii.

dissert. xxxii. p. 999—1007,) Maffei, (Istoria Diplomat. p.

155-160,) that before the third of January, 540, peace and free

correspondence were restored between Ravenna and Faenza.]

Vitiges, who perhaps had attempted to escape, was honorably

guarded in his palace; 109 the flower of the Gothic youth was

selected for the service of the emperor; the remainder of the

people was dismissed to their peaceful habitations in the

southern provinces; and a colony of Italians was invited to

replenish the depopulated city. The submission of the capital was

imitated in the towns and villages of Italy, which had not been

subdued, or even visited, by the Romans; and the independent

Goths, who remained in arms at Pavia and Verona, were ambitious

only to become the subjects of Belisarius. But his inflexible

loyalty rejected, except as the substitute of Justinian, their

oaths of allegiance; and he was not offended by the reproach of

their deputies, that he rather chose to be a slave than a king.

109 (return) [ He was seized by John the Sanguinary, but an oath

or sacrament was pledged for his safety in the Basilica Julii,

(Hist. Miscell. l. xvii. in Muratori, tom. i. p. 107.) Anastasius

(in Vit. Pont. p. 40) gives a dark but probable account.

Montfaucon is quoted by Mascou (Hist. of the Germans, xii. 21)

for a votive shield representing the captivity of Vitiges and now

in the collection of Signor Landi at Rome.]

After the second victory of Belisarius, envy again whispered,

Justinian listened, and the hero was recalled. “The remnant of

the Gothic war was no longer worthy of his presence: a gracious

sovereign was impatient to reward his services, and to consult

his wisdom; and he alone was capable of defending the East

against the innumerable armies of Persia.” Belisarius understood

the suspicion, accepted the excuse, embarked at Ravenna his

spoils and trophies; and proved, by his ready obedience, that

such an abrupt removal from the government of Italy was not less

unjust than it might have been indiscreet. The emperor received

with honorable courtesy both Vitiges and his more noble consort;

and as the king of the Goths conformed to the Athanasian faith,

he obtained, with a rich inheritance of land in Asia, the rank of

senator and patrician.110 Every spectator admired, without peril,

the strength and stature of the young Barbarians: they adored the

majesty of the throne, and promised to shed their blood in the

service of their benefactor. Justinian deposited in the Byzantine

palace the treasures of the Gothic monarchy. A flattering senate

was sometime admitted to gaze on the magnificent spectacle; but

it was enviously secluded from the public view: and the conqueror

of Italy renounced, without a murmur, perhaps without a sigh, the

well-earned honors of a second triumph. His glory was indeed

exalted above all external pomp; and the faint and hollow praises

of the court were supplied, even in a servile age, by the respect

and admiration of his country. Whenever he appeared in the

streets and public places of Constantinople, Belisarius attracted

and satisfied the eyes of the people. His lofty stature and

majestic countenance fulfilled their expectations of a hero; the

meanest of his fellow-citizens were emboldened by his gentle and

gracious demeanor; and the martial train which attended his

footsteps left his person more accessible than in a day of

battle. Seven thousand horsemen, matchless for beauty and valor,

were maintained in the service, and at the private expense, of

the general. 111 Their prowess was always conspicuous in single

combats, or in the foremost ranks; and both parties confessed

that in the siege of Rome, the guards of Belisarius had alone

vanquished the Barbarian host. Their numbers were continually

augmented by the bravest and most faithful of the enemy; and his

fortunate captives, the Vandals, the Moors, and the Goths,

emulated the attachment of his domestic followers. By the union

of liberality and justice, he acquired the love of the soldiers,

without alienating the affections of the people. The sick and

wounded were relieved with medicines and money; and still more

efficaciously, by the healing visits and smiles of their

commander. The loss of a weapon or a horse was instantly

repaired, and each deed of valor was rewarded by the rich and

honorable gifts of a bracelet or a collar, which were rendered

more precious by the judgment of Belisarius. He was endeared to

the husbandmen by the peace and plenty which they enjoyed under

the shadow of his standard. Instead of being injured, the country

was enriched by the march of the Roman armies; and such was the

rigid discipline of their camp, that not an apple was gathered

from the tree, not a path could be traced in the fields of corn.

Belisarius was chaste and sober. In the license of a military

life, none could boast that they had seen him intoxicated with

wine: the most beautiful captives of Gothic or Vandal race were

offered to his embraces; but he turned aside from their charms,

and the husband of Antonina was never suspected of violating the

laws of conjugal fidelity. The spectator and historian of his

exploits has observed, that amidst the perils of war, he was

daring without rashness, prudent without fear, slow or rapid

according to the exigencies of the moment; that in the deepest

distress he was animated by real or apparent hope, but that he

was modest and humble in the most prosperous fortune. By these

virtues, he equalled or excelled the ancient masters of the

military art. Victory, by sea and land, attended his arms. He

subdued Africa, Italy, and the adjacent islands; led away

captives the successors of Genseric and Theodoric; filled

Constantinople with the spoils of their palaces; and in the space

of six years recovered half the provinces of the Western empire.

In his fame and merit, in wealth and power, he remained without a

rival, the first of the Roman subjects; the voice of envy could

only magnify his dangerous importance; and the emperor might

applaud his own discerning spirit, which had discovered and

raised the genius of Belisarius.

110 (return) [ Vitiges lived two years at Constantinople, and

imperatoris in affectû _convictus_ (or conjunctus) rebus excessit

humanis. His widow _Mathasuenta_, the wife and mother of the

patricians, the elder and younger Germanus, united the streams of

Anician and Amali blood, (Jornandes, c. 60, p. 221, in Muratori,

tom. i.)]

111 (return) [ Procopius, Goth. l. iii. c. 1. Aimoin, a French

monk of the xith century, who had obtained, and has disfigured,

some authentic information of Belisarius, mentions, in his name,

12,000, _pueri_ or slaves—quos propriis alimus stipendiis—besides

18,000 soldiers, (Historians of France, tom. iii. De Gestis

Franc. l. ii. c. 6, p. 48.)]

It was the custom of the Roman triumphs, that a slave should be

placed behind the chariot to remind the conqueror of the

instability of fortune, and the infirmities of human nature.

Procopius, in his Anecdotes, has assumed that servile and

ungrateful office. The generous reader may cast away the libel,

but the evidence of facts will adhere to his memory; and he will

reluctantly confess, that the fame, and even the virtue, of

Belisarius, were polluted by the lust and cruelty of his wife;

and that hero deserved an appellation which may not drop from the

pen of the decent historian. The mother of Antonina 112 was a

theatrical prostitute, and both her father and grandfather

exercised, at Thessalonica and Constantinople, the vile, though

lucrative, profession of charioteers. In the various situations

of their fortune she became the companion, the enemy, the

servant, and the favorite of the empress Theodora: these loose

and ambitious females had been connected by similar pleasures;

they were separated by the jealousy of vice, and at length

reconciled by the partnership of guilt. Before her marriage with

Belisarius, Antonina had one husband and many lovers: Photius,

the son of her former nuptials, was of an age to distinguish

himself at the siege of Naples; and it was not till the autumn of

her age and beauty 113 that she indulged a scandalous attachment

to a Thracian youth. Theodosius had been educated in the Eunomian

heresy; the African voyage was consecrated by the baptism and

auspicious name of the first soldier who embarked; and the

proselyte was adopted into the family of his spiritual parents,

114 Belisarius and Antonina. Before they touched the shores of

Africa, this holy kindred degenerated into sensual love: and as

Antonina soon overleaped the bounds of modesty and caution, the

Roman general was alone ignorant of his own dishonor. During

their residence at Carthage, he surprised the two lovers in a

subterraneous chamber, solitary, warm, and almost naked. Anger

flashed from his eyes. “With the help of this young man,” said

the unblushing Antonina, “I was secreting our most precious

effects from the knowledge of Justinian.” The youth resumed his

garments, and the pious husband consented to disbelieve the

evidence of his own senses. From this pleasing and perhaps

voluntary delusion, Belisarius was awakened at Syracuse, by the

officious information of Macedonia; and that female attendant,

after requiring an oath for her security, produced two

chamberlains, who, like herself, had often beheld the adulteries

of Antonina. A hasty flight into Asia saved Theodosius from the

justice of an injured husband, who had signified to one of his

guards the order of his death; but the tears of Antonina, and her

artful seductions, assured the credulous hero of her innocence:

and he stooped, against his faith and judgment, to abandon those

imprudent friends, who had presumed to accuse or doubt the

chastity of his wife. The revenge of a guilty woman is implacable

and bloody: the unfortunate Macedonia, with the two witnesses,

were secretly arrested by the minister of her cruelty; their

tongues were cut out, their bodies were hacked into small pieces,

and their remains were cast into the Sea of Syracuse. A rash

though judicious saying of Constantine, “I would sooner have

punished the adulteress than the boy,” was deeply remembered by

Antonina; and two years afterwards, when despair had armed that

officer against his general, her sanguinary advice decided and

hastened his execution. Even the indignation of Photius was not

forgiven by his mother; the exile of her son prepared the recall

of her lover; and Theodosius condescended to accept the pressing

and humble invitation of the conqueror of Italy. In the absolute

direction of his household, and in the important commissions of

peace and war, 115 the favorite youth most rapidly acquired a

fortune of four hundred thousand pounds sterling; and after their

return to Constantinople, the passion of Antonina, at least,

continued ardent and unabated. But fear, devotion, and lassitude

perhaps, inspired Theodosius with more serious thoughts. He

dreaded the busy scandal of the capital, and the indiscreet

fondness of the wife of Belisarius; escaped from her embraces,

and retiring to Ephesus, shaved his head, and took refuge in the

sanctuary of a monastic life. The despair of the new Ariadne

could scarcely have been excused by the death of her husband. She

wept, she tore her hair, she filled the palace with her cries;

“she had lost the dearest of friends, a tender, a faithful, a

laborious friend!” But her warm entreaties, fortified by the

prayers of Belisarius, were insufficient to draw the holy monk

from the solitude of Ephesus. It was not till the general moved

forward for the Persian war, that Theodosius could be tempted to

return to Constantinople; and the short interval before the

departure of Antonina herself was boldly devoted to love and

pleasure.

112 (return) [The diligence of Alemannus could add but little to

the four first and most curious chapters of the Anecdotes. Of

these strange Anecdotes, a part may be true, because probable—and

a part true, because improbable. Procopius must have known the

former, and the latter he could scarcely invent. Note: The malice

of court scandal is proverbially inventive; and of such scandal

the “Anecdota” may be an embellished record.—M.]

113 (return) [ Procopius intimates (Anecdot. c. 4) that when

Belisarius returned to Italy, (A.D. 543,) Antonina was sixty

years of age. A forced, but more polite construction, which

refers that date to the moment when he was writing, (A.D. 559,)

would be compatible with the manhood of Photius, (Gothic. l. i.

c. 10) in 536.]

114 (return) [ Gompare the Vandalic War (l. i. c. 12) with the

Anecdotes (c. i.) and Alemannus, (p. 2, 3.) This mode of

baptismal adoption was revived by Leo the philosopher.]

115 (return) [ In November, 537, Photius arrested the pope,

(Liberat. Brev. c. 22. Pagi, tom. ii. p. 562) About the end of

539, Belisarius sent Theodosius on an important and lucrative

commission to Ravenna, (Goth. l. ii. c. 18.)]

A philosopher may pity and forgive the infirmities of female

nature, from which he receives no real injury: but contemptible

is the husband who feels, and yet endures, his own infamy in that

of his wife. Antonina pursued her son with implacable hatred; and

the gallant Photius 116 was exposed to her secret persecutions in

the camp beyond the Tigris. Enraged by his own wrongs, and by the

dishonor of his blood, he cast away in his turn the sentiments of

nature, and revealed to Belisarius the turpitude of a woman who

had violated all the duties of a mother and a wife. From the

surprise and indignation of the Roman general, his former

credulity appears to have been sincere: he embraced the knees of

the son of Antonina, adjured him to remember his obligations

rather than his birth, and confirmed at the altar their holy vows

of revenge and mutual defence. The dominion of Antonina was

impaired by absence; and when she met her husband, on his return

from the Persian confines, Belisarius, in his first and transient

emotions, confined her person, and threatened her life. Photius

was more resolved to punish, and less prompt to pardon: he flew

to Ephesus; extorted from a trusty eunuch of his mother the full

confession of her guilt; arrested Theodosius and his treasures in

the church of St. John the Apostle, and concealed his captives,

whose execution was only delayed, in a secure and sequestered

fortress of Cilicia. Such a daring outrage against public justice

could not pass with impunity; and the cause of Antonina was

espoused by the empress, whose favor she had deserved by the

recent services of the disgrace of a præfect, and the exile and

murder of a pope. At the end of the campaign, Belisarius was

recalled; he complied, as usual, with the Imperial mandate. His

mind was not prepared for rebellion: his obedience, however

adverse to the dictates of honor, was consonant to the wishes of

his heart; and when he embraced his wife, at the command, and

perhaps in the presence, of the empress, the tender husband was

disposed to forgive or to be forgiven. The bounty of Theodora

reserved for her companion a more precious favor. “I have found,”

she said, “my dearest patrician, a pearl of inestimable value; it

has not yet been viewed by any mortal eye; but the sight and the

possession of this jewel are destined for my friend.” 1161 As

soon as the curiosity and impatience of Antonina were kindled,

the door of a bed-chamber was thrown open, and she beheld her

lover, whom the diligence of the eunuchs had discovered in his

secret prison. Her silent wonder burst into passionate

exclamations of gratitude and joy, and she named Theodora her

queen, her benefactress, and her savior. The monk of Ephesus was

nourished in the palace with luxury and ambition; but instead of

assuming, as he was promised, the command of the Roman armies,

Theodosius expired in the first fatigues of an amorous interview.

1162 The grief of Antonina could only be assuaged by the

sufferings of her son. A youth of consular rank, and a sickly

constitution, was punished, without a trial, like a malefactor

and a slave: yet such was the constancy of his mind, that Photius

sustained the tortures of the scourge and the rack, 1163 without

violating the faith which he had sworn to Belisarius. After this

fruitless cruelty, the son of Antonina, while his mother feasted

with the empress, was buried in her subterraneous prisons, which

admitted not the distinction of night and day. He twice escaped

to the most venerable sanctuaries of Constantinople, the churches

of St. Sophia, and of the Virgin: but his tyrants were insensible

of religion as of pity; and the helpless youth, amidst the

clamors of the clergy and people, was twice dragged from the

altar to the dungeon. His third attempt was more successful. At

the end of three years, the prophet Zachariah, or some mortal

friend, indicated the means of an escape: he eluded the spies and

guards of the empress, reached the holy sepulchre of Jerusalem,

embraced the profession of a monk; and the abbot Photius was

employed, after the death of Justinian, to reconcile and regulate

the churches of Egypt. The son of Antonina suffered all that an

enemy can inflict: her patient husband imposed on himself the

more exquisite misery of violating his promise and deserting his

friend.

116 (return) [ Theophanes (Chronograph. p. 204) styles him

Photinus, the son-in-law of Belisarius; and he is copied by the

Historia Miscella and Anastasius.]

1161 (return) [ This and much of the private scandal in the

“Anecdota” is liable to serious doubt. Who reported all these

private conversations, and how did they reach the ears of

Procopius?—M.]

1162 (return) [ This is a strange misrepresentation—he died of a

dysentery; nor does it appear that it was immediately after this

scene. Antonina proposed to raise him to the generalship of the

army. Procop. Anecd. p. 14. The sudden change from the abstemious

diet of a monk to the luxury of the court is a much more probable

cause of his death.—M.]

1163 (return) [ The expression of Procopius does not appear to me

to mean this kind of torture. Ibid.—M.]

In the succeeding campaign, Belisarius was again sent against the

Persians: he saved the East, but he offended Theodora, and

perhaps the emperor himself. The malady of Justinian had

countenanced the rumor of his death; and the Roman general, on

the supposition of that probable event spoke the free language of

a citizen and a soldier. His colleague Buzes, who concurred in

the same sentiments, lost his rank, his liberty, and his health,

by the persecution of the empress: but the disgrace of Belisarius

was alleviated by the dignity of his own character, and the

influence of his wife, who might wish to humble, but could not

desire to ruin, the partner of her fortunes. Even his removal was

colored by the assurance, that the sinking state of Italy would

be retrieved by the single presence of its conqueror.

But no sooner had he returned, alone and defenceless, than a

hostile commission was sent to the East, to seize his treasures

and criminate his actions; the guards and veterans, who followed

his private banner, were distributed among the chiefs of the

army, and even the eunuchs presumed to cast lots for the

partition of his martial domestics. When he passed with a small

and sordid retinue through the streets of Constantinople, his

forlorn appearance excited the amazement and compassion of the

people. Justinian and Theodora received him with cold

ingratitude; the servile crowd, with insolence and contempt; and

in the evening he retired with trembling steps to his deserted

palace. An indisposition, feigned or real, had confined Antonina

to her apartment; and she walked disdainfully silent in the

adjacent portico, while Belisarius threw himself on his bed, and

expected, in an agony of grief and terror, the death which he had

so often braved under the walls of Rome. Long after sunset a

messenger was announced from the empress: he opened, with anxious

curiosity, the letter which contained the sentence of his fate.

“You cannot be ignorant how much you have deserved my

displeasure. I am not insensible of the services of Antonina. To

her merits and intercession I have granted your life, and permit

you to retain a part of your treasures, which might be justly

forfeited to the state. Let your gratitude, where it is due, be

displayed, not in words, but in your future behavior.” I know not

how to believe or to relate the transports with which the hero is

said to have received this ignominious pardon. He fell prostrate

before his wife, he kissed the feet of his savior, and he

devoutly promised to live the grateful and submissive slave of

Antonina. A fine of one hundred and twenty thousand pounds

sterling was levied on the fortunes of Belisarius; and with the

office of count, or master of the royal stables, he accepted the

conduct of the Italian war. At his departure from Constantinople,

his friends, and even the public, were persuaded that as soon as

he regained his freedom, he would renounce his dissimulation, and

that his wife, Theodora, and perhaps the emperor himself, would

be sacrificed to the just revenge of a virtuous rebel. Their

hopes were deceived; and the unconquerable patience and loyalty

of Belisarius appear either below or above the character of a

man. 117

117 (return) [ The continuator of the Chronicle of Marcellinus

gives, in a few decent words, the substance of the Anecdotes:

Belisarius de Oriente evocatus, in offensam periculumque

incurrens grave, et invidiae subeacens rursus remittitur in

Italiam, (p. 54.)]

Chapter XLII: State Of The Barbaric World.—Part I.

State Of The Barbaric World.—Establishment Of The Lombards On the

Danube.—Tribes And Inroads Of The Sclavonians.—Origin, Empire, And

Embassies Of The Turks.—The Flight Of The Avars.—Chosroes I, Or

Nushirvan, King Of Persia.—His Prosperous Reign And Wars With The

Romans.—The Colchian Or Lazic War.—The Æthiopians.

Our estimate of personal merit, is relative to the common

faculties of mankind. The aspiring efforts of genius, or virtue,

either in active or speculative life, are measured, not so much

by their real elevation, as by the height to which they ascend

above the level of their age and country; and the same stature,

which in a people of giants would pass unnoticed, must appear

conspicuous in a race of pygmies. Leonidas, and his three hundred

companions, devoted their lives at Thermopylae; but the education

of the infant, the boy, and the man, had prepared, and almost

insured, this memorable sacrifice; and each Spartan would

approve, rather than admire, an act of duty, of which himself and

eight thousand of his fellow-citizens were equally capable. 1 The

great Pompey might inscribe on his trophies, that he had defeated

in battle two millions of enemies, and reduced fifteen hundred

cities from the Lake Maeotis to the Red Sea: 2 but the fortune of

Rome flew before his eagles; the nations were oppressed by their

own fears, and the invincible legions which he commanded, had

been formed by the habits of conquest and the discipline of ages.

In this view, the character of Belisarius may be deservedly

placed above the heroes of the ancient republics. His

imperfections flowed from the contagion of the times; his virtues

were his own, the free gift of nature or reflection; he raised

himself without a master or a rival; and so inadequate were the

arms committed to his hand, that his sole advantage was derived

from the pride and presumption of his adversaries. Under his

command, the subjects of Justinian often deserved to be called

Romans: but the unwarlike appellation of Greeks was imposed as a

term of reproach by the haughty Goths; who affected to blush,

that they must dispute the kingdom of Italy with a nation of

tragedians, pantomimes, and pirates. 3 The climate of Asia has

indeed been found less congenial than that of Europe to military

spirit: those populous countries were enervated by luxury,

despotism, and superstition; and the monks were more expensive

and more numerous than the soldiers of the East. The regular

force of the empire had once amounted to six hundred and

forty-five thousand men: it was reduced, in the time of

Justinian, to one hundred and fifty thousand; and this number,

large as it may seem, was thinly scattered over the sea and land;

in Spain and Italy, in Africa and Egypt, on the banks of the

Danube, the coast of the Euxine, and the frontiers of Persia. The

citizen was exhausted, yet the soldier was unpaid; his poverty

was mischievously soothed by the privilege of rapine and

indolence; and the tardy payments were detained and intercepted

by the fraud of those agents who usurp, without courage or

danger, the emoluments of war. Public and private distress

recruited the armies of the state; but in the field, and still

more in the presence of the enemy, their numbers were always

defective. The want of national spirit was supplied by the

precarious faith and disorderly service of Barbarian mercenaries.

Even military honor, which has often survived the loss of virtue

and freedom, was almost totally extinct. The generals, who were

multiplied beyond the example of former times, labored only to

prevent the success, or to sully the reputation of their

colleagues; and they had been taught by experience, that if merit

sometimes provoked the jealousy, error, or even guilt, would

obtain the indulgence, of a gracious emperor. 4 In such an age,

the triumphs of Belisarius, and afterwards of Narses, shine with

incomparable lustre; but they are encompassed with the darkest

shades of disgrace and calamity. While the lieutenant of

Justinian subdued the kingdoms of the Goths and Vandals, the

emperor, 5 timid, though ambitious, balanced the forces of the

Barbarians, fomented their divisions by flattery and falsehood,

and invited by his patience and liberality the repetition of

injuries. 6 The keys of Carthage, Rome, and Ravenna, were

presented to their conqueror, while Antioch was destroyed by the

Persians, and Justinian trembled for the safety of

Constantinople.

1 (return) [ It will be a pleasure, not a task, to read

Herodotus, (l. vii. c. 104, 134, p. 550, 615.) The conversation

of Xerxes and Demaratus at Thermopylae is one of the most

interesting and moral scenes in history. It was the torture of

the royal Spartan to behold, with anguish and remorse, the virtue

of his country.]

2 (return) [ See this proud inscription in Pliny, (Hist. Natur.

vii. 27.) Few men have more exquisitely tasted of glory and

disgrace; nor could Juvenal (Satir. x.) produce a more striking

example of the vicissitudes of fortune, and the vanity of human

wishes.]

3 (return) [ This last epithet of Procopius is too nobly

translated by pirates; naval thieves is the proper word;

strippers of garments, either for injury or insult, (Demosthenes

contra Conon Reiske, Orator, Graec. tom. ii. p. 1264.)]

4 (return) [ See the third and fourth books of the Gothic War:

the writer of the Anecdotes cannot aggravate these abuses.]

5 (return) [ Agathias, l. v. p. 157, 158. He confines this

weakness of the emperor and the empire to the old age of

Justinian; but alas! he was never young.]

6 (return) [ This mischievous policy, which Procopius (Anecdot.

c. 19) imputes to the emperor, is revealed in his epistle to a

Scythian prince, who was capable of understanding it.]

Even the Gothic victories of Belisarius were prejudicial to the

state, since they abolished the important barrier of the Upper

Danube, which had been so faithfully guarded by Theodoric and his

daughter. For the defence of Italy, the Goths evacuated Pannonia

and Noricum, which they left in a peaceful and flourishing

condition: the sovereignty was claimed by the emperor of the

Romans; the actual possession was abandoned to the boldness of

the first invader. On the opposite banks of the Danube, the

plains of Upper Hungary and the Transylvanian hills were

possessed, since the death of Attila, by the tribes of the

Gepidae, who respected the Gothic arms, and despised, not indeed

the gold of the Romans, but the secret motive of their annual

subsidies. The vacant fortifications of the river were instantly

occupied by these Barbarians; their standards were planted on the

walls of Sirmium and Belgrade; and the ironical tone of their

apology aggravated this insult on the majesty of the empire. “So

extensive, O Caesar, are your dominions, so numerous are your

cities, that you are continually seeking for nations to whom,

either in peace or in war, you may relinquish these useless

possessions. The Gepidae are your brave and faithful allies; and

if they have anticipated your gifts, they have shown a just

confidence in your bounty.” Their presumption was excused by the

mode of revenge which Justinian embraced. Instead of asserting

the rights of a sovereign for the protection of his subjects, the

emperor invited a strange people to invade and possess the Roman

provinces between the Danube and the Alps and the ambition of the

Gepidae was checked by the rising power and fame of the Lombards.

7 This corrupt appellation has been diffused in the thirteenth

century by the merchants and bankers, the Italian posterity of

these savage warriors: but the original name of Langobards is

expressive only of the peculiar length and fashion of their

beards. I am not disposed either to question or to justify their

Scandinavian origin; 8 nor to pursue the migrations of the

Lombards through unknown regions and marvellous adventures. About

the time of Augustus and Trajan, a ray of historic light breaks

on the darkness of their antiquities, and they are discovered,

for the first time, between the Elbe and the Oder. Fierce, beyond

the example of the Germans, they delighted to propagate the

tremendous belief, that their heads were formed like the heads of

dogs, and that they drank the blood of their enemies, whom they

vanquished in battle. The smallness of their numbers was

recruited by the adoption of their bravest slaves; and alone,

amidst their powerful neighbors, they defended by arms their

high-spirited independence. In the tempests of the north, which

overwhelmed so many names and nations, this little bark of the

Lombards still floated on the surface: they gradually descended

towards the south and the Danube, and, at the end of four hundred

years, they again appear with their ancient valor and renown.

Their manners were not less ferocious. The assassination of a

royal guest was executed in the presence, and by the command, of

the king’s daughter, who had been provoked by some words of

insult, and disappointed by his diminutive stature; and a

tribute, the price of blood, was imposed on the Lombards, by his

brother the king of the Heruli. Adversity revived a sense of

moderation and justice, and the insolence of conquest was

chastised by the signal defeat and irreparable dispersion of the

Heruli, who were seated in the southern provinces of Poland. 9

The victories of the Lombards recommended them to the friendship

of the emperors; and at the solicitations of Justinian, they

passed the Danube, to reduce, according to their treaty, the

cities of Noricum and the fortresses of Pannonia. But the spirit

of rapine soon tempted them beyond these ample limits; they

wandered along the coast of the Hadriatic as far as Dyrrachium,

and presumed, with familiar rudeness to enter the towns and

houses of their Roman allies, and to seize the captives who had

escaped from their audacious hands. These acts of hostility, the

sallies, as it might be pretended, of some loose adventurers,

were disowned by the nation, and excused by the emperor; but the

arms of the Lombards were more seriously engaged by a contest of

thirty years, which was terminated only by the extirpation of the

Gepidae. The hostile nations often pleaded their cause before the

throne of Constantinople; and the crafty Justinian, to whom the

Barbarians were almost equally odious, pronounced a partial and

ambiguous sentence, and dexterously protracted the war by slow

and ineffectual succors. Their strength was formidable, since the

Lombards, who sent into the field several myriads of soldiers,

still claimed, as the weaker side, the protection of the Romans.

Their spirit was intrepid; yet such is the uncertainty of

courage, that the two armies were suddenly struck with a panic;

they fled from each other, and the rival kings remained with

their guards in the midst of an empty plain. A short truce was

obtained; but their mutual resentment again kindled; and the

remembrance of their shame rendered the next encounter more

desperate and bloody. Forty thousand of the Barbarians perished

in the decisive battle, which broke the power of the Gepidae,

transferred the fears and wishes of Justinian, and first

displayed the character of Alboin, the youthful prince of the

Lombards, and the future conqueror of Italy. 10

7 (return) [ Gens Germana feritate ferocior, says Velleius

Paterculus of the Lombards, (ii. 106.) Langobardos paucitas

nobilitat. Plurimis ac valentissimis nationibus cincti non per

obsequium, sed praeliis et perilitando, tuti sunt, (Tacit. de

Moribus German. c. 40.) See likewise Strabo, (l. viii. p. 446.)

The best geographers place them beyond the Elbe, in the bishopric

of Magdeburgh and the middle march of Brandenburgh; and their

situation will agree with the patriotic remark of the count de

Hertzberg, that most of the Barbarian conquerors issued from the

same countries which still produce the armies of Prussia. * Note:

See Malte Brun, vol. i. p 402.—M]

8 (return) [ The Scandinavian origin of the Goths and Lombards,

as stated by Paul Warnefrid, surnamed the deacon, is attacked by

Cluverius, (Germania, Antiq. l. iii. c. 26, p. 102, &c.,) a

native of Prussia, and defended by Grotius, (Prolegom. ad Hist.

Goth. p. 28, &c.,) the Swedish Ambassador.]

9 (return) [ Two facts in the narrative of Paul Diaconus (l. i.

c. 20) are expressive of national manners: 1. Dum ad tabulam

luderet—while he played at draughts. 2. Camporum viridantia lina.

The cultivation of flax supposes property, commerce, agriculture,

and manufactures]

10 (return) [ I have used, without undertaking to reconcile, the

facts in Procopius, (Goth. l. ii. c. 14, l. iii. c. 33, 34, l.

iv. c. 18, 25,) Paul Diaconus, (de Gestis Langobard, l. i. c.

1-23, in Muratori, Script. Rerum Italicarum, tom. i. p. 405-419,)

and Jornandes, (de Success. Regnorum, p. 242.) The patient reader

may draw some light from Mascou (Hist. of the Germans, and

Annotat. xxiii.) and De Buat, (Hist. des Peuples, &c., tom. ix.

x. xi.)]

The wild people who dwelt or wandered in the plains of Russia,

Lithuania, and Poland, might be reduced, in the age of Justinian,

under the two great families of the Bulgarians 11 and the

Sclavonians. According to the Greek writers, the former, who

touched the Euxine and the Lake Maeotis, derived from the Huns

their name or descent; and it is needless to renew the simple and

well-known picture of Tartar manners. They were bold and

dexterous archers, who drank the milk, and feasted on the flesh,

of their fleet and indefatigable horses; whose flocks and herds

followed, or rather guided, the motions of their roving camps; to

whose inroads no country was remote or impervious, and who were

practised in flight, though incapable of fear. The nation was

divided into two powerful and hostile tribes, who pursued each

other with fraternal hatred. They eagerly disputed the

friendship, or rather the gifts, of the emperor; and the

distinctions which nature had fixed between the faithful dog and

the rapacious wolf was applied by an ambassador who received only

verbal instructions from the mouth of his illiterate prince. 12

The Bulgarians, of whatsoever species, were equally attracted by

Roman wealth: they assumed a vague dominion over the Sclavonian

name, and their rapid marches could only be stopped by the Baltic

Sea, or the extreme cold and poverty of the north. But the same

race of Sclavonians appears to have maintained, in every age, the

possession of the same countries. Their numerous tribes, however

distant or adverse, used one common language (it was harsh and

irregular), and were known by the resemblance of their form,

which deviated from the swarthy Tartar, and approached without

attaining the lofty stature and fair complexion of the German.

Four thousand six hundred villages 13 were scattered over the

provinces of Russia and Poland, and their huts were hastily built

of rough timber, in a country deficient both in stone and iron.

Erected, or rather concealed, in the depth of forests, on the

banks of rivers, or the edges of morasses, we may not perhaps,

without flattery, compare them to the architecture of the beaver;

which they resembled in a double issue, to the land and water,

for the escape of the savage inhabitant, an animal less cleanly,

less diligent, and less social, than that marvellous quadruped.

The fertility of the soil, rather than the labor of the natives,

supplied the rustic plenty of the Sclavonians. Their sheep and

horned cattle were large and numerous, and the fields which they

sowed with millet or panic 14 afforded, in place of bread, a

coarse and less nutritive food. The incessant rapine of their

neighbors compelled them to bury this treasure in the earth; but

on the appearance of a stranger, it was freely imparted by a

people, whose unfavorable character is qualified by the epithets

of chaste, patient, and hospitable. As their supreme god, they

adored an invisible master of the thunder. The rivers and the

nymphs obtained their subordinate honors, and the popular worship

was expressed in vows and sacrifice. The Sclavonians disdained to

obey a despot, a prince, or even a magistrate; but their

experience was too narrow, their passions too headstrong, to

compose a system of equal law or general defence. Some voluntary

respect was yielded to age and valor; but each tribe or village

existed as a separate republic, and all must be persuaded where

none could be compelled. They fought on foot, almost naked, and

except an unwieldy shield, without any defensive armor; their

weapons of offence were a bow, a quiver of small poisoned arrows,

and a long rope, which they dexterously threw from a distance,

and entangled their enemy in a running noose. In the field, the

Sclavonian infantry was dangerous by their speed, agility, and

hardiness: they swam, they dived, they remained under water,

drawing their breath through a hollow cane; and a river or lake

was often the scene of their unsuspected ambuscade. But these

were the achievements of spies or stragglers; the military art

was unknown to the Sclavonians; their name was obscure, and their

conquests were inglorious. 15

11 (return) [ I adopt the appellation of Bulgarians from

Ennodius, (in Panegyr. Theodorici, Opp. Sirmond, tom. i. p. 1598,

1599,) Jornandes, (de Rebus Geticis, c. 5, p. 194, et de Regn.

Successione, p. 242,) Theophanes, (p. 185,) and the Chronicles of

Cassiodorus and Marcellinus. The name of Huns is too vague; the

tribes of the Cutturgurians and Utturgurians are too minute and

too harsh. * Note: The Bulgarians are first mentioned among the

writers of the West in the Panegyric on Theodoric by Ennodius,

Bishop of Pavia. Though they perhaps took part in the conquests

of the Huns, they did not advance to the Danube till after the

dismemberment of that monarchy on the death of Attila. But the

Bulgarians are mentioned much earlier by the Armenian writers.

Above 600 years before Christ, a tribe of Bulgarians, driven from

their native possessions beyond the Caspian, occupied a part of

Armenia, north of the Araxes. They were of the Finnish race; part

of the nation, in the fifth century, moved westward, and reached

the modern Bulgaria; part remained along the Volga, which is

called Etel, Etil, or Athil, in all the Tartar languages, but

from the Bulgarians, the Volga. The power of the eastern

Bulgarians was broken by Batou, son of Tchingiz Khan; that of the

western will appear in the course of the history. From St.

Martin, vol. vii p. 141. Malte-Brun, on the contrary, conceives

that the Bulgarians took their name from the river. According to

the Byzantine historians they were a branch of the Ougres,

(Thunmann, Hist. of the People to the East of Europe,) but they

have more resemblance to the Turks. Their first country, Great

Bulgaria, was washed by the Volga. Some remains of their capital

are still shown near Kasan. They afterwards dwelt in Kuban, and

finally on the Danube, where they subdued (about the year 500)

the Slavo-Servians established on the Lower Danube. Conquered in

their turn by the Avars, they freed themselves from that yoke in

635; their empire then comprised the Cutturgurians, the remains

of the Huns established on the Palus Maeotis. The Danubian

Bulgaria, a dismemberment of this vast state, was long formidable

to the Byzantine empire. Malte-Brun, Prec. de Geog Univ. vol. i.

p. 419.—M. ——According to Shafarik, the Danubian Bulgaria was

peopled by a Slavo Bulgarian race. The Slavish population was

conquered by the Bulgarian (of Uralian and Finnish descent,) and

incorporated with them. This mingled race are the Bulgarians

bordering on the Byzantine empire. Shafarik, ii 152, et seq.—M.

1845]

12 (return) [ Procopius, (Goth. l. iv. c. 19.) His verbal message

(he owns him self an illiterate Barbarian) is delivered as an

epistle. The style is savage, figurative, and original.]

13 (return) [ This sum is the result of a particular list, in a

curious Ms. fragment of the year 550, found in the library of

Milan. The obscure geography of the times provokes and exercises

the patience of the count de Buat, (tom. xi. p. 69—189.) The

French minister often loses himself in a wilderness which

requires a Saxon and Polish guide.]

14 (return) [ Panicum, milium. See Columella, l. ii. c. 9, p.

430, edit. Gesner. Plin. Hist. Natur. xviii. 24, 25. The

Samaritans made a pap of millet, mingled with mare’s milk or

blood. In the wealth of modern husbandry, our millet feeds

poultry, and not heroes. See the dictionaries of Bomare and

Miller.]

15 (return) [ For the name and nation, the situation and manners,

of the Sclavonians, see the original evidence of the vith

century, in Procopius, (Goth. l. ii. c. 26, l. iii. c. 14,) and

the emperor Mauritius or Maurice (Stratagemat. l. ii. c. 5, apud

Mascon Annotat. xxxi.) The stratagems of Maurice have been

printed only, as I understand, at the end of Scheffer’s edition

of Arrian’s Tactics, at Upsal, 1664, (Fabric. Bibliot. Graec. l.

iv. c. 8, tom. iii. p. 278,) a scarce, and hitherto, to me, an

inaccessible book.]

I have marked the faint and general outline of the Sclavonians

and Bulgarians, without attempting to define their intermediate

boundaries, which were not accurately known or respected by the

Barbarians themselves. Their importance was measured by their

vicinity to the empire; and the level country of Moldavia and

Wallachia was occupied by the Antes, 16 a Sclavonian tribe, which

swelled the titles of Justinian with an epithet of conquest. 17

Against the Antes he erected the fortifications of the Lower

Danube; and labored to secure the alliance of a people seated in

the direct channel of northern inundation, an interval of two

hundred miles between the mountains of Transylvania and the

Euxine Sea. But the Antes wanted power and inclination to stem

the fury of the torrent; and the light-armed Sclavonians, from a

hundred tribes, pursued with almost equal speed the footsteps of

the Bulgarian horse. The payment of one piece of gold for each

soldier procured a safe and easy retreat through the country of

the Gepidae, who commanded the passage of the Upper Danube. 18

The hopes or fears of the Barbarians; their intense union or

discord; the accident of a frozen or shallow stream; the prospect

of harvest or vintage; the prosperity or distress of the Romans;

were the causes which produced the uniform repetition of annual

visits, 19 tedious in the narrative, and destructive in the

event. The same year, and possibly the same month, in which

Ravenna surrendered, was marked by an invasion of the Huns or

Bulgarians, so dreadful, that it almost effaced the memory of

their past inroads. They spread from the suburbs of

Constantinople to the Ionian Gulf, destroyed thirty-two cities or

castles, erased Potidaea, which Athens had built, and Philip had

besieged, and repassed the Danube, dragging at their horses’

heels one hundred and twenty thousand of the subjects of

Justinian. In a subsequent inroad they pierced the wall of the

Thracian Chersonesus, extirpated the habitations and the

inhabitants, boldly traversed the Hellespont, and returned to

their companions, laden with the spoils of Asia. Another party,

which seemed a multitude in the eyes of the Romans, penetrated,

without opposition, from the Straits of Thermopylae to the

Isthmus of Corinth; and the last ruin of Greece has appeared an

object too minute for the attention of history. The works which

the emperor raised for the protection, but at the expense of his

subjects, served only to disclose the weakness of some neglected

part; and the walls, which by flattery had been deemed

impregnable, were either deserted by the garrison, or scaled by

the Barbarians. Three thousand Sclavonians, who insolently

divided themselves into two bands, discovered the weakness and

misery of a triumphant reign. They passed the Danube and the

Hebrus, vanquished the Roman generals who dared to oppose their

progress, and plundered, with impunity, the cities of Illyricum

and Thrace, each of which had arms and numbers to overwhelm their

contemptible assailants. Whatever praise the boldness of the

Sclavonians may deserve, it is sullied by the wanton and

deliberate cruelty which they are accused of exercising on their

prisoners. Without distinction of rank, or age, or sex, the

captives were impaled or flayed alive, or suspended between four

posts, and beaten with clubs till they expired, or enclosed in

some spacious building, and left to perish in the flames with the

spoil and cattle which might impede the march of these savage

victors. 20 Perhaps a more impartial narrative would reduce the

number, and qualify the nature, of these horrid acts; and they

might sometimes be excused by the cruel laws of retaliation. In

the siege of Topirus, 21 whose obstinate defence had enraged the

Sclavonians, they massacred fifteen thousand males; but they

spared the women and children; the most valuable captives were

always reserved for labor or ransom; the servitude was not

rigorous, and the terms of their deliverance were speedy and

moderate. But the subject, or the historian of Justinian, exhaled

his just indignation in the language of complaint and reproach;

and Procopius has confidently affirmed, that in a reign of

thirty-two years, each annual inroad of the Barbarians consumed

two hundred thousand of the inhabitants of the Roman empire. The

entire population of Turkish Europe, which nearly corresponds

with the provinces of Justinian, would perhaps be incapable of

supplying six millions of persons, the result of this incredible

estimate. 22

16 (return) [ Antes corum fortissimi.... Taysis qui rapidus et

vorticosus in Histri fluenta furens devolvitur, (Jornandes, c. 5,

p. 194, edit. Murator. Procopius, Goth. l. iii. c. 14, et de

Edific. l iv. c. 7.) Yet the same Procopius mentions the Goths

and Huns as neighbors to the Danube, (de Edific. l. v. c. 1.)]

17 (return) [ The national title of Anticus, in the laws and

inscriptions of Justinian, was adopted by his successors, and is

justified by the pious Ludewig (in Vit. Justinian. p. 515.) It

had strangely puzzled the civilians of the middle age.]

18 (return) [ Procopius, Goth. l. iv. c. 25.]

19 (return) [ An inroad of the Huns is connected, by Procopius,

with a comet perhaps that of 531, (Persic. l. ii. c. 4.) Agathias

(l. v. p. 154, 155) borrows from his predecessors some early

facts.]

20 (return) [ The cruelties of the Sclavonians are related or

magnified by Procopius, (Goth. l. iii. c. 29, 38.) For their mild

and liberal behavior to their prisoners, we may appeal to the

authority, somewhat more recent of the emperor Maurice,

(Stratagem. l. ii. c. 5.)]

21 (return) [ Topirus was situate near Philippi in Thrace, or

Macedonia, opposite to the Isle of Thasos, twelve days’ journey

from Constantinople (Cellarius, tom. i. p. 676, 846.)]

22 (return) [ According to the malevolent testimony of the

Anecdotes, (c. 18,) these inroads had reduced the provinces south

of the Danube to the state of a Scythian wilderness.]

In the midst of these obscure calamities, Europe felt the shock

of revolution, which first revealed to the world the name and

nation of the Turks. 2211 Like Romulus, the founder 2212 of that

martial people was suckled by a she-wolf, who afterwards made him

the father of a numerous progeny; and the representation of that

animal in the banners of the Turks preserved the memory, or

rather suggested the idea, of a fable, which was invented,

without any mutual intercourse, by the shepherds of Latium and

those of Scythia. At the equal distance of two thousand miles

from the Caspian, the Icy, the Chinese, and the Bengal Seas, a

ridge of mountains is conspicuous, the centre, and perhaps the

summit, of Asia; which, in the language of different nations, has

been styled Imaus, and Caf, 23 and Altai, and the Golden

Mountains, 2311 and the Girdle of the Earth. The sides of the

hills were productive of minerals; and the iron forges, 24 for

the purpose of war, were exercised by the Turks, the most

despised portion of the slaves of the great khan of the Geougen.

But their servitude could only last till a leader, bold and

eloquent, should arise to persuade his countrymen that the same

arms which they forged for their masters, might become, in their

own hands, the instruments of freedom and victory. They sallied

from the mountains; 25 a sceptre was the reward of his advice;

and the annual ceremony, in which a piece of iron was heated in

the fire, and a smith’s hammer 2511 was successively handled by

the prince and his nobles, recorded for ages the humble

profession and rational pride of the Turkish nation. Bertezena,

2512 their first leader, signalized their valor and his own in

successful combats against the neighboring tribes; but when he

presumed to ask in marriage the daughter of the great khan, the

insolent demand of a slave and a mechanic was contemptuously

rejected. The disgrace was expiated by a more noble alliance with

a princess of China; and the decisive battle which almost

extirpated the nation of the Geougen, established in Tartary the

new and more powerful empire of the Turks. 2513 They reigned over

the north; but they confessed the vanity of conquest, by their

faithful attachment to the mountain of their fathers. The royal

encampment seldom lost sight of Mount Altai, from whence the

River Irtish descends to water the rich pastures of the Calmucks,

26 which nourish the largest sheep and oxen in the world. The

soil is fruitful, and the climate mild and temperate: the happy

region was ignorant of earthquake and pestilence; the emperor’s

throne was turned towards the East, and a golden wolf on the top

of a spear seemed to guard the entrance of his tent. One of the

successors of Bertezena was tempted by the luxury and

superstition of China; but his design of building cities and

temples was defeated by the simple wisdom of a Barbarian

counsellor. “The Turks,” he said, “are not equal in number to one

hundredth part of the inhabitants of China. If we balance their

power, and elude their armies, it is because we wander without

any fixed habitations in the exercise of war and hunting. Are we

strong? we advance and conquer: are we feeble? we retire and are

concealed. Should the Turks confine themselves within the walls

of cities, the loss of a battle would be the destruction of their

empire. The bonzes preach only patience, humility, and the

renunciation of the world. Such, O king! is not the religion of

heroes.” They entertained, with less reluctance, the doctrines of

Zoroaster; but the greatest part of the nation acquiesced,

without inquiry, in the opinions, or rather in the practice, of

their ancestors. The honors of sacrifice were reserved for the

supreme deity; they acknowledged, in rude hymns, their

obligations to the air, the fire, the water, and the earth; and

their priests derived some profit from the art of divination.

Their unwritten laws were rigorous and impartial: theft was

punished with a tenfold restitution; adultery, treason, and

murder, with death; and no chastisement could be inflicted too

severe for the rare and inexpiable guilt of cowardice. As the

subject nations marched under the standard of the Turks, their

cavalry, both men and horses, were proudly computed by millions;

one of their effective armies consisted of four hundred thousand

soldiers, and in less than fifty years they were connected in

peace and war with the Romans, the Persians, and the Chinese. In

their northern limits, some vestige may be discovered of the form

and situation of Kamptchatka, of a people of hunters and

fishermen, whose sledges were drawn by dogs, and whose

habitations were buried in the earth. The Turks were ignorant of

astronomy; but the observation taken by some learned Chinese,

with a gnomon of eight feet, fixes the royal camp in the latitude

of forty-nine degrees, and marks their extreme progress within

three, or at least ten degrees, of the polar circle. 27 Among

their southern conquests the most splendid was that of the

Nephthalites, or white Huns, a polite and warlike people, who

possessed the commercial cities of Bochara and Samarcand, who had

vanquished the Persian monarch, and carried their victorious arms

along the banks, and perhaps to the mouth, of the Indus. On the

side of the West, the Turkish cavalry advanced to the Lake

Maeotis. They passed that lake on the ice. The khan who dwelt at

the foot of Mount Altai issued his commands for the siege of

Bosphorus, 28 a city the voluntary subject of Rome, and whose

princes had formerly been the friends of Athens. 29 To the east,

the Turks invaded China, as often as the vigor of the government

was relaxed: and I am taught to read in the history of the times,

that they mowed down their patient enemies like hemp or grass;

and that the mandarins applauded the wisdom of an emperor who

repulsed these Barbarians with golden lances. This extent of

savage empire compelled the Turkish monarch to establish three

subordinate princes of his own blood, who soon forgot their

gratitude and allegiance. The conquerors were enervated by

luxury, which is always fatal except to an industrious people;

the policy of China solicited the vanquished nations to resume

their independence and the power of the Turks was limited to a

period of two hundred years. The revival of their name and

dominion in the southern countries of Asia are the events of a

later age; and the dynasties, which succeeded to their native

realms, may sleep in oblivion; since their history bears no

relation to the decline and fall of the Roman empire. 30

2211 (return) [ It must be remembered that the name of Turks is

extended to a whole family of the Asiatic races, and not confined

to the Assena, or Turks of the Altai.—M.]

2212 (return) [ Assena (the wolf) was the name of this chief.

Klaproth, Tabl. Hist. de l’Asie p. 114.—M.]

The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Table of Contents with links in the HTML file to the two Project Gutenberg editions (12 volumes) · 第 45 / 79 章

63 (return) [ The series of the first Gothic war is represented