Count Belisarius

To begin, then, with the East. King Khosrou is still alive in this year of our Lord 571, when I write this book. He has abstained from any further invasions of Roman Mesopotamia or Syria, ever since Belisarius turned him back at Carchemish; though the Saracens, his allies, are harassing our frontiers again. But he let the war in Colchis drag on, with alternate victory and defeat, until ten years ago: when another Eternal Peace was signed, under which he withdrew his claim to the sovereignty of Colchis and Justinian agreed to pay him a small annual tribute. (As I write, this Peace, too, has been broken – by the Romans this time. There has also been a successful revolt of the native Christians in Persian Armenia, which has placed itself under Roman protection.) Khosrou, like each of his ancestors in turn, has experienced greatest hostility from those most nearly related to him by blood; since Persian women are held in no honour and have no power to restrain their men-folk from mutual murder. His favourite son, born of a Christian woman, embraced Christianity when he came of age, and not long since rebelled, with a large part of the army; Khosrou crushed him in battle and he died.

Khosrou, though at first suspicious of Greek philosophy, has in his mature years studied it eagerly, engrafting it upon the Magian faith. Thus the torch of the Old Religion, quenched at Athens by Justinian, has been relighted not only in New Antioch, on the Euphrates, but in Persia itself at Khosrou's great university of Gondi Sapor, near Susa. There the best of the Greek Classics have been translated into Persian, together with works from the Latin and Sanskrit languages. But Khosrou abhors and persecutes Christianity, as a religion that ' leads men to neglect their duty in this life for hope of salvation in the next, and that tends to dishonour the Royal House of Persia by awarding

Divinity to a Jew of obscure parentage and rebellious spirit.' He also persecutes a doctrine called Communism; this was first preached by one Mazdak, who derived it from early Christian practice, but who wished the community of possession to include not only goods and money but also women. Khosrou enjoys good health, and rides vigorously. I do not know whether it was the Mages or the Greek philosophers who persuaded him that the admiration of posterity for a sovereign is secured less by aggressive war against neighbours than by a record of generosity, justice, culture, the resolute defence of his country, and the energetic pursuance of his subjects' welfare at home and abroad. This, at least, is King Khosrou's present view. Ever since the ravages of the plague, which he regarded as a warning sign from Heaven, he has been most attentive to his people, in a despotic way, and has rebuilt, rcpopulated, and restocked all those districts which suffered from Roman, Arab, or Hun invasion. Already Ids grace-name is Nushirvan ('The Generous Mind'), and it will be long celebrated in Persian history. They will say of him: 'He protected trade, agriculture, and learning – those were the good days.' For Persia is now strong, prosperous, contented. If only the same could be truly said of our own Empire after the long reign of his ambitious contemporary Justinian!

Now, of King Teudel in the West. Four years after having tacitly agreed, by the recall of Belisarius, to yield all Italy to the Goths – except the city of Ravenna – Justinian found it necessary to renew the war: it was inconvenient for his religious policy that the bishops of North Italy should have broken communion with the Pope Vigilius, and that Arianism should not yet be crushed. He consented to renew the war, but could not bring himself either to provide sufficient forces or to choose a general to command them. On one point only he was resolved: that he would not give Belisarius any further opportunity to distinguish himself. Here was a continual comedy for my mistress and myself to watch, now that we were safe in Constantinople: Justinian playing the capricious tricks that had been so inconvenient to us in Italy. Belisarius made no comment on these matters to us; and I verily believe that he refrained from all hostile criticisms of Imperial policy even in his private mind.

First, Justinian sent Germanus with 5,000 men to Sicily. Then he began to consider that Germanus had been the person recently selected for Emperor by the Armenian assassin, Artaban, and that he was far too closely related to the Goths – he had married Matasontha, formerly King Wittich's wife, and his young son by her was the only surviving male descendant of the great Theoderich. Recalling Germanus suddenly, Justinian gave the command to one Liberius, an old, harmless patrician with no fighting experience at all.