legislative innovations—avarice and cruelty of justinian—barbarian invasions provoked—exorbitant subsidies to the chiefs of the huns and chosroes king of persia, followed by disturbances and violation of truce—saracens, slavs, antes, and other barbarous peoples—desolation of the provinces—religious persecutions and confiscation of church property—montanists, sabbatians, arians, and samaritans—pretended conversions—manicheans and polytheists—caesarea, the author’s birthplace—revolt of the peasants under julian—hellenism—law against paederasty—persecution of astrologers—continuous emigration.
when justinian came to the throne, he straightway succeeded in upsetting everything. what had previously been forbidden by the laws he introduced, while he abolished all existing institutions, as though he had assumed the imperial robe for no other purpose than to alter completely the form of government. he did away with existing offices, and established other new ones for the management of affairs. he acted in the same manner in regard to the laws and the army; not that he was led to do so by any love of justice or the public advantage, but merely in order that all institutions might be new and might bear his name; if there was any institution that he was unable to abolish at once, he gave it his name, that at least it might appear new. he could never satisfy his insatiable desire, either of money or blood; but after he had plundered one wealthy house, he would seek for another to rob, and straightway squander the plunder upon subsidies to barbarians, or senseless extravagance in building. after he had destroyed his victims by tens of thousands, he immediately began to lay plots against even greater numbers. as the roman empire was at peace with foreign nations, his impatience of quiet led him, out of uncontrollable love of bloodshed, to set the barbarians fighting with one another. sending for the chieftains of the huns for no reason whatever, he took a pride in lavishing great sums of money upon them, under the pretext of securing their friendship, just as he did in the time of the emperor justin, as i have already told you. these huns, when they had got the money, sent to some of their fellow-chieftains with their retainers, and bade them make inroads into the emperor’s territory, that they also might make a bargain with him for the peace which he was so ready to purchase. these men straightway subjugated the empire, and nevertheless remained in the emperor’s pay; and, following their examples, others straightway began to harass the wretched romans, and, after they had secured their booty, were graciously rewarded by the emperor for their invasion. thus the whole hunnish nation, one tribe after another, never ceased at any time to lay waste and plunder the empire; for these barbarians are under several independent chieftains, and the war, having once begun through his foolish generosity, never came to an end, but always kept beginning anew; so that, during this time, there was no mountain, no cave, no spot whatever in the roman empire that remained unravaged, and many countries were harried and plundered by the enemy more than five several times.
these calamities, and those which were brought upon the empire by the medes, the saracens, the sclavonians, the antes, and other barbarians, i have described in the previous books of my history; but, as i have said at the beginning of this story, i was here obliged to explain the causes which led thereto.
justinian paid chosroes many centenars in order to secure peace, and then, with unreasonable arbitrariness, did more than anyone to break the truce, by employing every effort to bring alamundur and his huns over to his own side, as i have already set forth in plain terms in my history.
while he was stirring up all this strife and war to plague the romans, he also endeavoured, by various devices, to drench the earth in human blood, to carry off more riches for himself, and to murder many of his subjects. he proceeded as follows. there prevail in the roman empire many christian doctrines which are known as heresies, such as those of the montanists and sabbatians and all the others by which men’s minds are led astray. justinian ordered all these beliefs to be abandoned in favour of the old religion, and threatened the recusants with legal disability to transmit their property to their wives and children by will. the churches of these so-called heretics—especially those belonging to the arian heresy—were rich beyond belief. neither the whole of the senate, or any other of the greatest corporations in the roman empire, could be compared with these churches in wealth. they had gold and silver plate and jewels more than any man could count or describe; they owned many mansions and villages, and large estates everywhere, and everything else which is reckoned and called wealth among men.
as none of the previous emperors had interfered with them, many people, even of the orthodox faith, procured, through this wealth, work and the means of livelihood. but the emperor justinian first of all sequestrated all the property of these churches, and suddenly took away all that they possessed, by which many people lost the means of subsistence. many agents were straightway sent out to all parts of the empire to force whomsoever they met to change the faith of his forefathers. these homely people, considering this an act of impiety, decided to oppose the emperor’s agents. hereupon many were put to death by the persecuting faction, and many made an end of themselves, thinking, in their superstitious folly, that this course best satisfied the claims of religion; but the greater part of them voluntarily quitted the land of their forefathers, and went into exile. the montanists, who were settled in phrygia, shut themselves up in their churches, set them on fire, and perished in the flames; and, from this time forth, nothing was to be seen in the roman empire except massacres and flight.
justinian straightway passed a similar law with regard to the samaritans, which produced a riot in palestine. in my own city of caesarea and other cities, the people, thinking that it was a foolish thing to suffer for a mere senseless dogma, adopted, in place of the name which they had hitherto borne, the appellation of “christians,” and so avoided the danger with which they were threatened by this law. such of them as had any claims to reason and who belonged to the better class, thought it their duty to remain stedfast to their new faith; but the greater part, as though out of pique at having been forced against their will by the law to abandon the faith of their fathers, adopted the belief of the manicheans, or what is known as polytheism.
but all the country people met together in a body and determined to take up arms against the emperor. they chose a leader of their own, named julian, the son of sabarus, and for some time held their own in the struggle with the imperial troops, but were at last defeated and cut to pieces, together with their leader. it is said that one hundred thousand men fell in this engagement, and the most fertile country on the earth has ever since been without cultivators. this did great harm to the christian landowners in that country, for, although they received nothing from their property, yet they were forced to pay heavy taxes yearly to the emperor for the rest of their lives, and no abatement or relief from this burden was granted to them.
after this he began to persecute those who were called gentiles, torturing their persons and plundering their property. all of these people, who decided to adopt the christian faith nominally, saved themselves for the time, but not long afterwards most of them were caught offering libations and sacrifices and performing other unholy rites. how he treated the christians i will subsequently relate.
next he forbade paederasty by law, and he made this law apply not only to those who transgressed it after it had been passed, but even to those who had practised this wickedness long before. the law was applied to these persons in the loosest fashion, the testimony of one man or boy, who possibly might be a slave unwilling to bear witness against his master, was held to be sound evidence. those who were convicted were carried through the city, after having had their genitals cut off. this cruelty was not at first practised against any except those who belonged to the green faction or were thought to be very rich, or had otherwise offended.
justinian and theodora also dealt very harshly with the astrologers, so that the officers appointed to punish thieves proceeded against these men for no other cause than that they were astrologers, dealt many stripes on their backs, and paraded them on camels through the city; yet they were old and respectable men, against whom no reproach could be brought except that they dwelt in byzantium and were learned about the stars.
there was a continual stream of emigration, not only to the lands of the barbarians, but also to the nations most remote from rome; and one saw a very great number of foreigners both in the country and in each city of the empire, for men lightly exchanged their native land for another, as though their own country had been captured by an enemy.
