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 callled 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.