Delphi Complete Works of Procopius

by Procopius of Caesarea

  She then selected the most warlike men among them and sent them off straightway, instructing them to bring the man captive without fail. Then, by way of carrying out her mission, these men went about searching that whole country thoroughly, until they found Radigis hiding in a dense wood; then they bound him and took him back to the girl. So he stood before her eyes trembling and expecting to die instantly by the most cruel death; she, however, contrary to his expectations, neither killed him nor inflicted any other harm upon him, but by way of reproaching him for his insult to her, enquired of the fellow why in the world he had made light of the agreement and allied himself to another woman, and that too though his betrothed had not been unfaithful. And he, seeking to defend himself against the charge, brought forward the commands of his father and the zeal of his subjects, and he uttered words of supplication and mingled many prayers with his defence, excusing his action by the stress of necessity. And if it was her will that they should be married he promised that what he had done unjustly in the past would be repaired by his subsequent conduct. Now when this was approved by the girl, and Radigis had been released from his bonds and received kind treatment in all other matters, he straightway dismissed the sister of Theudibert and wedded the girl from Brittia. Thus did these events take place.

  Now in this island of Brittia the men of ancient times built a long wall, cutting off a large part of it; and the climate and the soil and everything else is not alike on the two sides of it. For to the east of the wall there is a salubrious air, changing with the seasons, being moderately warm in summer and cool in winter. And many people dwell there, living in the same fashion as other men, and the trees abound with fruits which ripen at the fitting season, and the corn-lands flourish as abundantly as any; furthermore, the land seems to display a genuine pride in an abundance of springs of water. But on the west side everything is the reverse of this, so that it is actually impossible for a man to survive there even a half-hour, but countless snakes and serpents and every other kind of wild creature occupy this area as their own. And, strangest of all, the inhabitants say that if any man crosses this wall and goes to the other side, he dies straightway, being quite unable to support the pestilential air of that region, and wild animals, likewise, which go there are instantly met and taken by death.

  Since I have reached this point in the history, it is necessary for me to record a story which bears a very close resemblance to mythology, a story which did not indeed seem to me at all trustworthy, although it was constantly being published by countless persons who maintained that they had done the thing with their own hands and had heard the words with their own ears, and yet it cannot be altogether passed over, lest, in writing an account of the island of Brittia, gain a lasting reputation for ignorance of what takes place there.

  They say, then, that the souls of men who die are always conveyed to this place. And as to the manner in which this is done, I shall presently explain, having many a time heard the people there most earnestly describe it, though I have come to the conclusion that the tales they tell are to be attributed to some power of dreams. Along the coast of the ocean which lies opposite the island of Brittia there are numerous villages. These are inhabited by men who fish with nets or till the soil or carry on a sea-trade with this island, being in other respects subject to the Franks, but never making them any payment of tribute, that burden having been remitted to them from ancient times on account, as they say, of a certain service, which will here be described by me.

  The men of this place say that the conduct of souls is laid upon them in turn. So the men who on the following night must go to do this work relieving others in the service, as soon as darkness comes on, retire to their own houses and sleep, awaiting him who is to assemble them for the enterprise. And at a late hour of the night they are conscious of a knocking at their doors and hear an indistinct voice calling them together for their task. And they with no hesitation rise from their beds and walk to the shore, not understanding what necessity leads them to do this, but compelled nevertheless. There they see skiffs in readiness with no man at all in them, not their own skiffs, however, but a different kind, in which they embark and lay hold of the oars. And they are aware that the boats are burdened with a large number of passengers and are wet by the waves to the edge of the planks and the oarlocks, having not so much as one finger’s breadth above the water; they themselves, however, see no one, but after rowing a single hour they put in at Brittia. And yet when they make the voyage in their own skiffs, not using sails but rowing, they with difficulty make this passage in a night and a day. Then when they have reached the island and have been relieved of their burden, they depart with all speed, their boats now becoming suddenly light and rising above the waves, for they sink no further in the water than the keel itself.

  And they, for their part, neither see any man either sitting in the boat with them or departing from the boat, but they say that they hear a kind of voice from the island which seems to make announcement to those who take the souls in charge as each name is called of the passengers who have come over with them, telling over the positions of honour which they formerly held and calling out their fathers’ names with their own. And if women also happen to be among those who have been ferried over, they utter the names of the men to whom they were married in life. This, then, is what the men of this country say takes place. But I shall return to the previous narrative.

  XXI

  Such was the progress of the wars in each land. And the Gothic War continued as follows. After the emperor had summoned Belisarius to Byzantium as stated in the preceding narrative, he held him in honour, and not even at the death of Germanus did he purpose to send him to Italy, but he actually appointed him commander of the imperial guards as being General of the East, and detained him there. And Belisarius was first of all the Romans in dignity, although some of them had been enrolled before him among the patricians and had actually ascended to the seat of the consuls. But even so they all yielded first place to him, being ashamed in view of his achievements to take advantage of the law and to claim the right which it conferred, a circumstance which pleased the emperor exceedingly. Meanwhile John, the nephew of Vitalian, was passing the winter in Salones. And during all this time the commanders of the Roman army, expecting him in Italy, remained inactive. And the winter drew to its close and the sixteenth year ended in this Gothic War, the history of which Procopius has written. [551 A.D.]

  When the following year opened, John was minded to depart from Salones and lead his army as quickly as possible against Totila and the Goths. But the emperor prevented him, bidding him remain there until Narses the eunuch should arrive. For he had decided to appoint him commander-in-chief for this war. But the reason why this was the wish of the emperor was explicitly evident to no one in the world; for it is impossible that an emperor’s purpose be discovered except by his own will; but the surmises which people expressed I shall here set down. The thought had occurred to the Emperor Justinian that the other commanders of the Roman army would be quite unwilling to take orders from John, not consenting to be in any way inferior to him in rank. And consequently he feared lest by being at cross purposes or by playing the coward through envy they might make havoc of their operations.

  And I also heard the following account of the matter given by a Roman gentleman when I was sojourning in Rome; and this man was a member of the senate. This Roman said that once, during the time when Atalaric the grandson of Theoderic ruled Italy, a herd of cattle came into Rome in the late evening from the country through the forum which the Romans call the Forum of Peace; for in that place has been situated from ancient times the temple of Peace, which was struck by lightning. And there is a certain ancient fountain before this forum, and a bronze bull stands by it, the work, I think, of Pheidias the Athenian or of Lysippus. For there are many statues in this quarter which are the works of these two men. Here, for example, is another statue which is certainly the work of Pheidias; for the inscription on the statue
says this. There too is the calf of Myron. For the ancient Romans took great pains to make all the finest things of Greece adornments of Rome. And he said that one of the cattle then passing by — a steer — left the herd and mounting this fountain stood over the brazen bull. And by some chance a certain man of Tuscan birth was passing by, one who appeared to be a very rustic fellow, and he understood the scene which was being enacted and said (for the Tuscans even down to my day are gifted with prophecy) that one day a eunuch would undo the ruler of Rome. And then indeed that Tuscan and the words he uttered earned only laughter. For before actual experience comes men are ever wont to mock at prophecies, whilst proof does not upset them, because the events have not come about and the tale of them is not credible, but seems akin to some ridiculous myth.

  But now all men, yielding to the arguments of actual events, marvel at this sign. And it was perhaps for this reason that Narses marched as general against Totila, the emperor’s judgment penetrating the future, or chance ordaining the inevitable thing. So Narses, receiving a notable army and great sums of money from the emperor, set forth. But when he came with his command to the midst of Thrace, he spent some time at Philippopolis, having been cut off from his road. For an army of Huns had made a descent upon the Roman domain and were plundering and pillaging everything with no man to stand in their way. But after some of them had advanced against Thessalonice and the rest took the road to Byzantium, Narses finally departed thence and marched forward.

  XXII

  Now while John, on the one hand, was at Salones awaiting Narses, and Narses, on the other hand, was travelling rather slowly, being hindered by the inroad of the Huns, meantime Totila, while awaiting the army of Narses, was engaged as follows. He placed a part of the Romans and some of the members of the senate in Rome, leaving the rest in Campania. And he commanded them to look after the city as well as they could, shewing plainly thereby that he felt repentance for what he had done to Rome previously; for he had, as it happened, burned large parts of it, particularly on the further side of the Tiber River. But these Romans, being reduced to the state of slaves and stripped of all their money, were not only unable to lay claim to the public funds, but could not even secure those which belonged to them personally.

  Yet the Romans love their city above all the men we know, and they are eager to protect all their ancestral treasures and to preserve them, so that nothing of the ancient glory of Rome may be obliterated. For even though they were for a long period under barbarian sway, they preserved the buildings of the city and the most of its adornments, such as could through the excellence of their workmanship withstand so long a lapse of time and such neglect. Furthermore, all such memorials of the race as were still left are preserved even to this day, and among them the ship of Aeneas, the founder of the city, an altogether incredible sight. For they built a ship-house in the middle of the city on the bank of the Tiber, and depositing it there, they have preserved it from that time. And I shall now explain what sort of a ship this is, having seen it myself.

  The ship is one with a single bank of oars and is very long, being one hundred and twenty feet in length and twenty-five feet wide, and its height is all that it can be without becoming impossible to row. But there is nowhere in the boat any piecing together of timbers at all nor are the timbers fastened together by any device of iron, but all the timbers are of one piece, a thing strange and un heard of and true only, as far as we know, of this one boat. For the keel, which is a single piece, extends from the extreme stern to the bow, gradually sinking to the middle of the ship in a remarkable way and then rising again thence properly and in due order until it stands upright and rigid. And all the heavy timbers which fit into the keel (these the poets call “oak-stays,” but others call them “shepherds”) extend each and every one from one side all the way to the other side of the ship. These, too, sinking from either end, form a remarkably shapely bend, in order that the ship may be fashioned with a very wide hull, whether nature under the constraint of their future use originally carved out the timbers and fashioned this arch or the sweep of the ribs was properly adjusted by craftsmen’s skill and other devices. Each plank, furthermore, extends from the very stem to the other end of the ship, being of one piece and pierced by iron spikes only for this purpose, that by being fastened to the timbers they may form the side of the ship. This ship thus constructed makes an impression when seen which transcends all description, for the nature of things always makes those works which are most cunningly built not easy for men to describe, but by means of her innovations so prevails over our usual habits of mind as to check even our power of speech. Now none of these timbers has either rotted or given the least indication of being unsound, but the ship, intact throughout, just as if newly constructed by the hand of the builder, whoever he was, has preserved its strength in a marvellous way even to my time. Such are the facts relating to the ship of Aeneas.

  Totila now manned with Goths as many as three hundred ships of war and ordered them to go to Greece, instructing them to make every effort to capture those who fell in their way. But this fleet, as far as the land of the Phaeacians, which is now called Cercyra, was able to do no damage. For it so happens that there is no inhabited island in that part of the sea which extends from the strait of Charybdis as far as Cercyra, so that many a time, in passing that way, I have been at a loss to know where in the world the island of Calypso was. For nowhere in that sea have I seen an island with the exception of three not far from Phaeacia, and only about three hundred stades distant, huddled close together and very small and having no habitations either of men or of animals or anything else at all. These islands are now called Othoni. And one might say that Calypso lived there, and that Odysseus, consequently, being not far from the land of Phaeacia, ferried himself over from here on a raft, as Homer says, or by some other means without any ship. But let this be ventured by us only as a possible interpretation. For it is not easy to reconcile the actual facts precisely with the very ancient records, since the long passage of time is wont very generally to change the names of places and the beliefs concerning them.

  Such is the case of the ship which stands by the shore of the island in the land of the Phaeacians, made of white stone and supposed by some to be the very one which carried Odysseus to Ithaca at the time when he had the fortune to be entertained in Phaeacia. And yet this boat is not a monolith, but is composed of a very great number of stones. And an inscription has been cut in it and cries aloud that some merchant in earlier times set up this offering to Zeus Casius. For the men of this place once honoured Zeus Casius, since the very city in which this boat stands is called up to the present time Casope in the same manner that ship is made of many stones which Agamemnon the son of Atreus set up to Artemis at Geraestus in Euboea, seeking even in this way to blot out the insult to her, at the time when through the suffering of Iphigeneia Artemis permitted the Greeks to set sail. This is declared by an inscription on this boat in hexameters which was engraved either then or later. And though the most of it has disappeared because of the passage of time, the first verses are discernible even to the present and run as follows: —

  “Here on this spot Agamemnon did set me, a ship made of marble,

  A sign of the fleet of the Greeks sailing to Troy e’er to be.”

  And at the end it has the words: “Made by Tynnichus, to Artemis Bolosia”; for thus they used to name Eileithuia in former times, because they called the pains of travail “bolae.” But I must return to the point from which I have strayed.

  When this Gothic expedition reached Cercyra, they plundered it thoroughly in a sudden raid, and also the other islands called Sybotae which lie near it; then suddenly crossing over to the mainland also they plundered the whole country about Dodona, and particularly Nicopolis and Anchialus, where the natives say Anchises the father of Aeneas passed from the world, while he was sailing from captured Troy with his son, and thus gave the place its name. And going about the whole coast and meeting many Roman ships, they
captured every one of them, cargoes and all. Among these happened to be also some of the ships which were carrying provisions from Greece for the army of Narses. Thus then did these things take place.

  XXIII

  Long before this Totila had sent an army of Goths into Picenum, in order to capture Ancon; and he appointed as commanders over this army the most notable men among the Goths, Scipuar and Gibal and Gundulf, the last named having once been a guardsman of Belisarius. And some called him Indulf. And he gave them also forty-seven ships of war, in order that, in besieging the fortress by land and sea, they might make the overmastery of it easier and less laborious. And after this siege had been continued a long time it came about that the besieged were hard pressed by the scarcity of provisions.

  When this was learned by Valerian, who was waiting at Ravenna, being unable single-handed to succour the Romans in Ancon, he sent a messenger to John the nephew of Vitalian who was at Salones with the following letter. “Ancon is the only city left us to the south of the gulf, as you yourself know, if indeed it is now still left us. For such is the situation of the Romans who are being most closely besieged in this city, that I fear lest we be late with our assistance, shewing zeal after the critical time, and displaying our enthusiasm for it a day too late. But I shall cease. For the constraint imposed upon the besieged does not permit my letter to be made longer, since it strictly appropriates the time to its own uses, while the danger demands assistance more swift than words.” When John had read this letter, he dared, though it had been forbidden him by the emperor, to go on his own initiative, considering the straitened condition brought about by chance more weighty than the imperial commands. So selecting men whom he considered the most able fighters of all, and manning thirty-eight ships of war with them — boats of great swiftness and built with all possible care for warfare on the sea — and putting a few of his provisions aboard, he set sail from Salones and put in at Scardon. And Valerian also came thither not long afterwards with twelve ships.