Appendix to the Fifth Century

APPENDIX TO THE FIFTH CENTURY. ON THE TUSCULAN HISTORICAL FRAGMENTS.

(Ang. Mai. Spicileg. Rom. t. II, part. III, pag. 1-28.)

^A While I was in the Tusculan countryside in the month of May, 1842, in order to restore the strength of my impaired health, I occasionally visited the library of the nearby monastery of the Basilians, which is commonly called Grottaferrata, which was once abundantly supplied with Greek codices, but is now greatly diminished after its best and largest portion passed to the Vatican palace under the popes Sixtus V, Paul V, and Pius VI; most of which codices I not only saw in Rome years ago, but also handled with my own hands when I was in charge of the Vatican Library. And indeed, I published in the third volume of this *Spicilegium* the history of the miracles of the holy martyrs Cyrus and John, taken from the Cryptensis codex, which is now in the Vatican. Moreover, Rodota, in his history of the Greeks of the Italian rite (book I, chapter 11), narrates that other codices of that same monastery were transferred to the Barberini library by the order of Urban VIII. Nor do I doubt that other losses, as happens, have befallen that library from the lapse of time, from the solitude and devastation of the place due to political changes, and occasionally from the dishonesty of men. ^B And so, that famous codex of Aesop, which rumor among the learned has handed down as being kept at Grottaferrata, certainly does not appear anywhere now: although I suspect that there is perhaps more of a fable lurking in this report than there ever were fables in that codex. Therefore, a modest number of Greek codices remains there (for I pass over the Latin ones), concerning almost exclusively ascetic, hagiological, and liturgical matters: yet I know that I saw there a part of Galen also, a treatise on civil law, a fragment of a lexicon, minor scholia on Homer, the Odyssey and a fragment of the Iliad, and, as I think, a few other things, among which, if I remember correctly, there was a certain history of the ancient heresies. But how small are these things, compared to the old abundance and compared to the luxurious resources of the Roman libraries?

That which is specific to the Cryptensis codices is that almost all were written on palimpsests. For it appears that it was the custom among those monks that a new codex would hardly ever be written without some old and obsolete parchment being adapted for this use. ^C Great, therefore, is the crop of buried writings in those codices, which at first sight excites the curiosity of the reader, yet soon, as they are for the most part obscure, satiety with the matter weakens one’s interest. Although, therefore, I thought that there was little or nothing to linger over in these tiny remnants of codices, especially to avoid exhausting my health with labor, I nevertheless fixed my mind for a while on a certain palimpsest, which I remembered having seen many years before—I speak of the fragment of the Iliad, written at the end of the fourteenth century, whose membranes, collected from the ruin of various codices, exhibit different writings under Homer—indeed of a larger and ancient form, but, except for one, all of a liturgical or certainly sacred subject. Therefore, setting these aside, I began to look at that single writing which moved my interest more, because it contained the deeds of the Greek Empire and Church; which, however, I found condensed into only four pair of leaves, that is, sixteen pages; the connection of which leaves is as follows: Fol. 62-69. Fol. 63-68. Fol. 64-67. Fol. 65-66. ^D From these pairs of leaves, I noticed that two were perversely bound by the one who rewrote the codex: so that now the single leaf 69 is to be placed before the single 62; and likewise the single 67 before the 64. Therefore, having found these four pairs of leaves, I hoped at first that I held an entire quaternion of the codex, and thus that the series of the material would be continuous: but that hope vanished immediately; for in the first leaf (for thus the series of time demonstrates to me the order of the leaves) the Persian expedition of the Emperor Julian is narrated: in the second are the affairs of Arcadius, and soon his son Theodosius: in the third are the events carried out a little later under this Theodosius: in the fourth, finally, the age of Justinian the Great runs its course. Therefore, these pairs of leaves are necessarily separate from each other, with lacunae intervening. Although, however, the pairs of leaves themselves are distant from one another, the singles, with one exception, cohere: or, to speak more clearly, the three fragments I, III, IV contain a continuous discourse on all the pages, except for the second, in which the single leaf 67 is not continued from leaf 64. Thus those three fragments were the inner leaves of as many quaternions; the second was not; which matter those skilled in palimpsests or codices will easily understand with me.

Since these things were so (neglecting Homer, which is a fragment of no value in itself, given so many complete and more ancient codices of the Iliad met with elsewhere), I began to set myself to transcribe the writing of the Greek historian buried under Homer; parts of which, although some were visible, were for the most part so obliterated that they seemed able to be recovered by almost no effort. At length, with grave exertion and much trouble to my mind and eyes during the brighter hours of the day, I transferred whatever was in these pages into my notebooks; and I betook myself to Rome to read the historians of Christian times. For hitherto it was certain to me that this historian had written while Justinian was still living, who in the last leaf is three times called by him ὁ δεσπότης ἡμῶν, our lord, which is not accustomed to be said except of a living prince. Therefore, many historians having been consulted, the method of which will be held in the scholia, I recognized that, before others, John Malalas had usurped the greater part of my historian—namely, the accounts of Julian the Augustus, and the monomachy of Areobindus, and some other parts; but that Malalas himself could not be the author of our fragments. For besides the fact that Humphry Hody demonstrated sufficiently in the *Prolegomena* to the same (ch. 15-29) that Malalas was much later than Justinian, there are many things in these fragments which are sometimes lacking from Malalas' history, and sometimes disagree. Otherwise, we know that this was the perpetual and most annoying disease of the writers of the later Byzantine age, that one would most shamelessly copy another. And indeed, the excellent Theophanes admits in his Preface that he does not extract anything from his own store, but takes everything from the ancient writers before him, only having neatly arranged the order of the times himself: which order George Hamartolus, a historian certainly not to be despised, thereafter followed, whose chronicles in manuscript codices I see are very similar. Who does not see the plagiarisms of the *Chronicon Paschale*, of Cedrenus, Glycas, Zonaras, Nicephorus Callistus, and others of the corpus of Byzantine collection of writers? Who does not grow weary of the warmed-over cabbage? And the unpublished chroniclers also must be accused of the same crime of plagiarism, for example John Siculus, Theodosius Melitinus, and others whom I have seen repeatedly in the Vatican codices. From this, however, so-called rejection of the Byzantines, I altogether except the Tusculan or Cryptensis fragments,

not so much that some fruit of my retirement might emerge, as because these remains (being the work of a man writing under Justinian, and therefore older than all the aforementioned) could not be left under those Homeric coverings. And so I thought it my duty to append a Latin translation. For, as will be clear to the reader, they contain something new, amend certain things in other historians, and reveal the source from which many have drawn. Who would not have judged that the Neapolitan quaternion of Gargilius Martialis should be published, given that Palladius, a writer on husbandry, had stolen several passages from it? The dignity of the elegant script also delighted me, which seems to be scarcely a century removed from Justinian—that is, from the author's age—unless perhaps it should be considered contemporaneous. I have seen to it that a specimen of this, as much as was contained on one page of the codex, was cast in type (omitting the Homeric clothing), skillfully delineated by my companion in retirement, Peter Matranga, a man as gifted in his Greek lineage as in his learning. ^A I believe the readers will wait for me to reveal the author of these fragments, if possible; if not, I shall at least put forward my own conjectures in the public view. Certainly, as to which Greek historians flourished around the times of Justinian the Great, Photius's *Bibliotheca*, the *Lexicon* of Suidas, Nicephorus Callistus (book I, chapter 1), and the collection of Byzantine historians—in which many names of lost works are praised—all demonstrate this, as do Labbe in his *Apparatus*, Hodius in his *Prolegomena* to Joannes Malalas, Vossius in his *History of Greek Literature*, and finally, the great Fabricius in his *Bibliotheca Graeca*. For my part, I was thinking first of all of Theodorus Lector, whose history was arranged by years, months, and indictions, as is the case in ours. ^B Zacharias Scholasticus and Petrus Patricius also came to mind; but I preferred the first two, being ecclesiastics: for these Tusculan fragments do not appear to have a lay author. Why should I now name others, or guess any longer? Especially since this inquiry is somewhat more laborious than the considerations of my time or leisure seem to demand. I therefore suppress this entire line of reasoning with caution, or at least defer it, in which I shall rejoice if I am forestalled by others.

FRAGMENT I

But the same Augustus Julian, having undertaken an expedition against Saporarsaces, the king of the Persians, betook himself to Hierapolis, having sent men who were to prepare ships at the city of Samosata in Euphratensia, some made of wood, others of hides, just as the very wise chronicler Magnus of Carrhae, who was in the retinue of Augustus Julian, has written. ^C Then, setting out from Hierapolis, he came to the city of Carrhae. But there, two roads presented themselves to him, one leading to Nisibis, which was then a city under Roman rule, and the other to a Roman fort called Circisium, situated between the two rivers, the Euphrates and the Abboras, which Diocletian, the Roman emperor, had built. There, having divided his army into two parts, Augustus Julian sent sixteen thousand heavy-armed soldiers toward Nisibis, with two commanders, Sebastianus and Procopius. But Julian himself proceeded to the fort of Circisium, and having left there all the stationarii he found—six thousand—and having added to them other heavy-armed soldiers with two commanders, ^D Acmaeus and Maurus, he departed from there and crossed the Abboras river by a bridge, with the ships having reached the Euphrates river, and going down.

The number of these ships was 1550. And having assembled his own army, with Anatolius the magister and Sallustius the praetorian prefect ^A by his side, along with his generals, he ascended a high platform and addressed the army in person, praising them and urging them 15 to contend against the Persians promptly and prudently. He immediately ordered them to board the ships, the Augustus himself also going to the vessel prepared for him. He gave orders that 1500 brave men from the ranks of the lancearii and mattiarii should act as scouts, leading the way, and he also willed that his imperial standards be carried. He kept with him Lucianus the comes, a most pugnacious man, who had pillaged many Persian forts situated along the Euphrates and on islands in the river, and had killed Persians who encountered him on boats. Furthermore, he had stationed Victor and Daglaiphus ^B behind the rest of the ships to keep watch over the masses. So the emperor came with the whole army through the great moat of the Euphrates, which joins the Tigris river, and he entered the same Tigris river where the two rivers meet and create a great lake. He passed over into Persian territory, in the region of the Mauzanitae, near the city of Ctesiphon, where the Persian royal palaces were. Having gained this approach to Babylon, he marched across the plain of Ctesiphon, wishing to go to Babylon also, accompanied by the senate, and to bring it under his own power... and having become master of this ascent to Babylon, he came through the plain of the same city ^C of Ctesiphon, wishing to come with his own senate and Babylon and take possession of it.

Meanwhile, Saporarsaces, having suspected that the Roman emperor Julian was traveling by way of Nisibis, hurried against him with all his own forces. But having soon received the message that the Roman emperor was behind him—already having occupied the Persian territories—and that the Roman generals with a great force were encountering him in front, seeing that he was caught in the middle, he fled into Persarmenia. However, he fraudulently sent two of his senators, whose noses he had cut off by their own consent, to the Roman emperor Julian, that they might deceive him so that he would not overtake them by pursuing. These men, indeed, showing their cut-off noses, came to the Roman emperor, ^D intending to betray, as they said, the king of the Persians, who had inflicted that punishment upon them. Julian Augustus himself, deceived by their perjury, followed them with the army; and they led him into the desert and waterless places, wandering for 150 miles with his army.

FRAGMENT II

^A Following the reign of Theodosius the Great, a Spaniard by birth, his son Arcadius reigned, having come from Rome, for a total of twenty-three years, leaving his younger brother Honorius in the city of Rome. Arcadius was sharp and energetic, and immediately upon his arrival in Constantinople, he took his son, called Theodosius the Younger, as a partner in the empire.

During the reign of this same Arcadius, the most holy John, Archbishop of Constantinople, was cast into exile, having been plotted against by Theophilus, Bishop of Alexandria the Great, by Severianus, Bishop of Gabala, and by Eudoxia Augusta, the wife of Arcadius himself; and he was sent to the city of Cucusus in Armenia. Thus, after the sentence of exile had been proclaimed, the same most holy bishop went down into the baptistery of the most holy Great Church of Constantinople, and there he greeted the most devout Olympias, daughter of Seleucus the former prefect, and other noble women; and after a prayer, he departed from the church. Meanwhile, however, fire suddenly seized the whole church from every side. For the fire burst forth, rushing from the altar, and ascended by the chain of the lamp which was perpetually burning over the conch of the altar, and consumed the entire church, and also the house of the senate around the same church, up to the palace: and a great tumult ensued throughout the church and the city. For bishops from various cities were being expelled, and likewise clergy of various orders, as well as monks and laymen who refused to hold communion with the Church because of the exile of Bishop John; and many who were established in high dignities were beaten with lashes and punished with the confiscation of their goods, because they had withdrawn themselves from the communion of the Church; yet for all that, no one allowed themselves to communicate. Moreover, even illustrious men of the senatorial order were beaten ^{B C D}

and dragged from their homes into public, with heads uncovered and feet bare. And they were ^A demanded, by the order of the same Emperor Arcadius and his wife Eudoxia, either to communicate with the Church or to pay a great sum of gold.

(14) [The Emperor] ordered an apple to be brought, and he showed it to her; and the Emperor became indignant ^B at [the rest], and suspected that the same Theodosius was in love with the Empress Eudoxia on account of that same Paulinus; for this same reason, the Emperor Theodosius himself killed the same Paulinus. And the Augusta Lady Eudoxia, having become sorrowful and insulted—for it was known everywhere that Paulinus, as a handsome young man, had been killed on her account—asked the Emperor Theodosius herself, Eudoxia, to be allowed to descend to the Holy Places for prayer. And he granted it to her; and she descended from Constantinople to Jerusalem to pray, as it is said (16). And upon entering the great city of Antioch, she delivered (it is said) a panegyric speech in the council chamber concerning the same city of Antioch and the so-called council chamber, sitting within on a chair of solid gold and set with royal jewels; and the people of that same city acclaimed her. And there was brought to her in the council chamber a golden image, and in their museum a bronze statue, which stand even to this day. And having bestowed favors upon the city of the Antiochenes... (17)... [and she built] many things in Jerusalem [and she renewed the holy wall] of Jerusalem, saying that the prophet David spoke of her: "In thy good pleasure shall the walls of Jerusalem be built, O Lord." And, having remained in the same Jerusalem and having built there a royal tomb for herself, she departed from this life, and was laid there in Jerusalem. And when she was near death, she affirmed under oath that she had no knowledge of the accusation which had been brought against her on account of Paulinus (18).

The same Emperor Theodosius [died; he was] handsome in nature, fair-skinned, well-proportioned, fine-nosed, broad-chested, with black eyebrows, smooth hair, a thick beard... ^C magnanimous, gracious, learned, loved by all the people and the senate.

And during the reign of this same Theodosius and Valentinian (19), Attila, who was of the race of the Gepids, launched a campaign against Rome and Constantinople, having a multitude of many myriads, having sent a message to Rome to Valentinian that he intended ^D to kill...

(16) Up to here the fragment is copied almost verbatim in Malalas, p. 22; however, the following parts concerning Eudoxia’s speech in the city of Antioch and the honors decreed to her are absent; these are read in other words partly in Evagrius, *Hist.* lib. 1, 20.

(17) Three verses are missing. On this, again look at Malalas, p. 22, and Glycas, ed. Paris, p. 291.

(18) What follows concerning the body of Theodosius is absent from Malalas; however, it should be compared with what is said by the chronicler Ephraem (v. 700 et seqq.), whom we edited in *Script. vet.*, vol. iii.

(19) Again, Malalas, *loc. cit.*, and the *Chronicon paschale*.

^A ...intimated: My master and yours, Attila, commands you through me to have your palace ready for him.

FRAGMENT III. Rufinus, a relative of the Augustus, was promoted to prefect; but later, as if aspiring to tyranny, he was delivered to death.

This same Theodosius loved the chamberlain Chrysaphius, also known as Summanus, because he was exceptionally handsome, and he lavished upon him whatever he asked; consequently, he possessed very great power and confidence with the same emperor, and held the highest management of affairs, turning and seizing everything for his own benefit. For he was everywhere the patron and leader of the Green faction. ^B

In the reign of the same Theodosius, at the time of the new moon, Nicomedia, the metropolis of Bithynia, suffered its fifth calamity, being laid level with the ground and at the same time engulfed by the sea. There, too, Theodosius founded many buildings—namely, baths, porticoes, a harbor, and a praetorium, as well as the Confession of Saint Anthimus and all its churches.

While he still reigned, the Isaurian leaders of brigands occupied Seleucia in Syria in the month of February, during the consulship of Theodosius himself and Romoridus; they plundered, laid waste to the region, and having made an incursion through the Amanus mountains and seized everything, they returned to Isauria. ^C

Under the same emperor, by divine indignation, Constantinople was shaken, first by an earthquake, on the twenty-sixth day of January, at night; and the city fell from the Troadensian portico as far as the Brazen Tetrapylon, so that the emperor, with the people, senate, and clergy, went barefoot in supplication for many days.

At the same time, Blasys, king of the Persians, waged war upon the Romans; upon learning of this, the Roman emperor created the patrician Procopius general in the Oriental parts, and sent him with the army to fight. When he was preparing for battle, the king of the Persians sent a messenger of this sort: namely, if there were any man in his entire army who could defeat in single combat a Persian to be chosen by him, he would immediately conclude a peace treaty for fifty years: but if the Roman were defeated, ^D

he would receive the fifty centenaria of gold that were usually paid. ^A This being agreed upon, the king of the Persians chose from the battalion of the so-called Immortals a Persian named Ardazanes; the Romans chose Areobindus the Goth, the count of the federates. Both therefore rode out armed on horseback; Areobindus also carried with him a *soccarim* according to the Gothic custom. The Persian was the first to make an attack with his lance, but Areobindus, swerving his body to the right, cast his *soccarim* at the Persian, pulled him from his horse, and killed him. What remained to be done, therefore, the king of the Persians performed, by composing a peace treaty. As for Areobindus himself, returning from the victory to Constantinople along with the general Procopius, and having received thanks from the Emperor, he was promoted to consul.

The same Emperor created a new province, separating it from Lycaonia, which he called Lycia, giving it the right of a metropolis and a governor to the city known as Myra in that same Lycia, where the miracle of God is visited, a mountain ^B bringing forth spontaneous fire. In the same way, the same Emperor also separated Syria Secunda from the first and created it as a province, giving it equal right of a metropolis and a governor to the city of Apamea. He also separated Cilicia Secunda from the first, making it a new province, having granted the right of a metropolis and a governor to the city of Anazarbus. Finally, he detached another province from Bithynia, which he named Honorias after the name of his uncle Honorius, not without the right of a metropolis, and assigned a governor to the Pontic city of Heraclea.

Under his reign occurred the disturbance of Nestorius. For, a tumult having arisen from his preaching, ^C the same Emperor Theodosius was compelled to call together a council of 240 bishops at Ephesus against the same Nestorius; and, having deposed him, they cast the same Nestorius out from the sacred diptychs.

At the same time, the mistress Eudoxia, living as a widow in Rome—who had been the wife of the Emperor Valentinian and daughter of Theodosius and Eudocia—nursing anger against the tyrant Maximus, who after murdering her husband had seized the empire, incited Genserich the Vandal, king of Africa, to come against the Emperor Maximus and Rome. ^D And he, arriving suddenly, occupied the city of Rome, killed the Emperor Maximus, and caused a general slaughter.

FRAGMENT IV.

When the imperial procession was taking place in the Hebdomon, the wardrobe-keepers lost the crown of our sovereign Justinian Augustus, which was found eight months later by the count of the praetor, surnamed Dapundaristes, in which both the single pearl and all the rest of the precious stones remained intact. ^A In the month of October, in the fourteenth indiction, while equestrian games were being held, an elephant entered the hippodrome, on which the ambassador of the Indians was riding. In the month of January, in the thirteenth indiction, the name of Menas the archbishop was removed from the sacred diptychs, and the name of Vigilius, the Roman pontiff, was read in the first place. In the month of March, in the thirteenth indiction, the elephant went out of its stable by night, and killed and trampled many men. On the sixteenth day of the month of April, in the thirteenth indiction, a conflict of the Greens and Blues occurred in the evening in the hippodrome, though there were no equestrian games being held, and many mortals perished, and some even of the populace received grievous wounds. The factionaries even broke into the workshops, and then they plundered whatever they found belonging to the rest of the property of John, surnamed Coccorobius; in which battle a youth named Pamphemus, from the neighborhood of the Hagiothei, was also killed. ^B In the month of June, on the twenty-eighth day, on the third weekday, in the same indiction, after the ninth year of the consulship of Basilius, the dedication of the Holy Apostles took place.

^C This supplement I take from Theophanes, p. 192, with which Cedrenus, p. 375, agrees.

(26) Clearly he writes here of a man who was alive; for we do not call anyone "our lords" except living princes. The same expression recurs below twice. And indeed Malalas, Theophanes, and Cedrenus omit this title of "our lord" altogether, as later authors. In the Roman Sessorian codex, which I have seen, certain litanies are read with these acclamations: "To our lord Nicolas, crowned by God, supreme pontiff and universal pope, life." Then: "To our lord Louis Augustus, crowned by God, great, peaceful emperor, life; and to his most excellent sons, the kings, life." Who, I ask, having read these, does not recognize that the litanies themselves were written while Nicolas I, the Pope, and Louis I, the Emperor, were alive, to which age the Sessorian codex actually belongs? Let no one therefore doubt that the Tusculan fragments are the remnants of a historical work composed while Justinian I was reigning.

(27) And Cedrenus. Theophanes p. 192. Likewise Anastasius the Librarian in his History, ed. Paris, p. 64: "But in the month of January, the name of Menas, patriarch of Constantinople, was replaced, and the name of Vigilius was placed before his in the diptychs." A noble passage for asserting the primacy of the Roman Pontiff. ^D Malalas is, however, entirely corrupt in the edition, p. 79, where it is said that the name of both Menas and Vigilius was expunged from the diptychs. In truth, I believe that after the word [Greek] there fell out of the book of Malalas the two words "was first read," which our text retains.

(28) Menas the finder of this crown Theophanes and Cedrenus.

(29) This passage I wish to be read by the clever-minded as by Photius.

(30) The ninth year after the consulship of Basilius, according to accurate annals, falls in the year of Christ 550. What therefore follows on folio 66 is believed by our historian to be later. For the fact that the end of this page of the verso of folio 65 is connected with the beginning of the page...

and the deposition of the holy relics of Andrew, Luke, and Timothy in the house of the same Holy Apostles in Constantinople. Bishop Mennas proceeded ^A with these same holy relics, sitting in a royal carriage, holding the three caskets of the holy relics on his knees; and another royal carriage preceded this one, in which were the same holy relics, and the archbishop Mennas.

In the month of April, in the thirteenth indiction, Narses the cubicularius was sent to Rome to make war against the Goths who were holding that same Rome; for after Belisarius had taken the same Rome ^B it had been taken again by the same Goths.

In the month of June, on the twenty-sixth day, in the same indiction, the bishop of Rome, Vigilius, was received by our most pious lord; for he had withdrawn from his sight and had fled to holy Sergius in the place called Hormisdas. And our most pious lord sent the comes praetor, known as the Diapundarista; and a great tumult occurred, and Pope Vigilius went into the holy sanctuary, and the comes seized him by the beard ^C in such a way as to cast him out of the holy sanctuary; and the bishop grasped the pillar of the holy altar, and the holy table fell to the ground; and later the ^D same Pope went to the city of Chalcedon, and stayed at the church of Saint Euphemia; but finally, the same Pope Vigilius was received by our most pious lord, who had repented.

And in the same year, in the reign of the same most pious lord, in the month of July, on the sixth day, in the fourteenth indiction, there occurred a great and fearful earthquake in all the region of the