Leo the Deacon of Kaloe

THE TEN BOOKS OF THE HISTORY OF LEO THE DEACON OF CALOE

DEDICATION BY C. B. HASE

TO THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS AND EXCELLENT MAN COUNT NIKOLAY ROMANZOV CHANCELLOR OF THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE, KNIGHT OF MANY IMPERIAL AND FOREIGN ORDERS, ETC., ETC., ETC. WHO, FIRED BY A SINCERE DESIRE FOR GREAT GLORY, HAS SO EMBRACED AND FOSTERED THE STUDY OF LETTERS AND THE LIBERAL ARTS, AS WELL AS ALL THE HIGHER SCIENCES, THAT, HAVING LINKED THEM BY THE TIGHTEST BOND TO THE INTERESTS OF THE STATE, HE HAS PROVED HIMSELF WORTHY OF THE HIGHEST EMINENCE BEFORE ALL OF EUROPE AND ALL POSTERITY. THIS NEW VOLUME OF BYZANTINE HISTORY IS DEDICATED, GIVEN, AND PRESENTED BY THE EDITOR.

PREFACE BY C. B. HASE

[I-XI] I. If perhaps anyone wonders why the History of Leo the Deacon—which I agreed several years ago to edit—is only now being published, that person, once he has understood the reason for the delay, will both readily grant me pardon for the procrastination and will owe all the greater thanks to the most distinguished man through whose generosity my efforts have been supported. Therefore, I shall set forth nothing before explaining by what fortune a writer long hidden has now at last emerged. Next, I shall speak about the life of the author, and what my own estimation is regarding his talent, his style of speaking, and his credibility; likewise, about the manuscript, in which alone, as far as I know, his History is preserved. Then I shall discuss the Tactics of Nicephorus Phocas, and finally, I shall explain the plan of my translation, my notes, and the edition as a whole. II. After I began my time at the Royal Library, as soon as it was permitted to know it more deeply, I easily understood, even after the efforts of Goar, Possinus, Du Cange, and those who, in very great...

numbers, drew thence ^A from an inexhaustible fountain, not a few things could be taken to enrich the collection of Byzantine authors more fully. Among the writers preserved there, there are two, above all, Leo the Deacon and Michael Psellus, whose edition had long been desired by learned men, and had at some time—if not brought to completion—at least been conceived in the mind and begun. For it is attested by Harles (Bibl. Græc. VII, 684) that Combefis himself, when his mind was roused to investigate and bring to light Greek writings, especially ecclesiastical and Byzantine ones, while searching the Royal Library, took up knowledge of both Leo and Psellus ^B and set about the editing of both. Indeed, he himself has this in his notes to the *Auctarium novissimum Bibliothecæ Græcorum Patrum* (Paris, 1672, p. 545), albeit rather roughly (as he is usually unpolished in his Latin prose): "While others, both Greek contemporaries or those little inferior, have pursued the tricks and evil arts of Photius, my Logothete has done so as well"—this is Simeon the Master and Logothete, of whom Harles speaks (VII, 417)—"if ever, with peace breathing more gently and the Most Christian King always victorious, the Royal Library might, as a necessary supplement to Byzantine history, with Leo the Deacon and Michael Psellus, truly make the subject-matter, by a many-titled royal authority, of public right by royal munificence, so that the Dutchman or some other nation may not snatch away that glory by delays." But in the year 1679 Combefis departed from this life, and of the two volumes of the ^C *Auctarium Byzantinum* which he had proposed to himself to publish, he was unable to issue even the first. For it—containing the writers after Theophanes, namely Constantine Porphyrogenitus concerning the Life of Basil, the anonymous Continuator of Theophanes, John Cameniata, George the Monk, and others—was not brought to light until six years later, under the care of Sébastien Mabre-Cramoisy, from the Royal Press in 1685. The edition of the other, meant to comprise Leo and Michael Psellus, was entrusted nearly thirty years later to Michael Le Quien, to be adorned from the Combefisian papers (see Echard, *Scriptores ordinis Prædicatorum* II, 684). Nor did he move sluggishly toward the work, so that Leo began already to be set in type at the Royal Press, and Le Quien himself has this in *Oriens Christianus* I, 255: "Which Leo the Deacon relates in his History, a part of which has already been published by the Royal press." But an escalating war, which was waged over the Spanish Succession, intervened in the printing, and the plan—as Echard writes at the loc. cit.—which had been committed to Michael Le Quien to execute, and which had already been begun by the King's types, was interrupted and deferred while a more atrocious war burned everywhere. Therefore, neither the works of Combefis nor of Le Quien, who functioned in life until 1733, could avail for Leo. And it is a matter of wonder that those sheets, then printed, have perished, I would almost say into nothing, and nowhere now appear. I have certainly searched as much as I could, and have inquired, and have also questioned those working at the Royal Press—men not only most expert in their art, but also historians, and very curious about the monuments of their own workshop: I could obtain no remains of that begun edition. Wherefore ^D (XV) I suspect that those copies were destroyed either by some peculiar accident or by deliberate action.

III. Combefis had therefore left, when departing from this life, along with many other excellently begun works, also a Latin version of Leo and Psellus, as it appears, completed. But those earlier materials, as it usually happens at the death of scholars, scattered and vanished, with many flying into the papers of the deceased everywhere: it is certain that the version of Leo and Psellus was preserved for many years at Paris in the house of the Dominican Fathers at Saint-Honoré, where Combefis passed away, and that access to it was granted to many learned men. Thus, various people in various places not only made mention of Leo, but also inserted fragments of it into their own writings. For instance, Banduri (*Imperium Orientale* II, 465, 480, 481, 726, 728); Du Cange, at not one place in his *Glossarium*, and in his notes to *Zonaras* (II, 90, 103, 105, 107); but most of all Franciscus Pagius, in his *Criticon* on the *Annales Baronii* (III, 873), asserting that this version had been read by him with the help of Bernard de Montfaucon, and (to use his own words) transcribed as far as the principal chapters, for the more certain illustration of the history of the century verging on the tenth. And truly, he filled his work with its fragments, both at the end of the third volume of his *Criticon* (873, 875, 876) and at the beginning of the fourth volume (3–39). From whence Schloezer drew and partly transcribed the same in *Nestor s. Russische Annalen in ihrer Grundsprache u. s. w.* (V, 125–177). On the contrary, Saxius (*Onomasticon* II, 156) complained that others had neglected those most noble fragments, edited in Latin, to an excessive degree—how such things could have escaped learned men, like William Cave in his *Historia litteraria scriptorum ecclesiasticorum* (II, 106), and especially J. A. Fabricius in *Bibliotheca Graeca* VI (for this is the true number, whereas V is read in Saxius), 353 and XIII 788, is a matter for reflection.

^A Nevertheless, there is an error here by Saxius himself. For his censure now falls upon Fabricius, whose volumes appeared, one in the year 1714, the other in 1726; it cannot be imputed as a fault to G. Cave, surely, who wrote in the year 1688, that at that time he was ignorant of what Pagius was to publish in 1705. But to return to the Combefisian version, it seems to have survived until the sudden upheaval by which all of Gaul was confounded at the turn of the last century. Then that same storm, which partly cast down from their entire standing those men who were illustrious in the more exquisite studies and doctrines, and partly drove them headlong from their fatherland; ^B by which blast it overturned the whole of literary and religious society, just as it dissipated or buried many other monuments of genius, committed to hidden papers, so likewise it dissipated or buried the last remnants of the Combefisian diligence. Certainly, neither when the libraries of the Dominican Fathers were plundered, nor when, after various thefts, the books remaining from them were scattered through diverse libraries, was anything heard of the discovered papers of Combefis, to say nothing of the versions of Leo and Psellus, which either lie hidden in some unknown retreat even now, or (which is more credible) have perished entirely today.

IV. Wherefore, ^C when once I had brought my mind to bring Leo to light, it behooved me to make a new Latin interpretation of him, except for the few things I mentioned above, which were preserved in the Criticisms of Pagius. Then I sought out what might pertain to illustrating the writer. But, with the work already nearly ready for the press, I began to perceive how many difficulties his edition would have, since along with other things—for what is the use of defining them here?—was the magnitude of the expenses, for which neither the resources of any single private individual would easily suffice, nor certainly my own. It was added that at that time I myself was most occupied in the Royal Library, attempting to compile a catalogue of Greek manuscripts recently brought from Italy, such as Bandini published regarding the Florentine manuscripts, and Lambecius regarding the Viennese. Wherefore, in order at least to understand what the judgment of learned men might be regarding Leo, I was satisfied at that time to bring to light the sixth book—as it had been translated by me—separately, for the sake of a specimen, in the *Notices et Extraits des Mss. de la Bibliothèque du Roi*, etc., VIII, 254–296. Nor was anything more done thereafter, than that I should entirely abandon the thought of an integral edition. ^D When some years had thus slipped away, with me distracted by other anxieties and concerns, behold, a learned man, than whom no one is more abundant in the memory of all northern antiquity, and no one more acute or successful in examining, comparing, and explaining monuments of Russian history, Philipp Krug, the glory and ornament of the Imperial Academy of Sciences of Saint Petersburg, voluntarily and with wonderfully kind and candid letters approached me, and, without my suspecting anything, suggested how the outcome of the matter previously instituted could be effected. Namely, that the Chancellor of the Russian Empire, etc., the illustrious Count Nicolaus de Romanzoff—a man, as he is heaped with every praise for great deeds, so he is born to advance the liberal arts—when the specimen of Leo edited in the *Notices et Extraits* had fallen into his hands, wished for the writer to be brought to light in his entirety, and would furnish the necessary expenses. Wonderfully delighted, therefore, by this news, I burned with a much keener desire to publish the work, and, being even more encouraged a little later by the letters of the illustrious Count himself, I immediately began the edition.

Nor was the zeal or will of other most eminent men wanting to me elsewhere. For that most exalted man, the Count de Montesquiou, a Peer of France and intimate counselor to the Most Christian King, while he held the interior administration, as we now call it, in Gaul, deemed it worthy to make the whole business of printing most expeditious by purchasing a not inconsiderable number of copies, as they say; his will was ratified after him by the illustrious Lord Count Decazes, who succeeded him in the same office, winning immortal praise while he strives with all his effort that letters and sciences, and indeed every good discipline, should flourish and be adorned in France. And also that man most eminent in erudition, authority, and virtues, the prince of Oriental doctrine throughout the world, the free Baron Silvester de Sacy, Rector of the University of Paris, member of the council for public instruction, prefect of the Royal Order of the Legion of Honor, fellow of the Royal Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres, etc., obtained through his intervention that Leo should be printed with the Royal types. Thus, under these auspices, the impression was begun and brought to an outcome in the space of two years: perhaps more slowly than I wished, though I thought it most pleasant to comply continuously with such great men; and fast enough, if you consider the bulk of the volume and the difficult method of the commentary and the Greek characters.

V. I come now to those things which are known concerning the life of Leo, which are indeed few, and differ almost not at all from those which I previously produced in *Notices et Extraits* VIII, 257. Leo began his life at Caloe (τῆς Καλοτῶν πόλεως,

πόλεως, Le Quien *Orient. Christ.* I, 726), which city is in proconsular Asia on Mount Tmolus, near the source of the Cayster river (below 2*): this whole region was then accounted part of the Theme of the Thracesians. We have no clear information regarding the station of his parents: he himself says that his father's name was Basil 2, and he seems to have spent his early youth in his homeland under the discipline of his parents; thence, for the sake of his studies, he set out for Constantinople as if to a certain home of learning. There, in the month of April, 966, at the sacred solemnity of the Ascension, when a popular movement resulted in the elevation of Nicephorus, he caught sight of the emperor riding gradually through the city, and he was amazed that his virtue and firmness of mind [XVIII] could not be disturbed in the least by the furious force of the mob. He writes that these things happened to him when he was a youth 40. So if we establish that in the year 966 he was about sixteen years old, it follows that he was born around the year 930. Around the year 973, when Basil was dismissed and Antony was created patriarch, he was in Asia: he relates that he frequently saw monstrous twins there, while traveling through the provinces of the empire 102. Some time later, having been admitted into the college of palace priests, in the year 981, when the Emperor Basil was waging war against the Bulgarians with great display and had placed his camp near Stoponium to besiege Triaditza (Cedr. II, 693), he followed the retinue in the capacity of a deacon; when the legions were pulled back, and the army was being devastated by an internecine slaughter while on the march, he himself barely escaped 107 from the hands of the Bulgarians who were rushing in from all sides. Therefore, I believe that in his *History*, as often as he makes mention of Moesia (as for example 38), he seems to tremble and turn pale as if at a terrible object, so that there is nothing that you could say has struck such fear into him. Neither he himself indicates what course of life he followed thereafter, nor do others report it: unless perhaps there is someone who thinks that, when he reached a more advanced age, he withdrew himself from the care of ecclesiastical affairs and retired into seclusion for the purpose of composing his *History*. It is certain, at any rate, that the writing was not finished before the year 989, in which Bardas Phocas, while rebelling against the Emperor Basil, was crushed: for his death is reported 108. The storming of Cherson, regarding which see 108, and the death of Basil the governor 106, occurred the year before. Whether it was Leo's intention to carry the history beyond the death of Tzimiskes may be doubted. For what he writes 109, that disasters—foreshadowed by a comet (which later occurred while Basil was reigning)—will be spoken of in the history in their own order, that is perhaps not to be understood as if he were setting them aside for himself to narrate, but rather generally, as providing material for other writers to speak of.

VI. Therefore, he undertook to write of three wars in particular—the Cretan, the Asiatic, and the Russian—which were formidable and difficult, and he wished to shed light on events occurring in his own time (959–975). But history is a great task, and among all types of writing, I would almost say it is the most difficult. Every age has its own blindness of mind, so that, although it may judge other matters rightly, in some things it must be condemned for error and sluggishness. Religions, customs, factions, and sects have infinite power: the sharpness of the mind is not usually [XIX] restricted in one way only by cultivated and erudite ages, much less by rough and dark ones. It is added that Leo's age placed eloquence in a style that was florid, so to speak: for everyone thought he had attained great praise in his speaking if, having embraced many ornaments in a pile, he used the rivalry of poetic diction with grander words, and harsh—not to say inept—metaphors. And I do not know if anything is more detrimental to history than such a colored style without dignity: for the speech proceeds with such excessive use of curling-irons that both all grace is taken away from the discourse and credibility from the exposition of facts. Leo did not avoid this fault, although he is not as insane as Theophylact Simocatta or Nicetas Choniates (especially in their orations, where they desire above all to be seen as eloquent); yet he could not escape it entirely, and perhaps that pursuit of fatty diction stifled the course of his fortunate talent. And since it was said by Divine Julius, first in his *De Analogia*, that an unheard-of and unusual word should be shunned like a reef, Leo on the contrary avoids fitting and customary vocabulary like certain jagged rocks. He rarely uses the word ἀδελφός: most frequently he uses αὐτάδελφος, ὁμαίμων, σύναιμος. He uses πέλω, τελέθω (as I have certainly written 90), τελέω, ὑπάρχω, πέφηνα (60, 93), πέφυκα, χρηματίζω, or anything whatever, rather than εἰμί; he uses ἀκουτίζομαι, διενηχέω, διενωτίζω, ἐνωτίζομαι rather than ἀκούω. He also sprinkles his speech throughout with old words culled from the poets, as if with stars (as it seems to him). Ὑπιωγαῖς 22, he snatched from the *Odyssey* E 404, where we now read ἐπιωγαὶ Νεῶν, *vadens*, 27, from some grammarian, I believe (see the most discerning arbiter of Greek propriety, Frid. Aug. Wolf, *Prolegom.* IV, 18): unless you say that *νεὼν* is to be read there, and that its gloss is ἐκκλησίαν, which has dropped out.

^A

VII. Another fault of Leo is the vain accumulation of synonyms. If somewhere he writes *σοβαρευόμενος* (13), lest he seem to know too few words, he immediately subjoins *καὶ γαυρούμενος* and *ἐπαιρόμενος τε καὶ βρενθυόμενος*. Such tautologies are heaped up on almost every page by all the Byzantines of the Middle Ages: nor were they purged and rejected until the time of the Palaeologi by more acute intellects, such as Demetrio Cydone, [XX] Chrysoloras, Theodoro Gaza, Chalcondylas, and their kind. At the same time, the latter began to imitate the style of the ancients less servilely than all others; and they were like year-old infants who walk only in a walker, or with a leader going before them. They did not emulate the perennial and perpetual concinnity and rhythm of both simple and placed words and of the whole structure—not (which was the main thing) the inspired spirits of the ancients—but if they thought some were worthy of imitation, they snatched their phrases from everywhere and transferred them word for word into their own writings. Leo acted no differently. But there is this difference between him and his contemporaries: while they, as much as they could, consumed almost all the noble coffers of all authors by imitating them, Leo’s speech flowed from three sources—from the version of the Septuagint (he compiles the books of the New Testament less trustingly), from Homer, and from Agathias of Myrina. From there he fished out locutions with which he stuffs and fills his writings, just as one sows many hostile seeds into a single field. But it does not matter to distinguish speech with foreign finery unless you can do it aptly and with judgment: and his style would seem less discordant if, having deposited all rhetorical noise, Leo had lowered himself to the style of the lowest commoners after the example of Constantine Porphyrogenitus. He, on the contrary, seems to have been especially delighted by Agathias, whose grandiloquence and buskin we can hardly bear even now. I have demonstrated this with citations in my Commentary (e.g., 306), though not everywhere: for to collect every smallest and greatest trace of imitation was tedious and contributed nothing to either the interpretation or the emendation of the author. From Procopius, who treated matters in a drier style, he seems to have taken nothing except certain sentences inserted here and there in the prologue and orations. Nor is it possible to detect any trace anywhere that he had perused the primary authors: Thucydides, Polybius, Plutarch. Moreover, you will frequently find *τοῦτος* used in him where the Attics would have written *οὗτος*. Similarly, the very frequent use of the preposition *κατὰ* for *ἐν*, as to use this: *κατὰ τὴν Ἀσίαν στασιάζουσι*, meaning rebelling in Asia. But these things are common to him and the other Byzantines. That which is peculiar is setting the infinitive of the future where you would expect the aorist or the present, [XXI] especially after *βούλεσθαι* (as 23, 24): then, the same word, with a few lines intervening, is freely repeated.

VIII. I have said, perhaps more censoriously, what someone might blame in Leo: nor truly am I one who praises the works of any writer, whom I have studied, more than is sufficient. Now it is fair to enumerate also the things that count in his favor. And first, indeed, is the great recommendation of Leo that he committed to writing those things which he himself saw, and he is to be held among those writers from whom others, who were later, derived their historical narratives as if from a fountainhead. I have demonstrated in the notes that Scylitzes borrowed much from Leo: it is known that Cedrenus took from Scylitzes everything, both small and great. I judge that Zonaras also used the History of Leo: see Ducange, *ad Zonar.* II, 107. Pagi also, we see, corrected not a few things from ours, after the confusion of chronology by more recent authors. Thus, from this part, the comparison of our writer with the rest who recorded the same events will not be unpleasant for studious and historical men. Nor can anyone deny that the events occurring in the palace after the death of the Younger Romanus (19 sq.), the rebellion of Leo the Curopalates (90), and the wars of Tzimiskes in the East (98 sqq.) are explained conveniently by him, and the Sphendosthlabian war is also explained fully and diligently. Concerning Nicephorus, guilty of perjury (23), he wrote with sufficiently great freedom—concerning this killer of Tzimiskes, he wrote severely and bravely, so that you might easily recognize him as a man studious of the right and the honest. Finally, you would compare Leo, who betook himself to history in miserable and dark times, unfairly with the heralds of deeds done in flourishing Greece, who, having obtained a more fortunate course, and using the faculty of the golden tongue, were able to ignite the clearest lights of knowledge and eloquence for the whole world and all centuries. Our author, in judgment, learning, and style, ought to have expressed ^D the image of his own times. Therefore, in the way of light...

(Note: [alt-version omitted])

to the events performed in that age (which indeed he does), we may easily bear that he held faith in astrology, 104, that he betrays a meager knowledge of geography, 80, and of ancient history, 92. We admire the acuteness of Polybius, the letters of Plutarch, and the abundance of Strabo. If such great and such men, surrounded by the safeguards of wisdom, could not lay aside errors or avoid all lapses, who is so unrefined regarding the Byzantine times as to think that Leo could have done so?

IX. This author, therefore, endowed with that historical virtue, such as it is, [XXII] has been preserved for us by one single codex of the Royal Library, signed formerly 2561, now 1712, formerly in the literary collection of Raphael Trichet du Fresne, who, as the son of a Bordeaux lawyer, while being led by a great desire of acquiring books, had visited the Spains and Italy once and often, while the most Christian King Louis XIII was reigning, in such a way that, after inspecting the libraries of learned men everywhere, he endeavored to enrich his own library from them. He brought this codex from Italy into Gaul, as Combefis testifies in Origin. Cpol. 265. Then, when Trichet had passed from life, J. B. Colbert, a privy councilor to Louis XIV the Great and moderator of the general treasury, whose immortal memory lives and will live on account of the benefits conferred upon Gaul, bought from the widow and brought into the Royal Library the whole of Trichet's literary instrument. In this were many printed books, Latin and Italian manuscripts plus or minus one hundred, and Greek forty. Thus, our codex, having been collected in the public library, became known to Du Cange, Bandini, and others whom I named at the beginning. It consists of 422 parchment leaves and eight paper ones, containing besides other things of lesser importance (see Cat. Codd. mss. Græcc. Bibl. Reg. II, 391) the following: 1.) The Chronicle of Simeon Logothete, mostly unpublished, from fol. 18 verso to fol. 272 recto; 2.) The History of Leo the Deacon, which now appears, from fol. 272 recto to 322 recto; 3.) The Chronographia of Michael Psellus in nine books, also unpublished, from fol. 322 recto to 422 recto. That it was written, if not in the 11th, then certainly as late as the 12th century, the form of the letters demonstrates, not unlike that which Montfaucon produced in Palæogr. Græc. 291, no. VII, so that I do not know what came into the mind of the authors of the Cat. Bibl. Reg. II, 391, to say that it seemed to be written in the fifteenth century, unless you understand that only concerning those things which exist on the eight paper leaves. The codex itself, although it does not teem with many deeply hidden errors, has as many itacisms as are accustomed to be in books written in the 12th century, so that, namely, ε and αι, η and ει, ο and ω, οι and υ are frequently confused with each other, and it is not so rare that εἰς τὴν (fol. 315 recto [ed. 95]) is seen written thus: ἡς τὴν. I have from time to time noted such errors; generally, when they had nothing that could undermine the credibility of the received reading, I omitted them. In sum, I confess that I have not taken on a greater labor than it is necessary for those to sustain who depend on a single codex in editing a writer for the first time. Where it is almost impossible for a portion of the errors contaminating the codex to escape the most minute diligence, and thus to redound upon the edition itself. So, what was remaining, I attempted to emend as far as I could by conjectures and by comparisons, having consulted Cedrenus and Scylitzes, who transferred several things from Leo word for word into their own histories (see above § VIII, below 225); finally, I have endeavored to provide, according to my ability, in establishing the Greek text, that which reason and learning seemed to prescribe.

X. I placed the booklet Περὶ παραδρομῆς πολέμου, *De velitatione bellica*, as yet unpublished, in the second place, so that the historical account of the deeds of Nicephorus Augustus might be followed by a description of matters conducted under his order. That this was not put into writing by Nicephorus himself, as Meursius thought (conf. Lambec. Comment. de Bibl. Cæs. VII, 433), is realized both as the work is examined, and declared in express words toward the end of the preface, 119. Yet, if we do not have a clear name for the writer, there cannot be infinite doubt about the time in which this Commentary was produced. The author, whoever he is, says that he was commanded by the Emperor Nicephorus Phocas to pursue this sort of warfare in writing. However, he praises him for his successes with such laudations that it is hardly believable that anyone would have renewed his memory while his slayer, John Tzimiskes, was still surviving and reigning. For men who are suddenly raised up, and raised even through crime, are moved all the more vehemently to commemorate him the more abundant fruits they reap from the committed deed. Therefore, I am led to believe that these things were written finally under Basil and Constantine, who gained control of affairs in the year 976. Furthermore, as often as mention is made of the prince, the author uses the plural number: οἱ ἅγιοι ἡμῶν βασιλεῖς, 155, τῶν ἁγίων βασιλέων, 155, τῶν βασιλέων ἡμῶν ἁγίων, 154, which seems to fit aptly the joint reign of Basil and Constantine. We have, therefore, in this small book the recorded no-

-^Atices of the way in which, toward the middle or the end of the tenth century, warfare was conducted by the Greeks, or ought to have been conducted, in the rugged regions of the Taurus, Antitaurus, and Amanus ranges. That one consideration alone persuaded me to include this little work in this volume; for unless you wish to have it as a military commentary on the expeditions of Phocas and Tzimiskes as described by Leo, I easily admit that neither for its richness of material, nor for the learning of its author, nor even for the elegance of its diction—[XXIV] even more than many other works of the same age which I have ready for publication—does it deserve to see the light of day. I have certainly taken care that it should not be said by us that anything superfluous was added in this regard. There were four manuscripts in which I had encountered this little book: I) Regius 2437 fol. 371 verso - 409 recto; II) Regius 2445 fol. 320 recto - 333 verso; III) Codex No. 26 of our Supplement, which I have indicated in the margin sometimes by the letter B, sometimes by the siglura Cod. suppl.; there this little book is read on fol. 171 recto - 172 verso; IV) Palatinus No. 393, brought to the library from the City in 1797 and returned to Rome in 1815. Of these, in preparing the edition, I have relied principally upon Cod. Reg. 2437; as I have noted its folios in the margin of the edition, so it is necessary to understand those readings whenever 'Cod. A,' or even 'Cod.' in the singular, is read in the margin. Where 'Codd.' is used in the plural, I have called the other three to my aid, and often in vain: for they were all so depraved that very many of their readings, unless some great remedy were applied, could not be sustained at all. I have attempted to amend such places by conjecture, yet in such a way that, whenever possible, I preferred to transpose words rather than to change them, being by my own habit more scrupulous in following the exemplars than rash in correcting them.

XI. Moreover, the style of this author, whoever he was, lacks all ornament; it is harsh and abrupt. The fact that he uses the vulgar tongue, which by the tenth century had already diverged greatly from the more elegant syntax, is demonstrated by his nominatives absolute (125: Πλῆθος γάρ) placed contrary to what was required; likewise his genitives absolute (123: μάνθανόντων — ὁρμήσωσι, 150: ἐγγιζόντων, 153: διατιθεμένου); his use of the aorist subjunctive for the future (as in 140, ἐκφύγωσιν, "they will escape," which is a common usage in many hurried Greek writers: see Index s.v. Conjunctivus); his perpetual use of ἐν for εἰς (126, 127, 133, 152); his construction of σὺν with the genitive (158); and his altogether frequent confusion of cases. He certainly does not imitate the style of anyone—not even Leo, as we have demonstrated—but employs simple and native words. Wherefore I would have been excessive had I spent as much time in searching out the sources of his imitation as I did for Leo. I have cut away all but a very few notes; the final thirty-three chapters, which one Palatine codex had, and which I believed had been added to this little work by another [XXV] author, I have for the present omitted. They are, however, of nearly the same subject matter as the foregoing, as can be understood from their titles, which are as follows:

XXVI. That one ought not to quarter an army from one theme into the encampment of another theme or unit. XXVII. Concerning those [watch-guards] required to be made at night and by day. XXVIII. Concerning those [watch-guards] required to be made at night and by day. XXIX. How the encampment ought to be reduced, when the infantry army is complete, but the cavalry is small. XXX. Concerning the twelve taxiarches. XXXI. That it is necessary, in treacherous and narrow places, to divide the entire army into two, and to encamp separately. XXXII. Concerning what number the cavalry force ought to have. XXXIII. How one ought to perform the departure of the entire army from the encampment. XXXIV. Concerning marching. XXXV. Concerning what one ought to do when enemies are known to wish to attack the camp at night. XXXVI. How one ought to act if, while the army is marching, enemies attack with a heavy force. XXXVII. Concerning what to do if one meets a narrow pass, or [needs] the crossing of a bridge or a deep river. XXXVIII. Concerning not bringing an idle multitude into enemy territory. XXXIX. Concerning the appropriate armor. XL. Concerning the fact that the lower-ranking officers should not have tents. XLI. Concerning guides and scouts. XLII. Concerning the passage of a mountain pass not held by the enemy. XLIII. Concerning a mountain pass held by the enemy. XLIV. Concerning a siege. XLV. How one must guard those sent out for the collection of necessities, and those who graze the horses.

XLVI. How one must rout the enemy when they lie in ambush against those going out to collect necessities. XLVII. Concerning the case if the leaders of the enemy are identified, along with their force, secretly intending to plot against the camp or the servants going out for collection. XLVIII. How one must attack the enemy's encampment during the night. XLIX. How it is possible, by means of strategy, to draw those who are besieged to the outside and wound them. L. Concerning a skirmish. LI. Concerning how the general must render judgment. LII. Concerning lawlessness. LIII. Concerning how to instruct the army and habituate it, while still in its own territory, to encamp and march in good order. LIV. Concerning having those who perform the orders exchange the service of the camp, because of the excessive labor of the commander. LV. Concerning the subordinate tasks, that it is necessary to plan and arrange these in advance and with careful reflection.

(XXVI) These chapters, such as they are, I have described long ago and translated into Latin, so that they might easily be made common in some subsequent volume, if only they seem of such importance to the learned. I seek their judgment on this matter, without interposing my own.

XII. Now, as regards the Latin interpretation of the History of Leo, I have retained the passages of Combefis’s version preserved in the *Critica* of Pagi (see above, p. 637), using almost the same words for my own edition, unless he had made a manifest error. I would wish everyone to be warned of this: that if anyone finds in the version either an inconsistency of style, or perhaps something said not with sufficient purity and correctness, he should not immediately think it deserves reproach. For Combefis was indeed a pious man and singularly learned in sacred matters, but he was never able to avoid the harshness and gloom of his mode of expression. In this entire volume, the care that we have taken in language and elocution (I fear) has not been as great as it could have been, and perhaps even ought to have been. But I think that pardon for such things can be granted more easily by those who study Byzantine history, and particularly by those who have long pondered the writers of the Middle Ages, who sound I know not what kind of barbarian and discordant note. Moreover, having followed the example of good writers, even in words pertaining to religions and beliefs, where it was most difficult, I preferred at times to dare something rather than to pollute Latin speech with many Greek words. (Regarding the Greek names of things which we translate, to use the words of Cornificius in the fourth book of his *Rhetoric*), these are removed from common usage: for the things themselves did not exist among us, and consequently the names of those things could not have been common. I have necessarily retained the designations of dignities—patriarch, domestic, drungarius, and others of that kind—even though they by no means flowed from the most refined fountain of Latinity. If anyone (XXVII) should wish either to pass over these in silence out of an excessive religious devotion to the Roman tongue, or to explain them by periphrasis, he truly seems unthinking to me, and one whose opinion is by no means to be upheld. The readings of the codex are placed in the outer margin of Leo’s version wherever I have accepted into the text a word clearly corrupted by the scribes. Where doubt remained, I kept the reading of the codex in the text and added my own conjecture in the margin: if it were highly probable, I prefixed the letter *l.*, that is, *lege* ("read"); if not, I prefixed *f.*, for *fortasse* ("perhaps") (for if "forte" was printed at any time, the fair reader should attribute that to the negligence of the printers). In sum, I have acted so that the judgment regarding my own suspicions—as to how probable or vain each one might be—might be left to the reader.

XIII. It remains for me to defend myself in a few words before those who are intelligent and fair judges of these matters, regarding the plan of my annotation, especially concerning Leo, if any think that I have wandered too far and strayed from the path. For I understood that it could be done in three ways so that the diligence of an editor in executing his work might, in some measure, respond to the benevolence of our supporters. First, if I were to leave the writers themselves, just as I had found them in the manuscripts, to the judgment of the learned, having only removed obvious errors and added a Latin version. Second, since many things were recently in the Imperial Library, and many remain to this day, pertaining in some way to Byzantine affairs, not yet edited, and never (as times now are) likely, I think, to see the light as wholes—Lives of the Saints, letters of pious brothers, bishops, patriarchs, treatises dogmatic, ascetic, and polemical in great number, and also unpublished annals—I began to study them diligently and to excerpt whatever could shed light on the sixteen years that elapsed from the death of Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus (Nov. 15, 959) down to Tzimiskes, who was taken away by poison on January 10, 976, the memory of whom Leo has encompassed. Since two histories were of particular use to me, one by Simeon the Logothete (see Harles, *Bibl. Gr.* VII, 685, 2), the other by Julius Pollux, I cannot refrain from expressing my gratitude for the spirit of the Italian scholars toward me, and what unique service it has been. For, upon a sudden

^A necessity in 1815, when the statues, paintings, and other ornaments of the cities that had once been transported to Paris (XXVIII) were being claimed from every side, the Vatican codex no. 163, containing that very history of Julius Pollux, happened to be among the codices being returned to the City. When the procurators of the Supreme Pontiff understood there that I would be hard-pressed to lack this codex in compiling my notes, they most kindly denied that they would permit anything to be harmful to my studies from their side, and they permitted that this codex remain in Paris until the publication of the book. Therefore, I both offer and possess the greatest thanks to the reverend and illustrious man Marino Marni, of the inner chamber of the Supreme Pontiff, and prefect of the Vatican archive and apostolic library, whose exceptional and study-filled services toward me were manifest in this matter. But as for the fact that even so there has been no very great accession of historical notations of this kind in this volume, I would wish this to be attributed, by Hercules, not to the scarcity of our library, but to the paucity of the years for which Leo records the events (see above, p. 641, VI). To Psellus, who pursued the memory of the hundred years from 975 to 1060, I might be able to add many unpublished things of this kind, by which his narrative is either confirmed, or corrected, or amplified in multiple ways.

XIV. Now, it did not escape me, even to satisfy this duty of mine in a twofold manner, that it might be that the utility of my office would not extend to so many—neither in the study of Greek literature nor of history. For, since in our studies, specifically the Greek ones, the supply is not greatest of those who, having left the beaten path, explore the inner and hidden literature, and furthermore, among those very persons who are exquisitely learned, how many are there who think that reading Byzantine writers contributes anything to a more subtle knowledge of the language? Historians, on the other hand, almost all allow themselves to be swept away with total devotion and zeal, either to the divine memory of those ancient men of old, or to the deeds performed—subtler, more temperate, or more splendidly and wonderfully—within our own memory or that of our fathers, or certainly to the illustration of the origins of peoples currently flourishing; few, and those very ones reluctantly or with distaste, shake out the annals of an aging or collapsing empire. Therefore, through my notes I wished to ensure that my work might reach a little further, and might extend even to those who are more alienated from Byzantine affairs: and for that reason, I have discussed the meaning of words not yet defined or only poorly understood at greater length and more fully in the notes. In which matter I could have, and perhaps even should have, taken into account the usage of the Attic writers (XXIX) more often. Indeed, I would say—not out of an unseemly suspicion of vainglory in an obscure matter—that what is in this of greatest importance ought to contribute primarily to enriching our common studies. But now, after the assiduous labor of many years, by which I have brought to an end the catalogue of Greek codices recently brought into the great Parisian library, and having been engaged in this type of study from boyhood and early youth, I consider that there is no writer more famous, nor any sacred author who wrote in Greek from the Theodosian period unto the ruin of the Eastern Empire, whom I have not handled in such a way that some part of him did not remain fixed in my memory. Scholia, catenas, paraphrases, commentaries—partly not accustomed to being read, partly not yet edited—it could not be but that I handled them in such a way that I acquired some sure notion of them. Wherefore, if I have endeavored here and there to illustrate certain questions from the scholia of the Fathers and the rhetoricians, to offer phrases, to enrich the Lexica, and to note certain errors committed by a superior memory (for as to censure by my equals, which is my nature, I have refrained entirely), I have not done so because I considered that these more recent writers should in any way be compared with those older, capital authors whom alone, I believe, anyone is eager to taste repeatedly and in whom one finds rest; nor do I wish to propose my own kind of studies as an example to others, especially the young: but because, being in this place and in this office, I am bound to handle such writings both by inclination and by duty, I preferred to perform what others could less conveniently do, rather than what they could perform just as well as I, or even much better than I.

XV. It was added that I heard a new edition of the Stephanian Thesaurus was being prepared in Britain, and that the learned men presiding over the edition were catching at words not yet accepted in the Lexica on every side. Therefore, words which, as far as I know, the Lexica still lack (I have noted many thousands through multiple readings), I have added here and there, gratifying the lexicographers rather than believing that a great monument must be constructed or a boast made in adding such words. I also made it my aim to select words and phrases especially from those writers who flourished from the third century up to the Emperor Heraclius: for among these, it is to be believed that something more intact and sound remained than among those who were from the seventh century and onwards, up to the capture of the city. I have mostly kept myself from historical illustrations. There are some who make good use of the material provided by us—many probable writers, and even some supreme ones, who are as clear examples of how history is to be composed, as they are the best judges of how it has been composed. Just as in Germany, Friedrich Christoph Schlosser, who in a book published a few years ago, exposed the onslaughts of the emperors, those who were harassing the holy images at Constantinople, most happily with no less acumen than eloquence. In Russia, Nikolaus Karamzin, a most reliable author of history, who illustrated his own national antiquities with a rare faculty of expression wonderfully: and especially Philipp Krug, to whom I have already given due and earned thanks above, whose *Critical Essay for the Illustration of Byzantine Chronology* (St. Petersburg, 1810—I omit his other writings, which are many) shone forth with a perfect knowledge of both Slavic and northern affairs, aided by the highest method and most considered prudence, and by whose most erudite observations I have been not insignificantly

aided, I shall never conceal. In France, a land excelling in every type of refined literature, antiquity, and science, Antoine-Jean Letronne, dear to me for many reasons, stands out not only for his most brilliant intellect but also for his singular and exquisite critical faculty. Nor are there lacking there—after the death of Ameilhon, a polished writer, and the Baron de Sainte-Croix, a man worthy of all veneration, and after the passing of Gibbon in Britain—other men of the highest learning and supreme judgment, trained in investigating the credibility of medieval writers. When my own parts are completed, I hand over Leo to be illustrated from a historical perspective, if they so wish. It was enough for me to submit to them material not unworthy of their ability and resourcefulness, and meanwhile to occupy myself in the work such that there would exist some account of my leisure, and from it Greek letters might be to some extent enriched. If this entire plan and effort of mine shall be approved by the learned, I ask that my labor be decorated by no other reward, for I shall then set out to publish other Byzantine authors in a similar manner, with less timidity and hesitation than I have shown up to now. For I have long had prepared for the press the Annals of Michael Psellus, the Chronicle of George Hamartolus, several books of Nicephorus Gregoras—those still unpublished (some thirty-one in number)—as well as unpublished Lives of the Saints, illustrating the history of the tenth century and those that follow, the little book of Gregory Palamas concerning his captivity among the Thessalonians, and others of that kind, which, provided they come to light at the earliest possible time, will shed new light on Byzantine affairs and on the ancient history of the Slavs and Turks, as the singular munificence of the patrons of this work bids us hope.

Written at Paris in the Royal Library, the Kalends of January, 1818.