Res Gestae

Ammianus Marcellinus

Ammianus Marcellinus. Ammianus Marcellinus, with an English translation, Vols. I-III. Rolfe, John C., translator. Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press; W. Heinemann, 1935-1940 (printing).

While the storm of the first attack was thus busied with unlooked-for undertakings, the king with his own people and the nations that he was leading turned his march to the right from the place called Bebase, as Antoninus had recommended, through Horre and Meiacarire and Charcha, as if he would pass by Amida; but when he had come near two fortresses of the Romans, of which one is called Reman and the other Busan, he learned from the information of deserters that the wealth of many people had been brought there and was kept in what were regarded as lofty and safe fortifications; and it was added that there was to be found there with a costly outfit a beautiful woman with her little daughter, the wife of a certain Craugasius of Nisibis, a man distinguished among the officials of his town for family, reputation, and influence.

Accordingly the king, with a haste due to his greed for seizing others’ property, attacked the fortresses

v1.p.469

with fiery confidence, whereupon the defenders, overcome with sudden panic and dazzled by the variety of arms, surrendered themselves and all those who had taken refuge with the garrison; and when ordered to depart, they at once handed over the keys of the gates. When entrance was given, whatever was stored there was brought out, and the women, paralysed with fear, were dragged forth with the children clinging to their mothers and experiencing grievous woes at the beginning of their tender years.

And when the king by inquiring whose wife the lady was had found that her husband was Craugasius, he allowed her, fearing as she did that violence would be offered her, to approach nearer without apprehension; and when she had been reassured and covered as far as her very lips with a black veil, he courteously encouraged her with sure hope of regaining her husband and of keeping her honour unsullied. For hearing that her husband ardently loved her, he thought that at this price he might purchase the betrayal of Nisibis.

Yet finding that there were others also who were maidens and consecrated to divine service according to the Christian custom, he ordered that they be kept uninjured and allowed to practise their religion in their wonted manner without any opposition; to be sure he made a pretence of mildness for the time, to the end that all whom he had heretofore terrified by his harshness and cruelty might lay aside their fear and come to him of their own volition, when they learned from recent instances that he now tempered the greatness of his fortune with kindliness and gracious deportment.