Res Gestae

When through the fleetness of my mount I had outstripped them and come to Amudis, a weak fortress, I found our men lying about at their ease, while their horses had been turned out to graze. Extending my arm far forward and gathering up my cloak and waving it on high, I showed by the usual sign that the enemy were near, and joining with them I was hurried along at their pace, although my horse was now growing tired.

We were alarmed, moreover, by the fact that it was full moon at night and by the level stretch of plain, which (in case any pressing emergency surprised us) could offer no hiding-places,

Therefore we devised the plan of placing a lighted lantern on a single pack-animal, binding it fast, so that it should not fall off, and then turning loose the animal that carried the light and letting him go towards the left without a driver, while we made our way to the mountain heights lying on the right, in order that the Persians, supposing that a tallow torch[*](Sebalis fax, which seems to occur only here, is the same as sebacea, a torch or candle made of tallow (sebum) instead of wax.) was carried before the general as he went slowly on his way, should take that course rather than any other; and had it not been for this stratagem, we should have been surrounded and captured and come into the power of the enemy.

Saved from this danger, we came to a wooded tract planted with vineyards and fruitbearing orchards, called Meiacarire,[*](According to Valesius, from Syrian maia or maio, water, and carire, cold; the former word appears also in Emmaus. ) so named from its cold springs. There all the inhabitants had decamped, but we found one soldier hiding in a remote spot. He, on being brought before the general, because of fear gave contradictory answers and so fell under suspicion. But influenced by threats made against him, he told the whole truth, saying that he was born at Paris in Gaul and served in a cavalry troop; but in fear of punishment for a fault that he had once committed he had deserted to the Persians. Then, being found to be of upright character, and to have married and reared children, he was sent as a spy to our territories and often brought back trustworthy news. But now

Then with our anxious cares increasing we went from there as quickly as circumstances allowed to Amida,[*](Modern Diarbekir, see Gibbon, ii. p. 269, Bury.) a city afterwards notorious for the calamities which it suffered.[*](Ch. ix. below, and xix, 1–8.) And when our scouts had returned there, we found in the scabbard of a sword a parchment written in cipher, which had been brought to us by order of Procopius, who, as I said before, had previously been sent as an envoy to the Persians with Count Lucillianus. In this, with intentional obscurity, for fear that, if the bearers were taken and the meaning of the message known, most disastrous consequences would follow, he gave the following message:—

Now that the envoys of the Greeks have been sent far away and perhaps are to be killed, that aged king, not content with Hellespontus, will bridge the Granicus and the Rhyndacus[*](Two rivers of Mysia, in north-western Asia Minor, the former celebrated for the victory of Alexander the Great over the Persians, the latter for the defeat of Mithradates by Lucullus.) and come to invade Asia with many nations. He is naturally passionate and very cruel, and he has as an instigator and abetter the successor of the former Roman emperor Hadrian;[*](Referring of course to the deserter Antoninus.) unless Greece takes heed, it is all over with her and her dirge chanted.

This writing meant that the king of the Persians had crossed the rivers Anzaba and Tigris, and, urged on by Antoninus, aspired to the rule of the

There was at that time in Corduene,[*](A mountainous region in Armenia, taken by Caesar Maximnianus from the Persians in the time of Galerius, but not yet wholly freed from their rule. Later it was separated from the Persian dominion by Jovian: cf. xxv. 2.) which was subject to the Persian power, a satrap called Jovinianus on Roman soil, a youth who had secret sympathy with us for the reason that, having been detained in Syria as a hostage and allured by the charm of liberal studies, he felt a burning desire to return to our country.

To him I was sent with a centurion of tried loyalty, for the purpose of getting better informed of what was going on; and I reached him over pathless mountains and through steep defiles. After he had seen and recognized me, and received me cordially, I confided to him alone the reason for my presence. Thereupon with one silent attendant who knew the country he sent me to some lofty cliffs a long distance from there, from which, unless one’s eyesight was impaired, even the smallest object was visible at a distance of fifty miles.

There we stayed for two full days, and at dawn of the third day we saw below us the whole circuit of the lands (which we[*](That is, the Greeks.) call ὁρίζοντες[*](The horizon.) ) filled with innumerable troops with the king leading the way, glittering in splendid attire. Close by him on the left went Grumbates, king of the Chionitae,[*](Sapor had recently made peace with them; see xvi. 9, 4.) a man of moderate strength, it is true, and with shrivelled limbs, but of a certain

How long, storied Greece, will you continue to tell us of Doriscus, the city of Thrace, and of the armies drawn up in troops within enclosures and numbered?[*](Cf. Herodotus, vii. 59. Xerxes, in order to reckon the size of his army, assembled ten thousand men and drew a circle around them; then he filled the space again and again with men, until the whole army was thus counted.) For I am too cautious, or (to speak more truly) too timid, to exaggerate anything beyond what is proven by trustworthy and sure evidence.