History of the Wars, Books I-II (The Persian War)

Summary

The first two books of Procopius's History of the Wars tell the long contest between the Roman Empire, ruled from Constantinople, and Sasanian Persia, from the early fifth century to 549. Procopius opens by declaring that he writes so that great deeds will not be lost, that he was an eyewitness as adviser to Belisarius, and that truth alone suits history. He then reaches back to Emperor Arcadius, who entrusted his infant son to the Persian king Isdigerdes, and to the Persian king Perozes, who perished in a hidden trench while warring on the Ephthalite Huns. His son Cabades (Kavadh) is deposed and shut in the Prison of Oblivion, escapes with his wife's help, regains the throne, and besieges and takes Amida in 502-503. The Romans answer by fortifying Daras. Cabades asks Emperor Justin to adopt his son Chosroes, and the refusal sours relations. In 530 Belisarius, a young commander, defeats a larger Persian army before Daras by trenches and a well-timed flank attack, but in 531 he is beaten near Callinicum. Chapters follow on Iberia and Lazica, on Ethiopia and the Homeritae across the Red Sea, and on the death of Cabades, the accession of Chosroes and the so-called endless peace of 532. Book I closes in Constantinople with the Nika insurrection of January 532, when the Blue and Green factions unite, burn much of the city and proclaim Hypatius emperor; the Empress Theodora's speech persuades Justinian not to flee, and Belisarius and Mundus storm the crowded hippodrome. A chapter on the downfall of John the Cappadocian follows. Book II begins with Chosroes, roused by Gothic and Armenian envoys, breaking the peace in 540. He extorts ransoms from Syrian cities, sacks Antioch, bathes in the sea at Seleucia, watches chariot races at Apamea, and threatens Edessa, whose citizens trust a letter of Christ to their ancient ruler Augarus. Belisarius campaigns in Mesopotamia in 541, and in 542 he turns back a Persian invasion largely by a show of confidence before Chosroes's envoy. Chapters 22 and 23 describe the great plague that came from Pelusium in Egypt and reached Constantinople in the spring of 542: its fevers, swellings, coma and delirium, the bewildered physicians, deaths of thousands a day, bodies stacked in the towers of Sycae, and Justinian's own illness. The book ends with the Roman defeat at Anglon in 543, Chosroes's failed siege of Edessa in 544, and war in Lazica around the fortress of Petra to 549. The library text is H. B. Dewing's 1914 Loeb translation of Books I and II, with his introduction, notes and index.

Plot or Argument

• Preface: truth and the modern bowman (I.1)

  Procopius states his purpose, his credentials as an eyewitness on Belisarius's staff, and his rule that truth alone belongs to history; he defends the mounted archers of his day against those who reverence only Homeric warriors.

• Persian kings and Roman emperors, 408-518 (I.2-10)

  Arcadius commends his son to the Persian king; Perozes dies in the Ephthalite trench; Cabades is imprisoned in the Prison of Oblivion, escapes and is restored; Amida falls after a winter siege; Anastasius builds Daras.

• The adoption refused and the frontier wars (I.11-18)

  Justin declines to adopt Chosroes by Roman law; war returns in Iberia and Mesopotamia; Belisarius wins before Daras in 530 and loses near Callinicum in 531.

• Red Sea diplomacy and the endless peace (I.19-23)

  Justinian courts the Ethiopians and the Homeritae against Persia; Cabades dies and Chosroes succeeds amid conspiracy; the endless peace is concluded in 532.

• The Nika insurrection and John the Cappadocian (I.24-25)

  The Blues and Greens unite, burn the city and crown Hypatius; Theodora's counsel holds the emperor in the palace; Belisarius and Mundus end the revolt in the hippodrome. The praetorian prefect John later falls through a plot laid by Antonina.

• Chosroes breaks the peace and sacks Antioch (II.1-14)

  Envoys from the Goths and Armenians urge war; a comet appears; Chosroes ransoms Syrian towns, takes Antioch in 540, speaks of blessings mixed with sorrow, and visits Apamea and Edessa before founding a new Antioch in Persia.

• Lazica and the campaigns of Belisarius (II.15-21)

  The Lazi invite Persia in and Petra is seized; Belisarius takes Sisauranon in 541 and in 542 halts Chosroes at Europum by a display of confidence.

• The plague (II.22-23)

  A pestilence spreads from Pelusium across the world and through Constantinople for four months, with detailed symptoms, the failure of medicine, mass burials, and a city where trade and court life stop.

• Anglon, Edessa and Petra (II.24-30)

  A Roman invasion of Persarmenia ends in rout at Anglon; Chosroes builds a mound against Edessa and is repulsed; a five-year truce leaves war in Lazica, where Romans and Lazi besiege Petra.

Characters

• Procopius, author and witness

  Belisarius's legal adviser, who refers to himself in the third person in the preface and as 'I' in Constantinople during the plague.

• Belisarius, Roman general

  Young commander who wins before Daras, loses at Callinicum, crushes the Nika rioters and later checks Chosroes in Mesopotamia.

• Justinian, Roman emperor (527-565)

  Emperor whose wars Procopius records; he nearly flees during the Nika revolt and falls ill in the plague.

• Theodora, empress

  Justinian's consort, whose speech in council turns the court from flight to resistance.

• Cabades (Kavadh I), Persian king

  Deposed, imprisoned and restored, he takes Amida and seeks Roman adoption for his son.

• Chosroes (Khosrow I), Persian king (531-579)

  Able and ruthless ruler who breaks the endless peace, sacks Antioch and besieges Edessa.

• Hypatius, nephew of Emperor Anastasius

  Proclaimed emperor by the crowd against his wife's pleading and executed after the revolt.

• John the Cappadocian, praetorian prefect

  Gifted and grasping minister whose dismissal the rioters demand and whose fall closes Book I.

• Mundus, general of Illyricum

  Commander who enters the hippodrome with his Erulian troops beside Belisarius.

Lessons

• Truth alone is appropriate to history

  Procopius claims the authority of an eyewitness and promises to record failures even of his friends. He models his history on Thucydides and Herodotus, with set speeches, digressions on peoples and places, and careful attention to cause. Readers can test the promise: he records Belisarius's defeat at Callinicum as well as his victory at Daras, and he names the faults of ministers he served beside.

  • What reasons does Procopius give for writing, and why does he think his history will be useful?
  • Where does he report a defeat or failure of his own side?
  • Why might a writer who was close to the events still need to be read carefully?

• Courage in a council

  During the Nika revolt the emperor's advisers debate whether to flee by ship. Theodora answers that flight would be worse than death and quotes the saying that royalty is a good burial-shroud. Her words steady the court, and the revolt is crushed the same day. Procopius also reports Origenes's advice to the rebels to act slowly, so the reader sees two councils weighing speed and patience at the same hour.

  • What options did the emperor's council consider, and what did Theodora advise?
  • What did Origenes counsel the senators who had joined Hypatius, and why was he not heeded?
  • When is it wise to stay at a post in danger, and when is withdrawal the better part of prudence?

• A careful observer before a plague he cannot explain

  Procopius refuses the confident theories of sophists and astrologers and refers the pestilence to God, yet he describes its course with the precision of a clinician: sudden mild fever, swellings in groin and armpit, coma or delirium, black pustules, vomiting of blood, and the deaths of pregnant women. He notes that attendants and physicians were not seen to catch it by contact, and that treatment helped some and harmed others. His humility about causes sits beside close observation of effects.

  • Which symptoms does Procopius list, and in what order do they appear?
  • Why does he say no explanation can be given except to refer the disease to God?
  • How can a person hold together faith in providence and careful study of a disease?

• Factions, fear and the common good

  Procopius calls the hatred between Blues and Greens a disease of the soul that breaks even ties of family and friendship. In the plague, he reports, former partisans laid aside their enmity and buried strangers with their own hands, though he doubts the change lasted. The two scenes ask what draws citizens together and what makes the bond hold.

  • How does Procopius describe the behavior of the circus factions?
  • What did the factions do differently during the plague?
  • Why does Procopius think the reform brought about by fear did not last, and is he right about human nature?

Context

In the sixth century the Roman Empire, governed from Constantinople, still ruled the eastern Mediterranean and saw itself as the Roman state in unbroken succession; its Greek-speaking subjects called themselves Romans. Its great rival was the Sasanian Persian kingdom, with its capital at Ctesiphon, and the two powers contested Armenia, the Caucasus kingdoms of Iberia and Lazica, and the cities of upper Mesopotamia. Justinian (527-565) sought to restore Roman rule in the West, reconquering Vandal Africa and Gothic Italy, codified Roman law, and rebuilt Hagia Sophia after the Nika fire. Khosrow I (Procopius's Chosroes) was remembered in Persian tradition as a just and reforming king, while Roman writers dwelt on his raids and ransoms. The plague of 541-542, now usually called the Plague of Justinian, was the first recorded pandemic of bubonic plague; ancient DNA studies have identified Yersinia pestis in burials of the period. Historians still debate its death toll and its long-term effects on the empire.

Composition

Procopius wrote in Attic Greek modelled on Thucydides and Herodotus, with speeches, ethnographic digressions and classicizing names (Medes for Persians, Massagetae for Huns). The first seven books, arranged by theatre of war (Persian, Vandal, Gothic), were published around 550-551, and an eighth book carried the narrative to about 553. The plague chapters deliberately echo Thucydides's account of the plague at Athens while recording what Procopius himself saw in Constantinople. H. B. Dewing's translation of Books I-II appeared in 1914 as the first of seven Loeb volumes.

Reception

The History of the Wars has been the principal narrative source for Justinian's reign since the Byzantine period, and later historians from Evagrius to Gibbon drew on it. The discovery and printing of the Secret History in 1623 made readers ask how the same author could praise and revile the same rulers; modern scholars differ on whether the two works reflect changing circumstances, a classical habit of genre, or private disillusion. The Nika chapter and the plague chapters are among the most frequently cited passages of late Roman history, the latter in modern studies of epidemic disease.

Comparisons

• the-history-of-the-peloponnesian-war

  Procopius consciously imitates Thucydides, from the opening claim of accuracy to the structure of the plague chapters, which set the Constantinople pestilence beside the plague at Athens.

• procopius-secret-history

  The same author's unpublished companion portrays Justinian, Theodora, Belisarius and Antonina in harsh terms; reading the two together shows how genre and audience shaped what a court historian could say.

• justinian-institutes

  The legal textbook issued in 533 shows the lawgiving side of the emperor whose wars Procopius narrates; Tribonian, whom Procopius calls Tribunianus, was the leading figure of the codification and is dismissed in the Nika chapter.

• harper-the-fate-of-rome

  Kyle Harper's modern study uses Procopius's eyewitness account of 542 alongside genetic and climate evidence to argue for the plague's large place in Rome's late history.

• camus-the-plague

  Camus's novel of an epidemic in Oran echoes themes Procopius records firsthand: burial overwhelmed, trade halted, and citizens briefly drawn into common service by danger.

• gibbon-decline-and-fall-selections

  Gibbon relies heavily on Procopius for his chapters on Justinian, the Nika sedition and the plague, and his narrative shows how the Greek historian's scenes entered modern historiography.

Quotes

For Students

A reading companion for classical Christian high school students. See the student guide.

Reading Guide

Watch for

• The preface's claims about truth and eyewitness authority, and whether the narrative lives up to them.
• How Procopius gives speeches to Persians as well as Romans, letting each side argue its case.
• Belisarius's tactics before Daras and the reasons Procopius gives for the defeat near Callinicum.
• Theodora's speech during the Nika revolt and the debate among the rebels at the same hour.
• The order of symptoms in the plague chapters and Procopius's comments on physicians.

Key terms and names

Blues and Greens

Circus factions that organized chariot racing and commanded fierce popular loyalty in Byzantine cities.

Nika

Greek for 'Conquer!', the watchword of the rioters in January 532.

Praetorian prefect

The chief civil and financial minister of the empire, the office held by John the Cappadocian.

Medes

Procopius's classicizing name for the Persians of the Sasanian kingdom.

Endless peace

The treaty of 532 between Justinian and Chosroes, broken by Persia in 540.

Boubon

Greek word for the groin, from which the plague swellings (buboes) take their name.

Referendarius

Court official who carried petitions to the emperor; Theodorus held the office and organized burials in 542.

Seminar Questions

1. Comprehension How did Belisarius defeat the Persian army before Daras in 530?
2. Comprehension What events turned a quarrel between the circus factions into a revolt against Justinian?
3. Comprehension What were the stages of the plague as Procopius describes them, and how did the city bury its dead?
4. Interpretation Why does Procopius record the speech of Chosroes after the sack of Antioch, and what does it reveal about the king?
5. Interpretation How does Procopius portray Theodora in the Nika chapter, and what does her speech accomplish?
6. Interpretation Why does Procopius refuse to give a natural cause for the plague, even as he describes it so precisely?
7. Big Question Is it ever right for a ruler to choose death over flight, and does a ruler's duty differ from a private person's?
8. Big Question Does shared danger make people better, or only more careful for a time?

Faith Connections

• Psalm 91:5-7 (Scripture)

  The psalm of protection from the pestilence that walks in darkness was read in the plague years of many centuries; Procopius's Constantinople also turned to sanctuaries and the holy names for refuge.

• Proverbs 16:9 (Scripture)

  Human plans and divine direction meet in this proverb. Procopius repeatedly sets careful planning beside fortune and providence, as when Origenes urges patience and Hypatius, whom Procopius calls fated, is led to the hippodrome.

• Matthew 25:35-40 (Scripture)

  Christ counts care for the sick and the stranger as done to himself. Procopius records former rivals burying strangers with their own hands, and Theodorus spending his own money to bury the abandoned.

• Cyprian of Carthage, On Mortality (Church Fathers)

  Writing during the plague of the 250s, Cyprian urged Christians to face epidemic death with hope and to serve the sick. His treatise offers an earlier Christian frame for the conduct Procopius describes in 542.

Logic and Rhetoric

Central argument: The wars of Justinian's age contain deeds as great as any in history. Procopius was an eyewitness on Belisarius's staff and writes on the principle that truth alone suits history. Therefore his narrative, which records defeats as well as victories, is both reliable and useful to anyone who must one day face a similar trial.

Rhetorical device: set speech (prosopopoeia). At the height of the Nika revolt Procopius gives Theodora a speech arguing that flight is worse than death for one who has ruled, ending with the ancient saying that royalty is a good burial-shroud.

Debate: Resolved: that Justinian's court was right to stand and fight rather than leave Constantinople during the Nika revolt.

Memory Work

It was his conviction that while cleverness is appropriate to rhetoric, and inventiveness to poetry, truth alone is appropriate to history.

For while it is impossible for a man who has seen the light not also to die, for one who has been an emperor it is unendurable to be a fugitive.

Writing Prompts

Essay: Procopius calls the factional hatred of the Blues and Greens a disease of the soul and then shows the same factions burying the dead together in the plague. Using both chapters, argue what Procopius believes about human nature and civic life.

Comparison with The History of the Peloponnesian War: Compare Procopius's account of the plague of 542 with Thucydides's account of the plague at Athens. What does each historian notice about symptoms, about the failure of physicians, and about the moral effects of epidemic on a city?

Medical Lens

Book II, chapters 22-23 contain the earliest detailed eyewitness description of what is now identified as bubonic plague, the pandemic of 541-542 often called the Plague of Justinian. Procopius records an onset of mild fever without heat or inflammation, followed within days by swellings in the groin (the boubon), armpit, behind the ears or on the thighs; then either deep coma, in which patients slept and could be fed without waking, or violent delirium with insomnia, persecutory fears and a rush toward water. Black pustules the size of a lentil and vomiting of blood brought death within a day. Pregnant women almost always died. Swellings that suppurated signalled recovery, and some survivors were left with withered thighs or impaired speech. He reports that physicians opened swellings in the dead and found a carbuncle-like growth inside, an early recorded autopsy inquiry; that prognosis by the best physicians often failed; that bathing helped some and harmed others; and that neither physicians nor those who buried the dead appeared to catch the disease by contact, an observation consistent with flea-borne transmission. The administrative response, with soldiers and imperial funds under the referendarius Theodorus, burial trenches and the use of the towers of Sycae, is an early account of public management of mass death. The neuropsychiatric picture of plague delirium is described with unusual care. Elsewhere, Procopius notes the Persian law that a man with a bodily defect such as the loss of an eye may not be king (I.11), and he records wounds and the deaths of combatants at Daras, Callinicum and Anglon. Modern retrospective identification of the disease rests on symptoms and on ancient DNA from sixth-century burials; this remains a reading of the text, not a diagnosis by Procopius.

• Book II, ch. 22

  Origin at Pelusium, spread along coasts, apparitions and dreams before onset, the mild fever and the appearance of swellings.

  Plague Epidemic Fever Infection Dreams Nightmares
• Book II, ch. 22

  Coma and delirium, the exhaustion of attendants, observation that carers and buriers did not catch the disease by contact.

  Madness Psychosis Nursing Caregiving Plague Epidemic
• Book II, ch. 22

  Physicians open the swellings of the dead; failed prognoses; mixed results of bathing and treatment; death of pregnant women; suppuration as a sign of recovery; sequelae in survivors.

  Physicians Doctors Anatomy Dissection Childbirth Maternal Disability Deformity
• Book II, ch. 23

  Four months of epidemic in Constantinople, daily deaths in thousands, burial organised by Theodorus, bodies placed in the towers of Sycae, cessation of trade, and Justinian's own swelling of the groin.

  Public Health Sanitation Death Dying Starvation Nutrition
• Book I, ch. 11

  Persian custom barring a man with a bodily defect, such as the one-eyed Zames, from the throne.

  Disability Deformity

Creative Prompts

• Dialogue

  Write the council in the palace during the Nika revolt, giving voice to an adviser who favors the ships, to Justinian, and to Theodora.

• Essay

  Compare Procopius's plague chapters with Thucydides's account of the plague at Athens: what does Procopius borrow, and what does he add from his own observation?

• Fiction

  Write a letter from one of Theodorus's burial workers in Constantinople in 542 to a brother in the army on the Persian frontier.

• Classroom

  On a map, mark Daras, Amida, Callinicum, Antioch, Edessa, Petra, Pelusium and Constantinople, and trace the routes of armies and of the plague.

Further Reading

• The Secret History, Procopius

  The same author's private and hostile account of Justinian's court.

• Procopius and the Sixth Century, Averil Cameron

• Procopius of Caesarea: Tyranny, History, and Philosophy at the End of Antiquity, Anthony Kaldellis

• Justinian's Flea: Plague, Empire, and the Birth of Europe, William Rosen

• The Age of Justinian: The Circumstances of Imperial Power, J. A. S. Evans