ITALY AND HER INVADERS.
BOOK V
.
CHAPTER VIII.
ROMAN SORTIES.
After the Gothic assault was repulsed, Belisarius sent a messenger to
Justinian with a letter announcing the victory and praying for reinforcements.
The letter, which was probably composed by Procopius himself, is worth reading,
especially as it helps us to understand the light in which the invasion of
Italy was regarded at Constantinople. “The King shall enjoy his own again” was
the key-note of all the Imperial proceedings both at Carthage and at Rome. It
was not a young and vigorous nationality, with a fair prospect of an honourable
career, that Justinian and his generals seemed to themselves to be suppressing.
It was simply an inalienable right that they were asserting, a right that
generations of barbaric domination could not weaken, the right of the Imperator
Romanus to Rome and to every country that her legions had once subdued.
“We have arrived in Italy” (said Belisarius) “in obedience to your
orders, and after possessing ourselves of a large extent of its territory have
also taken Rome, driving away the barbarians whom we found there, whose
captain, Leuderis, we lately sent to you. Owing,
however, to the large number of soldiers whom we have had to detach for
garrison duty in the various towns of Italy and Sicily which we have taken, our
force here is dwindled to 5000 men. The enemy has come against us with an army
150,000 strong; and in the first engagement, when we went out to reconnoitre by
the banks of the Tiber, being forced, contrary to our intention, to fight, we
were very nearly buried under the multitude of their spears. Then, when the
barbarians tried a general assault upon our walls with all their forces and
with many engines of war, they were within a little of capturing us and the
city at the first rush. Some good fortune however (for one must refer to
Fortune not to our valour the accomplishment of a deed which in the nature of
things was not to be expected) saved us from their hands.
“So far however, whether Valor or Fortune have decided the struggle,
your affairs have gone as well as could be desired, but I should like that this
success should continue in days to come. I will say without concealment what I
think you ought now to do, knowing well that human affairs turn out as God
wills, but knowing also that those who preside over the destinies of nations
are judged according to the event of their enterprises, be that event good or
bad. I pray you, then, let arms and soldiers be sent to us in such numbers that
we may no longer have to continue the war on terms of such terrible inequality
with our enemies. For it is not right to trust everything to Fortune, since if
she favours us at one time she will turn her back upon us at another. But I
pray you, 0 Emperor, to let this thought into your mind, that if the barbarians
should now vanquish us, not only shall we be driven out of your own Italy and
lose our army too, but deep disgrace will accrue to us all as the result of our
actions. We shall certainly be thought to have ruined the Romans who have
preferred loyalty to your Empire above their own safety. And thus even the good
luck which has attended us so far will prove in the end calamitous to our
friends. If we had failed in our attempts on Rome, on Campania, or on Sicily,
we should only have had the slight mortification of not being able to
appropriate the possessions of others. Very different will be our feelings now
when we lose what we have learned to look upon as our own, and drag those who
have trusted us down into the same abyss of ruin.
“Consider this too, I pray you, that it is only the good-will of the
citizens which has enabled us to hold Rome for ever so short a time against the
myriads who besiege it. With a wide extent of open country round it, with no
access to the sea, shut off from supplies, we could do nothing if the citizens
were hostile. They are still animated by friendly feelings towards us, but if
their hardships should be greatly prolonged it is only natural that they should
choose for themselves the easier lot. For a recently formed friendship like
theirs requires prosperity to enable it to endure: and the Romans especially
may be compelled by hunger to do many things which are very contrary to their
inclination.
“To conclude: I know that I am bound to sacrifice life itself to your
Majesty, and therefore no man shall force me, living, from this place. But
consider, I pray you, what kind of fame would accrue to Justinian from such an
end to the career of Belisarius”
The effect of this letter was to accelerate the preparations already
made for reinforcing the gallant band in Rome. Valerian and Martin had been
sent, late in 536, with ships and men to the help of Belisarius, but, fearing
to face the winter storms, had lingered on the coast of Aetolia. They now
received a message from the Emperor to quicken their movements; and at the same
time the spirits of the general and the citizens were raised by the tidings
that reinforcements were on their way to relieve them.
On the very next day after the failure of the Gothic assault the
unmenaced gates of Rome opened, and a troop of aged men, women, and children,
set forth from the city. Some went out by the Appian Gate and along the Appian
Way, others went forth by the Porta Portuensis and
sailed down the Tiber to the sea. They were accompanied by all the slaves, male
and female, except such of the former as Belisarius had impressed for the
defence of the walls. Even the soldiers had to part with the servants who
generally followed them to war. In thus immediately sending the useless mouths
out of Rome Belisarius showed his prompt appreciation of the necessities of his
position. He had repelled an assault; he would now guard as well as he might
against the dangers of a blockade. Had Witigis been as great a master as
Belisarius of the cruel logic of war, he would undoubtedly have prevented the
Byzantine general from disencumbering himself of the multitude, who by their
necessities would have been the most effectual allies of the Goths inside the
city. Imperfect as was the Gothic line of circumvallation, it is impossible to
believe that more than 100,000 warriors, including a large body of cavalry,
could not by occupying the main roads have prevented at least some of a large
and defenseless multitude from escaping, and have
driven them back within the walls of Rome. But, in fact, all of them, without
fear or molestation, reached the friendly shelter of the cities of Campania, or
crossed the straits and took refuge in Sicily.
The fact seems to have been that, except by a series of brave and
blundering assaults upon the actual walls of the city, the Goths, or perhaps we
should rather say the Gothic King, had no notion how to handle the siege. One
right step indeed he took, in view of the now necessary blockade. Three days
after the failure of the assault he sent a body of troops to Portus, which they
found practically undefended, notwithstanding its massive wall (the ruins of
which are still visible), and it was at once occupied by them with a garrison
of 1000 men. Procopius is of opinion that even 300 Roman soldiers would have
been sufficient to defend Portus, but they could not be spared by Belisarius
from the yet more pressing duty of watching on the Roman ramparts. The occupation
of Portus caused great inconvenience to the Romans, although they still
remained in possession of Ostia and the neighbouring harbour of Antium. From Portus (which since the second century had
practically displaced Ostia as the chief emporium of Rome) merchants were
accustomed to bring all heavy cargoes up the Tiber in barges drawn by oxen, for
which there was an excellent towpath all along the right bank of the river.
From Ostia, on the other hand, merchandise had to be brought in skiffs
dependent on the favour of the wind, which, owing to the winding character of
the river, seldom served them for a straight run from the harbour to the city.
Besides the occupation of Portus, Witigis could bethink him of no better
device to annoy the Romans than the cruel and senseless one of murdering their
hostages. He sent orders to Ravenna that all the Senators whom he had confined
there at the outbreak of the war should be put to death. A few escaped to
Milan, having had some warning of their impending fate. Among them were a
certain Cerventinus, and Reparatus a brother of the deacon Virgilius, who was in a few months to become Pope. The
others all perished, and with them went the Goth's last chance of ruling the
Roman otherwise than by fear. Meanwhile the Gothic blockade, into which the
siege was resolving itself, was of the feeblest and most inefficient kind.
Leaving all the praise of dash and daring to the scanty bands of their enemies,
the Goths clung timidly to their unwieldy camps, in which no doubt already
pestilence was lurking. They never ventured forth by night, seldom except in
large companies by day. The light Moorish horsemen were their especial terror.
If a Goth wandered forth into the Campagna alone, to cut fodder for his horse
or to bring one of the oxen in from pasture, he was almost sure to see one of
these children of the desert bearing down upon him. With one cast of the Moor's
lance the Goth was slain, his arms and his barbaric adornments were stripped
from him, and the Moor was off again full speed towards Rome before the avenger
could be upon his track.
Belisarius on the other hand, organized his defence of the city so
thoroughly as to leave as little as possible to the caprice of Fortune. To
prevent his own little band of soldiers from being worn out by continual
sentinel-duty, especially at night, and at the same time to keep from
starvation the Roman proletariat, all of whose ordinary work was stopped by the
siege, he instituted a kind of National Guard. He mixed a certain number of
these citizen soldiers with his regular troops, paying each of them a small sum
for his daily maintenance, and dividing the whole amalgamated force into
companies, to each of whom was assigned the duty of guarding a particular
portion of the walls by day or by night. To obviate the danger of treachery,
these companies were shifted every fortnight to some part of the circuit at a
considerable distance from that which they last guarded. After the same
interval the keys of every gate of the city were brought to him, melted down
and cast afresh with different wards, the locks of course being altered to suit
them. The names of the sentinels were entered upon a list which was called over
each day. The place of any absent soldier or citizen was at once filled up, and
he was summoned to the general's quarters to be punished, perhaps capitally
punished, for his delinquency. All the night, bands of music played at
intervals along the walls, to keep the defenders awake and to cheer their
drooping courage. All night too, the Moors, the terrible Moors, wore instructed
to prowl round the base of the walls, accompanied by bloodhounds, in order to
detect any attempt by the Goths at a nocturnal escalade.
About this time a curious attempt was made, which shows that there was
still an undercurrent of the old Paganism in the apparently Christian and
Orthodox City. The little square temple of Janus, nearly coeval with the
Republic, still stood in the Forum in front of the Senate-house and a little
above the Tria Fata or temple of the Fates. The temple was all overlaid with
brass; of brass was the double-faced statue of Janus, seven and a-half feet
high, which stood within it, looking with one face to the rising and with one
to the setting sun; of brass were the renowned gates which the Romans of old
shut only in time of peace, when all good things abounded, and opened in time
of war. Since the citizens of Rome had become zealous above all others in their
attachment to Christianity, these gates had been kept equally shut whether
peace or war were in the land. Now, however, some secret votaries of the old
faith tried, probably under cover of night, to open these brazen gates, that
the god might march out as of old to help the Roman armies. They did not
succeed in opening wide the massive doors, but they seem to have wrenched them
a little from their hinges, so that they would no longer shut tightly as aforetime; an apt symbol of the troubled state of things,
neither settled peace nor victorious war, which was for many centuries to
prevail in Rome. This evidence of still existing Paganism must have shocked the
servants of the pious Justinian; but owing to the troublous state of affairs no enquiry was made as to the authors of the deed.
At length, on the forty-first day from the commencement of the siege,
the long-looked-for reinforcements under Martin and Valerian arrived in Rome.
They were but 1600 men after all, but they were cavalry troops, hardy horsemen
from the regions beyond the Danube, Huns, Sclavonians,
and Antes; and their arrival brought joy to the heart of Belisarius, who
decided that now the time was come for attempting offensive operations against
the enemy. The first sallying party was Belisarius under the command of Trajan,
one of the body-guard of the General, a brave and capable man. He was ordered
to lead forth 200 light-armed horsemen from the Salarian Gate, and to occupy a little eminence near to one of the Gothic camps. There
was to be no hand-to-hand fighting; neither sword nor spear was to be used;
only each man's bow was to discharge as many arrows as possible, and when these
were exhausted the soldiers were to seek safety in flight. These orders were
obeyed. Each Roman arrow transfixed some Gothic warrior or his steed. When
their quivers were empty, the skirmishers hastened back under the shelter of
the walls of the city. The Goths pursued, but soon found themselves within
range of the ballistae, which were in full activity on the battlements. It was
believed in the Roman camp that 1000 of their enemies had been laid low by this
day's doings.
A second sortie under Mundilas and Diogenes
and a third under Wilas, all three brave guardsmen of Belisarius, were equally
destructive to the enemy, and the result was achieved with equally little cost
to the troop, 300 strong in each case, by whom the sortie was effected.
Seeing the success of these manoeuvres, Witigis, who had not yet
apprehended the difference of training and equipment between his countrymen and
the Imperialists, thought he could not do better than imitate them. Victory was
evidently to be had if a general made his army small enough: and he accordingly
sent 500 horsemen with orders to go as near as they could to the walls, without
coming within range of the ballistae, and avenge upon the Romans all the evils
which they had suffered at their hands. The Goths accordingly took up their
position on a little rising ground; and Belisarius, perceiving them, sent
Bessas with 1000 men to steal round and take them in rear. The Goths soon found
themselves overmastered: many of them fell; the rest fled to their camp and
were upbraided by Witigis for their cowardice.
“Why could not they win a victory with a handful of men as the troops on
the other side did?” So did the clumsy workman quarrel with his tools. Three
days after he got together another band of 500 men, picking them from each of
the Gothic camps that he might be sure to have some valiant men among them, and
sent them with the same general directions, “to do brave deeds against the
enemy” When they drew near, Belisarius sent 1500 horsemen against them under
the newly-arrived generals Martin and Valerian. An equestrian battle ensued.
Again the Goths, hopelessly outnumbered, were easily put to flight, and great
numbers of them were slain.
Not in the Gothic camp only did this uniform success of the Imperial
troops, apparently on the most different lines of encounter, excite much and
eager questioning: the Roman citizens, whose former criticisms had given place
to abject admiration, attributed it all to the marvellous genius of Belisarius.
In the Pincian Palace, however, the question was
earnestly debated by the friends of the General. Upon this occasion it was that
Belisarius expressed that opinion which has been already quoted, that the
superiority of the Imperial army in mounted archers was the cause of its
unvarying victories over the Goths, whether the battles were fought by larger
or smaller bodies of men.
The repeated and brilliant successes of the Imperial troops were almost
as embarrassing to Belisarius as to the Gothic King, though in a different way.
They fostered both in officers and soldiers such an overweening contempt of the
barbarians, that now nothing would satisfy them but to be led forth to a
regular pitched battle under the walls of Rome, and make an end once for all of
the presumptuous besiegers. The method which Belisarius preferred, and which
was far safer, was to wear out the barbarians by an incessant succession of
such movements as Shakespeare indicates by “alarums, excursions”. He dreaded
putting Fortune to the test with the whole of his little army at once. He found,
however, at last that to keep that army at all in hand it was necessary (as it
had been at the battle of Sura) to yield to their wish in this thing; and he
indulged the hope that their confidence of victory might be one powerful factor
in the process which would enable him to secure it. Still he would have made
his grand attack somewhat by way of a surprise, but was foiled in this endeavour
by the information given by deserters to the Goths. At length, therefore, he
resigned himself to fight a regular pitched battle with full notice on either
side. The customary harangues were delivered by each commander. Belisarius
reminded his soldiers that this battle was one of their own seeking, and that
they would have to justify the advice which they had ventured to give, and to
maintain the credit of their previous victories, by their conduct on that day.
He bade them not spare either horse or javelin or bow in the coming fray, since
all such losses should be abundantly made up to them out of his military
stores. The purport of the speech of Witigis—if Procopius's account of it be
not a mere rhetorical exercise—was to assure his brethren in arms that it was
no selfish care for his crown and dignity which made him the humble suitor for
their best assistance on that day. “For the loss of life or kingship I care
not; nay, I would pray to put off this purple robe today if only I were assured
that it would hang upon Gothic shoulders tomorrow. Even Theodahad’s end seems to me an enviable one, since he died by Gothic hands and lost life
and power by the same stroke. But what I cannot bear to contemplate is ruin
falling not only on me but on my race. I think of the calamity of the Vandals,
and imagine that I see you and your sons carried away into captivity, your
wives suffering the last indignities from our implacable foes, myself and my
wife, the granddaughter of the great Theodoric, led whithersoever the insulting
conqueror shall please to order. Think of all these things, my countrymen, and
vow in your own hearts that you will die on this field of battle rather than
they shall come to pass. If this be your determination, an easy victory is
yours. Few in number are the enemy, and after all they are but Greeks and
Greek-like people. The only thing which keeps them together is a vain
confidence derived from some recent disasters of ours. Be true to yourselves,
and you will soon shatter that confidence and inflict a signal punishment upon
them for all the insults that we have received at their hands”.
After this harangue Witigis drew up his army in line of battle, the
infantry in the middle, the cavalry on either wing. He stationed them as near
as might be to the Gothic camps, in order that when the Romans were defeated,
as he made no doubt they would be, owing to their enormous inferiority in
numbers, their long flight to the shelter of their walls might be as disastrous
to them as possible. Belisarius on his side determined to make his real attack
from the Pincian and Salarian Gates. At the same time a feigned attack towards the Gothic camp under Monte
Mario was to be made from the Porta Aurelia and the neighborhood of the Tomb of Hadrian. The object of this feigned attack was of course to
prevent the large number of Goths on the right bank of the Tiber from swarming
across the Milvian Bridge to the assistance of their brethren. Strict orders
were, however, given to Valentine, who commanded the troops in this quarter, on
no account to advance really within fighting distance of the enemy, but to
harass him with a perpetual apparent offer of battle never leading to a decided
result.
In further pursuance of the same policy the General accepted the service
of a large number of volunteers from among the mechanics of Rome, equipped them
with shield and spear, and stationed them in front of the Pancratian Gate. He placed no reliance on the services of these men for actual fighting,
utterly unused as they were to the art of war, but he reckoned, not without
cause, on the effect which the sight of so large a body of men would have in
preventing the Goths from quitting their camp under Monte Mario. Meanwhile, the
orders to the mechanic-volunteers were, not to stir till they should receive
the signal from him, a signal which he was fully determined never to give.
The battle, according to the original plan of Belisarius, was to be
fought entirely with cavalry, the arm in which he knew himself to be strongest,
many of his best foot-soldiers, who were already well-skilled in horsemanship,
having provided themselves with horses at the expense of the enemy, and so
turned themselves into cavalry. He feared too the instability of such infantry
as he had, and their liability to sudden panics, and therefore determined to
keep them near to the fosse of the city walls, there to act simply as a slight
support for any of the cavalry who might chance to be thrown into confusion.
The plan intention was changed at the last moment—the General was in a mood
that day for receiving advice from all quarters—by the earnest representations
of two valiant Asiatic highlanders, Principius, a
Pisidian, and Tarmutus, an Isaurian, whose brother
Eunas commanded the contingent of those hardy mountaineers. These men besought
him no further to lessen the numbers of his gallant little army by withdrawing
the foot-soldiers, the representatives of those mighty legions by which ‘the
Romans of old' had won their greatness, from active service. They asserted
their conviction that if, in recent engagements, the infantry had done
something less than their duty, the fault lay not with the common soldiers but
with the officers, who insisted on being mounted, and who were, too often, only
looking about for a favourable moment for flight. Thus the troops were
discouraged, because they felt that the men who were giving them orders did not
share their dangers. But if Belisarius would allow these horsemen officers to
fight that day with the horsemen, and would allow them, Principius and Tarmutus, to share on foot the dangers of the men
under their command, and with them to advance boldly against the enemy, they
trusted with God's help to do some deeds against them that the world should
know of. Belisarius for long would not yield. He loved the two valiant
highlanders: he was loth to run the risk of losing them: he was also loth to
run the risk of losing his little army of foot-soldiers. At length, however, he
consented. He left the smallest possible number of soldiers to guard, with the
help of the Roman populace, the machines on the battlements and at the gates:
and placing the main body of his infantry under the command of Principius and Tarmutus, he gave
them orders to march behind the cavalry against the enemy. Should any portion
of the cavalry be put to flight they were to open their ranks and let them pass
through, themselves engaging the enemy till the horsemen had time to reform.
It was felt on both sides that this was to be a decisive trial of
strength. Witigis had put in battle array every man of his army available for
service, leaving in the camps only the campfollowers and the men who were disabled by their wounds. Early in the morning the hostile
ranks closed for battle. The troops in front of the Pincian and Salarian Gates soon got the upper hand of the
enemy, among whose clustered masses their arrows fell with terrible effect. But
the Gothic multitudes were too thick, and the men too stout-hearted for even
this slaughter to produce complete rout. As one rank of the barbarians was mown
down, another pressed forward to supply its place. Thus the Romans, who had
slowly pressed forward, found themselves by noon close to the Gothic camp, but
surrounded still by so compact a body of their foes that they began to feel
that any pretext which would enable them to return in good order under the
shelter of their walls would be a welcome thing. The heroes of this period of
the struggle were an Isaurian guardsman named Athenodorus and two Cappadocians, Theodoret and Georgius, who darted forth in front of
the Roman line and with their spears transfixed many of the enemy. Thus again
the men who came from the rough sides of Mount Taurus showed themselves
conspicuous among the most warlike spirits of the Imperial army.
While this hot strife was being waged on the north-east of the city,
strange events were taking place on the other side of the river in the Neronian
plain under Monte Mario. Here the Gothic general Marcias had been enjoined by
his King to play a waiting game, and above all things to watch the Milvian
Bridge in order that no Romans should cross by it to succour their countrymen.
The Romans, it will be remembered, had received a similar order from their
general, and it might therefore have been expected that there would be no
battle. But as the day wore on, it chanced that one of the feigned assaults of
the Roman troops was turned into a real one by the sudden giving way of the
Gothic ranks. The flying Goths were unable to reach their camp, but turned and
reformed upon one of the hills in the neighbourhood of the Monte Mario. Among
the Roman troops were many sailors and slaves acting the soldier for the first
time, and ignorant of discipline. Possibly, though this is not expressly
stated, some of the mechanic crew who were stationed in front of the Pancratian Gate joined in the pursuit. At any rate the
successful Romans soon became quite unmanageable by their leaders. The
loudly-shouted commands of their general, Valentine, were unheard or
disregarded. They did not concern themselves with the slaughter of the flying
Goths. They did not press on to seize and cross the Milvian Bridge, in which
case their opportune assistance to Belisarius might almost have enabled him to
end the war at a stroke. They only occupied themselves with the plunder of the
Gothic camp, where silver vessels and many other precious things (evidences of
the enriching effect of the long peace on the Ostrogothic warriors) attracted
their greedy eyes. The natural consequence followed. The Goths, so long left
unmolested, and leisurely reforming on Monte Mario, looked on for a time
quietly at the plunder of their camp. Then taking heart from their long
reprieve, and reading the signs of disorder in the hostile forces, they dashed
on with a savage yell, leaped the ramparts of their camp, and scattered the
invaders of it like chaff before the wind. Silver vessels and golden trappings,
all the spoils for the sake of which the greedy crew had sacrificed the chance
of a splendid victory, were dashed in terror to the ground, while the slaves
and sailors dressed up in military garb fled on all sides in utter rout and
confusion from the camp, or fell by hundreds under the Gothic sword. The day's
fighting on the Neronian Plain had been a series of blunders on both sides, but
the eventual victory rested with the side which made fewest, Marcias and his
Goths.
At the same time the fortunes of the Imperial army on the north-east of
the city began to decline. The Goths, driven to bay at the rampart of their
camp, formed a testudo with their shields and succeeded in withstanding the
Roman onset, and in slaying many men and horses. The smallness of the attacking
army became more and more terribly apparent both to itself and the enemy; and
at length the right wing of the Gothic cavalry, bending round, charged the
Romans in flank. They broke and fled. The cavalry reached the ranks of the
supporting infantry, who did not support them, but turned and fled likewise;
and soon the whole Roman army, horse and foot, generals and common soldiers,
were in headlong flight toward the city walls.
Like Nolan at the charge of Balaklava, Principius and Tarmutus atoned by a brave death for the
disastrous counsels which in all good faith they had given to the General. With
a little knot of faithful friends they for a time arrested the headlong torrent
of the Gothic pursuit, and the delay thus caused saved numberless lives in the
Imperial army. Then Principius fell, hacked to pieces
by countless wounds, and forty-two of his brave foot-soldiers fell around him. Tarmutus with two Isaurian javelins in his hand long kept
the enemy at bay. He found his strength failing him, and was just about to sink
down in exhaustion, when a charge of his brother Ennes, at the head of some of
his cavalry, gave him a few moments' relief. Then plucking up heart again, he
shook himself loose from his pursuers and ran at full speed (he was ever swift
of foot) towards the walls of the city. He reached the Pincian Gate, pierced with many wounds and be dabbled with gore, but still holding his
two Isaurian javelins in his hand.
At the gate he fell down fainting. His comrades thought him dead, but
laid him on a shield and bore him into the City. He was not dead, however : he
still breathed; but two days afterwards he expired of his wounds, leaving a
name memorable to the whole army, but especially to his trusty Isaurian
comrades.
The soldiers who had already entered the City shut the gates with a
clash, and refused to let the fugitives enter, lest the Goths should enter with
them. Panic-stricken, and with scarcely a thought of self-defense,
the defeated soldiers huddled up under the shelter of the walls, their spears
all broken or cast away in the flight, their bows useless by reason of the
dense masses in which they were packed together. The Goths appeared in menacing
attitude at the outer edge of the fosse. Had they poured down across it, as
they were at first minded to, they might have well-nigh annihilated the army of
Belisarius. But when they saw the citizens and the soldiers within the City
clustering more thickly upon the walls, afraid of the terrible ballistae they
retired, indulging only in the luxury of taunts and epithets of barbarian scorn
hurled at the beaten army.
The events of the day had fully justified the intuitive judgment of
Belisarius. The besieged, though terrible in skirmishes and sudden excursions,
were too few in number for a pitched battle. “The fight” says Procopius, “which
began at the camps of the barbarians ended in the trench and close to the walls
of the City”.
After this disastrous day the Imperial troops reverted to their old
method of unexpected sallies by small bodies of troops, and practiced it with
much of their former success. There is something of a Homeric, something of a
mediaeval character in the stories which Procopius tells us of this period of
the siege. No masses of troops were engaged on either side. Infantry were
unused, save that a few bold and fleet-footed soldiers generally accompanied
the horsemen. Single combats between great champions on horseback on either
side were the order of the day.
Thus in one sally the general Bessas transfixed three of the bravest of
the Gothic horsemen in succession with his spear, and with little aid from his
followers put the rest of their squadron to flight. Thus also Chorsamantis, a Hun and one of the body-guard of
Belisarius, in a charge on the Neronian Plain pursued too far, and was
separated from his comrades. Seeing this the Goths closed round him, but he,
standing on his defence, slew the foremost of their band. They wavered and fled
before him. Drawing near to the walls of their camp and feeling that the eyes
of their fellows were upon them, they turned, for very shame that so many
should be chased by one. Again he slew their bravest, and again they fled. Thus
he pursued them up to the very gates of the camp, and then returned across the
plain unharmed. Soon after, in another combat, a Gothic arrow pierced his left
thigh, penetrating even to the bone. The army surgeons insisted upon a rest of
several days after so grave an injury, but the sturdy barbarian bore with
impatience so long a seclusion from the delights of battle, and was often heard
to murmur, “I will make those Gothic fellows pay for my wounded leg”. Before
long the wound healed and he was out of the doctors' hands. One day at the
noontide meal, according to his usual custom, he became intoxicated, and
determined that he would sally forth alone against the enemy, and, as he said
over and over again to himself in the thick tones of a drunkard, “make them pay
for my leg” Biding down to the Pincian Gate he
declared that he was sent by the General to go forth against the enemy. The
sentinels, not daring to challenge the assertion of one of the body-guard of
Belisarius, and perhaps not perceiving his drunken condition, allowed him to
pass through the gate. When the Goths saw a solitary figure riding forth from
the city their first thought was “Here comes a deserter” but the bent bow and
flying arrows of Chorsamantis soon undeceived them.
Twenty of them came against him, whom he easily dispersed. He rode leisurely
forward to the camp. The Romans from the ramparts, not recognizing who he was,
took him for some madman. Soon he was surrounded by the outstreaming Goths, and after performing prodigies of valour fell dead amid a ring of
slaughtered enemies, leaving a name to be celebrated for many a day in the
camp-fire songs of his savage countrymen.
In reading this and many similar stories told us by Procopius we are of
course bound to remember that we do not hear the Gothic accounts of their own
exploits, accounts which might sometimes exhibit a Gothic champion chasing
scores of flying Byzantines. But after making all needful abatement on this
account, we shall probably be safe in supposing that the balance of hardihood,
of wild reckless daring, was on the side of the Imperial army. Though the
members of it called themselves Romans they were really for the most part, like Chorsamantis, barbarians, fresher from the wilderness
than the Ostrogothic soldiers, every one of whom had been born and bred amid
the delights of Italy. And the stern stuff of which the Imperial soldiers were
made was tempered and pointed by what still remained of Roman discipline, and
driven by the matchless skill of Belisarius straight to the heart of the foe.
On another occasion, the general Constantine, perhaps desiring to vie
with the achievements of his rival Bessas, sallied out with a small body of
Huns from the Porta Aurelia and found himself surrounded by a large troop of
the enemy. To preserve himself from being attacked on all sides he retreated
with his men into one of the narrow streets opening on Nero's Stadium. Here his
men, dismounting, discharged their arrows at the enemy, who menaced them from
the opposite ends of the street. The Goths thought, “Their quivers must soon be
empty, and then we will rush in upon them from both sides and destroy them” But
such was the deadly effect of the Hunnish missiles that the Goths found before
long that their number was reduced more than one half. Night was closing in.
They were seized with panic and fled. The pursuing Huns still aimed their
deadly arrows at the backs of the flying foe. Thus, after effecting a frightful
slaughter among the Goths, Constantine with his Massagetic horsemen returned in safety to Home that night.
At another time it befell that Peranius, the
general who came from the slopes of Caucasus, headed a sortie from the Salarian Gate. It was at first successful, and the Goths
fled before the Romans. Then, when the sun was going down, the tide of battle
turned. An Imperial soldier flying headlong before the Goths fell unawares into
an underground vault prepared by ' the Romans of old' as a magazine for corn.
Unable to climb the steep sides of the vault, and afraid to call for help, he
passed all night in that confinement, in evil case. Next day another Roman
sortie, more successful than the last, sent the Goths flying over the same
tract of country, and lo! a Gothic soldier fell headlong into the same vault.
The two companions in misfortune began to consult as to their means of escape,
and bound themselves by solemn vows each to be as careful for his companion's
safety as his own. Then they both sent up a tremendous shout, which was heard,
as it chanced, by a band of Gothic soldiers. They came, they peeped over the
mouth of the vaults and asked in Gothic tongue whoever was shouting from that
darksome hole. The Goth alone replied, told his tale, and begged his comrades
to deliver him from that horrible pit. They let down ropes into the vault, the
ropes were made fast, they hauled up a man out of the pit, and to their
astonishment a Roman soldier stood before them. The Roman—who had sagaciously
argued that if his companion came up first no Gothic soldiers would trouble
themselves to haul up him—explained the strange adventure and besought them to
lower the ropes again for their own comrade. They did so, and when the Goth was
drawn up he told them of his plighted faith, and entreated them to let his
companion in danger go free. They complied, and the Roman returned unharmed to
the City. As Ariosto sings of Ferrau and Rinaldo, when those fierce enemies
agreed to roam together in search of Angelica who was beloved by both of them,—
'Oh loyal knights of that long vanished day!
Their faiths were two, they wooed one woman's smile,
And still they felt rude tokens of their fray,
The blows which each on other rained erewhile:
Yet through dark woods by paths that seemed to stray
They rode, and each nor feared nor harboured guile.'
(Orlando Furioso, 1. 22.)
A breath of the age of chivalry seems wafted over the savage
battlefield, as we read of the vow between the two deadly enemies in the vault
so loyally observed, and we half persuade ourselves that we perceive another
aura from that still future age when men everywhere, recognizing that they have
all fallen into the same pit of ruin and longing for deliverance, shall listen
to the voice of the Divine Reconciler, “Sirs, ye are brethren : why do ye wrong
one to another?”
The month of June was now begun. The combatants had reached the third
month of the siege and had finished two years of the war. A certain Euthalius had landed at Tarracina bringing from Byzantium some much-needed treasure for the pay of the soldiers.
In order to secure for him and for his escort of 100 men a safe entrance at
nightfall into the city, Belisarius harassed the enemy through the long
summer's day with incessant expectations of attack, expectations which, after
the soldiers had taken their midday meal, were converted into realities. As
usual the attacks were made on both sides, from the Pincian Gate and over the Neronian Plain. At the former place the Romans were commanded
by three of Belisarius's guards, the Persian Artasines, Buchas the Hun, and Cutila the Thracian. The tide of war rolled backwards and forwards many times, and
many succors poured forth both from the City and from
the Gothic camp, over both of which the shouts and the din of battle resounded.
At length the Romans prevailed, and drove back their foes. In this action the
splendid contempt of pain shown by Cutila and by a
brother-guardsman Arzes greatly impressed the mind of
Procopius. Cutila had been wounded by a javelin which
lodged in his skull. He still took part in the fight, and at sunset rode back
with his comrades to the city, the javelin nodding to and fro in his head with every movement of his body. Arzes had received a Gothic arrow at the angle of the eye and nose, which came with
such violence that it almost penetrated to the nape of his neck. He too rode
back to Rome, like Cutila apparently heedless of the
weapon which was shaking in the wound.
Meanwhile things were going ill with Martin and Valerian, who commanded
the Imperial troops on the Neronian Plain. They were surrounded by large
numbers of the enemy, and seemed on the point of being overwhelmed by them. At
this crisis—it was now growing late— an opportune charge under Buchas the Hun, withdrawn for this purpose from the sortie
on the other side of the city, saved the day. Buchas himself performed prodigies of valour. For a long time he alone, though still
but a stripling, kept twelve of the enemy at bay. At length one Goth was able
to deal him a slight wound under the right arm-pit, and another, a more serious
wound, transversely, through the muscles of the thigh. By this time, however,
he and his men had restored the fortunes of the Imperial troops. Valerian and
Martin rode up with speed, scattered the barbarians who surrounded Buchas, and led him home between them, each holding one of
his reins.
The object of all this bloody skirmishing was attained. Euthalius with the treasure, creeping along the Appian Way,
stole at nightfall, unperceived, into the City. When all were returned within
the walls, the wounded heroes were of course attended to; and Procopius,
insatiable in his desire to widen his experience of human life, seems to have
visited the surgical wards. The case of Arzes, who
was looked upon as one of the bravest men in the household of Belisarius, gave
the surgeons much anxious thought. To save the sight of the eye they held to be
altogether impossible; but moreover they feared that the laceration of the
multitude of nerves through which the arrow must be drawn, if it were
extracted, would cause the death of the patient. A physician, Theoctistus by name, pressed his finger on the nape of his
neck and asked if that gave him pain. When Arzes replied that it did, Theoctistus gave him the glad
assurance, “Then we shall be able to save your life and your eye too”. At once
cutting off the feather end of the arrow where it projected from the face, the
surgeons dissected the comparatively insensitive tissues at the end of the neck
till they grasped the triangular point of the arrow, and drawing it out endways
gave the patient but little pain and left him with his eye uninjured and his face
unscarred. The cases of Cutila and Buchas terminated less favourably. When the javelin was
drawn from the head of the former he fainted. Inflammation of the membranes of
the brain set in, followed by delirium, and he died not many days after. Buchas also died after three days, of the terrible haemorrhage
from his wounded thigh. The physicians assured Procopius that had the lance
penetrated straight in, his life might have been preserved, but the transverse
wound was fatal.
The deaths of these heroes filled the Roman army with sorrow, which was
only mitigated by the sounds of lamentation arising from the Gothic camp. These bewailings, not previously heard after much fiercer
encounters, were due to the exalted rank of the warriors who had fallen by the
sword of Buchas.
Such were some of the sallies and skirmishes which occurred in this
memorable siege. Sixty-nine encounters in all took place, and Procopius wisely
remarks that it is not needful for him to give the details of all of them. He
himself, as we shall soon see, left the scene of action for a time; and for
some months of the remainder of the siege we miss the minute descriptive
touches (though some readers may find them tedious) which reveal the personal
presence of the historian in the earlier acts of the great drama.
