Chapter XLVI: Troubles In Persia.—Part I

Revolutions On Persia After The Death Of Chosroes On Nushirvan.—His Son Hormouz, A Tyrant, Is Deposed.—Usurpation Of Baharam.—Flight And Restoration Of Chosroes II.—His Gratitude To The Romans.—The Chagan Of The Avars.—Revolt Of The Army Against Maurice.—His Death.—Tyranny Of Phocas.—Elevation Of Heraclius.—The Persian War.—Chosroes Subdues Syria, Egypt, And Asia Minor.—Siege Of Constantinople By The Persians And Avars.—Persian Expeditions.—Victories And Triumph Of Heraclius.

The conflict of Rome and Persia was prolonged from the death of
Craesus to the reign of Heraclius. An experience of seven hundred
years might convince the rival nations of the impossibility of
maintaining their conquests beyond the fatal limits of the Tigris
and Euphrates. Yet the emulation of Trajan and Julian was
awakened by the trophies of Alexander, and the sovereigns of
Persia indulged the ambitious hope of restoring the empire of
Cyrus. 1 Such extraordinary efforts of power and courage will
always command the attention of posterity; but the events by
which the fate of nations is not materially changed, leave a
faint impression on the page of history, and the patience of the
reader would be exhausted by the repetition of the same
hostilities, undertaken without cause, prosecuted without glory,
and terminated without effect. The arts of negotiation, unknown
to the simple greatness of the senate and the Caesars, were
assiduously cultivated by the Byzantine princes; and the
memorials of their perpetual embassies 2 repeat, with the same
uniform prolixity, the language of falsehood and declamation, the
insolence of the Barbarians, and the servile temper of the
tributary Greeks. Lamenting the barren superfluity of materials,
I have studied to compress the narrative of these uninteresting
transactions: but the just Nushirvan is still applauded as the
model of Oriental kings, and the ambition of his grandson
Chosroes prepared the revolution of the East, which was speedily
accomplished by the arms and the religion of the successors of
Mahomet.

1 (return) [ Missis qui... reposcerent... veteres Persarum ac
Macedonum terminos, seque invasurum possessa Cyro et post
Alexandro, per vaniloquentiam ac minas jaciebat. Tacit. Annal.
vi. 31. Such was the language of the Arsacides. I have repeatedly
marked the lofty claims of the Sassanians.]

2 (return) [ See the embassies of Menander, extracted and
preserved in the tenth century by the order of Constantine
Porphyrogenitus.]

In the useless altercations, that precede and justify the
quarrels of princes, the Greeks and the Barbarians accused each
other of violating the peace which had been concluded between the
two empires about four years before the death of Justinian. The
sovereign of Persia and India aspired to reduce under his
obedience the province of Yemen or Arabia 3 Felix; the distant
land of myrrh and frankincense, which had escaped, rather than
opposed, the conquerors of the East. After the defeat of Abrahah
under the walls of Mecca, the discord of his sons and brothers
gave an easy entrance to the Persians: they chased the strangers
of Abyssinia beyond the Red Sea; and a native prince of the
ancient Homerites was restored to the throne as the vassal or
viceroy of the great Nushirvan. 4 But the nephew of Justinian
declared his resolution to avenge the injuries of his Christian
ally the prince of Abyssinia, as they suggested a decent pretence
to discontinue the annual tribute, which was poorly disguised by
the name of pension. The churches of Persarmenia were oppressed
by the intolerant spirit of the Magi; 411 they secretly invoked
the protector of the Christians, and, after the pious murder of
their satraps, the rebels were avowed and supported as the
brethren and subjects of the Roman emperor. The complaints of
Nushirvan were disregarded by the Byzantine court; Justin yielded
to the importunities of the Turks, who offered an alliance
against the common enemy; and the Persian monarchy was threatened
at the same instant by the united forces of Europe, of Aethiopia,
and of Scythia. At the age of fourscore the sovereign of the East
would perhaps have chosen the peaceful enjoyment of his glory and
greatness; but as soon as war became inevitable, he took the
field with the alacrity of youth, whilst the aggressor trembled
in the palace of Constantinople. Nushirvan, or Chosroes,
conducted in person the siege of Dara; and although that
important fortress had been left destitute of troops and
magazines, the valor of the inhabitants resisted above five
months the archers, the elephants, and the military engines of
the Great King. In the mean while his general Adarman advanced
from Babylon, traversed the desert, passed the Euphrates,
insulted the suburbs of Antioch, reduced to ashes the city of
Apamea, and laid the spoils of Syria at the feet of his master,
whose perseverance in the midst of winter at length subverted the
bulwark of the East. But these losses, which astonished the
provinces and the court, produced a salutary effect in the
repentance and abdication of the emperor Justin: a new spirit
arose in the Byzantine councils; and a truce of three years was
obtained by the prudence of Tiberius. That seasonable interval
was employed in the preparations of war; and the voice of rumor
proclaimed to the world, that from the distant countries of the
Alps and the Rhine, from Scythia, Maesia, Pannonia, Illyricum,
and Isauria, the strength of the Imperial cavalry was reenforced
with one hundred and fifty thousand soldiers. Yet the king of
Persia, without fear, or without faith, resolved to prevent the
attack of the enemy; again passed the Euphrates, and dismissing
the ambassadors of Tiberius, arrogantly commanded them to await
his arrival at Caesarea, the metropolis of the Cappadocian
provinces. The two armies encountered each other in the battle of
Melitene: 412 the Barbarians, who darkened the air with a cloud
of arrows, prolonged their line, and extended their wings across
the plain; while the Romans, in deep and solid bodies, expected
to prevail in closer action, by the weight of their swords and
lances. A Scythian chief, who commanded their right wing,
suddenly turned the flank of the enemy, attacked their rear-guard
in the presence of Chosroes, penetrated to the midst of the camp,
pillaged the royal tent, profaned the eternal fire, loaded a
train of camels with the spoils of Asia, cut his way through the
Persian host, and returned with songs of victory to his friends,
who had consumed the day in single combats, or ineffectual
skirmishes. The darkness of the night, and the separation of the
Romans, afforded the Persian monarch an opportunity of revenge;
and one of their camps was swept away by a rapid and impetuous
assault. But the review of his loss, and the consciousness of his
danger, determined Chosroes to a speedy retreat: he burnt, in his
passage, the vacant town of Melitene; and, without consulting the
safety of his troops, boldly swam the Euphrates on the back of an
elephant. After this unsuccessful campaign, the want of
magazines, and perhaps some inroad of the Turks, obliged him to
disband or divide his forces; the Romans were left masters of the
field, and their general Justinian, advancing to the relief of
the Persarmenian rebels, erected his standard on the banks of the
Araxes. The great Pompey had formerly halted within three days’
march of the Caspian: 5 that inland sea was explored, for the
first time, by a hostile fleet, 6 and seventy thousand captives
were transplanted from Hyrcania to the Isle of Cyprus. On the
return of spring, Justinian descended into the fertile plains of
Assyria; the flames of war approached the residence of Nushirvan;
the indignant monarch sunk into the grave; and his last edict
restrained his successors from exposing their person in battle
against the Romans. 611 Yet the memory of this transient affront
was lost in the glories of a long reign; and his formidable
enemies, after indulging their dream of conquest, again solicited
a short respite from the calamities of war. 7

3 (return) [ The general independence of the Arabs, which cannot
be admitted without many limitations, is blindly asserted in a
separate dissertation of the authors of the Universal History,
vol. xx. p. 196—250. A perpetual miracle is supposed to have
guarded the prophecy in favor of the posterity of Ishmael; and
these learned bigots are not afraid to risk the truth of
Christianity on this frail and slippery foundation. * Note: It
certainly appears difficult to extract a prediction of the
perpetual independence of the Arabs from the text in Genesis,
which would have received an ample fulfilment during centuries of
uninvaded freedom. But the disputants appear to forget the
inseparable connection in the prediction between the wild, the
Bedoween habits of the Ismaelites, with their national
independence. The stationary and civilized descendant of Ismael
forfeited, as it were, his birthright, and ceased to be a genuine
son of the “wild man” The phrase, “dwelling in the presence of
his brethren,” is interpreted by Rosenmüller (in loc.) and
others, according to the Hebrew geography, “to the East” of his
brethren, the legitimate race of Abraham—M.]

4 (return) [ D’Herbelot, Biblioth. Orient. p. 477. Pocock,
Specimen Hist. Arabum, p. 64, 65. Father Pagi (Critica, tom. ii.
p. 646) has proved that, after ten years’ peace, the Persian war,
which continued twenty years, was renewed A.D. 571. Mahomet was
born A.D. 569, in the year of the elephant, or the defeat of
Abrahah, (Gagnier, Vie de Mahomet, tom. i. p. 89, 90, 98;) and
this account allows two years for the conquest of Yemen. * Note:
Abrahah, according to some accounts, was succeeded by his son
Taksoum, who reigned seventeen years; his brother Mascouh, who
was slain in battle against the Persians, twelve. But this
chronology is irreconcilable with the Arabian conquests of
Nushirvan the Great. Either Seif, or his son Maadi Karb, was the
native prince placed on the throne by the Persians. St. Martin,
vol. x. p. 78. See likewise Johannsen, Hist. Yemanae.—M.]

411 (return) [ Persarmenia was long maintained in peace by the
tolerant administration of Mejej, prince of the Gnounians. On his
death he was succeeded by a persecutor, a Persian, named
Ten-Schahpour, who attempted to propagate Zoroastrianism by
violence. Nushirvan, on an appeal to the throne by the Armenian
clergy, replaced Ten-Schahpour, in 552, by Veschnas-Vahram. The
new marzban, or governor, was instructed to repress the bigoted
Magi in their persecutions of the Armenians, but the Persian
converts to Christianity were still exposed to cruel sufferings.
The most distinguished of them, Izdbouzid, was crucified at Dovin
in the presence of a vast multitude. The fame of this martyr
spread to the West. Menander, the historian, not only, as appears
by a fragment published by Mai, related this event in his
history, but, according to M. St. Martin, wrote a tragedy on the
subject. This, however, is an unwarrantable inference from the
phrase which merely means that he related the tragic event in his
history. An epigram on the same subject, preserved in the
Anthology, Jacob’s Anth. Palat. i. 27, belongs to the historian.
Yet Armenia remained in peace under the government of
Veschnas-Vahram and his successor Varazdat. The tyranny of his
successor Surena led to the insurrection under Vartan, the
Mamigonian, who revenged the death of his brother on the marzban
Surena, surprised Dovin, and put to the sword the governor, the
soldiers, and the Magians. From St. Martin, vol x. p. 79—89.—M.]

412 (return) [ Malathiah. It was in the lesser Armenia.—M.]

5 (return) [ He had vanquished the Albanians, who brought into
the field 12,000 horse and 60,000 foot; but he dreaded the
multitude of venomous reptiles, whose existence may admit of some
doubt, as well as that of the neighboring Amazons. Plutarch, in
Pompeio, tom. ii. p. 1165, 1166.]

6 (return) [ In the history of the world I can only perceive two
navies on the Caspian: 1. Of the Macedonians, when Patrocles, the
admiral of the kings of Syria, Seleucus and Antiochus, descended
most probably the River Oxus, from the confines of India, (Plin.
Hist. Natur. vi. 21.) 2. Of the Russians, when Peter the First
conducted a fleet and army from the neighborhood of Moscow to the
coast of Persia, (Bell’s Travels, vol. ii. p. 325—352.) He justly
observes, that such martial pomp had never been displayed on the
Volga.]

611 (return) [ This circumstance rests on the statements of
Evagrius and Theophylaci Simocatta. They are not of sufficient
authority to establish a fact so improbable. St. Martin, vol. x.
p. 140.—M.]

7 (return) [ For these Persian wars and treaties, see Menander,
in Excerpt. Legat. p. 113—125. Theophanes Byzant. apud Photium,
cod. lxiv p. 77, 80, 81. Evagrius, l. v. c. 7—15. Theophylact, l.
iii. c. 9—16 Agathias, l. iv. p. 140.]

The throne of Chosroes Nushirvan was filled by Hormouz, or
Hormisdas, the eldest or the most favored of his sons. With the
kingdoms of Persia and India, he inherited the reputation and
example of his father, the service, in every rank, of his wise
and valiant officers, and a general system of administration,
harmonized by time and political wisdom to promote the happiness
of the prince and people. But the royal youth enjoyed a still
more valuable blessing, the friendship of a sage who had presided
over his education, and who always preferred the honor to the
interest of his pupil, his interest to his inclination. In a
dispute with the Greek and Indian philosophers, Buzurg 8 had once
maintained, that the most grievous misfortune of life is old age
without the remembrance of virtue; and our candor will presume
that the same principle compelled him, during three years, to
direct the councils of the Persian empire. His zeal was rewarded
by the gratitude and docility of Hormouz, who acknowledged
himself more indebted to his preceptor than to his parent: but
when age and labor had impaired the strength, and perhaps the
faculties, of this prudent counsellor, he retired from court, and
abandoned the youthful monarch to his own passions and those of
his favorites. By the fatal vicissitude of human affairs, the
same scenes were renewed at Ctesiphon, which had been exhibited
at Rome after the death of Marcus Antoninus. The ministers of
flattery and corruption, who had been banished by his father,
were recalled and cherished by the son; the disgrace and exile of
the friends of Nushirvan established their tyranny; and virtue
was driven by degrees from the mind of Hormouz, from his palace,
and from the government of the state. The faithful agents, the
eyes and ears of the king, informed him of the progress of
disorder, that the provincial governors flew to their prey with
the fierceness of lions and eagles, and that their rapine and
injustice would teach the most loyal of his subjects to abhor the
name and authority of their sovereign. The sincerity of this
advice was punished with death; the murmurs of the cities were
despised, their tumults were quelled by military execution: the
intermediate powers between the throne and the people were
abolished; and the childish vanity of Hormouz, who affected the
daily use of the tiara, was fond of declaring, that he alone
would be the judge as well as the master of his kingdom.

In every word, and in every action, the son of Nushirvan
degenerated from the virtues of his father. His avarice defrauded
the troops; his jealous caprice degraded the satraps; the palace,
the tribunals, the waters of the Tigris, were stained with the
blood of the innocent, and the tyrant exulted in the sufferings
and execution of thirteen thousand victims. As the excuse of his
cruelty, he sometimes condescended to observe, that the fears of
the Persians would be productive of hatred, and that their hatred
must terminate in rebellion but he forgot that his own guilt and
folly had inspired the sentiments which he deplored, and prepared
the event which he so justly apprehended. Exasperated by long and
hopeless oppression, the provinces of Babylon, Susa, and
Carmania, erected the standard of revolt; and the princes of
Arabia, India, and Scythia, refused the customary tribute to the
unworthy successor of Nushirvan. The arms of the Romans, in slow
sieges and frequent inroads, afflicted the frontiers of
Mesopotamia and Assyria: one of their generals professed himself
the disciple of Scipio; and the soldiers were animated by a
miraculous image of Christ, whose mild aspect should never have
been displayed in the front of battle. 9 At the same time, the
eastern provinces of Persia were invaded by the great khan, who
passed the Oxus at the head of three or four hundred thousand
Turks. The imprudent Hormouz accepted their perfidious and
formidable aid; the cities of Khorassan or Bactriana were
commanded to open their gates; the march of the Barbarians
towards the mountains of Hyrcania revealed the correspondence of
the Turkish and Roman arms; and their union must have subverted
the throne of the house of Sassan.

8 (return) [ Buzurg Mihir may be considered, in his character and
station, as the Seneca of the East; but his virtues, and perhaps
his faults, are less known than those of the Roman, who appears
to have been much more loquacious. The Persian sage was the
person who imported from India the game of chess and the fables
of Pilpay. Such has been the fame of his wisdom and virtues, that
the Christians claim him as a believer in the gospel; and the
Mahometans revere Buzurg as a premature Mussulman. D’Herbelot,
Bibliotheque Orientale, p. 218.]

9 (return) [ See the imitation of Scipio in Theophylact, l. i. c.
14; the image of Christ, l. ii. c. 3. Hereafter I shall speak
more amply of the Christian images—I had almost said idols. This,
if I am not mistaken, is the oldest of divine manufacture; but in
the next thousand years, many others issued from the same
workshop.]

Persia had been lost by a king; it was saved by a hero. After his
revolt, Varanes or Bahram is stigmatized by the son of Hormouz as
an ungrateful slave; the proud and ambiguous reproach of
despotism, since he was truly descended from the ancient princes
of Rei, 10 one of the seven families whose splendid, as well as
substantial, prerogatives exalted them above the heads of the
Persian nobility. 11 At the siege of Dara, the valor of Bahram
was signalized under the eyes of Nushirvan, and both the father
and son successively promoted him to the command of armies, the
government of Media, and the superintendence of the palace. The
popular prediction which marked him as the deliverer of Persia,
might be inspired by his past victories and extraordinary figure:
the epithet Giubin 1111 is expressive of the quality of dry wood:
he had the strength and stature of a giant; and his savage
countenance was fancifully compared to that of a wild cat. While
the nation trembled, while Hormouz disguised his terror by the
name of suspicion, and his servants concealed their disloyalty
under the mask of fear, Bahram alone displayed his undaunted
courage and apparent fidelity: and as soon as he found that no
more than twelve thousand soldiers would follow him against the
enemy; he prudently declared, that to this fatal number Heaven
had reserved the honors of the triumph. 1112 The steep and narrow
descent of the Pule Rudbar, 12 or Hyrcanian rock, is the only
pass through which an army can penetrate into the territory of
Rei and the plains of Media. From the commanding heights, a band
of resolute men might overwhelm with stones and darts the myriads
of the Turkish host: their emperor and his son were transpierced
with arrows; and the fugitives were left, without counsel or
provisions, to the revenge of an injured people. The patriotism
of the Persian general was stimulated by his affection for the
city of his forefathers: in the hour of victory, every peasant
became a soldier, and every soldier a hero; and their ardor was
kindled by the gorgeous spectacle of beds, and thrones, and
tables of massy gold, the spoils of Asia, and the luxury of the
hostile camp. A prince of a less malignant temper could not
easily have forgiven his benefactor; and the secret hatred of
Hormouz was envenomed by a malicious report, that Bahram had
privately retained the most precious fruits of his Turkish
victory. But the approach of a Roman army on the side of the
Araxes compelled the implacable tyrant to smile and to applaud;
and the toils of Bahram were rewarded with the permission of
encountering a new enemy, by their skill and discipline more
formidable than a Scythian multitude. Elated by his recent
success, he despatched a herald with a bold defiance to the camp
of the Romans, requesting them to fix a day of battle, and to
choose whether they would pass the river themselves, or allow a
free passage to the arms of the great king. The lieutenant of the
emperor Maurice preferred the safer alternative; and this local
circumstance, which would have enhanced the victory of the
Persians, rendered their defeat more bloody and their escape more
difficult. But the loss of his subjects, and the danger of his
kingdom, were overbalanced in the mind of Hormouz by the disgrace
of his personal enemy; and no sooner had Bahram collected and
reviewed his forces, than he received from a royal messenger the
insulting gift of a distaff, a spinning-wheel, and a complete
suit of female apparel. Obedient to the will of his sovereign he
showed himself to the soldiers in this unworthy disguise: they
resented his ignominy and their own; a shout of rebellion ran
through the ranks; and the general accepted their oath of
fidelity and vows of revenge. A second messenger, who had been
commanded to bring the rebel in chains, was trampled under the
feet of an elephant, and manifestos were diligently circulated,
exhorting the Persians to assert their freedom against an odious
and contemptible tyrant. The defection was rapid and universal;
his loyal slaves were sacrificed to the public fury; the troops
deserted to the standard of Bahram; and the provinces again
saluted the deliverer of his country.

10 (return) [ Ragae, or Rei, is mentioned in the Apocryphal book
of Tobit as already flourishing, 700 years before Christ, under
the Assyrian empire. Under the foreign names of Europus and
Arsacia, this city, 500 stadia to the south of the Caspian gates,
was successively embellished by the Macedonians and Parthians,
(Strabo, l. xi. p. 796.) Its grandeur and populousness in the
ixth century are exaggerated beyond the bounds of credibility;
but Rei has been since ruined by wars and the unwholesomeness of
the air. Chardin, Voyage en Perse, tom. i. p. 279, 280.
D’Herbelot, Biblioth. Oriental. p. 714.]

11 (return) [ Theophylact. l. iii. c. 18. The story of the seven
Persians is told in the third book of Herodotus; and their noble
descendants are often mentioned, especially in the fragments of
Ctesias. Yet the independence of Otanes (Herodot. l. iii. c. 83,
84) is hostile to the spirit of despotism, and it may not seem
probable that the seven families could survive the revolutions of
eleven hundred years. They might, however, be represented by the
seven ministers, (Brisson, de Regno Persico, l. i. p. 190;) and
some Persian nobles, like the kings of Pontus (Polyb l. v. p.
540) and Cappadocia, (Diodor. Sicul. l. xxxi. tom. ii. p. 517,)
might claim their descent from the bold companions of Darius.]

1111 (return) [ He is generally called Baharam Choubeen, Baharam,
the stick-like, probably from his appearance. Malcolm, vol. i. p.
120.—M.]

1112 (return) [ The Persian historians say, that Hormouz
entreated his general to increase his numbers; but Baharam
replied, that experience had taught him that it was the quality,
not the number of soldiers, which gave success. * * * No man in
his army was under forty years, and none above fifty. Malcolm,
vol. i. p. 121—M.]

12 (return) [ See an accurate description of this mountain by
Olearius, (Voyage en Perse, p. 997, 998,) who ascended it with
much difficulty and danger in his return from Ispahan to the
Caspian Sea.]

As the passes were faithfully guarded, Hormouz could only compute
the number of his enemies by the testimony of a guilty
conscience, and the daily defection of those who, in the hour of
his distress, avenged their wrongs, or forgot their obligations.
He proudly displayed the ensigns of royalty; but the city and
palace of Modain had already escaped from the hand of the tyrant.
Among the victims of his cruelty, Bindoes, a Sassanian prince,
had been cast into a dungeon; his fetters were broken by the zeal
and courage of a brother; and he stood before the king at the
head of those trusty guards, who had been chosen as the ministers
of his confinement, and perhaps of his death. Alarmed by the
hasty intrusion and bold reproaches of the captive, Hormouz
looked round, but in vain, for advice or assistance; discovered
that his strength consisted in the obedience of others; and
patiently yielded to the single arm of Bindoes, who dragged him
from the throne to the same dungeon in which he himself had been
so lately confined. At the first tumult, Chosroes, the eldest of
the sons of Hormouz, escaped from the city; he was persuaded to
return by the pressing and friendly invitation of Bindoes, who
promised to seat him on his father’s throne, and who expected to
reign under the name of an inexperienced youth. In the just
assurance, that his accomplices could neither forgive nor hope to
be forgiven, and that every Persian might be trusted as the judge
and enemy of the tyrant, he instituted a public trial without a
precedent and without a copy in the annals of the East. The son
of Nushirvan, who had requested to plead in his own defence, was
introduced as a criminal into the full assembly of the nobles and
satraps. 13 He was heard with decent attention as long as he
expatiated on the advantages of order and obedience, the danger
of innovation, and the inevitable discord of those who had
encouraged each other to trample on their lawful and hereditary
sovereign. By a pathetic appeal to their humanity, he extorted
that pity which is seldom refused to the fallen fortunes of a
king; and while they beheld the abject posture and squalid
appearance of the prisoner, his tears, his chains, and the marks
of ignominious stripes, it was impossible to forget how recently
they had adored the divine splendor of his diadem and purple. But
an angry murmur arose in the assembly as soon as he presumed to
vindicate his conduct, and to applaud the victories of his reign.
He defined the duties of a king, and the Persian nobles listened
with a smile of contempt; they were fired with indignation when
he dared to vilify the character of Chosroes; and by the
indiscreet offer of resigning the sceptre to the second of his
sons, he subscribed his own condemnation, and sacrificed the life
of his own innocent favorite. The mangled bodies of the boy and
his mother were exposed to the people; the eyes of Hormouz were
pierced with a hot needle; and the punishment of the father was
succeeded by the coronation of his eldest son. Chosroes had
ascended the throne without guilt, and his piety strove to
alleviate the misery of the abdicated monarch; from the dungeon
he removed Hormouz to an apartment of the palace, supplied with
liberality the consolations of sensual enjoyment, and patiently
endured the furious sallies of his resentment and despair. He
might despise the resentment of a blind and unpopular tyrant, but
the tiara was trembling on his head, till he could subvert the
power, or acquire the friendship, of the great Bahram, who
sternly denied the justice of a revolution, in which himself and
his soldiers, the true representatives of Persia, had never been
consulted. The offer of a general amnesty, and of the second rank
in his kingdom, was answered by an epistle from Bahram, friend of
the gods, conqueror of men, and enemy of tyrants, the satrap of
satraps, general of the Persian armies, and a prince adorned with
the title of eleven virtues. 14 He commands Chosroes, the son of
Hormouz, to shun the example and fate of his father, to confine
the traitors who had been released from their chains, to deposit
in some holy place the diadem which he had usurped, and to accept
from his gracious benefactor the pardon of his faults and the
government of a province. The rebel might not be proud, and the
king most assuredly was not humble; but the one was conscious of
his strength, the other was sensible of his weakness; and even
the modest language of his reply still left room for treaty and
reconciliation. Chosroes led into the field the slaves of the
palace and the populace of the capital: they beheld with terror
the banners of a veteran army; they were encompassed and
surprised by the evolutions of the general; and the satraps who
had deposed Hormouz, received the punishment of their revolt, or
expiated their first treason by a second and more criminal act of
disloyalty. The life and liberty of Chosroes were saved, but he
was reduced to the necessity of imploring aid or refuge in some
foreign land; and the implacable Bindoes, anxious to secure an
unquestionable title, hastily returned to the palace, and ended,
with a bowstring, the wretched existence of the son of Nushirvan.
15

13 (return) [ The Orientals suppose that Bahram convened this
assembly and proclaimed Chosroes; but Theophylact is, in this
instance, more distinct and credible. * Note: Yet Theophylact
seems to have seized the opportunity to indulge his propensity
for writing orations; and the orations read rather like those of
a Grecian sophist than of an Eastern assembly.—M.]

14 (return) [ See the words of Theophylact, l. iv. c. 7., &c. In
answer, Chosroes styles himself in genuine Oriental bombast.]

15 (return) [ Theophylact (l. iv. c. 7) imputes the death of
Hormouz to his son, by whose command he was beaten to death with
clubs. I have followed the milder account of Khondemir and
Eutychius, and shall always be content with the slightest
evidence to extenuate the crime of parricide. Note: Malcolm
concurs in ascribing his death to Bundawee, (Bindoes,) vol. i. p.
123. The Eastern writers generally impute the crime to the uncle
St. Martin, vol. x. p. 300.—M.]

While Chosroes despatched the preparations of his retreat, he
deliberated with his remaining friends, 16 whether he should lurk
in the valleys of Mount Caucasus, or fly to the tents of the
Turks, or solicit the protection of the emperor. The long
emulation of the successors of Artaxerxes and Constantine
increased his reluctance to appear as a suppliant in a rival
court; but he weighed the forces of the Romans, and prudently
considered that the neighborhood of Syria would render his escape
more easy and their succors more effectual. Attended only by his
concubines, and a troop of thirty guards, he secretly departed
from the capital, followed the banks of the Euphrates, traversed
the desert, and halted at the distance of ten miles from
Circesium. About the third watch of the night, the Roman præfect
was informed of his approach, and he introduced the royal
stranger to the fortress at the dawn of day. From thence the king
of Persia was conducted to the more honorable residence of
Hierapolis; and Maurice dissembled his pride, and displayed his
benevolence, at the reception of the letters and ambassadors of
the grandson of Nushirvan. They humbly represented the
vicissitudes of fortune and the common interest of princes,
exaggerated the ingratitude of Bahram, the agent of the evil
principle, and urged, with specious argument, that it was for the
advantage of the Romans themselves to support the two monarchies
which balance the world, the two great luminaries by whose
salutary influence it is vivified and adorned. The anxiety of
Chosroes was soon relieved by the assurance, that the emperor had
espoused the cause of justice and royalty; but Maurice prudently
declined the expense and delay of his useless visit to
Constantinople. In the name of his generous benefactor, a rich
diadem was presented to the fugitive prince, with an inestimable
gift of jewels and gold; a powerful army was assembled on the
frontiers of Syria and Armenia, under the command of the valiant
and faithful Narses, 17 and this general, of his own nation, and
his own choice, was directed to pass the Tigris, and never to
sheathe his sword till he had restored Chosroes to the throne of
his ancestors. 1711 The enterprise, however splendid, was less
arduous than it might appear. Persia had already repented of her
fatal rashness, which betrayed the heir of the house of Sassan to
the ambition of a rebellious subject: and the bold refusal of the
Magi to consecrate his usurpation, compelled Bahram to assume the
sceptre, regardless of the laws and prejudices of the nation. The
palace was soon distracted with conspiracy, the city with tumult,
the provinces with insurrection; and the cruel execution of the
guilty and the suspected served to irritate rather than subdue
the public discontent. No sooner did the grandson of Nushirvan
display his own and the Roman banners beyond the Tigris, than he
was joined, each day, by the increasing multitudes of the
nobility and people; and as he advanced, he received from every
side the grateful offerings of the keys of his cities and the
heads of his enemies. As soon as Modain was freed from the
presence of the usurper, the loyal inhabitants obeyed the first
summons of Mebodes at the head of only two thousand horse, and
Chosroes accepted the sacred and precious ornaments of the palace
as the pledge of their truth and the presage of his approaching
success. After the junction of the Imperial troops, which Bahram
vainly struggled to prevent, the contest was decided by two
battles on the banks of the Zab, and the confines of Media. The
Romans, with the faithful subjects of Persia, amounted to sixty
thousand, while the whole force of the usurper did not exceed
forty thousand men: the two generals signalized their valor and
ability; but the victory was finally determined by the prevalence
of numbers and discipline. With the remnant of a broken army,
Bahram fled towards the eastern provinces of the Oxus: the enmity
of Persia reconciled him to the Turks; but his days were
shortened by poison, perhaps the most incurable of poisons; the
stings of remorse and despair, and the bitter remembrance of lost
glory. Yet the modern Persians still commemorate the exploits of
Bahram; and some excellent laws have prolonged the duration of
his troubled and transitory reign.

16 (return) [ After the battle of Pharsalia, the Pompey of Lucan
(l. viii. 256—455) holds a similar debate. He was himself
desirous of seeking the Parthians: but his companions abhorred
the unnatural alliance and the adverse prejudices might operate
as forcibly on Chosroes and his companions, who could describe,
with the same vehemence, the contrast of laws, religion, and
manners, between the East and West.]

17 (return) [ In this age there were three warriors of the name
of Narses, who have been often confounded, (Pagi, Critica, tom.
ii. p. 640:) 1. A Persarmenian, the brother of Isaac and
Armatius, who, after a successful action against Belisarius,
deserted from his Persian sovereign, and afterwards served in the
Italian war.—2. The eunuch who conquered Italy.—3. The restorer
of Chosroes, who is celebrated in the poem of Corippus (l. iii.
220—327) as excelsus super omnia vertico agmina.... habitu
modestus.... morum probitate placens, virtute verendus;
fulmineus, cautus, vigilans, &c.]

1711 (return) [ The Armenians adhered to Chosroes. St. Martin,
vol. x. p. 312.—M. ——According to Mivkhond and the Oriental
writers, Bahram received the daughter of the Khakan in marriage,
and commanded a body of Turks in an invasion of Persia. Some say
that he was assassinated; Malcolm adopts the opinion that he was
poisoned. His sister Gourdieh, the companion of his flight, is
celebrated in the Shah Nameh. She was afterwards one of the wives
of Chosroes. St. Martin. vol. x. p. 331.—M.]

The restoration of Chosroes was celebrated with feasts and
executions; and the music of the royal banquet was often
disturbed by the groans of dying or mutilated criminals. A
general pardon might have diffused comfort and tranquillity
through a country which had been shaken by the late revolutions;
yet, before the sanguinary temper of Chosroes is blamed, we
should learn whether the Persians had not been accustomed either
to dread the rigor, or to despise the weakness, of their
sovereign. The revolt of Bahram, and the conspiracy of the
satraps, were impartially punished by the revenge or justice of
the conqueror; the merits of Bindoes himself could not purify his
hand from the guilt of royal blood: and the son of Hormouz was
desirous to assert his own innocence, and to vindicate the
sanctity of kings. During the vigor of the Roman power, several
princes were seated on the throne of Persia by the arms and the
authority of the first Caesars. But their new subjects were soon
disgusted with the vices or virtues which they had imbibed in a
foreign land; the instability of their dominion gave birth to a
vulgar observation, that the choice of Rome was solicited and
rejected with equal ardor by the capricious levity of Oriental
slaves. But the glory of Maurice was conspicuous in the long and
fortunate reign of his son and his ally. A band of a thousand
Romans, who continued to guard the person of Chosroes, proclaimed
his confidence in the fidelity of the strangers; his growing
strength enabled him to dismiss this unpopular aid, but he
steadily professed the same gratitude and reverence to his
adopted father; and till the death of Maurice, the peace and
alliance of the two empires were faithfully maintained. 18 Yet
the mercenary friendship of the Roman prince had been purchased
with costly and important gifts; the strong cities of
Martyropolis and Dara 1811 were restored, and the Persarmenians
became the willing subjects of an empire, whose eastern limit was
extended, beyond the example of former times, as far as the banks
of the Araxes, and the neighborhood of the Caspian. A pious hope
was indulged, that the church as well as the state might triumph
in this revolution: but if Chosroes had sincerely listened to the
Christian bishops, the impression was erased by the zeal and
eloquence of the Magi: if he was armed with philosophic
indifference, he accommodated his belief, or rather his
professions, to the various circumstances of an exile and a
sovereign. The imaginary conversion of the king of Persia was
reduced to a local and superstitious veneration for Sergius, 19
one of the saints of Antioch, who heard his prayers and appeared
to him in dreams; he enriched the shrine with offerings of gold
and silver, and ascribed to this invisible patron the success of
his arms, and the pregnancy of Sira, a devout Christian and the
best beloved of his wives. 20 The beauty of Sira, or Schirin, 21
her wit, her musical talents, are still famous in the history, or
rather in the romances, of the East: her own name is expressive,
in the Persian tongue, of sweetness and grace; and the epithet of
Parviz alludes to the charms of her royal lover. Yet Sira never
shared the passions which she inspired, and the bliss of Chosroes
was tortured by a jealous doubt, that while he possessed her
person, she had bestowed her affections on a meaner favorite. 22

18 (return) [ Experimentis cognitum est Barbaros malle Roma
petere reges quam habere. These experiments are admirably
represented in the invitation and expulsion of Vonones, (Annal.
ii. 1—3,) Tiridates, (Annal. vi. 32-44,) and Meherdates, (Annal.
xi. 10, xii. 10-14.) The eye of Tacitus seems to have
transpierced the camp of the Parthians and the walls of the
harem.]

1811 (return) [ Concerning Nisibis, see St. Martin and his
Armenian authorities, vol. x p. 332, and Memoires sur l’Armenie,
tom. i. p. 25.—M.]

19 (return) [ Sergius and his companion Bacchus, who are said to
have suffered in the persecution of Maximian, obtained divine
honor in France, Italy, Constantinople, and the East. Their tomb
at Rasaphe was famous for miracles, and that Syrian town acquired
the more honorable name of Sergiopolis. Tillemont, Mem. Eccles.
tom. v. p. 481—496. Butler’s Saints, vol. x. p. 155.]

20 (return) [ Evagrius (l. vi. c. 21) and Theophylact (l. v. c.
13, 14) have preserved the original letters of Chosroes, written
in Greek, signed with his own hand, and afterwards inscribed on
crosses and tables of gold, which were deposited in the church of
Sergiopolis. They had been sent to the bishop of Antioch, as
primate of Syria. * Note: St. Martin thinks that they were first
written in Syriac, and then translated into the bad Greek in
which they appear, vol. x. p. 334.—M.]

21 (return) [ The Greeks only describe her as a Roman by birth, a
Christian by religion: but she is represented as the daughter of
the emperor Maurice in the Persian and Turkish romances which
celebrate the love of Khosrou for Schirin, of Schirin for Ferhad,
the most beautiful youth of the East, D’Herbelot, Biblioth.
Orient. p. 789, 997, 998. * Note: Compare M. von Hammer’s preface
to, and poem of, Schirin in which he gives an account of the
various Persian poems, of which he has endeavored to extract the
essence in his own work.—M.]

22 (return) [ The whole series of the tyranny of Hormouz, the
revolt of Bahram, and the flight and restoration of Chosroes, is
related by two contemporary Greeks—more concisely by Evagrius,
(l. vi. c. 16, 17, 18, 19,) and most diffusely by Theophylact
Simocatta, (l. iii. c. 6—18, l. iv. c. 1—16, l. v. c. 1-15:)
succeeding compilers, Zonaras and Cedrenus, can only transcribe
and abridge. The Christian Arabs, Eutychius (Annal. tom. ii. p.
200—208) and Abulpharagius (Dynast. p. 96—98) appear to have
consulted some particular memoirs. The great Persian historians
of the xvth century, Mirkhond and Khondemir, are only known to me
by the imperfect extracts of Schikard, (Tarikh, p. 150—155,)
Texeira, or rather Stevens, (Hist. of Persia, p. 182—186,) a
Turkish Ms. translated by the Abbe Fourmount, (Hist. de
l’Academie des Inscriptions, tom. vii. p. 325—334,) and
D’Herbelot, (aux mots Hormouz, p. 457—459. Bahram, p. 174.
Khosrou Parviz, p. 996.) Were I perfectly satisfied of their
authority, I could wish these Oriental materials had been more
copious.]