XL.

praises the solid construction and double parapet CHA P. of a wall, whose long arms stretched on either side into the sea; but whose strength was deemed insufficient to guard the Chersonesus, if each city, and particularly Galipoli and Sestus, had not been secured by their peculiar fortifications. The long wall, as it was emphatically styled, was a work as disgraceful in the object, as it was respectable in the execution. The riches of a capital diffuse themselves over the neighbouring country, and the territory of Constantinople, a paradise of nature, was adorned with the luxurious gardens and villas of the senators and opulent citizens. But their wealth served only to attract the bold and rapacious Barbarians; the noblest of the Romans, in the bosom of peaceful indolence, were led away into Scythian captivity, and their sovereign might view from his palace, the hostile flames which were insolently spread to the gates of the Imperial city. At the distance only of forty miles Anastasius was constrained to establish a last frontier; his long wall, of sixty miles from the Propontis to the Euxine, proclaimed the impotence of his arms; and as the danger became more imminent, new fortifications were added by the indefatigable prudence of Justinian *. Asia Minor, after the submission of the Isau- Security of

Asia, after rians t, remained without enemies and without the conVOL. VII.

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fortifications. quest of

XL.

CHA P. fortifications. Those bold savages, who had dís.

dained to be the subjects of Gallienus, persisted two hundred and thirty years in a life of independence and rapine. The most successful princes respected the strength of the mountains and the despair of the natives ; their fierce spirit was sometimes soothed with gifts, and sometimes restrained by terror; and a military count, with three legions, fixed his permanent and ignominious station in the heart of the Roman provinces *. But no sooner was the vigilance of power relaxed or diverted, than the light-armed squadrons descended from the hills, and invaded the peaceful plenty of Asia. Although the Isaurians were not remarkable for stature or bravery, want rendered them bold, and experience made them skilful in the exercise of predatory war. They advanced with secrecy and speed to the attack of villages and defenceless towns; their flying parties have sometimes touched the Hellespont, the Euxine, and the gates of Tarsus, Antioch, or Damascust; and the spoil was lodged in their inaccessible mountains, before the Roman troops had received their orders, or the distant province had computed its loss. The guilt of rebellion and robbery excluded them from the rights of national enemies; and the magistrates were instructed by an edict, that the trial or punishment of an Isaurian, even on the festival of Easter, was

a me * Trebellius Pollio in Hist. August. p. 107. who lived under Diocletian, or Constantine. See likewise Pancirolus ad Not. Imp. Orient. c. 115. 141. See Cod. Theodos. 1. ix. tit. 35. leg. 37. with a copious collective Annotation of Godefroy, tom. iii. p. 256, 257.

+ See the full and wide extent of their inroads in Philostorgius (Hist. Eccles. l. xi. c. 8.), with Godefroy's learned Dissertations,

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a meritorious act of justice and piety *. If the CHAP. captives were condemned to domestic slavery, they maintained, with their sword or dagger, the private quarrel of their masters ; and it was found expedient for the public tranquillity, to prohibit the service of such dangerous retainers. When their countryman Tarcalissæus or Zeno ascended the thorne, he invited a faithful and formidable band of Isaurians, who insulted the court and city, and were rewarded by an annual tribute of five thousand pounds of gold. But the hopes of fortune depopulated the mountains, luxury enervated the hardiness of their minds and bodies, and in proportion as they mixed with mankind, they became less qualified for the enjoyment of poor and solitary freedom. After the death of Zeno, his successor Anastasius suppressed their pensions, exposed their persons to the revenge of the people, banished them from Constantinople, and prepared to sustain a war, which left only the alternative of victory or servitude. A brother of the last emperor usurped the title of Augustus, his cause was powerfully supported by the arms, the treasures, and the magazines, collected by Zeno; and the native Isaurians must have formed the smallest portion of the hundred and fifty thousand Barbarians under his standard, which was sanctified, for the first time, by the presence of a fighting bishop. Their disorderly numbers were vanquished in the plains of

Phrygia

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• Cod. Justiniani. I. ix. tit. 12. leg. io. The punishments are severe--a fine of an hundred pounds of gold, degradation, and even death. The public peace might afford a pretence, but Zeno was desirous of monopolizing the valous and service of the Isaurians.

XL.

A. D.

CHAP. Phrygia by the valour and discipline of the Gothis;

but a war of six years almost exhausted the courage

of the emperor * The Isaurians retired to their 493—498. mountains ; their fortresses were successively be

sieged and ruined ; their communication with the sea was intercepted; the bravest of their leaders died in arms; the surviving chiefs, before their execution, were dragged in chains through the hippodrome; a colony of their youth was transplanted into Thrace, and the remnant of the people submitted to the Roman government. Yet some generations elapsed before their minds were reduced to the level of slavery. The populous villages of Mount Taurus were filled with horsemen and archers; they resisted the imposition of tributes, but they recruited the armies of Justinian ; and his civil magistrates, the proconsul of Cappadocia, the count of Isauria, and the prætors of Lycaonia and Pisidia, were invested with military power to restrain the licentious practice of rapes

and assassinations t. Fortifica. If we extend our view from the tropic to the tions of the empire. mouth of the Tanais, we may observe on one hand,

the

* The Isaurian war and the triumph of Anastasius are briefly and darkly represented by John Malala (tom. ii. p. 106, 107.), Evagrius (1, iii. c. 35.), Theophanes (p. 118-120.), and the Chronicle of Marcellinus.

+ Fortes ea regio (says Justinian) viros habet, nec in ullo differt ab Isauria, though Procopius (Persic. 1. i. c. 18.), marks an essential difference between their military character; yet in former times the Lycaonians and Pisidians had defended their liberty against the great king (Xenophon. Anabasis, l. iii. c. 2.). Justinian introduces some false and ridiculous erudition of the ancient empire of the Pisidians, and of Lycaon, who, after visiting Rome (long before Æneas), gave a name and people, to Lycaonia (Novell, 24, 25. 27. 30.).

From the

the Persian

the precautions of Justinian to curb the savages of CHA P. Æthiopia *, and on the other, the long walls XL. which he constructed in Crimea for the protection of his friendly Goths, a colony of three thousand Euxine to shepherds and warriors t. From that peninsula frontier, to Trebizond, the eastern curve of the Euxine was secured by forts, by alliance, or by religion; and the possession of Lazica, the Colchos of ancient, the Mingrelia of modern, geography, soon became the object of an important war. Trebizond, in after-times the seat of a romantic empire, was indebted to the liberality of Justinian for a church, an aqueduct, and a castle, whose ditches are hewn in the solid rock. From that maritime city, a frontier-line of five hundred miles may be drawn to the fortress of Circesium, the last Roman station on the Euphrates 1. Above Trebizond immediately, and five days journey to the south, the country rises into dark forests and craggy mountains, as savage though not so lofty as the Alps and the Pyrenees. In this rigorous climate,

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