luntary agreement before marriage. A wife was found
for each without any previous notice, not because she pleased him (as
is generally the case even amongst the barbarians) but because
Theodora so desired it. Brides also had to put up with the same
treatment, and were obliged to marry husbands whom they did not
desire. She often turned the bride out of bed herself, and, without
any reason, dismissed the bridegroom before the marriage had been
consummated, merely saying, in great anger, that she disapproved of
her. Amongst others whom she treated in this manner was Leontius the
"referendary," and Saturninus, the son of Hermogenes the late Master
of Offices, whom she deprived of their wives. This Saturninus had a
young maiden cousin of an age to marry, free-born and modest, whom
Cyrillus, her father, had betrothed to him after the death of
Hermogenes. After the bridal chamber had been made ready and
everything prepared, Theodora imprisoned the youthful bridegroom, who
was afterwards conducted to another chamber, and forced, in spite of
his violent lamentations and tears, to wed the daughter of
Chrysomallo. This Chrysomallo had formerly been a dancer and a common
prostitute, and at that time lived with another woman like her, and
with Indaro, in the palace, where, instead of devoting themselves to
phallic worship and theatrical amusements, they occupied themselves
with affairs of State together with Theodora.

Saturninus, having lain with his new wife and discovered that she had
already lost her maidenhead, informed one of his friends that his wife
was no virgin. When this reached the ears of Theodora, she ordered the
servants to hoist him up, like a boy at school, upbraiding him with
having behaved too saucily and having taken an unbecoming oath. She
then had him severely flogged on the bare back, and advised him to
restrain his talkative tongue for the future.

In my former writings I have already related her treatment of John of
Cappadocia, which was due to a desire to avenge personal injuries, not
to punish him for offences against the State, as is proved by the fact
that she did nothing of the kind in the case of those who committed
far greater cruelties against their subjects. The real cause of her
hatred was, that he ventured to oppose her designs and accused her to
the Emperor, so that they nearly came to open hostilities. I mention
this here because, as I have already stated, in this work I am bound
to state the