would be his heiress,
as he had no other children. She did not, however, trust Antonina's
character, and feared lest, after her own death, Antonina might prove
unfaithful to her house, although she had found her so helpful in
emergencies, and might break the compact. These considerations
prompted her to a most abominable act. She made the boy and girl live
together without any marriage ceremony, in violation of the laws. It
is said that the girl was unwilling to cohabit with him, and that the
Empress had her secretly forced to do so, that the marriage might be
consummated by the dishonour of the bride, and so the Emperor might
not be able to oppose it. After this had taken place, Anastasius and
the girl fell passionately in love with each other, and lived together
in this manner for eight months.

Immediately after the Empress's death, Antonina came to Byzantium. She
found it easy to ignore the outrage which Theodora had committed upon
her, and, without considering that, if she united the girl to another,
she would be no better than a harlot, she drove away Theodora's
grandson with insults, and forcibly separated her daughter from the
man whom she loved.

This action caused her to be regarded as one of the most heartless
women upon earth, but nevertheless the mother obtained, without any
difficulty, Belisarius's approval of her conduct, on his return home.
Thus did this man's true character reveal itself. Although he had
sworn a solemn oath to Photius and to several of his intimates and
broken it, yet all men readily forgave him, because they suspected
that the reason of his faithlessness was not the dominion of his wife
over him, but his fear of Theodora; but now that Theodora was dead, as
I have told you, he thought nothing about Photius or any of his
intimates, but entirely submitted to the sway of his wife, and her
pander Calligonus. Then at last all men ceased to believe in him,
scorned and flouted him, and railed at him for an idiot. Such were the
offences of Belisarius, about which I have been obliged to speak
freely in this place.

In its proper place, I have said enough about the shortcomings of
Sergius, the son of Bacchus, in Libya. I have told how he was the
chief cause of the ruin of the Roman power in that country, how he
broke the oath which he swore to the Levathae on the Gospels, and how
he, without excuse, put to death the eighty ambassadors. I need only
add in this place, that these men did not com