ambassadors once more visiting the Byzantine
court, and entreating Justin to renounce the fifty years' peace and
unite with them in a grand attack upon the common enemy, which, if
assaulted simultaneously on either side, might (they argued) be almost
certainly crushed. Justin gave the ambassadors no definite reply, but
renewed the alliance with Dizabul, and took seriously into consideration
the question whether he should not yield to the representations made
to him, and renew the war which Justinian had terminated nine years
previously.

There were many circumstances which urged him towards a rupture. The
payments to be made under the fifty years' peace had in his eyes the
appearance of a tribute rendered by Rome to Persia, which was, he
thought, an intolerable disgrace. A subsidy, not very dissimilar, which
Justinian had allowed the Saracenic Arabs under Persian rule, he had
already discontinued; and hostilities had, in consequence, already
commenced between the Persian and the Roman Saracens. The successes
of Chosroes in Western Arabia had at once provoked his jealousy,
and secured to Rome, in that quarter, an important ally in the great
Christian kingdom of Abyssinia. The Turks of Central Asia had sought his
friendship and offered to combine their attacks with his, if he would
consent to go to war. Moreover, there was once more discontent and
even rebellion in Armenia, where the proselytizing zeal of the Persian
governors had again driven the natives to take up arms and raise the
standard of independence. Above all, the Great King, who had warred with
such success for twenty years against his uncle, was now in advanced
age, and seemed to have given signs of feebleness, inasmuch as in his
recent expeditions he had individually taken no part, but had entrusted
the command of his troops to others. Under these circumstances, Justin,
in the year A.D. 572, determined to renounce the peace made ten
years earlier with the Persians, and to recommence the old struggle.
Accordingly he at once dismissed the Persian envoy, Sebocthes, with
contempt, refused wholly to make the stipulated payment, proclaimed his
intention of receiving the Armenian insurgents under his protection,
and bade Chosroes lay a finger on them at his peril. He then appointed
Marcian to the prefecture of the East, and gave him the conduct of the
war which was now inevitable.

No sooner did the Persian monarch find his kingdom seriously menaced
than, despite