was committed to the subtle prudence of Count Trajan; and he had the merit of insinuating himself into the confidence of the credulous prince, that he might find an opportunity of stabbing him to the heart. Para was invited to a Roman banquet, which had been prepared with all the pomp and sensuality of the East: the hall resounded with cheerful music, and the company was already heated with wine; when the count retired for an instant, drew his sword, and gave the signal of the murder. A robust and desperate Barbarian instantly rushed on the king of Armenia; and, though he bravely defended his life with the first weapon that chance offered to his hand, A.D. 374 the table of the Imperial general was stained with the royal blood of a guest, and an ally. Such were the weak and wicked maxims of the Roman administration, that, to attain a doubtful object of political interest, the laws of nations and the sacred rights of hospitality were inhumanly violated in the face of the world.[1]
V. THE DANUBE. Conquests of Hermanric V. During a peaceful interval of thirty years, the Romans secured their frontiers, and the Goths extended their dominions, The victories of the great Hermanric,[2] king of the Ostrogoths, and the most noble of the race of the Amali, have been compared, by the enthusiasm of his countrymen, to the exploits of Alexander: with this singular, and almost incredible, difference, that the martial spirit of the Gothic hero, instead of being supported by the vigour of youth, was displayed with glory and success in the extreme period of human life; between the age of fourscore and one hundred and ten years. The independent tribes were persuaded, or compelled, to acknowledge the king of the Ostrogoths as the sovereign of the Gothic nation: the chiefs of the Visigoths, or Thervingi, renounced the royal title, and assumed the more humble appellation of Judges;[3] and, among those judges, Athanaric, Fritigem, and Alavivus were the most illustrious, by their personal merit, as well as by their vicinity to the Roman provinces. These domestic conquests,- ↑ See in Ammianus (xxx. 1) the adventures of Para. [Pap is the true name, Faustus, B. H. passim.] Moses of Chorene calls him Tiridates; and tells a long and not improbable story of his son Gnelus; who afterwards made himself popular in Armenia, and provoked the jealousy of the reigning king (l. iii. c. 21, &c., p. 253, &c.). [Knel was nephew of Arshak, who killed him and married his wife Pharandzēm. Faustus, iv. 15.]
- ↑ The concise account of the reign and conquests of Hermanric, seems to be one of the valuable fragments which Jornandes (c. 28) borrowed from the Gothic histories of Ablavius, or Cassiodorus.
- ↑ [Dahn agrees that the Visigoths belonged to a (loose) confederacy of which Hermanric was chief, Kön. der Germanen, ii. 90. But he doubts the legitimacy of inferring from the case of Athanaric (called Judge by Themistius, Or. X., and Ammian.) that the other chiefs were called Judges (v. 10).]
