This page needs to be proofread.
180
THE DECLINE AND FALL
hand, or at least by the command, of his rival.[1] Secret and effectual orders had been previously dispatched; the faithless and rapacious mercenaries, at the same moment and without resistance, were universally massacred; and the royalty of Theodoric was proclaimed by the Goths, with the tardy, reluctant, ambiguous consent of the emperor of the East. The design of a conspiracy was imputed, according to the usual forms, to the prostrate tyrant; but his innocence and the guilt of his conqueror[2] are sufficiently proved by the advantageous treaty which force would not sincerely have granted nor weakness have rashly infringed. The jealousy of power and the mischiefs of discord may suggest a more decent apology, and a sentence less rigorous may be pronounced against a crime which was necessary to introduce into Italy a regeneration of public felicity. Reign of Theodoric, king of Italy. A.D 493, March 5-A.D. 526, Aug. 30 The living author of this felicity was audaciously praised in his own presence by sacred and profane orators;[3] but history (in his time she was mute and inglorious) has not left any just representation of the events which displayed, or of the defects which clouded, the virtues of Theodoric.[4] One record of his fame, the volume of public epistles composed by Cassiodorius in the royal name, is still extant, and has obtained more implicit credit than it seems
- ↑ [An account of the death of Odovacar has been recovered in a fragment of John of Antioch (ib. fr. 214). Theodoric invited Odovacar (now 60 years old) to a feast in the Palace of the Consul at the south-east corner of Ravenna, on March 15. As Odovacar sat at table, two men knelt before him with a petition and clasped his hands. Then soldiers, who were hidden in recesses on either side of the hall, rushed out, but for some cause they could not bring themselves to strike the king. Theodoric himself stepped forward and raised his sword. "Where is God?" cried Odovacar. "This didst thou to my friends," said Theodoric, and clave him from the collar bone to the loin. Surprised at his own stroke, he exclaimed, "The wretch can have had no bones in his body".]
- ↑ Procopius (Gothic. l. i. c. i) approves himself an impartial sceptic: ϕασὶ … δολερῷ τρόπῳ ἔκτεινε. Cassiodorius (in Chron.) and Ennodius (p. 1604 [p. 210, ed. Vogel]) are loyal and incredulous, and the testimony of the Valesian Fragment (p. 718 [§ 55]) may justify their belief. Marcellinus spits the venom of a Greek subject — perjuriis illectus interfectusque est (in Chron.).
- ↑ The sonorous and servile oration of Ennodius was pronounced at Milan or Ravenna in the years 507 or 508 (Sirmond, tom. i. p. 1615). Two or three years afterwards, the orator was rewarded with the bishopric of Pavia, which he held till his death in the year 521 (Dupin, Bibliot. Ecclés., tom. v. p. 11-14. See Saxii Onomasticon, tom. ii. p. 12).
- ↑ Our best materials are occasional hints from Procopius and the Valesian Fragment, which was discovered by Sirmond, and is published at the end of Ammianus Marcellinus. The author's name is unknown, and his style is barbarous; but in his various facts he exhibits the knowledge, without the passions, of a contemporary. [See Appendix 1.] The president Montesquieu had formed the plan of an history of Theodoric, which at a distance might appear a rich and interesting subject.
