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OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE
251
lation of Giustendil still indicates, about twenty miles to the south of Sophia, the residence of a Turkish sanjak[1] For the use of the emperor's countrymen, a cathedral, a palace, and an aqueduct were speedily constructed; the public and private edifices were adapted to the greatness of a royal city; and the strength of the walls resisted, during the life-time of Justinian, the unskilful assaults of the Huns and Sclavonians. Their progress was sometimes retarded, and their hopes of rapine were disappointed, by the innumerable castles, which, in the provinces of Dacia, Epirus, Thessaly, Macedonia, and Thrace, appeared to cover the whole face of the country. Six hundred of these forts were built or repaired by the emperor; but it seems reasonable to believe that the far greater part consisted only of a stone or brick tower, in the midst of a square or circular area, which was surrounded by a wall and ditch, and afforded in a moment of danger some protection to the peasants and cattle of the neighbouring villages.[2] Yet these military works, which exhausted the public treasure, could not remove the just apprehensions of Justinian and his European subjects. The warm baths of Anchialus in Thrace were rendered as safe as they were salutary; but the rich pastures of Thessalonica were foraged by the Scythian cavalry; the delicious vale of Tempe, three hundred miles from the Danube, was continually alarmed
- ↑ See d'Anville (Mémoires de l'Académie, &c. tom. xxxi. p. 289, 290), Rycaut (Present state of the Turkish Empire, p. 97, 316), Marsigli (Stato Militare del Imperio Ottomano, p. 130). The Sanjak of Giustendil is one of the twenty under the beglerbeg of Rumelia, and his district maintains 48 zaims and 588 timariots. [This identification is due to a false etymology. Küstendil corresponds to the ancient Pautalia, and derived this name from a mediæval despot, Constantine (of which Küstendil is the Turkish form). Justiniana Prima, the birthplace of Jus- tinian, is the ancient Scupi, the modern Üsküp. This has been completely de- monstrated by Mr. A. J. Evans, Antiquarian Researches in Illyricum, part 4, p. 134 sqq. Tauresium and Bederiane (see above, p. 205) are probably to be found (as Von Hahn suggested) in the villages of Taor and Bader. Mr. Evans points out (p. 82) that "the site of Scupi lies at the crossing-point of great natural routes across the western part of the Illyrian Peninsula. To those approaching the Aegean port [Thessalonica] from the middle Danube it occupied a position almost pre- cisely analogous to that held by Serdica on the military road to Constantinople." It is on the river Vardar (Axius) which connects it with Stobi and Thessalonica. "A. direct line of Roman way through the pass of Kačanik brought Scupi into peculiarly intimate relations with the Dardanian sister-town of Ulpiana." To Ulpiana Justinian gave the new name of Justiniana Secunda, and in its neighbourhood he built a city, Justinopolis, in honour of his uncle. This Dardanian foundation confirms the Dardanian origin of Justinian's family. Compare John Mal. apud Momms., Hermes, 6, 339, Ἰουστɩ̂νος ἐκ Βεδεριανον̂ ϕρουρίου πλησιάζοντος Ναίσσῳ, where the "proximity to Naissus" cannot be pressed.]
- ↑ These fortifications may be compared to the castles in Mingrelia (Chardin, Voyages en Perse, tom. i. p. 60, 131) — a natural picture.
