broken treaty on a lance, and bade his troops fight under that banner. As at Kossovo, the God of Battles accepted the appeal, and in the utter rout of the Persians that followed, Piroz himself was killed. The Turks, mere nomad tribesmen still, could not follow up their great success; but Persian power was paralyzed for the moment, and Armenia recognized the opportunity and sprang to arms. The new King, Balas, was glad enough to retain his sovereignty over them at the price of the recognition of their national Christianity.
Balas also filled up the vacant patriarchate of the Assyrian Church, but it was not Bar-soma that he selected. The late King's favourite seldom stands too well with the new ruler, and Balas ordered the consecration of the old school-fellow of Bar-soma, Acacius. This destroyed the very base of the power that the Bishop of Nisibis had wielded. He was, of course, metropolitan still; but he was not head of the melet, and another was. To use a homely metaphor, there had been a new deal, and a change of trumps. All the old figures remained unaltered, but their relations to one another and their relative values had changed.
For a little Bar-soma refused to admit the situation, and would not acknowledge Acacius. We do not know what ostensible reason he gave, but it does not matter, for it was his own power that he fought for, and the dispute was not long. The metropolitan of Nisibis had to admit that he was powerless against the patriarch backed by the King, and finally to submit, making the best terms for himself that he could.
Thus, in August 485, Acacius came north; and a gathering of bishops (for it was hardly a formal council) took place at B. Adrai,[1] in the province of Nuhadra. Bar-soma had still a strong party be-
- ↑ Syn. Or., 61, 308. Bar-soma, Letter 1.
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