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358 THE DECLINE AND FALL [Chap, xli Secret history of his wife Antonina Her lover Theodosius empire. In his fame and merit, in wealth and power, he remained without a rival, the first of the Eoman subjects ; the voice of envy could only magnify his dangerous importance ; and the emperor might applaud his own discerning spirit which had discovered and raised the genius of Belisarius. It was the custom of the Roman triumphs that a slave should be placed behind the chariot to remind the conqueror of the instability of fortune and the infirmities of human nature. Procopius, in his Anecdotes, has assumed that servile and un- grateful office. The generous reader may cast away the libel, but the evidence of facts will adhere to his memory ; and he will reluctantly confess that the fame, and even the virtue, of Belisarius were polluted by the lust and cruelty of his wife ; and that the hero deserved an appellation which may not drop from the pen of the decent historian. The mother of Antonina 128 was a theatrical prostitute, and both her father and grandfather exercised at Thessalonica and Constantinople the vile, though lucrative, profession of charioteers. In the various situations of their fortune, she became the companion, the enemy, the servant, and the favourite of the empress Theodora : these loose and ambitious females had been connected by similar pleasures ; they were separated by the jealousy of vice, and at length re- conciled by the partnership of guilt. Before her marriage with Belisarius, Antonina had one husband and many lovers ; Photius, the son of her former nuptials, was of an age to distinguish himself at the siege of Naples ; and it was not till the autumn of her age and beauty 129 that she indulged a scandalous attach- ment to a Thracian youth. Theodosius had been educated in the Eunomian heresy ; the African voyage was consecrated by the baptism and auspicious name of the first soldier who embarked ; and the proselyte was adopted into the family of his spiritual parents, 130 Belisarius and Antonina. Before they 128 The diligence of Alemannus could add but little to the four first and most curious chapters of the Anecdotes. Of these strange Anecdotes, a part may be true, because probable — and a part true, because improbable. Procopius must have known the former, and the latter he could scarcely invent. 129 Procopius insinuates (Anecdot. c. 4) that, when Belisarius returned to Italy (a.d. 543), Antonina was sixty years of age. A forced but more polite construction, which refers that date to the moment when he was writing (a.d. 559), would be com- patible with the manhood of Photius (Gothic. 1. i. c. 10) in 536. 130 Compare the Vandalic war (1. i. c. 12) with the Aneodotes (c. 1) and Ale- mannus (p. 2, 3). This mode of baptismal adoption was revived by Leo the philosopher.