CHAP.
XLVI.

His con-
quest of
Syria,
A. D. 611.

and a great number of the captives were beheaded on the field of battle by the sentence of the victor, who might justly condemn these seditious mercenaries as the authors or accomplices of the death of Maurice. Under the reign. of Phocas, the fortifications of Merdin, Dara, Amida, and Edessa, were successively besieged, reduced, and destroyed, by the Persian monarch: he passed the Euphrates, occupied the Syrian cities, Hierapolis, Chalcis, and Berrhea or Aleppo, and soon encompassed the walls of Antioch with his irresistible arms. The rapid tide of success discloses the decay of the empire, the incapacity of Phocas, and the disaffection of his subjects; and Chosroes provided a decent apology for their submission or revolt, by an impostor who attended his camp, as the son of Maurice and the lawful heir of the monarchy.

The first intelligence from the East which Heraclius received, was that of the loss of Antioch; but the aged metropolis, so often overturned by earthquakes and pil laged by the enemy, could supply but a small and languid stream of treasure and blood. The Persians were equally successful and more fortunate in the sack of Cæsarea, the capital of Cappadocia; and as they advanced beyond the ramparts of the frontier, the boundary of ancient war, they found a less obstinate resistance and a more plentiful harvest. The pleasant vale of Damascus has been adornedin every age with a royal city: her obscure felicity has hitherto escaped the historian of the Roman empire: but Chosroes reposed his troops in the paradise of Damascus before he ascended the hills of Libanus, or invaded the cities of the Phoenician coast. The conquest of Jerusalem, 60

58 The Persian historians have been themselves deceived; but Theophanes (p. 244.) accuses Chosroes of the fraud and falsehood; and Eutychius believes (Annal. tom. ii. p. 211.) that the son of Maurice, who was saved from the assassins, lived and died a monk on mount Sinai.

59 Eutychius dates all the losses of the empire under the reign of Phocas, an error which saves the honour of Heraclius, whom he brings not from Carthage, but Salonica, with a fleet laden with vegetables for the relief of Constantinople (Annal. tom. ii. p. 223, 224). The other Christians of the East, Barhebræus (apud Asseman, Bibliothec. Oriental. tom. iii. p. 412, 413), Elmacin (Hist. Saracen. p. 13...16), Abulpharagius (Dynast. p. 98, 99), are more sincere and accurate. The years of the Persian war are dis

posed in the chronology of Pagi.

60 On the conquest of Jerusalem, an event so interesting to the church,

XLVI.

of Pales

A. D. 614.

which had been meditated by Nushirvan, was achieved
by the zeal and avarice of his grandson; the ruin of the
proudest monument of Christianity was vehemently urged
by the intolerant spirit of the Magi; and he could enlist, tine,
for this holy warfare, an army of six and twenty thousand
Jews, whose furious bigotry might compensate, in some
degree, for the want of valour and discipline. After the
reduction of Gallilee, and the region beyond the Jordan,
whose resistance appears to have delayed the fate of the
capital, Jerusalem itself was taken by assault. The sepul--
chre of Christ, and the stately churches of Helena and Con-
stantine, were consumed, or at least damaged, by the flames;
the devout offerings of three hundred years were rifled in
one sacrilegious day; the patriarch Zachariah, and the
true cross, were transported into Persia; and the massacre
of ninety thousand Christians is imputed to the Jews and
Arabs who swelled the disorder of the Persian march.
The fugitives of Palestine were, entertained at Alexan-
dria by the charity of John the archbishop, who is distin-
guished among acrowd of saints by the epithet of alms-
giver: and the revenues of the church, with a treasure
of three hundred thousand pounds, were restored to the
true proprietors, the poor of every country and every de-
nomination. But Egypt itself, the only province which had
been exempt, since the time of Diocletian, from foreign
and domestic war, was again subdued by the successors
of Cyrus. Pelusium, the key of that impervious country,
was surprised by the cavalry of the Persians: they passed,
with impunity, the innumerable channels of the Delta,
and explored the long valley of the Nile, from the pyra-
mids of Memphis to the confines of Ethiopia. Alexan-
dria might have been relieved by a naval force, but the
archbishop and the præfect embarked for Cyprus; and
Chosroes entered the second city of the empire, which still

see the Annals of Eutychius (tom. ii. p. 212...223), and the lamentations of the monk Antiochus (apud Baronium, Annal. Eccles. A. D. 614, No. 16...26), whose one hundred and twenty-nine homilies are still extant, if what no one reads may be said to be extant.

61 The life of this worthy saint is composed by Leontius, a contempo. rary bishop; and I find in Baronius (Annal, Eccles. A. D. 610. No. 10, &c.) and Fleury (tom. viii. p. 235...242), sufficient extracts of this edifying work.

of Egypt,

A. D. 616.

XLVI.

of Asia Minor,

A. D. 616.

CHAP. preserved a wealthy remnant of industry and commerce. His western trophy was erected, not on the walls of Carthage, but in the neighbourhood of Tripoli: the Greek colonies of Cyrene were finally extirpated; and the conqueror, treading in the footsteps of Alexander, returned in triumph through the sands of the Lybian desart. In the first campaign, another army advanced from the Euphrates to the Thracian Bosphorus; Chalcedon surrendered after a long siege, and a Persian camp was maintained above ten years in the presence of Constantinople. The sea-coast of Pontus, the city of Ancyra, and the isle of Rhodes, are enumerated among the last conquests of the great king; and if Chosroes had possessed any maritime power, his boundless ambition would have spread slavery and desolation over the provinces of Europe.

&c.

His reign

nificence.

From the long-disputed banks of the Tigris and Euand mag- phrates, the reign of the grandson of Nushirvan was suddenly extended to the Hellespont and the Nile, the ancient limits of the Persian monarchy. But the provinces, which had been fashioned by the habits of six hundred years to the virtues and vices of the Roman government, supported with reluctance the yoke of the Barbarians. The idea of a republic was kept alive by the institutions, or at least by the writings, of the Greeks and Romans, and the subjects of Heraclius had been educated to pronounce the words of liberty and law. But it has always been the pride and policy of Oriental princes, to display the titles and att: ibutes of their omnipotence; to upbraid a nation of slaves with their true name and abject condition, and to enforce, by cruel and insolent threats, the rigour of their absolute commands. The Christians of the East were scandalized by the worship of fire, and the impious doctrine of the two principles: the Magi were not less intolerant than the bishops, and the martyrdom of some native Persians, who had deserted the religion of Zoroaster,63 was conceived

62 The error of Baronius, and many others who have carried the arms of Chesnes to Carthage instead of Chalcedon, is founded on the near resemblance of the Greek words Kaλxndove and Kagxndove, in the text of Theophanes, &c. which have been sometimes confounded by transcribers and sometimes by critics.

63 The genuine acts of St. Anastasius are published in those of the viith

64

to be the prelude of a fierce and general persecution. By the oppressive laws of Justinian, the adversaries of the church were made the enemies of the state; the alliance of the Jews, Nestorians, and Jacobites, had contributed to the success of Chosroes, and his partial favour to the sectaries provoked the hatred and fears of the Catholic clergy. Conscious of their fear and hatred, the Persian conqueror governed his new subjects with an iron sceptre ; and as if he suspected the stability of his dominion, he exhausted their wealth by exorbitant tributes and licentious rapine, despoiled or demolished the temples of the East, and transported to his hereditary realms the gold, the silver, the precious marbles, the arts, and the artists of the Asiatic cities. In the obscure picture of the calamities of the empire, it is not easy to discern the figure of Chosroes himself, to separate his actions from those of his lieutenants, or to ascertain his personal merit in the general blaze of glory and magnificence. He enjoyed with ostentation the fruits of victory, and frequently retired from the hardships of war to the luxury of the palace. But in the space of twenty-four years, he was deterred by superstition or resentment from approaching the gates of Ctesiphon: and his favourite residence of Artemita, or Dastagerd, was situate beyond the Tigris, about sixty miles to the north of the capital. The adjacent pastures were covered with flocks and herds: the paradise or park was replenished with pheasants, peacocks, ostriches, roebucks, and wild boars, and the noble game of lions and tigers was sometimes turned loose for the bolder pleasures of the chase. Nine hundred and sixty elephants were maintained for the use or splendour of the great king: his tents and baggage were carried into the field by twelve thousand great camels and eight thousand of a smaller size:66

general council, from whence Baronius (Annal. Eccles. A. D. 614. 626, 627), and Butler (Lives of the Saints, vol. i. p. 242...248), have taken their accounts. The holy martyr deserted from the Persian to the Roman army, became a monk at Jerusalem, and insulted the worship of the Magi, which was then established at Cæsarea in Palestine.

64 Abulpharagius, Dynast. p. 99. Elmacin, Hist. Saracen. p. 14.

65 D'Anville, Mem. de l'Academie des Inscriptions, tom. xxxii. p. 568...571.

66 The difference between the two races consists in one or two humps;
VOL. V.
3 N

CHAP.

XLVI.

CHAP.

XLVI.

and the royal stables were filled with six thousand mules and horses, among whom the names of Shebdiz and Barid are renowned for their speed or beauty. Six thousand guards successively mounted before the palace gate; the service of the interior apartments was performed by twelve thousand slaves, and in the number of three thousand virgins, the fairest of Asia, some happy concubine might conşole her master for the age or the indifference of Sira. The various treasures of gold, silver, gems, silk, and aromatics, were deposited in an hundred subterraneous vaults; and the chamber Badaverd denoted the accidental gift of the winds which had wafted the spoils of Heracli us into one of the Syrian harbours of his rival. The voice of flattery, and perhaps of fiction, is not ashamed to compute the thirty thousand rich hangings that adorned the walls; the forty thousand columns of silver, or more probably of marble, and plated wood, that supported the roof; and the thousand globes of gold suspended in the dome, to imitate the motions of the planets and the constellations of the zodiac. While the Persian monarch contemplated the wonders of his art and power, he received an epistle from an obscure citizen of Mecca, inviting him to acknowledge Mahomet as the apostle of God. He rejected the invitation, and tore the epistle. "It is thus," exclaimed the Arabian prophet, " that God will tear the kingdom, "and reject the supplications of Chosroes."68 Placed on the verge of the two great empires of the East, Mahomet observed with secret joy the progress of their mutual destruction, and in the midst of the Persian triumphs, he the dromedary has only one; the size of the proper camel is larger; the country he comes from, Turkestan or Bactriana; the dromedary is confined to Arabia and Africa. Buffon, Hist. Naturelle, tom. xi. p. 211, &c. Aristot. Hist. Animal. tom. i. l. ii. c. 1. tom. ii p. 185.

67 Theophanes, Chronograph. p. 268. D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, p. 997. The Greeks describe the decay, the Persians the splendour, of Dastagerd; but the former speak from the modest witness of the eye, the latter from the vague report of the ear.

68 The historians of Mahomet, Abulfeda (in Vit. Mohammed, p. 92, 93), and Gagnier (Vie de Mahomet, tom. ii. p. 247), date this embassy in the viith year of the Hegira, which commences A. D. 628, May 11. Their chronology is erroneous, since Chosroes died in the month of February of the same year (Pagi, Critica, tom. ii. p. 779). The count de Boulainvilliers (Vie de Mahomed, p. 327, 328.) places this embassy about A. D. 615, soon after the conquest of Palestine. Yet Mahomet would scarcely have ventured so soon on so bold a step.