Its purpose.
In reading this estimate by Cassiodorus of his own performance, we can see at once that it lacked that first of all conditions precedent for the attainment of absolute historic truth, complete impartiality[43]. Like Hume and like Macaulay Cassiodorus wrote his history with a purpose. We may describe that purpose as two-fold:
(1) To vindicate the claim of the Goths to rank among the historic nations of antiquity by bringing them into some sort of connection with Greece and Rome ('Originem Gothicam historiam fecit esse Romanam'); and (2) among the Goths, to exalt as highly as possible the family of the Amals, that family from which Theodoric had sprung, and to string as many regal names as possible upon the Amal chain ('Evidenter ostendens in decimam septimam progeniem stirpem nos habere regalem').
I have said that the possession of a purpose like this is unfavourable to the attainment of absolute historic truth; but the aim which Cassiodorus proposed to himself was a lofty one, being in fact the reconciliation of the past and the future of the world by showing tothe outworn Latin race that the new blood which was being poured into it by the northern nations came, like its own, from a noble ancestry: and, for us, the labour to which it stimulated him has been full of profit, since to it we owe something like one half of our knowledge of the Teutonic ancestors of Modern Europe.
Confusion between Goths and Getae.
The much-desired object of 'making the origin of Gothic history Roman' was effected chiefly by attributing to the Goths all that Cassiodorus found written in classic authors concerning the Getae or the Scythians. The confusion between Goths and Getae, though modern ethnologists are nearly unanimous in pronouncing it to be a confusion between two utterly different nations, is not one for which Cassiodorus is responsible, since it had been made at least a hundred years before his time. When the Emperor Claudius II won his great victories over the Goths in the middle of the Third Century, he was hailed rightly enough by the surname ofGothicus; but when at the beginning of the Fifth Century the feeble Emperors Arcadius and Honorius wished to celebrate a victory which, as they vainly hoped, had effectually broken the power of the Goths, the words which they inscribed upon the Arch of Triumph were 'QuodGetarumnationem in omne aevum docuere extingui.' In the poems of Claudian, and generally in all the contemporary literature of the time, the regular word for the countrymen of Alaric is Getae.
The term Scythian.
The Greek historians, on the other hand, freely applied the general term Scythian—as they had done at any time since the Scythian campaign of Darius Hystaspis—to any barbarian nation living beyond the Danube and the Cimmerian Bosporus. With these two clues, or imaginary clues, in his hand, Cassiodorus could traverse a considerable part of the border-land of classical antiquity. The battles between the Scythians and the Egyptians, the story of the Amazons, Telephus son of Hercules andnephew of Priam, the defeat of Cyrus by Tomyris, and the unsuccessful expedition of Darius—all were connected with Gothic history by means of that easily stretched word, Scythia. Then comes Sitalces, King of Thrace, who makes war on Perdiccas of Macedon; and then, 'in the time of Sylla,' a certain wise philosopher-king of Dacia, Diceneus by name, in whose character and history Cassiodorus perhaps outlined his own ideal of wisdom swaying brute force. With these and similar stories culled from classical authors Cassiodorus appears to have filled up the interval—which was to him of absolutely uncertain duration—between the Gothic migration from the Baltic to the Euxine and their appearance as conquerors and ravagers in the eastern half of the Roman Empire in the middle of the third century of the Christian era. Now, soothing as it may have been to the pride of a Roman subject of Theodoric to be informed that his master's ancestors had fought at the war of Troy and humbled the pride of Perdiccas, to a scientific historian these Scytho-Getic histories culled from Herodotus and Trogus are of little or no value, and his first step in the process of enquiry is to eliminate them from 'Gothica historia,' thus making it, as far as he can,not'Romana.' The question then arises whether there was another truly Gothic element in the history of Cassiodorus, and if so, what value can be attached to it. Thus enquiring we soon find, both before and after this intrusive Scytho-Getic element, matter of quite a different kind, which has often much of the ring of the true TeutonicSaga. It is reasonable to believe that here Cassiodorus, whose mission it was to reconcile Roman and Goth, and who could not have achieved this end by altering the history of the less civilised people out of all possibility of recognition by its own chieftains and warriors, has really interwoven in his work some part of the songs and Sagas which were still current among the older men who had shared the wanderings of Theodoric. Thislegendary portion, which Cassiodorus himself perhaps half despised, as being gathered not from books but from the lips of rude minstrels, is in fact the only part of his work which has any scientific value.
The Amal pedigree.
In his glorification of the Amal line, Cassiodorus follows more closely these genuine national traditions than in his history of the Gothic people. References to Herodotus and Trogus would have been here obviously out of place, and he accordingly puts before us a pedigree fashioned on the same model as those which we find in the Saxon Chronicle, and therefore probably genuine. By genuine of course is meant a pedigree which was really current and accepted among the people over whom Theodoric ruled. How many of the links which form it represent real historical personages is a matter about which we may almost be said neither to know nor care. We see that it begins in the approved fashion with 'Non puri homines sed semidei id est Anses[44],' and that the first of these half-divine ancestors is namedGaut, evidently the eponymous hero of the Gothic people. Some of the later links—Amal, Ostrogotha, Athal—have the same appearance of names coined to embody facts of the national consciousness. At the end of the genealogy appear the undoubtedly historical names of the immediate ancestors of Theodoric. It is noteworthy that several, in fact the majority of the names of Kings who figure in early Gothic history, are not included in this genealogy. While this fact permits us to doubt whether Cassiodorus has not exaggerated the pre-eminence of the Amal race in early days, it must be admitted to be also an evidence of the good faith with which he preserved the national tradition on these points. Had he been merely inventing, it would have been easy to include every name of a distinguished Gothic King among the progenitors of his Sovereign.
Abstract by Jordanes.
Such then was the general purpose of the Gothic History of Cassiodorus. The book itself has perished—a tantalising loss when we consider how many treatises from the same pen have been preserved to us which we could well have spared. But we can speak, as will be seen from the preceding remarks, with considerable confidence as to its plan and purpose, because we possess in the well-known treatise of Jordanes 'On the Origin of the Goths[45]' an abbreviated copy, executed it is true by a very inferior hand, but still manifestly preserving some of the features of the original. It will not be necessary here to go into the difficult question as to the personality of this writer, which has been debated at considerable length and with much ingenuity by several German authors[46]. It is enough to say that Jordanes, who was, according to his own statement, 'agrammatus,' a man of Gothic descent, a notary, and then a monk[47], on the alleged request of his friend Castalius, 'compressed the twelve books of Senator,de origine actibusque Getarum, bringing down the history from olden times to our own days by kings and generations, into one little pamphlet.' Still, according to his statement, which there can be little doubt is here thoroughly false, he had the loan of the Gothic History for only three days from the steward of Cassiodorus, and wrote chiefly or entirely from his recollection of this hasty perusal[48]. He says that headded some suitable passages from the Greek and Latin historians, but his own range of historical reading was evidently so narrow that we may fairly suspect these additions to have been of the slenderest possible dimensions. Upon the whole, there can be little doubt that it is a safe rule to attribute everything that is good or passable in this little treatise to Cassiodorus, and everything that is very bad, childish, and absurd in it to Jordanes.
Temporary retirement from official life (?).
The literary labours of Cassiodorus, of which the Gothic History was one of the fruits, were probably continued for two or three years after its completion[49]. At least there is reason to believe that he was not actively engaged in the service of the State during those terrible years (524 and 525) in which the failing intellect of Theodoric, goaded almost to madness by Justin's persecution of his Arian co-religionists, condescended to ignoble measures of retaliation, which brought him into collision with Senate and Pope, and in the end tarnished his fame by the judicial murder of Boethius and Symmachus. It was fortunate indeed for Cassiodorus if he was during this time, perhaps because of his unwillingness to help the King to his own hurt, enjoying an interval of literary retirement at Squillace. His honour must have suffered if he had abetted the intolerant policy of Theodoric; his life might have been forfeit if he had openly opposed it.
Cassiodorus as Master of the Offices, 526.
Whatever may have been the cause of the temporary obscuration of Cassiodorus, he was soon again shining inall the splendour of official dignity; for when Theodoric died, his old and trusted minister was holding—probably not for the first time in his official career[50]—the great place of Master of the Offices.
TheMagister Officiorum, whose relation to the other members of the Cabinet of the Sovereign was somewhat indefinite, and who was in fact constantly trying to enlarge the circle of his authority at their expense, was at the head of the Civil Service of the Roman Empire, and afterwards occupied a similar position in the Ostrogothic State. It was said of him by the Byzantine orator Priscus (himself a man who had been engaged in important embassies), 'Of all the counsels of the Emperor the Magister is a partaker, inasmuch as the messengers and interpreters and the soldiers employed on guard at the palace are ranged under him.' Quite in harmony with this general statement are the more precise indications of the 'Notitia.' There, 'under the disposition of the illustrious Magister Officiorum,' we find fiveScholae, which seem to have been composed of household troops[51]. Then comes the great Schola of theAgentes in rebusand their deputies—a mighty army of 'king's messengers,' who swarmed through all the Provinces of the Empire, executing the orders of the Sovereign, and earning gold and hatred from the helpless Provincials among whom their errands lay. In addition to these the four great stationary bureaux—the Scrinium Memoriae, Scrinium Dispositionum, Scrinium Epistolarum, and Scrinium Libellorum—the offices whose duty it was to conduct the correspondence of the Sovereign with foreign powers, and to answer the petitions of his own subjects, all owned the Master of the Offices as their head. Moreover, the great arsenals (of which there were six in Italy at Concordia, Verona, Mantua, Cremona, Ticinum, and Lucca) received their orders from the same official. An anomalous and too widely dispersed range of functions this seems according to our ideas, including something of the Secretaryship for Foreign Affairs, something of the Home Secretaryship, and something of the War Office and the Horse Guards. Yet, as if this were not enough, there was also transferred to him from the office of the Praetorian Praefect the superintendence of the Cursus Publicus, that excellent institution by which facilities for intercourse were provided between the capital and the most distant Provinces, relays of post-horses being kept at every town, available for use by those who bore properly signed 'letters of evection.' Thus to the multifarious duties of the Master of the Offices was added in effect the duty of Postmaster-General. It was found however in practice to be an inconvenient arrangement for the Master of the Offices to have the control of the services of the 'public horses,' while the Praetorian Praefect remained responsible for the supply of their food; and the charge of theCursus Publicuswas accordingly retransferred—at any rate in the Eastern Empire—to the office of the Praefect, though the letters of evection still required the counter-signature of the Master[52].
Death of Theodoric, Aug. 30, 526.
Such was the position of Cassiodorus when, on the 30th of August, 526, by the death of Theodoric, he lost the master whom he had served so long and so faithfully. The difficulties which beset the new reign are pretty clearly indicated in the letters which Cassiodorus published in the name of the young King Athalaric, Theodoric's grandson, and which are to be found in theEighth Bookof the 'Variae.' Athalaric himself being only a boy of eight or ten years of age, supreme power was vested in his mother Amalasuentha, with what title we are unable to say, but apparently not with that of Queen. This Princess, a woman of great and varied accomplishments, perhaps once a pupil, certainly a friend, of Cassiodorus, ruled entirely in accordance with the maxims of his statesmanship, and endeavoured with female impulsiveness to carry into effect his darling scheme of Romanising the Goths. During the whole of her regency we may doubtless consider Cassiodorus as virtually her Prime Minister, and the eight years which it occupied were without doubt that portion of his life in which he exercised the most direct and unquestioned influence on State affairs.
Services of Cassiodorus to the Regent Amalasuentha.
His services at the commencement of the new reign will be best described in his own words: 'Nostris quoque principiis[53]' (the letter is written in Athalaric's name) 'quanto se labore concessit, cum novitas regni multa posceret ordinari? Erat solus ad universa sufficiens. Ipsum dictatio publica, ipsum consilia nostra poscebant; et labore ejus actum est ne laboraret imperium.Reperimus eum quidem Magistrum sed implevit nobis Quaestoris officium: et mercedes justissima devotione persolvens, cautelam, quam ab auctore nostro didicerat, libenter haeredis utilitatibus exhibebat[54].'
Fears of invasion.
Cassiodorus then goes on to describe how he laboured for his young Sovereign with the sword as well as with the pen. Some hostile invasion was dreaded, perhaps from the Franks, or, more probably, from the Vandals, whose relations with the Ostrogoths at that time were strained, owing to the murder of Theodoric's sister Amalafrida by Hilderic the Vandal King. Cassiodorus provided ships and equipped soldiers at his own expense,probably for the defence of his beloved Province of Bruttii. The alarm of war passed away, but difficulties appear to have arisen owing to the sudden cancellation of the contracts which had been entered into when hostilities seemed imminent; and to these difficulties Cassiodorus tells us that he brought his trained experience as an administrator and a judge, resolving them so as to give satisfaction to all who were concerned.
Cassiodorus as Praetorian Praefect, 533.
Seven years of Amalasuentha's regency thus passed, and now at length, at fifty-three years of age, Cassiodorus was promoted (Sept. 1, 533) to the most distinguished place which a subject could occupy. He received from Amalasuentha the office of Praetorian Praefect. As thirty-three years had elapsed since his father was invested with the same dignity, we may fairly conjecture that father and son both climbed this eminence at the same period of their lives; yet, considering the extraordinary credit which the younger Cassiodorus enjoyed at Court, we might have expected that he would have been clothed with the Praefecture before he attained the fifty-third year of his age. And, in fact, he hints in the letter composed by him, in which he informs himself of his own elevation[55], that that elevation had been somewhat too long delayed, though the reason which he alleges for the delay (namely, that the people might greet the new Praefect the more heartily[56]) is upon the face of it not the true cause.
Office of the Praetorian Praefect.
The majesty of the Praetorian Praefect's office is fully dwelt upon and its functions described in a letter in the following collection[57], to which the reader is referred. Originally only the chief officer of those Praetorian troops in Rome by whom the Emperor was guarded, until, aswas so often the case, he was in some fit of petulance by the same pampered sentinels dethroned, the Praefectus Praetorio had gradually become more and more of a judge, less and less of a soldier. In the great changes wrought by Constantine the Praetorian guards disappeared—somewhat in the same fashion after which the Janissaries were removed by Sultan Mahmoud. The Praetorian Praefect's dignity, however, survived, and though he lost every shred of military command he became or continued to be the first civil servant of the Empire. Cassiodorus is fond of comparing him to Joseph at the Court of Pharaoh, nor is the comparison an inapt one. In the Constantinople of our own day the Grand Vizier holds a position not altogether unlike that which the Praefect held in the Court of Arcadius and Theodosius. 'The office of this Praefect,' said one who had spent his life as one of his subordinates[58],' is like the Ocean, encircling all other offices and ministering to all their needs. The Consulate is indeed higher in rank than the Praefecture, but less in power. The Praefect wears amandye, or woollen cloak, dyed with the purple of Cos, and differing from the Emperor's only in the fact that it reaches not to the feet but to the knees. Girt with his sword he takes his seat as President of the Senate. When that body has assembled, the chiefs of the army fall prostrate before the Praefect, who raises them and kisses each in turn, in order to express his desire to be on good terms with the military power. Nay, even the Emperor himself walks (or till lately used to walk) on foot from his palace to meet the Praefect as he moves slowly towards him at the head of the Senate. The insignia of the Praefect's office are his lofty chariot, his golden reed-case [pen-holder], weighing one hundred pounds, his massive silver inkstand, and silver bowl on a tripod of the same metal to receive the petitions of suitors. Threeofficial yachts wait upon his orders, and convey him from the capital to the neighbouring Provinces.'
The Praetorian Praefect as Judge of Appeal.
The personage thus highly placed had a share in the government of the State, a share which the Master of the Offices was for ever trying to diminish, but which, in the hands of one who like Cassiodorus waspersona grataat the Court, might be made not only important but predominant[59]. The chief employment, however, of the ordinary Praefectus Praetorio consisted in hearing appeals from the Governors of the Provinces. When the magical words 'Provoco ad Caesarem' had been uttered, it was in most cases before the Praetorian Praefect that the appeal was practically heard; and when the Praetorian Praefect had pronounced his decision, no appeal from that was permitted, even to the Emperor himself[60].
Letters written during the Praefecture of Cassiodorus.
Cassiodorus held the post of Praetorian Praefect, amid various changes in the fortunes of the State, from 533 to 538, or perhaps a year or two longer. Of his activity in the domain of internal administration, theEleventhandTwelfthBooks of the 'Variae' give a vivid and interesting picture. Unfortunately, neither those books nor theTenth Bookof the same collection, which contains the letters written by him during the same time in the names of the successive Gothic Sovereigns, give any sufficient information as to the real course of publicevents. Great misfortunes, great crimes, and the movements of great armies are covered over in these documents by a veil of unmeaning platitudes and hypocritical compliments. In order to enable the student to 'read between the lines,' and to pierce through the verbiage of these letters to the facts which they were meant to hint at or to conceal, it will be necessary briefly to describe the political history of the period as we learn it from the narratives of Procopius and Jordanes—narratives which may be inaccurate in a few minor details but are doubtless correct in their main outlines.
Opposition to Romanising policy of Amalasuentha.
The Romanising policy of the cultivated but somewhat self-willed Princess Amalasuentha met with considerable opposition on the part of her Gothic subjects. Above all, they objected to the bookish education which she was giving to her son, the young King. They declared that it was entirely contrary to the maxims of Theodoric that a young Goth should be trembling before the strap of a pedagogue when he ought to be learning to look unfalteringly on spear and sword. These representations were so vigorously made, and by speakers of such high rank in the State, that Amalasuentha was compelled to listen to them, to remove her son from the society of his teachers, and to allow him to associate with companions of his own age, who, not being wisely chosen, soon initiated him in every kind of vice and dissipation.
Amalasuentha puts three Gothic nobles to death.
The Princess, who had not forgiven the leaders of the Gothic party for their presumptuously offered counsels, singled out three of the most powerful nobles who were at the head of that party and sent them into honourable banishment at the opposite ends of Italy. Finding, however, that they were still holding communication with one another, she sent to the Emperor Justinian to ask if he would give her an asylum in his dominions if she required it, and then gave orders for the secret assassination of the three noblemen. Thecoup d'étatsucceeded: she had no need to flee the country; and theship bearing the royal treasure, which amounted to 40,000 pounds weight of gold, which she had sent to Dyrrhachium to await her possible flight, was ordered to return home.
Embassies between Ravenna and Constantinople.
Athalaric's health was now rapidly failing, owing to his licentious excesses, and Amalasuentha, fearing that after his death her own life might be in danger, began again secretly to negotiate with Justinian for the entire surrender of the kingdom of Italy into his hands, on receiving an assurance of shelter and maintenance at the Court of Byzantium. These negotiations were masked by others of a more public kind, in which Justinian claimed the Sicilian fortress of Lilybaeum, which had once belonged to the Vandals; insisted on the surrender of some Huns, deserters from the army of Africa; and demanded redress for the sack by the Goths of the Moesian city of Gratiana. These claims Amalasuentha met publicly with a reply as brave and uncompromising as her most patriotic subjects could desire, but in private, as has been already said, she was prepared, for an adequate assurance of personal safety, to barter away all the rights and liberties of her Italian subjects, Roman as well as Gothic, and to allow her father's hard-earned kingdom to sink into a mere dependency of Constantinople.
Death of Athalaric, Oct. 2, 534.
Such was the position of affairs when on the 2nd October 534, little more than a year after Cassiodorus had donned the purple of the Praefect, Athalaric died, and by his death the whole attitude of the parties to the negotiations was changed. The power to rule, and with it the very power to make terms of any kind with the Emperor, was in danger of slipping from the hands of Amalasuentha. The principle of female sovereignty was barely accepted by any Teutonic tribe. Evidently the Ostrogoths had not accepted it, or Amalasuentha would have ruled as Queen in her own right instead of as Regent for her son. In order to strengthen her position, and ensure her acceptanceas Sovereign by the Gothic warriors, she decided to associate with herself, not in matrimony, for he was already married, but in regal partnership, her cousin Theodahad, the nearest male heir of Theodoric, and to mount the throne together with him. Previously, however, to announcing this scheme in public, she sent for Theodahad and exacted from him 'tremendous oaths[61]' that if he were chosen King he would be satisfied with the mere name of royalty, leaving her as much of the actual substance of power as she possessed at that moment.
Amalasuentha associates Theodahad in the Sovereignty.
The partnership-royalty and the oath of self-abnegation were the desperate expedients of a woman who knew herself to have mighty enemies among her subjects, and who felt power slipping from her grasp. With one side of her character her new partner could sympathise; for Theodahad, though sprung from the loins of Gothic warriors, was a man of some literary culture, who preferred poring over the 'Republic' of Plato to heading a charge of the Gothic cavalry. But his acquaintance with Latin and Greek literature had done nothing to ennoble his temper or expand his heart. A cold, hard, avaricious soul, he had been entirely bent on adding field to field and removing his neighbour's landmark, until the vast possessions which he had received from the generosity of Theodoric should embrace the whole of the great Tuscan plain. It will be seen by referring to two letters in the following collection[62]that Theodoric himself had twice employed the pen of Cassiodorus to rebuke the rapacity of his nephew; and at a more recent date, since the beginning of Athalaric's illness, Amalasuentha had been compelled by the complaints of her Tuscan subjects to issue a commission of enquiry, which had found Theodahad guilty of the various acts of land-robbery which had been charged against him, and had compelled him to make restitution.
Amalasuentha is deposed and imprisoned by Theodahad, April 30, 535.
The new Queen persuaded herself, and tried to persuade her cousin, that this ignominious sentence had in some way put the subject of it straight with the world, and had smoothed his pathway to the throne. She trusted to his gratitude and his tremendous oaths for her own undisturbed position at the helm of the State, but she found before many months of the joint reign had passed that the reed upon which she was leaning was about to pierce her hand. Only four letters, it will be seen, of the following collection were written by order of Amalasuentha after the commencement of the joint reign. Soon Theodahad felt himself strong enough to hurl from the throne the woman who had dared to compel him to draw back the boundary of his Tuscanlatifundium.The relations of the three noblemen whom Amalasuentha had put to death gathered gladly round him, eager to work out the blood-feud; and by their help he slew many of the strongest supporters of the Queen, and shut her up in prison in a little lonely island upon the lake of Vulsinii. This event took place on the 30th of April, 535, not quite seven months after the death of Athalaric[63].
Embassy of Peter.
During all these later months there had been a perpetual flux and reflux of diplomatic communications between Ravenna and Constantinople. The different stages of the negotiations are marked, apparently with clearness, by Procopius; but it is not always easy to harmonise them with the letters published by Cassiodorus, who either did not write, or shrank from republishing, some of the most important letters to the Emperor. This remark applies to the missive which was probably taken by the Senators Liberius and Opilio, who were now sent by Theodahad to Justinian to apologise for the imprisonment of Amalasuentha, andto promise that she should receive no injury. Meanwhile Peter, a rhetorician and an ex-Consul, was travelling from Constantinople with a commission the character of which was being constantly changed by the rapid current of events. He started with instructions to complete the transaction with Amalasuentha as to the surrender of Italy, and to buy from Theodahad, who was still a private individual, his possessions in Tuscany. Soon after his departure he met the ambassadors, who told him of the death of Athalaric and the accession of Theodahad. On the shores of the Hadriatic he heard of Amalasuentha's captivity. He waited for further instructions from his master, and on his arrival at Ravenna he found that all was over. The letter which he was to have handed to the deposed Queen, assuring her of Justinian's protection, was already obsolete. The kinsmen of the three nobles had been permitted or encouraged by Theodahad to end the blood-feud bloodily.Death of Amalasuentha.They had repaired to the Lake of Vulsinii and murdered Amalasuentha in her bath[64]. The Byzantine ambassador sought the presence of the King, boldly denounced his wicked deed, and declared on the part of his master a war which would be waged without truce or treaty till Amalasuentha was avenged. Thus began the eighteen years' war between Justinian and the Ostrogoths.
Why did Cassiodorus continue in the service of Theodahad?
It might certainly have been expected that a statesman who had been honoured with the intimate friendship of Theodoric and his daughter, even if unable to avenge her death, would have refused to serve in the Cabinet of her murderer. It is accordingly with a feeling of painful surprise that we find Cassiodorus still holding the Secretary's pen, and writing letter after letter (they form the majority of the documents in theTenth Bookof the 'Variae') in the name of Theodahad and his wife Gudelina. Dangers no doubt were thickening round his beloved Italy. He may have thought that whoever wore the Gothic crown, Duty forbade him to quit the Secretum at Ravenna just when war with the Empire was becoming every day more imminent. On the other hand, the Praetorian Praefecture, the object of a life's ambition, was now his, but had been his only for two years. It was hard to lay aside the purplemandyewhile the first gloss was yet upon it; hard to have to fall back into the ranks of the ordinary senators, and no longer to receive the reverent salutations of the chiefs of the army when he entered the hall of meeting. Whether the public good or the private advantage swayed him most who shall say? There are times when patriotism calls for the costliest sacrifice which a statesman can make—the sacrifice, apparently, of his own honour. The man who has made such a sacrifice must be content to be misjudged by his fellow-men. Certainly, to us the one stain upon an otherwise pure reputation seems to be found in the service, the apparently willing service, which in theTenth Bookof his letters Cassiodorus renders to Theodahad.
Vacillation of Theodahad.
Throughout the latter half of 535, Belisarius in Sicily and Mundus in Dalmatia were warring for Justinian against Theodahad. The rhetorician Peter, who had boldly rebuked the Gothic King for the murder of his benefactress, and had on his master's behalf denounced a truceless war against him, still lingered at his Court. Theodahad, who during part of the summer and autumn of 535 seems to have been at Rome, not at Ravenna, was more than half inclined to resume his old negotiations with the Emperor, and either to purchase peace by sinking into the condition of a tributary, or to sell his kingdom outright for a revenue of £48,000 a year and a high place among the nobles of the Empire. Procopius[65]gives us a vivid and detailed narrative of the manner in which these negotiations were conducted by Theodahad, who was perpetually wavering between arrogance and timidity; trembling at the successes of Belisarius, elated by any victory which his generals might win in Dalmatia; and who at length, upon receiving the tidings of the defeat and death of Mundus, broke off the negotiations altogether, and shut up Peter and his colleague Athanasius in prison.
Silence of the 'Variae' as to many of the negotiations between Theodahad and Justinian.
Here again, while not doubting the truth of the narrative of Procopius, I do not find it possible exactly to fit in the letters written by Cassiodorus for Theodahad with the various stages of the negotiation as described by him. Especially the striking letter of the King to the Emperor—striking by reason of its very abjectness—which is quoted by Procopius in the sixth chapter of his First Book, appears to be entirely unrepresented in the collection of Cassiodorus. Evidently all this part of the 'Variae' has been severely edited by its author, who has expunged all that seemed to reflect too great discredit on the Sovereign whom he had once served, and has preserved only some letters written to Justinian and Theodora by Theodahad and his wife, vaguely praising peace, and beseeching the Imperial pair to restore it to Italy; letters which, as it seems to me, may be applied with about equal fitness to any movement of the busy shuttle of diplomacy backwards and forwards between Ravenna and Constantinople.
Theodahad deposed, Witigis elected, Aug. 536.
The onward march of Belisarius trampled all the combinations of diplomatists into the dust. In the early part of July, 536, he had succeeded in capturing the important city of Neapolis, and had begun to threaten Rome. The Gothic warriors, disgusted at the incapacity of their King, and probably suspecting his disloyalty to the nation, met (August, 536) under arms upon the plainof Regeta[66], deposed Theodahad, and elected a veteran named Witigis as his successor. Witigis at once ordered Theodahad to be put to death, and being himself of somewhat obscure lineage, endeavoured to strengthen his title to the crown by marrying Matasuentha, the sister of Athalaric and the only surviving descendant of Theodoric.
Letter on the elevation of Witigis.
Whether Cassiodorus had any hand in this revolution—which was pre-eminently a Gothic movement—we cannot tell; but certainly one of the best specimens of his letters is that written in the name of the new King[67], in which he makes Witigis thus speak, 'Universis Gothis'—not as Theodoric had so often spoken, 'Universis Gothis et Romanis:'
'Unde Auctori nostro Christo gratias humillimâ satisfactione referentes, indicamus parentes nostros Gothos inter procinctuales gladios, more majorum, scuto supposito, regalem nobis contulisse, praestante Deo, dignitatem, ut honorem arma darent, cujus opinionem bella pepererant. Non enim in cubilis angustis, sed in campis latè patentibus electum me esse noveritis: nec inter blandientium delicata colloquia, sed tubis concrepantibus sum quaesitus, ut tali fremitu concitatus desiderio virtutis ingenitae regem sibi Martium Geticus populus inveniret.'
Letters written in name of Witigis.
We have only five letters written by Cassiodorus for Witigis (who reigned from August, 536, to May[68], 540). One has been already described. All the other four are concerned with negotiations for peace with Justinian, and may probably be referred to the early part of the new reign.
Share of Cassiodorus in the administration during the war.
It will be seen that the letters written by Cassiodorus for the Sovereign during the five years following the death of Athalaric are few and somewhat unsatisfactory.But, on the other hand, it was just during these years that he wrote in his own name as Praetorian Praefect the letters which are comprised in theEleventhandTwelfthBooks of his collection, and which are in some respects the most interesting of the whole series. There is a strong probability that he was not present at the long siege of Rome (March, 537, to March, 538), nor is it likely that he, an elderly civilian, would take much part in any of the warlike operations that followed. Upon the whole, it seems probable that during the greater part of this time Cassiodorus was, to the best of his power, keeping the civil administration together by virtue of his own authority as Praetorian Praefect, without that constant reference to the wishes of the Sovereign which would have been necessary under Theodoric and his daughter. Perhaps, in the transitional state of things which then prevailed in Italy, with the power of the Gothic sceptre broken but the sway of the Roman Caesar not yet firmly established in its stead, men of all parties and both nationalities were willing that as much as possible of the routine of government should be carried on by a statesman who was Roman by birth and culture, but who had been the trusted counsellor of Gothic Kings.
Dates of later letters.
I have endeavoured as far as possible to fix the dates of these later letters. It will be seen that we have one[69]probably belonging to the year 536, five[70]to 537, and one[71](possibly) to 538. These later letters refer chiefly to the terrible famine which followed in the train of the war, and of which Cassiodorus strenuously laboured to mitigate the severity.
End of Cassiodorus' official career.
It is possible that the Praefect may have continued to hold office down to the capture of Ravenna in May, 540, which made Witigis a prisoner, and seemed to bring the Ostrogothic monarchy to an end. Upon the whole,however, it is rather more probable that in the year 538 or 539 he finally retired from public life. The dates of his letters will show that there is nothing in them which forbids us to accept this conclusion; and the fact, if it be a fact, that in 540, when Belisarius, with his Secretary Procopius in his train, made his triumphal entry into Ravenna, the late Praefect was no longer there, but in his native Province of Bruttii, a little lessens the difficulty of that which still remains most difficult of comprehension, the entire omission from Procopius' History of the Gothic War of all mention of the name of Cassiodorus.
The Variae edited.
The closing years of the veteran statesman's tenure of office were years of some literary activity. It was in them that he was collecting, and to some extent probably revising, the letters which appear in the following collection. His motives for publishing this monument of his official life are sufficiently set forth in the two prefaces, one prefixed to theFirst Bookand the other to theEleventh. Much emphasis is laid on the entreaties of his friends, the regular excuse, in the sixth century as in the nineteenth, for an author or a politician doing the very thing which most pleases his own vanity. A worthier reason probably existed in the author's natural desire to vindicate his own consistency, by showing that the influence which for more than thirty years he had wielded in the councils of the Gothic Sovereigns had been uniformly exerted on the side of law and order and just government, directed equally to the repression of Teutonic barbarism and the punishment of Roman venality.