David Hume - The Dark Ages

Illus had employed the two years which he spent at Antioch (482-484) in making himself popular and gaining friends. He counted, for the coming struggle, on the support of the orthodox adherents of the Council of Chalcedon, who had been displeased be an ecclesiastical decree (the Henotikon) in which Zeno had expressly declined to maintain the dogmas of that assembly (A.D. 481). He may also have hoped for some help from pagans. He was very intimate with the pagan philosopher Pamprepius, who had been appointed Quaestor through his influence, and had accompanied him to Antioch. Deciding not to assume the purple himself, Illus drew from his Isaurian prison the ex-tyrant Marcian, and proclaimed him Emperor. He had sought the assistance of the Patrician and king Odovacar in Italy; he had written to the Persian monarch Piroz and to some of the satraps of Roman Armenia. Odovacar refused; the Persians and Armenians promised help when the time came. A great defeat which the Persians suffered at the hands of the Ephthalites (January, A.D. 484; Piroz was slain) rendered it impossible for them to fulfill their promise.

Zeno sent an Isaurian force against the rebels. 34About the same time Illus changed his plans, and entered into an alliance with his old enemy the Emperor Verina who was still languishing in an Isaurian fortress. 35He brought her to Tarsus, arrayed her in imperial robes; and it was decided to set aside Marcian, 36and to proclaim as Emperor the patrician Leontius. Verina crowned him Emperor, and a proclamation in her name was sent through the provinces of the East and Egypt. In this document she claims that the Empire belongs to her, that it was she who conferred it upon Zeno, and that now, since his avarice is ruining the state, she has determined to transfer it to the pious Leontius. 37The new Emperor was received at Antioch, 38and the rebellion spread. The Isaurian troops which Zeno had sent were obviously unable to cope with it, and Zeno sought the hope of Theoderic the Amal and his Ostrogoths. Theoderic, as Master of Soldiers in praesenti , joined the army of John the Scythian, and though he was recalled almost immediately, his followers seem to have remained and taken part in the campaign. 39Rugian auxiliaries were also sent under the command of Aspar’s son Ermenric. A battle was fought, the forces of Zeno were victorious, and Illus, Leontius, and Verina, with all their chief partisans, fled to the strong fortress of Cherris 40in the Isaurian mountains (autumn, A.D. 484). The Empress died in a few days. The cause of Illus was now hopeless, but the fortress held out for nearly four years. It was taken by treachery (488), and Illus and Leontius were beheaded. 41

The struggle between Illus and Zeno derives particular interest from the association of Illus with the prominent pagans who still flourished at Athens, Constantinople, and Alexandria. These men seem to have hoped that Illus, if victorious, would be able to secure public toleration for paganism. 42It was impossible, of course, to stamp the movement with a pagan character. If Illus had come forward as a new Julian, he would have had no following. But there is little doubt that he was personally in sympathy with the “Hellenes”; he was a man with intellectual interests and was inclined to the Neoplatonic philosophy. His close intimacy with the pagan savant, Pamprepius of Panopolis, who shared his fortunes, proves this. Pamprepius, who is described as swarthy and ugly, went in his youth from Egypt to the university of Athens, where he studied under the philosopher Proclus and was appointed professor of grammar (literature and philology). A quarrel with a magistrate forced him to leave Athens, and he betook himself to Constantinople, where pagans of talent, if they behaved discreetly, could still find a place. 43At the request of Illus he delivered a lecture, probably explaining the doctrines of Neoplatonism, and Illus procured his appointment as professor of grammar at the university. He established himself in the favour of Illus by public recitation of a poem, 44in reward for which he received a pension. But when Illus was absent in Isauria (A.D. 478), his enemies seized the opportunity to attack Pamprepius as a pagan and a sorcerer. He was banished from the city and retired to Pergamum; but Illus summoned him to Isauria, and then brought him back in triumph, and procured his appointment to the high post of Quaestorship. Henceforward his fortunes were bound up with those of Illus, to whom he acted as confidant and adviser throughout the struggle for the throne. The pagans blamed Pamprepius for the failure of the movement, and represented him as a traitor to the cause of his chief. But we may take it as certain that this charge was false, and that he was slain not because he was suspected of treachery, but because his prophecies had not come true and he had proved himself a blind guide. 45

The greater part of Zeno’s reign had been troubled on the one hand by the hostile risings of the Ostrogoths, which have still to be described, and on the other by rebellion. In 488 both these troubles were terminated by the departure of the Goths from Italy and by the final suppression of Illus. The Emperor persisted in his policy of firmly establishing Isaurian predominance. His brother Longinus, who had managed to escape from his prison, 46was consul twice and princeps of the Senate. 47Kottomenes had been appointed Master of Soldiers in praesenti , instead of Theoderic, in 484, and Longinus of Kardala at the same time became Master of Offices; both these men were Isaurians. 48

A modern historian who was perhaps the first to say a good word for Zeno, observes that “the great work of his reign was the formation of an army of native troops to serve as a counterpoise to the barbarian mercenaries”; and goes on to remark that the man who successfully resisted the schemes and forces of the great Theoderic cannot have been contemptible. 49And even from the pages of a hostile contemporary writer 50we can see that he was not so bad as he was painted. He is said to have been in some respects superior to Leo, less relentless and less greedy. He was not popular, 51for his ecclesiastical policy of conciliation did not find general favour, and he was an Isaurian. But he was inclined to be mild; he desired to abstain from employing capital punishment. In the first year of his reign, Erythrius was Praetorian Prefect, a very humane man, who, when he saw that sufficient revenue could not be raised without severe oppression, resigned his office. 52In fiscal administration Zeno was less successful than his predecessors and his successor Anastasius. We are told that he wasted all that Leo left in the treasury by donatives to his friends and inaccuracy in checking his accounts. In A.D. 477 the funds were very low, hardly sufficient to supply pay for the army. But the blame of this may rather rest with Basiliscus, who, reigning precariously for twenty months, must have been obliged to incur large expenses, to supply which he was driven to extortion, and in the following years the Ostrogoths were an incubus on the exchequer; while we must further remember that since the enormous outlay incurred by Leo’s naval expedition the treasury had been in financial difficulties, which only a ruler of strict economy and business habits, like the succeeding Emperor Anastasius, could have remedied. Zeno was not a man of business, he was indolent and in many respects weak. Yet it is said that his reign would have been a good one but for the influence of the Praetorian Prefect Sebastian, who succeeded Erythrius, and introduced a system of selling offices. 53Of Sebastian we otherwise hear very little.