the secret history of justinian and theodora

For the General declared that in a dream a certain person came to him, a creature of enormous size and in other respects too mighty to resemble a man. This John had confined Justinus in a prison because of some offence and was on the point of removing him from the world on the following day, and would have done so had not a vivid dream come to him in the meantime and prevented him. And he sent a considerable army against them, commanded by John who is known as the Hunchback.

But at a later time Anastasius, who had succeeded to the royal power, became involved in a war against the Isaurian nation, who had taken up arms against him. For they were all men of very fine figure. And they came to Byzantium, walking on foot and themselves carrying cloaks slung over their shoulders, and when they arrived they had in these cloaks nothing more than toasted bread which they had put in at home and the Emperor enrolled them in the ranks of the soldiers and designated them for the Palace Guard. When Leon was holding the imperial power in Byzantium, three young farmers, Illyrians by race, Zimarchus, Dityvistus and Justinus from Vederiana, men who at home had to struggle incessantly against conditions of poverty and all its attendant ills, in an effort to better their condition set out to join the army. Now what manner of persons Justinian and Theodora were and the method by which they ruined the Roman Empire I shall proceed to tell forthwith.

The secret history of justinian and theodora