m Byzantium and was in Picenum. Now this Narses[186] was a
eunuch and guardian of the royal treasures, but for the rest keen and
more energetic than would be expected of a eunuch. And five thousand
soldiers followed him, of whom the several detachments were commanded by
different men, among whom were Justinus, the general of Illyricum, and
another Narses, who had previously come to the land of the Romans as a
deserter from the Armenians who are subject to the Persians; with him
had come his brother Aratius,[187] who, as it happened, had joined
Belisarius a little before this with another army. And about two
thousand of the Erulian nation also followed him, commanded by Visandus
and Aluith and Phanitheus.

FOOTNOTES:

[186] He was an Armenian of Persia; see Book I. xv. 31.

[187] Book I. xv. 31.

XIV

Now as to who in the world the Eruli are, and how they entered into
alliance with the Romans, I shall forthwith explain.[188] They used to
dwell beyond the Ister[189] River from of old, worshipping a great host
of gods, whom it seemed to them holy to appease even by human
sacrifices. And they observed many customs which were not in accord with
those of other men. For they were not permitted to live either when they
grew old or when they fell sick, but as soon as one of them was
overtaken by old age or by sickness, it became necessary for him to ask
his relatives to remove him from the world as quickly as possible. And
these relatives would pile up a quantity of wood to a great height and
lay the man on top of the wood, and then they would send one of the
Eruli, but not a relative of the man, to his side with a dagger; for it
was not lawful for a kinsman to be his slayer. And when the slayer of
their relative had returned, they would straightway burn the whole pile
of wood, beginning at the edges. And after the lire had ceased, they
would immediately collect the bones and bury them in the earth. And when
a man of the Eruli died, it was necessary for his wife, if she laid
claim to virtue and wished to leave a fair name behind her, to die not
long afterward beside the tomb of her husband by hanging herself with a
rope. And if she did not do this, the result was that she was in ill
repute thereafter and an offence to the relatives of her husband. Such
were the customs observed by the Eruli in ancient times.

But as time went on they became superior to all the barbarians who dwelt
about them both in power and in n