laging and plundering
everything there. But what disturbed most of all both him and all
Carthage was the fate which befell Aigan, the Massagete, and Rufinus,
the Thracian, in Byzacium. For both were men of great repute both in the
household of Belisarius and in the Roman army, one of them, Aigan, being
among the spearmen of Belisarius, while the other, as the most
courageous of all, was accustomed to carry the standard of the general
in battle; such an officer the Romans call "bandifer."[32] Now at the
time referred to these two men were commanding detatchments of cavalry
in Byzacium, and when they saw the Moors plundering everything before
them and making all the Libyans captives, they watched in a narrow pass
with their followers for those who were escorting the booty, and killed
them and took away all the captives. And when a report of this came to
the commanders of the barbarians, Coutzinas and Esdilasas and
Iourphouthes and Medisinissas, who were not far away from this pass,
they moved against them with their whole army in the late afternoon. And
the Romans, being a very few men and shut off in a narrow place in the
midst of many thousands, were not able to ward off their assailants. For
wherever they might turn, they were always shot at from the rear. Then,
indeed, Rufinus and Aigan with some few men ran to the top of a rock
which was near by and from there defended themselves against the
barbarians. Now as long as they were using their bows, the enemy did not
dare come directly to a hand-to-hand struggle with them, but they kept
hurling their javelins among them; but when all the arrows of the Romans
were now exhausted, the Moors closed with them, and they defended
themselves with their swords as well as the circumstances permitted. But
since they were overpowered by the multitude of the barbarians, Aigan
fell there with his whole body hacked to pieces, and Rufinus was seized
by the enemy and led away. But straightway one of the commanders,
Medisinissas, fearing lest he should escape and again make trouble for
them, cut off his head and taking it to his home shewed it to his wives,
for it was a remarkable sight on account of the extraordinary size of
the head and the abundance of hair. And now, since the narration of the
history has brought me to this point, it is necessary to tell from the
beginning whence the nations of the Moors came to Libya and how they
settled there.

When the Hebrews had withdrawn from Egy