words (for the man was
wholly inexperienced in such misfortunes), Hypatius reproached him at
length and said that those who were about to die unjustly should not
lament. For in the beginning they had been forced by the people against
their will, and afterwards they had come to the hippodrome with no
thought of harming the emperor. And the soldiers killed both of them on
the following day and threw their bodies into the sea. The emperor
confiscated all their property for the public treasury, and also that of
all the other members of the senate who had sided with them. Later,
however, he restored to the children of Hypatius and Pompeius and to all
others the titles which they had formerly held, and as much of their
property as he had not happened to bestow upon his friends. This was the
end of the insurrection in Byzantium.

XXV

Tribunianus and John were thus deprived of office, but at a later time
they were both restored to the same positions. And Tribunianus lived on
in office many years and died of disease, suffering no further harm from
anyone. For he was a smooth fellow and agreeable in every way and well
able by the excellence of his education to throw into the shade his
affliction of avarice. But John was oppressive and severe alike with all
men, inflicting blows upon those whom he met and plundering without
respect absolutely all their money; consequently in the tenth year of
his office he rightly and justly atoned for his lawless conduct in the
following manner.

The Empress Theodora hated him above all others. And while he gave
offence to the woman by the wrongs he committed, he was not of a mind to
win her by flattery or by kindness in any way, but he openly set himself
in opposition to her and kept slandering her to the emperor, neither
blushing before her high station nor feeling shame because of the
extraordinary love which the emperor felt for her. When the queen
perceived what was being done, she purposed to slay the man, but in no
way could she do this, since the Emperor Justinian set great store by
him. And when John learned of the purpose of the queen regarding him, he
was greatly terrified. And whenever he went into his chamber to sleep,
he expected every night that some one of the barbarians would fall upon
him to slay him; and he kept peeping out of the room and looking about
the entrances and remained sleepless, although he had attached to
himself many thousands of spearmen and guards, a thin