e to attach Alamoundaras
to himself. For, as he said, Summus, who had recently gone to the
Saracen ostensibly to arrange matters, had hoodwinked him by promises of
large sums of money on condition that he should join the Romans, and he
brought forward a letter which, he alleged, the Emperor Justinian had
written to Alamoundaras concerning these things. He also declared that
he had sent a letter to some of the Huns, in which he urged them to
invade the land of the Persians and to do extensive damage to the
country thereabout. This letter he asserted to have been put into his
hands by the Huns themselves who had come before him. So then Chosroes,
with these charges against the Romans, was purposing to break off the
treaty. But as to whether he was speaking the truth in these matters, I
am not able to say.

II

At this point Vittigis, the leader of the Goths, already worsted in the
war, sent two envoys to him to persuade him to march against the Romans;
but the men whom he sent were not Goths, in order that the real
character of the embassy might not be at once obvious and so make
negotiations useless, but Ligurian priests who were attracted to this
enterprise by rich gifts of money. One of these men, who seemed to be
the more worthy, undertook the embassy assuming the pretended name of
bishop which did not belong to him at all, while the other followed as
his attendant. And when in the course of the journey they came to the
land of Thrace, they attached to themselves a man from there to be an
interpreter of the Syriac and the Greek tongues, and without being
detected by any of the Romans, they reached the land of Persia. For
inasmuch as they were at peace, they were not keeping a strict guard
over that region. And coming before Chosroes they spoke as follows: "It
is true, O King, that all other envoys undertake their task for the sake
of advantages to themselves as a rule, but we have been sent by
Vittigis, the king of the Goths and the Italians, in order to speak in
behalf of thy kingdom; and consider that he is now present before thee
speaking these words. If anyone should say, O King, putting all in a
word, that thou hast given up thy kingdom and all men everywhere to
Justinian, he would be speaking correctly. For since he is by nature a
meddler and a lover of those things which in no way belong to him, and
is not able to abide by the settled order of things, he has conceived
the desire of seizing upon the whole ea