g to live in the established fashion or to uphold
the institutions of the Persians. For he both reverenced strange
divinities, and lately, when his wife had died, he had buried her,
though it was forbidden by the laws of the Persians ever to hide in the
earth the bodies of the dead. The judges therefore condemned the man to
death, while Cabades, though seeming to be deeply moved with sympathy as
a friend of Seoses, was by no means willing to rescue him. He did not,
on the other hand, make it known that he was angry with him, but, as he
said, he was not willing to undo the laws of the Persians, although he
owed the man the price of his life, since Seoses was chiefly responsible
both for the fact that he was alive and also that he was king. Thus,
then, Seoses was condemned and was removed from among men. And the
office which began with him ended also with him. For no other man has
been made adrastadaran salanes. Rufinus also slandered Hypatius to the
emperor. As a result of this the emperor reduced him from his office,
and tortured most cruelly certain of his associates only to find out
that this slander was absolutely unsound; beyond this, however, he did
Hypatius no harm.

XII

Immediately after this, Cabades, though eager to make some kind of an
invasion into the land of the Romans, was utterly unable to do so on
account of the following obstacle which happened to arise. The Iberians,
who live in Asia, are settled in the immediate neighbourhood of the
Caspian Gates, which lie to the north of them. Adjoining them on the
left towards the west is Lazica, and on the right towards the east are
the Persian peoples. This nation is Christian and they guard the rites
of this faith more closely than any other men known to us, but they have
been subjects of the Persian king, as it happens, from ancient times.
And just then Cabades was desirous of forcing them to adopt the rites of
his own religion. And he enjoined upon their king, Gourgenes, to do all
things as the Persians are accustomed to do them, and in particular not
under any circumstances to hide their dead in the earth, but to throw
them all to the birds and dogs. For this reason, then, Gourgenes wished
to go over to the Emperor Justinus, and he asked that he might receive
pledges that the Romans would never abandon the Iberians to the
Persians. And the emperor gave him these pledges with great eagerness,
and he sent Probus, the nephew of the late emperor Anastasius, a