Procopius

Procopius of Caesarea (Greek: Προκόπιος ὁ Καισαρεύς Prokopios ho Kaisareus, Latin: Procopius Caesariensis; c. 500 – c. 554 AD) was a prominent late antique Greek scholar from Palaestina Prima.^[1] Accompanying the Byzantine chief-general Belisarius in the wars of the Emperor Justinian, he became the principal Greek-Byzantine historian of the 6th century, writing the Wars (or Histories), the Buildings of Justinian and the now-celebrated (and infamous) Secret History. He is commonly held to be the last major historian of the ancient Western world.

Life

Apart from his own writings, the main source for Procopius' life is an entry in the Suda,^[2] a Byzantine encyclopaedia, written sometime after 975, which tells everything about his early life. He was a native of Caesarea in the Roman Province Palaestina Prima.^[3] He would have received a conventional elite education in the Greek classics and then rhetoric,^[4] perhaps at the famous School of Gaza,^[5] may have attended law school, possibly at Berytus (modern Beirut) or Constantinople,^[6] and became a rhetor (barrister or advocate).^[2] He evidently knew Latin, as was natural for a man with legal training.^[7] In 527, the first year of Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian's reign, he became the adsessor (legal adviser) for Belisarius, Justinian's chief military commander who was then beginning a brilliant career.^[8]

Procopius was with Belisarius on the eastern front until the latter was defeated at the Battle of Callinicum in 531^[9] and recalled to Constantinople.^[10] Procopius witnessed the Nika riots of January, 532, which Belisarius and his fellow general Mundus repressed with a massacre in the Hippodrome.^[11] In 533, he accompanied Belisarius on his victorious expedition against the Vandal kingdom in North Africa, took part in the capture of Carthage, and remained in Africa with Belisarius' successor Solomon the Eunuch when Belisarius returned to Constantinople. Procopius recorded a few of the extreme weather events of 535–536, although these were presented as a backdrop to Roman (Byzantine) military activities, such as a mutiny, in and near Carthage.^[12] He rejoined Belisarius for his campaign against the Ostrogothic kingdom in Italy and experienced the Gothic siege of Rome that lasted a year and nine days, ending in mid-March 538. He witnessed Belisarius' entry into the Gothic capital, Ravenna, in 540. Book Eight of the Wars of Justinian, and the Secret History, suggest that his relationship with Belisarius seems to have cooled thereafter. When Belisarius was sent back to Italy in 544 to cope with a renewal of the war with the Goths, now led by the able king Totila, Procopius appears to have no longer been on Belisarius' staff.

As magister militum, Belisarius was a vir illustris, and Procopius, as his adsessor, must, therefore, have had at least the rank of a vir spectabilis. He thus belonged to the middle-ranking group of the ordo senatorius. However, the Suda, which is usually well informed in such matters, also describes Procopius himself as ἰλλούστριος . Should this information be correct, then Procopius had a seat in the senate of Constantinople, which was restricted to the illustres under Justinian.

It is not known when Procopius himself died, and many historians (James Howard-Johnson, Averil Cameron, Geoffrey Greatrex) date his death to 554, but in 562 there was an urban prefect of Constantinople (praefectus urbi Constantinopolitanae) who happened to be called Procopius. In that year, Belisarius was implicated in a conspiracy and was brought before this urban prefect.

Writings

Emperor Justinian

The writings of Procopius are the primary source of information for the rule of the Eastern Roman emperor Justinian. Procopius was the author of a history in eight books of the wars fought by Justinian I, a panegyric on Justinian's public works throughout the empire, and a book known as the Secret History that claims to report the scandals that Procopius could not include in his published history.

Secret History

Belisarius may be this bearded figure on the right of Emperor Justinian I in the mosaic in the Church of San Vitale, Ravenna, which celebrates the reconquest of Italy by the Roman army under the skillful leadership of Belisarius.

The famous Secret History (Ancient Greek: Ἀποκρύφη Ἱστορία Apokrýphe Historía, Latin: Historia Arcana) was discovered centuries later in the Vatican Library^[15] and published by Niccolò Alamanni in 1623 at Lyons. Its existence was already known from the Suda, which referred to it as the Anekdota (Ancient Greek: Ἀνέκδοτα, Latin Anecdota, "unpublished writings"). The Secret History covers roughly the same years as the first seven books of the History of Justinian's Wars and appears to have been written after they were published. Current consensus generally dates it to 550 or 558, or maybe even as late as 562.

In the eyes of many scholars, the Secret History reveals an author who had become deeply disillusioned with the emperor Justinian and his wife, Empress Theodora, as well as Belisarius, his former commander and patron, and Antonina, Belisarius' wife. The anecdotes claim to expose the secret springs of their public actions, as well as the private lives of the emperor, his wife and their entourage. Justinian is portrayed as cruel, venal, prodigal and incompetent; as for Theodora, the reader is treated to the most detailed and titillating portrayals of vulgarity and insatiable lust combined with shrewish and calculating mean-spiritedness. However, it has been argued that Procopius feared that a conspiracy could overthrow the imperial power, and therefore prepared an exaggerated document in order to clear himself of all accusations of proximity to the former imperial power; if this hypothesis is correct, the Secret History cannot be seen as proof that Procopius hated Justinian and Theodora.^[16]

Among the more titillating (and doubtful) revelations in the Secret History is Procopius' account of Theodora's thespian accomplishments:

Often, even in the theatre, in the sight of all the people, she removed her costume and stood nude in their midst, except for a girdle about the groin: not that she was abashed at revealing that, too, to the audience, but because there was a law against appearing altogether naked on the stage, without at least this much of a fig-leaf. Covered thus with a ribbon, she would sink down to the stage floor and recline on her back. Slaves to whom the duty was entrusted would then scatter grains of barley from above into the calyx of this passion flower, whence geese, trained for the purpose, would next pick the grains one by one with their bills and eat.^[17]

Her husband Justinian, meanwhile, was a monster whose head could suddenly vanish—at least according to this passage:

And some of those who have been with Justinian at the palace late at night, men who were pure of spirit, have thought they saw a strange demoniac form taking his place. One man said that the Emperor suddenly rose from his throne and walked about, and indeed he was never wont to remain sitting for long, and immediately Justinian's head vanished, while the rest of his body seemed to ebb and flow; whereat the beholder stood aghast and fearful, wondering if his eyes were deceiving him. But presently he perceived the vanished head filling out and joining the body again as strangely as it had left it.^[18]

The Buildings of Justinian

Triumphal arch at the entrance to the Sangarius Bridge

The Buildings of Justinian (Greek: Περὶ Κτισμάτων Perì Ktismáton, Latin: De Aedificiis, "On Buildings") is a panegyric on Justinian's building activity in the empire.^[19] The first book may date to before the collapse of the first dome of Hagia Sophia in 557, but some scholars^[20] think that it is possible that the work postdates the building of the bridge over the Sangarius in the late 550s. The Peri ktismaton (or De Aedificiis) tells us nothing further about Belisarius, but it takes a sharply different attitude towards Justinian. He is presented as an idealised Christian emperor who built churches for the glory of God and defenses for the safety of his subjects and who showed particular concern for the water supply. He built new aqueducts as well as restoring those that had fallen into disuse.

Historians consider Buildings to be an incomplete work, due to evidence of the surviving version being a draft with two possible redactions.^[19][21]

Theodora, who was dead when this panegyric was written, is mentioned only briefly, but Procopius' praise of her beauty is fulsome. The panegyric was likely written at Justinian's behest, however, and it is doubtful that the sentiments expressed are sincere.

Due to the panegyrical nature of The Buildings, historians have discovered in several occasions discrepancies between claims made by Procopius and other primary sources. A primary example is in Procopius starting the reign of Justinian in 518, which was actually the start of the reign of Justin I, Justinian's predecessor and uncle. This discrepancy can be seen as part of Procopius' panegyric method, as it allowed him to credit buildings constructed under the rule Justin I as Justinian's accomplishments. In this context can be mentioned the renovations to the walls of Edessa after a flood in 525, along with several churches in the region, all of which were completed under Justinian's uncle. Similarly, Procopius falsely credits Justinian for the extensive re-fortifications made in the cities of Tomis and Histria in Scythia Minor, along the Danubian frontier, actual accomplishments of Anastasius I, predecessor of Justin I.^[22]

Context

Procopius belongs to the school of late antique secular historians who continued the traditions of the Second Sophistic; they wrote in Attic Greek, their models were Herodotus, Polybius and especially Thucydides, and their subject matter was secular history. They avoided vocabulary unknown to Attic Greek and inserted an explanation when they had to use contemporary words. Thus Procopius explains to his readers that ekklesia, meaning a Christian church, is the equivalent of a temple or shrine and that monks are "the most temperate of Christians ... whom men are accustomed to call monks" (Wars 2.9.14; 1.7.22). In classical Athens, monks had been unknown and an ekklesia was the assembly of Athenian citizens that passed the laws.

The secular historians eschewed the history of the Christian church, which they left to ecclesiastical history—a genre that was founded by Eusebius of Caesarea. However, Averil Cameron has argued convincingly that Procopius' works reflect the tensions between the classical and Christian models of history in 6th century Byzantium. This is supported by Mary Whitby's analysis of Procopius' depiction of Constantinople and the Church of Hagia Sophia in comparison to contemporary pagan panegyrics (Buildings, Book I). Procopius can be seen as depicting Justinian as essentially God's Vicegerent, making the case for buildings being a primarily religious panegyric.^[23]

Procopius indicated (Secret History 26.18) that he planned to write an ecclesiastical history himself and, if he had, he would probably have followed the rules of that genre. But, as far as it is known, the ecclesiastical history remained unwritten.

A number of historical novels based on Procopius' works (along with other sources) have been written, one of which, Count Belisarius, was written by poet and novelist Robert Graves in 1938. Procopius himself appears as a minor character in Felix Dahn's A Struggle for Rome and in L. Sprague de Camp's alternate history novel Lest Darkness Fall. The novel's main character, archaeologist Martin Padway, derives most of his knowledge of historical events from the Secret History.^[24]

List of selected works

• Procopii Caesariensis opera omnia. Edited by J. Haury; revised by G. Wirth. 3 vols. Leipzig: Teubner, 1962–64. Greek text.
• Procopius. Edited by H. B. Dewing. 7 vols. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press and London, Hutchinson, 1914–40. Greek text and English translation.
• Procopius, The Secret History, translated by G. A. Williamson. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1966. A readable and accessible English translation of the Anecdota. Recently re-issued by Penguin (2007) with an updated and livelier translation by Peter Sarris, who has also provided a new commentary and notes.
• Prokopios, The Secret History, translated by Anthony Kaldellis. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 2010. This edition includes related texts, an introductory essay, notes, maps, a timeline, a guide to the main sources from the period and a guide to scholarship in English. The translator uses blunt and precise English prose in order to adhere to the style of the original text.

References

This article is based on an earlier version by James Allan Evans, originally posted at Nupedia.

Further reading

• Adshead, Katherine: Procopius' Poliorcetica: continuities and discontinuities, in: G. Clarke et al. (eds.): Reading the past in late antiquity, Australian National UP, Rushcutters Bay 1990, pp. 93–119
• Alonso-Núñez, J. M.: Jordanes and Procopius on Northern Europe, in: Nottingham Medieval Studies 31 (1987), 1–16.
• Amitay, Ory: Procopius of Caesarea and the Girgashite Diaspora, in: Journal for the Study of the Pseudepigrapha 20 (2011), 257–276.
• Anagnostakis, Ilias: Procopius's dream before the campaign against Libya: a reading of Wars 3.12.1-5, in: C. Angelidi and G. Calofonos (eds.), Dreaming in Byzantium and Beyond, Farnham: Ashgate Publishing 2014, 79–94.
• Bachrach, Bernard S.: Procopius, Agathias and the Frankish Military, in: Speculum 45 (1970), 435–441.
• Bachrach, Bernard S.: Procopius and the chronology of Clovis's reign, in: Viator 1 (1970), 21–32.
• Baldwin, Barry: An Aphorism in Procopius, in: Rheinisches Museum für Philologie 125 (1982), 309–311.
• Baldwin, Barry: Sexual Rhetoric in Procopius, in: Mnemosyne 40 (1987), pp. 150–152
• Belke, Klaus: Prokops De aedificiis, Buch V, zu Kleinasien, in: Antiquité Tardive 8 (2000), 115–125.
• Börm, Henning: Prokop und die Perser. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, 2007. (Review in English by G. Greatrex and Review in English by A. Kaldellis)
• Börm, Henning: Procopius of Caesarea, in Encyclopaedia Iranica Online, New York 2013.
• Börm, Henning: Procopius, his predecessors, and the genesis of the Anecdota: Antimonarchic discourse in late antique historiography, in: H. Börm (ed.): Antimonarchic discourse in Antiquity. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag 2015, 305–346.
• Braund, David: Procopius on the Economy of Lazica, in: The Classical Quarterly 41 (1991), 221–225.
• Brodka, Dariusz: Die Geschichtsphilosophie in der spätantiken Historiographie. Studien zu Prokopios von Kaisareia, Agathias von Myrina und Theophylaktos Simokattes. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2004.
• Burn, A. R.: Procopius and the island of ghosts, in: English Historical Review 70 (1955), 258–261.
• Cameron, Averil: Procopius and the Sixth Century. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985.
• Cameron, Averil: The scepticism of Procopius, in: Historia 15 (1966), 466–482.
• Colvin, Ian: Reporting Battles and Understanding Campaigns in Procopius and Agathias: Classicising Historians' Use of Archived Documents as Sources, in: A. Sarantis (ed.): War and warfare in late antiquity. Current perspectives, Leiden: Brill 2013, 571–598.
• Cresci, Lia Raffaella: Procopio al confine tra due tradizioni storiografiche, in: Rivista di Filologia e di Istruzione Classica 129 (2001), 61–77.
• Cristini, Marco: Il seguito ostrogoto di Amalafrida: confutazione di Procopio, Bellum Vandalicum 1.8.12, in: Klio 99 (2017), 278-289.
• Croke, Brian and James Crow: Procopius and Dara, in: The Journal of Roman Studies 73 (1983), 143–159.
• Downey, Glanville: The Composition of Procopius, De Aedificiis, in: Transactions and Proceedings of the American Philological Association 78 (1947), 171–183.
• Evans, James A. S.: Justinian and the Historian Procopius, in: Greece & Rome 17 (1970), 218–223.
• Evans, James A. S.: Procopius. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1972.
• Gordon, C. D.: Procopius and Justinian's Financial Policies, in: Phoenix 13 (1959), 23–30.
• Greatrex, Geoffrey: Procopius and the Persian Wars, D. Phil. thesis, Oxford, 1994.
• Greatrex, Geoffrey: The dates of Procopius' works, in: BMGS 18 (1994), 101–114.
• Greatrex, Geoffrey: The Composition of Procopius' Persian Wars and John the Cappadocian, in: Prudentia 27 (1995), 1–13.
• Greatrex, Geoffrey: Rome and Persia at War, 502–532. London: Francis Cairns, 1998.
• Greatrex, Geoffrey: Recent work on Procopius and the composition of Wars VIII, in: BMGS 27 (2003), 45–67.
• Greatrex, Geoffrey: Perceptions of Procopius in Recent Scholarship, in: Histos 8 (2014), 76–121 and 121a–e (addenda).
• Howard-Johnston, James: The Education and Expertise of Procopius, in: Antiquité Tardive 10 (2002), 19–30
• Kaegi, Walter: Procopius the military historian, in: Byzantinische Forschungen. 15, 1990, ISSN 0167-5346, 53–85 (online (PDF; 989 KB)).
• Kaldellis, Anthony: Classicism, Barbarism, and Warfare: Prokopios and the Conservative Reaction to Later Roman Military Policy, American Journal of Ancient History, n.s. 3-4 (2004-2005 [2007]), 189-218.
• Kaldellis, Anthony: Identifying Dissident Circles in Sixth-Century Byzantium: The Friendship of Prokopios and Ioannes Lydos, Florilegium, Vol. 21 (2004), 1-17.
• Kaldellis, Anthony: Procopius of Caesarea: Tyranny, History and Philosophy at the End of Antiquity. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004.
• Kaldellis, Anthony: Prokopios’ Persian War: A Thematic and Literary Analysis, in: R. Macrides, ed., History as Literature in Byzantium, Aldershot: Ashgate, 2010, 253-273.
• Kaldellis, Anthony: Prokopios’ Vandal War: Thematic Trajectories and Hidden Transcripts, in: S. T. Stevens & J. Conant, eds., North Africa under Byzantium and Early Islam, Washington, D.C: Dumbarton Oaks, 2016, 13-21.
• Kaldellis, Anthony: The Date and Structure of Prokopios’ Secret History and his Projected Work on Church History, in: Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies, Vol. 49 (2009), 585-616.
• Kruse, Marion: The Speech of the Armenians in Procopius: Justinian's Foreign Policy and the Transition between Books 1 and 2 of the Wars, in: The Classical Quarterly 63 (2013), 866–881.
• Lillington-Martin, Christopher, 2007–2017:
  • 2007, "Archaeological and Ancient Literary Evidence for a Battle near Dara Gap, Turkey, AD 530: Topography, Texts and Trenches" in BAR –S1717, 2007 The Late Roman Army in the Near East from Diocletian to the Arab Conquest Proceedings of a colloquium held at Potenza, Acerenza and Matera, Italy edited by Ariel S. Lewin and Pietrina Pellegrini, pp. 299–311;
  • 2009, "Procopius, Belisarius and the Goths" in Journal of the Oxford University History Society,(2009) Odd Alliances edited by Heather Ellis and Graciela Iglesias Rogers. ISSN 1742-917X, pages 1– 17, https://sites.google.com/site/jouhsinfo/issue7specialissueforinternetexplorer;
  • 2011, "Secret Histories", http://classicsconfidential.co.uk/2011/11/19/secret-histories/;
  • 2012, "Hard and Soft Power on the Eastern Frontier: a Roman Fortlet between Dara and Nisibis, Mesopotamia, Turkey: Prokopios’ Mindouos?" in The Byzantinist, edited by Douglas Whalin, Issue 2 (2012), pp. 4–5, http://oxfordbyzantinesociety.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/obsnews2012final.pdf;
  • 2013, Procopius on the struggle for Dara and Rome, in A. Sarantis, N. Christie (eds.): War and Warfare in Late Antiquity: Current Perspectives (Late Antique Archaeology 8.1–8.2 2010–11), Leiden: Brill 2013, pp. 599–630, ISBN 978-90-04-25257-8;
  • 2013 “La defensa de Roma por Belisario” in: Justiniano I el Grande (Desperta Ferro) edited by Alberto Pérez Rubio, no. 18 (July 2013), pages 40-45, ISSN 2171-9276;
  • 2017, Procopius of Caesarea: Literary and Historical Interpretations (editor), Routledge (July 2017), www.routledge.com/9781472466044;
  • 2017, "Introduction" and chapter 10, “Procopius, πάρεδρος / quaestor, Codex Justinianus, I.27 and Belisarius’ strategy in the Mediterranean” in Procopius of Caesarea: Literary and Historical Interpretations above.
• Maas, Michael Robert: Strabo and Procopius: Classical Geography for a Christian Empire, in H. Amirav et al. (eds.): From Rome to Constantinople. Studies in Honour of Averil Cameron, Leuven: Peeters, 2007, 67–84.
• Martindale, John: The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire III, Cambridge 1992, 1060–1066.
• Meier, Mischa: Prokop, Agathias, die Pest und das ′Ende′ der antiken Historiographie, in Historische Zeitschrift 278 (2004), 281–310.
• Pazdernik, Charles F.: Xenophon's Hellenica in Procopius' Wars: Pharnabazus and Belisarius, in Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 46 (2006), 175–206.
• Rance, Philip: "Narses and the Battle of Taginae (552 AD): Procopius and Sixth-Century Warfare", Historia. Zeitschrift für alte Geschichte 30.4 (2005) 424-472.
• Rubin, Berthold: Prokopios, in Realencyclopädie der Classischen Altertumswissenschaft 23/1 (1957), 273–599. Earlier published (with index) as Prokopios von Kaisareia, Stuttgart: Druckenmüller, 1954.
• Stewart, Michael, Contests of Andreia in Procopius’ Gothic Wars, Παρεκβολαι 4 (2014), pp. 21–54.
• Stewart, Michael, The Andreios Eunuch-Commander Narses: Sign of a Decoupling of martial Virtues and Hegemonic Masculinity in the early Byzantine Empire?, Cerae 2 (2015), pp. 1–25.
• Treadgold, Warren: The Early Byzantine Historians, Basingstoke: Macmillan 2007, 176–226.
• The Secret History of Art by Noah Charney on the Vatican Library and Procopius. An article by art historian Noah Charney about the Vatican Library and its famous manuscript, Historia Arcana by Procopius.
• Whately, Conor, Battles and Generals: Combat, Culture, and Didacticism in Procopius' Wars. Leiden, 2016.
• Whitby, L. M. "Procopius and the Development of Roman Defences in Upper Mesopotamia", in P. Freeman and D. Kennedy (ed.), The Defence of the Roman and Byzantine East, Oxford, 1986, 717–35.

External links

Wikisource has original works written by or about: Procopius