Beate Dignas & Engelbert Winter - Kaveh Farrokh

2.4 The sixth century 39
tax system as well as the military, which increased Sasanian strike power
significantly. 112
The period after the so-called ‘eternal Peace’ of 532 was therefore not
really a détente because both great powers watched each other with suspicion.
The great successes of Justinian I alarmed Xusrō I. Procopius tells us
that the Sasanian king soon regretted having concluded the peace thereby
facilitating his opponent’s tremendous expansion of power. 113 Towards the
end of the 30s the situation was so tense that war was almost inevitable. In
most modern accounts Xusrō I is presented as the aggressor. 114 There were
diplomatic activities preliminary to the war but these were geared towards
improving their respective positions within a delicate international balance
of power (13 and 35). A dispute over border-land between two Arab
tribes, the Lahmids and Ghassanids, was used to justify the outbreak of
new hostilities (25). 115
From the spring of 540 Romans and Persians were once more at war.
Initially, Xusrō I scored a prestigious victory when he attacked and took
Antioch on the Orontes (13). 116 The inhabitants of the Syrian metropolis
were deported to Persia (36). Justinian had not been able to stop the forceful
Sasanian attack. As the majority of the Roman units were engaged in the
West and not available to confront the Persian army, the emperor had to
enter into negotiations (35). Both sides agreed to a truce under the following
terms: Xusrō had to withdraw whereas the Romans were obliged to make
not only a single payment but also an annual tributary payment of 500
pounds of gold. 117 Justinian accepted the terms because this was the only
way for him to conclude his activities in Italy successfully.
Xusrō I withdrew his army very slowly to make sure that he would receive
the stipulated payments. A formal peace treaty would not be concluded
before the tribute had been handed over. The king moved his army to the
gates of Chalcis, on which he imposed a ransom, and then crossed the
112 On Xusrō I’s reforms see Grignaschi 1971: 87–147; Gnoli 1985: 265–70; Rubin 1995: 227–97 and
Howard-Johnston 1995b: 211–26.
113 Proc. BP i.26.2.
114 The most elaborate account of Justinian’s Persian Wars may be found in Rubin 1960: 279–84; see
also Higgins 1941: 279–315; Blockley 1985a: 62–74.
115 Already during the second half of the third century Rome and Persia had begun to entrust the
defence of their frontiers to powerful Arab leaders (24). In the sixth century the allied Saracens,
who fought both on the Sasanian and the Roman side, played a decisive role in the development of
the armed confrontations between West and East (25); see in general Shahîd 1984; 1988 and 1995;
Ball 2000: 30–105.
116 Downey 1953: 340–8 and 1963: 247–53; Liebeschütz 1977: 487–99 and Börm 2006: 301–28; on the
Byzantine–Sasanian confrontations between 540 and 544 see Trombley 2005: 392–6.
117 Proc. BP ii.10.24; on tributary and subsidiary payments as a common element of late antique
diplomacy see Isaac 1995: 129–32.