Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

conclusion 551
tion. The fiscal cupidity of his regime – which included the despatch of
Roman treasures to Constantinople – aroused contempt in Italy and Sicily,
and few will have mourned his death, by an assassin’s hand, in his bath at
Syracuse in 668. 129 With Constans’ death imperial ambitions in Italy came
to an ignominous end. Byzantine territories were eroded further by the
Lombards in the seventh century. Romuald of Benevento (671–87) conquered
most of the duchy of Calabria, apart from the area around
Otranto. 130 In the north, king Rothari (636–52) had already obliterated the
duchy of Genoa and extended Lombard possessions in Venetia before
Constans’ western campaigns. 131 Although Byzantine interest in Italian and
papal affairs continued in the succeeding centuries, and a rump province
existed – and even expanded – in Apulia until the beginning of the second
millennium, it was clear that much of Italy’s destiny lay outside the
empire. 132 Constans’ failure was followed by a more lasting peace treaty in
c. 680 which made clear what Phocas had acknowledged in his ratifications
of 605: the wars fought between Lombards and Byzantines had brought
ancient Italy to an end. 133
129 Paul. Diac. Hist. Lang. v.11; Lib. Pont. 1.343. Haldon, Byzantium in the Seventh Century 59–61.
130 Paul. Diac. Hist. Lang. vi.1. 131 Fredegar, Chron. iv.71; Paul. Diac. Hist. Lang. iv.45.
132 Kreutz (1991) 62–6; Brown (1995) 320–48. 133 Dölger (1924) no. 240.
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