The preacher on that day was a bishop whom we had not heard before, but who was known to be greatly admired as a theologian by Justinian. He held some Italian see or other, and was good-looking in rather a foppish way. He took for his text the verses in the first epistle of the Apostle Paul to the Corinthians, which lay down that men should wear their hair short and not pray with their heads covered; but that women should wear their hair long and not pray with their heads uncovered. He dwelt most gravely on the verse: ‘For if a woman be not covered, let her also be shorn’; which was to say that if a woman attended service in a church without a head-covering she should be punished by having her hair clipped close to her head. The audience settled down to an entertaining homily, though not without nervous looks on many faces, male and female. For there was many a woman there whose head-covering consisted of no more than a spray of jewels, and many a man whose hair was cut in the Hunnish mode then fashionable – clipping the front part off as far back as the temples and leaving the back hair to grow down the shoulders. What if the Emperor or Empress should be persuaded by this bishop to take severe steps against the law-breakers? Nevertheless, it was not these people whom the Bishop intended to denounce: for the sermon, most illogically, was directed against women who wore wigs. As though a wig were not a head-covering of the most complicated and effective sort!
He started gently in a musical voice with general thoughts on the subject of women’s hair, appreciatively quoting the pagan poets of both languages – to make it quite clear to us that he was a man of polite education, not an ignorant, narrow-minded, monastery-bred preacher. He cited Ovid as having said this, and Meleager that, in praise of a fine head of hair. Nor were these praises anti-scriptural, he pointed out: for the Apostle Paul himself, in the very passage from which the text was derived, had written: ‘If a woman have long hair it is a glory to her.’ And in praising length the Apostle no doubt meant to praise strength and glossiness, for no hair that is not strong or glossy can grow to commendable length. ‘But,’ he said, putting tremendous emphasis on the word, ‘But, during any religious ceremony and on any but the most intimate private occasions, this long, strong glossy, beautiful hair must be decently covered, out of respect for the angels.’
For the Christian angels – he proceeded to explain, as if he had had a long and troublesome acquaintance with them – are all eunuchs; they look down from Heaven on human worshippers, and from that vertical angle see little but heads and shoulders. ‘Any honest person who has had any experience of eunuchs,’ he went on – with a sly glance at the choir and at the long aisle reserved for eunuchs of the Civil Service and for personal eunuchs attached to prominent courtiers, such as myself – ‘Any such honest person will support me when I assert that the lack of the customary male organs of generation does not, as might be supposed, free the heart from carnal affections. Not by any means! I have indeed seldom known a eunuch who could confess truly to having no tender feelings for women’s hands and eyes and feet and hair – oh, but especially for their hair! I know many a rich and learned eunuch who spends his leisure time, wantonly and shamefully, in the slow combing of the hair of some frivolous woman of his household! You may laugh, my sisters, but you know it is so, and it is a great sin that you are committing if you pander thus to the ineffectual lusts of the castrated. Angels are no less subject to temptation than eunuchs: the Arch-Fiend himself was an angel who fell from Grace – was it perhaps partly from delight in the hair of some daughter of Earth? Out of respect therefore for these blessed but beauty-loving angels, who must not be distracted from their religious duty of perpetual hosannas and hallelujahs, it is the first duty of all Christian women with fine hair to keep it securely covered. It is surely evil enough to wean human worshippers from their devotions by an ill-timed display of the crowning glory of women, without seeking to drag angels down to earth and thus add to the race of demons – already numerous enough, God knows!’
But the pagan poets, even – he quoted Martial, Propertius, and Juvenal – had written with the utmost horror of women who wore hair that was not their own. Wigs were thus proved to be an offence not only against the Laws of the Church, but against secular canons of beauty and good taste. ‘As for the Orthodox view of the Holy Fathers, it could not be clearer, and may be summarized as follows. Male wigs are in general designed to cover baldness: they are therefore in the nature of a skull-cap and constitute a covering, and are therefore anathema. Women’s wigs, however (for a bald woman is a rarity), are designed to add to the hair already in existence on their heads, to heighten and improve its effect: they therefore do not constitute a covering, and are anathema. The righteous thunders of the Church, Council after Council, have always been directed at wigs of both sexes: both the cowardly male wig and the immodest female wig. Tertullian has said – but what has Tertullian not said against these stitched and coiled monstrosities of wigs? He has said, amongst other things, that all personal disguise is adultery before God. All wigs, paint, powder, masks, false bosoms are disguises and inventions of the devil.
‘Moreover, my erring sisters,’ the Bishop proceeded, suddenly pointing very rudely at Chrysomallo and my mistress, whose wigs, after Theodora’s, were the two most elegant monstrosities in all St Sophia’s that day, ‘Tertullian makes a powerful appeal to your common sense as well as to your religious scruples. He writes: “If you will not fling away your impious false hair, as hateful to Heaven, cannot I make it hateful to yourselves as women of worldly discernment, by reminding you that those lascivious, bought ringlets of yours may have had a detestable origin? They may well have been cut from the corpse of some woman dead of the plague, and still retain the seeds of plague alive in them; or, worse, they may have adorned the head of a blasphemer irretrievably damned by Heaven and carry in them God’s heavy curse, ineluctable.”
‘What does wise St Ambrose say of wigs? “Do not talk to me of curled wigs: they are the pimps of passion, not the instructors of virtue.” What does downright St Cyprian say? “Give heed to me, O ye women. Adultery is a grievous sin; but she who wears false hair is guilty of a greater.” What does the famous St Jerome say? He tells an instructive story, on the truth of which he stakes his reputation as a Christian teacher – yes, if this story is a fabrication, the great name of Jerome must be erased from the diptychs as though he were a heretic or forger! He tells of a respectable matron of his acquaintance, by name Praetexta, who had the misfortune to be married to a pagan. Now it is well known that a wife should obey her husband in all things, and indeed this very text in Corinthians makes it plain, when it says “the head of every man is the Son, but the head of the woman is the man”. But there is a reservation implicit in this first phrase, namely that if the husband be no Christian, the Son, not he, becomes her Head in spiritual matters; as, with widows, the Son becomes their sole Head, unless they marry again in discourtesy to the Son.
‘This husband, therefore, whose name was Hymetius, said one day to Praetexta: “Our orphan niece, Eustochia, whom we have tenderly nurtured in our home, is not an uncomely girl. She might easily find a rich husband, and thus relieve us of the expense of a dowry, but for one fault in her looks – her thin and ragged hair. Do you therefore, my good wife, repair this defect of nature, by going secretly to the hairdresser’s and ordering a fine curly toupee for her.” This Praetexta did, hoping the expenditure of five gold pieces to save a thousand or more, and forgot entirely both her duty to God and her respect for the angels. That very night, as she lay beside her husband, dwelling with satisfaction upon Eustochia’s remarkable transformation, to that sinful bedside descended a tall angel, piping in wrathful falsetto. “Praetexta,” cried this angel, “you have obeyed your husband, an unbeliever, rather than your crucified Lord. You have decked the hair of a virgin with superfluous ringlets and given her the appearance of a harlot. For this do I now wither up your hands, and command them to recognize the enormity of your crime by the measure of their suffering. Only five months more shall you live, and then Hell sh
all be your portion; and if you are bold enough to touch the head of Eustochia again, your husband and children shall die even before you do.” O my erring sisters, what a sin that was, and how fully deserved that anguish of corporal punishment!’
It was only natural that my mistress Antonina should giggle a little at this story. It was no great interest of hers that the name of this St Jerome should remain on the diptychs; and he certainly deserved to have it removed, she considered, for so outrageous a story. If Prae – texta’s hands had really been withered, how was there any possibility of her using them again on her niece’s head? She remarked on this to the Lady Chrysomallo, who giggled too and, signalling to her husband in the nave below, flapped her hands about dramatically, as if they, too, were withered. Such levity angered the Bishop. He began to rail at my mistress and the Lady Chrysomallo, mentioning them by name, though he was a stranger in the City: which made it clear enough to us that the instigation to preach against them had come from some enemy of theirs at Court. He threatened them with exclusion from the Eucharist, and branded my mistress as a shameless, ill-living widow who painted her face and lived as merrily as the Great Whore of Babylon instead of wearing sad raiment and weeping for her sins and ministering to the poor, as widows should. He said that my mistress brought dishonour upon the Pious and Superbly Beautiful Sovereign who employed her, and upon the whole city of Constantinople; and that if a sudden pestilence broke out, spreading from my mistress’s abominable wig and from the filthy red ringlets pendant therefrom, the faithful in the City would know whom to thank.
This indelicacy was too much for Theodora, who was sitting enthroned at Justinian’s side. She rose, excused herself with a respectful obeisance to Justinian, and began to walk away down the nave, her pages behind her, without waiting either for Eucharist or blessing. Etiquette demanded that the ladies in the gallery should rise to accompany her. The Bishop was now demanding that my mistress’s head and the Lady Chrysomallo’s be shorn until as bald as ostrich eggs. Theodora answered him indirectly; for to have answered him directly would have been an insult to Justinian, who remained silent. She paused in her progress, to call to Cappadocian John, across the benches: ‘Pray tell your eloquent, smooth-chinned friend that it is not becoming for the Razor to preach anathema against the Comb – or wise.’
The ladies clattered noisily down from the gallery to her, and only men and eunuchs were left in the Church to hear the sermon out. But in the buzz of indignant or excited talk that we raised the Bishop soon found it expedient to wind up his argument, with an object apology to His Clemency if he had perhaps spoken with too great frankness and to the personal offence of his most Chaste, Gracious, and Lovely Empress whose glories it was beyond the skill of poets, Christian and pagan alike, to match in their most melodious verses. The Bishop was indeed in a dangerous position, and would never have dared to preach such a sermon if he had not been privately assured by someone or other that the Lady Chrysomallo and my mistress were in disfavour at Court. As for the Razor and the Comb: Theodora’s point was that this. Bishop was himself offending against Church Law by appearing with a shaven chin. Only scissors were allowed to pass over a priest’s face. His hair had been irreligiously pomaded too, for he was a typical Ravenna dandy. Before the day was out he had been re-embarked in a small trading vessel and was on his way back to Italy. Theodora made it plain enough to Justinian that she stood by her old associates, so long as they remained loyal to the Throne, as firmly as she stood by her convictions about the single nature of the Son.
These events made a great impression in Constantinople, and my mistress’s name became the subject of many untrue but not altogether discreditable tales in the Bazaar. By now her history was well known, and that Theodora had acknowledged her as a friend by the public re-proof of a bishop greatly strengthened her position. Nevertheless, to protect her against personal violence a permanent guard of two Ushers was thenceforth attached to her when she went out for walks or drives; and a whole detachment of Guards when presently she was sent out to the Persian frontier as Theodora’s emissary to Belisarius, in circumstances which the next chapter will explain.
CHAPTER 7
THE BATTLE OF DARAS
I MUST at this point give a short account of events in Persia since Belisarius had been appointed to the command of the troops at Daras. The impregnable city of Nisibis, fifteen miles to the eastward, had once been the principal Roman frontier station. It had successfully withstood three long sieges against Sapor, the eleventh Sassanid, when it was peacefully handed over to him by the disgraceful treaty which the Emperor Jovian signed, yielding to Persia five frontier districts. To supply the place of Nisibis, Anastasius had fortified Daras, which remained in Roman territory; but an outpost was needed to secure it against a surprise attack. Justinian therefore permitted Belisarius, at his own request, to build a castle at Mygdon, which was three miles away and only a few hundred yards from the frontier.
Belisarius had made a study of the art of fortification. He sited the castle in a strong position, and began building at a great pace, intending to make it ready for occupation by a garrison before the Persians could interrupt the work. The masons, who were very numerous, built hurriedly, sword at thigh, just as the Jews under Nehemiah are said to have rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem under the jealous eyes of their Samaritan neighbours. Before he began the work Belisarius had gathered together at Daras a great quantity of timber and dressed stones and lime; and the castle walls, which enclosed two acres of land, were soon two men high and rapidly rising higher.
The Persian commander at Nisibis handed an immediate protest to Belisarius, a copy of which he also sent to the Commander of the Roman Armies in the East, with a covering letter to the effect that the Persians took a serious view of this further breach of the treaty clauses relating to frontier fortifications. If building operations did not cease forthwith he would be obliged to resort to compulsion.
This protest was referred at once to Justinian, who replied that it was to be disregarded, and that Belisarius must be reinforced at once. The reinforcements sent were a mixed division of cavalry and infantry under two young Thracian noblemen, brothers, named Coutzes and Boutzes, who jointly commanded the troops stationed in the Lebanon.
By the greatest ill-luck the clash with the Persians in front of Mygdon Castle took place on a day when Belisarius was lying sick, in the worst stage of malarial fever, and fit for nothing. Not more than 8,000 troops were engaged on either side in this battle; in the course of which Boutzes, with half the cavalry, allowed himself to be drawn away in pursuit of a small body of the enemy, and left exposed the flank of the main body, which was composed of infantry. The Persians made a concentrated attack on Coutzes’s cavalry on the other flank and routed it, capturing a number of prisoners, including Coutzes himself. The infantry, protected in their flight by Belisarius’s Household cavalry under the command of Armenian John, streamed back to the castle. At nightfall Boutzes, returning with his forces intact and proudly exhibiting his plunder, learned of the fate of his brother and grew very angry. He ordered the castle to be evacuated, as a place of evil omen; and the whole Roman force, infantry and cavalry, retired on Daras, carrying the sick Belisarius with them on a litter. Two days later Belisarius, recovered from the delirium of fever, but still so weak that he could hardly sit his horse, made a counter-attack on the Persians, who had occupied the castle and were already dismantling it. At the head of his Household Cavalry, who numbered a thousand men, he drove them from the walls; but Boutzes, who should then have led the infantry back again with supplies for a siege, could not persuade them to follow him; so Mygdon Castle was abandoned once more for lack of a garrison. The Persians razed it to the ground and retired victoriously to Nisibis.
Justinian, on reading the reports that came to him, decided that the Commander of the Armies in the East had made an error of judgement in sending Belisarius inadequate and ill-led forces, and that Belisarius was the only soldier who had not tarnished his r
eputation. He therefore dismissed this Commander of the Armies and appointed in his place Belisarius, whose age at that time was only twenty-eight. Justinian also sent out to the frontier the Master of the Offices, one of his chief ministers, whose duties included the supervision of posts, communications, and arsenals throughout the Eastern Empire, and foreign embassies abroad. This Master of Offices was charged with resuming peace-negotiations with the Persians but protracting them as long as possible, thus giving Belisarius time to put Daras and the frontier generally into a posture of defence. Belisarius took advantage of this truce to make a tour of inspection of the frontier, strengthening fortifications, raising and drilling troops, collecting military stores. It was hoped that a renewal of hostilities might be avoided, because Kobad at the age of seventy-five seemed likely to prefer a tranquil old age to the anxieties of a major war. But this was not to be.
Belisarius, who had succeeded in getting together an army of 25,000 men (of whom, however, he could not count on more than 3,000 to show hardihood, either in attack or defence) soon heard that a well-trained army of 40,000 men under the command of the Persian generalissimo Firouz was marching against him. Then came a Persian messenger with an arrogant message for Belisarius: ‘Firouz of the Golden Fillet spends tomorrow night in the City of Daras. Let a bath be prepared for him.’
To which Belisarius replied with the amiable wit which became his handsome person: ‘Belisarius of the Steel Casque assures the Persian Generalissimo that the sweating chamber and the cold douche will both be ready for him.’