ByzReview: Theophylact Simocatta, and Maurice's 'Strategikon'

I have already covered the majority of the ‘Classicizing’ historians of 6^th century Byzantium in previous reviews – Procopius, Agathias, Menander the Guardsman, and now we can finish off with the last example: Theophylact Simocatta. The dramatic events that surround the reign of the emperor Maurice (582-602) are of crucial importance to Byzantine and world history, and it is these events for which Theophylact Simocatta is one of our best sources.

                When the emperor Tiberius II Constantine died, he bequeathed  rule of the empire to his son-in-law Maurice, along with the ongoing border disputes with every one of the Romans’ neighbours – especially the Persians to the east and the Avars to the north. The narrative of Theophylact’s history is built entirely around Maurice, beginning with his accession and then recounting the various wars until Maurice is brutally overthrown and murdered by the man who would succeed him, the notorious emperor Phocas (602-610). As far as historical narratives go, Theophylact seems especially committed to this one era, and reads more like the story of one emperor than Procopius, Agathias or Menander ever did. Whereas the earlier historians concerned themselves almost solely with foreign policy issues, Theophylact holds Maurice as a central character to his narrative, beginning and ending with this man and ensuring that this history is nothing less than the story of Maurice.

Maurice's empire

                The history is divided into eight books, taking the narrative in a fairly logical direction and offering some rather interesting stories. One of the stories which most dominates the narrative is the conclusion to the Persian war, which had been raging for a decade before Maurice inherited the throne. After several years of inconclusive action, the war takes a dramatic turn when a revolution erupts against the rule of the Persian king Hormisdas (Hormizd IV – 579-590). Hormisdas is finally overthrown by a palace coup in favour of his son Chosroes (Khosrow II), who subsequently has to escape the capital as the rebel army bears down on it. Fleeing into exile, Chosroes makes his way to his ostensible enemies, the Romans, where he asks Maurice to help him regain his throne in exchange for peace and territorial concessions. Chosroes, with Roman help, is once again put in charge of the Persian empire, beginning a new era of peace between Rome and Persia and allowing Maurice to try to tackle the encroaching Avar people in the north.

                The tragedy of Maurice’s reign is its brutal end, and the subsequent undoing of all his diplomatic successes with Persia which would ultimately bring about the downfall of both empires. Maurice was not the savviest of emperors, and his mismanagement of the army caused a full-blown military rebellion against him. With the capital revolting and his army now following a general called Phocas, Maurice does what Justinian nearly did seventy years beforehand – he fled the capital for his life, handing over the empire to his enemies. In essence it was the same problem that Chosroes had had about a decade earlier, and like Chosroes Maurice tried to enlist help from the other empire in order to regain his throne. It would have been good for him to cash in on the favour owed to him, but sadly Phocas’ supporters found him first, and butchered the former-emperor and his entire family.

                The emperor Phocas’ bloody rise to power was a disaster for the Romans, and every account of the period casts him as one of the most dreadful villains ever to rule the empire. It was not simply that Maurice was the first Roman emperor to die a violent death in generations, but added to this was the fact it gave the Persian king Chosroes the excuse he needed to get even with the Romans. The subsequent twenty-five year war, waged by the Persians under the pretext of restoring Maurice’s family to power, marked the climax of the longstanding hostile Roman-Persian relations, and would almost result in the final defeat of the Romans. Occasionally we get references within the text to this war and its associated horrors, though the narrative never takes us beyond the beginning of Phocas’ reign. In essence then it is a history of a great disaster, explaining the war of the first quarter of the 7^th century in terms of the good emperor Maurice being overthrown. The Byzantines did occasionally write their histories for this reason – to recount the events of the recent past in order to explain the misery of the current age. The previous historians of the 6^th century – Procopius and his continuators – were simply recounting past events, but Theophylact seems to be telling a proper story.

                I can honestly say that the history of Theophylact Simocatta is a worthwhile and interesting piece of history and (dare I say it), even an enjoyable one. Like his predecessors he does spend a lot of time describing tedious campaigns and battles, but his devotion to a central narrative, to the life, character and reign of the emperor Maurice, and the inclusion of the interesting and important regime change in Persia all make this is a most accessible and fascinating text. The style of the Greek original is said to be awkward and difficult to read, but the translation is one of the more readable I have encountered. Theophylact marks the end of the ‘Classicizing’ historians of the 6^th century, and with the monumental upheavals of the reign of Heraclius which lead us conveniently into the so-called ‘Byzantine Dark Age’, we can wave good-bye to antiquity for good.

                As a rough addendum, we can take this moment to consider another important text associated with Maurice: the Strategikon. A military handbook composed in the late 6^th century and divided into twelve sections of wildly differing length, the Strategikon is considered to be the work of the future emperor Maurice from his days as a general. Whether or not he was the one who actually wrote, dictated or ordered this text to be produced is not an especially important issue; many of the manuscripts bear his name, the text perfectly describes the ideal composition of the Late-Roman army at the end of the 6^th century and, as Maurice was an experienced military commander, he fits the bill as the most likely author of the Strategikon.

                This book is probably the best starting-point for anybody who wishes to understand the Byzantine-Roman army. Maurice knows his audience, and he describes as clearly and as logically as possible everything the Byzantine commander needs to know about the forces at his disposal. Right at the beginning Maurice explains the basics: the different ranks of officer, the different sizes of division of the army, the armaments and equipment of the troops and, most significantly, the importance of mounted troops; cavalry! The infantry legions of the old Republic are a thing of the ancient past by the time of Justinian and his successors, and centuries of fighting alongside and against mounted nomadic peoples must have taught the Romans the value of horseback soldiers equipped as archers. As Maurice tells us, the troops should be equipped in the manner of the Avars (the nation who occupied the lands north of Byzantium), using Avar-style tents and carrying all their equipment on their horses, including a suitable amount of arrows for ammunition. Next come the many tactics and drills the troops must perform, in order to ready them against any possible foe they could face – and probably will face, considering the number of nations who share the empire’s borders. As it happens, the Strategikon does contain sections on the tactics and style of warfare of other peoples, including the Persians and Avars, which though loaded with prejudice about these peoples can be of use for anybody seeking to learn more about these peoples. Personally I see them as little more than Byzantine-Roman prejudices against foreign nations, perhaps touched with bitter memories of past experiences with said peoples.

                The baggage train is an important feature in the Strategikon, and Maurice keeps driving home an important message: Keep your Baggage Train Safe. Obviously, if you want to keep your army supplied and happy then you must keep their supplies, provisions and property behind your army, keep an eye on them, and make sure the enemy don’t get to it. Another feature of the advanced tactics on show in this new Roman army are the depotatoi, or medical corpsmen, who ride behind the line in order to pick up wounded or unhorsed men. The Byzantine acknowledgement of the value of individual soldiers is on show here, and for good reason. Later-Roman troops underwent a lot of training, and any who could be prevented from being trampled by the second line is time and money saved as far as the treasury is concerned. But one of the best features of this book is that it has the most wonderful diagrams! It can be a tad difficult to visualise how an army should look if you’re only reading about it, and the Strategikon tries to get round this by showing the composition of the army visually; arranging symbols representing different troop-types into formations in order to show what your army should look like from up above. They can be a bit bewildering, these diagrams, but they are amazing and beautiful nonetheless.

                I believe this concludes the subject of the emperor Maurice, his historian and his own military treatise. If you’re keen on military history, read the Strategikon even if you have no real interest in late Roman or Byzantine history. It’s more interesting than the Art of War, at any rate.  Theophylact Simocatta and the Strategikon are incredible sources, and the life and times of Maurice are well worth acquainting yourselves with.

Bibliozantium 6

Theophylactus Simocatta and Genesius. Theophylacti Simmocattae Historiarum Libri Octo. I. Bekker (ed). Bonn. [Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae], 46, (1834).

Theophylact Simocatta. The History of Theophylact Simocatta – An English Translation with Introduction and Notes. Translated by M. Whitby and M. Whitby. Oxford: Clarendon Press. (1986).

Maurice. Mauricii Strategicon. G.T. Dennis (ed). German translation by E. Gamillscheg. Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences. [Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae], 17, (1981).

Maurice. Maurice’s Strategikon – Handbook of Byzantine Military Strategy. Translated by G.T. Dennis. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press. (1984).

               

[A Brief Gnote: The first entry in this bibliograph is, as always, the CSHB Bonn edition of the original Greek. The funny thing about these Bonn editions is that they sometimes compile several different Byzantine writers into the same edition. Along with the work of Theophylact Simocatta, the Bonn edition of his work also includes the shorter history of the 9^th century by a certain Genesios. How they decided to include these two very different histories together in the same edition is mystifying. The second title on this list is a straight up English translation of Theophylact. As this is the version I read, and the only one that seems to be available, I recommend it to the casual or new reader. In terms of the Strategikon, the best properly edited text is the CFHB version which includes a facing-page translation into German, but a separate English translation by the original editor, George T. Dennis, has been produced – and this would be the best and most easily accessible version available to both casual reader and scholar alike].