FLAN OF THE LAST TWO VOLUMES. SUCCESSION AND CHARACTERS OF THE GREEK EMPERORS OF CONSTANTINOPLE, FROM HERACLIUS TO THE LATIN CONQUEST. Defects of the Byzantine History,. Its Connection with the Revolutions of the World,. Plan of the last two Volumes,.... THE HISTORY OF THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. CHAPTER XXXIX. ZENO AND ANASTASIUS, EMPERORS OF THE EAST.-BIRTH, EDU. CATION, AND FIRST EXPLOITS OF THEODORIC THE OSTROGOTH. -HIS INVASION AND CONQUEST OF ITALY.-THE GOTHIC KINGDOM OF ITALY.-STATE OF THE WEST.-MILITARY AND CIVIL GOVERNMENT. THE SENATOR BOETHIUS.LAST ACTS AND DEATH OF THEODORIC. AFTER the fall of the Roman empire in the West, an interval of fifty years, till the memorable reign of Justinian, is faintly marked by the obscure names and imperfect annals of Zeno, Anastasius, and Justin, who successively ascended to the throne of Constantinople. During the same period, Italy revived and flourished under the government of a Gothic king, who might have deserved a statue among the best and bravest of the ancient Romans. Theodoric the Ostrogoth, the fourteenth in lineal descent of the royal line of the Amali,' was born in the neighborhood of 'Jornandes (de Rebus Geticis, c. 13, 14, p. 629, 630, edit. Grot.) has drawn the pedigree of Theodoric from Gapt, one of the Anses or Demigods, who lived about the time of Domitian. Cassiodorus, the first who celebrates the royal race of the Amali, (Viriar. viii. 5, ix 25, VOL. IV.-A Vienna' two years after the death of Attila. A recent victory had restored the independence of the Ostrogoths; and the three brothers, Walamir, Theodemir, and Widimir, who ruled that warlike nation with united counsels, had separately pitched their habitations in the fertile though desolate province of Pannonia. The Huns still threatened their revolted subjects, but their hasty attack was repelled by the single forces of Walamir, and the news of his victory reached the distant camp of his brother in the same auspicious moment that the favorite concubine of Theodemir was delivered of a son and heir. In the eighth year of his age, Theodoric was reluctantly yielded by his father to the public interest, as the pledge of an alliance which Leo, emperor of the East, had consented to purchase by an annual subsidy of three hundred pounds of gold. The royal hostage was educated at Constantinople with care and tenderness. His body was formed to all the exercises of war, his mind was expanded by the habits of liberal conversation; he frequented the schools of the most skilful masters; but he disdained or neglected the arts of Greece, and so ignorant did he always remain of the first elements of science, that a rude mark was contrived to represent the signature of the illiterate king of Italy. As soon as he had attained the age of eighteen, he was restored to the x. 2, xi. 1,) reckons the grandson of Theodoric as the xviith in descent. Peringsciold (the Swedish commentator of Cochlous, Vit. Theodoric. p. 271, &c., Stockholm, 1699) labors to connect this genealogy with the legends or traditions of his native country.* More correctly on the banks of the Lake Pelso, (Nieusiedler-see,) near Carnuntum, almost on the same spot where Marcus Antoninus composed his meditations, (Jornandes, c. 52, p. 659. Severin. Pannonia Illustrata, p. 22. Cellarius, Geograph. Antiq. (tom. i. p. 350.) The four first letters of his name (OEOA) were inscribed on a gold plate, and when it was fixed on the paper, the king drew his pen through the intervals (Anonym. Valesian. ad calcem Amm. Marcellin p. 722.) This authentic fact, with the testimony of Procopius, or at Amala was a name of hereditary sanctity and honor among the Visi goths. It enters into the names of Amalaberga, Amala suintha, (swinthej means strength,) Amalafred, Amalarich. In the poem of the Nibelungen written three hundred years later, the Ostrogoths are called the Amilungen According to Wachter it means, unstained, from the privative a, and malo a stain. It is pure Sanscrit, Amala, immaculatus. Schlegel. Indische Bibli othek, 1. p. 233.-M. t The date of Theodoric's birth is not accurately determined. We ca hardly err. observes Manso in placing it between the years 453 and 458, Manso, Geschichte des Ost Gothischen Reichs, p. 14.-M. |