by Rufinus when he came to Byzantium. [531 A.D.] Hermogenes also came
thither not long afterwards, and the winter came to a close; thus ended
the fourth year of the reign of the Emperor Justinian.


XVII

At the opening of spring a Persian army under the leadership of
Azarethes invaded the Roman territory. They were fifteen thousand
strong, all horsemen. With them was Alamoundaras, son of Saccice, with a
very large body of Saracens. But this invasion was not made by the
Persians in the customary manner; for they did not invade Mesopotamia,
as formerly, but the country called Commagene of old, but now
Euphratesia, a point from which, as far as we know, the Persians never
before conducted a campaign against the Romans. But why the land was
called Mesopotamia and why the Persians refrained from making their
attack at this point is what I now propose to relate.

There is a mountain in Armenia which is not especially precipitous,
two-and-forty stades removed from Theodosiopolis and lying toward the
north from it. From this mountain issue two springs, forming immediately
two rivers, the one on the right called the Euphrates, and the other the
Tigris. One of these, the Tigris, descends, with no deviations and with
no tributaries except small ones emptying into it, straight toward the
city of Amida. And continuing into the country which lies to the north
of this city it enters the land of Assyria. But the Euphrates at its
beginning flows for a short distance, and is then immediately lost to
sight as it goes on; it does not, however, become subterranean, but a
very strange thing happens. For the water is covered by a bog of great
depth, extending about fifty stades in length and twenty in breadth; and