the province of Romagna, which had already assumed that
distinctive appellation; the Catholics of the Exarchate yielded
without reluctance to his civil and military power; and a foreign
enemy was introduced for the first time into the impregnable
fortress of Ravenna. That city and fortress were speedily
recovered by the active diligence and maritime forces of the
Venetians; and those faithful subjects obeyed the exhortation of
Gregory himself, in separating the personal guilt of Leo from the
general cause of the Roman empire. ^49 The Greeks were less
mindful of the service, than the Lombards of the injury: the two
nations, hostile in their faith, were reconciled in a dangerous
and unnatural alliance: the king and the exarch marched to the
conquest of Spoleto and Rome: the storm evaporated without
effect, but the policy of Liutprand alarmed Italy with a
vexatious alternative of hostility and truce. His successor
Astolphus declared himself the equal enemy of the emperor and the
pope: Ravenna was subdued by force or treachery, ^50 and this
final conquest extinguished the series of the exarchs, who had
reigned with a subordinate power since the time of Justinian and
the ruin of the Gothic kingdom. Rome was summoned to acknowledge
the victorious Lombard as her lawful sovereign; the annual
tribute of a piece of gold was fixed as the ransom of each
citizen, and the sword of destruction was unsheathed to exact the
penalty of her disobedience. The Romans hesitated; they
entreated; they complained; and the threatening Barbarians were
checked by arms and negotiations, till the popes had engaged the
friendship of an ally and avenger beyond the Alps. ^51

[Footnote 47: See West's Dissertation on the Olympic Games,
(Pindar. vol. ii. p. 32-36, edition in 12mo.,) and the judicious