CHAPTER III

ASSASSINATION OF VITALIAN

JUSTIN sends for Vitalian, who was living in Thrace and who had entertained designs of dethroning Anastasius, to Constantinople: for he dreaded his power, his military experience, his universal renown, and his great desire to possess the sovereignty: and rightly conjecturing that he should not be able to overcome him otherwise than by pretending to be a friend; by way of concealing his guile under a plausible mask, he appoints him commander of one of the bodies called Præsentes, and, as a more effectual persuasive, with a view to u still greater deception, he raises him to the consulship. He, being consul elect, was assassinated on visiting the palace, at an inner door, and thus met with a punishment for his insolence towards the Roman sovereignty. But these events happened subsequently.