Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/109

 OF THE llOMAN EMPIRE 89 and embassies. It might legally be questioned how far a Saxon was entitled to the privilege of the French nation ; but every scruple was silenced by the fame and piety of a hero who had restored the empire of the West. After the death of her father- in-law and husband, Theophano governed Rome, Italy, and Ger- many during the minority of her son, the third Otho ; and the Latins have praised the virtues of an empress, who sacrificed to a superior duty the remembrance of her country. "o In the nup- tials of her sister Anne, every prejudice was lost, and every con- sideration of dignity was superseded, by the stronger argument of necessity and fear. A Pagan of the North, Wolodomir, great woiodamir prince of Russia, aspired to a daughter of the Roman purple ; ["viaSimu- of and his claim was enforced by the threats of war, the promise of oss^Lesfl] conversion, and the offer of a powerful succour against a domestic rebel. A victim of her religion and country, the Grecian princess was torn from the palace of her fathers, and condemned to a savage reign and an hopeless exile on the banks of the Borys- thenes, or in the neighbourhood of the Polar circle."^ Yet the marriage of Anne was fortunate and fruitful ; the daughter of her grandson Jeroslaus was recommended by her Imperial de- [Yarosiav] scent ; and the king of France, Henry I., sought a wife on the last borders of Europe and Christendom."^ In the Byzantine palace, the emperor was the first slave ofDespotic the ceremonies which he imposed, of the rigid forms which ""'" regulated each word and gesture, besieged him in the palace, and violated the leisure of his rural solitude. But the lives and fortunes of millions hung on his arbitrary will ; and the firmest ™ Licet ilia Imperalrix Grosca sibi et aliis fuisset satis utilis, et optima, S:c., is the preamble of an inimical writer, apud Fagi, tom. iv. A. D. 989, No. 3. Her marriage and principal actions may be found in Mur.atori, Pagi, and St. Marc, under the proper years. [For the question as to the identity of Theophano, see above, vol. v. p. 2ti, note 49. For her remarkably capable regency (a striking contrast to that of Agnes of Poictiers, mother of the Emperor Henry IV.) sec Giesebrecht, Gesch. der deutschen Kaiserzeit, i. p. 611 si/ij.] iCedrenus, tom. ii. p. 699 [ii. p. 444, ed. Bonn]; Zonaras, tom. ii. p. 221 [xvii. 7] ; Elmacin, Hist. Saracenica, 1. iii. c. 6 ; Nestor apud Levesque, tom. ii. p. 112 [Chron. Nestor, c. 42] ; Pagi, Critica, A.D. 987, No. 6 ; a singular concourse ! Wolodomir and Anne are ranked among the saints of the Russian chm'ch. Yet we know his vices, and are ignorant of her virtues. [For the date of Vladimir's marriage and conversion see below, chap. I v. p. 164, note 100.] "■- Henricus primus duxit uxorcm .Scythicam [et] Russam, filiani regis Jeroslai. An embassy of bishops was sent into Russi.a, and the father gratanter filiam cum multis donis misit. This event happenerl in the year 1051. See the passages of the original chronicles in Bouquet's Historians of France (tom. xi. p. 29, 159, 161, 319, 304, 481). Voltaire might wonder at this alliance; but he should not have owned his ignorance of the country, n-ligion. itc., of Jeroslaus — a name so conspicuous in the Russian annal<--.