Page:The age of Justinian and Theodora (Volume 1).djvu/354

 the East the rule of Pulcheria, as the adviser of her brother Theodosius II, and afterwards of her nominal husband Marcian, extended almost to half a century. The importance of an Augusta in disposing of the crown on the decease of her husband has been indicated in the description of the elevation of Anastasius; and the official who records the election of Justin, ascribes the turbulence of the populace on that occasion to the absence of control by a princess of that rank. But the power of a dowager empress was most signally exemplified in the case of Verina, widow of Leo I, who, in her dissatisfaction with the policy of her son-in-law Zeno, succeeded in provoking a revolution, placed the chief of her party on the throne for more than a twelvemonth, and continued to involve the Empire in bloodshed for a series of years. Below the Imperial dignity the feminine element was perpetually active and widely exerted, especially throughout the provinces. The wives of legates, of proconsuls or governors, accompanied their husbands on their missions to distant parts, and were often responsible, both in peace and war, for the complexion assumed by the local administration. They displayed themselves ostentatiously in public, addressed themselves authoritatively to the army, and instigated measures of finance, to such an extent that they were sometimes regarded as the moving spirit in whatever