Page:The age of Justinian and Theodora (Volume 2).djvu/62

 at Adule. After the lapse of a year another envoy was despatched from Constantinople, and Nonnosus, one of a family of legates, familiarized with these regions by constant visits, traversed not only Axum, but Yemen, in order to stimulate the execution of these important schemes. In the end, however, the project failed of achievement; the tribes of Himyar shrunk from entering on a long and arduous journey over the sandy wastes to attack an enemy whom they believed to be more bellicose than themselves, while the shipmasters could not be induced to avoid the Persian ports, where they found eager buyers for all the silk they could procure. The death of Elesbaas occurred shortly afterwards, but not before an interior revolt had freed Himyar for a time from the Aethiopian supremacy.

In the next phase of the war, martial activity centred around Martyropolis, a fortified town of Roman Armenia, situated on the river Nymphius. A considerable Persian army, under several veteran generals, beset the stronghold with all the engines proper to a determined siege in the warfare of the period. At the same time Cavades, octogenarian though he was, resolute in his purpose to do all the damage possible to his adversaries, provoked an artificial irruption of the Huns into Roman territory, and opened the Caspian Gates to a great host of those barbarians. At his instigation they carried their depredations rapidly to the south, and in the autumn of 531 effected a junction with the Persian forces