Justinian Criticism Of Justinia

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Procopius of Caesarea was a scholar and contemporary historian from Palaestina, who wrote about the reign of the Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian during the time of 527-560 AD . One of the most interesting and important writing by Procopius is Anecdota or better known as “Secret History”. The Secret History was written around 550 AD and it includes Procopius’s true thoughts and criticisms of Justinian as a person and as an emperor.
In the Secret History during chapter 7, Procopius describes Justinian physical appearance as,”... he was neither tall nor short, but of average height; not thin, but moderately plump; his face was round, and not bad looking...” When Procopius begins to portray Justinian as a person, he mentions that Justinian’s “…nature was an unnatural mixture of folly and wickedness.” Meaning that Justinian lacked common sense and was not every reasonable, while also being morally wrong.
Procopius continues to give Justinian a bad reputation as an individual and as an emperor by writing, “This Emperor, then, was deceitful, devious, false, hypocritical, two-faced, cruel, skilled in dissembling his thought, never moved to tears by either joy or pain, though he could summon them artfully at will when the occasion demanded...” Even …show more content…

Vol. 1 discuss Emperor Justinian, they use a completely different tone than the one Procopius uses. Edgar mentions that Emperor Justinian had some achievements and useful skills that allowed him to stay emperor of the Roman Empire. Also, Edgar talks about how hard Justinian was trying to reconstitute and improve the Roman Empire. Nevertheless, Procopius’s tone in Secret History was angry and disrespectfully toward Justinian, because he never attend for this piece of work to get publish. Hence, is why it was after his death, because if Procopius’s true thoughts were release to the public he would have been tortured and later put to

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