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[ On the extent, population, &c., of the Roman kingdom, the reader may peruse, with pleasure, the Discours Preliminaire to the Republique Romaine of M. de Beaufort, (tom. i.,) who will not be accused of too much credulity for the early ages of Rome.]
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[ Quos (Romanos) nos, Longobardi scilicet, Saxones, Franci, Locharingi, Bajoarii, Suevi, Burgundiones, tanto dedignamur ut inimicos nostros commoti, nil aliud contumeliarum nisi Romane, dicamus: hoc solo, id est Romanorum nomine, quicquid ignobilitatis, quicquid timiditatis, quicquid avaritiae, quicquid luxuriae, quicquid mendacii, immo quicquid vitiorum est comprehendentes, (Liutprand, in Legat Script. Ital. tom. ii. para i. p. 481.) For the sins of Cato or Tully Minos might have imposed as a fit penance the daily perusal of this barbarous passage.]
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[ Yet this contumelious sentence, quoted by Robertson (Charles V note 2) as well as Gibbon, was applied by the angry bishop to the Byzantine Romans, whom, indeed, he admits to be the genuine descendants of Romulus.—M.]
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[ Pipino regi Francorum, omnis senatus, atque universa populi generalitas a Deo servatae Romanae urbis. Codex Carolin. epist. 36, in Script. Ital. tom. iii. pars ii. p. 160. The names of senatus and senator were never totally extinct, (Dissert. Chorograph. p. 216, 217;) but in the middle ages they signified little more than nobiles, optimates, &c., (Ducange, Gloss. Latin.)]
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[ See Muratori, Antiquit. Italiae Medii Aevi, tom. ii. Dissertat xxvii. p. 548. On one of these coins we read Hadrianus Papa (A.D. 772;) on the reverse, Vict. Ddnn. with the word Conob, which the Pere Joubert (Science des Medailles, tom. ii. p. 42) explains by Constantinopoli Officina B (secunda.)]
In the quarrels of ancient Greece, the holy people of Elis enjoyed a perpetual peace, under the protection of Jupiter, and in the exercise of the Olympic games. [47] Happy would it have been for the Romans, if a similar privilege had guarded the patrimony of St. Peter from the calamities of war; if the Christians, who visited the holy threshold, would have sheathed their swords in the presence of the apostle and his successor. But this mystic circle could have been traced only by the wand of a legislator and a sage: this pacific system was incompatible with the zeal and ambition of the popes; the Romans were not addicted, like the inhabitants of Elis, to the innocent and placid labors of agriculture; and the Barbarians of Italy, though softened by the climate, were far below the Grecian states in the institutions of public and private life. A memorable example of repentance and piety was exhibited by Liutprand, king of the Lombards. In arms, at the gate of the Vatican, the conqueror listened to the voice of Gregory the Second, [48] withdrew his troops, resigned his conquests, respectfully visited the church of St. Peter, and after performing his devotions, offered his sword and dagger, his cuirass and mantle, his silver cross, and his crown of gold, on the tomb of the apostle. But this religious fervor was the illusion, perhaps the artifice, of the moment; the sense of interest is strong and lasting; the love of arms and rapine was congenial to the Lombards; and both the prince and people were irresistibly tempted by the disorders of Italy, the nakedness of Rome, and the unwarlike profession of her new chief. On the first edicts of the emperor, they declared themselves the champions of the holy images: Liutprand invaded the province of Romagna, which had already assumed that distinctive appellation; the Catholics of the Exarchate yielded without reluctance to his civil and military power; and a foreign enemy was introduced for the first time into the impregnable fortress of Ravenna. That city and fortress were speedily recovered by the active diligence and maritime forces of the Venetians; and those faithful subjects obeyed the exhortation of Gregory himself, in separating the personal guilt of Leo from the general cause of the Roman empire. [49] The Greeks were less mindful of the service, than the Lombards of the injury: the two nations, hostile in their faith, were reconciled in a dangerous and unnatural alliance: the king and the exarch marched to the conquest of Spoleto and Rome: the storm evaporated without effect, but the policy of Liutprand alarmed Italy with a vexatious alternative of hostility and truce. His successor Astolphus declared himself the equal enemy of the emperor and the pope: Ravenna was subdued by force or treachery, [50] and this final conquest extinguished the series of the exarchs, who had reigned with a subordinate power since the time of Justinian and the ruin of the Gothic kingdom. Rome was summoned to acknowledge the victorious Lombard as her lawful sovereign; the annual tribute of a piece of gold was fixed as the ransom of each citizen, and the sword of destruction was unsheathed to exact the penalty of her disobedience. The Romans hesitated; they entreated; they complained; and the threatening Barbarians were checked by arms and negotiations, till the popes had engaged the friendship of an ally and avenger beyond the Alps. [51]