Narses now thought himself strong enough to meet the diminished host of Franks in the field; and he therefore came down from the north and encamped on the other side of the river, almost in sight of the enemy. His whole force, however, did not exceed eighteen thousand men, a great many of the barbarians, who had accompanied him into Italy, having been dismissed to their homes shortly after the defeat of Totila. He began hostilities by cutting off the foraging parties, on which the Franks were dependent for supplies, a proceeding which harassed them so much that they decided to end the molestation by a battle. When the Roman general noticed that the enemy were preparing to attack him he disposed his forces in order, placing all his infantry in the centre, and his cavalry on the wings. A certain number of his troops who were armed only with missiles, bowmen, and slingers, he posted at the rear, and he also concealed a detachment of horse in an adjacent wood. The martial equipment of the army opposed to him was very incomplete. All were infantry who bore no defensive armour, except shields and an occasional helmet; and their only offensive weapons were a sword, a barbed javelin, and a two-edged axe. They drew themselves up in the form of a wedge with the apex in front, and when the order to charge was given they drove down on the Roman centre with an impetus which carried them right through the troops opposed to them, so that they seemed to be on the way to capture the camp of their adversaries. Narses now signalled for his wings to wheel round towards the centre, until they faced almost the reverse way, and then to empty their quivers into the unprotected backs of the enemy. At the same time they were assailed in front by a brigade of Herules who had not arrived at their place in the centre before the sudden onslaught of the Franks. The result of these tactics was the practical annihilation of the barbarian host, along with whom Butilin himself perished. While most of them were slain and many driven into the river, it is said that only five escaped death on the field of battle. Of the Romans only eighty were killed, and these were the men who stood in the ranks where they had to withstand the first shock of the Frankish charge. Shortly after this victory Narses proceeded to the reduction of Compsae,[623] where the number of recalcitrant Goths, who had taken asylum with Ragnaris, now amounted to seven thousand. The fortress was blockaded during the winter; and at the beginning of spring (555), after their leader had been slain in a chance encounter, the occupants surrendered unconditionally to the eunuch, who sent them to Constantinople, so that their services might be utilized for the future in the defence of the Empire.
After a war of twenty years Justinian at last felt himself to be the veritable sovereign of Italy; and he drew up forthwith a comprehensive Act for the future government of the country. The title of this document, the legate to whose hand it was entrusted, and the place chosen for its promulgation, were all worthy of its importance. In the autumn of 554 the exiled Pope Vigilius quitted the Imperial capital to annunciate the Pragmatic Sanction from the throne of St. Peter as the Emperor's message of amity to the Italian people. Yet the concessions made to the inhabitants by this Constitution were, perhaps, not worthy of the name; and many who benefited, through the adoption of a definite Imperial policy, did so at the expense of others. Not altogether inequitably, however, as the main object of the Emperor was to restore the status quo before the accession to power of Totila. The Pragmatic Sanction, therefore, enacted a universal reinstatement of, and restitution to those who were the losers by the interior administration of that monarch. In his efforts to consolidate his power he had made, or winked at, sweeping transfers of real and personal estate to his supporters from those who were disaffected to his cause. Now everyone was called on to take his own again wherever he could find it, without being troubled to make out his claim in conformity with the niceties of legal practice, it being conceded that there might have been an indefinite loss or destruction of instruments of title during the general upset. Lands and cattle, houses and movables, were to revert to their original owners; slaves of both sexes, who had obtained or assumed their freedom in the laxity of the times, were to return to the hand of their masters; and even the marriage tie was declared to be a nullity if contracted under the altered social conditions. Thus, husbands and wives who relapsed into servitude could be repudiated by their hymeneal partners; and even nuns, who had tasted of matrimony, had the option of re-entering their convents. On the other hand, Justinian did not encroach on the liberty of his new subjects by depriving them of advantages which they had formerly enjoyed; for instance, the provincial Rectors were to be chosen locally by the prelates of the Church from among the Italians themselves; and the salaries customarily paid at Rome for the promotion of liberal studies, literature, rhetoric, law, and physic, were to be continued to the professors. He also invited the Roman senators to visit him at the Byzantine Court whenever it pleased them to do so; and enacted that travellers might pass without let or hindrance between Italy and the rest of the Empire. The usual formulas as to the efficient collection of the taxes and against fiscal oppression were, of course, prominently expressed in this Constitution; and in this department we may be sure that the Gothic rule was often regretted.[624]
[599] Procopius, De Bel. Goth., iii, 1 (whence the narrative proceeds as below). Cf. Anecd., 24, 26.
[600] Afterwards and now Pavia.
[601] Baduela on coins, but the Greeks always call him "Tõtilas," perhaps phonetically.
[602] He had delayed at CP. to celebrate his nuptials with the daughter of Germanus; Procopius, loc. cit., 12.
[603] Now Otranto, the nearest point to the opposite coast of Greece.
[604] He was really afraid to be in the vicinity of Antonina, says Procopius (Anecd., 5), as he believed that she had a mandate from Theodora to make away with him, the latter having an inveterate enmity against Germanus and his family.
[605] See p. 546.
[606] In a later part of his work, however, Procopius says (loc. cit., iv, 33) that Totila also burnt many of the buildings at this time. Marcellinus Com. (an. 547) corroborates, and says that for forty days there was neither man nor beast within the city.