Narses

Biography

One of the most improbable great commanders in history — a court eunuch and treasurer who took the field in his seventies and proved himself a master tactician. An Armenian by origin, Narses spent his career in the palace as Justinian's trusted chamberlain before being sent to finish the Gothic War that had bogged down for years. Arriving with a large, well-supplied army — the resources Belisarius had always lacked — he crushed the Goths at Taginae in 552 with a brilliant use of massed archery against Totila's cavalry, killing the Gothic king. He destroyed the last Gothic army at Mons Lactarius and then annihilated a huge Frankish-Alemannic invasion at the Volturnus in 554. He governed the reconquered Italy for over a decade before dying, according to tradition, at nearly a hundred.

Key Battles