Procopius of Caesarea

Biography

The greatest historian of late antiquity, Procopius served as legal secretary and adviser to Belisarius and accompanied him on the Persian, Vandal, and Gothic campaigns, giving him a front-row seat at the reconquest. His 'History of the Wars' is the essential eyewitness account of Justinian's age and one of the finest works of ancient historiography. He also wrote the 'Buildings,' a panegyric to Justinian's construction projects — and, most notoriously, the 'Secret History,' a venomous private tract that portrayed Justinian and Theodora as literally demonic, cruel, and corrupt, published only after his death. Together his works give us a uniquely complete and complex picture of the empire, its wars, its plague, and its rulers, seen from the inside by a brilliant and disillusioned observer.