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having erred, I received my due according to my iniquities; but I will plead my case before God against those who suggest these things to me. Do not be puffed up by the honor of your reign. So treat all as yourself. Know who you were and who you are now. Do not be arrogant to your countrymen, and you will not sin. You know who I was and who I am now, seeing death before my eyes. All these who are present are your servants and your children. Pay attention to the army. Do not appoint cowardly and foolish men. Let them not persuade you that those before you also conducted themselves thus. These things I charge and advise you from what I have suffered. Let those who have wealth enjoy it usefully. I have preferred you for those who have not. Your mother, who was once your mistress, revere and honor; for you were a slave before, but now become her son.” When the emperor said these things, and the Caesar had fallen at his feet, the emperor said, “If you wish, I am; if you do not wish, I do not live. May God who made heaven and earth put into your heart also other things, which I have forgotten to tell you.” But with the disease weighing heavily upon the emperor, he died not long after. And his body was placed in the Heroon of Justinian, in a Proconnesian sarcophagus, with Sophia his wife. In the time of this most pious Justin, a certain Jew in 1.687 the city, a glass-maker, had an only-begotten child, whom he sent to learn his letters near the great church, whose sacristan, having many remains from the holy table, gave them to the children to consume them. With whom the Jewish child also gathered; who, being dismissed, went to his parents. And his father says, “Why are you late, child?” And the boy answered, “With the Christian children in the great church I ate too, father.” But that deceitful beast, having become exceedingly enraged, after lunch took the child and went to his workshop, threw him into the furnace and, having closed the door, departed. But his wife, knowing her husband’s madness against the child, went to the workshop and, peeking through the peephole, heard the child’s voice, and entering, she found the child sitting inside the furnace unburnt. Whom she brought out and asked him how he had remained unburnt; and he answered, “A woman wearing purple came and extinguished the flame, saying to me, do not be afraid, child.” His mother, hearing these things and being astonished, went with her son to the patriarch Menas, and after reporting everything, she begged to become a Christian. And he brought them to the emperor, and the emperor ordered the father of the child to be present also, and after the examination the emperor urged the Hebrew to become a Christian. And having exhorted him much, he did not persuade him. Wherefore he also ordered him to be impaled, as having become the murderer of his own child. 1.688 And having baptized the wife and the child, the patriarch made her a nun, and the child a lector.
Year of the world #2271, year of the divine incarnation 577, Tiberius, orthodox emperor of the Romans, for 4 years. He was perfect in the build of his body, well-chested, with fine eyes and slightly grey-eyed, having blond hair on his head and beard, fair in complexion and ruddy in face, good and exceedingly magnanimous. When he went up into the hippodrome, the factions shouted, "Let us see, let us see the Augusta of the Romans." And he declared, "The church opposite the public bath of Digisteos is homonymous with the Augusta." Therefore the factions acclaimed, "Many years to Anastasia Augusta." But Sophia, the wife of Justin, was struck to the soul; for she did not know that he had a wife, and for this reason, under Justin, she had cultivated a friendship with him, having persuaded him to promote Tiberius to be emperor, because she wanted to marry him and remain Augusta. But Tiberius brought her down to the Palace of Sophia, ordering a cubicularius and certain others to be in her service and
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σφαλεὶς ἀπέλαβον κατὰ τὰς ἀνομίας μου· ἀλλὰ δικάσομαι ἐν τῷ θεῷ τοῖς ὑποβάλλουσί μοι ταῦτα. μὴ ἐπαρθῇς ἐπὶ τιμῇ τῆς βασιλείας σου. οὕτως ἔχε τοὺς πάντας ὡς ἑαυτόν. γνῶθι τίς ἦς καὶ τίς εἶ νῦν. μὴ ὑπερήφανος ᾖς τοῖς ὁμοφύλοις, καὶ οὐχ ἁμάρτῃς. οἶδας τίς ἤμην καὶ τίς εἰμὶ νῦν, τὸν θάνατον ἐν ὀφθαλμοῖς ὁρῶν. πάντες οὗτοι οἱ παριστάμενοι δοῦλοί εἰσι καὶ τέκνα σου. τῷ στρατῷ πρόσεχε. ἀνάνδρους καὶ ἀσυνέτους μὴ προχειρίζου. μή σε πεισάτωσαν ὅτι καὶ οἱ πρὸ σοῦ οὕτως διεγένοντο. ταῦτα παρεγγυῶ σοι καὶ παραινῶ ἀφ' ὧν ἔπα θον. περιουσίας οἱ ἔχοντες ἀπολαυέτωσαν αὐτῶν χρησίμως. τοῖς μὴ ἔχουσι σε προετίμησα. τὴν μητέρα σου, τήν ποτέ σου δέσποι ναν γενομένην, σέβου καὶ τίμα· δοῦλος γὰρ ἦσθα πρότερον, νῦν δὲ γενοῦ υἱὸς αὐτῆς." ταῦτα εἰπόντος τοῦ βασιλέως, καὶ τοῦ Καίσαρος ἐν τοῖς ποσὶν αὐτοῦ πεσόντος, ἔφη ὁ βασιλεύς "εἰ θέ λεις, εἰμί, εἰ οὐ θέλεις, οὐ ζῶ. ὁ θεὸς ὁ τὸν οὐρανὸν καὶ τὴν γῆν ποιήσας ἐμβάλῃ εἰς τὴν καρδίαν σου καὶ ἄλλα, ἃ ἐπελαθό μην εἰπεῖν σοι." τῆς νόσου δὲ τῷ βασιλεῖ βαρέως ἐπικειμένης μετ' οὐ πολὺ ἐτελεύτησε. καὶ ἐτέθη τὸ σῶμα αὐτοῦ ἐν τῷ ἡρῴῳ Ἰουστινιανοῦ, ἐν λάρνακι Προικοννησίῳ, μετὰ Σοφίας τῆς γυναι κὸς αὐτοῦ. Ἐπὶ τούτου τοῦ εὐσεβεστάτου Ἰουστίνου Ἰουδαῖός τις ἐν 1.687 τῇ πόλει ὑελοψὸς παιδίον ἐκέκτητο μονογενές, ὃ παρέδωκε μαν θάνειν γράμματα πλησίον τῆς μεγάλης ἐκκλησίας, ἧς ὁ σκευοφύλαξ ἔχων λείψανα πολλὰ τῆς ἁγίας τραπέζης δέδωκε τοῖς παισὶ πρὸς τὸ δαπανῆσαι αὐτά. μεθ' ὧν συνῆλθε καὶ τὸ Ἰουδαϊκὸν παιδίον· ὅπερ ἀπολυθὲν πρὸς τοὺς γονεῖς αὐτοῦ ἀπῆλθε. καὶ φησὶν ὁ πατὴρ αὐτοῦ "ἵνα τί ἐβράδυνας, τέκνον;" ὁ δὲ παῖς ἀπεκρίθη "μετὰ τῶν Χριστιανῶν παιδίων εἰς τὴν μεγάλην ἐκκλη σίαν ἔφαγον κἀγώ, πάτερ." ὁ δὲ δόλιος ἐκεῖνος θὴρ σφόδρα μανείς, μετὰ τὸ ἀριστῆσαι λαβὼν τὸ παιδίον καὶ ἀπελθὼν εἰς τὸ ἐργαστήριον αὐτοῦ ἔρριψεν αὐτὸ εἰς τὴν κάμινον καὶ κλείσας τὴν θύραν ἀνεχώρησεν. ἡ δὲ γυνὴ αὐτοῦ τὴν κατὰ τοῦ παιδὸς μα νίαν τοῦ ἀνδρὸς αὐτῆς εἰδυῖα, ἀπελθοῦσα ἐν τῷ ἐργαστηρίῳ καὶ διὰ τῆς ὀπῆς παρακύψασα ἤκουσε τῆς φωνῆς τοῦ παιδὸς καὶ εἰσ ελθοῦσα εὗρε τὸν παῖδα καθήμενον ἔσωθεν τῆς καμίνου ἀκατά φλεκτον. ὃν ἐξαγαγοῦσα ἠρώτα αὐτὸν πῶς ἀκατάφλεκτος διέμει νεν· ὁ δὲ ἀπεκρίνετο "γυνὴ πορφυροφοροῦσα ἦλθε καὶ τὴν φλόγα κατέσβεσε, λέγουσά μοι μὴ φοβοῦ, παιδίον." ἡ δὲ μήτηρ αὐ τοῦ ταῦτα ἀκούσασα καὶ καταπλαγεῖσα ἀπῆλθε σὺν τῷ υἱῷ πρὸς τὸν πατριάρχην Μηνᾶν, καὶ πάντα ἀναγγείλασα παρεκάλει Χρι στιανὴ γενέσθαι. ὁ δὲ πρὸς τὸν βασιλέα ἀπήγαγε, καὶ ἐκέλευσεν ὁ βασιλεὺς παραστῆναι καὶ τὸν πατέρα τοῦ παιδίου, καὶ μετὰ τὴν ἐξέτασιν παρεκάλει τὸν Ἑβραῖον ὁ βασιλεὺς γενέσθαι Χριστιανόν. καὶ πολλὰ παραινέσας αὐτὸν οὐκ ἔπεισεν. ὅθεν καὶ προσέταξεν αὐτὸν ἀνασκολοπισθῆναι ὡς φονέα γενόμενον τοῦ ἰδίου παιδίου. 1.688 τὴν δὲ γυναῖκα καὶ τὸ παιδίον βαπτίσας ὁ πατριάρχης τὴν μὲν ἐποίησεν ἀσκήτριαν, τὸ δὲ παιδίον ἀναγνώστην.
Κόσμου ἔτος #22οαʹ, τῆς θείας σαρκώσεως ἔτος φοζʹ, Ῥω μαίων βασιλεὺς ὀρθόδοξος Τιβέριος ἔτη δʹ. ἦν δὲ τὴν τοῦ σώ ματος ἀναδρομὴν τέλειος, εὔστηθος, εὐόμματός τε καὶ ὀλίγον ὑπόγλαυκος, ξανθὴν ἔχων τὴν τρίχα τῆς κεφαλῆς καὶ τὸ γένειον, λευκὸς τὴν χροιὰν καὶ τὸ πρόσωπον ἀνθηρός, ἀγαθὸς καὶ μεγα λόψυχος εἰς ὑπερβολήν. τούτου ἀνελθόντος ἐν τῷ ἱππικῷ ἀνέ κραξαν τὰ μέρη "ἴδωμεν ἴδωμεν τὴν Αὐγοῦσταν Ῥωμαίων." ὁ δὲ ἐδήλωσεν "ἡ ἀντικρὺ τοῦ δημοσίου λουτροῦ ∆ιηγιστέως ἐκ κλησία ὁμώνυμός ἐστι τῇ Αὐγούστῃ." εὐφήμησαν οὖν τὰ μέρη "̓Αναστασίας Αὐγούστης πολλὰ τὰ ἔτη." ἡ δὲ Σοφία ἡ τοῦ Ἰουστίνου γυνὴ ἐπλήγη τὴν ψυχήν· οὐ γὰρ ᾔδει ἔχειν αὐτὸν γυ ναῖκα, καὶ διὰ τοῦτο προσεφιλιώθη αὐτῷ ὑπὸ Ἰουστίνου, πεί σασα αὐτὸν προβαλέσθαι εἰς βασιλέα Τιβέριον, βουλομένη γῆμαι αὐτὸν καὶ μεῖναι Αὐγοῦστα. ταύτην δὲ κατήγαγε Τιβέριος εἰς τὸ παλάτιον τῶν Σοφιῶν, κελεύσας κουβικουλάριον καὶ ἑτέρους τινὰς εἶναι εἰς ὑπηρεσίαν αὐτῆς καὶ