Persia from the Earliest Period to the Arab

176 HISTORY OF PERSIA.
and condemned to take refuge within the dominions
of Mauritius, who readily espoused his cause.
A powerful army was shortly after (A.D. 591) as
sembled on the frontiers of Syria and Armenia, under
the command of the best general of his time, Narses,
with orders not to sheath the sword,
replaced on the throne of his ancestors.
" The restoration
of Khosru was celebrated with feasts and
till Khosni was
executions, and the music of the royal banquet was
often disturbed by the groans of dying or mutilated
criminals."
During the reign of Mauritius, the Persian ruler
was not forgetful of the power to whom he owed
his throne ;
the cities of Martyropolis and of Dara were
restored to the Romans, the banks of the Araxes and
the shores of the Caspian forming the boundaries of
their empire. But these advantages were not destined to
remain for many years under the command of the
feeble Constantinopolitans, the murder of Mauricius and
of his family by the upstart Phocas producing such a
revolution as might easily have been foreseen. When
Khosru heard of this murder he instantly declared war
(nominally at least) to avenge
the death of his bene-
factor, and doubtless, at first, owed much of his success
to the destruction of the unfortunate Narses, who had
been seized by Phocas, and burnt alive in the market-
place of Constantinople (A.D. 605). Indeed, during the
short reign of this usurper, the Persians were everywhere
victorious :
"
the fortifications of Mardin, Dara, Amicla,
and Edessa," says Gibbon, " were besieged, reduced or
destroyed by the Persian monarch ; he passed the
Euphrates, occupied the Syrian cities Hierapolis and