

Justinian (Justinianus) the Second or Younger, son of the aforesaid Constantine, remained in the sovereignty for the first time for ten years after his father. At first he was good, intelligent, careful, and generous distributor of alms. In consequence he greatly enhanced the Constantinopolitan sovereignty, and made many laws respected by the godly Christian clergy. After he had reigned ten years he brought Africa from under the power of the Saracens, and made peace with them on land and sea. Likewise, he recovered from the Saracens Africa and Lybia, which his father had lost. When Gizites, the Saracen, died, he was succeeded by Baldalan, and when he heard that Justinian had acquired the sovereignty with the consent of all the provinces, he voluntarily offered him peace; under the terms of which Africa and Lybia were returned to the empire. And some write that in the same treaty there was a condition that the Saracens should pay the Roman tribute for ten years at the rate of one thousand golden coins per day and one servant from among their people, and one horse. In the meantime Justinian began to employ surprising fickleness toward the people, and contrary to the treaty of peace, he attacked the Saracens and Bulgarians; but of them he received more vexations than he had given them credit for. Immediately, then, he returned to Constantinople, where he was despised by all the citizens because he did not silence the cruelty of the exarches. And he held a council, in which a number of things were done contrary to Christian usage, and which Pope Sergius would not confirm. For this reason the emperor became enraged against the pope, and ordered him brought before him in chains. This, however, the soldiers of Italy would not permit to be done. Among the people there rose up against the emperor one Leontius (Leoncius), the Constantinopolitan senator, together with Gallinicus, the patriarch. Leontius incited the people to arms, and broke open the prisons and released the prisoners. He took Justinian prisoner, cut off his nose, and sent him into exile.[Justinian II, surnamed Rhinotmetus (‘the slit-nosed’), Eastern Roman emperor, from 685 to 695, and from 704 to 711, succeeded his father Constantine IV at the age of sixteen. His reign was unhappy both at home and abroad. He made a truce with the Arabs, which admitted them to the joint possession of Armenia, Iberia and Cyprus, while by removing 12,000 Christian Mardaites from their native Lebanon, he gave the Arabs a command over Asia Minor of which they took advantage in 692 by conquering all Armenia. In 689 Justinian was defeated by the Bulgarians, but settled many Slavs in Asia Minor. Meanwhile the bitter dissensions caused in the church by the emperor, his bloody persecution of the Manicheans, and the rapacity with which, through his creatures Stephanus and Theodatus, he extorted the means of gratifying his sumptuous tastes and his mania for erecting costly buildings, drove his subjects into rebellion. In 695 they rose under Leontius, who cut off the emperor’s nose (thus his surname) with the intent of forever preventing his return to power (an unblemished appearance being a requirement of Imperial rule), and banished him to Cherson in the Crimea.]

Leontius (Leoncius), or, as others would have it, Emperor Leo the Second, after deposing Justinian assumed the sovereignty; and he reigned 3 years. When news of the revolt in the empire reached Habdimelech, the Saracen king, he undertook to attack Africa. Leontius sent John (Ioannem), a general of the army, to oppose him. He drove the Saracens completely out of Africa. However, before long, when another revolt occurred, they made Tiberius, a citizen of Constantinople, emperor. Tiberius speedily sailed to Constantinople, taking Leontius prisoner, as Leontius had done with Justinian.[Leontius (Leo II); see further note to Justinian, below.]

Tiberius, the third emperor of this name, reigned seven years after the taking and imprisonment of Leontius (Leoncio). He was a very noble citizen of Constantinople, and was elected emperor during a revolt, as mentioned above; and he sent Philippus, a citizen of Constantinople, into exile because he had said that he had a dream that an eagle had overshadowed the head of Tiberius. This Tiberius was later deposed, as will be related below.[Tiberius III; see further note to Justinian, below.]

Justinian (Justinianus), former emperor, with the aid of the Bavarians[Here and elsewhere in this paragraph, Schedel (or his source) has confused Bavarians with Khazars. Justinian received no help from the Bavarians.] and Bulgarians, again returned to Constantinople, and reigned six years. In the beginning of the pontificate of John (Ioannis) the Sixth, and while at Cherson (to which city he had been banished), Justinian determined to recover the sovereignty. Immediately the citizens who had supported Tiberius, prepared to fight Justinian; but Justinian came secretly and fled to the Bavarians, whose king espoused his daughter to him. However, at the expiration of a year the aforesaid Tiberius, by the use of money, so changed the attitude of the king that he was about to give up his guest and son-in-law. When Justinian became aware of this he fled to the king of Bulgaria, placing himself under his protection. With this king’s help, and by the aid of arms, Justinian returned to Constantinople; and there he ordered Leontius and Tiberius put to death, while he caused Gallinicus, the patriarch, to be deprived of his eyesight and sent to Rome; and as often as he blew his cut-off nose, he caused one of his opponents to be hacked to pieces. Afterwards he and his son Tiberius were struck down.[Leontius, after a reign of three years, was in turn dethroned and imprisoned by Tiberius III, who next assumed the purple. Justinian meanwhile had escaped from Cherson, and married Theodora, sister of Busirus, khan of the Khazars. Compelled, however, by the intrigues of Tiberius, to leave his new home, he fled to Terbelis, king of the Bulgarians. Being provided with an army of 15,000 horsemen, Justinian suddenly pounced upon Constantinople, slew his rivals, Leontius and Tiberius, with thousands of their partisans, and once more ascended the throne (704). His second reign was marked by an unsuccessful war against Terbelis; by Arab victories in Asia Minor; by devastating expeditions against his own cities of Ravenna and Cherson, where he inflicted horrible punishment upon the disaffected nobles and refugees; and by the same cruel rapacity toward his subjects. Conspiracies again broke out, and Bardanes, surnamed Philippicus, assumed the purple; and Justinian, last of the house of Heraclius, was assassinated in Asia Minor in December 711.]