Note 209 — BOOK I.

For some remarks on the date of this letter, see Introduction, p. 23. The mention of interrupted peace, which evidently requires not mere estrangement but an actual state of war, points to the year 505, when Sabinian, the general of Anastasius, was defeated by the Ostrogoths and their allies at Horrea Margi; or to 508, when the Imperial fleet made a raid on the coast of Apulia, as probable dates for the composition of the letter. Its place at the beginning of the Variae does not at all imply priority in date to the letters which follow it. It was evidently Cassiodorus' method to put in the forefront of every book in his collection a letter to an Emperor or King, or other great personage.

As for the tone of the letter, and the exact character of the relation between the Courts of Ravenna and Constantinople which is indicated by it, there is room for a wide divergence of opinion. To me it does not seem to bear out Justinian's contention (recorded by Procopius, De Bello Gotthico ii. 6) that Theodoric ruled Italy as the Emperor's lieutenant. Under all the apparent deference and affectation of humility the language seems to me to be substantially that of one equal addressing another, older and with a somewhat more assured position, but still an equal.