HKB
Oppression of the soldiers by the Logothetes--Division of the soldiers into three classes--Their promotion suspended--Their pay diverted to other purposes--The diminishing army--Praetorian soldiers disbanded--Alexander the Logothete in Italy--The general's aides-de-camp--The frontier garrisons abandoned--Palace guards, Scholares, and supernumeraries--Armenians--Peter, the Master of Offices, the murderer of Amalasunta--Palace officials, Domestics, and Protectors--Suppression of the quinquennial gratuity--The imperial officers and dignitaries.
Unjust treatment of merchants, mariners, and artisans--The straits of the Bosphorus and the Hellespont burdened with custom-house dues--Enormous dues levied by Addeus in the port of Byzantium--Change in the silver coinage: its depreciation--Monopoly of the silk trade--Ruin of Berytus and Tyre--Malversations of Peter Barsyames and his successors--Tyranny of Theodora and avarice of Justinian.