Kitap 30
2.3
To this Valens made answer to this effect: that he could not repeal anything of that which had been agreed upon by common consent, but would maintain it with the utmost vigour. In reply to this noble utterance a 377–8 A.D. letter was brought from the king when the winter was already nearly ended,377–8. giving trivial and arrogant reasons. For he asserted that the weeds of discord could not be pruned away by the roots except in the presence of those who had been witnesses to the conclusion of the peace with Jovian, some of whom (as he had learned) had since died.
2.4
After this the emperor’s cares grew heavier. 377 A.D. Now he was in condition rather to make a choice of plans than to discover any; and so, thinking it to be to the advantage of the State, he ordered Victor, commander of the cavalry, and Urbicius, general in Mesopotamia, to go quickly to the Persians, bearing an ultimatum in plain language: that it was criminal of a king who was just and contented with his own (as he boasted) wrongfully to covet Armenia, whose people had been granted permission to live independently; and that, unless the guard of soldiers given to SauromacesCf. xxvii. 12, 16. should return without hindrance at the beginning of the following year (as had been agreed), Sapor would be forced to do against his will what he had refrained from doing of his own accord.
