Contemporaries, according to the sources, believed that Narses, as a commander, was not inferior to Belisarius.
There was another commander, in modern terms, from the professional military, who died in his youth, who, as Procopius of Caesarea argued, was not inferior, and maybe even superior to Belisarius.
Archangel Michael in the garb of the archangel. Mosaic. VI century Basilica S. Apollinari in class. Ravenna, Italy
It was about Ursicia Sitta, who was rapidly moving up the career ladder, perhaps due to his kinship with the future wife of Emperor Justinian, ahead of his colleague. At the beginning of his career, he was defeated by the Armenians who fought on the side of the Persians, Ionne and Artavan. They soon became commanders in the Roman army. Sitta in 527 cleans Armenia from the Persians and receives a new title of the military master of Armenia (magister militum per Armeniam). This is a completely new post introduced by Justinian for the new part that entered the empire - Armenia. Of course, parts of Armenia had previously been part of the power of the Romans, but such a position did not exist. In 530. in the battle near the city of Stala in Armenia, a battle took place in which only the cavalry participated. Sitta emerged victorious, after which he conquered the warlike tribe of Tsans here.
Soon he becomes the Master of the East, and after this position was returned to Belisarius - he became the commander of the Present Army - magister militum praesentalis. In this position, he took part in suppressing the uprising in the newly annexed Armenia. But due to a misunderstanding, which is so abundant in the war, the small forces of the Romans were left without allies and Sitta fell in an unequal horse battle near the town of Inohalaku in 539.
It is worth noting that Sitta participated mainly in horse battles and battles, he was a professional soldier who, one might say, spent his whole life in the "saddle", as well as Belisarius, but Narses, all his life made a civilian career and he reached in this field of senior positions.
The possible trust that the basileus of the Romans showed him is due to the fact that, unlike other generals, being a eunuch, he could not usurp the throne.
As we noted above, hostilities, as noted in historical sources, were less and less interested in the emperor. He preferred quick success and profits from the enterprise, and was extremely niggardly investing in them. Defeats and difficulties in the fight against enemies were partly due to precisely these features of the ruler of the empire, who, especially in the second half of his reign, was more busy with theology.
Another point, the fragmentation in the actions of the Roman commanders was ambition, leaderism, self-interest, all this did not contribute to the successful conduct of hostilities.
Against this background, the actions of King Totila appear as extremely meaningful: he captured Rome, Tarentum, completely robbed the once flourishing Sicily and took Regius in southern Italy, thanks to the betrayal of the Turkic Bulgarians by the master of the army John. At the same time, he pursued, as far as possible, a sparing policy towards the civilian population and officials. The Goths and their allies in Italy, in addition to realizing themselves as a victorious people, always pointed to the fact that they had legal rights to Italy, officially confirmed, Emperor Zeno granted him a master of the army, he was even a consul.
At the same time, the Roman soldiers scattered across the garrisons of Italy were not paid money for a long time, payments were made sporadically, which prompted them to go over to the side of the enemy or defect.
In such conditions, Totila not only fought in Italy, he waged an offensive war: in 551 he captured Corsica and Sardinia, and in 552 he took and robbed the sea fortress and the town of Kerkyra (Corfa) and Epirus (North-West Greece). This situation forced the emperor to begin to form a new army to fight in Italy. Under the leadership of Justinian's nephew Herman, detachments began to gather for a campaign in Italy, but before the campaign he died.
Soon, Justinian appointed the treasurer, the eunuch Narses (475-573) as commander. Narses was already familiar with this theater of operations, since in 538. already landed in Italy, but due to disagreements with Belisarius, and the inability to establish one-man command, since the treasurer could not obey the strategy and vice versa, the emperor, having received a complaint from Belisarius, recalled him to the capital.
The choice of the commander is not entirely clear, since Narses did not really have long-term combat experience, but he had common sense and experience in diplomacy. He had close relations with such a wild and warlike tribe as the Heruls (Eruls). It is difficult to imagine what was the reason for such a close friendship between him and such a harsh tribe, perhaps, the desire to make money on the part of the Herul, the usual thirst for gold of the peoples, standing at the stage of "military democracy".
In this regard, I would like to dwell on the description of the geruls, as they are painted by the authors of that time.
Heruli, Eruli (lat. Heruli, Eruli) are a Germanic tribe. In the III century. started moving from Scandinavia to the south, to the northern part of the Black Sea region. In the 2nd half of the 4th century, after the defeat of the "state" of Germanarich, they were subdued by the Huns. After the death of Attila and the collapse of the Hunnic Union, part of the Heruls remained on the shores of the Azov and Black Seas, and the other part founded their "state" (about 500g) on the Danube in Panonia (the Roman province of the Second Panonia), subjugating the surrounding tribes, including and the Lombards. But military happiness is changeable, the strengthened Lombards defeated the Heruls in 512.
Heruli (erula) VI century. Reconstruction by E.
Heruli were pagans and made human sacrifices, but, settling on the Danube, near the Roman border, as “allies”, they adopted Christianity and began to participate in the campaigns of the Romans: “However, - as Procopius writes, - in this case, they were not always loyal allies of the Romans, and motivated by greed, they always tried to rape their neighbors, and such a course of action did not cause them shame … They entered into godless sexual intercourse, among other things, with men and with donkeys; of all people, they were the most unfit and criminal, and therefore they were destined to perish shamefully. " [Procopius of Caesarea War with the Goths / SS Translation. P. Kondratyev. T. I. M., 1996. S. 154., S. 158.]
Soon the Heruls left the Roman borders for the Gepids in Dacia. Subsequently, they were swept away by the subsequent invasions of the Slavs.
In the VI century. Heruli are in the Roman army in the theater of operations in Italy and in the East as "allies" and federates: "Some of [Heruli - V. E.] of them became Roman soldiers and were enlisted in the army under the name of" Federates "."
A thousand geruls were in the expeditionary force in Africa. All in all, there were about 10 thousand of them in the Roman army in Italy, which constituted a significant percentage of the "expeditionary army". Their unbridled disposition corresponded to the idea of a good warrior during this period, but the lack of discipline and psychological imbalance often led to the death of these soldiers.
Significantly, in this regard, firstly, the death of a detachment of Heruls and their leader Fulkaris, who was ambushed by the Franks in the city of Parma: “He believed that the duty of the strategist and the leader is not to arrange the battle order and lead it, but to be different in battle, get ahead of others, attack the enemy with ardor and fight the enemy hand-to-hand. " [Agathius of Mirinei. On the reign of Justinian / Translation by M. V. Levchenko M., 1996.]
Secondly, the "whims" of the Heruls before and during the Battle of Kasulin in 553 could cost the Romans dearly.
Both Procopius and Jordan often portrayed the Heruls as lightly armed warriors, but this does not mean that they fought like the Romans with darts and arrows and bows: “For the Heruls have no helmets, no shells, or other protective weapons. They have nothing but a shield and a simple rough shirt, girding which, they go into battle. And the slaves-Heruli enter the battle even without shields, and only when they show their courage in the war, the gentlemen allow them to use their shields for their own protection in a collision with enemies”[Procopius of Caesarea War with the Persians / Translation, article, comments by A. A. Chekalova. SPb., 1997. S. 128. BP. II. XXV.28.].
Obviously, the friendship of the treasurer with the Heruls played an important role in the choice of Narses as the head of the expedition.
Narses, according to Procopius, raised the question of the need for serious financing of a new expedition before the Vasilevs. The money was allocated not only for new troops, but also for paying off debts to Italian soldiers. He began to gather troops among the horsemen from the catalog stratiots of Thrace and Illyria.
Illyrians are horsemen from stratiotic (soldier's) settlements of regular cavalry from the northwest of the Balkan Peninsula (Epirus and the territory of modern Albania). Mauritius Stratig pointed out that they are inferior in combat terms to the federates and the Vexillarians, and their formation in depth should be one more warrior than the latter.
We know that in the second half of the 5th century. Sarmatians and "some of the Huns" were settled in Illyria. [Jordan. About the origin and deeds of the Getae. Translated by E. Ch. Skrzhinsky. SPb., 1997. S. 112.].
Illyrians are active participants in hostilities in the 6th century. Emperor Tiberius in 577. recruited horsemen in Illyria to fight in the East. Similar to the Illyrians was the "regular Thracian cavalry".
Narses also recruited horsemen of the Huns, possibly federates, into his expedition, and also Persian defectors and Gepids entered the corps. The emperor turned to the Lombards, and their king allocated 2 thousand. the best warriors and 3 thousand armed servants.
In his campaign, he was actively, according to Paul the Deacon, assisted by a professional soldier, the commander Dagistey.
Narses intended to cross the Alps. So, the expedition was ready to go. Looking ahead, it is worth saying that in their history more than once the Romans will collect expeditions both for trips to Italy and Sicily, right up to the 12th century.
