Belisarius
Belisarius reconquered North Africa and Italy for the Eastern Roman Empire with very small armies and was repeatedly suspected by the emperor he served. Born around 500 in the Balkans, he entered the imperial guard young and was given command in the east in his twenties, winning at Dara in 530 against a much larger Persian force by fighting from prepared trenches. In January 532 the Nika riots nearly destroyed Justinian's reign; Belisarius and Mundus took troops into the Hippodrome and killed a very large number of rioters, and the throne survived. In 533 he was sent to Africa with about fifteen thousand men against the Vandal kingdom. He landed unopposed, beat Gelimer at Ad Decimum and Tricamarum within months, and took Carthage — recovering a province lost for a century in a single campaign. He then invaded Italy against the Ostrogoths, taking Sicily, Naples and Rome in 536, and holding Rome through a siege of a year and nine days with a fraction of the besiegers' numbers, using sorties and cutting their supplies. He took Ravenna in 540 by pretending to accept the Gothic offer to make him western emperor, and then handing the city to Justinian — an act of loyalty that is usually cited against the suspicion he lived under. He was recalled and sent east, returned to Italy with inadequate troops and money, and was recalled again. He came out of retirement in 559 to drive off a Bulgar raid on Constantinople with a scratch force. He was briefly imprisoned in 562 on a conspiracy charge and restored. The tradition that he was blinded and begged in the street is a much later invention.
- Lived: 505 CE – 565 CE
- Nationality: Byzantine
- Roles: military_leader
