After having for some time practiced as a “Rhetorician,” that is, advocate or jurist, in his native land, he seems to have migrated early to Byzantium or Constantinople.
There he gave lessons in elocution, and acted as counsel in several law-cases. His talents soon attracted attention, and he was promoted to official duties in the service of the State. He was commissioned to accompany the famous Belisarius during his command of the army in the East, in the capacity of Counsellor or Assessor.
Procopius was on Belisarius's first Persian campaign, and later took part in an expedition against the Vandals. He was in Italy on the Gothic campaign until 540, after which he lived in Constantinople, since he describes the great plague of 542 in the capital.
Procopius would remain in the employ of the Roman government through at least 554, at which point the historian fades from the historical record.
He is the author of three major historical works: the History of the Wars, the Anecdota, and Buildings. The world of Justinian and Procopius was one of rapid, unsettling change as the Roman Empire evolved into something new.
Procopius of Caesarea composed a record of the wars which Justinian, the emperor of the Romans, waged against the barbarians of the east and of the west.
His chief work in “Histories,” in eight books: two on the Persian wars (408-553), two on the Vandal wars (395-545), and four on the Gothic wars, bringing down the narrative to the beginning of 559.
Procopius provides an ample record for the historian, narrating the momentous events of Justinian’s reign: however, his voice is inflected by his antiquarianism and a disapproval of innovation verging on the reactionary.
Procopius also composed De Aedificiis (on Buildings) around 554 AD. The purpose is to glorify the reigning emperor Justinian as a master builder and imperial patron, it does also present a compendium of significant building activities throughout the extent of the sixth-century Mediterranean world.
Procopius of Caesarea
