Theodora as a Byzantine Mime performer
From Anecdota (The Secret History) by Procopius. 9.2-26 (selections)
ŠTranslation by Mark Damen. All Rights Reserved
Translators notes:
Procopius served as official historian to the Byzantine emperor Justinian.
While recording the accomplishments of this great man, at the same time he must
have witnessed many horrors and atrocities. Near the end of his life, unable
to hold back his anger but not so foolish as to make public his thoughts, Procopius
wrote in secret what he called "The Unpublished Notes" (Anecdota). In
these notes he reveals his true loathing of Justinian and Justinian's wife Theodora.
Without a wince of modesty he recounts tales too lurid to be factual (but perhaps
based in truth). He tell us, for instance, that he was convinced Justinian was,
in fact, a demon disguised as a man because men, as Procopius says, "whose soul
was pure," claimed they saw him late at night in the palace walking around without
his head (12.20-22). These notes, never published in his day, were only first
discovered in the 900's A.D., for our first reference to them comes from that
time.
The political system of Byzantium was broken into rival parties called the
Blues and the Greens. Based on supporters of two teams of chariot racers, these
factions violently divided Byzantine society. Indeed, Justinian's favoritism
of the Greens over the Blues resulted in much grief and civil bloodshed during
his reign. The passage below begins at the point in Anecdota where, having
just finished maligning Justinian's character, Procopius sets out to vilify
his wife Theodora.
(2) There was a certain Acacius in Byzantium, an animal-keeper of the beasts in the Circus; he belonged to the Greens. People called him "the bear-trainer." (3) This man, in the reign of Anastasius, died of disease, with three female children left behind, Comito, Theodora, and Anastasia, of whom the oldest happened to be not yet seven years. (4) His wife, widowed, married another man who along with her was supposed to take care of matters concerning the estate (i.e. of her former husband) and his job (i.e. as animalkeeper).
(5) But the dancing-master of the Greens, one Asterius by name, bribed by someone else with money, deprived them (i.e. Acacius' widow and her new husband) of that office (i.e. animal-keeper) and simply gave it instead to the one who had bribed him. For dancing masters were able to dispose of such things legally, as they wished. (6) And when the woman (i.e. Acacius' wife) saw the whole populace (of Constantinople) gathered in the Circus, having put garlands on her children's heads and both hands, she sat them down like beggars (i.e. to beg for their father's office back). (7) But the Greens did not choose to recognize this act of supplication; the Blues, however, appointed them to the office because their own animalkeeper had died just recently.
(8) When these children came of age, their own mother put them on the stage there as soon as possible, in that they were comely in appearance, but not all at the same time, rather as each seemed to be ripe for this task. (9) The first, Comito, had already become distinguished among the prostitutes of her day. Theodora, walking behind her and wrapped in a little tunic with sleeves, the sort meant for a girl-slave, attended on her in other ways and followed, always carrying on her shoulders the stool her sister was accustomed to sit on in assemblies. (10) As long as she was too young, Theodora never knew a man or had sex as a woman, but still she engaged in the male form of sex with disreputable men, and especially (did) these things with slaves who, following their owners to the theatre, performed this monstrous act as the opportunity was afforded to them. . . .
(13) Later she (i.e. Theodora) mixed with actors (mimoi) in every aspect of theatre work and shared with them in their training there, even assisting with their jesting and ribaldry. For she was exceptionally quick and funny, and immediately became the center of attention because of her efforts. . . .
(20) Often even in the theatre, in full sight of the people she undressed and
was naked in the middle, having only a ribbon (diazoma, "girdle")
about her private parts and crotch, not that she was ashamed to show even those
to the crowd, but because no one is permitted to run around totally naked there
(i.e. in the theatre) at least not without having a ribbon around their crotch.
Thus, wearing this get-up, she fell backwards on the ground and lay there on
her back. (21) Certain hired hands to whom the task was assigned tossed grain
all over her private parts. Geese that happened to have been trained for just
this purpose picked off this grain one kernel at a time from there with their
bills and ate it. Not even when she got up did she blush; rather she was often
even proud of this performance. For she was not only shameless but tried to
make everyone else shameless, too. (23) Also, she often stood naked with the
actors in their midst on the stage, arching her back and . . . (25) All good people who ran into her in the marketplace turned away and quickly
avoided her, lest by touching the cloak of this person they might seem to share
in her sin. For she was to those who saw her at any time, but especially at
daybreak, a bird of ill omen. (26) To her fellow actresses she was often very
rude, ever the scorpion. Indeed she was filled with much malice.
In the preface to his edition of Anecdota, A. Boak
gives some sane advice to those evaluating the historicity of the passage above:
. . . we must be careful to examine each charge (against
Theodora) separately, for although the facts are usually as Procopius states them,
his explanations of the actions taken are frequently distorted by his animosity.
This animosity explains the unsavory account of Theodora's early life in Constantinople,
which degenerates into pure pornography obviously based on the type of malicious
gossip that defies verification. This is not to say that Theodora led a blameless
early life, although her later years gave no cause for censure and her conduct
as empress was dignified, shrewd, courageous, and humane.