155. The actor fellow, of whom I spoke some time ago, had been in love with this princess before, and he was successful in his wooing. So he plotted against the emperor, but the plot went awry. When he returned from exile, he was more passionately in love than ever. I was well aware of this, but I thought Constantine knew nothing about it. Really, I was rather doubtful.
However, it was he himself who settled the question for me. On a certain occasion when I was accompanying him on one of his visits to the lady (he was being carried on a litter), her lover was also one of the party At the time she was in her private apartment in the palace, standing by some latticed gates. Before embracing her, the emperor stopped, thinking of something, and while he was concentrating on the matter in question, the clown cast his eyes in the direction of his beloved. Seeing her, he smiled gently and then showed other signs of his love for her. Again and again his eyes turned towards her.
While this was going on, the emperor gently nudged me in the ribs. ‘See the rascal,’ he said, ‘still in love. His past punishment hasn’t done him the least good.’ Immediately I heard him, I was covered in confusion, but he went on to see the lady, while the other, by no means abashed, looked at her with more insolence than ever. However, it all came to nothing, for the emperor died, as I shall tell you later in my history, and of the other two the Augusta was again considered a mere hostage, and the lover saw his passion end in nothing but empty dreams.
156. It must be clear that in this account I have repeatedly passed over many events that occurred during this period, so I will return to the emperor. But first I will devote some pages to the empress Zoe, ending with her death, and then I will take up any main story again. What she was like in her youth I cannot say with any certainty, I have already given some description of her earlier in this book, but what I wrote then depended on hearsay.
The Physical Attributes of The Empress Zoe
157. When she had grown old, she was somewhat lacking in stability. I do not wish to convey the impression that she was deranged or out of her right mind, but she was absolutely ignorant of public affairs and her judgment was completely warped by the vulgar extravagance that prevailed in the palace. Whatever intellectual advantages she may have enjoyed in the past, her character certainly did not suffer her to preserve even them free from insincerity, for a perverse delight in displaying her knowledge showed her for what she was — not intellectually honest, but lacking in taste. We will not speak of her reverence for God: I cannot find fault with immoderation in that.
Read More about Zoe and Theodora part 78
