On the following day Belisarius commanded those on the ships to disembark, and after marshalling the whole army and drawing it up in battle formation, he marched into Carthage; for he feared lest he should encounter some snare set by the enemy.  There he reminded the soldiers at length of how much good fortune had come to them because they had displayed moderation toward the Libyans, and he exhorted them earnestly to preserve good order with the greatest care in Carthage.  For all the Libyans had been Romans in earlier times and had come under the Vandals by no will of their own and had suffered many outrages at the hands of these barbarians.  For this very reason the emperor had entered into war with the Vandals, and it was not holy that any harm should come from them to the people whose freedom they had made the ground for taking the field against the Vandals. [Sept. 15, 533 A.D.] After such words of exhortation he entered Carthage, and, since no enemy was seen by them, he went up to the palace and seated himself on Gelimer’s throne.  There a crowd of merchants and other Carthaginians came before Belisarius with much shouting, persons whose homes were on the sea, and they made the charge that there had been a robbery of their property on the preceding night by the sailors.  And Belisarius bound Calonymus by oaths to bring without fail all his thefts to the light.  And Calonymus, taking the oath and disregarding what he had sworn, for the moment made the money his plunder, but not long afterwards he paid his just penalty in Byzantium.  For being taken with the disease called apoplexy, he became insane and bit off his own tongue and then died.  But this happened at a later time.

XXI

But then, since the hour was appropriate, Belisarius commanded that lunch be prepared for them, in the very place where Gelimer was accustomed to entertain the leaders of the Vandals.  This place the Romans call “Delphix,” not in their own tongue, but using the Greek word according to the ancient custom.  For in the palace at Rome, where the dining couches of the emperor were placed, a tripod had stood from olden times, on which the emperor’s cupbearers used to place the cups.  Now the Romans call a tripod “Delphix,” since they were first made at Delphi, and from this both in Byzantium and wherever there is a king’s dining couch they call the room “Delphix”; for the Romans follow the Greek also in calling the emperor’s residence “Palatium.”  For a Greek named Pallas lived in this place before the capture of Troy and built a noteworthy house there, and they called this dwelling “Palatium”; and when Augustus received the imperial power, he decided to take up his first residence in that house, and from this they call the place wherever the emperor resides “Palatium.”  So Belisarius dined in the Delphix and with him all the notables of the army.  And it happened that the lunch made for Gelimer on the preceding day was in readiness.  And we feasted