Graves recounts how Belisarius suffers trying to satisfy the whims of the two rulers, including the confusion following the command of Theodora, a monophysite Christian, to depose Pope Silverius.
Count | Count Basie | count | Count Dracula | The Count of Monte Cristo | Belisarius | Imperial Count | Count of Flanders | Count of Barcelona | Count Basie Orchestra | Gaspar de Guzmán, Count-Duke of Olivares | Count of Soissons | You Can Count on Me | Jean-Frédéric Phélypeaux, Count of Maurepas | Count Palatine | Count palatine | Count of Paris | John II, Count of Rietberg | Count of Nevers | count of Blois | William I, Count of Nassau-Dillenburg | Simon VI, Count of Lippe | Ramon Berenguer II, Count of Barcelona | Ramon Berenguer I, Count of Barcelona | Prince Gaston, Count of Eu | Peter II, Count of Savoy | Juan Vicente de Güemes, 2nd Count of Revillagigedo | Gustav Horn, Count of Pori | Gilbert, Count of Gravina | Gebhard, Count of the Lahngau |
Their story was familiar to Asimov from his recent reading of Robert Graves's novel Count Belisarius, and of his earlier study of Edward Gibbon's History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, on which the entire series is loosely based.