Instead, it was the Christians who came to write Julian’s story. Theodoret of Cyrus (c.393–c.460) had two main points to make. Julian, supposedly a brilliant general, was in fact a poor strategist who made elementary mistakes: burning his boats left his troops downhearted, as did marching them across a parched desert in forty-degree heat. The emperor had failed to order enough supplies in advance, and also failed to loot the country he passed through with any efficiency. Theodoret’s second and wider point was about the nature of the pagan gods. Be they crafted in a German forest or a Greek
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