XXXIV. In the month of Ab (August) of this year there came an edict from the emperor Anastasius that the fights of wild beasts in the amphitheatre should be suppressed in all the cities of the Roman empire. In the month of Ilul (September) there was a violent earthquake, and a great sound was heard from heaven over the land, so that the earth trembled from its foundations at the sound; and all the villages and towns heard that sound and felt the earthquake. Alarming rumours and evil reports came to us from all quarters; and, as some said, a marvellous sign was seen in the river Euphrates and at the hot-spring of Abarne, in that the water which flowed from their fountains was dried up this day. It does not appear to me that this is false, because, whenever the earth is rent by earthquakes, it happens that the running waters in those places that are cleft are restrained from flowing, and are at times even turned into another direction; as the blessed David too, when telling in the eighteenth psalm of the punishments that came from God upon His enemies, by means of the shaking of the earth and the cleaving of the mountains, and the like, lets us know that this also took place. For he says: "The fountains of the waters were laid bare, and the foundations of the world were seen, at Thy rebuke, O Lord." There came too in the course of this month a letter, which was read in church before the whole congregation, stating that Nicopolis had fallen to the ground of a sudden at midnight and overwhelmed all its inhabitants. Some strangers too who were there, and certain brethren from our schools who were travelling there and happened to be on the spot, were buried (in the ruins). Their companions who came (back from thence) told us (this). The whole wall of the city all round, and everything that was within it, was overturned in that night, and not one person of them remained alive, save the bishop of the town and two other men, who were sleeping behind the apse of the altar of the church. When the ceiling of the room in which they were sleeping fell, one end of its beams was propped up by the wall of the altar, and so it did not bury them. A certain brother, whose veracity can be depended upon, has told me as follows. "At nightfall on the night when Nicopolis fell, we were lying down inside the town, I and a companion of mine. He was very restless, and said to me, 'Get up, and let us go and pass the night outside of the town in yonder cave, as is our custom, for I cannot get rest here, because the air is so sultry and sleep will not come to me.' So we got up, I and he, and went out of the town, and passed the night in the cave, as was our custom. When the time of dawn drew nigh, I awakened the brother who was with me, and said to him, 'Get up, for it is daybreak, and let us go into the town, and attend to our business.' So we got up, I and he, and came into the town, and found all its houses overturned, and the people and the cattle, the oxen and the camels, buried therein; and the sound of their groaning was coming up from under the ground. Those who came together to the spot took out the bishop from beneath the beams (of the roof) by which he was sheltered. He asked for bread and wine, wherewith to celebrate the eucharist, [but could get none,] because the whole town was overturned and nothing in it left standing. Presently, however, there arrived a wayfarer, a good man, who gave him some small pieces of bread and a little wine, and he celebrated the eucharist and prayed, and made those who were there participate in the mystery of life. He resembled at this time, as it seems to me, the just Lot when he made his escape from Sodom." Thus much is sufficient to tell.