Converted by the Greek brothers to the Christian religion, Suatocopius
is stated for many years to have set a good example to his subjects of
all the virtues called royal; but finally, emboldened by the continuous
prosperity of a long reign and the representations of his courtiers, he
declined paying any more tribute into the imperial exchequer. This
refusal at once involved him in warfare with the Emperor Arnulph, and
in a battle which ensued the Moravians were defeated, and, so it was
universally believed, their monarch slain. The body of Suatocopius
could not be discovered, declares our chief authority, but the fact of
his death was deemed indisputable, and his son was permitted by his
godfather, the victor, to ascend the vacant throne.
Many years elapsed, and Suatocopius was probably forgotten, when some
monks brought his son the astounding information that his father, the
king, had only just expired, in the distant and mean hermitage whence
they came. The tale which they told, and which their hearer placed
entire credence in, according to the history of Pope Pius, was to the
effect that for several years they had housed and fed a wanderer who
one day had besought their hospitality; during the whole time he had
lived with them he had cheerfully and patiently endured all the
hardships of their rough and indigent life, but finding his end
approaching, the unknown had summoned them to his side and said:--
"Until the present moment you have not known who I am. Know then that
I am the King of Moravia, who, having lost a battle, took refuge
amongst you. I die, after having tasted the joys of reigning and of
private life. The royal state is certainly not preferable to the
repose of solitude. Here I sleep without fear and without disquietude,
enjoying the calm and pleasures of life, tasting fruits and the purest
water, which is far more agreeable than the most precious beverages the
courts of kings afford. I have spent with you happily the remainder of
the life God has granted me, and the time which I passed upon the
throne now seems to me to have been a continual death.... When I am
dead inter my body in this place, but go, I beg you, and inform my son,
if he be still alive, what I have told you."
Soon after this confession the supposed king died; his body was duly
interred by his fellow monks, and information of his decease sent to
the reigning monarch. He, with all diligence, had the body disinterred
and brought to Volgrade, the capital of Moravia, and, notwithstanding
the years that had elapsed since the disappearance of Suatocopius, and
the length of time the corpse had been buried, recognized the body as
his father's, and had it deposited, with all due pomp and ceremony, in
the royal sepulchre, to moulder, royal or plebeian, amid the ashes of
his predecessors.
THE FALSE HENRY THE FIFTH OF GERMANY.
A.D. 1130.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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