In spite of the antipathy of the leaders of opinion, the Jews of Italy were happy in comparison with their brethren of the Byzantine empire. Theodoric's successors, his beautiful and accomplished daughter Amalasuntha, and her husband and murderer Theodatus, a weakling with philosophical pretensions, followed his principles. The Jews supported King Theodatus with tenacious fidelity, even when he himself had given up all hope. The Jews of Naples risked their lives rather than come under Justinian's scourge. Belisarius, the conqueror of the Vandal empire, the laurel-crowned hero, trembled at Justinian's wrath, and allowed himself to be used as the blind tool of the latter's tyranny; he had already subjugated the whole of Sicily and the southern extremity of the Italian peninsula, and now was swiftly approaching Naples, the largest and most beautiful city of Lower Italy. On his summons to the inhabitants to surrender, the Neapolitans divided into two factions. But even the war party was not disposed to sacrifice itself for the Ostrogoths, who were hated in Italy. The Jews alone, and two lawyers, Pastor and Asclepiadotus, who had been raised to fame through the influence of the Ostrogothic kings, opposed the surrender of the city to the Byzantine general. The Jews, who were wealthy and patriotic, offered their lives and their fortunes for the defense of the city. In order to allay the fear of scarcity of provisions, they promised to supply Naples with all necessaries during the siege. The Jews, unaided, defended that part of the city which was nearest the sea, and fought with such bravery, that the enemy did not venture to direct their attacks against that quarter. A contemporary historian (Procopius) has raised a glorious monument to the heroic bravery of the Jews of Naples. Having one night, by means of treachery, penetrated into the city, the enemy almost made themselves masters of it (536), but the Jews, with the courage of lions, still continued the struggle. It was only at break of day, when the enemy had overwhelmed them with numbers, and many of their own side had been killed, that the Jews quitted their posts. It is not related how the surviving Jewish combatants fared--certainly no better than their confederates Asclepiadotus and Pastor, who fell victims to the fury of the people. Now occurred that which the Italian Jews had anticipated with horror; they came under the rule of the Emperor Justinian, whose anti-Jewish ideas place him in a class with Hadrian, Constantine, and Firuz. Italy, ruler of the world, sank to the rank of a province (Exarchate) of the Byzantine empire, and the Jews of Italy trembled before the exarch of Ravenna.