This is the briefest possible record of how the original liberty of the Roman clergy and people to elect the Pope was treated by the foreign Arian rulers, Odoacer, Theodorich, Athalarich, and Theodatus. Then the emperor Justinian became by right of conquest immediate lord of Rome, and seized without scruple upon the appointment and confirmation of the Popes. The act of his empress Theodora, in her violent deposition of Pope Silverius, is the first specimen of Byzantine conduct when it enters by right of conquest upon Italian territory. That the Romans had every reason to wish for the extinction of foreign, which was also heretical, domination, must be clear to every one who follows history in its detail. But likewise the example with which Byzantine domination in Italy opens will suffice to represent to us in a living picture the permanent relation of the Popes to the eastern or Greek empire. If arbitrary(201) violations of the freedom of Papal election by the Gothic kings may be given as the exception, it became by frequent repetitions under Justinian the rule. As the patriarchal see of Constantinople had long been given only to select Court favourites, and taken away from the occupants at every change of imperial inclination, the same plan was pursued henceforth with the filling of the Apostolical See. The emperor issued his edict: the Romans and the Pope were expected to obey. Not even the domain of the Faith was kept free to the Pope. In this also the attempt of the emperors was to lower the chief dignity of the Church to be the echo of their commands. From Justinian onwards the Byzantine emperors claimed and exercised the right to confirm the papal election.(202)