As with most ancient historians, we know little about the ‘real’ Procopius. What we do know derives principally from references to himself sprinkled throughout his writings and bits of information found in contemporary and later Byzantine sources. To these literary accounts we may add recent epigraphical, archeological, and topographical approaches, which have contributed greatly to our understanding of the world Procopius inhabited. As scholars have rightly cautioned, however, taking a biographical approach to Procopius presents certain challenges—and indeed raises some insurmountable barriers. Separating authors from their writings is difficult. Even what appears to be the most straightforward autobiographical material found in the Wars, the Secret History, and the Buildings must be used with care, since even if we feel we get to know Procopius from these writings, much of what we encounter is a carefully constructed facade. There can be a great gulf between the life and the work. To borrow the sage warning of Alan Ross, ‘these moments of ostensible self-revelation are also among Procopius’ most literary and […] they allow Procopius consciously to create a narratorial persona as much as they may incidentally uncover the man behind the work’. Put slightly differently, Peter Van Nuffelen stresses that ‘text and author are two related but distinct identities’. This is eminently sensible advice. Ancient authors strove to manipulate their audiences to provoke an emotional response. Moreover, relating both sides of the story was a basic tenet of ancient Greek and Byzantine rhetoric. Chameleon-like, the author was expected to adapt his persona to the edicts of his chosen rhetorical form. We should therefore not just assume that the attitudes expressed in any text reveal deeper truths about the author's outward or inner self.