Edward Gibbon, an English historian, published The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire in six volumes between 1776 and 1788. This is Chapter 46 of that work. He follows Rome from the prosperous age of Trajan and the Antonines, around the year 100, through the fall of the West and on to the Ottoman capture of Constantinople in 1453.

Chapter 46: Revolutions on Persia after the death of Khosrow or Nushirvan—His son Hormouz, a tyrant, is deposed—Usurpation of Bahram—Flight and restoration of Khosrow II—His gratitude to the Romans—The Khagan of the Avars—Revolt of the army against Maurice—His Death—Tyranny of Phocas—Elevation of Heraclius—The Persian War—Khosrow subdues Syria, Egypt, and Asia Minor—Siege of Constantinople by the Persians and Avars—Persian expeditions—Victories and triumph of Heraclius. The footnotes — Gibbon’s famous asides — are not in this reading. What you have is the narrative, in his own eighteenth-century English.