[Captain Rhino]

Interesting account. Thanks for posting.

The closing sentence about Romans voluntarily defecting to the Huns reminded me of a Roman history course from my undergraduate days. When the timeline got to the Byzantine period, there was significant discussion of the heavy taxation of freemen by the state. I particularly remember two items:

1. Freemen were actually going to wealthy landowners and asking to be enslaved because their tax burdens would be lighter.

(There was also a period of depopulation throughout the Roman Empire where extensive areas, once under cultivation, were allowed to become overgrown.)

2. That Byzantine rule was so abusive and heavy-handed for cities in Mesopotamia and Persia that Muslim armies were often welcomed as liberators.

[MeneMeneTekelUpharsin]

That Byzantine rule was so abusive and heavy-handed for cities in Mesopotamia and Persia that Muslim armies were often welcomed as liberators.

That is about to happen here.

[Antoninus]

2. That Byzantine rule was so abusive and heavy-handed for cities in Mesopotamia and Persia that Muslim armies were often welcomed as liberators.

Yup. But in almost every case, they regretted that decision very shortly thereafter. Read the account of the Muslim conquest of Egypt in the Chronicle of John, Bishop of Nikiu.