Complex sentence: Theophanes writes, with obvious exaggeration, of a thousand dromons, while Anastasius gives the more plausible number of thirty vessels--was destroyed; according to Theophanes, "it is said that only three ships escaped".
Split into simpler sentences: Theophanes writes, with obvious exaggeration, of a thousand dromons, while Anastasius gives the more plausible number of thirty vessels--was destroyed. According to Theophanes, "it is said that only three ships escaped".