Narses was a native of Persarmenia, a part of Armenia under Sasanian Persian control.
[1] He is first recorded in 527 in service of the Sasanian military in the Iberian War, where he and his brother Aratius defeated Sittas and Belisarius in Persarmenia.
[2] In c. 535, he was the commander of the troops in Philae, Egypt, where he destroyed the pagan shrines of the Nobades and Blemmyes, as ordered by the emperor Justinian I.
[1] Narses was not given any military command until 543, when he was assigned a force of Armenians and Herules to fight the Sasanians.
During the hasty invasion of 543 against Dvin, it was wrongly heard that the Sasanian army had left Anglon.