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Constantine the Great

November 21, 2023

"Constantine I" redirects here. For the third king of the modern Greek state, see Constantine I of Greece. For other uses, see Constantine I (disambiguation).

Constantine I[g] (27 February c. 272 – 22 May 337), also known as Constantine the Great, was Roman emperor from AD 306 to 337. He was the first emperor to convert to Christianity.[h] Born in Naissus, Dacia Mediterranea (now Niš, Serbia), he was the son of Flavius Constantius, a Roman army officer of Illyrian origin who had been one of the four rulers of the Tetrarchy. His mother, Helena, was a Greek woman of low birth and a Christian. Later canonized as a saint, she is traditionally attributed with the conversion of her son. Constantine served with distinction under the Roman emperors Diocletian and Galerius. He began his career by campaigning in the eastern provinces (against the Persians) before being recalled in the west (in AD 305) to fight alongside his father in the province of Britannia. After his father's death in 306, Constantine was acclaimed as augustus (emperor) by his army at Eboracum (York, England). He eventually emerged victorious in the civil wars against emperors Maxentius and Licinius to become the sole ruler of the Roman Empire by 324.

Constantine the Great
Roman Emperor
Reign25 July 306 – 22 May 337
PredecessorConstantius I (in the West)
Successor
Co-rulers
See list
BornFlavius Constantinus
27 February c. 272[1]
Naissus, Moesia, Roman Empire[2]
Died22 May 337 (aged 65)
Achyron, Nicomedia, Bithynia, Roman Empire
Burial
Originally the Church of the Holy Apostles, Constantinople, but Constantius II, his son, had it moved
Spouses
Issue
Detail
Names
Flavius Valerius Constantinus
Regnal name
Imperator Caesar Flavius Valerius Constantinus Augustus
GreekΚωνσταντῖνος
DynastyConstantinian
FatherConstantius Chlorus
MotherHelena
Religion

Upon his ascension, Constantine enacted numerous reforms to strengthen the empire. He restructured the government, separating civil and military authorities. To combat inflation, he introduced the solidus, a new gold coin that became the standard for Byzantine and European currencies for more than a thousand years. The Roman army was reorganised to consist of mobile units (comitatenses), often around the Emperor, to serve on campaigns against external enemies or Roman rebels, and frontier - garrison troops (limitanei) which were capable of countering barbarian raids, but less and less capable, over time, of countering full scale barbarian invasions. Constantine pursued successful campaigns against the tribes on the Roman frontiers—such as the Franks, the Alemanni, the Goths, and the Sarmatians—and resettled territories abandoned by his predecessors during the Crisis of the Third Century with citizens of Roman culture.

Although Constantine lived much of his life as a pagan and later as a catechumen, he began to favour Christianity beginning in 312, finally becoming a Christian and being baptized by either Eusebius of Nicomedia, an Arian bishop, or by Pope Sylvester I, which is maintained by the Catholic Church and the Coptic Orthodox Church. He played an influential role in the proclamation of the Edict of Milan in 313, which declared tolerance for Christianity in the Roman Empire. He convoked the First Council of Nicaea in 325 which produced the statement of Christian belief known as the Nicene Creed. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre was built on his orders at the purported site of Jesus' tomb in Jerusalem and was deemed the holiest place in all of Christendom. The papal claim to temporal power in the High Middle Ages was based on the fabricated Donation of Constantine. He has historically been referred to as the "First Christian Emperor," but while he did favour the Christian Church, some modern scholars debate his beliefs and even his comprehension of Christianity.[i] Nevertheless, he is venerated as a saint in Eastern Christianity, and he did much for pushing Christianity towards the mainstream of Roman culture.

The age of Constantine marked a distinct epoch in the history of the Roman Empire and a pivotal moment in the transition from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages. He built a new imperial residence at the city of Byzantium and renamed it New Rome, later adopting the name Constantinople after himself, where it was located in modern Istanbul. It subsequently became the capital of the empire for more than a thousand years, the later Eastern Roman Empire often being referred to in English as the Byzantine Empire, a term never used by the Empire, invented by German historian Hieronymus Wolf. His more immediate political legacy was that he replaced Diocletian's Tetrarchy with the de facto principle of dynastic succession by leaving the empire to his sons and other members of the Constantinian dynasty. His reputation flourished during the lifetime of his children and for centuries after his reign. The medieval church held him up as a paragon of virtue, while secular rulers invoked him as a prototype, a point of reference, and the symbol of imperial legitimacy and identity. Beginning with the Renaissance, there were more critical appraisals of his reign with the rediscovery of anti-Constantinian sources. Trends in modern and recent scholarship have attempted to balance the extremes of previous scholarship.

Sources edit

Constantine was a ruler of major importance and has always been a controversial figure.[6] The fluctuations in his reputation reflect the nature of the ancient sources for his reign. These are abundant and detailed,[7] but they have been strongly influenced by the official propaganda of the period[8] and are often one-sided;[9] no contemporaneous histories or biographies dealing with his life and rule have survived.[10] The nearest replacement is Eusebius's Vita Constantini—a mixture of eulogy and hagiography[11] written between 335 and circa 339[12]—that extols Constantine's moral and religious virtues.[13] The Vita creates a contentiously positive image of Constantine,[14] and modern historians have frequently challenged its reliability.[15] The fullest secular life of Constantine is the anonymous Origo Constantini,[16] a work of uncertain date[17] which focuses on military and political events to the neglect of cultural and religious matters.[18]

Lactantius' De mortibus persecutorum, a political Christian pamphlet on the reigns of Diocletian and the Tetrarchy, provides valuable but tendentious detail on Constantine's predecessors and early life.[19] The ecclesiastical histories of Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret describe the ecclesiastic disputes of Constantine's later reign.[20] Written during the reign of Theodosius II (r. 402–450), a century after Constantine's reign, these ecclesiastical historians obscure the events and theologies of the Constantinian period through misdirection, misrepresentation, and deliberate obscurity.[21] The contemporary writings of the orthodox Christian Athanasius and the ecclesiastical history of the Arian Philostorgius also survive, though their biases are no less firm.[22]

The epitomes of Aurelius Victor (De Caesaribus), Eutropius (Breviarium), Festus (Breviarium), and the anonymous author of the Epitome de Caesaribus offer compressed secular political and military histories of the period. Although not Christian, the epitomes paint a favourable image of Constantine but omit reference to Constantine's religious policies.[23] The Panegyrici Latini, a collection of panegyrics from the late 3rd and early 4th centuries, provides valuable information on the politics and ideology of the tetrarchic period and the early life of Constantine.[24] Contemporary architecture—such as the Arch of Constantine in Rome and palaces in Gamzigrad and Córdoba[25]—epigraphic remains, and the coinage of the era complement the literary sources.[26]

Early life edit

 
Remains of the luxurious residence palace of Mediana, erected by Constantine I near his birth town of Naissus

Constantine was born in Naissus (today Niš, Serbia), part of the Dardania province of Moesia on 27 February,[27] c.  AD 272.[28] His father was Flavius Constantius[j] an Illyrian who was born in the same region (then called Dacia Ripensis)[32][33][29] and a native of the province of Moesia.[34] His original full name, as well as that of his father, is not known.[35][36] His praenomen is variously given as Lucius, Marcus and Gaius.[36] Whatever the case, praenomina had already disappeared from most public records by this time.[37] He also adopted the name "Valerius", the nomen of emperor Diocletian, following his father's ascension as caesar.[36][35]

Constantine probably spent little time with his father[38] who was an officer in the Roman army, part of Emperor Aurelian's imperial bodyguard. Being described as a tolerant and politically skilled man,[39] Constantius advanced through the ranks, earning the governorship of Dalmatia from Emperor Diocletian, another of Aurelian's companions from Illyricum, in 284 or 285.[34] Constantine's mother was Helena, a Greek woman of low social standing from Helenopolis of Bithynia.[40][41][42][43][44] It is uncertain whether she was legally married to Constantius or merely his concubine.[45] His main language was Latin, and during his public speeches he needed Greek translators.[46]

 
Head from a statue of the emperor Diocletian
 
Bust of Maximian, Diocletian's co-emperor

In July 285, Diocletian declared Maximian, another colleague from Illyricum, his co-emperor. Each emperor would have his own court, his own military and administrative faculties, and each would rule with a separate praetorian prefect as chief lieutenant.[47] Maximian ruled in the West, from his capitals at Mediolanum (Milan, Italy) or Augusta Treverorum (Trier, Germany), while Diocletian ruled in the East, from Nicomedia (İzmit, Turkey). The division was merely pragmatic: the empire was called "indivisible" in official panegyric,[48] and both emperors could move freely throughout the empire.[49] In 288, Maximian appointed Constantius to serve as his praetorian prefect in Gaul. Constantius left Helena to marry Maximian's stepdaughter Theodora in 288 or 289.[50]

Diocletian divided the empire again in 293, appointing two caesars to rule over further subdivisions of East and West. Each would be subordinate to his respective augustus but would act with supreme authority in his assigned lands. This system would later be called the Tetrarchy. Diocletian's first appointee for the office of Caesar was Constantius; his second was Galerius, a native of Felix Romuliana. According to Lactantius, Galerius was a brutal, animalistic man. Although he shared the paganism of Rome's aristocracy, he seemed to them an alien figure, a semi-barbarian.[51] On 1 March, Constantius was promoted to the office of Caesar, and dispatched to Gaul to fight the rebels Carausius and Allectus.[52] In spite of meritocratic overtones, the Tetrarchy retained vestiges of hereditary privilege,[53] and Constantine became the prime candidate for future appointment as Caesar as soon as his father took the position. Constantine went to the court of Diocletian, where he lived as his father's heir presumptive.[54]

In the East edit

Constantine received a formal education at Diocletian's court, where he learned Latin literature, Greek, and philosophy.[55] The cultural environment in Nicomedia was open, fluid, and socially mobile; in it, Constantine could mix with intellectuals both pagan and Christian. He may have attended the lectures of Lactantius, a Christian scholar of Latin in the city.[56] Because Diocletian did not completely trust Constantius—none of the Tetrarchs fully trusted their colleagues—Constantine was held as something of a hostage, a tool to ensure Constantius' best behavior. Constantine was nonetheless a prominent member of the court: he fought for Diocletian and Galerius in Asia and served in a variety of tribunates; he campaigned against barbarians on the Danube in 296 and fought the Persians under Diocletian in Syria in 297, as well as under Galerius in Mesopotamia in 298–299.[57] By late 305, he had become a tribune of the first order, a tribunus ordinis primi.[58]

 
Porphyry bust of Emperor Galerius

Constantine had returned to Nicomedia from the eastern front by the spring of 303, in time to witness the beginnings of Diocletian's "Great Persecution", the most severe persecution of Christians in Roman history.[59] In late 302AD, Diocletian and Galerius sent a messenger to the oracle of Apollo at Didyma with an inquiry about Christians.[60] Constantine could recall his presence at the palace when the messenger returned when Diocletian accepted his court's demands for universal persecution.[61] On 23 February 303, Diocletian ordered the destruction of Nicomedia's new church, condemned its scriptures to the flames, and had its treasures seized. In the months that followed, churches and scriptures were destroyed, Christians were deprived of official ranks, and priests were imprisoned.[62] It is unlikely that Constantine played any role in the persecution.[63] In his later writings, he attempted to present himself as an opponent of Diocletian's "sanguinary edicts" against the "Worshippers of God",[64] but nothing indicates that he opposed it effectively at the time.[65] Although no contemporary Christian challenged Constantine for his inaction during the persecutions, it remained a political liability throughout his life.[66]

On 1 May 305, Diocletian, as a result of a debilitating sickness taken in the winter of 304–305, announced his resignation. In a parallel ceremony in Milan, Maximian did the same.[67] Lactantius states that Galerius manipulated the weakened Diocletian into resigning and forced him to accept Galerius' allies in the imperial succession. According to Lactantius, the crowd listening to Diocletian's resignation speech believed, until the last moment, that Diocletian would choose Constantine and Maxentius (Maximian's son) as his successors.[68] It was not to be: Constantius and Galerius were promoted to augusti, while Severus and Maximinus, Galerius' nephew, were appointed their caesars respectively. Constantine and Maxentius were ignored.[69]

Some of the ancient sources detail plots that Galerius made on Constantine's life in the months following Diocletian's abdication. They assert that Galerius assigned Constantine to lead an advance unit in a cavalry charge through a swamp on the middle Danube, made him enter into single combat with a lion, and attempted to kill him in hunts and wars. Constantine always emerged victorious: the lion emerged from the contest in a poorer condition than Constantine; Constantine returned to Nicomedia from the Danube with a Sarmatian captive to drop at Galerius' feet.[70] It is uncertain how much these tales can be trusted.[71]

In the West edit

Constantine recognized the implicit danger in remaining at Galerius' court, where he was held as a virtual hostage. His career depended on being rescued by his father in the West. Constantius was quick to intervene.[72] In the late spring or early summer of 305, Constantius requested leave for his son to help him campaign in Britain. After a long evening of drinking, Galerius granted the request. Constantine's later propaganda describes how he fled the court in the night, before Galerius could change his mind. He rode from post-house to post-house at high speed, hamstringing every horse in his wake.[73] By the time Galerius awoke the following morning, Constantine had fled too far to be caught.[74] Constantine joined his father in Gaul, at Bononia (Boulogne) before the summer of 305.[75]

 
Modern bronze statue of Constantine I in York, England, near the spot where he was proclaimed Augustus in 306

From Bononia, they crossed the English Channel to Britain and made their way to Eboracum (York), capital of the province of Britannia Secunda and home to a large military base. Constantine was able to spend a year in northern Britain at his father's side, campaigning against the Picts beyond Hadrian's Wall in the summer and autumn.[76] Constantius' campaign, like that of Septimius Severus before it, probably advanced far into the north without achieving great success.[77] Constantius had become severely sick over the course of his reign and died on 25 July 306 in Eboracum. Before dying, he declared his support for raising Constantine to the rank of full augustus. The Alamannic king Chrocus, a barbarian taken into service under Constantius, then proclaimed Constantine as augustus. The troops loyal to Constantius' memory followed him in acclamation. Gaul and Britain quickly accepted his rule;[78] Hispania, which had been in his father's domain for less than a year, rejected it.[79]

Constantine sent Galerius an official notice of Constantius' death and his own acclamation. Along with the notice, he included a portrait of himself in the robes of an augustus.[80] The portrait was wreathed in bay.[81] He requested recognition as heir to his father's throne and passed off responsibility for his unlawful ascension on his army, claiming they had "forced it upon him".[82] Galerius was put into a fury by the message; he almost set the portrait and messenger on fire.[83] His advisers calmed him and argued that outright denial of Constantine's claims would mean certain war.[84] Galerius was compelled to compromise: he granted Constantine the title "caesar" rather than "augustus" (the latter office went to Severus instead).[85] Wishing to make it clear that he alone gave Constantine legitimacy, Galerius personally sent Constantine the emperor's traditional purple robes.[86] Constantine accepted the decision,[85] knowing that it would remove doubts as to his legitimacy.[87]

Early rule edit

 
Aureus of Constantine; the inscription around the portrait is "Constantinus P[ius] F[elix] Aug[ustus]"

Constantine's share of the empire consisted of Britain, Gaul, and Spain, and he commanded one of the largest Roman armies which was stationed along the important Rhine frontier.[88] He remained in Britain after his promotion to emperor, driving back the tribes of the Picts and securing his control in the northwestern dioceses. He completed the reconstruction of military bases begun under his father's rule, and he ordered the repair of the region's roadways.[89] He then left for Augusta Treverorum (Trier) in Gaul, the Tetrarchic capital of the northwestern Roman Empire.[90] The Franks learned of Constantine's acclamation and invaded Gaul across the lower Rhine over the winter of 306–307.[91] He drove them back beyond the Rhine and captured kings Ascaric and Merogais; the kings and their soldiers were fed to the beasts of Trier's amphitheatre in the adventus (arrival) celebrations which followed.[92]

 
Public baths (thermae) built in Trier by Constantine, more than 100 metres (328 ft) wide by 200 metres (656 ft) long and capable of serving several thousand at a time, built to rival those of Rome[93]

Constantine began a major expansion of Trier. He strengthened the circuit wall around the city with military towers and fortified gates, and he began building a palace complex in the northeastern part of the city. To the south of his palace, he ordered the construction of a large formal audience hall and a massive imperial bathhouse. He sponsored many building projects throughout Gaul during his tenure as emperor of the West, especially in Augustodunum (Autun) and Arelate (Arles).[94] According to Lactantius, Constantine followed a tolerant policy towards Christianity, although he was not yet a Christian. He probably judged it a more sensible policy than open persecution[95] and a way to distinguish himself from the "great persecutor" Galerius.[96] He decreed a formal end to persecution and returned to Christians all that they had lost during them.[97]

Constantine was largely untried and had a hint of illegitimacy about him; he relied on his father's reputation in his early propaganda, which gave as much coverage to his father's deeds as to his.[98] His military skill and building projects, however, soon gave the panegyrist the opportunity to comment favourably on the similarities between father and son, and Eusebius remarked that Constantine was a "renewal, as it were, in his own person, of his father's life and reign".[99] Constantinian coinage, sculpture, and oratory also show a tendency for disdain towards the "barbarians" beyond the frontiers. He minted a coin issue after his victory over the Alemanni which depicts weeping and begging Alemannic tribesmen, "the Alemanni conquered" beneath the phrase "Romans' rejoicing".[100] There was little sympathy for these enemies; as his panegyrist declared, "It is a stupid clemency that spares the conquered foe."[101]

Maxentius' rebellion edit

 
Dresden bust of Emperor Maxentius, who was defeated by Constantine at the Battle of the Milvian Bridge

Following Galerius' recognition of Constantine as caesar, Constantine's portrait was brought to Rome, as was customary. Maxentius mocked the portrait's subject as the son of a harlot and lamented his own powerlessness.[102] Maxentius, envious of Constantine's authority,[103] seized the title of emperor on 28 October 306. Galerius refused to recognize him but failed to unseat him. Galerius sent Severus against Maxentius, but during the campaign, Severus' armies, previously under command of Maxentius' father Maximian, defected, and Severus was seized and imprisoned.[104] Maximian, brought out of retirement by his son's rebellion, left for Gaul to confer with Constantine in late 307. He offered to marry his daughter Fausta to Constantine and elevate him to augustan rank. In return, Constantine would reaffirm the old family alliance between Maximian and Constantius and offer support to Maxentius' cause in Italy. Constantine accepted and married Fausta in Trier in late summer 307. Constantine gave Maxentius his meagre support, offering Maxentius political recognition.[105]

Constantine remained aloof from the Italian conflict, however. Over the spring and summer of 307, he had left Gaul for Britain to avoid any involvement in the Italian turmoil;[106] now, instead of giving Maxentius military aid, he sent his troops against Germanic tribes along the Rhine. In 308, he raided the territory of the Bructeri and made a bridge across the Rhine at Colonia Agrippinensium (Cologne). In 310, he marched to the northern Rhine and fought the Franks. When not campaigning, he toured his lands advertising his benevolence and supporting the economy and the arts. His refusal to participate in the war increased his popularity among his people and strengthened his power base in the West.[107] Maximian returned to Rome in the winter of 307–308 but soon fell out with his son. In early 308, after a failed attempt to usurp Maxentius' title, Maximian returned to Constantine's court.[108]

On 11 November 308, Galerius called a general council at the military city of Carnuntum (Petronell-Carnuntum, Austria) to resolve the instability in the western provinces. In attendance were Diocletian, briefly returned from retirement, Galerius, and Maximian. Maximian was forced to abdicate again and Constantine was again demoted to caesar. Licinius, one of Galerius' old military companions, was appointed augustus in the western regions. The new system did not last long: Constantine refused to accept the demotion and continued to style himself as augustus on his coinage, even as other members of the Tetrarchy referred to him as a caesar on theirs. Maximinus was frustrated that he had been passed over for promotion while the newcomer Licinius had been raised to the office of augustus and demanded that Galerius promote him. Galerius offered to call both Maximinus and Constantine "sons of the augusti",[109] but neither accepted the new title. By the spring of 310, Galerius was referring to both men as augusti.[110]

Maximian's rebellion edit

 
A gold solidus of "Unconquered Constantine" with the god Sol Invictus behind him, struck in AD 313. The use of Sol's image stressed Constantine's status as his father's successor, appealed to the educated citizens of Gaul, and was considered less offensive than the traditional pagan pantheon to the Christians.[111]

In 310, a dispossessed Maximian rebelled against Constantine while Constantine was away campaigning against the Franks. Maximian had been sent south to Arles with a contingent of Constantine's army, in preparation for any attacks by Maxentius in southern Gaul. He announced that Constantine was dead and took up the imperial purple. In spite of a large donative pledge to any who would support him as emperor, most of Constantine's army remained loyal to their emperor, and Maximian was soon compelled to leave. When Constantine heard of the rebellion, he abandoned his campaign against the Franks and marched his army up the Rhine.[112] At Cabillunum (Chalon-sur-Saône), he moved his troops onto waiting boats to row down the slow waters of the Saône to the quicker waters of the Rhone. He disembarked at Lugdunum (Lyon).[113] Maximian fled to Massilia (Marseille), a town better able to withstand a long siege than Arles. It made little difference, however, as loyal citizens opened the rear gates to Constantine. Maximian was captured and reproved for his crimes. Constantine granted some clemency but strongly encouraged his suicide. In July 310, Maximian hanged himself.[112]

In spite of the earlier rupture in their relations, Maxentius was eager to present himself as his father's devoted son after his death.[114] He began minting coins with his father's deified image, proclaiming his desire to avenge Maximian's death.[115] Constantine initially presented the suicide as an unfortunate family tragedy. By 311, however, he was spreading another version. According to this, after Constantine had pardoned him, Maximian planned to murder Constantine in his sleep. Fausta learned of the plot and warned Constantine, who put a eunuch in his own place in bed. Maximian was apprehended when he killed the eunuch and was offered suicide, which he accepted.[116] Along with using propaganda, Constantine instituted a damnatio memoriae on Maximian, destroying all inscriptions referring to him and eliminating any public work bearing his image.[117]

The death of Maximian required a shift in Constantine's public image. He could no longer rely on his connection to the elder Emperor Maximian and needed a new source of legitimacy.[118] In a speech delivered in Gaul on 25 July 310, the anonymous orator reveals a previously unknown dynastic connection to Claudius II, a 3rd-century emperor famed for defeating the Goths and restoring order to the empire. Breaking away from tetrarchic models, the speech emphasizes Constantine's ancestral prerogative to rule, rather than principles of imperial equality. The new ideology expressed in the speech made Galerius and Maximian irrelevant to Constantine's right to rule.[119] Indeed, the orator emphasizes ancestry to the exclusion of all other factors: "No chance agreement of men, nor some unexpected consequence of favour, made you emperor," the orator declares to Constantine.[120]

The oration also moves away from the religious ideology of the Tetrarchy, with its focus on twin dynasties of Jupiter and Hercules. Instead, the orator proclaims that Constantine experienced a divine vision of Apollo and Victory granting him laurel wreaths of health and a long reign. In the likeness of Apollo, Constantine recognized himself as the saving figure to whom would be granted "rule of the whole world",[121] as the poet Virgil had once foretold.[122] The oration's religious shift is paralleled by a similar shift in Constantine's coinage. In his early reign, the coinage of Constantine advertised Mars as his patron. From 310 on, Mars was replaced by Sol Invictus, a god conventionally identified with Apollo.[123] There is little reason to believe that either the dynastic connection or the divine vision are anything other than fiction, but their proclamation strengthened Constantine's claims to legitimacy and increased his popularity among the citizens of Gaul.[124]

Civil wars edit

See also: Civil wars of the Tetrarchy

War against Maxentius edit

By the middle of 310, Galerius had become too ill to involve himself in imperial politics.[125] His final act survives: a letter to provincials posted in Nicomedia on 30 April 311, proclaiming an end to the persecutions, and the resumption of religious toleration.[126]

Eusebius maintains "divine providence […] took action against the perpetrator of these crimes" and gives a graphic account of Galerius' demise:

"Without warning suppurative inflammation broke out round the middle of his genitals, then a deep-seated fistula ulcer; these ate their way incurably into his innermost bowels. From them came a teeming indescribable mass of worms, and a sickening smell was given off, for the whole of his hulking body, thanks to over eating, had been transformed even before his illness into a huge lump of flabby fat, which then decomposed and presented those who came near it with a revolting and horrifying sight."[127]

Galerius died soon after the edict's proclamation,[128] destroying what little remained of the Tetrarchy.[129] Maximinus mobilized against Licinius and seized Asia Minor. A hasty peace was signed on a boat in the middle of the Bosphorus.[130] While Constantine toured Britain and Gaul, Maxentius prepared for war.[131] He fortified northern Italy and strengthened his support in the Christian community by allowing it to elect Eusebius as bishop of Rome.[132]

 
A Roman fresco in Trier, Germany, possibly depicting Constantia.[133]

Maxentius' rule was nevertheless insecure. His early support dissolved in the wake of heightened tax rates and depressed trade; riots broke out in Rome and Carthage;[134] and Domitius Alexander was able to briefly usurp his authority in Africa.[135] By 312, he was a man barely tolerated, not one actively supported,[136] even among Christian Italians.[137] In the summer of 311, Maxentius mobilized against Constantine while Licinius was occupied with affairs in the East. He declared war on Constantine, vowing to avenge his father's "murder".[138] To prevent Maxentius from forming an alliance against him with Licinius,[139] Constantine forged his own alliance with Licinius over the winter of 311–312 and offered him his sister Constantia in marriage. Maximinus considered Constantine's arrangement with Licinius an affront to his authority. In response, he sent ambassadors to Rome, offering political recognition to Maxentius in exchange for a military support, which Maxentius accepted.[140] According to Eusebius, inter-regional travel became impossible, and there was military buildup everywhere. There was "not a place where people were not expecting the onset of hostilities every day".[141]

 
Battle of Constantine and Maxentius (detail of part of a fresco by Giulio Romano in the Hall of Constantine in the Raphael Rooms in the Vatican), copy c. 1650 by Lazzaro Baldi, now at the University of Edinburgh

Constantine's advisers and generals cautioned against preemptive attack on Maxentius;[142] even his soothsayers recommended against it, stating that the sacrifices had produced unfavourable omens.[143] Constantine, with a spirit that left a deep impression on his followers, inspiring some to believe that he had some form of supernatural guidance,[144] ignored all these cautions.[145] Early in the spring of 312,[146] Constantine crossed the Cottian Alps with a quarter of his army, a force numbering about 40,000.[147] The first town his army encountered was Segusium (Susa, Italy), a heavily fortified town that shut its gates to him. Constantine ordered his men to set fire to its gates and scale its walls. He took the town quickly. Constantine ordered his troops not to loot the town and advanced into northern Italy.[146]

At the approach to the west of the important city of Augusta Taurinorum (Turin, Italy), Constantine met a large force of heavily armed Maxentian cavalry.[148] In the ensuing Battle of Turin Constantine's army encircled Maxentius' cavalry, flanked them with his own cavalry, and dismounted them with blows from his soldiers' iron-tipped clubs. Constantine's armies emerged victorious.[149] Turin refused to give refuge to Maxentius' retreating forces, opening its gates to Constantine instead.[150] Other cities of the north Italian plain sent Constantine embassies of congratulation for his victory. He moved on to Milan, where he was met with open gates and jubilant rejoicing. Constantine rested his army in Milan until mid-summer 312, when he moved on to Brixia (Brescia).[151]

Brescia's army was easily dispersed,[152] and Constantine quickly advanced to Verona where a large Maxentian force was camped.[153] Ruricius Pompeianus, general of the Veronese forces and Maxentius' praetorian prefect,[154] was in a strong defensive position since the town was surrounded on three sides by the Adige. Constantine sent a small force north of the town in an attempt to cross the river unnoticed. Ruricius sent a large detachment to counter Constantine's expeditionary force but was defeated. Constantine's forces successfully surrounded the town and laid siege.[155] Ruricius gave Constantine the slip and returned with a larger force to oppose Constantine. Constantine refused to let up on the siege and sent only a small force to oppose him. In the desperately fought encounter that followed, Ruricius was killed and his army destroyed.[156] Verona surrendered soon afterwards, followed by Aquileia,[157] Mutina (Modena),[158] and Ravenna.[159] The road to Rome was now wide open to Constantine.[160]

 
The Milvian Bridge (Ponte Milvio) over the River Tiber, north of Rome, where Constantine and Maxentius fought in the Battle of the Milvian Bridge

Maxentius prepared for the same type of war he had waged against Severus and Galerius: he sat in Rome and prepared for a siege.[161] He still controlled Rome's Praetorian Guard, was well-stocked with African grain, and was surrounded on all sides by the seemingly impregnable Aurelian Walls. He ordered all bridges across the Tiber cut, reportedly on the counsel of the gods,[162] and left the rest of central Italy undefended; Constantine secured that region's support without challenge.[163] Constantine progressed slowly[164] along the Via Flaminia,[165] allowing the weakness of Maxentius to draw his regime further into turmoil.[164] Maxentius' support continued to weaken: at chariot races on 27 October, the crowd openly taunted Maxentius, shouting that Constantine was invincible.[166] Maxentius, no longer certain that he would emerge from a siege victorious, built a temporary boat bridge across the Tiber in preparation for a field battle against Constantine.[167] On 28 October 312, the sixth anniversary of his reign, he approached the keepers of the Sibylline Books for guidance. The keepers prophesied that, on that very day, "the enemy of the Romans" would die. Maxentius advanced north to meet Constantine in battle.[168]

Constantine adopts the Greek letters Chi Rho for Christ's initials edit

See also: Chi Rho
Main article: Battle of the Milvian Bridge
Further information: Ponte Milvio
 
Silver medallion of 315; Constantine with a chi-rho symbol as the crest of his helmet

Maxentius' forces were still twice the size of Constantine's, and he organised them in long lines facing the battle plain with their backs to the river.[169] Constantine's army arrived on the field bearing unfamiliar symbols on their standards and their shields.[170] According to Lactantius "Constantine was directed in a dream to cause the heavenly sign to be delineated on the shields of his soldiers, and so to proceed to battle. He did as he had been commanded, and he marked on their shields the letter Χ, with a perpendicular line drawn through it and turned round thus at the top, being the cipher of Christ. Having this sign (☧), his troops stood to arms."[171] Eusebius describes a vision that Constantine had while marching at midday in which "he saw with his own eyes the trophy of a cross of light in the heavens, above the sun, and bearing the inscription, In Hoc Signo Vinces" ("In this sign thou shalt conquer").[172] In Eusebius's account, Constantine had a dream the following night in which Christ appeared with the same heavenly sign and told him to make an army standard in the form of the labarum.[173] Eusebius is vague about when and where these events took place,[174] but it enters his narrative before the war begins against Maxentius.[175] He describes the sign as Chi (Χ) traversed by Rho (Ρ) to form ☧, representing the first two letters of the Greek word ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ (Christos).[176][177] A medallion was issued at Ticinum in 315 which shows Constantine wearing a helmet emblazoned with the Chi Rho,[178] and coins issued at Siscia in 317/318 repeat the image.[179] The figure was otherwise rare and is uncommon in imperial iconography and propaganda before the 320s.[180] It was not completely unknown, however, being an abbreviation of the Greek word chrēston (good), having previously appeared on the coins of Ptolemy III Euergetes in the 3rd century BC. Following Constantine, centuries of Christians invoked the miraculous or the supernatural when justifying or describing their warfare.[181]

Constantine deployed his own forces along the whole length of Maxentius' line. He ordered his cavalry to charge, and they broke Maxentius' cavalry. He then sent his infantry against Maxentius' infantry, pushing many into the Tiber where they were slaughtered and drowned.[169] The battle was brief,[182] and Maxentius' troops were broken before the first charge.[183] His horse guards and praetorians initially held their position, but they broke under the force of a Constantinian cavalry charge; they also broke ranks and fled to the river. Maxentius rode with them and attempted to cross the bridge of boats (Ponte Milvio), but he was pushed into the Tiber and drowned by the mass of his fleeing soldiers.[184]

In Rome edit

 
Head of a bronze colossus of Constantine, now in the Capitoline Museums[185]

Constantine entered Rome on 29 October 312[186][187] and staged a grand adventus in the city which was met with jubilation.[188] Maxentius' body was fished out of the Tiber and decapitated, and his head was paraded through the streets for all to see.[189] After the ceremonies, the disembodied head was sent to Carthage, and Carthage offered no further resistance.[190] Unlike his predecessors, Constantine neglected to make the trip to the Capitoline Hill and perform customary sacrifices at the Temple of Jupiter.[191] However, he did visit the Senatorial Curia Julia,[192] and he promised to restore its ancestral privileges and give it a secure role in his reformed government; there would be no revenge against Maxentius' supporters.[193] In response, the Senate decreed him "title of the first name", which meant that his name would be listed first in all official documents,[194] and they acclaimed him as "the greatest augustus".[195] He issued decrees returning property that was lost under Maxentius, recalling political exiles, and releasing Maxentius' imprisoned opponents.[196]

An extensive propaganda campaign followed, during which Maxentius' image was purged from all public places. He was written up as a "tyrant" and set against an idealized image of Constantine the "liberator". Eusebius is the best representative of this strand of Constantinian propaganda.[197] Maxentius' rescripts were declared invalid, and the honours that he had granted to leaders of the Senate were also invalidated.[198] Constantine also attempted to remove Maxentius' influence on Rome's urban landscape. All structures built by him were rededicated to Constantine, including the Temple of Romulus and the Basilica of Maxentius.[199] At the focal point of the basilica, a stone statue was erected of Constantine holding the Christian labarum in its hand. Its inscription bore the message which the statue illustrated: "By this sign, Constantine had freed Rome from the yoke of the tyrant."[200]

Constantine also sought to upstage Maxentius' achievements. For example, the Circus Maximus was redeveloped so that its seating capacity was 25 times larger than that of Maxentius' racing complex on the Via Appia.[201] Maxentius' strongest military supporters were neutralized when he disbanded the Praetorian Guard and Imperial Horse Guard.[202] The tombstones of the Imperial Horse Guard were ground up and used in a basilica on the Via Labicana,[203] and their former base was redeveloped into the Lateran Basilica on 9 November 312—barely two weeks after Constantine captured the city.[204] The Legio II Parthica was removed from Albano Laziale,[198] and the remainder of Maxentius' armies were sent to do frontier duty on the Rhine.[205]

Wars against Licinius edit

 
Gold aureus of the Emperor Licinius

In the following years, Constantine gradually consolidated his military superiority over his rivals in the crumbling Tetrarchy. In 313, he met Licinius in Milan to secure their alliance by the marriage of Licinius and Constantine's half-sister Constantia. During this meeting, the emperors agreed on the so-called Edict of Milan,[206] officially granting full tolerance to Christianity and all religions in the empire.[207] The document had special benefits for Christians, legalizing their religion and granting them restoration for all property seized during Diocletian's persecution. It repudiates past methods of religious coercion and used only general terms to refer to the divine sphere—"Divinity" and "Supreme Divinity", summa divinitas.[208] The conference was cut short, however, when news reached Licinius that his rival Maximinus had crossed the Bosporus and invaded European territory. Licinius departed and eventually defeated Maximinus, gaining control over the entire eastern half of the Roman Empire. Relations between the two remaining emperors deteriorated, as Constantine suffered an assassination attempt at the hands of a character that Licinius wanted elevated to the rank of Caesar;[209] Licinius, for his part, had Constantine's statues in Emona destroyed.[210] In either 314 or 316, the two augusti fought against one another at the Battle of Cibalae, with Constantine being victorious. They clashed again at the Battle of Mardia in 317 and agreed to a settlement in which Constantine's sons Crispus and Constantine II, and Licinius' son Licinianus were made caesars.[211] After this arrangement, Constantine ruled the dioceses of Pannonia and Macedonia and took residence at Sirmium, whence he could wage war on the Goths and Sarmatians in 322, and on the Goths in 323, defeating and killing their leader Rausimod.[209]

In 320, Licinius allegedly reneged on the religious freedom promised by the Edict of Milan and began to oppress Christians anew,[212] generally without bloodshed, but resorting to confiscations and sacking of Christian office-holders.[213] Although this characterization of Licinius as anti-Christian is somewhat doubtful, the fact is that he seems to have been far less open in his support of Christianity than Constantine. Therefore, Licinius was prone to see the Church as a force more loyal to Constantine than to the Imperial system in general,[214] as the explanation offered by the Church historian Sozomen.[215]

This dubious arrangement eventually became a challenge to Constantine in the West, climaxing in the great civil war of 324. Constantine's Christian eulogists present the war as a battle between Christianity and paganism; Licinius, aided by Gothic mercenaries, represented the past and ancient paganism, while Constantine and his Franks marched under the standard of the labarum.[citation needed] Outnumbered but fired by their zeal, Constantine's army emerged victorious in the Battle of Adrianople. Licinius fled across the Bosphorus and appointed Martinian, his magister officiorum, as nominal augustus in the West, but Constantine next won the Battle of the Hellespont and finally the Battle of Chrysopolis on 18 September 324.[216] Licinius and Martinian surrendered to Constantine at Nicomedia on the promise their lives would be spared: they were sent to live as private citizens in Thessalonica and Cappadocia respectively, but in 325 Constantine accused Licinius of plotting against him and had them both arrested and hanged; Licinius' son (the son of Constantine's half-sister) was killed in 326.[217] Thus Constantine became the sole emperor of the Roman Empire.[218]

Later rule edit

Foundation of Constantinople edit

Further information: New Rome
 
Coin struck by Constantine I to commemorate the founding of Constantinople

Diocletian had chosen Nicomedia in the East as his capital during the Tetrarchy[219]—not far from Byzantium, well situated to defend Thrace, Asia, and Egypt, all of which had required his military attention.[220] Constantine had recognized the shift of the empire from the remote and depopulated West to the richer cities of the East, and the military strategic importance of protecting the Danube from barbarian excursions and Asia from a hostile Persia in choosing his new capital[221] as well as being able to monitor shipping traffic between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean.[222] Licinius' defeat came to represent the defeat of a rival centre of pagan and Greek-speaking political activity in the East, as opposed to the Christian and Latin-speaking Rome, and it was proposed that a new Eastern capital should represent the integration of the East into the Roman Empire as a whole, as a centre of learning, prosperity, and cultural preservation for the whole of the Eastern Roman Empire.[223] Among the various locations proposed for this alternative capital, Constantine appears to have toyed earlier with Serdica (present-day Sofia), as he was reported saying that "Serdica is my Rome".[224] Sirmium and Thessalonica were also considered.[225] Eventually, however, Constantine decided to work on the Greek city of Byzantium, which offered the advantage of having already been extensively rebuilt on Roman patterns of urbanism during the preceding century by Septimius Severus and Caracalla, who had already acknowledged its strategic importance.[226] The city was thus founded in 324,[227] dedicated on 11 May 330[227] and renamed Constantinopolis ("Constantine's City" or Constantinople in English). Special commemorative coins were issued in 330 to honor the event. The new city was protected by the relics of the True Cross, the Rod of Moses and other holy relics, though a cameo now at the Hermitage Museum also represented Constantine crowned by the tyche of the new city.[228] The figures of old gods were either replaced or assimilated into a framework of Christian symbolism. Constantine built the new Church of the Holy Apostles on the site of a temple to Aphrodite. Generations later there was the story that a divine vision led Constantine to this spot, and an angel no one else could see led him on a circuit of the new walls.[229] The capital would often be compared to the 'old' Rome as Nova Roma Constantinopolitana, the "New Rome of Constantinople".[218][230]

Religious policy edit

Main article: Religious policies of Constantine the Great
Further information: Constantinian shift, Constantine the Great and Christianity, and Constantine the Great and Judaism
Saint

Constantine the Great
 
Mosaic in the Hagia Sophia, section: Maria as patron saint of Constantinople, detail: donor portrait of Emperor Constantine I with a model of the city
Emperor and Equal to the Apostles
Resting placeConstantinople
Venerated in
Major shrineChurch of the Holy Apostles, Constantinople
Feast21 May
 
Constantine burning books by Arian heretics ('Heretici Arriani'), from a 9th-century manuscript now in Vercelli

Constantine was the first emperor to stop the persecution of Christians and to legalize Christianity, along with all other religions/cults in the Roman Empire. In February 313, he met with Licinius in Milan and developed the Edict of Milan, which stated that Christians should be allowed to follow their faith without oppression.[234] This removed penalties for professing Christianity, under which many had been martyred previously, and it returned confiscated Church property. The edict protected all religions from persecution, not only Christianity, allowing anyone to worship any deity that they chose. A similar edict had been issued in 311 by Galerius, senior emperor of the Tetrarchy, which granted Christians the right to practise their religion but did not restore any property to them.[235] The Edict of Milan included several clauses which stated that all confiscated churches would be returned, as well as other provisions for previously persecuted Christians. Scholars debate whether Constantine adopted his mother Helena's Christianity in his youth or whether he adopted it gradually over the course of his life.[236]

 
Pope Sylvester I and Emperor Constantine

Constantine possibly retained the title of pontifex maximus which emperors bore as heads of the ancient Roman religion until Gratian renounced the title.[237][238] According to Christian writers, Constantine was over 40 when he finally declared himself a Christian, making it clear that he owed his successes to the protection of the Christian High God alone.[239] Despite these declarations of being a Christian, he waited to be baptized on his deathbed, believing that the baptism would release him of any sins he committed in the course of carrying out his policies while emperor.[240] He supported the Church financially, built basilicas, granted privileges to clergy (such as exemption from certain taxes), promoted Christians to high office, and returned property confiscated during the long period of persecution.[241] His most famous building projects include the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and Old St. Peter's Basilica. In constructing the Old St. Peter's Basilica, Constantine went to great lengths to erect the basilica on top of St. Peter's resting place, so much so that it even affected the design of the basilica, including the challenge of erecting it on the hill where St. Peter rested, making its complete construction time over 30 years from the date Constantine ordered it to be built.

Constantine might not have patronized Christianity alone. A triumphal arch was built in 315 to celebrate his victory in the Battle of the Milvian Bridge which was decorated with images of the goddess Victoria, and sacrifices were made to pagan gods at its dedication, including Apollo, Diana, and Hercules. Absent from the arch are any depictions of Christian symbolism. However, the arch was commissioned by the Senate, so the absence of Christian symbols may reflect the role of the Curia at the time as a pagan redoubt.[242]

In 321, he legislated that the venerable Sunday should be a day of rest for all citizens.[243] In 323, he issued a decree banning Christians from participating in state sacrifices.[244] After the pagan gods had disappeared from his coinage, Christian symbols appeared as Constantine's attributes, the chi rho between his hands or on his labarum,[245] as well on the coinage.[246] The reign of Constantine established a precedent for the emperor to have great influence and authority in the early Christian councils, most notably the dispute over Arianism. Constantine disliked the risks to societal stability that religious disputes and controversies brought with them, preferring to establish an orthodoxy.[247] His influence over the Church councils was to enforce doctrine, root out heresy, and uphold ecclesiastical unity; the Church's role was to determine proper worship, doctrines, and dogma.[248]

North African bishops struggled with Christian bishops who had been ordained by Donatus in opposition to Caecilian from 313 to 316. The African bishops could not come to terms, and the Donatists asked Constantine to act as a judge in the dispute. Three regional Church councils and another trial before Constantine all ruled against Donatus and the Donatism movement in North Africa. In 317, Constantine issued an edict to confiscate Donatist church property and to send Donatist clergy into exile.[249] More significantly, in 325 he summoned the First Council of Nicaea, most known for its dealing with Arianism and for instituting the Nicene Creed.[250] He enforced the council's prohibition against celebrating the Lord's Supper on the day before the Jewish Passover, which marked a definite break of Christianity from the Judaic tradition. From then on, the solar Julian calendar was given precedence over the lunisolar Hebrew calendar among the Christian churches of the Roman Empire.[251]

Constantine made some new laws regarding the Jews; some of them were unfavourable towards Jews, although they were not harsher than those of his predecessors.[252] It was made illegal for Jews to seek converts or to attack other Jews who had converted to Christianity.[252] They were forbidden to own Christian slaves or to circumcise their slaves.[253][254] On the other hand, Jewish clergy were given the same exemptions as Christian clergy.[252][255]

Administrative reforms edit

 
Hexagonal gold pendant with double solidus of Constantine the Great in the centre, AD 321, now in the British Museum

Beginning in the mid-3rd century, the emperors began to favour members of the equestrian order over senators, who had a monopoly on the most important offices of the state. Senators were stripped of the command of legions and most provincial governorships, as it was felt that they lacked the specialized military upbringing needed in an age of acute defense needs;[256] such posts were given to equestrians by Diocletian and his colleagues, following a practice enforced piecemeal by their predecessors. The emperors, however, still needed the talents and the help of the very rich, who were relied on to maintain social order and cohesion by means of a web of powerful influence and contacts at all levels. Exclusion of the old senatorial aristocracy threatened this arrangement.

In 326, Constantine reversed this pro-equestrian trend, raising many administrative positions to senatorial rank and thus opening these offices to the old aristocracy; at the same time, he elevated the rank of existing equestrian office-holders to senator, degrading the equestrian order in the process (at least as a bureaucratic rank).[257] The title of perfectissimus was granted only to mid- or low-level officials by the end of the 4th century.

By the new Constantinian arrangement, one could become a senator by being elected praetor or by fulfilling a function of senatorial rank.[258] From then on, holding actual power and social status were melded together into a joint imperial hierarchy. Constantine gained the support of the old nobility with this,[259] as the Senate was allowed to elect praetors and quaestors in place of the usual practice of the emperors directly creating magistrates (adlectio). An inscription in honor of city prefect Ceionius Rufus Albinus states that Constantine had restored the Senate "the auctoritas it had lost at Caesar's time".[260]

The Senate as a body remained devoid of any significant power; nevertheless, the senators had been marginalized as potential holders of imperial functions during the 3rd century but could dispute such positions alongside more upstart bureaucrats.[261] Some modern historians see in those administrative reforms an attempt by Constantine at reintegrating the senatorial order into the imperial administrative elite to counter the possibility of alienating pagan senators from a Christianized imperial rule;[262] however, such an interpretation remains conjectural, given the fact that we do not have the precise numbers about pre-Constantine conversions to Christianity in the old senatorial milieu. Some historians suggest that early conversions among the old aristocracy were more numerous than previously supposed.[263]

Constantine's reforms had to do only with the civilian administration. The military chiefs had risen from the ranks since the Crisis of the Third Century[264] but remained outside the Senate, in which they were included only by Constantine's children.[265]

Monetary reforms edit

 
A nummus of Constantine

In the 3rd century, the production of fiat money to pay for public expenses resulted in runaway inflation, and Diocletian tried unsuccessfully to re-establish trustworthy minting of silver coins, as well as silver-bronze "billon" coins (the term "billon" meaning an alloy of precious and base metals that is mostly base metal). Silver currency was overvalued in terms of its actual metal content and therefore could only circulate at much discounted rates. Constantine stopped minting the Diocletianic "pure" silver argenteus soon after 305, while the "billon" currency continued to be used until the 360s. From the early 300s on, Constantine forsook any attempts at restoring the silver currency, preferring instead to concentrate on minting large quantities of the gold solidus, 72 of which made a pound of gold. New and highly debased silver pieces continued to be issued during his later reign and after his death, in a continuous process of retariffing, until this "billon" minting ceased in 367, and the silver piece was continued by various denominations of bronze coins, the most important being the centenionalis.[266]

These bronze pieces continued to be devalued, assuring the possibility of keeping fiduciary minting alongside a gold standard. The author of De Rebus Bellicis held that the rift widened between classes because of this monetary policy; the rich benefited from the stability in purchasing power of the gold piece, while the poor had to cope with ever-degrading bronze pieces.[267] Later emperors such as Julian the Apostate insisted on trustworthy mintings of the bronze currency.[268]

Constantine's monetary policies were closely associated with his religious policies; increased minting was associated with the confiscation of all gold, silver, and bronze statues from pagan temples between 331 and 336 which were declared to be imperial property. Two imperial commissioners for each province had the task of getting the statues and melting them for immediate minting, with the exception of a number of bronze statues that were used as public monuments in Constantinople.[269]

Executions of Crispus and Fausta edit

 
Gold coin of Constantine's eldest son Crispus, who was executed by his father
 
Bust of Constantine's wife Fausta, in the Louvre, Paris

Constantine had his eldest son Crispus seized and put to death by "cold poison" at Pola (Pula, Croatia) sometime between 15 May and 17 June 326.[270] In July, he had his wife Empress Fausta (stepmother of Crispus) killed in an overheated bath.[271] Their names were wiped from the face of many inscriptions, references to their lives were eradicated from the literary record, and their memory was condemned. Eusebius, for example, edited out any praise of Crispus from later copies of Historia Ecclesiastica, and his Vita Constantini contains no mention of Fausta or Crispus.[272] Few ancient sources are willing to discuss possible motives for the events, and the few that do are of later provenance and are generally unreliable.[273] At the time of the executions, it was commonly believed that Empress Fausta was either in an illicit relationship with Crispus or was spreading rumors to that effect. A popular myth arose, modified to allude to the Hippolytus–Phaedra legend, with the suggestion that Constantine killed Crispus and Fausta for their immoralities;[274] the largely fictional Passion of Artemius explicitly makes this connection.[275] The myth rests on slim evidence as an interpretation of the executions; only late and unreliable sources allude to the relationship between Crispus and Fausta, and there is no evidence for the modern suggestion that Constantine's "godly" edicts of 326 and the irregularities of Crispus are somehow connected.[274]

Although Constantine created his apparent heirs "caesars", following a pattern established by Diocletian, he gave his creations a hereditary character, alien to the tetrarchic system: Constantine's caesars were to be kept in the hope of ascending to empire and entirely subordinated to their augustus, as long as he was alive.[276] Adrian Goldsworthy speculates an alternative explanation for the execution of Crispus was Constantine's desire to keep a firm grip on his prospective heirs, this—and Fausta's desire for having her sons inheriting instead of their half-brother—being reason enough for killing Crispus; the subsequent execution of Fausta, however, was probably meant as a reminder to her children that Constantine would not hesitate in "killing his own relatives when he felt this was necessary".[277]

Later campaigns edit

 
The northern and eastern frontiers of the Roman Empire in the time of Constantine, with the territories acquired in the course of the thirty years of military campaigns between 306 and 337
 
Gold medallion struck at Nicomedia in 336–337 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of his rule

Constantine considered Constantinople his capital and permanent residence. He lived there for a good portion of his later life. In 328, construction was completed on Constantine's Bridge at Sucidava, (today Celei in Romania)[278] in hopes of reconquering Dacia, a province that had been abandoned under Aurelian. In the late winter of 332, Constantine campaigned with the Sarmatians against the Goths. The weather and lack of food reportedly cost the Goths dearly before they submitted to Rome. In 334, after Sarmatian commoners had overthrown their leaders, Constantine led a campaign against the tribe. He won a victory in the war and extended his control over the region, as remains of camps and fortifications in the region indicate.[279] Constantine resettled some Sarmatian exiles as farmers in Illyrian and Roman districts and conscripted the rest into the army. The new frontier in Dacia was along the Brazda lui Novac line supported by new castra.[280] Constantine took the title Dacicus maximus in 336.[281]

In the last years of his life, Constantine made plans for a campaign against Persia. In a letter written to the king of Persia, Shapur, Constantine had asserted his patronage over Persia's Christian subjects and urged Shapur to treat them well.[282] The letter is undatable. In response to border raids, Constantine sent Constantius to guard the eastern frontier in 335. In 336, Prince Narseh invaded Armenia (a Christian kingdom since 301) and installed a Persian client on the throne. Constantine then resolved to campaign against Persia. He treated the war as a Christian crusade, calling for bishops to accompany the army and commissioning a tent in the shape of a church to follow him everywhere. Constantine planned to be baptized in the Jordan River before crossing into Persia. Persian diplomats came to Constantinople over the winter of 336–337, seeking peace, but Constantine turned them away. The campaign was called off, however, when Constantine became sick in the spring of 337.[283]

Illness and death edit

 
The Baptism of Constantine, as imagined by students of Raphael
 
 
 
Constantine's sons and successors: Constantine II, Constantius II, and Constans

From his recent illness, Constantine knew death would soon come. Within the Church of the Holy Apostles, Constantine had secretly prepared a final resting-place for himself.[284] It came sooner than he had expected. Soon after the Feast of Easter 337, Constantine fell seriously ill.[285] He left Constantinople for the hot baths near his mother's city of Helenopolis (Altınova), on the southern shores of the Gulf of Nicomedia (present-day Gulf of İzmit). There, in a church his mother built in honor of Lucian the Martyr, he prayed, and there he realised that he was dying. Seeking purification, he became a catechumen and attempted a return to Constantinople, making it only as far as a suburb of Nicomedia.[286] He summoned the bishops and told them of his hope to be baptized in the River Jordan, where Christ was written to have been baptized. He requested the baptism right away, promising to live a more Christian life should he live through his illness. The bishops, Eusebius records, "performed the sacred ceremonies according to custom".[287] He chose the Arianizing bishop Eusebius of Nicomedia, bishop of the city where he lay dying, as his baptizer.[288] In postponing his baptism, he followed one custom at the time which postponed baptism until after infancy.[289] It has been thought that Constantine put off baptism as long as he did so as to be absolved from as much of his sin as possible.[290] Constantine died soon after at a suburban villa called Achyron, on the last day of the fifty-day festival of Pentecost directly following Pascha (or Easter), on 22 May 337.[291]

Although Constantine's death follows the conclusion of the Persian campaign in Eusebius's account, most other sources report his death as occurring in its middle. Emperor Julian (a nephew of Constantine), writing in the mid-350s, observes that the Sassanians escaped punishment for their ill-deeds, because Constantine died "in the middle of his preparations for war".[292] Similar accounts are given in the Origo Constantini, an anonymous document composed while Constantine was still living, which has Constantine dying in Nicomedia;[293] the Historiae abbreviatae of Sextus Aurelius Victor, written in 361, which has Constantine dying at an estate near Nicomedia called Achyrona while marching against the Persians;[294] and the Breviarium of Eutropius, a handbook compiled in 369 for the Emperor Valens, which has Constantine dying in a nameless state villa in Nicomedia.[295] From these and other accounts, some have concluded that Eusebius's Vita was edited to defend Constantine's reputation against what Eusebius saw as a less congenial version of the campaign.[296]

Following his death, his body was transferred to Constantinople and buried in the Church of the Holy Apostles,[297] in a porphyry sarcophagus that was described in the 10th century by Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus in the De Ceremoniis.[298] His body survived the plundering of the city during the Fourth Crusade in 1204 but was destroyed at some point afterwards.[299] Constantine was succeeded by his three sons born of Fausta, Constantine II, Constantius II and Constans. His sons, along with his nephew Dalmatius, had already received one division of the empire each to administer as caesars; Constantine may have intended his successors to resume a structure akin to Diocletian's Tetrarchy.[300] A number of relatives were killed by followers of Constantius, notably Constantine's nephews Dalmatius (who held the rank of caesar) and Hannibalianus, presumably to eliminate possible contenders to an already complicated succession. He also had two daughters, Constantina and Helena, wife of Emperor Julian.[301]

Assessment and legacy edit

Constantine reunited the empire under one emperor, and he won major victories over the Franks and Alamanni in 306–308, the Franks again in 313–314, the Goths in 332, and the Sarmatians in 334. By 336, he had reoccupied most of the long-lost province of Dacia which Aurelian had been forced to abandon in 271. At the time of his death, he was planning a great expedition to end raids on the eastern provinces from the Persian Empire.[302]

In the cultural sphere, Constantine revived the clean-shaven face fashion of earlier emperors, originally introduced among the Romans by Scipio Africanus (236–183 BC) and changed into the wearing of the beard by Hadrian (r. 117–138). This new Roman imperial fashion lasted until the reign of Phocas (r. 602–610) in the 7th century.[303][304]

The Holy Roman Empire reckoned Constantine among the venerable figures of its tradition. In the later Byzantine state, it became a great honor for an emperor to be hailed as a "new Constantine"; ten emperors carried the name, including the last emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire.[305] Charlemagne used monumental Constantinian forms in his court to suggest that he was Constantine's successor and equal. Charlemagne, Henry VIII, Philip II of Spain, Godfrey of Bouillon, House of Capet, House of Habsburg, House of Stuart, Macedonian dynasty and Phokas family claimed descent from Constantine.[306][307][308][309][310][311][312][313][314] Geoffrey of Monmouth embroidered a tale that the legendary king of Britain, King Arthur, was also a descendant of Constantine.[315] Constantine acquired a mythic role as a hero and warrior against heathens. His reception as a saint seems to have spread within the Byzantine empire during wars against the Sasanian Persians and the Muslims in the late 6th and 7th century.[316] The motif of the Romanesque equestrian, the mounted figure in the posture of a triumphant Roman emperor, became a visual metaphor in statuary in praise of local benefactors. The name "Constantine" enjoyed renewed popularity in western France in the 11th and 12th centuries.[317]

The Niš Constantine the Great Airport is named in honor of him. A large cross was planned to be built on a hill overlooking Niš, but the project was cancelled.[318] In 2012, a memorial was erected in Niš in his honor. The Commemoration of the Edict of Milan was held in Niš in 2013.[319] The Orthodox Church considers Constantine a saint (Άγιος Κωνσταντίνος, Saint Constantine), having a feast day on 21 May,[320] and calls him isapostolos (ισαπόστολος Κωνσταντίνος)—an equal of the Apostles.[321]

Historiography edit

 
Constantius appoints Constantine as his successor by Peter Paul Rubens, 1622

During Constantine's lifetime, Praxagoras of Athens and Libanius, pagan authors, showered Constantine with praise, presenting him as a paragon of virtue. His nephew and son-in-law Julian the Apostate, however, wrote the satire Symposium, or the Saturnalia in 361, after the last of his sons died; it denigrated Constantine, calling him inferior to the great pagan emperors, and given over to luxury and greed.[322] Following Julian, Eunapius began – and Zosimus continued – a historiographic tradition that blamed Constantine for weakening the empire through his indulgence to the Christians.[323]

During the Middle Ages, European and Near-East Byzantine writers presented Constantine as an ideal ruler, the standard against which any king or emperor could be measured.[323] The Renaissance rediscovery of anti-Constantinian sources prompted a re-evaluation of his career. German humanist Johannes Leunclavius discovered Zosimus' writings and published a Latin translation in 1576. In its preface, he argues that Zosimus' picture of Constantine offered a more balanced view than that of Eusebius and the Church historians.[324] Cardinal Caesar Baronius criticized Zosimus, favouring Eusebius' account of the Constantinian era. Baronius' Life of Constantine (1588) presents Constantine as the model of a Christian prince.[325] Edward Gibbon aimed to unite the two extremes of Constantinian scholarship in his work The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776–89) by contrasting the portraits presented by Eusebius and Zosimus.[326] He presents a noble war hero who transforms into an Oriental despot in his old age, "degenerating into a cruel and dissolute monarch".[327]

Modern interpretations of Constantine's rule begin with Jacob Burckhardt's The Age of Constantine the Great (1853, rev. 1880). Burckhardt's Constantine is a scheming secularist, a politician who manipulates all parties in a quest to secure his own power.[328] Henri Grégoire followed Burckhardt's evaluation of Constantine in the 1930s, suggesting that Constantine developed an interest in Christianity only after witnessing its political usefulness. Grégoire was skeptical of the authenticity of Eusebius' Vita, and postulated a pseudo-Eusebius to assume responsibility for the vision and conversion narratives of that work.[329] Otto Seeck's Geschichte des Untergangs der antiken Welt (1920–23) and André Piganiol's L'empereur Constantin (1932) go against this historiographic tradition. Seeck presents Constantine as a sincere war hero whose ambiguities were the product of his own naïve inconsistency.[330] Piganiol's Constantine is a philosophical monotheist, a child of his era's religious syncretism.[331] Related histories by Arnold Hugh Martin Jones (Constantine and the Conversion of Europe, 1949) and Ramsay MacMullen (Constantine, 1969) give portraits of a less visionary and more impulsive Constantine.[332]

These later accounts were more willing to present Constantine as a genuine convert to Christianity. Norman H. Baynes began a historiographic tradition with Constantine the Great and the Christian Church (1929) which presents Constantine as a committed Christian, reinforced by Andreas Alföldi's The Conversion of Constantine and Pagan Rome (1948), and Timothy Barnes's Constantine and Eusebius (1981) is the culmination of this trend. Barnes' Constantine experienced a radical conversion which drove him on a personal crusade to convert his empire.[333] Charles Matson Odahl's Constantine and the Christian Empire (2004) takes much the same tack.[334] In spite of Barnes' work, arguments continue over the strength and depth of Constantine's religious conversion.[335] Certain themes in this school reached new extremes in T.G. Elliott's The Christianity of Constantine the Great (1996), which presented Constantine as a committed Christian from early childhood.[336] Paul Veyne's 2007 work Quand notre monde est devenu chrétien holds a similar view which does not speculate on the origin of Constantine's Christian motivation, but presents him as a religious revolutionary who fervently believed that he was meant "to play a providential role in the millenary economy of the salvation of humanity".[337]

Donation of Constantine edit

Main article: Donation of Constantine

Latin Christians considered it inappropriate that Constantine was baptized only on his death bed by an unorthodox bishop, and a legend emerged by the early 4th century that Pope Sylvester I had cured the pagan emperor from leprosy. According to this legend, Constantine was baptized and began the construction of a church in the Lateran Basilica.[338][339] The Donation of Constantine appeared in the 8th century, most likely during the pontificate of Pope Stephen II, in which the freshly converted Constantine gives "the city of Rome and all the provinces, districts, and cities of Italy and the Western regions" to Sylvester and his successors.[340] In the High Middle Ages,[341][342] this document was used and accepted as the basis for the pope's temporal power, though it was denounced as a forgery by Emperor Otto III[343] and lamented as the root of papal worldliness by Dante Alighieri.[344] Philologist and Catholic priest Lorenzo Valla proved in 1440 that the document was indeed a forgery.[345]

Geoffrey of Monmouth's Historia edit

During the medieval period, Britons regarded Constantine as a king of their own people, particularly associating him with Caernarfon in Gwynedd. While some of this is owed to his fame and his proclamation as emperor in Britain, there was also confusion of his family with Magnus Maximus's supposed wife Elen and her son, another Constantine (Welsh: Custennin). In the 12th century Henry of Huntingdon included a passage in his Historia Anglorum that the Emperor Constantine's mother was a Briton, making her the daughter of King Cole of Colchester.[346] Geoffrey of Monmouth expanded this story in his highly fictionalized Historia Regum Britanniae, an account of the supposed Kings of Britain from their Trojan origins to the Anglo-Saxon invasion.[347] According to Geoffrey, Cole was King of the Britons when Constantius, here a senator, came to Britain. Afraid of the Romans, Cole submits to Roman law so long as he retains his kingship. However, he dies only a month later, and Constantius takes the throne himself, marrying Cole's daughter Helena. They have their son Constantine, who succeeds his father as King of Britain before becoming Roman emperor.

Historically, this series of events is extremely improbable. Constantius had already left Helena by the time he left for Britain.[50] Additionally, no earlier source mentions that Helena was born in Britain, let alone that she was a princess. Henry's source for the story is unknown, though it may have been a lost hagiography of Helena.[347]

Family tree edit

See also: Constantinian dynasty


Family of Constantine the Great

Emperors are shown with a rounded-corner border with their dates as Augusti, names with a thicker border appear in both sections

1: Constantine's parents and half-siblings


2: Constantine's children

See also edit

Notes edit

  1. ^ a b Emperor of the East
  2. ^ Emperor of the West
  3. ^ a b In the West; unrecognized outside Italy
  4. ^ Originally emperor of the West; became emperor of the East after 313.
  5. ^ a b In the East; nominal emperor of the West.
  6. ^ Minervina may have been his concubine.
  7. ^ /ˈkɒnstəntaɪn, -tiːn/ KON-stən-tyne, -⁠teen; Latin: Flavius Valerius Constantinus, Classical Latin: [kõːstanˈtiːnʊs]; Greek: Κωνσταντῖνος, translit. Kōnstantînos
  8. ^ With the possible exception of Philip the Arab (r. 244–249). See Philip the Arab and Christianity.[3]
  9. ^ Constantine was not baptized until just before his death.[4][5]
  10. ^ The claim that Constantius descended from Claudius Gothicus, and thus also from the Flavian dynasty, is most certainly a fabrication.[29][30] His family probably adopted the name "Flavius" after being granted citizenship by one of the Flavian emperors, as it was common for "new Romans" to adopt the names of their benefactors.[31]
  11. ^ Constantine is not revered as a saint but as "the great" in the Latin Catholic Church.[231][232] Eastern Catholic Churches such as the Ukrainian Catholic Church may revere him as a saint.[233]

References edit

Citations edit

  1. ^ Birth dates vary, but most modern historians use "c. 272". Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 59.
  2. ^ "Constantine I | Biography, Accomplishments, Death, & Facts". Encyclopaedia Britannica Online. 25 May 2023.
  3. ^ I. Shahîd, Rome and the Arabs (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, 1984), 65–93; H. A. Pohlsander, "Philip the Arab and Christianity", Historia 29:4 (1980): 463–73.
  4. ^ . About.com. Archived from the original on 5 October 2011. Retrieved 3 March 2017.
  5. ^ Harris, Jonathan (2017). Constantinople: Capital of Byzantium (2nd ed.). Bloomsbury Academic. p. 38. ISBN 9781474254670.
  6. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, p. 272.
  7. ^ Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), p. 14; Cameron, p. 90–91; Lenski, "Introduction" (CC), 2–3.
  8. ^ Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), p. 23–25; Cameron, 90–91; Southern, 169.
  9. ^ Cameron, 90; Southern, 169.
  10. ^ Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), 14; Corcoran, Empire of the Tetrarchs, 1; Lenski, "Introduction" (CC), 2–3.
  11. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 265–68.
  12. ^ Drake, "What Eusebius Knew", 21.
  13. ^ Eusebius, Vita Constantini 1.11; Odahl, 3.
  14. ^ Lenski, "Introduction" (CC), 5; Storch, 145–55.
  15. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 265–71; Cameron, 90–92; Cameron and Hall, 4–6; Elliott, "Eusebian Frauds in the "Vita Constantini"", 162–71.
  16. ^ Lieu and Montserrat, 39; Odahl, 3.
  17. ^ Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), 26; Lieu and Montserrat, 40; Odahl, 3.
  18. ^ Lieu and Montserrat, 40; Odahl, 3.
  19. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 12–14; Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), 24; Mackay, 207; Odahl, 9–10.
  20. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 225; Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), 28–30; Odahl, 4–6.
  21. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 225; Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), 26–29; Odahl, 5–6.
  22. ^ Odahl, 6, 10.
  23. ^ Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), 27–28; Lieu and Montserrat, 2–6; Odahl, 6–7; Warmington, 166–67.
  24. ^ Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), 24; Odahl, 8; Wienand, Kaiser als Sieger, 26–43.
  25. ^ Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), 20–21; Johnson, "Architecture of Empire" (CC), 288–91; Odahl, 11–12.
  26. ^ Bleckmann, "Sources for the History of Constantine" (CC), 17–21; Odahl, 11–14; Wienand, Kaiser als Sieger, 43–86.
  27. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 3, 39–42; Elliott, Christianity of Constantine, 17; Odahl, 15; Pohlsander, "Constantine I"; Southern, 169, 341.
  28. ^ Barnes, New Empire, 39–42; Elliott, "Constantine's Conversion", 425–26; Elliott, "Eusebian Frauds", 163; Elliott, Christianity of Constantine, 17; Jones, 13–14; Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 59; Odahl, 15–16; Pohlsander, Emperor Constantine, 14; Rodgers, 238–239; Wright, 495, 507.
  29. ^ a b Kazhdan 1991, pp. 524–525.
  30. ^ Jones, Martindale & Morris, p. 223.
  31. ^ Salway, Benet (1994). "What's in a Name? A Survey of Roman Onomastic Practice from c. 700 B.C. to A.D. 700" (PDF). Journal of Roman Studies. 84: 124–145. doi:10.2307/300873. JSTOR 300873. S2CID 162435434. (PDF) from the original on 11 April 2020.
  32. ^ Odahl, Charles M. (2001). Constantine and the Christian empire. London: Routledge. pp. 40–41. ISBN 978-0-415-17485-5.
  33. ^ Gabucci, Ada (2002). Ancient Rome : art, architecture and history. Los Angeles, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum. p. 141. ISBN 978-0-89236-656-9.
  34. ^ a b Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 3; Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 59–60; Odahl, 16–17.
  35. ^ a b Otto Seeck: Constantius 1.(in German) In: Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft (RE). Vol. IV,1, Stuttgart 1900, col. 1013–1026.
  36. ^ a b c Conrad Benjamin: Constantinus 2.(in German) In: Realencyclopädie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft (RE). Vol. IV,1, Stuttgart 1900, col. 1013–1026.
  37. ^ Wilson, Steven (2003). The Means Of Naming: A Social History. Routledge. p. 47. ISBN 9781135368364.
  38. ^ fMacMullen, Constantine, 21.
  39. ^ Panegyrici Latini 8(5), 9(4); Lactantius, De Mortibus Persecutorum 8.7; Eusebius, Vita Constantini 1.13.3; Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 13, 290.
  40. ^ Drijvers, J.W. Helena Augusta: The Mother of Constantine the Great and the Legend of Her finding the True Cross (Leiden, 1991) 9, 15–17.
  41. ^ Phelan, Marilyn E.; Phelan, Jay M. (8 June 2021). In His Footsteps: The Early Followers of Jesus. Wipf and Stock Publishers. p. 67. ISBN 978-1-6667-0186-9. "Constantine's mother Helena, was a Greek and a Christian".
  42. ^ Stanton, Andrea L. (2012). Cultural Sociology of the Middle East, Asia, and Africa: An Encyclopedia. SAGE. p. 25. ISBN 978-1-4129-8176-7. Constantine's mother, Helena, was a Greek form Asia Minor and also a devoted Christian who seemed to have influenced his choices.
  43. ^ Vatikiotis, Michael (5 August 2021). Lives Between The Lines: A Journey in Search of the Lost Levant. Orion. p. 138. ISBN 978-1-4746-1322-4.
  44. ^ Gibbon, Edward. The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Vol. I. p. 407.
  45. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 3; Barnes, New Empire, 39–40; Elliott, Christianity of Constantine, 17; Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 59, 83; Odahl, 16; Pohlsander, Emperor Constantine, 14.
  46. ^ Tejirian, Eleanor H.; Simon, Reeva Spector (2012). Conflict, conquest, and conversion two thousand years of Christian missions in the Middle East. New York: Columbia University Press. p. 15. ISBN 978-0-231-51109-4.
  47. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, pp. 8–14; Corcoran, "Before Constantine" (CC), 41–54; Odahl, 46–50; Treadgold, 14–15.
  48. ^ Bowman, p. 70; Potter, 283; Williams, 49, 65.
  49. ^ Potter, 283; Williams, 49, 65.
  50. ^ a b Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 3; Elliott, Christianity of Constantine, 20; Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 59–60; Odahl, 47, 299; Pohlsander, Emperor Constantine, 14.
  51. ^ Lactantius, De Mortibus Persecutorum 7.1; Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 13, 290.
  52. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 3, 8; Corcoran, "Before Constantine" (CC), 40–41; Elliott, Christianity of Constantine, 20; Odahl, 46–47; Pohlsander, Emperor Constantine, 8–9, 14; Treadgold, 17.
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  54. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 3; Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 59–60; Odahl, 56–57.
  55. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 73–74; Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 60; Odahl, 72, 301.
  56. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 47, 73–74; Fowden, "Between Pagans and Christians", 175–76.
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  58. ^ Elliott, Christianity of Constantine, 29; Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 61; Odahl, 72–74, 306; Pohlsander, Emperor Constantine, 15. Contra: J. Moreau, Lactance: "De la mort des persécuteurs", Sources Chrétiennes 39 (1954): 313; Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 297.
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  62. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 22–25; MacMullen, Constantine, 24–30; Odahl, 67–69; Potter, 337.
  63. ^ MacMullen, Constantine, 24–25.
  64. ^ Oratio ad Sanctorum Coetum 25; Odahl, 73.
  65. ^ Drake, "The Impact of Constantine on Christianity" (CC), 126; Elliott, "Constantine's Conversion", 425–26.
  66. ^ Drake, "The Impact of Constantine on Christianity" (CC), 126.
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  68. ^ Lactantius, De Mortibus Persecutorum 19.2–6; Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 26; Potter, 342.
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  70. ^ Origo 4; Lactantius, De Mortibus Persecutorum 24.3–9; Praxagoras fr. 1.2; Aurelius Victor 40.2–3; Epitome de Caesaribus 41.2; Zosimus 2.8.3; Eusebius, Vita Constantini 1.21; Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 61; MacMullen, Constantine, 32; Odahl, 73.
  71. ^ Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 61.
  72. ^ Odahl, 75–76.
  73. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 27; Elliott, Christianity of Constantine, 39–40; Lenski, "Reign of Constantine" (CC), 61; MacMullen, Constantine, 32; Odahl, 77; Pohlsander, Emperor Constantine, 15–16; Potter, 344–45; Southern, 169–70, 341.
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  94. ^ Odahl, 82–83. See also: William E. Gwatkin, Jr. Roman Trier." The Classical Journal 29 (1933): 3–12.
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  96. ^ Odahl, 86.
  97. ^ Barnes, Constantine and Eusebius, 28.
  98. ^ Rodgers, 236.
  99. ^ Panegyrici Latini 7(6)3.4; Eusebius, Vita Constantini 1.22, qtd. and tr. Odahl, 83; Rodgers, 238.
  100. ^ MacMullen, Constantine, 40.
  101. ^ Qtd. in MacMullen, Constantine, 40.
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Further reading edit

  • Arjava, Antii. Women and Law in Late Antiquity. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. ISBN 0-19-815233-7
  • Baynes, Norman H. (1930). Constantine the Great and the Christian Church. London: Milford.
  • Burckhardt, Jacob (1949). The Age of Constantine the Great. London: Routledge.
  • Cameron, Averil (1993). The later Roman empire: AD 284–430. London: Fontana Press. ISBN 978-0-00-686172-0.
  • Cowan, Ross (2016). Milvian Bridge AD 312: Constantine's Battle for Empire and Faith. Oxford: Osprey Publishing.
  • Eadie, John W., ed. (1971). The conversion of Constantine. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 978-0-03-083645-9.
  • Fourlas, Benjamin (2020). "St Constantine and the Army of Heroic Men Raised by Tiberius II Constantine in 574/575. Some Thoughts on the Historical Significance of the Early Byzantine Silver Hoard at Karlsruhe". Jahrbuch des Römisch-Germanischen Zentralmuseums 62, 2015 [published 2020], 341–375. doi:10.11588/jrgzm.2015.1.77142
  • Harries, Jill. Law and Empire in Late Antiquity. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2004. Hardcover ISBN 0-521-41087-8 Paperback ISBN 0-521-42273-6
  • Hartley, Elizabeth. Constantine the Great: York's Roman Emperor. York: Lund Humphries, 2004. ISBN 978-0-85331-928-3.
  • Heather, Peter J. "Foedera and Foederati of the Fourth Century." In From Roman Provinces to Medieval Kingdoms, edited by Thomas F.X. Noble, 292–308. New York: Routledge, 2006. Hardcover ISBN 0-415-32741-5 Paperback ISBN 0-415-32742-3
  • Leithart, Peter J. Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom. Downers Grove: IL, InterVarsity Press 2010
  • MacMullen, Ramsay. Christianizing the Roman Empire A.D. 100–400. New Haven, CT; London: Yale University Press, 1984. ISBN 978-0-300-03642-8
  • MacMullen, Ramsay. Christianity and Paganism in the Fourth to Eighth Centuries. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997. ISBN 0-300-07148-5
  • Percival J. On the Question of Constantine's Conversion to Christianity 14 June 2015 at the Wayback Machine, Clio History Journal, 2008
  • Pelikán, Jaroslav (1987). The excellent empire: the fall of Rome and the triumph of the church. San Francisco: Harper & Row. ISBN 978-0-06-254636-4.
  • Velikov, Yuliyan (2013). Imperator et Sacerdos. Veliko Turnovo University Press. ISBN 978-954-524-932-7 (in Bulgarian)

External links edit

 
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Constantine I.
 
Wikiquote has quotations related to Constantine the Great.
  • (archived 19 February 2013)
  • Firth, John B. . Archived from the original (BTM) on 15 March 2012. Retrieved 19 February 2016.
  • Letters of Constantine: Book 1, Book 2, & Book 3
  • Encyclopædia Britannica, Constantine I
  • Henry Stuart Jones (1911). "Constantine (emperors)". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. 6. (11th ed.), Cambridge University Press. pp. 988–992.
  • Charles George Herbermann and Georg Grupp (1908). "Constantine the Great". In Catholic Encyclopedia. 4. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
  • BBC North Yorkshire's site on Constantine the Great
  • Constantine's time in York on the 'History of York'
  • Commemorations
  • Roman Legionary AD 284–337: The Age of Diocletian and Constantine the Great
  • Milvian Bridge AD 312: Constantine's Battle for Empire and Faith
Constantine the Great
Born: 27 February 272  Died: 22 May 337
Regnal titles
Preceded by Roman emperor
306–337
With: Galerius, Severus II, Maxentius, Maximian,
Licinius, Maximinus II, Valerius Valens & Martinian 		Succeeded by
Political offices
Preceded by Roman consul
307
with Maximian 		Succeeded by
Preceded by
Galerius
Maximinus
 Roman consul II–III
312–313
with Licinius
Maximinus 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Roman consul IV
315
with Licinius 		Succeeded by
Antonius Caecina Sabinus
Vettius Rufinus
Preceded by
Licinius
Crispus
 Roman consul V–VI
319–320
with Licinius II
Constantine II 		Succeeded by
Crispus
Constantine II
Preceded by Roman consul VII
326
with Constantius II 		Succeeded by
Flavius Constantius
Valerius Maximus
Preceded by
Januarinus
Vettius Iustus
 Roman consul VIII
329
with Constantine II 		Succeeded by
Legendary titles
Preceded by
Constantius Chlorus
 King of Britain Succeeded by

November 21, 2023
constantine, great, constantine, redirects, here, third, king, modern, greek, state, constantine, greece, other, uses, constantine, disambiguation, constantine, february, also, known, roman, emperor, from, first, emperor, convert, christianity, born, naissus, . Constantine I redirects here For the third king of the modern Greek state see Constantine I of Greece For other uses see Constantine I disambiguation Constantine I g 27 February c 272 22 May 337 also known as Constantine the Great was Roman emperor from AD 306 to 337 He was the first emperor to convert to Christianity h Born in Naissus Dacia Mediterranea now Nis Serbia he was the son of Flavius Constantius a Roman army officer of Illyrian origin who had been one of the four rulers of the Tetrarchy His mother Helena was a Greek woman of low birth and a Christian Later canonized as a saint she is traditionally attributed with the conversion of her son Constantine served with distinction under the Roman emperors Diocletian and Galerius He began his career by campaigning in the eastern provinces against the Persians before being recalled in the west in AD 305 to fight alongside his father in the province of Britannia After his father s death in 306 Constantine was acclaimed as augustus emperor by his army at Eboracum York England He eventually emerged victorious in the civil wars against emperors Maxentius and Licinius to become the sole ruler of the Roman Empire by 324 Constantine the GreatHead of the Colossus of Constantine Capitoline MuseumsRoman EmperorReign25 July 306 22 May 337PredecessorConstantius I in the West SuccessorConstantine IIConstantius IIConstans ICo rulersSee list Galerius 306 311 a Severus II 306 307 b Maxentius 306 312 c Maximian 306 308 310 c Licinius 308 324 d Maximinus II 310 313 a Valens 316 317 e Martinian 324 e BornFlavius Constantinus27 February c 272 1 Naissus Moesia Roman Empire 2 Died22 May 337 aged 65 Achyron Nicomedia Bithynia Roman EmpireBurialOriginally the Church of the Holy Apostles Constantinople but Constantius II his son had it movedSpousesMinervina f FaustaIssueDetailCrispusConstantine IIConstantius IIConstantinaConstans IHelenaNamesFlavius Valerius ConstantinusRegnal nameImperator Caesar Flavius Valerius Constantinus AugustusGreekKwnstantῖnosDynastyConstantinianFatherConstantius ChlorusMotherHelenaReligionRoman polytheism until 312 Christianity from 312 Upon his ascension Constantine enacted numerous reforms to strengthen the empire He restructured the government separating civil and military authorities To combat inflation he introduced the solidus a new gold coin that became the standard for Byzantine and European currencies for more than a thousand years The Roman army was reorganised to consist of mobile units comitatenses often around the Emperor to serve on campaigns against external enemies or Roman rebels and frontier garrison troops limitanei which were capable of countering barbarian raids but less and less capable over time of countering full scale barbarian invasions Constantine pursued successful campaigns against the tribes on the Roman frontiers such as the Franks the Alemanni the Goths and the Sarmatians and resettled territories abandoned by his predecessors during the Crisis of the Third Century with citizens of Roman culture Although Constantine lived much of his life as a pagan and later as a catechumen he began to favour Christianity beginning in 312 finally becoming a Christian and being baptized by either Eusebius of Nicomedia an Arian bishop or by Pope Sylvester I which is maintained by the Catholic Church and the Coptic Orthodox Church He played an influential role in the proclamation of the Edict of Milan in 313 which declared tolerance for Christianity in the Roman Empire He convoked the First Council of Nicaea in 325 which produced the statement of Christian belief known as the Nicene Creed The Church of the Holy Sepulchre was built on his orders at the purported site of Jesus tomb in Jerusalem and was deemed the holiest place in all of Christendom The papal claim to temporal power in the High Middle Ages was based on the fabricated Donation of Constantine He has historically been referred to as the First Christian Emperor but while he did favour the Christian Church some modern scholars debate his beliefs and even his comprehension of Christianity i Nevertheless he is venerated as a saint in Eastern Christianity and he did much for pushing Christianity towards the mainstream of Roman culture The age of Constantine marked a distinct epoch in the history of the Roman Empire and a pivotal moment in the transition from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages He built a new imperial residence at the city of Byzantium and renamed it New Rome later adopting the name Constantinople after himself where it was located in modern Istanbul It subsequently became the capital of the empire for more than a thousand years the later Eastern Roman Empire often being referred to in English as the Byzantine Empire a term never used by the Empire invented by German historian Hieronymus Wolf His more immediate political legacy was that he replaced Diocletian s Tetrarchy with the de facto principle of dynastic succession by leaving the empire to his sons and other members of the Constantinian dynasty His reputation flourished during the lifetime of his children and for centuries after his reign The medieval church held him up as a paragon of virtue while secular rulers invoked him as a prototype a point of reference and the symbol of imperial legitimacy and identity Beginning with the Renaissance there were more critical appraisals of his reign with the rediscovery of anti Constantinian sources Trends in modern and recent scholarship have attempted to balance the extremes of previous scholarship Contents 1 Sources 2 Early life 2 1 In the East 2 2 In the West 3 Early rule 3 1 Maxentius rebellion 3 2 Maximian s rebellion 4 Civil wars 4 1 War against Maxentius 4 1 1 Constantine adopts the Greek letters Chi Rho for Christ s initials 4 2 In Rome 4 3 Wars against Licinius 5 Later rule 5 1 Foundation of Constantinople 5 2 Religious policy 5 3 Administrative reforms 5 4 Monetary reforms 5 5 Executions of Crispus and Fausta 5 6 Later campaigns 5 7 Illness and death 6 Assessment and legacy 6 1 Historiography 6 2 Donation of Constantine 6 3 Geoffrey of Monmouth s Historia 7 Family tree 8 See also 9 Notes 10 References 10 1 Citations 10 2 Sources 10 2 1 Ancient sources 10 2 2 Modern sources 11 Further reading 12 External linksSources editConstantine was a ruler of major importance and has always been a controversial figure 6 The fluctuations in his reputation reflect the nature of the ancient sources for his reign These are abundant and detailed 7 but they have been strongly influenced by the official propaganda of the period 8 and are often one sided 9 no contemporaneous histories or biographies dealing with his life and rule have survived 10 The nearest replacement is Eusebius s Vita Constantini a mixture of eulogy and hagiography 11 written between 335 and circa 339 12 that extols Constantine s moral and religious virtues 13 The Vita creates a contentiously positive image of Constantine 14 and modern historians have frequently challenged its reliability 15 The fullest secular life of Constantine is the anonymous Origo Constantini 16 a work of uncertain date 17 which focuses on military and political events to the neglect of cultural and religious matters 18 Lactantius De mortibus persecutorum a political Christian pamphlet on the reigns of Diocletian and the Tetrarchy provides valuable but tendentious detail on Constantine s predecessors and early life 19 The ecclesiastical histories of Socrates Sozomen and Theodoret describe the ecclesiastic disputes of Constantine s later reign 20 Written during the reign of Theodosius II r 402 450 a century after Constantine s reign these ecclesiastical historians obscure the events and theologies of the Constantinian period through misdirection misrepresentation and deliberate obscurity 21 The contemporary writings of the orthodox Christian Athanasius and the ecclesiastical history of the Arian Philostorgius also survive though their biases are no less firm 22 The epitomes of Aurelius Victor De Caesaribus Eutropius Breviarium Festus Breviarium and the anonymous author of the Epitome de Caesaribus offer compressed secular political and military histories of the period Although not Christian the epitomes paint a favourable image of Constantine but omit reference to Constantine s religious policies 23 The Panegyrici Latini a collection of panegyrics from the late 3rd and early 4th centuries provides valuable information on the politics and ideology of the tetrarchic period and the early life of Constantine 24 Contemporary architecture such as the Arch of Constantine in Rome and palaces in Gamzigrad and Cordoba 25 epigraphic remains and the coinage of the era complement the literary sources 26 Early life edit nbsp Remains of the luxurious residence palace of Mediana erected by Constantine I near his birth town of NaissusConstantine was born in Naissus today Nis Serbia part of the Dardania province of Moesia on 27 February 27 c AD 272 28 His father was Flavius Constantius j an Illyrian who was born in the same region then called Dacia Ripensis 32 33 29 and a native of the province of Moesia 34 His original full name as well as that of his father is not known 35 36 His praenomen is variously given as Lucius Marcus and Gaius 36 Whatever the case praenomina had already disappeared from most public records by this time 37 He also adopted the name Valerius the nomen of emperor Diocletian following his father s ascension as caesar 36 35 Constantine probably spent little time with his father 38 who was an officer in the Roman army part of Emperor Aurelian s imperial bodyguard Being described as a tolerant and politically skilled man 39 Constantius advanced through the ranks earning the governorship of Dalmatia from Emperor Diocletian another of Aurelian s companions from Illyricum in 284 or 285 34 Constantine s mother was Helena a Greek woman of low social standing from Helenopolis of Bithynia 40 41 42 43 44 It is uncertain whether she was legally married to Constantius or merely his concubine 45 His main language was Latin and during his public speeches he needed Greek translators 46 nbsp Head from a statue of the emperor Diocletian nbsp Bust of Maximian Diocletian s co emperor In July 285 Diocletian declared Maximian another colleague from Illyricum his co emperor Each emperor would have his own court his own military and administrative faculties and each would rule with a separate praetorian prefect as chief lieutenant 47 Maximian ruled in the West from his capitals at Mediolanum Milan Italy or Augusta Treverorum Trier Germany while Diocletian ruled in the East from Nicomedia Izmit Turkey The division was merely pragmatic the empire was called indivisible in official panegyric 48 and both emperors could move freely throughout the empire 49 In 288 Maximian appointed Constantius to serve as his praetorian prefect in Gaul Constantius left Helena to marry Maximian s stepdaughter Theodora in 288 or 289 50 Diocletian divided the empire again in 293 appointing two caesars to rule over further subdivisions of East and West Each would be subordinate to his respective augustus but would act with supreme authority in his assigned lands This system would later be called the Tetrarchy Diocletian s first appointee for the office of Caesar was Constantius his second was Galerius a native of Felix Romuliana According to Lactantius Galerius was a brutal animalistic man Although he shared the paganism of Rome s aristocracy he seemed to them an alien figure a semi barbarian 51 On 1 March Constantius was promoted to the office of Caesar and dispatched to Gaul to fight the rebels Carausius and Allectus 52 In spite of meritocratic overtones the Tetrarchy retained vestiges of hereditary privilege 53 and Constantine became the prime candidate for future appointment as Caesar as soon as his father took the position Constantine went to the court of Diocletian where he lived as his father s heir presumptive 54 In the East edit Constantine received a formal education at Diocletian s court where he learned Latin literature Greek and philosophy 55 The cultural environment in Nicomedia was open fluid and socially mobile in it Constantine could mix with intellectuals both pagan and Christian He may have attended the lectures of Lactantius a Christian scholar of Latin in the city 56 Because Diocletian did not completely trust Constantius none of the Tetrarchs fully trusted their colleagues Constantine was held as something of a hostage a tool to ensure Constantius best behavior Constantine was nonetheless a prominent member of the court he fought for Diocletian and Galerius in Asia and served in a variety of tribunates he campaigned against barbarians on the Danube in 296 and fought the Persians under Diocletian in Syria in 297 as well as under Galerius in Mesopotamia in 298 299 57 By late 305 he had become a tribune of the first order a tribunus ordinis primi 58 nbsp Porphyry bust of Emperor GaleriusConstantine had returned to Nicomedia from the eastern front by the spring of 303 in time to witness the beginnings of Diocletian s Great Persecution the most severe persecution of Christians in Roman history 59 In late 302AD Diocletian and Galerius sent a messenger to the oracle of Apollo at Didyma with an inquiry about Christians 60 Constantine could recall his presence at the palace when the messenger returned when Diocletian accepted his court s demands for universal persecution 61 On 23 February 303 Diocletian ordered the destruction of Nicomedia s new church condemned its scriptures to the flames and had its treasures seized In the months that followed churches and scriptures were destroyed Christians were deprived of official ranks and priests were imprisoned 62 It is unlikely that Constantine played any role in the persecution 63 In his later writings he attempted to present himself as an opponent of Diocletian s sanguinary edicts against the Worshippers of God 64 but nothing indicates that he opposed it effectively at the time 65 Although no contemporary Christian challenged Constantine for his inaction during the persecutions it remained a political liability throughout his life 66 On 1 May 305 Diocletian as a result of a debilitating sickness taken in the winter of 304 305 announced his resignation In a parallel ceremony in Milan Maximian did the same 67 Lactantius states that Galerius manipulated the weakened Diocletian into resigning and forced him to accept Galerius allies in the imperial succession According to Lactantius the crowd listening to Diocletian s resignation speech believed until the last moment that Diocletian would choose Constantine and Maxentius Maximian s son as his successors 68 It was not to be Constantius and Galerius were promoted to augusti while Severus and Maximinus Galerius nephew were appointed their caesars respectively Constantine and Maxentius were ignored 69 Some of the ancient sources detail plots that Galerius made on Constantine s life in the months following Diocletian s abdication They assert that Galerius assigned Constantine to lead an advance unit in a cavalry charge through a swamp on the middle Danube made him enter into single combat with a lion and attempted to kill him in hunts and wars Constantine always emerged victorious the lion emerged from the contest in a poorer condition than Constantine Constantine returned to Nicomedia from the Danube with a Sarmatian captive to drop at Galerius feet 70 It is uncertain how much these tales can be trusted 71 In the West edit Constantine recognized the implicit danger in remaining at Galerius court where he was held as a virtual hostage His career depended on being rescued by his father in the West Constantius was quick to intervene 72 In the late spring or early summer of 305 Constantius requested leave for his son to help him campaign in Britain After a long evening of drinking Galerius granted the request Constantine s later propaganda describes how he fled the court in the night before Galerius could change his mind He rode from post house to post house at high speed hamstringing every horse in his wake 73 By the time Galerius awoke the following morning Constantine had fled too far to be caught 74 Constantine joined his father in Gaul at Bononia Boulogne before the summer of 305 75 nbsp Modern bronze statue of Constantine I in York England near the spot where he was proclaimed Augustus in 306From Bononia they crossed the English Channel to Britain and made their way to Eboracum York capital of the province of Britannia Secunda and home to a large military base Constantine was able to spend a year in northern Britain at his father s side campaigning against the Picts beyond Hadrian s Wall in the summer and autumn 76 Constantius campaign like that of Septimius Severus before it probably advanced far into the north without achieving great success 77 Constantius had become severely sick over the course of his reign and died on 25 July 306 in Eboracum Before dying he declared his support for raising Constantine to the rank of full augustus The Alamannic king Chrocus a barbarian taken into service under Constantius then proclaimed Constantine as augustus The troops loyal to Constantius memory followed him in acclamation Gaul and Britain quickly accepted his rule 78 Hispania which had been in his father s domain for less than a year rejected it 79 Constantine sent Galerius an official notice of Constantius death and his own acclamation Along with the notice he included a portrait of himself in the robes of an augustus 80 The portrait was wreathed in bay 81 He requested recognition as heir to his father s throne and passed off responsibility for his unlawful ascension on his army claiming they had forced it upon him 82 Galerius was put into a fury by the message he almost set the portrait and messenger on fire 83 His advisers calmed him and argued that outright denial of Constantine s claims would mean certain war 84 Galerius was compelled to compromise he granted Constantine the title caesar rather than augustus the latter office went to Severus instead 85 Wishing to make it clear that he alone gave Constantine legitimacy Galerius personally sent Constantine the emperor s traditional purple robes 86 Constantine accepted the decision 85 knowing that it would remove doubts as to his legitimacy 87 Early rule edit nbsp Aureus of Constantine the inscription around the portrait is Constantinus P ius F elix Aug ustus Constantine s share of the empire consisted of Britain Gaul and Spain and he commanded one of the largest Roman armies which was stationed along the important Rhine frontier 88 He remained in Britain after his promotion to emperor driving back the tribes of the Picts and securing his control in the northwestern dioceses He completed the reconstruction of military bases begun under his father s rule and he ordered the repair of the region s roadways 89 He then left for Augusta Treverorum Trier in Gaul the Tetrarchic capital of the northwestern Roman Empire 90 The Franks learned of Constantine s acclamation and invaded Gaul across the lower Rhine over the winter of 306 307 91 He drove them back beyond the Rhine and captured kings Ascaric and Merogais the kings and their soldiers were fed to the beasts of Trier s amphitheatre in the adventus arrival celebrations which followed 92 nbsp Public baths thermae built in Trier by Constantine more than 100 metres 328 ft wide by 200 metres 656 ft long and capable of serving several thousand at a time built to rival those of Rome 93 Constantine began a major expansion of Trier He strengthened the circuit wall around the city with military towers and fortified gates and he began building a palace complex in the northeastern part of the city To the south of his palace he ordered the construction of a large formal audience hall and a massive imperial bathhouse He sponsored many building projects throughout Gaul during his tenure as emperor of the West especially in Augustodunum Autun and Arelate Arles 94 According to Lactantius Constantine followed a tolerant policy towards Christianity although he was not yet a Christian He probably judged it a more sensible policy than open persecution 95 and a way to distinguish himself from the great persecutor Galerius 96 He decreed a formal end to persecution and returned to Christians all that they had lost during them 97 Constantine was largely untried and had a hint of illegitimacy about him he relied on his father s reputation in his early propaganda which gave as much coverage to his father s deeds as to his 98 His military skill and building projects however soon gave the panegyrist the opportunity to comment favourably on the similarities between father and son and Eusebius remarked that Constantine was a renewal as it were in his own person of his father s life and reign 99 Constantinian coinage sculpture and oratory also show a tendency for disdain towards the barbarians beyond the frontiers He minted a coin issue after his victory over the Alemanni which depicts weeping and begging Alemannic tribesmen the Alemanni conquered beneath the phrase Romans rejoicing 100 There was little sympathy for these enemies as his panegyrist declared It is a stupid clemency that spares the conquered foe 101 Maxentius rebellion edit nbsp Dresden bust of Emperor Maxentius who was defeated by Constantine at the Battle of the Milvian BridgeFollowing Galerius recognition of Constantine as caesar Constantine s portrait was brought to Rome as was customary Maxentius mocked the portrait s subject as the son of a harlot and lamented his own powerlessness 102 Maxentius envious of Constantine s authority 103 seized the title of emperor on 28 October 306 Galerius refused to recognize him but failed to unseat him Galerius sent Severus against Maxentius but during the campaign Severus armies previously under command of Maxentius father Maximian defected and Severus was seized and imprisoned 104 Maximian brought out of retirement by his son s rebellion left for Gaul to confer with Constantine in late 307 He offered to marry his daughter Fausta to Constantine and elevate him to augustan rank In return Constantine would reaffirm the old family alliance between Maximian and Constantius and offer support to Maxentius cause in Italy Constantine accepted and married Fausta in Trier in late summer 307 Constantine gave Maxentius his meagre support offering Maxentius political recognition 105 Constantine remained aloof from the Italian conflict however Over the spring and summer of 307 he had left Gaul for Britain to avoid any involvement in the Italian turmoil 106 now instead of giving Maxentius military aid he sent his troops against Germanic tribes along the Rhine In 308 he raided the territory of the Bructeri and made a bridge across the Rhine at Colonia Agrippinensium Cologne In 310 he marched to the northern Rhine and fought the Franks When not campaigning he toured his lands advertising his benevolence and supporting the economy and the arts His refusal to participate in the war increased his popularity among his people and strengthened his power base in the West 107 Maximian returned to Rome in the winter of 307 308 but soon fell out with his son In early 308 after a failed attempt to usurp Maxentius title Maximian returned to Constantine s court 108 On 11 November 308 Galerius called a general council at the military city of Carnuntum Petronell Carnuntum Austria to resolve the instability in the western provinces In attendance were Diocletian briefly returned from retirement Galerius and Maximian Maximian was forced to abdicate again and Constantine was again demoted to caesar Licinius one of Galerius old military companions was appointed augustus in the western regions The new system did not last long Constantine refused to accept the demotion and continued to style himself as augustus on his coinage even as other members of the Tetrarchy referred to him as a caesar on theirs Maximinus was frustrated that he had been passed over for promotion while the newcomer Licinius had been raised to the office of augustus and demanded that Galerius promote him Galerius offered to call both Maximinus and Constantine sons of the augusti 109 but neither accepted the new title By the spring of 310 Galerius was referring to both men as augusti 110 Maximian s rebellion edit nbsp A gold solidus of Unconquered Constantine with the god Sol Invictus behind him struck in AD 313 The use of Sol s image stressed Constantine s status as his father s successor appealed to the educated citizens of Gaul and was considered less offensive than the traditional pagan pantheon to the Christians 111 In 310 a dispossessed Maximian rebelled against Constantine while Constantine was away campaigning against the Franks Maximian had been sent south to Arles with a contingent of Constantine s army in preparation for any attacks by Maxentius in southern Gaul He announced that Constantine was dead and took up the imperial purple In spite of a large donative pledge to any who would support him as emperor most of Constantine s army remained loyal to their emperor and Maximian was soon compelled to leave When Constantine heard of the rebellion he abandoned his campaign against the Franks and marched his army up the Rhine 112 At Cabillunum Chalon sur Saone he moved his troops onto waiting boats to row down the slow waters of the Saone to the quicker waters of the Rhone He disembarked at Lugdunum Lyon 113 Maximian fled to Massilia Marseille a town better able to withstand a long siege than Arles It made little difference however as loyal citizens opened the rear gates to Constantine Maximian was captured and reproved for his crimes Constantine granted some clemency but strongly encouraged his suicide In July 310 Maximian hanged himself 112 In spite of the earlier rupture in their relations Maxentius was eager to present himself as his father s devoted son after his death 114 He began minting coins with his father s deified image proclaiming his desire to avenge Maximian s death 115 Constantine initially presented the suicide as an unfortunate family tragedy By 311 however he was spreading another version According to this after Constantine had pardoned him Maximian planned to murder Constantine in his sleep Fausta learned of the plot and warned Constantine who put a eunuch in his own place in bed Maximian was apprehended when he killed the eunuch and was offered suicide which he accepted 116 Along with using propaganda Constantine instituted a damnatio memoriae on Maximian destroying all inscriptions referring to him and eliminating any public work bearing his image 117 The death of Maximian required a shift in Constantine s public image He could no longer rely on his connection to the elder Emperor Maximian and needed a new source of legitimacy 118 In a speech delivered in Gaul on 25 July 310 the anonymous orator reveals a previously unknown dynastic connection to Claudius II a 3rd century emperor famed for defeating the Goths and restoring order to the empire Breaking away from tetrarchic models the speech emphasizes Constantine s ancestral prerogative to rule rather than principles of imperial equality The new ideology expressed in the speech made Galerius and Maximian irrelevant to Constantine s right to rule 119 Indeed the orator emphasizes ancestry to the exclusion of all other factors No chance agreement of men nor some unexpected consequence of favour made you emperor the orator declares to Constantine 120 The oration also moves away from the religious ideology of the Tetrarchy with its focus on twin dynasties of Jupiter and Hercules Instead the orator proclaims that Constantine experienced a divine vision of Apollo and Victory granting him laurel wreaths of health and a long reign In the likeness of Apollo Constantine recognized himself as the saving figure to whom would be granted rule of the whole world 121 as the poet Virgil had once foretold 122 The oration s religious shift is paralleled by a similar shift in Constantine s coinage In his early reign the coinage of Constantine advertised Mars as his patron From 310 on Mars was replaced by Sol Invictus a god conventionally identified with Apollo 123 There is little reason to believe that either the dynastic connection or the divine vision are anything other than fiction but their proclamation strengthened Constantine s claims to legitimacy and increased his popularity among the citizens of Gaul 124 Civil wars editSee also Civil wars of the Tetrarchy War against Maxentius edit By the middle of 310 Galerius had become too ill to involve himself in imperial politics 125 His final act survives a letter to provincials posted in Nicomedia on 30 April 311 proclaiming an end to the persecutions and the resumption of religious toleration 126 Eusebius maintains divine providence took action against the perpetrator of these crimes and gives a graphic account of Galerius demise Without warning suppurative inflammation broke out round the middle of his genitals then a deep seated fistula ulcer these ate their way incurably into his innermost bowels From them came a teeming indescribable mass of worms and a sickening smell was given off for the whole of his hulking body thanks to over eating had been transformed even before his illness into a huge lump of flabby fat which then decomposed and presented those who came near it with a revolting and horrifying sight 127 Galerius died soon after the edict s proclamation 128 destroying what little remained of the Tetrarchy 129 Maximinus mobilized against Licinius and seized Asia Minor A hasty peace was signed on a boat in the middle of the Bosphorus 130 While Constantine toured Britain and Gaul Maxentius prepared for war 131 He fortified northern Italy and strengthened his support in the Christian community by allowing it to elect Eusebius as bishop of Rome 132 nbsp A Roman fresco in Trier Germany possibly depicting Constantia 133 Maxentius rule was nevertheless insecure His early support dissolved in the wake of heightened tax rates and depressed trade riots broke out in Rome and Carthage 134 and Domitius Alexander was able to briefly usurp his authority in Africa 135 By 312 he was a man barely tolerated not one actively supported 136 even among Christian Italians 137 In the summer of 311 Maxentius mobilized against Constantine while Licinius was occupied with affairs in the East He declared war on Constantine vowing to avenge his father s murder 138 To prevent Maxentius from forming an alliance against him with Licinius 139 Constantine forged his own alliance with Licinius over the winter of 311 312 and offered him his sister Constantia in marriage Maximinus considered Constantine s arrangement with Licinius an affront to his authority In response he sent ambassadors to Rome offering political recognition to Maxentius in exchange for a military support which Maxentius accepted 140 According to Eusebius inter regional travel became impossible and there was military buildup everywhere There was not a place where people were not expecting the onset of hostilities every day 141 nbsp Battle of Constantine and Maxentius detail of part of a fresco by Giulio Romano in the Hall of Constantine in the Raphael Rooms in the Vatican copy c 1650 by Lazzaro Baldi now at the University of EdinburghConstantine s advisers and generals cautioned against preemptive attack on Maxentius 142 even his soothsayers recommended against it stating that the sacrifices had produced unfavourable omens 143 Constantine with a spirit that left a deep impression on his followers inspiring some to believe that he had some form of supernatural guidance 144 ignored all these cautions 145 Early in the spring of 312 146 Constantine crossed the Cottian Alps with a quarter of his army a force numbering about 40 000 147 The first town his army encountered was Segusium Susa Italy a heavily fortified town that shut its gates to him Constantine ordered his men to set fire to its gates and scale its walls He took the town quickly Constantine ordered his troops not to loot the town and advanced into northern Italy 146 At the approach to the west of the important city of Augusta Taurinorum Turin Italy Constantine met a large force of heavily armed Maxentian cavalry 148 In the ensuing Battle of Turin Constantine s army encircled Maxentius cavalry flanked them with his own cavalry and dismounted them with blows from his soldiers iron tipped clubs Constantine s armies emerged victorious 149 Turin refused to give refuge to Maxentius retreating forces opening its gates to Constantine instead 150 Other cities of the north Italian plain sent Constantine embassies of congratulation for his victory He moved on to Milan where he was met with open gates and jubilant rejoicing Constantine rested his army in Milan until mid summer 312 when he moved on to Brixia Brescia 151 Brescia s army was easily dispersed 152 and Constantine quickly advanced to Verona where a large Maxentian force was camped 153 Ruricius Pompeianus general of the Veronese forces and Maxentius praetorian prefect 154 was in a strong defensive position since the town was surrounded on three sides by the Adige Constantine sent a small force north of the town in an attempt to cross the river unnoticed Ruricius sent a large detachment to counter Constantine s expeditionary force but was defeated Constantine s forces successfully surrounded the town and laid siege 155 Ruricius gave Constantine the slip and returned with a larger force to oppose Constantine Constantine refused to let up on the siege and sent only a small force to oppose him In the desperately fought encounter that followed Ruricius was killed and his army destroyed 156 Verona surrendered soon afterwards followed by Aquileia 157 Mutina Modena 158 and Ravenna 159 The road to Rome was now wide open to Constantine 160 nbsp The Milvian Bridge Ponte Milvio over the River Tiber north of Rome where Constantine and Maxentius fought in the Battle of the Milvian BridgeMaxentius prepared for the same type of war he had waged against Severus and Galerius he sat in Rome and prepared for a siege 161 He still controlled Rome s Praetorian Guard was well stocked with African grain and was surrounded on all sides by the seemingly impregnable Aurelian Walls He ordered all bridges across the Tiber cut reportedly on the counsel of the gods 162 and left the rest of central Italy undefended Constantine secured that region s support without challenge 163 Constantine progressed slowly 164 along the Via Flaminia 165 allowing the weakness of Maxentius to draw his regime further into turmoil 164 Maxentius support continued to weaken at chariot races on 27 October the crowd openly taunted Maxentius shouting that Constantine was invincible 166 Maxentius no longer certain that he would emerge from a siege victorious built a temporary boat bridge across the Tiber in preparation for a field battle against Constantine 167 On 28 October 312 the sixth anniversary of his reign he approached the keepers of the Sibylline Books for guidance The keepers prophesied that on that very day the enemy of the Romans would die Maxentius advanced north to meet Constantine in battle 168 Constantine adopts the Greek letters Chi Rho for Christ s initials edit See also Chi Rho Main article Battle of the Milvian Bridge Further information Ponte Milvio nbsp Silver medallion of 315 Constantine with a chi rho symbol as the crest of his helmetMaxentius forces were still twice the size of Constantine s and he organised them in long lines facing the battle plain with their backs to the river 169 Constantine s army arrived on the field bearing unfamiliar symbols on their standards and their shields 170 According to Lactantius Constantine was directed in a dream to cause the heavenly sign to be delineated on the shields of his soldiers and so to proceed to battle He did as he had been commanded and he marked on their shields the letter X with a perpendicular line drawn through it and turned round thus at the top being the cipher of Christ Having this sign his troops stood to arms 171 Eusebius describes a vision that Constantine had while marching at midday in which he saw with his own eyes the trophy of a cross of light in the heavens above the sun and bearing the inscription In Hoc Signo Vinces In this sign thou shalt conquer 172 In Eusebius s account Constantine had a dream the following night in which Christ appeared with the same heavenly sign and told him to make an army standard in the form of the labarum 173 Eusebius is vague about when and where these events took place 174 but it enters his narrative before the war begins against Maxentius 175 He describes the sign as Chi X traversed by Rho R to form representing the first two letters of the Greek word XRISTOS Christos 176 177 A medallion was issued at Ticinum in 315 which shows Constantine wearing a helmet emblazoned with the Chi Rho 178 and coins issued at Siscia in 317 318 repeat the image 179 The figure was otherwise rare and is uncommon in imperial iconography and propaganda before the 320s 180 It was not completely unknown however being an abbreviation of the Greek word chreston good having previously appeared on the coins of Ptolemy III Euergetes in the 3rd century BC Following Constantine centuries of Christians invoked the miraculous or the supernatural when justifying or describing their warfare 181 Constantine deployed his own forces along the whole length of Maxentius line He ordered his cavalry to charge and they broke Maxentius cavalry He then sent his infantry against Maxentius infantry pushing many into the Tiber where they were slaughtered and drowned 169 The battle was brief 182 and Maxentius troops were broken before the first charge 183 His horse guards and praetorians initially held their position but they broke under the force of a Constantinian cavalry charge they also broke ranks and fled to the river Maxentius rode with them and attempted to cross the bridge of boats Ponte Milvio but he was pushed into the Tiber and drowned by the mass of his fleeing soldiers 184 In Rome edit nbsp Head of a bronze colossus of Constantine now in the Capitoline Museums 185 Constantine entered Rome on 29 October 312 186 187 and staged a grand adventus in the city which was met with jubilation 188 Maxentius body was fished out of the Tiber and decapitated and his head was paraded through the streets for all to see 189 After the ceremonies the disembodied head was sent to Carthage and Carthage offered no further resistance 190 Unlike his predecessors Constantine neglected to make the trip to the Capitoline Hill and perform customary sacrifices at the Temple of Jupiter 191 However he did visit the Senatorial Curia Julia 192 and he promised to restore its ancestral privileges and give it a secure role in his reformed government there would be no revenge against Maxentius supporters 193 In response the Senate decreed him title of the first name which meant that his name would be listed first in all official documents 194 and they acclaimed him as the greatest augustus 195 He issued decrees returning property that was lost under Maxentius recalling political exiles and releasing Maxentius imprisoned opponents 196 An extensive propaganda campaign followed during which Maxentius image was purged from all public places He was written up as a tyrant and set against an idealized image of Constantine the liberator Eusebius is the best representative of this strand of Constantinian propaganda 197 Maxentius rescripts were declared invalid and the honours that he had granted to leaders of the Senate were also invalidated 198 Constantine also attempted to remove Maxentius influence on Rome s urban landscape All structures built by him were rededicated to Constantine including the Temple of Romulus and the Basilica of Maxentius 199 At the focal point of the basilica a stone statue was erected of Constantine holding the Christian labarum in its hand Its inscription bore the message which the statue illustrated By this sign Constantine had freed Rome from the yoke of the tyrant 200 Constantine also sought to upstage Maxentius achievements For example the Circus Maximus was redeveloped so that its seating capacity was 25 times larger than that of Maxentius racing complex on the Via Appia 201 Maxentius strongest military supporters were neutralized when he disbanded the Praetorian Guard and Imperial Horse Guard 202 The tombstones of the Imperial Horse Guard were ground up and used in a basilica on the Via Labicana 203 and their former base was redeveloped into the Lateran Basilica on 9 November 312 barely two weeks after Constantine captured the city 204 The Legio II Parthica was removed from Albano Laziale 198 and the remainder of Maxentius armies were sent to do frontier duty on the Rhine 205 Wars against Licinius edit nbsp Gold aureus of the Emperor LiciniusIn the following years Constantine gradually consolidated his military superiority over his rivals in the crumbling Tetrarchy In 313 he met Licinius in Milan to secure their alliance by the marriage of Licinius and Constantine s half sister Constantia During this meeting the emperors agreed on the so called Edict of Milan 206 officially granting full tolerance to Christianity and all religions in the empire 207 The document had special benefits for Christians legalizing their religion and granting them restoration for all property seized during Diocletian s persecution It repudiates past methods of religious coercion and used only general terms to refer to the divine sphere Divinity and Supreme Divinity summa divinitas 208 The conference was cut short however when news reached Licinius that his rival Maximinus had crossed the Bosporus and invaded European territory Licinius departed and eventually defeated Maximinus gaining control over the entire eastern half of the Roman Empire Relations between the two remaining emperors deteriorated as Constantine suffered an assassination attempt at the hands of a character that Licinius wanted elevated to the rank of Caesar 209 Licinius for his part had Constantine s statues in Emona destroyed 210 In either 314 or 316 the two augusti fought against one another at the Battle of Cibalae with Constantine being victorious They clashed again at the Battle of Mardia in 317 and agreed to a settlement in which Constantine s sons Crispus and Constantine II and Licinius son Licinianus were made caesars 211 After this arrangement Constantine ruled the dioceses of Pannonia and Macedonia and took residence at Sirmium whence he could wage war on the Goths and Sarmatians in 322 and on the Goths in 323 defeating and killing their leader Rausimod 209 In 320 Licinius allegedly reneged on the religious freedom promised by the Edict of Milan and began to oppress Christians anew 212 generally without bloodshed but resorting to confiscations and sacking of Christian office holders 213 Although this characterization of Licinius as anti Christian is somewhat doubtful the fact is that he seems to have been far less open in his support of Christianity than Constantine Therefore Licinius was prone to see the Church as a force more loyal to Constantine than to the Imperial system in general 214 as the explanation offered by the Church historian Sozomen 215 This dubious arrangement eventually became a challenge to Constantine in the West climaxing in the great civil war of 324 Constantine s Christian eulogists present the war as a battle between Christianity and paganism Licinius aided by Gothic mercenaries represented the past and ancient paganism while Constantine and his Franks marched under the standard of the labarum citation needed Outnumbered but fired by their zeal Constantine s army emerged victorious in the Battle of Adrianople Licinius fled across the Bosphorus and appointed Martinian his magister officiorum as nominal augustus in the West but Constantine next won the Battle of the Hellespont and finally the Battle of Chrysopolis on 18 September 324 216 Licinius and Martinian surrendered to Constantine at Nicomedia on the promise their lives would be spared they were sent to live as private citizens in Thessalonica and Cappadocia respectively but in 325 Constantine accused Licinius of plotting against him and had them both arrested and hanged Licinius son the son of Constantine s half sister was killed in 326 217 Thus Constantine became the sole emperor of the Roman Empire 218 Later rule editFoundation of Constantinople edit Further information New Rome nbsp Coin struck by Constantine I to commemorate the founding of ConstantinopleDiocletian had chosen Nicomedia in the East as his capital during the Tetrarchy 219 not far from Byzantium well situated to defend Thrace Asia and Egypt all of which had required his military attention 220 Constantine had recognized the shift of the empire from the remote and depopulated West to the richer cities of the East and the military strategic importance of protecting the Danube from barbarian excursions and Asia from a hostile Persia in choosing his new capital 221 as well as being able to monitor shipping traffic between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean 222 Licinius defeat came to represent the defeat of a rival centre of pagan and Greek speaking political activity in the East as opposed to the Christian and Latin speaking Rome and it was proposed that a new Eastern capital should represent the integration of the East into the Roman Empire as a whole as a centre of learning prosperity and cultural preservation for the whole of the Eastern Roman Empire 223 Among the various locations proposed for this alternative capital Constantine appears to have toyed earlier with Serdica present day Sofia as he was reported saying that Serdica is my Rome 224 Sirmium and Thessalonica were also considered 225 Eventually however Constantine decided to work on the Greek city of Byzantium which offered the advantage of having already been extensively rebuilt on Roman patterns of urbanism during the preceding century by Septimius Severus and Caracalla who had already acknowledged its strategic importance 226 The city was thus founded in 324 227 dedicated on 11 May 330 227 and renamed Constantinopolis Constantine s City or Constantinople in English Special commemorative coins were issued in 330 to honor the event The new city was protected by the relics of the True Cross the Rod of Moses and other holy relics though a cameo now at the Hermitage Museum also represented Constantine crowned by the tyche of the new city 228 The figures of old gods were either replaced or assimilated into a framework of Christian symbolism Constantine built the new Church of the Holy Apostles on the site of a temple to Aphrodite Generations later there was the story that a divine vision led Constantine to this spot and an angel no one else could see led him on a circuit of the new walls 229 The capital would often be compared to the old Rome as Nova Roma Constantinopolitana the New Rome of Constantinople 218 230 Religious policy edit Main article Religious policies of Constantine the Great Further information Constantinian shift Constantine the Great and Christianity and Constantine the Great and Judaism SaintConstantine the Great nbsp Mosaic in the Hagia Sophia section Maria as patron saint of Constantinople detail donor portrait of Emperor Constantine I with a model of the cityEmperor and Equal to the ApostlesResting placeConstantinopleVenerated inEastern Catholic Church k Eastern Orthodox Church Oriental Orthodoxy Anglican Communion Lutheran ChurchMajor shrineChurch of the Holy Apostles ConstantinopleFeast21 May nbsp Constantine burning books by Arian heretics Heretici Arriani from a 9th century manuscript now in VercelliConstantine was the first emperor to stop the persecution of Christians and to legalize Christianity along with all other religions cults in the Roman Empire In February 313 he met with Licinius in Milan and developed the Edict of Milan which stated that Christians should be allowed to follow their faith without oppression 234 This removed penalties for professing Christianity under which many had been martyred previously and it returned confiscated Church property The edict protected all religions from persecution not only Christianity allowing anyone to worship any deity that they chose A similar edict had been issued in 311 by Galerius senior emperor of the Tetrarchy which granted Christians the right to practise their religion but did not restore any property to them 235 The Edict of Milan included several clauses which stated that all confiscated churches would be returned as well as other provisions for previously persecuted Christians Scholars debate whether Constantine adopted his mother Helena s Christianity in his youth or whether he adopted it gradually over the course of his life 236 nbsp Pope Sylvester I and Emperor ConstantineConstantine possibly retained the title of pontifex maximus which emperors bore as heads of the ancient Roman religion until Gratian renounced the title 237 238 According to Christian writers Constantine was over 40 when he finally declared himself a Christian making it clear that he owed his successes to the protection of the Christian High God alone 239 Despite these declarations of being a Christian he waited to be baptized on his deathbed believing that the baptism would release him of any sins he committed in the course of carrying out his policies while emperor 240 He supported the Church financially built basilicas granted privileges to clergy such as exemption from certain taxes promoted Christians to high office and returned property confiscated during the long period of persecution 241 His most famous building projects include the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and Old St Peter s Basilica In constructing the Old St Peter s Basilica Constantine went to great lengths to erect the basilica on top of St Peter s resting place so much so that it even affected the design of the basilica including the challenge of erecting it on the hill where St Peter rested making its complete construction time over 30 years from the date Constantine ordered it to be built Constantine might not have patronized Christianity alone A triumphal arch was built in 315 to celebrate his victory in the Battle of the Milvian Bridge which was decorated with images of the goddess Victoria and sacrifices were made to pagan gods at its dedication including Apollo Diana and Hercules Absent from the arch are any depictions of Christian symbolism However the arch was commissioned by the Senate so the absence of Christian symbols may reflect the role of the Curia at the time as a pagan redoubt 242 In 321 he legislated that the venerable Sunday should be a day of rest for all citizens 243 In 323 he issued a decree banning Christians from participating in state sacrifices 244 After the pagan gods had disappeared from his coinage Christian symbols appeared as Constantine s attributes the chi rho between his hands or on his labarum 245 as well on the coinage 246 The reign of Constantine established a precedent for the emperor to have great influence and authority in the early Christian councils most notably the dispute over Arianism Constantine disliked the risks to societal stability that religious disputes and controversies brought with them preferring to establish an orthodoxy 247 His influence over the Church councils was to enforce doctrine root out heresy and uphold ecclesiastical unity the Church s role was to determine proper worship doctrines and dogma 248 North African bishops struggled with Christian bishops who had been ordained by Donatus in opposition to Caecilian from 313 to 316 The African bishops could not come to terms and the Donatists asked Constantine to act as a judge in the dispute Three regional Church councils and another trial before Constantine all ruled against Donatus and the Donatism movement in North Africa In 317 Constantine issued an edict to confiscate Donatist church property and to send Donatist clergy into exile 249 More significantly in 325 he summoned the First Council of Nicaea most known for its dealing with Arianism and for instituting the Nicene Creed 250 He enforced the council s prohibition against celebrating the Lord s Supper on the day before the Jewish Passover which marked a definite break of Christianity from the Judaic tradition From then on the solar Julian calendar was given precedence over the lunisolar Hebrew calendar among the Christian churches of the Roman Empire 251 Constantine made some new laws regarding the Jews some of them were unfavourable towards Jews although they were not harsher than those of his predecessors 252 It was made illegal for Jews to seek converts or to attack other Jews who had converted to Christianity 252 They were forbidden to own Christian slaves or to circumcise their slaves 253 254 On the other hand Jewish clergy were given the same exemptions as Christian clergy 252 255 Administrative reforms edit nbsp Hexagonal gold pendant with double solidus of Constantine the Great in the centre AD 321 now in the British MuseumBeginning in the mid 3rd century the emperors began to favour members of the equestrian order over senators who had a monopoly on the most important offices of the state Senators were stripped of the command of legions and most provincial governorships as it was felt that they lacked the specialized military upbringing needed in an age of acute defense needs 256 such posts were given to equestrians by Diocletian and his colleagues following a practice enforced piecemeal by their predecessors The emperors however still needed the talents and the help of the very rich who were relied on to maintain social order and cohesion by means of a web of powerful influence and contacts at all levels Exclusion of the old senatorial aristocracy threatened this arrangement In 326 Constantine reversed this pro equestrian trend raising many administrative positions to senatorial rank and thus opening these offices to the old aristocracy at the same time he elevated the rank of existing equestrian office holders to senator degrading the equestrian order in the process at least as a bureaucratic rank 257 The title of perfectissimus was granted only to mid or low level officials by the end of the 4th century By the new Constantinian arrangement one could become a senator by being elected praetor or by fulfilling a function of senatorial rank 258 From then on holding actual power and social status were melded together into a joint imperial hierarchy Constantine gained the support of the old nobility with this 259 as the Senate was allowed to elect praetors and quaestors in place of the usual practice of the emperors directly creating magistrates adlectio An inscription in honor of city prefect Ceionius Rufus Albinus states that Constantine had restored the Senate the auctoritas it had lost at Caesar s time 260 The Senate as a body remained devoid of any significant power nevertheless the senators had been marginalized as potential holders of imperial functions during the 3rd century but could dispute such positions alongside more upstart bureaucrats 261 Some modern historians see in those administrative reforms an attempt by Constantine at reintegrating the senatorial order into the imperial administrative elite to counter the possibility of alienating pagan senators from a Christianized imperial rule 262 however such an interpretation remains conjectural given the fact that we do not have the precise numbers about pre Constantine conversions to Christianity in the old senatorial milieu Some historians suggest that early conversions among the old aristocracy were more numerous than previously supposed 263 Constantine s reforms had to do only with the civilian administration The military chiefs had risen from the ranks since the Crisis of the Third Century 264 but remained outside the Senate in which they were included only by Constantine s children 265 Monetary reforms edit nbsp A nummus of ConstantineIn the 3rd century the production of fiat money to pay for public expenses resulted in runaway inflation and Diocletian tried unsuccessfully to re establish trustworthy minting of silver coins as well as silver bronze billon coins the term billon meaning an alloy of precious and base metals that is mostly base metal Silver currency was overvalued in terms of its actual metal content and therefore could only circulate at much discounted rates Constantine stopped minting the Diocletianic pure silver argenteus soon after 305 while the billon currency continued to be used until the 360s From the early 300s on Constantine forsook any attempts at restoring the silver currency preferring instead to concentrate on minting large quantities of the gold solidus 72 of which made a pound of gold New and highly debased silver pieces continued to be issued during his later reign and after his death in a continuous process of retariffing until this billon minting ceased in 367 and the silver piece was continued by various denominations of bronze coins the most important being the centenionalis 266 These bronze pieces continued to be devalued assuring the possibility of keeping fiduciary minting alongside a gold standard The author of De Rebus Bellicis held that the rift widened between classes because of this monetary policy the rich benefited from the stability in purchasing power of the gold piece while the poor had to cope with ever degrading bronze pieces 267 Later emperors such as Julian the Apostate insisted on trustworthy mintings of the bronze currency 268 Constantine s monetary policies were closely associated with his religious policies increased minting was associated with the confiscation of all gold silver and bronze statues from pagan temples between 331 and 336 which were declared to be imperial property Two imperial commissioners for each province had the task of getting the statues and melting them for immediate minting with the exception of a number of bronze statues that were used as public monuments in Constantinople 269 Executions of Crispus and Fausta edit nbsp Gold coin of Constantine s eldest son Crispus who was executed by his father nbsp Bust of Constantine s wife Fausta in the Louvre Paris Constantine had his eldest son Crispus seized and put to death by cold poison at Pola Pula Croatia sometime between 15 May and 17 June 326 270 In July he had his wife Empress Fausta stepmother of Crispus killed in an overheated bath 271 Their names were wiped from the face of many inscriptions references to their lives were eradicated from the literary record and their memory was condemned Eusebius for example edited out any praise of Crispus from later copies of Historia Ecclesiastica and his Vita Constantini contains no mention of Fausta or Crispus 272 Few ancient sources are willing to discuss possible motives for the events and the few that do are of later provenance and are generally unreliable 273 At the time of the executions it was commonly believed that Empress Fausta was either in an illicit relationship with Crispus or was spreading rumors to that effect A popular myth arose modified to allude to the Hippolytus Phaedra legend with the suggestion that Constantine killed Crispus and Fausta for their immoralities 274 the largely fictional Passion of Artemius explicitly makes this connection 275 The myth rests on slim evidence as an interpretation of the executions only late and unreliable sources allude to the relationship between Crispus and Fausta and there is no evidence for the modern suggestion that Constantine s godly edicts of 326 and the irregularities of Crispus are somehow connected 274 Although Constantine created his apparent heirs caesars following a pattern established by Diocletian he gave his creations a hereditary character alien to the tetrarchic system Constantine s caesars were to be kept in the hope of ascending to empire and entirely subordinated to their augustus as long as he was alive 276 Adrian Goldsworthy speculates an alternative explanation for the execution of Crispus was Constantine s desire to keep a firm grip on his prospective heirs this and Fausta s desire for having her sons inheriting instead of their half brother being reason enough for killing Crispus the subsequent execution of Fausta however was probably meant as a reminder to her children that Constantine would not hesitate in killing his own relatives when he felt this was necessary 277 Later campaigns edit nbsp The northern and eastern frontiers of the Roman Empire in the time of Constantine with the territories acquired in the course of the thirty years of military campaigns between 306 and 337 nbsp Gold medallion struck at Nicomedia in 336 337 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of his rule Constantine considered Constantinople his capital and permanent residence He lived there for a good portion of his later life In 328 construction was completed on Constantine s Bridge at Sucidava today Celei in Romania 278 in hopes of reconquering Dacia a province that had been abandoned under Aurelian In the late winter of 332 Constantine campaigned with the Sarmatians against the Goths The weather and lack of food reportedly cost the Goths dearly before they submitted to Rome In 334 after Sarmatian commoners had overthrown their leaders Constantine led a campaign against the tribe He won a victory in the war and extended his control over the region as remains of camps and fortifications in the region indicate 279 Constantine resettled some Sarmatian exiles as farmers in Illyrian and Roman districts and conscripted the rest into the army The new frontier in Dacia was along the Brazda lui Novac line supported by new castra 280 Constantine took the title Dacicus maximus in 336 281 In the last years of his life Constantine made plans for a campaign against Persia In a letter written to the king of Persia Shapur Constantine had asserted his patronage over Persia s Christian subjects and urged Shapur to treat them well 282 The letter is undatable In response to border raids Constantine sent Constantius to guard the eastern frontier in 335 In 336 Prince Narseh invaded Armenia a Christian kingdom since 301 and installed a Persian client on the throne Constantine then resolved to campaign against Persia He treated the war as a Christian crusade calling for bishops to accompany the army and commissioning a tent in the shape of a church to follow him everywhere Constantine planned to be baptized in the Jordan River before crossing into Persia Persian diplomats came to Constantinople over the winter of 336 337 seeking peace but Constantine turned them away The campaign was called off however when Constantine became sick in the spring of 337 283 Illness and death edit nbsp The Baptism of Constantine as imagined by students of Raphael nbsp nbsp nbsp Constantine s sons and successors Constantine II Constantius II and Constans From his recent illness Constantine knew death would soon come Within the Church of the Holy Apostles Constantine had secretly prepared a final resting place for himself 284 It came sooner than he had expected Soon after the Feast of Easter 337 Constantine fell seriously ill 285 He left Constantinople for the hot baths near his mother s city of Helenopolis Altinova on the southern shores of the Gulf of Nicomedia present day Gulf of Izmit There in a church his mother built in honor of Lucian the Martyr he prayed and there he realised that he was dying Seeking purification he became a catechumen and attempted a return to Constantinople making it only as far as a suburb of Nicomedia 286 He summoned the bishops and told them of his hope to be baptized in the River Jordan where Christ was written to have been baptized He requested the baptism right away promising to live a more Christian life should he live through his illness The bishops Eusebius records performed the sacred ceremonies according to custom 287 He chose the Arianizing bishop Eusebius of Nicomedia bishop of the city where he lay dying as his baptizer 288 In postponing his baptism he followed one custom at the time which postponed baptism until after infancy 289 It has been thought that Constantine put off baptism as long as he did so as to be absolved from as much of his sin as possible 290 Constantine died soon after at a suburban villa called Achyron on the last day of the fifty day festival of Pentecost directly following Pascha or Easter on 22 May 337 291 Although Constantine s death follows the conclusion of the Persian campaign in Eusebius s account most other sources report his death as occurring in its middle Emperor Julian a nephew of Constantine writing in the mid 350s observes that the Sassanians escaped punishment for their ill deeds because Constantine died in the middle of his preparations for war 292 Similar accounts are given in the Origo Constantini an anonymous document composed while Constantine was still living which has Constantine dying in Nicomedia 293 the Historiae abbreviatae of Sextus Aurelius Victor written in 361 which has Constantine dying at an estate near Nicomedia called Achyrona while marching against the Persians 294 and the Breviarium of Eutropius a handbook compiled in 369 for the Emperor Valens which has Constantine dying in a nameless state villa in Nicomedia 295 From these and other accounts some have concluded that Eusebius s Vita was edited to defend Constantine s reputation against what Eusebius saw as a less congenial version of the campaign 296 Following his death his body was transferred to Constantinople and buried in the Church of the Holy Apostles 297 in a porphyry sarcophagus that was described in the 10th century by Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus in the De Ceremoniis 298 His body survived the plundering of the city during the Fourth Crusade in 1204 but was destroyed at some point afterwards 299 Constantine was succeeded by his three sons born of Fausta Constantine II Constantius II and Constans His sons along with his nephew Dalmatius had already received one division of the empire each to administer as caesars Constantine may have intended his successors to resume a structure akin to Diocletian s Tetrarchy 300 A number of relatives were killed by followers of Constantius notably Constantine s nephews Dalmatius who held the rank of caesar and Hannibalianus presumably to eliminate possible contenders to an already complicated succession He also had two daughters Constantina and Helena wife of Emperor Julian 301 Assessment and legacy editConstantine reunited the empire under one emperor and he won major victories over the Franks and Alamanni in 306 308 the Franks again in 313 314 the Goths in 332 and the Sarmatians in 334 By 336 he had reoccupied most of the long lost province of Dacia which Aurelian had been forced to abandon in 271 At the time of his death he was planning a great expedition to end raids on the eastern provinces from the Persian Empire 302 In the cultural sphere Constantine revived the clean shaven face fashion of earlier emperors originally introduced among the Romans by Scipio Africanus 236 183 BC and changed into the wearing of the beard by Hadrian r 117 138 This new Roman imperial fashion lasted until the reign of Phocas r 602 610 in the 7th century 303 304 The Holy Roman Empire reckoned Constantine among the venerable figures of its tradition In the later Byzantine state it became a great honor for an emperor to be hailed as a new Constantine ten emperors carried the name including the last emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire 305 Charlemagne used monumental Constantinian forms in his court to suggest that he was Constantine s successor and equal Charlemagne Henry VIII Philip II of Spain Godfrey of Bouillon House of Capet House of Habsburg House of Stuart Macedonian dynasty and Phokas family claimed descent from Constantine 306 307 308 309 310 311 312 313 314 Geoffrey of Monmouth embroidered a tale that the legendary king of Britain King Arthur was also a descendant of Constantine 315 Constantine acquired a mythic role as a hero and warrior against heathens His reception as a saint seems to have spread within the Byzantine empire during wars against the Sasanian Persians and the Muslims in the late 6th and 7th century 316 The motif of the Romanesque equestrian the mounted figure in the posture of a triumphant Roman emperor became a visual metaphor in statuary in praise of local benefactors The name Constantine enjoyed renewed popularity in western France in the 11th and 12th centuries 317 The Nis Constantine the Great Airport is named in honor of him A large cross was planned to be built on a hill overlooking Nis but the project was cancelled 318 In 2012 a memorial was erected in Nis in his honor The Commemoration of the Edict of Milan was held in Nis in 2013 319 The Orthodox Church considers Constantine a saint Agios Kwnstantinos Saint Constantine having a feast day on 21 May 320 and calls him isapostolos isapostolos Kwnstantinos an equal of the Apostles 321 Historiography edit nbsp Constantius appoints Constantine as his successor by Peter Paul Rubens 1622During Constantine s lifetime Praxagoras of Athens and Libanius pagan authors showered Constantine with praise presenting him as a paragon of virtue His nephew and son in law Julian the Apostate however wrote the satire Symposium or the Saturnalia in 361 after the last of his sons died it denigrated Constantine calling him inferior to the great pagan emperors and given over to luxury and greed 322 Following Julian Eunapius began and Zosimus continued a historiographic tradition that blamed Constantine for weakening the empire through his indulgence to the Christians 323 During the Middle Ages European and Near East Byzantine writers presented Constantine as an ideal ruler the standard against which any king or emperor could be measured 323 The Renaissance rediscovery of anti Constantinian sources prompted a re evaluation of his career German humanist Johannes Leunclavius discovered Zosimus writings and published a Latin translation in 1576 In its preface he argues that Zosimus picture of Constantine offered a more balanced view than that of Eusebius and the Church historians 324 Cardinal Caesar Baronius criticized Zosimus favouring Eusebius account of the Constantinian era Baronius Life of Constantine 1588 presents Constantine as the model of a Christian prince 325 Edward Gibbon aimed to unite the two extremes of Constantinian scholarship in his work The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire 1776 89 by contrasting the portraits presented by Eusebius and Zosimus 326 He presents a noble war hero who transforms into an Oriental despot in his old age degenerating into a cruel and dissolute monarch 327 Modern interpretations of Constantine s rule begin with Jacob Burckhardt s The Age of Constantine the Great 1853 rev 1880 Burckhardt s Constantine is a scheming secularist a politician who manipulates all parties in a quest to secure his own power 328 Henri Gregoire followed Burckhardt s evaluation of Constantine in the 1930s suggesting that Constantine developed an interest in Christianity only after witnessing its political usefulness Gregoire was skeptical of the authenticity of Eusebius Vita and postulated a pseudo Eusebius to assume responsibility for the vision and conversion narratives of that work 329 Otto Seeck s Geschichte des Untergangs der antiken Welt 1920 23 and Andre Piganiol s L empereur Constantin 1932 go against this historiographic tradition Seeck presents Constantine as a sincere war hero whose ambiguities were the product of his own naive inconsistency 330 Piganiol s Constantine is a philosophical monotheist a child of his era s religious syncretism 331 Related histories by Arnold Hugh Martin Jones Constantine and the Conversion of Europe 1949 and Ramsay MacMullen Constantine 1969 give portraits of a less visionary and more impulsive Constantine 332 These later accounts were more willing to present Constantine as a genuine convert to Christianity Norman H Baynes began a historiographic tradition with Constantine the Great and the Christian Church 1929 which presents Constantine as a committed Christian reinforced by Andreas Alfoldi s The Conversion of Constantine and Pagan Rome 1948 and Timothy Barnes s Constantine and Eusebius 1981 is the culmination of this trend Barnes Constantine experienced a radical conversion which drove him on a personal crusade to convert his empire 333 Charles Matson Odahl s Constantine and the Christian Empire 2004 takes much the same tack 334 In spite of Barnes work arguments continue over the strength and depth of Constantine s religious conversion 335 Certain themes in this school reached new extremes in T G Elliott s The Christianity of Constantine the Great 1996 which presented Constantine as a committed Christian from early childhood 336 Paul Veyne s 2007 work Quand notre monde est devenu chretien holds a similar view which does not speculate on the origin of Constantine s Christian motivation but presents him as a religious revolutionary who fervently believed that he was meant to play a providential role in the millenary economy of the salvation of humanity 337 Donation of Constantine edit Main article Donation of Constantine Latin Christians considered it inappropriate that Constantine was baptized only on his death bed by an unorthodox bishop and a legend emerged by the early 4th century that Pope Sylvester I had cured the pagan emperor from leprosy According to this legend Constantine was baptized and began the construction of a church in the Lateran Basilica 338 339 The Donation of Constantine appeared in the 8th century most likely during the pontificate of Pope Stephen II in which the freshly converted Constantine gives the city of Rome and all the provinces districts and cities of Italy and the Western regions to Sylvester and his successors 340 In the High Middle Ages 341 342 this document was used and accepted as the basis for the pope s temporal power though it was denounced as a forgery by Emperor Otto III 343 and lamented as the root of papal worldliness by Dante Alighieri 344 Philologist and Catholic priest Lorenzo Valla proved in 1440 that the document was indeed a forgery 345 Geoffrey of Monmouth s Historia edit During the medieval period Britons regarded Constantine as a king of their own people particularly associating him with Caernarfon in Gwynedd While some of this is owed to his fame and his proclamation as emperor in Britain there was also confusion of his family with Magnus Maximus s supposed wife Elen and her son another Constantine Welsh Custennin In the 12th century Henry of Huntingdon included a passage in his Historia Anglorum that the Emperor Constantine s mother was a Briton making her the daughter of King Cole of Colchester 346 Geoffrey of Monmouth expanded this story in his highly fictionalized Historia Regum Britanniae an account of the supposed Kings of Britain from their Trojan origins to the Anglo Saxon invasion 347 According to Geoffrey Cole was King of the Britons when Constantius here a senator came to Britain Afraid of the Romans Cole submits to Roman law so long as he retains his kingship However he dies only a month later and Constantius takes the throne himself marrying Cole s daughter Helena They have their son Constantine who succeeds his father as King of Britain before becoming Roman emperor Historically this series of events is extremely improbable Constantius had already left Helena by the time he left for Britain 50 Additionally no earlier source mentions that Helena was born in Britain let alone that she was a princess Henry s source for the story is unknown though it may have been a lost hagiography of Helena 347 Family tree editSee also Constantinian dynasty vteCONSTANTINIAN DYNASTY detailed family treeAfranius HannibalianusEutropiaMaximianWestern emperorTheodoraConstantius I ChlorusWestern emperor250 305 306Helena250 330MaxentiusWestern emperorConstantia293 330 Licinius250 308 324 325Flavius Dalmatiuscensor1 GallaJulius Constantiusd 337 2 BasilinaAnastasiaEutropiaFausta289 326Constantine I the Great272 306 337MinervinaDalmatiuscaesarHannibalianus 1 Constantius Gallus 2 Julian331 360 363Helenad 360Constantina 1 Hannibalianus2 Constantius GallusConstantius II317 337 361 FaustinaConstantine IIWestern emperor316 337 340Constans IWestern emperor320 337 350 daughter JustusCrispusd 326Jovian331 363 364Marina SeveraValentinian IWestern emperorVALENTINIANIC DYNASTYJustinaConstantia361 383GratianWestern emperor359 367 383GallaTheodosius IEastern emperorTHEODOSIAN DYNASTYFamily of Constantine the GreatEmperors are shown with a rounded corner border with their dates as Augusti names with a thicker border appear in both sections1 Constantine s parents and half siblings Claudius Gothicus268 270fabricated ancestryJulia HelenaConstantius I305 306Maximiana TheodoraConstantine I306 337Flavius DalmatiusHannibalianusFlavia Julia ConstantiaLicinius308 324AnastasiaBassianusGallaJulius ConstantiusBasilinaLicinius IIEutropiaVirius NepotianusHannibalianusConstantinaConstantius GallusJulian360 363HelenaNepotianus2 Constantine s children MinervinaConstantine I306 337FaustaCrispusConstantine II337 340Constans337 350HannibalianusConstantinaConstantius GallusFaustinaConstantius II337 361HelenaJulian360 363Gratian367 383ConstantiaSee also edit nbsp Byzantine Empire portal nbsp Saints portalBronze colossus of Constantine Colossus of Constantine Life of Constantine Fifty Bibles of Constantine German and Sarmatian campaigns of Constantine List of people known as the greatNotes edit a b Emperor of the East Emperor of the West a b In the West unrecognized outside Italy Originally emperor of the West became emperor of the East after 313 a b In the East nominal emperor of the West Minervina may have been his concubine ˈ k ɒ n s t en t aɪ n t iː n KON sten tyne teen Latin Flavius Valerius Constantinus Classical Latin koːstanˈtiːnʊs Greek Kwnstantῖnos translit Kōnstantinos With the possible exception of Philip the Arab r 244 249 See Philip the Arab and Christianity 3 Constantine was not baptized until just before his death 4 5 The claim that Constantius descended from Claudius Gothicus and thus also from the Flavian dynasty is most certainly a fabrication 29 30 His family probably adopted the name Flavius after being granted citizenship by one of the Flavian emperors as it was common for new Romans to adopt the names of their benefactors 31 Constantine is not revered as a saint but as the great in the Latin Catholic Church 231 232 Eastern Catholic Churches such as the Ukrainian Catholic Church may revere him as a saint 233 References editCitations edit Birth dates vary but most modern historians use c 272 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 59 Constantine I Biography Accomplishments Death amp Facts Encyclopaedia Britannica Online 25 May 2023 I Shahid Rome and the Arabs Washington D C Dumbarton Oaks 1984 65 93 H A Pohlsander Philip the Arab and Christianity Historia 29 4 1980 463 73 Constantine the Great About com Archived from the original on 5 October 2011 Retrieved 3 March 2017 Harris Jonathan 2017 Constantinople Capital of Byzantium 2nd ed Bloomsbury Academic p 38 ISBN 9781474254670 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius p 272 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC p 14 Cameron p 90 91 Lenski Introduction CC 2 3 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC p 23 25 Cameron 90 91 Southern 169 Cameron 90 Southern 169 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC 14 Corcoran Empire of the Tetrarchs 1 Lenski Introduction CC 2 3 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 265 68 Drake What Eusebius Knew 21 Eusebius Vita Constantini 1 11 Odahl 3 Lenski Introduction CC 5 Storch 145 55 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 265 71 Cameron 90 92 Cameron and Hall 4 6 Elliott Eusebian Frauds in the Vita Constantini 162 71 Lieu and Montserrat 39 Odahl 3 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC 26 Lieu and Montserrat 40 Odahl 3 Lieu and Montserrat 40 Odahl 3 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 12 14 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC 24 Mackay 207 Odahl 9 10 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 225 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC 28 30 Odahl 4 6 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 225 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC 26 29 Odahl 5 6 Odahl 6 10 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC 27 28 Lieu and Montserrat 2 6 Odahl 6 7 Warmington 166 67 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC 24 Odahl 8 Wienand Kaiser als Sieger 26 43 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC 20 21 Johnson Architecture of Empire CC 288 91 Odahl 11 12 Bleckmann Sources for the History of Constantine CC 17 21 Odahl 11 14 Wienand Kaiser als Sieger 43 86 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 3 39 42 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 17 Odahl 15 Pohlsander Constantine I Southern 169 341 Barnes New Empire 39 42 Elliott Constantine s Conversion 425 26 Elliott Eusebian Frauds 163 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 17 Jones 13 14 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 59 Odahl 15 16 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 14 Rodgers 238 239 Wright 495 507 a b Kazhdan 1991 pp 524 525 Jones Martindale amp Morris p 223 Salway Benet 1994 What s in a Name A Survey of Roman Onomastic Practice from c 700 B C to A D 700 PDF Journal of Roman Studies 84 124 145 doi 10 2307 300873 JSTOR 300873 S2CID 162435434 Archived PDF from the original on 11 April 2020 Odahl Charles M 2001 Constantine and the Christian empire London Routledge pp 40 41 ISBN 978 0 415 17485 5 Gabucci Ada 2002 Ancient Rome art architecture and history Los Angeles CA J Paul Getty Museum p 141 ISBN 978 0 89236 656 9 a b Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 3 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 59 60 Odahl 16 17 a b Otto Seeck Constantius 1 in German In Realencyclopadie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft RE Vol IV 1 Stuttgart 1900 col 1013 1026 a b c Conrad Benjamin Constantinus 2 in German In Realencyclopadie der classischen Altertumswissenschaft RE Vol IV 1 Stuttgart 1900 col 1013 1026 Wilson Steven 2003 The Means Of Naming A Social History Routledge p 47 ISBN 9781135368364 fMacMullen Constantine 21 Panegyrici Latini 8 5 9 4 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 8 7 Eusebius Vita Constantini 1 13 3 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 13 290 Drijvers J W Helena Augusta The Mother of Constantine the Great and the Legend of Her finding the True Cross Leiden 1991 9 15 17 Phelan Marilyn E Phelan Jay M 8 June 2021 In His Footsteps The Early Followers of Jesus Wipf and Stock Publishers p 67 ISBN 978 1 6667 0186 9 Constantine s mother Helena was a Greek and a Christian Stanton Andrea L 2012 Cultural Sociology of the Middle East Asia and Africa An Encyclopedia SAGE p 25 ISBN 978 1 4129 8176 7 Constantine s mother Helena was a Greek form Asia Minor and also a devoted Christian who seemed to have influenced his choices Vatikiotis Michael 5 August 2021 Lives Between The Lines A Journey in Search of the Lost Levant Orion p 138 ISBN 978 1 4746 1322 4 Gibbon Edward The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Vol I p 407 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 3 Barnes New Empire 39 40 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 17 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 59 83 Odahl 16 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 14 Tejirian Eleanor H Simon Reeva Spector 2012 Conflict conquest and conversion two thousand years of Christian missions in the Middle East New York Columbia University Press p 15 ISBN 978 0 231 51109 4 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius pp 8 14 Corcoran Before Constantine CC 41 54 Odahl 46 50 Treadgold 14 15 Bowman p 70 Potter 283 Williams 49 65 Potter 283 Williams 49 65 a b Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 3 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 20 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 59 60 Odahl 47 299 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 14 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 7 1 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 13 290 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 3 8 Corcoran Before Constantine CC 40 41 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 20 Odahl 46 47 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 8 9 14 Treadgold 17 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 8 9 Corcoran Before Constantine CC 42 43 54 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 3 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 59 60 Odahl 56 57 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 73 74 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 60 Odahl 72 301 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 47 73 74 Fowden Between Pagans and Christians 175 76 Constantine Oratio ad Sanctorum Coetum 16 2 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 29 30 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 60 Odahl 72 73 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 29 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 61 Odahl 72 74 306 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 15 Contra J Moreau Lactance De la mort des persecuteurs Sources Chretiennes 39 1954 313 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 297 Constantine Oratio ad Sanctorum Coetum 25 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 30 Odahl 73 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 10 6 11 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 21 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 35 36 MacMullen Constantine 24 Odahl 67 Potter 338 Eusebius Vita Constantini 2 49 52 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 21 Odahl 67 73 304 Potter 338 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 22 25 MacMullen Constantine 24 30 Odahl 67 69 Potter 337 MacMullen Constantine 24 25 Oratio ad Sanctorum Coetum 25 Odahl 73 Drake The Impact of Constantine on Christianity CC 126 Elliott Constantine s Conversion 425 26 Drake The Impact of Constantine on Christianity CC 126 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 25 27 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 60 Odahl 69 72 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 15 Potter 341 342 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 19 2 6 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 26 Potter 342 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 60 61 Odahl 72 74 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 15 Origo 4 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 24 3 9 Praxagoras fr 1 2 Aurelius Victor 40 2 3 Epitome de Caesaribus 41 2 Zosimus 2 8 3 Eusebius Vita Constantini 1 21 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 61 MacMullen Constantine 32 Odahl 73 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 61 Odahl 75 76 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 27 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 39 40 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 61 MacMullen Constantine 32 Odahl 77 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 15 16 Potter 344 45 Southern 169 70 341 MacMullen Constantine 32 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 27 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 39 40 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 61 Odahl 77 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 15 16 Potter 344 45 Southern 169 70 341 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 27 298 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 39 Odahl 77 78 309 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 15 16 Mattingly 233 34 Southern 170 341 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 27 28 Jones 59 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 61 62 Odahl 78 79 Jones 59 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 28 29 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 62 Odahl 79 80 Jones 59 MacMullen Constantine 39 Treadgold 28 Gibbon Edward 1737 1794 2018 History of The Decline and Fall of The Roman Empire Otbebookpublishing ISBN 978 3 96272 518 1 OCLC 1059411020 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 28 29 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 62 Odahl 79 80 Rees 160 a b Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 29 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 41 Jones 59 MacMullen Constantine 39 Odahl 79 80 Odahl 79 80 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 29 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 16 17 Odahl 80 81 Odahl 81 MacMullen Constantine 39 Odahl 81 82 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 29 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 41 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 63 MacMullen Constantine 39 40 Odahl 81 83 Odahl 82 83 Odahl 82 83 See also William E Gwatkin Jr Roman Trier The Classical Journal 29 1933 3 12 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 24 9 Barnes Lactantius and Constantine 43 46 Odahl 85 310 11 Odahl 86 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 28 Rodgers 236 Panegyrici Latini 7 6 3 4 Eusebius Vita Constantini 1 22 qtd and tr Odahl 83 Rodgers 238 MacMullen Constantine 40 Qtd in MacMullen Constantine 40 Zosimus 2 9 2 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 62 MacMullen Constantine 39 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 29 Odahl 86 Potter 346 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 30 31 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 41 42 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 62 63 Odahl 86 87 Potter 348 49 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 31 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 64 Odahl 87 88 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 15 16 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 30 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 62 63 Odahl 86 87 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 34 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 63 65 Odahl 89 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 15 16 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 32 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 64 Odahl 89 93 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 32 34 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 42 43 Jones 61 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 65 Odahl 90 91 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 17 Potter 349 50 Treadgold 29 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 33 Jones 61 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 36 37 a b Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 34 35 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 43 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 65 66 Odahl 93 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 17 Potter 352 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 34 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 43 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 68 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 20 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 45 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 68 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 30 1 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 40 41 305 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 68 Potter 352 Panegyrici Latini 6 7 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 35 37 301 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 66 Odahl 94 95 314 15 Potter 352 53 Panegyrici Latini 6 7 1 Qtd in Potter 353 Panegyrici Latini 6 7 21 5 Virgil Ecologues 4 10 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 36 37 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 67 Odahl 95 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 36 37 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 50 53 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 66 67 Odahl 94 95 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 31 35 Eusebius Historia Ecclesiastica 8 16 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 43 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 68 Odahl 95 96 316 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 34 Eusebius Historia Ecclesiastica 8 17 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 304 Jones 66 Eusebius 1965 The History of the Church Penguin Classics p 278 ISBN 0140445358 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 39 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 43 44 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 68 Odahl 95 96 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 45 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 69 Odahl 96 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 39 40 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 44 Odahl 96 Odahl 96 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 38 Odahl 96 Hillner Julia 2017 Constantia half sister of Constantine and wife of Licinius Constantia Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Classics doi 10 1093 acrefore 9780199381135 013 8065 ISBN 978 0 19 938113 5 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 37 Curran 66 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 68 MacMullen Constantine 62 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 37 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 37 39 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 38 39 MacMullen Constantine 62 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 40 Curran 66 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 Elliott Christianity of Constantine 44 45 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 69 Odahl 96 Eusebius Historia Ecclesiastica 8 15 1 2 qtd and tr in MacMullen Constantine 65 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 MacMullen Constantine 71 Panegyrici Latini 12 9 2 5 Curran 67 Curran 67 MacMullen Constantine 70 71 a b Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 Odahl 101 Panegyrici Latini 12 9 5 1 3 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 MacMullen Constantine 71 Odahl 101 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 Jones 70 MacMullen Constantine 71 Odahl 101 02 Panegyrici Latini 12 9 5 6 4 10 21 24 Jones 70 71 MacMullen Constantine 71 Odahl 102 317 18 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 Jones 71 Odahl 102 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 41 42 Odahl 103 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 42 Jones 71 MacMullen Constantine 71 Odahl 103 Jones 71 MacMullen Constantine 71 Odahl 103 Jones 71 Odahl 103 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 42 Jones 71 Odahl 103 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 42 Jones 71 Odahl 103 04 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 42 Jones 71 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 69 MacMullen Constantine 71 Odahl 104 Jones 71 MacMullen Constantine 71 MacMullen Constantine 71 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 42 Curran 67 Jones 71 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 42 Jones 71 Odahl 105 Jones 71 Odahl 104 a b Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 42 MacMullen Constantine 72 Odahl 107 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 42 Curran 67 Jones 71 72 Odahl 107 8 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 42 43 MacMullen Constantine 78 Odahl 108 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 44 8 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 43 Curran 67 Jones 72 Odahl 108 a b Odahl 108 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 43 Digeser 122 Jones 72 Odahl 106 Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 44 4 6 tr J L Creed Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum Oxford Oxford University Press 1984 qtd in Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 71 Eusebius Vita Constantini 1 28 tr Odahl 105 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 43 Drake Impact of Constantine on Christianity CC 113 Odahl 105 Eusebius Vita Constantini 1 27 29 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 43 306 Odahl 105 06 319 20 Drake Impact of Constantine on Christianity CC 113 Cameron and Hall 208 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 306 MacMullen Constantine 73 Odahl 319 Cameron and Hall 206 07 Drake Impact of Constantine on Christianity CC 114 Nicholson 311 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 71 citing Roman Imperial Coinage 7 Ticinum 36 R Ross Holloway Constantine and Rome New Haven Yale University Press 2004 3 citing Kraft Das Silbermedaillon Constantins des Grosses mit dem Christusmonogram auf dem Helm Jahrbuch fur Numismatik und Geldgeschichte 5 6 1954 55 151 78 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 71 Rowley Matthew Hodgson Natasha R eds 2022 Miracles political authority and violence in medieval and early modern history Themes in medieval and early modern history London New York Routledge Taylor amp Francis Group ISBN 978 0 367 76728 0 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 43 Curran 68 MacMullen Constantine 78 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 43 Curran 68 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 70 MacMullen Constantine 78 Odahl 108 Head of the bronze colossus Capitoline Museums Barnes 1981 p 44 MacMullen Constantine 81 Odahl 108 Cameron 93 Curran 71 74 Odahl 110 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 44 Curran 72 Jones 72 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 70 MacMullen Constantine 78 Odahl 108 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 44 45 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 44 MacMullen Constantine 81 Odahl 111 Cf also Curran 72 75 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 45 Curran 72 MacMullen Constantine 81 Odahl 109 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 45 46 Odahl 109 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 46 Odahl 109 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 46 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 44 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 45 47 Cameron 93 Curran 76 77 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 70 a b Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 45 Curran 80 83 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 47 Curran 83 85 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 45 Curran 76 Odahl 109 Curran 101 Krautheimer Corpus Basilicarum Christianarum Romanorum 5 90 cited in Curran 93 96 Odahl 109 The term is a misnomer as the act of Milan was not an edict while the subsequent edicts by Licinius of which the edicts to the provinces of Bythinia and Palestine are recorded by Lactantius and Eusebius respectively were not issued in Milan Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 25 Drake Impact 121 23 a b Carrie amp Rousselle L Empire Romain 229 Byfield Ted ed The Christians Their First Two Thousand Years vol III p 148 The sign in the sky that changed history Archived from the original on 19 January 2016 Retrieved 5 February 2016 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine pp 38 39 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine pp 41 42 Carrie amp Rousselle L Empire Romain pp 229 30 Timothy E Gregory A History of Byzantium Chichester John Wiley amp Sons 2010 ISBN 978 1 4051 8471 7 p 54 Philip Schaff ed Nicene and Post nicene Fathers Second Series New York Cosimo 2007 ISBN 978 1 60206 508 6 p 418 footnote 6 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 42 43 Scarre Chronicle of the Roman Emperors 215 a b MacMullen Constantine Sherrard ed Krieger Byzantium Silver Burdett Company Morristown NJ 1966 p 15 Sinnigen amp Boak A History of Rome to A D 565 6th ed Macmillan Publishing Co Inc New York 1977 pp 409 10 Norwich Byzantium The Early Centuries Penguin Books Middlesex 1988 p 40 Sherrard ed Krieger Byzantium Silver Burdett Company Morristown NJ 1966 p 18 Gilbert Dagron Naissance d une Capitale 24 Petrus Patricius excerpta Vaticana 190 Kwnstantinos eboyleysato prwton en Sardikh metagagein ta dhmosia filwn te thn polin ekeinhn synexws elegen h emh Rwmh Sardikh esti Ramsey MacMullen Constantine Routledge ed 1987 149 Dagron Naissance d une Capitale 15 19 a b Constantinople in The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium Oxford University Press Oxford 1991 p 508 ISBN 0 19 504652 8 Sardonyx cameo depicting constantine the great crowned by Constantinople 4th century AD Archived 16 March 2006 at the Wayback Machine at The Road to Byzantium Luxury Arts of Antiquity The Hermitage Rooms at Somerset House 30 March 2006 3 September 2006 Philostorgius Historia Ecclesiastica 2 9 According to the Reallexikon fur Antike und Christentum vol 164 Stuttgart A Hiersemann 2005 column 442 there is no evidence for the tradition that Constantine officially dubbed the city New Rome Nova Roma or Nea Rhome Commemorative coins that were issued during the 330s already refer to the city as Constantinopolis Michael Grant The Climax of Rome London Weidenfeld and Nicolson 1968 133 It is possible that the emperor called the city Second Rome Deutera Rhome by official decree as reported by the 5th century church historian Socrates of Constantinople Constantine the Great Catholic Encyclopedia New Advent Retrieved 9 January 2022 St Constantine FaithND University of Notre Dame Retrieved 9 January 2022 Saint Constantine the Great Saint Constantine Ukrainian Catholic Church Archived from the original on 25 February 2020 Bowder Diana 1987 The Age of Constantine and Julian Barnes amp Noble Books p 28 ISBN 9780064906012 See Lactantius De Mortibus Persecutorum 34 35 R Gerberding and J H Moran Cruz Medieval Worlds New York Houghton Mifflin Company 2004 p 55 Gratian Encyclopaedia Britannica 2008 Encyclopaedia Britannica Online 3 February 2008 Pontifex Maximus Archived 3 March 2013 at the Wayback Machine Livius org article by Jona Lendering retrieved 21 August 2011 Peter Brown The Rise of Christendom 2nd edition Oxford Blackwell Publishing 2003 p 60 Drake 2000 p 395 R Gerberding and J H Moran Cruz Medieval Worlds New York Houghton Mifflin Company 2004 pp 55 56 Robin Lane Fox apud Jonathan Bardill Constantine Divine Emperor of the Christian Golden Age Cambridge University Press 2011 ISBN 978 0 521 76423 0 p 307 note 27 Codex Justinianeus 3 12 2 Codex Theodosianus 16 2 5 Cf Paul Veyne Quand notre monde est devenu chretien 163 R MacMullen Christianizing The Roman Empire A D 100 400 Yale University Press 1984 p 44 ISBN 0 300 03642 6 Richards Jeffrey The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476 752 London Routledge amp Kegan Paul 1979 14 15 The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476 752 London Routledge amp Kegan Paul 1979 15 Richards Jeffrey The Popes and the Papacy in the Early Middle Ages 476 752 London Routledge amp Kegan Paul 1979 pp 15 16 Frend W H C The Donatist Church A Movement of Protest in Roman North Africa 1952 Oxford pp 156 162 Norwich John Julius 1996 Byzantium First American ed New York pp 54 57 ISBN 0394537785 OCLC 18164817 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint location missing publisher link Church Fathers Life of Constantine Book III Eusebius www newadvent org a b c Cf Adrian Goldsworthy How Rome Fell 187 Stemberger Gunter 1999 Jews and Christians in the Holy Land A amp C Black pp 37 38 ISBN 978 0 567 23050 8 If a Jew has bought and circumcised a Christian slave or one belonging to any other religious community he may under no circumstances keep the circumcised person in slavery rather whoever suffers such a thing shall obtain the privilege of freedom Schafer Peter 2003 The History of the Jews in the Greco Roman World Routledge p 182 ISBN 978 1 134 40317 2 Constantine forbade the circumcision of Christian slaves and declared any slave circumcised despite this prohibition a free man Cameron 107 Christol amp Nony Rome et son Empire 241 As equestrian order refers to people of equestrian census that had an actual position in the state bureaucracy thousands of whom had no state function cf Claude Lepelley Fine delle ordine equestre le tappe delle unificazione dela classe dirigente romana nel IV secolo IN Giardina ed Societa romana e impero tardoantico Bari Laterza 1986 V 1 quoted by Carrie amp Rouselle p 660 Christol amp Nony Rome et son Empire 247 Carrie amp Rousselle L Empire Romain 658 Carrie amp Rousselle L Empire Romain 658 59 Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae archived from the original on 20 July 2012 retrieved 5 February 2016 Carrie amp Rousselle L Empire Romain p 659 Carrie amp Rousselle L Empire Romain 660 Cf Arnhein The Senatorial Aristocracy in the Later Roman Empire quoted by Perry Anderson Passages from Antiquity to Feudalism 101 Carrie amp Rousselle p 657 citing T D Barnes Statistics and the Conversion of the Roman Aristocracy Journal of Roman Studies 85 1995 Cf Paul Veyne L Empire Greco Romain 49 Christol amp Nony Rome et son Empire 247 Walter Scheidel The Monetary Systems of the Han and Roman Empires 174 175 De Rebus Bellicis 2 Sandro Mazzarino according to Christol amp Nony Rome et son Empire 246 Carrie amp Rousselle L Empire Romain 245 246 Guthrie 325 326 Guthrie 326 Woods Death of the Empress 70 72 Guthrie 326 Woods Death of the Empress 72 Encyclopedia of Roman Empire MobileReference com 2008 ISBN 978 1 60501 314 5 Retrieved 5 October 2014 a b Guthrie 326 27 Art Pass 45 Woods Death of the Empress 71 72 Christol amp Nony Rome et son Empire 237 238 Cf Adrian Goldsworthy How Rome Fell 189 amp 191 Madgearu Alexandru 2008 Istoria Militară a Daciei Post Romane 275 376 Cetatea de Scaun ISBN 978 973 8966 70 3 pp 64 126 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 250 Madgearu Alexandru 2008 Istoria Militară a Daciei Post Romane 275 376 Cetatea de Scaun ISBN 978 973 8966 70 3 pp 64 126 Odahl 261 Eusebius VC 4 9ff cited in Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 259 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 258 59 See also Fowden Last Days 146 48 and Wiemer 515 Eusebius Vita Constantini 4 58 60 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 259 Eusebius Vita Constantini 4 61 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 259 Eusebius Vita Constantini 4 62 Eusebius Vita Constantini 4 62 4 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 75 76 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 82 Because he was so old he could not be submerged in water to be baptised and therefore the rules of baptism were changed to what they are today having water placed on the forehead alone In this period infant baptism though practiced usually in circumstances of emergency had not yet become a matter of routine in the west Thomas M Finn Early Christian Baptism and the Catechumenate East and West Syria Collegeville The Liturgical Press Michael Glazier 1992 Philip Rousseau Baptism in Late Antiquity A Guide to the Post Classical World ed G W Bowersock Peter Brown and Oleg Grabar Cambridge MA Belknap Press 1999 Marilena Amerise Il battesimo di Costantino il Grande Eusebius Vita Constantini 4 64 Fowden Last Days of Constantine 147 Lenski Reign of Constantine CC 82 Julian Orations 1 18 b Origo Constantini 35 Sextus Aurelius Victor Historiae abbreviatae XLI 16 Eutropius Breviarium X 8 2 Fowden Last Days of Constantine 148 49 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 75 76 A A Vasiliev 1848 Imperial Porphyry Sarcophagi in Constantinople PDF Dumbarton Oaks Papers 4 1 3 26 doi 10 2307 1291047 JSTOR 1291047 Archived PDF from the original on 31 December 2019 Majeska George P 1984 Russian Travelers to Constantinople in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries Dumbarton Oaks ISBN 978 0 88402 101 8 Retrieved 15 April 2017 via Google Knihy Edward J Watts 2020 The Final Pagan Generation Rome s Unexpected Path to Christianity University of California Press p 83 ISBN 9780520379220 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 71 figure 9 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 72 Byzantine first amp last times Byzantium xronikon com Retrieved 7 November 2012 Barba NumisWiki The Collaborative Numismatics Project Forumancientcoins com Retrieved 7 November 2012 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 91 Jane E Everson 2001 The Italian Romance Epic in the Age of Humanism The Matter of Italy and the World of Rome Oxford University Press p 34 ISBN 978 0 19 816015 1 Stewart James Mottram 2008 Empire and Nation in Early English Renaissance Literature Boydell amp Brewer Ltd p 17 ISBN 978 1843841821 Richard L Kagan 2009 Clio and the Crown The Politics of History in Medieval and Early Modern Spain JHU Press p 135 ISBN 978 1421401652 Paul Magdalino 2003 Byzantinum in the Year 1000 Brill p 187 ISBN 9004120971 Theofili Kampianaki 2022 John Zonaras Epitome of Histories A Compendium of Jewish Roman History and Its Reception Oxford University Press p 91 ISBN 978 0 19 268858 3 Tristan Marshall 18 November 2000 Theatre and Empire Great Britain on the London Stages under James VI and I Manchester University Press pp 36 7 ISBN 978 0 7190 5748 9 Retrieved 14 December 2012 An Empire of Memory The Legend of Charlemagne the Franks and Jerusalem before the First Crusade Oxford University Press 2011 p 22 ISBN 978 0 19 161640 2 Mandell Creighton Justin Winsor Samuel Rawson Gardiner Reginald Lane Poole Sir John Goronwy Edwards 1887 The English Historical Review Volume 2 Oxford University Press p 670 Anthony Bale 2019 The Cambridge Companion to the Literature of the Crusades Cambridge University Press p 204 ISBN 9781108474511 Mulligan pp 262 264 Fourlas 2020 Seidel 237 239 Nis Vinik osta pusto brdo NOVOSTI Edict of Milan celebration to begin in Nis 17 January 2013 Pohlsander Emperor Constantine 92 93 Lieu Constantine in Legendary Literature CC 305 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 272 223 a b Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 273 Johannes Leunclavius Apologia pro Zosimo adversus Evagrii Nicephori Callisti et aliorum acerbas criminationes Defence of Zosimus against the Unjustified Charges of Evagrius Nicephorus Callistus and Others Basel 1576 cited in Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 273 and Odahl 282 Caesar Baronius Annales Ecclesiastici 3 Antwerp 1623 cited in Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 274 and Odahl 282 Edward Gibbon The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Chapter 18 cited in Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 274 and Odahl 282 See also Lenski Introduction CC 6 7 Gibbon Decline and Fall 1 256 David P Jordan Gibbon s Age of Constantine and the Fall of Rome History and Theory 8 1 1969 71 96 Jacob Burckhardt Die Zeit Constantins des Grossen Basel 1853 revised edition Leipzig 1880 cited in Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 274 Lenski Introduction CC 7 Lenski Introduction CC 7 Lenski Introduction CC 7 8 Barnes Constantine and Eusebius 274 Lenski Introduction CC 8 Lenski Introduction CC 8 9 Odahl 283 Odahl 283 Mark Humphries Constantine review of Constantine and the Christian Empire by Charles Odahl Classical Quarterly 56 2 2006 449 Averil Cameron Introduction in Constantine History Historiography and Legend ed Samuel N C Lieu and Dominic Montserrat New York Routledge 1998 3 Lenski Introduction CC 10 Quand notre monde est devenu chretien Fabian E Udoh review Theological Studies June 2008 Canella Tessa Gli Actus Silvestri fra Oriente e Occidente Storia e diffusione di una leggenda Costantiniana Academia pp 243 244 Retrieved 10 May 2021 Lieu Constantine in Legendary Literature CC 298 301 Constitutum Constantini 17 qtd in Lieu Constantine in Legendary Literature CC 301 303 Gregory A History of Byzantium 49 Van Dam Remembering Constantine at the Milvian Bridge 30 Henry Charles Lea The Donation of Constantine The English Historical Review 10 37 1895 86 87 Inferno 19 115 Paradisio 20 55 cf De Monarchia 3 10 Fubini 79 86 Lenski Introduction CC 6 Henry of Huntingdon Historia Anglorum Book I ch 37 a b Greenway Diana Ed Henry of Huntingdon 1996 Historia Anglorum The History of the English People Oxford University Press p civ ISBN 978 0 19 822224 8 Sources edit Ancient sources edit Athanasius of Alexandria Apologia contra Arianos Defence against the Arians c 349 Atkinson M and Archibald Robertson trans Apologia Contra Arianos From Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol 4 Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1892 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 14 August 2009 Athanasius of Alexandria Epistola de Decretis Nicaenae Synodi Letter on the Decrees of the Council of Nicaea c 352 Newman John Henry trans De Decretis From Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol 4 Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1892 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 28 September 2009 Athanasius of Alexandria Historia Arianorum History of the Arians c 357 Atkinson M and Archibald Robertson trans Historia Arianorum From Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol 4 Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1892 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 14 August 2009 Sextus Aurelius Victor Liber de Caesaribus Book on the Caesars c 361 Codex Theodosianus Theodosian Code 439 Mommsen T and Paul M Meyer eds Theodosiani libri XVI cum Constitutionibus Sirmondianis et Leges novellae ad Theodosianum pertinentes2 in Latin Berlin Weidmann 1905 1954 Compiled by Nicholas Palmer revised by Tony Honore for Oxford Text Archive 1984 Prepared for online use by R W B Salway 1999 Preface books 1 8 Online at University College London and the University of Grenoble Retrieved 25 August 2009 Unknown edition in Latin Online at AncientRome ru Retrieved 15 August 2009 Codex Justinianeus Justinianic Code or Code of Justinian Scott Samuel P trans The Code of Justinian in The Civil Law 17 vols 1932 Online at the Constitution Society Retrieved 14 August 2009 Krueger Paul ed 1954 Codex Justinianus in Latin Berlin Archived from the original on 31 August 2012 Retrieved 28 September 2009 via University of Grenoble a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint location missing publisher link Epitome de Caesaribus Epitome on the Caesars c 395 Banchich Thomas M trans A Booklet About the Style of Life and the Manners of the Imperatores Canisius College Translated Texts 1 Buffalo NY Canisius College 2009 Online at De Imperatoribus Romanis Retrieved 15 August 2009 De Rebus Bellicis On Military Matters fourth fifth century Eunapius History from Dexippus first edition c 390 second edition c 415 Fragmentary Eusebius of Caesarea Historia Ecclesiastica Church History first seven books c 300 eighth and ninth book c 313 tenth book c 315 epilogue c 325 Williamson G A trans Church History London Penguin 1989 ISBN 0 14 044535 8 McGiffert Arthur Cushman trans Church History From Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol 1 Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1890 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 28 September 2009 Oratio de Laudibus Constantini Oration in Praise of Constantine sometimes the Tricennial Oration 336 Richardson Ernest Cushing trans Oration in Praise of Constantine From Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol 1 Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1890 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 16 August 2009 Vita Constantini The Life of the Blessed Emperor Constantine c 336 339 Richardson Ernest Cushing trans Life of Constantine From Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol 1 Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1890 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 9 June 2009 Life of the Blessed Emperor Constantine 2009 Reprint of Bagster edition 1845 Evolution Publishing ISBN 978 1 889758 93 0 Cameron Averil and Stuart Hall trans Life of Constantine 1999 Oxford University Press ISBN 0 19 814924 7 Eutropius Breviarium ab Urbe Condita Abbreviated History from the City s Founding c 369 Watson John Henry trans Justin Cornelius Nepos and Eutropius London George Bell amp Sons 1886 Online at Tertullian Retrieved 28 September 2009 Rufus Festus Breviarium Festi The Abbreviated History of Festus c 370 Banchich Thomas M and Jennifer A Meka trans Breviarium of the Accomplishments of the Roman People Canisius College Translated Texts 2 Buffalo NY Canisius College 2001 Online at De Imperatoribus Romanis Retrieved 15 August 2009 Jerome Chronicon Chronicle c 380 Pearse Roger et al trans The Chronicle of St Jerome in Early Church Fathers Additional Texts Tertullian 2005 Online at Tertullian Retrieved 14 August 2009 Jordanes De origine actibusque Getarum Getica The Origin and Deeds of the Goths c 551 Mierow Charles C trans The Origins and Deeds of the Goths Princeton Princeton University Press 1915 Online at the University of Calgary Retrieved 28 September 2009 The Gothic History of Jordanes 2006 Reprint of 1915 edition Evolution Publishing ISBN 978 1 889758 77 0 The Christian Roman Empire series Lactantius De mortibus persecutorum On the Deaths of the Persecutors c 313 315 Fletcher William trans Of the Manner in Which the Persecutors Died From Ante Nicene Fathers Vol 7 Edited by Alexander Roberts James Donaldson and A Cleveland Coxe Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1886 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 9 June 2009 Libanius Orationes Orations c 362 365 Optatus Libri VII de Schismate Donatistarum Seven Books on the Schism of the Donatists first edition c 365 367 second edition c 385 Vassall Phillips O R trans The Work of St Optatus Against the Donatists London Longmans Green amp Co 1917 Transcribed at tertullian org by Roger Pearse 2006 Online at Tertullian Retrieved 9 June 2009 Edwards Mark ed 1997 Optatus Against the Donatists doi 10 3828 978 0 85323 752 5 ISBN 978 0 85323 752 5 Origo Constantini Imperiatoris The Lineage of the Emperor Constantine c 340 390 Rolfe J C trans Excerpta Valesiana in vol 3 of Rolfe s translation of Ammianus Marcellinus History Loeb ed London Heinemann 1952 Online at LacusCurtius Retrieved 16 August 2009 Orosius Historiarum Adversum Paganos Libri VII Seven Books of History Against the Pagans c 417 XII Panegyrici Latini Twelve Latin Panegyircs relevant panegyrics dated 289 291 297 298 307 310 311 313 and 321 Philostorgius Historia Ecclesiastica Church History c 433 Walford Edward trans Epitome of the Ecclesiastical History of Philostorgius Compiled by Photius Patriarch of Constantinople London Henry G Bohn 1855 Online at Tertullian Retrieved 15 August 2009 Praxagoras of Athens Historia History of Constantine the Great c 337 Fragmentary Socrates of Constantinople Scholasticus Historia Ecclesiastica Church History c 443 Zenos A C trans Ecclesiastical History From Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol 2 Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1890 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 14 August 2009 Sozomen Historia Ecclesiastica Church History c 445 Hartranft Chester D Ecclesiastical History From Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol 2 Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1890 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 15 August 2009 Theodoret Historia Ecclesiastica Church History c 448 Jackson Blomfield trans Ecclesiastical History From Nicene and Post Nicene Fathers Second Series Vol 3 Edited by Philip Schaff and Henry Wace Buffalo NY Christian Literature Publishing Co 1892 Revised and edited for New Advent by Kevin Knight Online at New Advent Retrieved 15 August 2009 Zosimus Historia Nova New History c 500 Unknown trans The History of Count Zosimus London Green and Champlin 1814 Online at Tertullian Retrieved 15 August 2009 Modern sources edit Alfoldi Andrew The Conversion of Constantine and Pagan Rome Translated by Harold Mattingly Oxford Clarendon Press 1948 Anderson Perry 2013 1974 Passages from Antiquity to Feudalism Verso Books ISBN 9781781680087 Armstrong Gregory T 1964 Church and State Relations The Changes Wrought by Constantine Journal of the American Academy of Religion XXXII 1 7 doi 10 1093 jaarel XXXII 1 1 Armstrong Gregory T 1974 Constantine s Churches Symbol and Structure Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 33 1 5 16 doi 10 2307 988835 JSTOR 988835 Barnes T D 1973 Lactantius and Constantine Journal of Roman Studies 63 29 46 doi 10 2307 299163 JSTOR 299163 S2CID 163051414 Barnes Timothy D 1981 Constantine and Eusebius Cambridge MA Harvard University Press ISBN 978 0 674 16531 1 Barnes Timothy D 1982 The New Empire of Diocletian and Constantine doi 10 4159 harvard 9780674280670 ISBN 9780674280670 S2CID 162343436 Barnes T D 1985 Constantine and the Christians of Persia Journal of Roman Studies 75 126 136 doi 10 2307 300656 JSTOR 300656 S2CID 162744718 Barnes Timothy 2011 Constantine Dynasty Religion and Power in the Later Roman Empire Oxford Wiley Blackwell ISBN 978 1 405 11727 2 Bowman Alan K 2005 Diocletian and the first tetrarchy a d 284 305 The Cambridge Ancient History pp 67 89 doi 10 1017 CHOL9780521301992 004 ISBN 9781139053921 Cameron Averil 2005 The Reign of Constantine a d 306 337 The Cambridge Ancient History pp 90 109 doi 10 1017 CHOL9780521301992 005 ISBN 9781139053921 Carrie Jean Michel Rouselle Aline 1999 L Empire Romain en mutation des Severes a Constantin 192 337 Paris Seuil ISBN 2 02 025819 6 Christol Michel Nony D 2003 Rome et son Empire Paris Hachette ISBN 2 02 025819 6 Corcoran Simon 1996 The Empire of the Tetrarchs Imperial Pronouncements and Government AD 284 324 Oxford Clarendon Press ISBN 0 19 815304 X Curran John 2000 Pagan City and Christian Capital Hardcover ed Oxford Clarendon Press ISBN 0 19 815278 7 Paperback ISBN 0 19 925420 6 Dagron Gilbert 1984 Naissance d une Capitale Constantinople et ses institutions de 330 a 451 Paris Presses Universitaires de France ISBN 2 13 038902 3 Digeser Elizabeth DePalma 2000 The Making of A Christian Empire Lactantius and Rome London Cornell University Press ISBN 0 8014 3594 3 Downey Glanville 1957 Education in the Christian Roman Empire Christian and Pagan Theories under Constantine and His Successors Speculum 32 1 48 61 doi 10 2307 2849245 JSTOR 2849245 S2CID 161904593 Drake H A 1988 What Eusebius Knew The Genesis of the Vita Constantini Classical Philology 83 20 38 doi 10 1086 367077 S2CID 162370910 Drake H A 1995 Constantine and Consensus Church History 64 1 1 15 doi 10 2307 3168653 JSTOR 3168653 S2CID 163129848 Drake H A 1996 Lambs into Lions Explaining Early Christian Intolerance Past amp Present 153 3 36 doi 10 1093 past 153 1 3 Drake H A 2000 Constantine and the Bishops The Politics of Intolerance Baltimore Johns Hopkins University Press ISBN 0 8018 6218 3 Elliott T G 1987 Constantine s Conversion Do We Really Need It Phoenix 41 4 420 438 doi 10 2307 1088714 JSTOR 1088714 Elliott T G 1991 Eusebian Frauds in the Vita Constantini Phoenix 45 2 162 171 doi 10 2307 1088553 JSTOR 1088553 Elliott T G 1996 The Christianity of Constantine the Great Scranton PA University of Scranton Press ISBN 0 940866 59 5 Fowden Garth 1988 Between Pagans and Christians Journal of Roman Studies 78 173 182 doi 10 2307 301456 JSTOR 301456 S2CID 163374397 Fowden Garth 1994 The Last Days of Constantine Oppositional Versions and their Influence Journal of Roman Studies 84 146 170 doi 10 2307 300874 JSTOR 300874 S2CID 161959828 Fubini Riccardo 1996 Humanism and Truth Valla Writes Against the Donation of Constantine Journal of the History of Ideas 57 79 86 doi 10 1353 jhi 1996 0004 S2CID 170927536 Gibbon Edward 1952 1789 Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc in 2 volumes Goldsworthy Adrian 2009 How Rome Fell Yale University Press ISBN 978 0 300 13719 4 Grant Robert M 1975 Religion and Politics at the Council at Nicaea The Journal of Religion 55 1 12 doi 10 1086 486406 S2CID 170410226 Guthrie Patrick 1966 The Execution of Crispus Phoenix 20 4 325 331 doi 10 2307 1087057 JSTOR 1087057 Helgeland John 1974 Christians and the Roman Army A D 173 337 Church History 43 2 149 163 doi 10 2307 3163949 JSTOR 3163949 S2CID 162376477 Jones A H M J R Martindale amp J Morris 1971 Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire Vol 1 Cambridge University Press ISBN 0 521 07233 6 Jones A H M 1978 1948 Constantine and the Conversion of Europe Buffalo University of Toronto Press Jordan David P 1969 Gibbon s Age of Constantine and the Fall of Rome History and Theory 8 1 71 96 doi 10 2307 2504190 JSTOR 2504190 Kazhdan Alexander P ed 1991 Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium Oxford University Press ISBN 978 0 19 504652 6 Jones A H M 1978 1948 Constantine and the Conversion of Europe Buffalo University of Toronto Press ISBN 9780802063694 Lenski Noel 2006 The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Constantine New York Cambridge University Press ISBN 9780521521574 Lieu Samuel N C Montserrat Dominic 1996 From Constantine to Julian Pagan and Byzantine Views A Source History New York Routledge ISBN 9780415093354 MacKay Christopher S 1999 Lactantius and the Succession to Diocletian Classical Philology 94 2 198 209 doi 10 1086 449431 S2CID 161141658 MacMullen Ramsay 1969 Constantine New York Dial Press ISBN 0 7099 4685 6 Mattingly David An Imperial Possession Britain in the Roman Empire London Penguin 2007 ISBN 978 0 14 014822 0 McLay Denis 2015 An Examination of the Role of Ossius Bishop of Cordoba in the Arian Controversy Nicholson Oliver 2000 Constantine s Vision of the Ecross Vigiliae Christianae 54 3 309 323 doi 10 1163 157007200X00189 Odahl Charles Matson Constantine and the Christian Empire New York Routledge 2004 Hardcover ISBN 0 415 17485 6 Paperback ISBN 0 415 38655 1 Pears Edwin 1909 The Campaign against Paganism A D 824 The English Historical Review XXIV XCIII 1 17 doi 10 1093 ehr XXIV XCIII 1 Vaudour Catherine 1984 La ceramique normande Etudes Normandes 33 2 79 106 doi 10 3406 etnor 1984 2597 Pohlsander Hans 2004a The Emperor Constantine London amp New York Routledge ISBN 0 415 31937 4 Paperback ISBN 0 415 31938 2 Pohlsander Hans Constantine I 306 337 A D De Imperatoribus Romanis 2004b Retrieved 16 December 2007 Potter David S 2004 The Roman Empire at Bay AD 180 395 Hardcover ed New York Routledge ISBN 0 415 10057 7 Paperback ISBN 0 415 10058 5 Rees Roger 2002 Layers of Loyalty in Latin Panegyric doi 10 1093 acprof oso 9780199249183 001 0001 ISBN 9780199249183 Rodgers Barbara Saylor 1989 The Metamorphosis of Constantine The Classical Quarterly 39 233 246 doi 10 1017 S0009838800040611 S2CID 170720156 Scheidel Walter The Monetary Systems of the Han and Roman Empires In Scheidel ed Rome and China Comparative Perspectives on Ancient World Empires Oxford Oxford University Press 2010 ISBN 978 0 19 975835 7 Seidel Linda 1976 Constantine and Charlemagne Gesta 15 1 2 237 239 doi 10 2307 766771 JSTOR 766771 S2CID 193434433 Southern Pat 2001 The Roman Empire from Severus to Constantine New York Routledge ISBN 0 415 23944 3 Storch Rudolph H 1971 The Eusebian Constantine Church History 40 2 145 155 doi 10 2307 3162367 JSTOR 3162367 S2CID 162937055 Treadgold Warren 1997 A History of the Byzantine State and Society Stanford Stanford University Press ISBN 978 0 8047 2630 6 Udoh Fabian E Quand notre monde est devenu chretien review Theological Studies June 2008 Veyne Paul L Empire Greco Romain Paris Seuil 2005 ISBN 2 02 057798 4 Veyne Paul Quand notre monde est devenu chretien Paris Albin Michel 2007 ISBN 978 2 226 17609 7 Warmington Brian Some Constantinian References in Ammianus In The Late Roman World and its Historian Interpreting Ammianus Marcellinus edited by Jan Willem Drijvers and David Hunt 166 177 London Routledge 1999 ISBN 0 415 20271 X Weiss Peter 2003 The vision of Constantine Journal of Roman Archaeology 16 237 259 doi 10 1017 S1047759400013088 S2CID 162396067 Wiemer Hans Ulrich 1994 Libanius on Constantine The Classical Quarterly 44 2 511 524 doi 10 1017 S0009838800043962 S2CID 170876695 Wienand Johannes 2012 Der Kaiser als Sieger doi 10 1524 9783050059044 ISBN 9783050059044 Wienand Johannes ed Contested Monarchy Integrating the Roman Empire in the Fourth Century AD Oxford Oxford University Press 2015 Williams Stephen 1997 Diocletian and the Roman Recovery New York Routledge ISBN 0 415 91827 8 Woods David 1998 On the Death of the Empress Fausta Greece and Rome 45 70 86 doi 10 1093 gr 45 1 70 Woods D 1997 Where Did Constantine I Die The Journal of Theological Studies 48 2 531 535 doi 10 1093 jts 48 2 531 Wright David H 1987 The True Face of Constantine the Great Dumbarton Oaks Papers 41 493 507 doi 10 2307 1291584 JSTOR 1291584 Further reading editArjava Antii Women and Law in Late Antiquity Oxford Oxford University Press 1996 ISBN 0 19 815233 7 Baynes Norman H 1930 Constantine the Great and the Christian Church London Milford Burckhardt Jacob 1949 The Age of Constantine the Great London Routledge Cameron Averil 1993 The later Roman empire AD 284 430 London Fontana Press ISBN 978 0 00 686172 0 Cowan Ross 2016 Milvian Bridge AD 312 Constantine s Battle for Empire and Faith Oxford Osprey Publishing Eadie John W ed 1971 The conversion of Constantine New York Holt Rinehart and Winston ISBN 978 0 03 083645 9 Fourlas Benjamin 2020 St Constantine and the Army of Heroic Men Raised by Tiberius II Constantine in 574 575 Some Thoughts on the Historical Significance of the Early Byzantine Silver Hoard at Karlsruhe Jahrbuch des Romisch Germanischen Zentralmuseums 62 2015 published 2020 341 375 doi 10 11588 jrgzm 2015 1 77142 Harries Jill Law and Empire in Late Antiquity Cambridge UK Cambridge University Press 2004 Hardcover ISBN 0 521 41087 8 Paperback ISBN 0 521 42273 6 Hartley Elizabeth Constantine the Great York s Roman Emperor York Lund Humphries 2004 ISBN 978 0 85331 928 3 Heather Peter J Foedera and Foederati of the Fourth Century In From Roman Provinces to Medieval Kingdoms edited by Thomas F X Noble 292 308 New York Routledge 2006 Hardcover ISBN 0 415 32741 5 Paperback ISBN 0 415 32742 3 Leithart Peter J Defending Constantine The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom Downers Grove IL InterVarsity Press 2010 MacMullen Ramsay Christianizing the Roman Empire A D 100 400 New Haven CT London Yale University Press 1984 ISBN 978 0 300 03642 8 MacMullen Ramsay Christianity and Paganism in the Fourth to Eighth Centuries New Haven Yale University Press 1997 ISBN 0 300 07148 5 Percival J On the Question of Constantine s Conversion to Christianity Archived 14 June 2015 at the Wayback Machine Clio History Journal 2008 Pelikan Jaroslav 1987 The excellent empire the fall of Rome and the triumph of the church San Francisco Harper amp Row ISBN 978 0 06 254636 4 Velikov Yuliyan 2013 Imperator et Sacerdos Veliko Turnovo University Press ISBN 978 954 524 932 7 in Bulgarian External links edit nbsp Wikimedia Commons has media related to Constantine I nbsp Wikiquote has quotations related to Constantine the Great Complete chronological list of Constantine s extant writings archived 19 February 2013 Firth John B Constantine the Great the Reorganisation of the Empire and the Triumph of the Church Archived from the original BTM on 15 March 2012 Retrieved 19 February 2016 Letters of Constantine Book 1 Book 2 amp Book 3 Encyclopaedia Britannica Constantine I Henry Stuart Jones 1911 Constantine emperors In Chisholm Hugh ed Encyclopaedia Britannica 6 11th ed Cambridge University Press pp 988 992 Charles George Herbermann and Georg Grupp 1908 Constantine the Great In Catholic Encyclopedia 4 New York Robert Appleton Company BBC North Yorkshire s site on Constantine the Great Constantine s time in York on the History of York Commemorations Roman Legionary AD 284 337 The Age of Diocletian and Constantine the Great Milvian Bridge AD 312 Constantine s Battle for Empire and Faith Constantine the GreatConstantinian dynastyBorn 27 February 272 Died 22 May 337Regnal titlesPreceded byConstantius Chlorus Roman emperor306 337 With Galerius Severus II Maxentius Maximian Licinius Maximinus II Valerius Valens amp Martinian Succeeded byConstantine IIConstantius IIConstansPolitical officesPreceded byConstantius ChlorusGalerius Roman consul307with Maximian Succeeded byDiocletianGaleriusPreceded byGaleriusMaximinus Roman consul II III312 313with Licinius Maximinus Succeeded byC Ceionius Rufius VolusianusPetronius AnnianusPreceded byC Ceionius Rufius VolusianusPetronius Annianus Roman consul IV315with Licinius Succeeded byAntonius Caecina SabinusVettius RufinusPreceded byLiciniusCrispus Roman consul V VI319 320with Licinius II Constantine II Succeeded byCrispusConstantine IIPreceded bySex Anicius PaulinusJulius Julianus Roman consul VII326with Constantius II Succeeded byFlavius ConstantiusValerius MaximusPreceded byJanuarinusVettius Iustus Roman consul VIII329with Constantine II Succeeded byGallicanusAurelius Valerius Symmachus TullianusLegendary titlesPreceded byConstantius Chlorus King of Britain Succeeded byOctavius Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Constantine the Great amp oldid 1185264996, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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