2.20 Diocletian

This period of crisis ended with the ascension of the emperor Diocletian in 284 CE. He not only managed to survive for twenty years after taking the throne, he also reorganized the Empire and pulled it back from the brink. When Diocletian became emperor in the late Third Century, he realized that the empire had simply grown too big geographically to be controlled by one person located in one place. In 293 CE, he undertook radical reforms and officially divided the empire into two—the Eastern Roman Empire and the Western Roman Empire. He had a grand vision of an “augustus” in each empire working together for the good of the whole. Under each emperor would be a “caesar” or king. The idea was that this would control not only the government, but the military officially and protect the empire from the chaos of the previous century and the threat from outsiders. Then, about ten years after he took the throne, Diocletian decided to further divide responsibility and each emperor took on junior emperor. This created the Tetrarchy, the rule of four.

Diocletian further subdivided the Empire, so that for the rest of his reign, the four co-emperors (two “augusti” and two “caesars”) worked together to administer the entire territory. Diocletian himself resided in the East and thus Rome lost its prominence as the center of the empire. After Diocletian resigned in 305 CE, the civil war he tried to prevent came to pass.

A general stationed in Britain named Constantine, son of the Tetrarch Constantius, launched a military campaign to reunite the Empire under his sole rule. Ultimately, Constantine would “win” the civil war and peace will be established until his death. The eastern and western halves of the Empire still had separate administrations and he kept up the size and organization of the army. He also took a decisive step toward stabilizing the economy by issuing new currency based on a fixed gold standard. The new coin, the solidus, was to be the standard international currency of the western world for 800 years.

Constantine’s greatest historical impact, however, was in the realm of religion. He was the first Christian emperor, something that had an enormous effect on the history of Europe and, ultimately, the world. Before his climactic battle in 312 CE to defeat his last rival to the imperial throne, Constantine had a vision that he claimed was sent by the Christian God, promising him victory if he converted to Christianity. There are plenty of theories about a more cynical explanation for his conversion (most revolving around the fact that Constantine went on to plunder the temples of the old Roman gods), but regardless of the fact that he used his conversion to help himself to the wealth of “pagan” temples, he actively supported Christian institutions and empowered Christian officials. Ultimately, his sponsorship of Christianity saw it expand dramatically in his lifetime.

In 324 CE, Constantine founded a new capital city for the entire empire at the site of the ancient Greek town of Byzantium, at the intersection of Europe and Anatolia (he named it Constantinople, which is Istanbul today). It was at the juncture of the eastern and western halves of the Empire, with all trade routes between Asia and Europe passing through its area of influence. It became the heart of wealth and power in the Empire and a Christian “new beginning” for Roman civilization itself. The city grew to become one of the great cities of late antiquity and the Middle Ages; it was fed by grain from Egypt and brought in an enormous wealth through trade. Subsequent emperors also built up massive fortifications, walls so strong that it took 1,000 years for an enemy to be able to breach them (namely the Ottoman Turks, who finally conquered the city in 1453 CE).

Unfortunately, upon Constantine’s demise, his sons resumed the civil war, this time one against the other. During this violent period, they roughly divided the empire on a north-south line that ran through the Balkans. In 395 CE, Emperor Theodosius made this line official and the Eastern and Western Empires were created. The Eastern Empire’s capital city became Constantinople. The Western Empire’s capital city was located at Ravenna along the northeastern coast of the Italian peninsula. This was also an important location commercially and it had natural barriers that made it a strategic military location, but Ravenna never rivaled Constantinople in size or importance.

“Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.” The Beginnings: The Greeks and Romans. Films on Demand. 1997. 1:26.