Dil Sh. History of the Byzantine Empire. Byzantine emperor Justinian I the Great Direction of foreign policy of Justinian 1

As you know, the power of the Byzantine emperors (basileus) was not legally hereditary. In fact, anyone could be on the throne. The most famous Byzantine emperors were not of high birth.

Justinian I the Great (482 or 483=565), one of the greatest Byzantine emperors, codifier of Roman law and builder of the Cathedral of St. Sofia. Justinian was probably an Illyrian, born in Tauresia (province of Dardania, near modern Skopje) into a peasant family, but brought up in Constantinople. At birth, he received the name Peter Savvaty, to which Flavius ​​​​was subsequently added (as a sign of belonging to the imperial family) and Justinian (in honor of his maternal uncle, Emperor Justin I, ruled in 518=527).

Justinian, the favorite of the emperor's uncle who had no children of his own, became an extremely influential figure under him and, gradually ascending the ranks, rose to the post of commander of the capital's military garrison (magister equitum et peditum praesentalis). Justin adopted him and made him his co-emperor in the last few months of his reign, so that when August 1, 527 Justin died. Justinian ascended the throne.

Justinian "considered strengthening the military and political power of Byzantium as his primary task. He set himself an ambitious goal - to restore the Roman Empire within its former borders - and, I must say, quite successfully accomplished this goal. At that time, the main threat to the empire came from the east, from powerful Sasanian Iran, the wars with which formed the core of Justinian's eastern policy until the conclusion of the "eternal peace" in 532. According to the peace treaty, the borders between Byzantium and Iran remained the same, but the empire achieved the inclusion of Lazika, Armenia, Crimea and Arabia in its sphere of influence, where the dominance of Christianity was established. aggressive campaigns Justinian - conquered the Vandals in North Africa (533-534).

The purpose of this work is to review and study the foreign policy of Justinian.

Consider the reign of Justinian in several aspects: 1) war; 2) internal affairs and private life; 3) religious policy; 4) codification of law.

For the Byzantine Empire of the VI century. became one of the brightest periods of its history. The heyday of its greatness was associated primarily with the name of Emperor Justinian. In his time, Roman legislation was codified and the Code of Civil Law (Corpus Juris Civilis) was drawn up, the temple of Sophia of Constantinople was built, and the borders of the state for some time began to resemble the borders of the former Roman Empire. The official language of the state and the native language of Justinian was still Latin, the country was reborn as a Christian Roman Empire, but it was during this period that it became clear that this was no longer Rome, but Byzantium.

Chapter 1. The Byzantine state in the era of Justinian

1.1. Accession to the throne of Emperor Justinian

In 518 Emperor Anastasius died. He was succeeded by Justin I, whose reign was not particularly illustrious, but he may simply have been overshadowed by his great nephew Justinian. Biography of Justin one of best examples Byzantine "vertical mobility", since the future emperor came from simple Illyrian peasants. The legend of Slavic roots of Justin and Justinian, although in reality they could rather be representatives of the Latinized Albanian tribes. The emperor could not boast of learning, and even putting his own signature was, according to contemporaries, beyond his strength. Justin achieved the imperial throne thanks to a professional military career. Thus, the Byzantine concept of "vertical mobility" was the realization for that time of the words of Alexander the Great that power in the state should go to the strongest.

Perhaps the most striking event of the reign of Justin lay in the religious sphere, however, church affairs went far beyond the walls of temples in their significance and had a serious impact on the entire public life. More will be said about Byzantine Christianity below, but the main thing is worth noting here: at that time, the schism was stopped, which for the first time divided the eastern and western part Christian Church - the Roman and Constantinople Patriarchates. On Maundy Thursday, March 28, 519, representatives of the throne of Constantinople and the legates of the Roman Pope Hormizda condemned the "Enoticon", that is, the act of unity with the Monophysites, adopted in 482 by Emperor Zeno and Patriarch Akakiy. This meant a return to the decisions of the IV Ecumenical Council (451) and the restoration of communion with the Roman Church. The so-called “Akakian schism”, which for the first time in church history divided the two centers of the Christian world from 482 to 519, ended. In public terms, this meant unity with Rome and the West of the Empire and conflict with its eastern provinces. Some researchers (for example, the Russian Byzantinist A.A. Vasiliev, 1867-1953) saw in this the political short-sightedness of Justin, and then Justinian, since the anti-Monophysite policy greatly contributed to the loss of Byzantium’s possessions in the Middle East, while the West equally turned out to be unpromising for the empire. But at the same time, Byzantium remained faithful to Christian orthodoxy and did not leave Europe. So, during the reign of Justin, the rejection of the Monophysite policy of his predecessors and a return to the Chalcedonian decisions took place.

An interesting letter was written by the young Justinian to Pope Hormizda shortly after the reconciliation of Constantinople and Rome. This message concerned bringing the Monophysites to agreement: “You will be able,” the future emperor wrote in 520, “to bring the people of our Lord to peace, not by persecution and bloodshed, but by patience, so that, wanting to win souls, we would not lose the bodies of many people, like souls. It is fitting to correct long-term mistakes with gentleness and indulgence. That doctor is rightly praised who passionately strives to cure old diseases in such a way that new wounds do not arise from them. It must be said that Orthodox emperors (including Justinian himself), unfortunately, did not always follow such a policy. Was this not one of the reasons for such an easy deposition of its eastern provinces from the Empire at the beginning of the 7th century. and still ongoing church division?

Along with the struggle against heresies in the empire itself, Justin nevertheless sought to support all Christians outside it. The name of this emperor is associated with the help that Byzantium provided to the Monophysite king of the Ethiopian principality of Aksum against Yemen, whose authorities adhered to Judaism. For Byzantium, this was both a strengthening of its own influence abroad, and a struggle for the support of Christianity in southwestern Arabia. It seems that this support left a deep mark in Christian Ethiopia: in the work of the XIV century. Kebra Nagast (Glory of the Kings) reports a meeting in Jerusalem between Emperor Justin and the Ethiopian king Kaleb, during which they divided the land between them. In reality, there was no such meeting, but the presence of such a legend speaks of the importance of Byzantine support for Ethiopian Christians.

At the beginning of 527, Justinian became the co-ruler of Emperor Justin. The custom of choosing a successor was common in the Roman Empire. Since the dynastic principle did not yet exist, such an election of a co-ruler was a certain guarantee of the succession of power and saved the successor from the otherwise inevitable struggle for power. Justinian's influence was significant even before he officially became co-emperor. First of all, this was due to the fact that he was much more educated than his uncle, so Justin objectively needed the support of his younger relative.

In August 527, the already very old emperor Justin died, and Justinian's bright and long reign began, lasting almost forty years.

1.2. Rise of Byzantium

Under Justinian, Byzantium became not only the largest and richest state in Europe, but also the most cultured. Justinian strengthened law and order in the country. In his time, Constantinople turns into a glorified artistic center of the medieval world, into a "palladium of sciences and arts", followed by Ravenna, Rome, Nicaea, Thessalonica, which also became the focus of the Byzantine artistic style. Under Justinian, "wonderful temples were built that have survived to this day - and.

Created under Justinian, the "Code of Civil Law" is the pinnacle of Byzantine legal thought. It consisted of four parts (Code of Justinian, Digesta, Institutions, Novels). The "Code" reflects the changes that have taken place in the economic and social life of the empire, incl. the improvement of the legal status of women, the release of slaves, etc. For the first time, the theory of natural law was legally recognized, according to which all people are equal by nature, and slavery is incompatible with human nature. Thanks to the most thorough development of such institutions of the Roman-Byzantine legislation as the principle of private property, inheritance rights, family law, regulation of trade and usury operations, the Code of Justinian has not lost its significance even for lawyers of modern times.

The most important part of the codification of the emperor Justinian, distinguished by the richness of the legal material used, are digests, or pandects. The latter term is borrowed from the Greek language, which means "containing everything."

According to the plan of Justinian, set out in a special Constitution of December 12, 530, his digests were to be a comprehensive collection covering the legal heritage of the classical era. The preparation of the digest was entrusted to a special commission led by Tribonian, which included, in addition to prominent officials and practitioners, well-known professors from the Constantinople (Theophilus, Gratian) and Beirut (Dorotheus and Anatoly) law schools. The compilers of the digest (later they became known as compilers) were endowed with broad powers to select and shorten the texts of classical jurists ("ancient jurists"), to eliminate contradictions, repetitions and obsolete provisions in them, to make other changes to them, taking into account the imperial constitutions.

In the process of working on the digests, the commission reviewed and used 2,000 essays and processed 3 million lines. In the event of controversial issues, she turned to Justinian for clarification, who issued the corresponding constitutions, which amounted to "50 decisions". Digests, given the scale of the material used in them, were prepared exclusively in a short time, published on December 16, 533 by a special Constitution.

Digests are a unique legal monument, numbering about 150 thousand lines, including more than 9 thousand texts taken from the books of Roman lawyers who lived from the 1st century BC. BC e. according to the IV century. n. e. Ulpian, Paul, Papinian, Julian, Pomponius, Modestin are quoted more than others in the Digests. So, the texts of Ulpian are 1/3, Paul - 1/6, Papinian - 1/18 part.

Structurally, the Digests are divided into seven parts (there is no such heading in the text itself) and into 50 books, which in turn (except for books 30-32 on legates and fideicommissas) are divided into titles that have names. Titles consist of fragments, the number and size of which are not the same. Each fragment contains a text from the work of a lawyer. The fragment is given with the indication of the author and the title of the work from which the quotation was taken.

The content of the Digest is very wide and varied. They consider some general issues of justice and law, substantiate the division of law into public and private, give an outline of the emergence and development of Roman law, outline the understanding of law, etc. Relatively little space is devoted to public law, mainly in recent books (47-50 ), which talks about crimes and punishments, about the process, the rights of the fiscus, city government, military peculia, etc. Issues related to the field of international law are also presented here: the conduct of war, the reception and dispatch of embassies, the status of foreigners, etc. .

Private law is represented most fully in the Digests. Particularly much attention is paid to inheritance (by law and will), marital relations, property law, various types contracts. It reflected many of the new trends characteristic of postclassical Roman law: the merger of praetorian and civil law and the elimination of many of the formalities of the latter (for example, the division of things into mancipable and non-mancipated), softening paternal authority, erasing the distinction between legates and fideicomisses, etc. In an effort to adapt Roman classical jurisprudence to Byzantine reality in the VI century. commentators often distorted the original text, included new provisions, and doing this on behalf of the cited author (interpolation). Probably, a number of changes in the classical texts were carried out not directly by the compilers, but by the compilers of the copies of the works that they used and into which insertions and corrections had already been made earlier in the margins of the manuscript and between the lines. The selection of interpolations and glosses, which makes it possible to distinguish between classical and postclassical law, is one of the most important trends in modern romance.

The digests are written in Latin, but many terms, and sometimes entire extracts (from Marcianus, Papinianus, and Modestinus), are given in Greek. Having given the Digests the force of law, Justinian forbade their commentary, as well as references to old laws and writings of jurists.

The original text of Justinian's Digest has not survived. The most ancient and complete copy (the Florentine manuscript) belongs to the 6th or 7th centuries. A number of copies of the Digest of Justinian, compiled in the 11th-12th centuries, have also been preserved, but significant reductions were made in them, as well as significant distortions of the text (the so-called "vulgate").

A peculiar part of Justinian's codification is the Institutions - an elementary textbook of law, addressed by the emperor to "youth who loves the laws." To draw up the Institutions, at the direction of Justinian, in 530, a special commission was composed of Tribonian (chairman) and the law professors Theophilus and Dorotheus. The latter are the actual authors of the Institutions of Justinian, since Tribonian was at that time busy preparing the Digest. The institutions were published on November 21, 533, and in the same year (simultaneously with the publication of the Digest) they received the force of imperial law and began to be used as an official source of law.

The Institutions of Justinian were based on the writings of Gaius (Institutions and "Daily Affairs"), as well as the Institutions of Florentine, Marcian, Ulpian and Paul. Digests, as well as a number of imperial constitutions, had a certain influence on them. The institutions of Justinian, although to a lesser extent than the Digests, reflected the features of postclassical (Late Roman, Byzantine) law. Many obsolete legal institutions were excluded from them (for example, obsolete forms of marriage, legal action and formulary process, etc.). On the other hand, a number of new provisions relating to legal entity, concubinate, colonate, codicilla, etc. Some issues in the Institutions of Justinian are developed in more detail than in the Institutions of Gaius, in particular, the classification of rights in rem has been further developed, the circle of grounds for the emergence of obligations has been expanded (quasi-delicts have been added).

Like the Institutions of Gaius, the Institutions of Justinian consist of 4 books. Under the influence of the Digest, they were divided into titles, which consist of separate fragments. Although the taxonomy of the Institutions of Justinian is borrowed from the Institutions of Gaius, the arrangement of the material (especially in last book) has some differences.

The first book gives general information on justice and law, on the legal status of persons, on freedmen, on marriage, on paternal authority, on guardianship and guardianship. The second book is devoted to property law. It examines in detail the new ways of dividing and properties of things, provides for new ways of acquiring them. It also speaks of wills and legacies.

The third book includes titles related to inheritance without a will, the degree of cognatic kinship, etc. The same book sets out general provisions on obligations and details certain types of contracts. In contrast to the Institutions of Gaius, obligations from torts are included in the fourth book, where the law of Aquilia on compensation for harm is considered in particular detail. The following are the issues of protection of rights ( different types claims and interdicts). In the final part of the Institutions of Justinian, two titles are added, which list the duties of people and various types of crimes, especially developed in imperial legislation (lèse majesté, adultery, patricide, forgery, etc.).

How historical source Justinian's institutions are of less value than the Digests and Justinian's Code, but they also have undoubted merit - a systematic, concise and clear presentation of legal material on a wide range of issues. The original text of the Institutions of Justinian has not been preserved; the oldest copy dates back to the 9th century.

The Roman Empire gradually abandoned its former rigidity and inflexibility, so that on a large (perhaps even excessive) scale, the norms of the law of peoples and even natural law began to be taken into account. Justinian decided to generalize and systematize this extensive material. The work was organized by the outstanding lawyer Tribonian with numerous assistants. As a result, the famous Corpus iuris civilis (Code of Civil Law) was born, consisting of three parts: 1) Codex Iustinianus (Justinian's Code). It was first published in 529, but soon it was significantly revised and in 534 received the force of law in the form in which we now know it. This included all the imperial decrees (constitutiones) that seemed important and remained relevant, starting with the emperor Hadrian, who ruled at the beginning of the 2nd century, including 50 decrees of Justinian himself. 2) Pandectae or Digesta (=Digesta), a compilation of the views of the best jurists prepared in 530-533 (mainly of the 2nd and 3rd centuries), provided with amendments. Commission of Justinian undertook the work of reconciliation different approaches lawyers. The legislation described in these authoritative texts became binding on all courts. 3) Institutiones (-Institutions, i.e. - Fundamentals), a law textbook for students. Textbook by Guy, a lawyer who lived in the 2nd century. AD, was modernized and corrected, and from December 533 this text was included in the curricula.

Already after the death of Justinian, Novellae (Novels) were published, an addition to the Code, which contains 174 new imperial decrees, and after the death of Tribonian (546), Justinian published only 18 documents. Most documents are written in Greek, which has acquired the status of an official language.

reputation and achievements. Assessing the personality of Justinian and his achievements, one should take into account the role that his contemporary and main historian Procopius plays in shaping our ideas about him. A well-informed and competent scholar, for reasons unknown to us, Procopius had a persistent dislike for the emperor, which he did not deny himself the pleasure of pouring into secret history (Anecdota), especially about Theodora.

History did not appreciate the merits of Justinian as the great codifier of law, only for this act alone Dante gave him a place in Paradise. In the religious struggle, Justinian played a controversial role: at first he tried to reconcile rivals and reach a compromise, then unleashed persecution and ended up almost completely abandoning what he professed at first. It should not be underestimated as statesman and strategist. With regard to Persia, he pursued a traditional policy, having achieved some success. Justinian conceived a grandiose program for the return of the western possessions of the Roman Empire and almost completely implemented it. However, by doing this he upset the balance of power in the empire, and, perhaps, later Byzantium was extremely short of energy and resources that were wasted in the West. Justinian died in Constantinople on November 14, 565.

Justinian's codification drew a peculiar line under the centuries-old development of Roman law, representing a concentrated result of its entire previous history. Therefore, the Code of Laws of Justinian, although it reflected some post-classical and purely Byzantine features, is basically a source of Roman law.

In 535-555. the above three collections of Roman law were supplemented by collections of constitutions (short stories) of Justinian himself, in which the features of not Roman law, but Byzantine society and law, were already reflected to a greater extent. However, these collections were compiled by private individuals and did not have an official character. The largest of them included 168 short stories, of which 153 belong to Justinian. Much later (in the Middle Ages) Justinian's collections of short stories began to be included in the Corpus juris civilis as his fourth book.

Chapter 2. Domestic and foreign policy of Justinian

2.1. Domestic policy of Justinian

Both internal and foreign policy Justinian was aimed at the comprehensive strengthening of the Byzantine state. His ideal was to restore the former greatness of the Roman Empire, but on a new, Christian basis. An integral part of the program to restore the former greatness was the reunification of possessions in the West.

One of the important levers for the consolidation of the state at that time was religious policy. If its significance is great in modern states, then in the Middle Ages it was even higher due to almost total religiosity and the presence state religion. In 529, an imperial decree was issued that infringed on the civil rights of non-Christians and heretics. For them, the road was closed, first of all, to high government positions. Only the Monophysites, who at that time were the most significant and numerous part of the followers of heretical teachings, did not fall under the decree, but they enjoyed the support of Empress Theodora. It is probable that, above all, this law had in mind the pagans, who still remained both in the countryside and among the educated elite. In 529, the pagan Platonic Academy in Athens was closed, which, although it did not have its former splendor, nevertheless remained a stronghold of pagan thought and non-Christianized classical education. Interestingly, in the same year in the West, St. Benedict of Nursia cut down the grove of Apollo on Monte Cassino, which was the last pagan sanctuary in Italy, where this did not require powerful state support, so it seems that Greco-Roman paganism objectively lived out its last days in that era

In 529, the Samaritan uprising began in Palestine, which lasted until 532 and was suppressed with great cruelty. The uprising was a response to religious pressure from the authorities (the religion of the Samaritans is one of the varieties of Judaism).

In 528, a grandiose work was begun that perpetuated the name of Justinian - work began on the codification of Roman law. “The emperor,” he believed, “should not only be adorned with weapons, but also armed with laws, in order to be able to rule both in wartime and in peacetime; he must be both a firm defender of the law and a triumphant over defeated enemies. In the Roman Empire, legislation consisted of both laws ( legs), published by emperors, and republican law, developed by lawyers of the classical period. It was called ancient law (jus vetus or jus antiquum). Laws were not subject to repeal (so it will be in canon law, that is, church legislation), but the new laws could well invalidate the previous ones. This created great difficulties in the application of laws. Even before Justinian, three codes were compiled, i.e. collection, Roman law - Codex Gregorianus, Codex Hermogenianus And Codex Theodosianus. In February 528, a commission of ten lawyers headed by Tribonian and Theophilus began to operate in Constantinople, who were supposed to revise these codes, as well as the laws that came out after they were compiled, and create a single collection from all this legislative array. In April 529, the Code of Justinian was published ( Codex Justinianus), which became a binding code of laws for the entire Empire.

In 530, the same Tribonian created a commission for the processing of "ancient law". In a short time, Justinian's lawyers read and revised about two thousand books and more than three million lines. As a result of this work, in 533 they published a code called digesta or pandect (Pandectae). In addition to the legislative significance, this collection had one more thing - it preserved a huge number of statements and texts of the great Roman lawyers, which otherwise might not have reached us. In the digests, the opinions of many of them acquired the force of law. In the same 533 were published institutions in four books that served study guide according to the code and digests. Formally, they were a manual on civil law and were intended for students, but in fact they were a brief guide to all Roman law in force in the era of Justinian.

After all this grandiose work, there was a need to revise the code of Justinian, which was nevertheless done in haste. In 534, the second edition of the code was published, taking into account the legislative activity of the previous years. However, even after this, the emperor continued to issue many laws, called novellae leges-new laws, or briefly short stories. Interestingly, if all the previous cataloging of Roman law was done by Justinian in Latin, then the short stories were published in Greek, i.e. in the language of the majority of the population of the Empire, which gradually supplanted official language states even in the areas of legislation, public administration and military service.

All four parts of the Justinian legislation: the code, digests, institutions and short stories, were a single whole - a set of Roman law that was in force in the era of the early Byzantine Empire. In the XII century. V Western Europe a revival of interest in Roman law began, the so-called reception of Roman law. And this happened precisely on the basis of the grandiose lawmaking of Justinian, which European lawyers called Code of civil law- Corpus Juris Civilis. So, in addition to the great role in Byzantine legislation itself, Justinian's lawyers preserved Roman law for the world: most of everything that is known about it has come down to us and has been preserved thanks to them.

In January 532, an event occurred in Constantinople that shocked the entire city society and almost deprived Justinian and his wife Theodora of royal power: on January 14, an uprising began in the city, which received the name Nika(in Greek - "conquer"). In Byzantium, the role of its capital, Constantinople, was much greater than in most modern states. Just as the Roman Empire was a state created by one city and its citizens, so Byzantium was to a large extent the empire of one city - New Rome (Constantinople). People of Rome formally was the ruler of the empire, and the Senate - the main government agency. The election of the emperor was to receive the obligatory approval of this act by the people. By the VI century. there was little left of the former polis democracy, but the opinion of the Constantinople demos was still a very weighty force.

The urban population was divided into social parties with their own interests, leaders, budget. The parties had certain religious preferences, and also represented the interests of certain classes. Strange as it may seem, the groups at the hippodrome were the formal representatives of these various interests of the city dwellers - circus party. The hippodrome was not just a place for horse races, but also the main place of communication for the metropolitan demos. The emperor came to the competitions, so that you could put forward your demands or show disapproval before him. Circus parties ( dima) differed in the colors of the clothes worn by the drivers. So, at the Constantinople hippodrome there were green, blue, white and red dimas. In the VI century. the most influential were Veneti(blue) and Prasyns(green). The Venets represented supporters of Chalcedonian Orthodoxy, and at the same time they were supported by wealthy sections of the townspeople; the Prasins, on the other hand, were Monophysites and enjoyed the sympathy of the poor strata of society. Interestingly, at the beginning of the VI century. in Rome by Theodoric the Great social the differences of the circus parties were the same.

Even at the end of the reign of Anastasius, who, being a Monophysite, supported the Greens, a rebellion took place in the capital, during which the Blues proclaimed their emperor. The humiliated emperor went out to the rebels on the hippodrome, which managed to pacify their anger. Under Justinian, social discontent and schism took on a large scale. On the one hand, Justinian, as an Orthodox orthodox, supported the Venets, while his wife Theodora supported the Prasins. Thus, both parties found support at court. However, the main conflict was not between different groups of the urban population, but between the city self-government and the imperial power. Both the Venets and the Prasins acted as a united front during the uprising.

The main demand of the rebels was the deposition of Justinian and the resignation of several senior officials objectionable to the people, primarily the cruel praetorian prefect John of Cappadocia and Tribonian. The banner of rebellion was raised by the nephews of the late emperor Anastasius - Hypatius and Pompey. The rioters destroyed the capital's prisons, and for several days in a row fires raged and atrocities were committed in the capital. In the same days, the basilica of Hagia Sophia burned down, on the site of which Justinian later erected his majestic temple. After failed negotiations with Justinian, Hypatius was proclaimed emperor at the hippodrome. Justinian himself took refuge in the palace and was already thinking about fleeing the capital. According to Procopius of Caesarea, the official historian of that era, the only decisive and courageous person was the empress. It was she who was able to convince the emperor not to flee, but to brutally suppress the rebellion. Procopius put the following words into her mouth: “A person who has been born must die, but being a fugitive for someone who was an emperor is unbearable ... If you, sovereign, want to be saved, it is not at all difficult. We have a lot of money: here is the sea, here are the ships. However, consider how, after fleeing, you would not prefer death to salvation. I like the ancient saying that royal dignity is a beautiful funeral attire.

The emperor decided to stay in the capital and began decisive action, especially since the unrest had lasted for six days. The pacification of the rebels was entrusted to Belisarius, in the future the most famous commander of Justinian in his wars in the West. Belisarius and his soldiers managed to drive the rebellious crowd to the hippodrome, where, according to historians, at least 30 thousand rebels were killed by them. After these bloody events, the victory of Justinian was undeniable, and the conflict between dimami and the emperor was finally decided in favor of the latter. The social and political influence of the parties is a thing of the past, and they remain, in fact, simple associations of horse racing fans. The revolt of Nika was an important stage in Justinian's struggle for control over all the levers of the state mechanism.

As often happens, the onset of a new stage in the life of a city or country is marked by intensive monumental construction, which clearly indicates the beginning of a new period. The reign of Justinian was no exception. Immediately after the suppression of the Nika uprising, the emperor set about restoring the capital, which had been significantly damaged by fires during the riots. The most famous building of Justinian is the temple of Hagia Sophia - the Wisdom of God, which until the Turkish conquest was the main temple of the Eastern Christian world and was called the Great Church by the Byzantines. The basilica, previously built by Constantine, perished during the uprising, so the emperor built the cathedral virtually from scratch; therefore, this cathedral was able to become a complete expression of the main trends in Byzantine architecture of that era.

Extensive construction throughout the state - secular, ecclesiastical, civil, military - required incredible financial costs. The lack of money was a constant companion of the reign of the Byzantine emperors, and, as already mentioned, only two emperors left behind a full treasury.

One of the important features of Justinian's domestic policy was the constant struggle against large private property. In many parts of the state (in Egypt, in Cappadocia) the land magnates had more power than the state. “State landed property,” we read in one of Justinian’s short stories, “almost completely passed into private hands, for it was stolen and plundered, including all the herds of horses, and not a single person opposed, for the mouths of all were stopped by gold.” Justinian tried by all means to return to the treasury both state land and what had long belonged to large local landowners. It should be noted that Justinian did not quite succeed in his struggle with large landownership: it remained a distinctive feature of the Byzantine economy for all the centuries of its existence.

2.2. Foreign policy

The foreign policy of the Empire during the decades of Justinian's reign was incredibly active. As for the wars, during this time they were fought on at least three fronts: with the Germanic tribes in the west, with Persia on the eastern border, and with the Slavs in the Balkans. As for Persia, during the change of rulers, peace was concluded with it in 532, which seemed very humiliating for Byzantium: it had to pay a large tribute annually. Thus, she paid off her old neighbor and enemy, with whom there were constant border conflicts that did not lead to any major changes on the map. It seems that Justinian preferred to leave this unpromising direction at that time, but to free his hands in the West.

It was there, in the West, that the main interest of Justinian's foreign policy was located. The basis of all his multifaceted activities was the desire to restore the former power of the Roman Empire, but with a Christian content. For this reason, the forces of the entire state were sent to recapture the territories of the former western part of the empire. There were two main directions - North Africa and Italy. The emperor decided to start with Africa.

The enterprise turned out to be quite risky, since it was necessary to transport a large army across the Mediterranean Sea on ships, despite the fact that the Vandals themselves, who then owned Roman Africa, had a serious fleet. But perhaps the calculation was made on the fact that the Vandals were cut off from other Germanic tribes, and because of this they could hardly count on the necessary support. In 533, the commander Belisarius landed with his army on the territory of the former Roman Africa - and the war with vandals. Justinian was indebted to Belisarius for the recent suppression of the Nike rebellion. Most of the victories in the West were also associated with his name. The main literary source on the wars of that time are the writings of Procopius of Caesarea, who was the secretary and friend of Belisarius and accompanied him during military campaigns. The beginning of the war was very successful, but it dragged on for 15 years, ending only in 548. It took the Byzantines less than a year to conquer the Vandal state and capture their king Gelimer. Such rapid success was facilitated by the conflicts of the Vandals with the local population, both Roman and Berber. And they themselves were no longer the enemy that destroyed the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century. In the edition of the codex of 534, Justinian was able to declare that "God, in His mercy, gave us not only Africa and all its provinces, but also returned the imperial insignia, which, after the capture of Rome [by the Vandals], were carried away by them."

The Vandal War, according to the official version, was victoriously completed, and Belisarius was recalled with an army to the capital. Immediately after this, it became clear that the Byzantine power in Africa did not have a significant social base. The imperial garrison was defeated, and Solomon - his commander and nephew of Belisarius - died. Skirmishes and even soldier mutinies continued until 548, when Byzantine power was firmly strengthened after the diplomatic and military victories of the commander John Troglita.

When the war with the Vandals seemed over, in the summer of 536 Justinian's Italian campaign, or war with the Ostrogoths, began. One army, led by Mund, conquered Dalmatia from the Ostrogoths, and the army of Belisarius, accustomed to sea movements, landed without difficulty in Sicily, after the capture of which they moved to the south of Italy proper. Belisarius was able to capture Naples, and in December 536 - Rome. in 540, the capital of the Ostrogoths, Ravenna, opened its gates to him, which from now on became the center of Byzantine influence in Italy. The captured king of the Ostrogoths was taken to Constantinople.

Despite the successful capture of Ravenna, 540 turned out to be difficult for the Empire. This year, Byzantium was attacked by the Huns, and Persia, for its part, violated the peace treaty and captured a significant part of the province of Syria (together with the city of Antioch). The empire had to wage war on all fronts. From 541 to 545, the Goths, having acquired a new leader in the person of Totila, the last defender of the Ostrogothic independence, conquered a significant part of Italy from the Byzantines. The position of the army was complicated by the fact that during these years Belisarius was not in Italy: in 540 he was recalled to Constantinople (perhaps Justinian was afraid that the defeated Goths offered Belisarius the crown), and then to the Persian front. in 545, peace was concluded with Persia, and Belisarius got the opportunity to return to Italy. From 546 to 550, Rome several times passed from the hands of the Byzantines to the hands of Totila and vice versa. By 550, only Ravenna, Ancona, Croton and Otranto remained under the rule of the empire.

Successes in the Italian campaign of the early 50s. were associated with the name of the Byzantine commander Narses. In 552 he defeated Totila and the remnants of his army, and in 554 he defeated the Franks and the Alemans. In 554, the whole of Italy was returned to the Empire, as well as the southeast of Spain. It is believed that by 554 Justinian's wars in the West were over. in the same year was published by the so-called Justinian. Pragmatic sanction, which returned to the large Roman landowners in Italy their lands, once taken by the Ostrogoths. If in "mainland" Byzantium Justinian fought with large private owners, then in the newly reconquered Italy, the Byzantine authorities saw in them the support of their influence. The document was also supposed to contribute to the economic recovery of Italy, whose economy had fallen into disrepair during the 20 years of the Ostrogothic campaign.

As for Rome, it has long lost the status of a big city and its significance was rather symbolic. However, repeated assaults and captures during the Ostrogothic War further contributed to its desolation. Now it has finally turned into a city of monasteries and the residence of the Roman bishop, and Ravenna has become the center of Byzantine Italy for a long time. However, this was nothing new. The city in the northeast of the peninsula, located among the swamps and protected by them from crazy barbarian raids, was the real capital of the late Western Roman Empire. The center of the Ostrogothic state was located in Ravenna, and the Byzantines settled there. During the Byzantine domination, she gained new life and in addition to performing political and military functions, it became the focus of Byzantine culture in Italy. When in the middle of the VIII century. Byzantines ( Romans) had to be evacuated from Ravenna, the influence of Byzantine culture affected its northern neighbor, Venice, for several centuries.

At the end of the 550s. The empire once again had to face serious dangers in the Balkans. In 558, for the first time, Avars appeared near the Byzantine border on the Danube. Apparently, the forces of the Avar Khaganate were rather limited, since instead of immediate hostilities, they preferred to send an embassy to Constantinople. The ambassadors of the Avar kagan Bayan asked Justinian for permission to settle their people inside the Byzantine borders on the condition of protecting the Empire from the invasion of other barbarians - the same nomadic hordes as the Avars themselves - who continued their movement across Eurasia, moving to the West from a kind of "ethnic volcano" , whose epicenter was probably in northern China.

Before the Empire had time to come to an agreement with the Avars, a year later, in 559, Bulgarians and Slavs appeared at its borders. The Bulgarian Khan Zabergan captured the whole of Thrace and ended up at the walls of Constantinople. Belisarius led the defense of the capital, and the assault on the beautifully fortified city turned out to be beyond the strength of the nomads. After an unsuccessful assault, the Bulgarians and Slavs fell into a trap arranged by him by the Byzantine army, but Justinian decided to spare them generously, probably to avoid a capricious turn of military luck. This time the danger is over. The Empire faced the most serious problems of the Slavic invasion and their settlement in the Balkans in the 7th century, a crisis for it in every respect. But already here the whole vulnerability of Byzantine power was revealed: Justinian waged victorious wars in North Africa and Spain, and at that time the heart of the Empire - Constantinople - could be in mortal danger. It was due both to his vulnerable geographic location, and with the demographic pressure and migrations of nomadic peoples. The empire was not stable, which forced its rulers, political elite and people to be in a state of constant concentration of forces, which allowed the state to live for more than a millennium.

In 562, the Empire made peace with Persia for 50 years, which ended the era of long conflicts that began in 540, when the Persian king Khosrow Anushirvan took advantage of Justinian's problems in the West and violated the "eternal peace" of 532. In 540, Persia captured Syria and ruined Antioch, but thanks to the intervention of the same Belisarius, the Empire managed to return the lost province. One way or another, the conflict dragged on until the early 560s, when both sides had already lost the opportunity to continue it. Thanks to the historian Menander, we know the details of the negotiations and the peace treaty of 562. Byzantium again assumed the obligation to pay Persia a serious annual tribute. At the same time, Justinian obtained from Khosrow religious tolerance for Persian Christians, albeit with a ban on further Christian mission in his country. What was very important for the Byzantines was the agreement of the Persians to clear Lazika, an area in the southeast of the Black Sea coast. Thus, Persia was deprived of the right to participate in the political and commercial affairs of Byzantium on the Black Sea.

The brilliant and controversial era of Justinian the Great (as his contemporaries flatteringly titled) was coming to an end. In March 565, Belisarius died, whose name was associated with many military successes of that era. And at the end of the same 565, at the age of over 80, Justinian died, whose reliable assistant and inspirer Empress Theodora died back in 548

Chapter 3. Byzantium after the death of Justinian

In November 565, without making any orders about the inheritance, he died at a ripe old age. The Byzantine state, for the expansion and exaltation of which he used so much effort and the integrity of which he tried to consolidate with enormous sacrifices, spiritual and material, was near death in a desperate situation, close to destruction and bankruptcy. The most weak side Justinian's systems were finance. Huge taxes, terrible extortion by their collectors, extravagance of the court and a chronic lack of money, for which all means seemed acceptable; bribing barbarians with money and ceding imperial lands to them; the brutal exploitation of the people's property, the confiscation of private lands for misdeeds on matters of faith and on the denunciations of a large army of spies - this whole system kept the population of the empire in a stupor and, it seemed, was ready to stifle any manifestation of free ideas. The bleak view of financial policy left by a contemporary historian is shared by new writers. “If it were required,” says Gfrerer, “more a brief description of system of Justinian, I would say that he adhered to the following program: “I own the income from all landed possessions, I am the master of landed property. My cities and houses, I own the work done by my subjects, and my money that is in their pockets. The right belongs to me alone, all other people have duties towards me and must unquestioningly carry out my orders. Both Theodora, as is known, had no children. The imperial family consisted of numerous nephews of the king, descended from his brother Herman and sister Vigilantia, between whom the king enjoyed the greatest favor, elevated to the rank of curopalate and located in Constantinople in last years life; the legacy of power passed to him. was already in his mature years upon accession to the throne, but his personal qualities as a ruler recede into the background in front of his energetic and ambitious wife Sophia, who inherited, to a certain extent, the traits of the imperious character of her aunt, Empress Theodora. First of all, it was necessary to reckon with the devastated treasury and the upset extreme an army that was insufficient to guard the borders threatened by barbarian invasion. The inner calm was alarmingly the conspiracies and intrigues of the members of the imperial house, who tried to react against the new order of things. The king's cousin, the son of Herman's nephew, also named Justin, who seemed dangerous in his influence in the army, was deprived of a military command and exiled to Alexandria, where he was killed by order of the king. The administration is distinguished by a complete break with the former policy of the Byzantine Empire. In the north and east there was a grave danger which had to be averted; the Slavs and Avars in Europe, the Persians in Asia focused attention on themselves and demanded the exertion of the forces of the empire. Upon accession to the throne, he solemnly promised the Senate and the people a right and speedy trial and personal thrift, as well as generous grants for public needs from his own treasury, made his name popular. But the misfortune was that he suffered from insanity, which over time became more and more noticeable and which prompted Empress Sophia to support the idea of ​​​​appointing a successor. According to the customs of the Roman Empire, in 574 he adopted the comite of the excuvites of Tiberius and appointed him Caesar; thus, from that time until the death of the king in 578, Tiberius ruled together with Sophia, and then became for a short time (578-582) the sole ruler of the empire. During his reign, most attention was devoted to events on the Persian border as a result of the war with the Persians that had begun in the previous reign. Tiberius can be credited with the fact that he chose a capable general for the Persian war in the person of the excuvite committee of Mauritius, whom he married shortly before his death to his daughter Constance and declared him his heir.

Although the twenty-year reign of Mauritius (582-602) differs little from the colorless period of Justinian's closest successors, it must be admitted undoubtedly that this reign marks a complete break with the old Roman influences and traditions and reveals an influx of new elements into the life of the Byzantine Empire. In spite of good intentions and military abilities, which might have placed the name of Mauritius in any other calmer time, he did not achieve positive results in any internal management, nor in wars with the Persians and Slavs. In Constantinople, they were dissatisfied with him for his frugality in spending public funds; in external wars, he was not always happy and therefore did not enjoy wide popularity. The catastrophe that occurred in 602 destroyed Mauritius and was accompanied by the brutal extermination of the entire royal family and its numerous adherents in the service and wealthy class. After the eight-year reign of Phocas (602-610), with which no reign can be compared in cruelty and rudeness, we enter into new period. Amartol has an anecdote that when Phocas appeared in St. Sophia, the voice of one monk was heard: “Lord! What kind of king did you send us!” This was followed by an invisible voice: “Worse, which would suit you perfectly for your sins, I could not find!” Recently, even in our times, the judgment first expressed in the 18th century was repeated: "Slavs occupy more space on earth than in history." This aphorism aims to show the lack of cultural elements in the history of the Slavs; it also hints at the political situation in the Slavic world, which is far from being as favorable as one might wish.

Throughout the 6th century, huge masses of Slavs concentrated and moved on the banks of the Danube. From the middle of the 5th century the Slavs send large armed detachments from beyond the Danube to the Byzantine regions and devastate the southern parts of the Balkan Peninsula. In the VI century. we are already meeting with a fait accompli, with the predominance of the Slavs on the Balkan Peninsula.

Conclusion

Summing up the general results of Justinian's entire foreign policy, one has to say that his endless and intense wars, which as a result did not correspond to his hopes and plans, had a disastrous effect on the general state of the state. Above all, these gigantic undertakings demanded enormous sums of money. According to the probably exaggerated calculation of Procopius in his "Secret History", i.e., a source that must be treated with caution, Anastasius left in the treasury a huge amount of cash for that time in the amount of 320,000 pounds of gold (about 130-140 million gold rubles) , which Justinian allegedly quickly spent even in the reign of his uncle.

But, according to another source of the 6th century, the Syrian John of Ephesus, the treasury of Anastasius was finally spent only under Justin II, that is, after the death of Justinian. In any case, the Anastasian Fund, which we accepted even on a smaller scale than that of Procopius, must have proved to be very useful to Justinian in his military undertakings. But nevertheless, this was not enough. The new taxes did not match the country's payment forces. The emperor's attempts to reduce the cost of maintaining the troops responded to their numbers, and the decrease in the latter made all his western conquests shaky.

From the point of view of Justinian's Roman ideology, his Western wars are understandable and natural. But from the point of view of the real interests of the country, they must be recognized as unnecessary and harmful. The difference between East and West in the sixth century was already so great that the very idea of ​​the West joining the Eastern Empire was anachronistic; there could no longer be a lasting merger. The conquered countries could only be held by force; but for this, as noted above, the empire had neither the strength nor the money. Carried away by his unfulfilled dreams, Justinian did not understand the significance of the eastern border and the eastern provinces, where the real vital interest of Byzantium was located. Western campaigns, being the result of one, the personal will of the emperor, could not have lasting results, and the plan to restore a unified Roman Empire died with Justinian. Thanks to his general foreign policy, the empire had to survive a severe internal economic crisis.

Bibliography

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3. Kulakovskiy Yu.A. History of Byzantium. SPb., "Aleteyya" 1996. T. II.

4. Pokrovsky I.A. History of Roman law. Pg., 1915.

5. Dyakonov A. John of Ephesus and his church-historical works, St. Petersburg, 1908.

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11. History of the state and law of foreign countries. - M., 1988.

Its main direction is known: to restore the Roman Empire. The main steps can be clearly identified. In order to untie his hands in the West, Justinian hastily ended the Persian war. Then he won Africa from the Vandals, Italy from the Ostrogoths, part of Spain from the Visigoths. Although he nowhere reached the former borders of Rome, he succeeded at least in turning the Mediterranean back into a "Roman lake". But then the East wakes up: again the war with the Persians, the empire is threatened by the invasion of the Huns and Slavs. Exhausted, Justinian no longer fights, he pays tribute. With the help of deft diplomacy, he keeps the barbarians at a distance, and by building a complex and deep defensive system, he turns the empire into a “huge fortified camp” (Sh. Diehl).

Conquests in the West

The Roman Empire was unable to solve either the German problem or the Persian one. Trajan's great efforts were in vain. Julian died on the battlefield, and his successor Jovian left the left bank of the Tigris. Military campaigns 521-531 under the leadership of one of the best commanders Justinian Belisarius did not give decisive results. Hurrying to finish them, Justinian concluded in 532 with a new Persian king Hos swarm, despite the very harsh conditions, "eternal peace" (in fact, it was nothing more than a truce). And immediately his aspirations turned to the West.

The Roman Orthodox population, who did not reconcile themselves to the dominion of the barbarian Arians, dreamed of the reconquest of the West. The offensive began in Africa - against the kingdom of the Vandals, founded by Gaiseric. The pretext was the usurpation of power by Gelimer in 531. Belisarius's brilliant campaign, which began in 533, forced Gelimer to capitulate a year later. True, the Berber uprisings called into question this victory: Solomon, the successor of Belisarius in Africa, was defeated and killed. But in 548 John Troglita finally restored order. With the exception of the western part of Morocco, North Africa became Roman again.

The campaign against the Ostrogoths was more difficult and lengthy. It began in 535, immediately after the victory in Africa, allegedly in response to the murder of the daughter-heiress of Theodoric the Great Amala Sunta by her husband Theodatus. Belisarius conquered Dalmatia, Sicily, Naples, Rome and the capital of the Ostrogoths, Ravenna. In 540, he pushed the captive king of the Ostrogoths Vitigis to the feet of Justinian in Constantinople. But everything was again called into question due to the vigorous resistance of the new Gothic king Totila. Belisarius, who had a small army at his disposal, was defeated. His successor Narses was more successful and, after a long and skillful campaign, won a decisive victory in 552.

Finally, in 550-554, Justinian captured several strongholds in southeastern Spain. The emperor took many measures designed to restore the former organization in the returned territories, divided into two prefectures - Italy and Africa. However, he was able to carry out only part of his plans. West Africa, three-quarters of Spain, all of Gaul with Provence, Norik and Rezia (that is, a cover for Italy) he never got. The recaptured territories were in a disastrous economic situation. There were not enough military forces to occupy them. The barbarians, driven back from the borders but not defeated, still posed a threat.

Threat from the East. Nevertheless, these incomplete and fragile results cost the empire a lot of effort. This was confirmed when Khosroes, taking advantage of the fact that Justinian was exhausted by battles in the West, terminated the agreement on " eternal peace» 532 years. Despite all the efforts of Belisarius, the Persians won victories for a long time, they reached the Mediterranean Sea and devastated Syria (Antioch was wiped off the face of the earth in 540). More than once Justinian had to buy a truce for two thousand pounds of gold a year. Finally, in 562, peace was signed for fifty years. Justinian undertook to pay the Persians a very large contribution and not to preach Christianity in their country. However, the Persians withdrew from Lazika, or the country of the Lazes (ancient Colchis), a territory on the east coast of Pontus Euxinus, which they had long disputed with the Romans. They did not gain a foothold either in the Mediterranean or the Black Seas, where their presence would also be dangerous for Byzantium. But the threat immediately arose on the Danube border. It came from the Huns and Slavs. The Huns periodically crossed the Danube and captured Thrace, then descended south and plundered Greece or headed east, reaching as far as Constantinople. They were always driven back to the borders, but these raids ravaged the provinces.

The Slavs were even more worried. It is possible that their detachments invaded the empire several times already under Anastasius, but in the time of Justinian the Slavic danger, henceforth inseparable from the history of Byzantium, manifests itself for the first time in all seriousness. More or less conscious intentions of the Slavs boiled down to the desire to get access to the Mediterranean Sea. From the very beginning, they chose Thessalonica as their goal, which already under Justinian enjoyed the reputation of the second city of the empire. Almost every year, detachments of the Slavs crossed the Danube and raided the interior of Byzantium. In Greece, they reached the Peloponnese, in Thrace - to the outskirts of Constantinople, in the west - to the Adriatic. Byzantine commanders always forced the Slavs to retreat, but they were never defeated; the following year, even more numerous detachments of the Slavs appeared again. The era of Justinian "laid the foundation for the Slavic question in the Balkans" (A. Vasiliev).

Empire Defense

Unfinished conquests in the West, painful defenses in the East: it was obvious that the empire recklessly counted only on military force. The army had excellent combat formations (for example, cavalry), but its strength did not exceed 150 thousand people, it lacked internal unity (too many barbarian "federates") and, finally, it had the disadvantages of any mercenary army, greedy and undisciplined . To reduce the burden on the soldiers, Justinian covered the entire territory of the empire fortifications. This was one of the most significant and most useful deeds of his reign, which aroused the admiration and surprise of the historian Procopius of Caesarea. In his treatise On Buildings, Procopius lists the military installations of the emperor and notes that those who see them with their own eyes will hardly believe that they were created by the will of one person. In all provinces, Justinian ordered the repair or construction of hundreds of buildings, from fortresses to simple castles. Naturally, there were much more of them not far from the border and they were located closer to each other, but fortifications were also erected in the interior regions, forming several defensive lines: all strategic points were guarded, all cities of any size were protected.

The detachments of the barbarians, if they still had enough strength for frequent devastating raids, had to go around the fortifications, which they did not know how to capture, that is, they could not stay in the country. Skillful organization was complemented by skillful diplomacy, rightly called "the science of managing barbarians." In accordance with this science, the Byzantines, generously distributing honorary titles or command positions to the leaders of the barbarians solemnly received at court, profitably used the vanity inherent in the barbarians and the authority that the empire and emperor enjoyed in their eyes. The Christianization of the barbarian countries was also encouraged, where, along with religion, the influence of Byzantium penetrated. Numerous and usually successful missions reached the northern shores of the Black Sea and as far as Abyssinia. Finally, subsidies and peace payments were distributed among the barbarians.

However, the last trick only revealed the weakness of the others. Procopius noticed that it was extremely reckless to ruin the treasury by paying compensation - this only aroused in their recipients a desire to seek new ones. However, this is the inevitable consequence of the mistake made by Justinian from the very beginning. He exhausted his forces in the West for illusory results. They got too expensive at the cost of forced exhausting defense in the East.

FOREIGN POLICY OF JUSTINIAN

At the moment when Justinian came to power, the empire had not yet recovered from the serious crisis that had gripped it since the end of the 5th century. In the last months of Justin's reign, the Persians, dissatisfied with the penetration of imperial policy into the Caucasus, into Armenia, onto the borders of Syria, again started the war, and the best part of the Byzantine army was chained in the East. Inside the state, the struggle between the Greens and the Blues maintained an extremely dangerous political excitement, which was further exacerbated by the deplorable venality of the administration, which caused general discontent. Justinian's urgent concern was to remove these difficulties, which delayed the fulfillment of his ambitious dreams in relation to the West. Not seeing or not wanting to see the extent of the eastern danger, at the cost of significant concessions, in 532 he signed a peace with the "great king", which gave him the opportunity to freely dispose of his military forces. On the other hand, he mercilessly suppressed internal turmoil. But in January 532, a formidable uprising, which retained the name “Nika” at the call of the rebels, filled Constantinople with fires and blood for a week. During this rebellion, when it seemed that the throne was about to collapse, Justinian found himself owing his salvation mainly to the courage of Theodora and the energy of Belisarius. But in any case, the brutal suppression of the uprising, which littered the hippodrome with thirty thousand corpses, resulted in the establishment of a lasting order in the capital and the transformation of imperial power into more absolute than ever.

In 532, Justinian's hands were untied.

Restoration of the empire in the West. The situation in the West favored his projects. Both in Africa and in Italy, the inhabitants, under the rule of heretic barbarians, had long called for the restoration of imperial power; the prestige of the empire was still so great that even the Vandals and Ostrogoths recognized the legitimacy of Byzantine claims. That is why the rapid decline of these barbarian kingdoms made them powerless against the advance of the armies of Justinian, and their differences did not give them the opportunity to unite against a common enemy. When, in 531, the seizure of power by Gelimer gave Byzantine diplomacy a pretext to intervene in African affairs, Justinian, relying on the formidable strength of his army, did not hesitate, striving to free the African Orthodox population from the “Arian captivity” with one blow and force the Vandal kingdom to enter the bosom of imperial unity. In 533 Belisarius sailed from Constantinople with an army of 10,000 infantry and 5,000-6,000 cavalry; the campaign was swift and brilliant. Gelimer, defeated at Decimus and Trikamar, surrounded during the retreat on Mount Pappua, was forced to surrender (534). Within a few months, several regiments of cavalry - for it was they who played the decisive role - destroyed the kingdom of Genseric against all expectations. The victorious Belisarius was given triumphal honors in Constantinople. And although it took another fifteen years (534-548) to put down the Berber uprisings and the revolts of the empire's dissolute mercenaries, Justinian could still take pride in conquering most of Africa and arrogantly assume the title of Emperor of Vandal and Africa.

The Ostrogoths of Italy did not budge when they defeated the Vandal kingdom. Soon it was their turn. The murder of Amalasunta, the daughter of the great Theodoric, by her husband Theodagatus (534) gave Justinian a pretext for intervention; this time, however, the war was more difficult and prolonged; despite the success of Belisarius, who conquered Sicily (535), captured Naples, then Rome, where he1 for a whole year (March 537-March 538) besieged the new Ostrogoth king Vitiges, and then took possession of Ravenna (540) and brought the captive Vitiges to the feet emperor, the Goths recovered again under the leadership of the dexterous and energetic Totilla, Belisarius, sent with insufficient forces to Italy, was defeated (544-548); it took the energy of Narses to crush the resistance of the Ostrogoths at Tagina (552), crush the last remnants of the barbarians in Campania (553) and free the peninsula from the Frankish hordes of Levtaris and Butilin (554). It took twenty years to reconquer Italy. Once again, Justinian, with his usual optimism, too soon believed in the final victory, and perhaps that is why he did not make the necessary effort in time to break the strength of the Ostrogoths with one blow. After all, the subjugation of Italy to imperial influence was begun with a completely insufficient army - with twenty-five or barely thirty thousand soldiers. As a result, the war dragged on hopelessly.

Similarly, in Spain, Justinian took advantage of circumstances to intervene in the dynastic feuds of the Visigothic kingdom (554) and win back the southeast of the country.

As a result of these happy campaigns, Justinian could flatter himself that he had succeeded in realizing his dream. Thanks to his stubborn ambition, Dalmatia, Italy, all of East Africa, southern Spain, the islands of the western Mediterranean basin - Sicily, Corsica, Sardinia, the Balearic Islands - again became parts of a single Roman Empire; the territory of the monarchy almost doubled. As a result of the capture of Ceuta, the power of the emperor extended as far as the Pillars of Hercules, and, if we exclude the part of the coast preserved by the Visigoths in Spain and Septimania and the Franks in Provence, it can be said that the Mediterranean Sea became a Roman lake again. No doubt neither Africa nor Italy entered the empire in its former extent; besides, they were already exhausted and devastated by long years of war. Nevertheless, as a result of these victories, the influence and glory of the empire increased undeniably, and Justinian used every opportunity to consolidate his successes. Africa and Italy formed, as before, two prefectures of the praetorium, and the emperor tried to restore to the population its former idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe empire. Restorative measures partially smoothed over the military devastation. The organization of defense - the creation of large military teams, the formation of border marks (limites), occupied by special border troops (limitanei), the construction of a powerful network of fortresses - all this guaranteed the security of the country. Justinian could be proud of the fact that he had restored in the West that perfect peace, that "perfect order", which seemed to him the sign of a truly civilized state.

Wars in the East. Unfortunately, these large enterprises exhausted the empire and made it neglect the East. The East avenged itself in the most terrible way.

First Persian War(527-532) was only a harbinger of impending danger. Since none of the opponents went too far, the outcome of the struggle remained undecided; Belisarius' victory at Darus (530) was offset by his defeat at Callinicus (531), and both sides were forced to conclude an unstable peace (532). But the new Persian king Khosroy Anushirvan (531-579), active and ambitious, was not one of those who could be satisfied with such results. Seeing that Byzantium was occupied in the West, especially concerned about the projects of world domination, which Justinian did not hide, he rushed to Syria in 540 and took Antioch; in 541, he invaded the country of the Lazes and captured Petra; in 542 he destroyed Commagene; in 543 defeated the Greeks in Armenia; in 544 devastated Mesopotamia. Belisarius himself was unable to overcome him. It was necessary to conclude a truce (545), which was renewed many times, and in 562 to sign a peace for fifty years, according to which Justinian undertook to pay tribute to the "great king" and abandoned any attempt to preach Christianity in Persian territory; but although at this price he preserved the country of the Lazes, ancient Colchis, the Persian threat, after this long and devastating war, did not become less frightening for the future.

At the same time in Europe the frontier on the Danube was succumbing to the pressure of the barbarians. In 540, the Huns put Thrace, Illyria, Greece to the Isthmus of Corinth and reached the approaches to Constantinople; in 547 and in 551. the Slavs devastated Illyria, and in 552 threatened Thessalonica; in 559 the Huns reappeared before the capital, saved with great difficulty thanks to the courage of old Belisarius.

In addition, Avars appear on the stage. Of course, none of these invasions established a lasting dominance of foreigners in the empire. But still the Balkan Peninsula was severely devastated. The empire paid dearly in the east for Justinian's triumphs in the west.

Defense measures and diplomacy. Nevertheless, Justinian sought to ensure the protection and security of the territory both in the west and in the east. By organizing large military commands entrusted to the masters of the army (magist ri militum), by creating military lines (limites) on all frontiers occupied by special troops (l imitanei), he restored in the face of the barbarians what was once called the "cover of the empire" (praetentura imperii) . But chiefly he erected on all frontiers a long line of fortresses, which occupied all important strategic points and formed several successive barriers against invasion; the whole territory behind them, for greater security, was covered with fortified castles. To this day, in many places, one can see the majestic ruins of the towers that towered by the hundreds in all the imperial provinces; they serve as magnificent evidence of that tremendous effort, thanks to which, according to the expression of Procopius, Justinian truly "saved the empire."

Finally, Byzantine diplomacy, in addition to military action, sought to secure the empire's prestige and influence throughout the outside world. Thanks to the clever distribution of favors and money, and the skillful ability to sow discord among the enemies of the empire, she brought under Byzantine rule the barbarian peoples who wandered on the borders of the monarchy, and made them safe. She included them in the sphere of influence of Byzantium by preaching Christianity. The activities of missionaries who spread Christianity from the shores of the Black Sea to the plateaus of Abyssinia and the oases of the Sahara were one of the most characteristic features of Byzantine politics in the Middle Ages.

Thus the empire created for itself a clientele of vassals; among them were the Arabs from Syria and Yemen, the Berbers from North Africa, the Lazians and Tsans on the borders of Armenia, the Heruli, the Gepids, the Lombards, the Huns on the Danube, up to the Frankish sovereigns of remote Gaul, in whose churches they prayed for the Roman emperor. Constantinople, where Justinian solemnly received the barbarian sovereigns, seemed to be the capital of the world. And although the aged emperor did, in the last years of his reign, allow the decline of the military establishments and too much carried away by the practice of ruinous diplomacy, which, by distributing money to the barbarians, aroused their dangerous desires, nevertheless it is certain that while the empire was strong enough to defend itself, its diplomacy , acting with the support of weapons, seemed to contemporaries a miracle of prudence, subtlety and insight; despite the heavy sacrifices that Justinian’s great ambition cost the empire, even his detractors recognized that “the natural desire of an emperor with a great soul is the desire to expand the empire and make it more glorious” (Procopius).