The New International Encyclopædia/Justinian I.

​JUSTIN′IAN I., Flavius Anicius Justinianus (483–565). Byzantine Emperor from 527 to 565. He was born probably May 11, 483, in the village of Tauresium, in Illyricum. His name was Uprauda, which he changed to Justinian. Although of obscure parentage, he shared the success of his maternal uncle, Justin I. (q.v.), being invited at an early age to Constantinople, where he received a careful education. When his uncle was elevated to the purple, in 518, he promoted his nephew to one position after another, and in 527, by the advice of the Senate, proclaimed him his colleague in the Empire. Justin survived the step but a few months, and Justinian was crowned as sole Emperor. His long reign is the most brilliant in the history of the later Empire. Although himself without taste or capacity for military command, he had the skill to select able generals, such as Belisarius and Narses. In his first war—that with Persia—he concluded a treaty by which a long-threatened crisis was warded off temporarily; but the rejoicings for this terminated in a domestic revolution. A conflict of the so-called Blue and Green factions in the circus in 532 was an outburst of political discontent, which went so far as to elect a rival Emperor, Hypatius. Justinian was struck with dismay, and made preparations for flight; but the vigor and determination of his Empress, Theodora (q.v.), arrested the revolt. Belisarius, with a relentless hand, repressed the tumult, 30,000 victims having, it is said, fallen in a single day. By the arms of Belisarius the Vandal Kingdom of Africa was reannexed to the Empire (533–534); and the same general and his successor, Narses, restored the Imperial authority in Rome as well as in Northern Italy and a portion of Spain (535–554). His second war with Persia (c.540–562) was ended by Justinian’s agreeing to pay an annual tribute. The Slavs and Huns were constantly attacking the Empire on the north and ravaging its territory, so that, in spite of his conquests, he left a weak empire to his successor. He died November 14, 565.

Justinian was a great builder of aqueducts, fortresses, churches (Saint Sophia), quays, harbors, and monasteries. These, together with the sums needed for his wars, involved an enormous expenditure, and the fiscal administration of Justinian, in consequence, pressed heavily on the public resources and on the people. It is, however, as a legislator that Justinian has gained his greatest renown. Immediately on his accession he appointed a committee of lawyers, with Tribonianus (q.v.) as chairman, to collect all previous legislative enactments which were still in force, and to compile a code. (See Code.) The authoritative commentaries of the jurists were next collected, digested, and published under the title of Pandects (q.v.). The code was republished in 534 with the addition of Justinian’s own Constitutions. The third great legal undertaking was the composition of a systematic treatise on the laws for the guidance of students and lawyers. This was published a month before the Digest, under the title of Institutiones, i.e. “Institutes.” It is difficult, from the character of his acts and from the nature of our sources ​(see Procopius) to form a just estimate of Justinian. There is no doubt of his ability and industry, but he was unscrupulous, vain, and easily influenced. He was passionately devoted to theology, and wrote hymns and controversial works. For the vexed question of his attitude toward the Church, consult Hutton, Church of the Sixth Century (New York, 1897). For his reign and life, consult: Gibbon, Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, ed. Bury (London, 1896–1900); Bury, Later Roman Empire (London, 1889); Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, vol. iv. (Oxford, 1880); Finlay, History of Greece (London, 1877).