CONSTANTINE I., known as "The Great" (288 ?-33 7 ), Roman emperor, was born on Feb. 27, probably A.D. 288, at Naissus (the modern Nish) in upper Moesia (Serbia). He was the illegitimate son of Constantius I. and Flavia Helena (described by St. Am brose as an innkeeper). While still a boy, Constantine was sent— practically as a hostage—to the Eastern court. He accompanied Diocletian to the East in 302, was invested with the rank of tri bunus primi ordinis and served under Galerius on the Danube. In 305 Diocletian and Maximian abdicated, and Constantius and Galerius became Augusti, while Severus and Maximin Daia at tained the rank of Caesars. Constantius now demanded from Galerius the restoration of his son, which was unwillingly granted; indeed, we are told that Constantine only escaped from the court of Galerius by flight, and evaded pursuit by carrying off all the post-horses! He found his father at Bononia (Boulogne) , on the point of crossing to Britain to repel an invasion of Picts and Scots. After gaining a victory, Constantius died at Eboracurn (York) and on July 25, 306, the army acclaimed his son as Augustus. Constantine, however, accepted the nomination of the army with feigned reluctance and wrote a carefully worded letter to Galerius, disclaiming responsibility for the action of the troops, but requesting recognition as Caesar. Galerius was not in a posi tion to refuse the request, in view of the temper of the western army, and for a year Constantine bore the title of Caesar not only in his own provinces, but in those of the East as well. He fought with success against the Franks and Alamanni, and reorganized the defences of the Rhine. The rising of Maxentius (q.v.) at Rome (Oct. 28), supported by his father Maximian (q.v.), led to the defeat, capture and death of the western Augustus, Severus. Maximian thereupon recognized Constantine as Augustus (A.D. 307) ; their alliance was confirmed by the marriage of Constan tine with Fausta, the daughter of Maximian, and the father and son-in-law held the consulship, which, however, was not recog nized in the East. Galerius now invaded Italy, but was forced by a mutiny of his troops to retire from the gates of Rome. Maxi mian urged Constantine to fall upon the flank of his retreating army, but he once more showed his determination to tread the strict path of legitimacy. In 308 Diocletian and Galerius held a conference at Carnuntum and determined to annul the actions of the Western rulers. Maximian was set aside, Licinius invested with the purple as Augustus of the West (Nov. I I), while the title filius Augustorum was conferred upon Constantine and Maximin Daia. Constantine tacitly ignored this arrangement ; he continued to bear the title of Augustus, and in 3o9, when he him self was proclaimed consul (with Licinius) in the East, no consuls were recognized in his dominions. In 31o, while Constantine was engaged in repelling an inroad of the Franks, Maximian endeav oured to resume the purple at Arelate (Arles). Constantine re turned in haste from the Rhine, and pursued Maximian to Mas silia, where he was captured and put to death. Since Constantine's legal title to the Empire of the West rested on his recognition by Maximian, he had now to seek for a new ground of legitimacy, and found it in the assertion of his descent from Claudius Gothicus (q.v.), who was represented as the father of Constantius Chlorus.
Constantine's patience was soon rewarded. In 31I Galerius died, and Maximin Daia (who had assumed the style of Augustus in 31o) at once marched to the shores of the Bosporus and at the same time entered into negotiations with Maxentius. This threw Licinius into the arms of Constantine, who entered into alliance with him and betrothed his half-sister Constantia to him. In the spring of 312 Constantine crossed the Alps, before Maxentius had completed his preparations. The force he commanded was of uncertain strength; according to his panegyrist (who may have underrated it) it consisted of about 25,000, according to Zonaras of nearly ioo,000 men. He stormed Susa, defeated Maxentius's generals at Turin and Verona, and marched straight for Rome. This bold move, which contrasted strongly with Constantine's usual caution, was, it would seem, the result of an event which, as told in Eusebius's Life of Constantine, takes the form of a conspicuous miracle—the Vision of the Flaming Cross which appeared in the sky at noonday with the legend 'Ev TOUTW vlrca ("By this conquer"), and led to Constantine's conversion to Christianity. Eusebius professes to have heard the story from the lips of Constantine ; but he wrote after the emperor's death, and it was evidently unknown to him in the shape given above when he wrote the Ecclesiastical History. The author of the De morti bus persecutorum was a well-informed contemporary, and he tells us that the sign was seen by Constantine in a dream ; and even Eusebius supplements the vision by day with a dream in the fol lowing night. In any case, Constantine adopted the monogram; (borne on the labarum [q.v.]) as his device.
Maxentius, trusting in superiority of numbers, marched out of Rome and prepared to dispute the passage of the Tiber at the Pons Mulvius (Ponte Molle), beside which a bridge of boats was constructed (see SAXA RTBRA). The army which Constantine had been training for six years at once proved its superiority. The Gallic cavalry swept the left wing of the enemy into the Tiber, and with it perished Maxentius, owing, as was said, to the collapse of the bridge of boats (Oct. 28, 312). The remainder of his troops surrendered at discretion and were incorporated by Con stantine in the ranks of his army, with the exception of the praetorian guard, which was finally disbanded.
Thus Constantine became undisputed master of Rome and the West, and Christianity, although not as yet adopted as the official religion, secured by the edict of Milan toleration throughout the empire. This edict was the result of a conference between Con stantine and Licinius in 313 at Milan, where the marriage of the latter with Constantia took place. In 314 war broke out between the two Augusti, owing, as we are told, to the treachery of Bassianus, the husband of Constantine's sister Anastasia, for whom he had claimed the rank of Caesar. After two hard-won victories Constantine made peace, Illyricum and Greece being added to his dominions. Constantine and Licinius held the consul ship in 315.
Peace was preserved for nearly nine years, during which the wise government of Constantine strengthened his position, while Licinius (who resumed the persecution of the Christians in 321) steadily lost ground. Great armaments were called into being by both emperors, and in the spring of 324 Licinius (whose forces are said to have been superior in numbers) declared war. He was twice defeated, first at Adrianople (July I) and afterwards at Chrysopolis (Sept. 18), when endeavouring to raise the siege of Byzantium, and was finally captured at Nicomedia. His life was spared on the intercession of Constantia and he was interned at Thessalonica, where he was executed in the following year on the charge of treasonable correspondence with the barbarians.
Constantine now reigned as sole emperor in East and West, presiding at the council of Nicaea (see under NICAEA and COUN CIL) in 325. In the following year his eldest son, Crispus, was banished to Pola and there put to death on a charge brought against him by Fausta. Shortly afterwards, as it would seem, Constantine became convinced of his innocence, and ordered Fausta to be executed. The precise nature of the circumstances remains a mystery.
In 326 Constantine determined to remove the seat of empire from Rome to the East, and before the close of the year the foundation-stone of Constantinople was laid. At least two other sites—Sardica and Troy—were considered before the emperor's choice fell on Byzantium. It is probable that this step was con nected with Constantine's decision to make Christianity the official religion of the empire. Rome was naturally the strong hold of paganism, to which the great majority of the senate clung with fervent devotion. Constantine did not wish to do open violence to this sentiment, and therefore resolved to found a new capital for the new empire of his creation. He announced that the site had been revealed to him in a dream ; the ceremony of inauguration was performed by Christian ecclesiastics on May II, 33o, when the city was dedicated to the Blessed Virgin.
In 332 Constantine was called in to aid the Sarmatians against the Goths, over whom his son gained a great victory. Two years later there was again fighting on the Danube, when 300,00o Sar matians were settled in Roman territory. In 335 a rebellion in Cyprus gave Constantine an excuse for executing the younger Licinius. In the same year he carried out a partition of the em pire between his three sons and his two nephews, Delmatius and Hannibalianus. The last named received the vassal-kingdom of Pontus with the title of rex regum, while the others ruled as Caesars in their several provinces. Constantine, however, retained the supreme government. Finally, in 337, Shapur (Sapor) II. of Persia asserted his claim to the provinces conquered by Diocletian, and war broke out. Constantine was preparing to lead his army in person, when he was taken ill and after a vain trial of the baths at Helenopolis, died at Ancyrona, a suburb of Nicomedia, on May 22, having received Christian baptism shortly before at the hands of Eusebius. He was buried in the church of the Apostles at Constantinople.
It has been said by Stanley that Constantine was entitled to be called "Great" in virtue rather of what he did than of what he was; and it is true that neither his intellectual nor his moral qualities were such as to earn the title. His claim to greatness rests mainly on the fact that he divined the future which lay be fore Christianity, and determined to enlist it in the service of his empire, and also on his achievement in completing the work be gun by Aurelian and Diocletian, by which the quasi-constitutional monarchy or "principate" of Augustus was transformed into the naked absolutism sometimes called the "dominate." There is no reason to doubt the sincerity of Constantine's conversion to Christianity, although we may not attribute to him the fervent piety which Eusebius ascribes to him, nor accept as genuine the discourses which pass under his name. The moral precepts of the new religion were not without influence upon his life, and he caused his sons to receive a Christian education. Motives of political expediency, hov.-wer, caused him to delay the full recog nition of Christianity as the religion of the state until he became sole ruler of the empire, although he not merely secured toleration for it immediately after his victory over Maxentius, but inter vened in the Donatist controversy as early as 313, and presided at the council of Arles in the following year. By a series of enact ments, immunities and privileges of various kinds were conferred on the Catholic Church and clergy—heretics being specifically ex cluded—and the emperor's attitude towards paganism gradually revealed itself as one of contemptuous toleration. From being the established religion of the state it sank into a mere superstitio. At the same time its rites were allowed to subsist except where they were held to be subversive of morality, and even in the closing years of Constantine's reign we find legislation in favour of the municipal Amines and collegia. In 333, or later, a cult of the Gens Flavia, as the Imperial family was called, was established at Hispellum (Spello) ; the offering of sacrifices in the new temple was., however, strictly prohibited. Nor was it until after Constan tine's final triumph over Licinius that pagan symbols disappeared from the coinage and the Christian monogram (which had already been used as a mint mark) became a prominent device. From this time forward the Arian controversy demanded the emperor's con stant attention, and by his action in presiding at the council of Nicaea and afterwards pronouncing sentence of banishment against Athanasius he not only identified himself more openly than ever with Christianity, but showed a determination to assert his suprem acy in ecclesiastical affairs, holding no doubt that, as the office of pontifex maximus gave him the supreme control of religious matters throughout the empire, the regulation of Christianity fell within his province. In this matter his discernment failed him. It had been comparatively easy to apply coercion to the Dona tists, whose resistence to the temporal power was not wholly due to spiritual considerations, but was largely the result of less pure motives ; but the Arian controversy raised fundamental issues, which to the mind of Constantine appeared capable of compro mise, but in reality, as Athanasius rightly discerned, disclosed vital differences of doctrine. The result foreshadowed the process by which the church which Constantine hoped to mould into an instrument of absolutism became its most determined opponent. It is unnecessary to give more than a passing mention to the legend according to which Constantine, smitten with leprosy after the execution of Crispus and Fausta, received absolution and bap tism from Silvester I. and by his Donation to the bishop of Rome laid the foundation of the temporal power of the papacy (see DONATION OF CONSTANTINE).
The political system of Constantine was the final result of a process which, though it had lasted as long as the empire, had assumed a marked form under Aurelian. It was Aurelian who surrounded the imperial person with oriental pomp, wearing the diadem and the jewelled robe, and assuming the style of dominus and even deus, who assimilated Italy to the condition of the provinces and gave official furtherance to the economic process by which a regime of status replaced a regime of contract. Diocle tian endeavoured to secure the new despotism against military usurpation by an elaborate system of co-regency with two lines of succession, bearing the names of Jovii and Herculii, but main tained by adoption and not by hereditary succession. This arti ficial system was destroyed by Constantine, who established dynastic absolutism in favour of his own family, the Gens Flavia, evidence of whose cult is found both in Italy and in Africa. To form a court he created a new official aristocracy to replace the senatorial order, which the military emperors of the 3rd century A.D. had reduced to practical insignificance. Upon this aristocracy he showered titles and distinctions, such as the revised patriciate, which carried with them the coveted immunity from fiscal bur dens. As the senate was now a quantite negligeable, Constantine could afford to readmit its members freely to the career of pro vincial administration, which had been almost closed to them since the reign of Gallienus, and to accord to it certain empty privileges such as the free election of quaestors and praetors, while on the other hand the right of the senator to be tried by his peers was taken away and he was placed under the jurisdiction of the provincial governor.
In the administration of the empire Constantine completed the work of Diocletian by effecting the separation of civil from mili tary functions. Under him the praefecti praetorio ceased entirely to perform military duties and became the heads of the civil administration, more especially in the matter of jurisdiction : in 331 their decisions were made final and no appeal to the emperor was permitted. The civil governors of the provinces (vicarii and praesides) had no control of the military forces, which were com manded by duces; and not content with the security against usurpation which was afforded by this division of power, Constan tine employed the comites who formed a large element in the official aristocracy to supervise and report upon their conduct of affairs (see CouNT), as well as an army of so-called agentes in rebus who, under colour of inspecting the Imperial posting serv ice, carried on a wholesale system of espionage. In the organiza tion of the army Constantine was responsible for the creation of the great commands under the magistri pediturn and equitum,. He also introduced the practice of placing barbarians, especially Ger mans, in posts of high responsibility.
The organization of society in strictly hereditary corporations or professions was no doubt partly completed before the acces sion of Constantine ; but his legislation contributed to rivet the fetters which bound each individual to the caste from which he sprang. Such originales are mentioned in Constantine's earliest laws, and in 332 the hereditary status of the agricultural colonus was recognized and enforced. Above all, the municipal decuriones on whom the responsibility for raising taxation rested saw every avenue of escape closed against them. In 326 they were forbidden to acquire immunity by joining the ranks of the Christian clergy. It was the interest of the government by such means to secure the regular payment of the heavy fiscal burdens both in money and in kind which had been laid on the subjects of the empire by Diocletian and were certainly not diminished by Constantine. One of our ancient authorities speaks of him as having been for o years an excellent ruler, for 12 a robber and for o a spendthrift, and he was constantly forced to make fresh exactions in order to enrich his favourites and to carry out such extravagant projects as the building of a new capital. To him are due the taxes, known as collatio glebalis, levied on the estates of senators, and collatio lustralis, levied on the profits of trade.
In general legislation the reign of Constantine was a time of feverish activity. Nearly 3oo of his enactments are preserved to us in the Codes, especially that of Theodosius. They display a genuine desire for reform and distinct traces of Christian influ ence; e.g., in their humane provisions as to the treatment of prisoners and slaves and the penalties imposed on offences against morality. Nevertheless, they are often crude in conception as well as turgid in style, and were manifestly drafted by official rhetori cians rather than by trained legists. Like Diocletian, Constantine believed that the time had come for society to be remodelled by the fiat of despotic authority, and it is significant that from hence forth we meet with the undisguised assertion that the will of the emperor is the sole fountain of law. Constantine, in fact, embodies the spirit of absolute authority which, both in church and State, was to prevail for many centuries.