sign in sign up
<<
Home , Basilica

BOOK 13 The Time of the Emperor Constantine

1. (316) After the reign of Maximus Licinius, the most sacred and faithful , the son of Constantius Chlorus, began to reign e~ght days before the Kalends of August during the consulship of AD307 Severus and Haximianus. His reign lasted for 32 years. He was tall, ruddy, magnanimous, peaceable and dear to God. 2. In the time of his reign a great war broke out in the West. The most sacred Constantine went out against the barbarians, but was defeated and encircled by them. In his distress, when he was on the point of sleep, he prayed that he might be rescued from them. Overcome by sleep he saw in a dream a cross in the sky on which was inscribed, "In this, conquer". After reading the inscription on the cross, he awoke. He got up and made a standard (317) showing the cross, just as he had seen it in the sky, and had it carried before him. After urging on his army, saying, "Victory is ours", he set out and joined battle with the barbarians. He won the battle so completely that none of the barbarians survived but all perished. He returned to Romevictorious amidst great joy, with the standard of the cross carried before him. He explained to everyone the meaning of the vision and of the standard of the cross, saying, "This is the sign of the God of the Galileans who are known as Christians". Immediately he destroyed the and all the shrines of the Hellenes and opened up the Christian churches, sending imperial edicts everywhere that the churches of the Christians should be opened. After fasting and having taken instruction, he was baptised by Silvester, bishop of - he himself and his mother Helena and all his relatives and his friends and a whole host of other Romans. And so the emperor Constantine became a Christian. 3, He began a campaign against the Persians, was victorious and made a peace treaty with Sapor, the emperor of the Persians. It was the Persians who asked to have peace with the Romans. The emperor Constantine (318) also created the province of Euphratesia., dividing it off from and Osrhoene and granting the status of a metropolis to . On his return he came to Antioch the Great and built there the Great , a very large undertaking, after demolishing the public bath known as that of the emperor Philip, for the bath was old and ruined by time and unfit for bathing. He also built a hospice nearby, Likewise he built the basilica known as that of Rufinus; this had been a of Hermes which had been demolished by Rufinus, the prefect of the sacred praetorians, He had set out with the emperor on the campaign but·

1. Bo 316.1-5; LM436,31. 2. Bo 316.6-317.16; JN 77,52-3, 60, 3. Bo 317.17-318.22; JN 77.61. Sapor (317.18): written as 'Sarabaros' Ba, Book 13 173 was ordered by him to remain in Antioch the Great. He completed this .basilica while the emperor was returning to Rome. When the emperor Constantine was on the point of leaving Antioch, for the first time he made a Christian, a man named Plutarch, governor of Antioch in Syria. He was ordered to supervise the building of the church and the .basilica. During the building of the hospice Plutarch found the bronze statue of Poseidon, which had stood as a talisman to prevent the city from suffering an earthquake. He removed it, melted it down and made it into a statue of the emperor Constantine. He set it up outside his praetorium and inscribed beneath it ."BonoConstantino" (To Constantine the Good), This bronze statue stands to the present day. 4. In the great city of the Antiochenes the emperor, (319) during the consulship of Julius and Albinus, appointed for the first time a l\0335 con,e_c;Orient.i's to fill the position of praetorian prefect in the East, making the temple of the Muses his praetorium and choosing a Christian named Felicianus. He bestowed on the city of the Antiochenes by his sacred decree the rank and privileges of a second comitotus, in the year 383 according to the era of the great city of the Antiochenes. Formerly l\0334/S there had not been a comes Orient.i's stationed in Antioch the Great; when war started a deleqotor was stationed in Antioch in Syria and when the war finished the deleqc1tor was relieved, The emperor Constantine departed from Antioch, leaving the prefect Rufinus there. Rufinus energetically completed the basilica, and for this reason it was called the basilica of Rufinus. 5. The emperor Constantine sent his mother, lady Helena, to to seek for the precious Cross, She found the precious Cross, with the five nails, and brought it back. From that time prospered in every way. 6. The emperor created the province of Third . 7. During his reign, during the consulship of Gallicanus and l\0330 Symmachus, the former Byzantion was dedicated. The emperor Constantine made a lengthy processu-~ going from.Rome to Byzantion, He reconstructed the earlier (320) city wall, that of Byzas, and added another great extension to the wall and, joining this to the old city wall, he ordered the city to be called . He also completed the hippodrome and adorned it with bronze statues and with ornamentation of every kind. and built in it a .Jr<,tiJi..CWk.'1,just like the one in Rome, for the emperor to watch the races. He also built a large

4. Bo 318.23-319.13. Julius (319.1;): written as 'Illus' Ba. S. Bo 319.14-18; JN 77.63, 6. Bo 319.19-20. 7. Bo 319.20-321.S: CP 527.18-528,18 (AD328), 493.18-494.12 (AD197), C 193,6-7, GM499.15-18, 500,4-9, Gallicanus (319.21; corr Chil) CP: 'Gallianus' Ba. 1be emperor Constantine (319.22): 'The glorious emperor Constantine' CP. made a lengthy pn:,a;>~ ••• Byzantion (319,22-3): 'went from Rome and stayed in Nikomedeia, the metropolis of Bithynia, and made a lengthy processus at Byzantion' CP. the earlier city wall, that of Byzas (319,23-320,1): 'the earlier wall of the city of Byzas' Bo, CP; see Bury, 1897, 228.