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Constantius II (Latin: Flavius Julius Constantius
Augustus; Greek: Κωνστάντιος; 7 August 317 – 3 November 361) was Roman
Emperor from 337 to 361. His reign saw constant warfare on the borders
against the Sasanian Empire and Germanic peoples, while internally the
Roman Empire went through repeated civil wars and usurpations. His
religious policies inflamed domestic conflicts that would continue after
his death.
The second son of Constantine I and Fausta,
Constantius was made Caesar by his father in 324. He led the Roman army
in war against the Sasanian Empire in 336. A year later, Constantine I
died, and Constantius became Augustus with his brothers Constantine II
and Constans. He promptly oversaw the massacre of eight of his
relatives, consolidating his hold on power. The brothers divided the
empire among themselves, with Constantius receiving the eastern
provinces. In 340, his brothers Constantine and Constans clashed over
the western provinces of the empire. The resulting conflict left
Constantine dead and Constans as ruler of the west. The war against the
Sasanians continued, with Constantius losing a major battle at Singara
in 344. Constans was overthrown and assassinated in 350 by the usurper
Magnentius.
Unwilling to accept Magnentius as co-ruler,
Constantius waged a civil war against the usurper, defeating him at the
battles of Mursa Major in 351 and Mons Seleucus in 353. Magnentius
committed suicide after the latter battle, leaving Constantius as sole
ruler of the empire. In 351, Constantius elevated his cousin Constantius
Gallus to the subordinate rank of Caesar to rule in the east, but had
him executed three years later after receiving scathing reports of his
violent and corrupt nature. Shortly thereafter, in 355, Constantius
promoted his last surviving cousin, Gallus' younger half-brother Julian,
to the rank of Caesar.
As emperor, Constantius promoted Arian
Christianity, persecuted pagans by banning sacrifices and closing pagan
temples and issued laws discriminating against Jews. His military
campaigns against Germanic tribes were successful: he defeated the
Alamanni in 354 and campaigned across the Danube against the Quadi and
Sarmatians in 357. The war against the Sasanians, which had been in a
lull since 350, erupted with renewed intensity in 359 and Constantius
traveled to the east in 360 to restore stability after the loss of
several border fortresses to the Sasanians. However, Julian claimed the
rank of Augustus in 360, leading to war between the two after
Constantius' attempts to convince Julian to back down failed. No battle
was fought, as Constantius became ill and died of fever on 3 November
361 in Mopsuestia, naming Julian as his rightful successor before his
death.
Constantius was born in 317 at Sirmium, Pannonia.
He was the third son of Constantine the Great, and second by his second
wife Fausta, the daughter of Maximian. Constantius was made Caesar by
his father on 13 November 324. In 336, religious unrest in Armenia and
tense relations between Constantine and king Shapur II caused war to
break out between Rome and Sassanid Persia. Though he made initial
preparations for the war, Constantine fell ill and sent Constantius east
to take command of the eastern frontier. Before Constantius arrived,
the Persian general Narses, who was possibly the king's brother, overran
Mesopotamia and captured Amida. Constantius promptly attacked Narses,
and after suffering minor setbacks defeated and killed Narses at the
Battle of Narasara. Constantius captured Amida and initiated a major
refortification of the city, enhancing the city's circuit walls and
constructing large towers. He also built a new stronghold in the
hinterland nearby, naming it Antinopolis.
Gold solidus of Constantius Gallus. A paternal
cousin of Constantius, he was made Caesar by Constantius in 350 and was
married to the Emperor's sister, Constantina. However, his mismanagement
of the eastern provinces led to his downfall and death in 354.
In early 337, Constantius hurried to Constantinople
after receiving news that his father was near death After Constantine
died, Constantius buried him with lavish ceremony in the Church of the
Holy Apostles.[9] Soon after his father's death Constantius supposedly
ordered a massacre of his relatives descended from the second marriage
of his paternal grandfather Constantius Chlorus, though the details are
unclear. Eutropius, writing between 350 and 370, states that Constantius
merely sanctioned “the act, rather than commanding it”. The massacre
killed two of Constantius' uncles and six of his cousins,[13] including
Hannibalianus and Dalmatius, rulers of Pontus and Moesia respectively.
The massacre left Constantius, his older brother Constantine II, his
younger brother Constans, and three cousins Gallus, Julian and
Nepotianus as the only surviving male relatives of Constantine the
Great.
Soon after, Constantius met his brothers in
Pannonia at Sirmium to formalize the partition of the empire.
Constantius received the eastern provinces, including Constantinople,
Thrace, Asia Minor, Syria, Egypt, and Cyrenaica; Constantine received
Britannia, Gaul, Hispania, and Mauretania; and Constans, initially under
the supervision of Constantine II, received Italy, Africa, Illyricum,
Pannonia, Macedonia, and Achaea.
Constantius then hurried east to Antioch to resume
the war with Persia. While Constantius was away from the eastern
frontier in early 337, King Shapur II assembled a large army, which
included war elephants, and launched an attack on Roman territory,
laying waste to Mesopotamia and putting the city of Nisibis under
siege.[18] Despite initial success, Shapur lifted his siege after his
army missed an opportunity to exploit a collapsed wall. When Constantius
learned of Shapur's withdrawal from Roman territory, he prepared his
army for a counter-attack.
Constantius repeatedly defended the eastern border
against invasions by the aggressive Sassanid Empire under Shapur. These
conflicts were mainly limited to Sassanid sieges of the major fortresses
of Roman Mesopotamia, including Nisibis (Nusaybin), Singara, and Amida
(Diyarbakir). Although Shapur seems to have been victorious in most of
these confrontations, the Sassanids were able to achieve little.
However, the Romans won a decisive victory at the Battle of Narasara,
killing Shapur's brother, Narses. Ultimately, Constantius was able to
push back the invasion, and Shapur failed to make any significant gains.
Meanwhile, Constantine II desired to retain control
of Constans' realm, leading the brothers into open conflict.
Constantine was killed in 340 near Aquileia during an ambush. As a
result, Constans took control of his deceased brother's realms and
became sole ruler of the Western two-thirds of the empire. This division
lasted until 350, when Constans was assassinated by forces loyal to the
usurper Magnentius.
As the only surviving son of Constantine the Great,
Constantius felt that the position of emperor was his alone,[23] and he
determined to march west to fight the usurper, Magnentius. However,
feeling that the east still required some sort of imperial presence, he
elevated his cousin Constantius Gallus to Caesar of the eastern
provinces. As an extra measure to ensure the loyalty of his cousin, he
married the elder of his two sisters, Constantina, to him.
Before facing Magnentius, Constantius first came to
terms with Vetranio, a loyal general in Illyricum who had recently been
acclaimed emperor by his soldiers. Vetranio immediately sent letters to
Constantius pledging his loyalty, which Constantius may have accepted
simply in order to stop Magnentius from gaining more support. These
events may have been spurred by the action of Constantina, who had since
traveled east to marry Gallus. Constantius subsequently sent Vetranio
the imperial diadem and acknowledged the general‘s new position as
Augustus. However, when Constantius arrived, Vetranio willingly resigned
his position and accepted Constantius’ offer of a comfortable
retirement in Bithynia.
In 351, Constantius clashed with Magnentius in
Pannonia with a large army. The ensuing Battle of Mursa Major was one of
the largest and bloodiest battles ever between two Roman armies. The
result was a victory for Constantius, but a costly one. Magnentius
survived the battle and, determined to fight on, withdrew into northern
Italy. Rather than pursuing his opponent, however, Constantius turned
his attention to securing the Danubian border, where he spent the early
months of 352 campaigning against the Sarmatians along the middle
Danube. After achieving his aims, Constantius advanced on Magnentius in
Italy. This action led the cities of Italy to switch their allegiance to
him and eject the usurper's garrisons. Again, Magnentius withdrew, this
time to southern Gaul.
In 353, Constantius and Magnentius met for the
final time at the Battle of Mons Seleucus in southern Gaul, and again
Constantius emerged the Victor. Magnentius, realizing the futility of
continuing his position, committed suicide on 10 August 353.
Sole ruler of the empire
Constantius spent much of the rest of 353 and early
354 on campaign against the Alamanni on the Danube frontier. The
campaign was successful and raiding by the Alamanni ceased temporarily.
In the meantime, Constantius had been receiving disturbing reports
regarding the actions of his cousin Gallus.[31] Possibly as a result of
these reports, Constantius concluded a peace with the Alamanni and
traveled to Mediolanum (Milan).
In Mediolanum, Constantius first summoned
Ursicinus, Gallus’ magister equitum, for reasons that remain
unclear.[33] Constantius then summoned Gallus and Constantina. Although
Gallus and Constantina complied with the order at first, when
Constantina died in Bithynia, Gallus began to hesitate. However, after
some convincing by one of Constantius’ agents, Gallus continued his
journey west, passing through Constantinople and Thrace to Poetovio
(Ptuj) in Pannonia.
In Poetovio, Gallus was arrested by the soldiers of
Constantius under the command of Barbatio. Gallus was then moved to
Pola and interrogated. Gallus claimed that it was Constantina who was to
blame for all the trouble while he was in charge of the eastern
provinces.[39] This angered Constantius so greatly that he immediately
ordered Gallus' execution. He soon changed his mind, however, and
recanted the order. Unfortunately for Gallus, this second order was
delayed by Eusebius, one of Constantius' eunuchs, and Gallus was
executed.
Religious issues
Constantius II depicted in the Chronography of 354 dispensing largesse (a Renaissance copy of a Carolingian copy)
In spite of some of the edicts issued by
Constantius, he never made any attempt to disband the various Roman
priestly colleges or the Vestal Virgins, he never acted against the
various pagan schools, and, at times, he actually made some effort to
protect paganism. In fact, he even ordered the election of a priest for
Africa. Also, he remained pontifex maximus and was deified by the Roman
Senate after his death. His relative moderation toward paganism is
reflected by the fact that it was over twenty years after his death,
during the reign of Gratian, that any pagan senator protested his
treatment of their religion.
Christianity
Although often considered an Arian, Constantius
ultimately preferred a third, compromise version that lay somewhere in
between Arianism and the Nicene Creed, retrospectively called
Semi-Arianism.[46][47] During his reign he attempted to mold the
Christian church to follow this compromise position, convening several
Christian councils. The most notable of these were the Council of Rimini
and its twin at Seleucia, which met in 359 and 360 respectively.
"Unfortunately for his memory the theologians whose advice he took were
ultimately discredited and the malcontents whom he pressed to conform
emerged victorious," writes the historian A.H.M. Jones. "The great
councils of 359–60 are therefore not reckoned ecumenical in the
tradition of the church, and Constantius II is not remembered as a
restorer of unity, but as a heretic who arbitrarily imposed his will on
the church."
Judaism faced some severe restrictions under
Constantius, who seems to have followed an anti-Jewish policy in line
with that of his father.[57] Early in his reign, Constantius issued a
double edict in concert with his brothers limiting the ownership of
slaves by Jewish people[58] and banning marriages between Jews and
Christian women.[58] A later edict issued by Constantius after becoming
sole emperor decreed that a person who was proven to have converted from
Christianity to Judaism would have all of his property confiscated by
the state.[59] However, Constantius' actions in this regard may not have
been so much to do with Jewish religion as with Jewish
business—apparently, privately owned Jewish businesses were often in
competition with state-owned businesses. As a result, Constantius may
have sought to provide an advantage to state-owned businesses by
limiting the skilled workers and slaves available to Jewish businesses.
On 11 August 355, the magister militum Claudius
Silvanus revolted in Gaul. Silvanus had surrendered to Constantius after
the Battle of Mursa Major. Constantius had made him magister militum in
353 with the purpose of blocking the German threats, a feat that
Silvanus achieved by bribing the German tribes with the money he had
collected. A plot organized by members of Constantius' court led the
emperor to recall Silvanus. After Silvanus revolted, he received a
letter from Constantius recalling him to Milan, but which made no
reference to the revolt. Ursicinus, who was meant to replace Silvanus,
bribed some troops, and Silvanus was killed.
Constantius realised that too many threats still
faced the Empire, however, and he could not possibly handle all of them
by himself. So on 6 November 355, he elevated his last remaining male
relative, Julian, to the rank of Caesar. A few days later, Julian was
married to Helena, the last surviving sister of Constantius.[62]
Constantius soon sent Julian off to Gaul.
Constantius spent the next few years overseeing
affairs in the western part of the empire primarily from his base at
Mediolanum. In 357 he visited Rome for the only time in his life. The
same year, he forced Sarmatian and Quadi invaders out of Pannonia and
Moesia Inferior, then led a successful counter-attack across the Danube.
In the winter of 357–58, Constantius received
ambassadors from Shapur II who demanded that Rome restore the lands
surrendered by Narseh. Despite rejecting these terms, Constantius tried
to avert war with the Sassanid Empire by sending two embassies to Shapur
II. Shapur II nevertheless launched another invasion of Roman
Mesopotamia. In 360, when news reached Constantius that Shapur II had
destroyed Singara, and taken Kiphas (Hasankeyf), Amida, and Ad Tigris (Cizre), he decided to travel east to face the re-emergent threat.
Usurpation of Julian and crises in the east
Missorium of Kerch depicting Constantius II on horseback with a spear. He is preceded by victory and accompanied by a guardsman.
In the meantime, Julian had won some victories
against the Alamanni, who had once again invaded Roman Gaul. However,
when Constantius requested reinforcements from Julian's army for the
eastern campaign, the Gallic legions revolted and proclaimed Julian
Augustus.
On account of the immediate Sassanid threat,
Constantius was unable to directly respond to his cousin's usurpation,
other than by sending missives in which he tried to convince Julian to
resign the title of Augustus and be satisfied with that of Caesar. By
361, Constantius saw no alternative but to face the usurper with force,
and yet the threat of the Sassanids remained. Constantius had already
spent part of early 361 unsuccessfully attempting to re-take the
fortress of Ad Tigris. After a time he had withdrawn to Antioch to
regroup and prepare for a confrontation with Shapur II.[ The campaigns
of the previous year had inflicted heavy losses on the Sassanids,
however, and they did not attempt another round of campaigns that year.
This temporary respite in hostilities allowed Constantius to turn his
full attention to facing Julian.
Death
Constantius immediately gathered his forces and set
off west. However, by the time he reached Mopsuestia in Cilicia, it was
clear that he was fatally ill and would not survive to face Julian.
Apparently, realising his death was near, Constantius had himself
baptised by Euzoius, the Semi-Arian bishop of Antioch, and then declared
that Julian was his rightful successor.[80] Constantius II died of
fever on 3 November 361.
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