CONSTANTINE (Imp. Caesar Flavius Valerius Constantinus Augustus), ROMAN EMPEROR, known as the GREAT.
SUMMARY. -
I. Life
II. Personality
III. Ecclesiastical policy
IV. Personal piety
V. Political motives for Constantine’s conversion
VI. Caesaropapism of Constantine
VII. Constantine in legend and cult
VIII. Constantinian constructions in Rome and Palestine
IX. Constantine’s Donation.I. Life
He was born in Naissus (Dacia) on 22 February, no earlier than 280 (according to Seck in 288), to Caesar Constantius I and Helena; he died in the villa of Achyron, near Nicomedia, on 22 May 337. In 289 Constantius separated from Helena and married Theodora, stepdaughter of Maximian Herculius. Constantine was educated at the court of Diocletian and Galerius in the East, kept there almost as a hostage. After the abdication of Diocletian and Maximian (1 May 305), Constantius, having become first Augustus, summoned his son to Gaul, and when he died shortly afterwards at Eboracum (York), the troops proclaimed Constantine emperor (25 July 306). At the same time in Rome, Maxentius, son of Maximian, proclaimed himself emperor (28 October 306), with his father’s support. Maximian and Maxentius formed an alliance with Constantine against Galerius, and Constantine married Fausta, daughter of Maximian, who had already been intended for him. Maximian and Maxentius recognized him as Augustus, but the consulship of Constantine and Maximian for 307 was not recognized in the East. Soon Maximian, having quarrelled with Maxentius, fled to Constantine in Gaul. Since he seemed also to be plotting against his son-in-law, Constantine had him imprisoned and executed (according to others he died by suicide) in July 310.
After the death of Galerius (May 311), the two emperors of the East, the Augustus Licinius and the Caesar Maximin Daia, fell into discord: Daia took the side of Maxentius, Licinius instead drew near to Constantine and married his half-sister Constantia. In the spring of 312 Constantine began the war against Maxentius and defeated him at the battle of the Milvian Bridge (28 October 312), in which Maxentius met his death. The Senate gave Constantine the title of first Augustus. In February 313 Constantine met Licinius at Milan, where they celebrated the marriage of Licinius to Constantia and issued the so-called “Edict of Milan” (see infra). After returning to Gaul, the first war between Constantine and Licinius broke out. Constantine defeated him at Cibalae (near Sirmium) and in the peace kept for himself Illyricum, thus making himself master of a good half of the empire. In 315 Constantine and Licinius were consuls. New disputes, in which the persecution of Christians resumed by Licinius in 321 was not unconnected, caused a second war in which Licinius was defeated at Adrianople (3 July 323), then at Chrysopolis in Asia Minor (18 September 323) and finally shut up in Nicomedia. Constantia intervened, and Constantine promised mercy; but conspiracies of Licinius with the barbarians gave Constantine cause to have him executed (324). Thus, after 40 years of divisions, Constantine remained sole head of the empire.
On 20 May 325 Constantine was present at the opening of the Council of Nicaea. From July to September 326 he stayed in Rome, and at this time he decreed the death of his eldest son Crispus at Pola. The reasons for this decision are obscure; it seems there was a palace intrigue involving Fausta, stepmother of Crispus. Convinced later of Crispus’s innocence through the intervention of his mother Helena, Constantine had Fausta executed. On 26 November 326 he laid the first stone of Constantinople, the new capital which was solemnly inaugurated on 11 May 330. Of the three sons he had by Fausta he had already given the title of Caesar, in 317, to Constantine (II), and in 323–24 to Constantius (II).
In 333 he also appointed the last, Constans, and in 335 Dalmatius, son of his half-brother Julius Constantius. Evidently he intended to revive Diocletian’s tetrarchy, entrusting it to his kinsmen. Hannibalianus, younger brother of Dalmatius, married Constantia, daughter of Constantine, and received the kingdom of Pontus. In 337, during preparations for a war against Shapur II, king of Persia, Constantine fell ill and died, having been baptized by Eusebius, bishop of Nicomedia. His body was buried in the basilica of the Apostles in Constantinople.
II. Personality
He is without doubt one of the greatest figures among the Roman emperors and his reign one of the most fortunate. His character “is above all that of a passionate and daring man: in the army he inspires men and is a bold strategist; at court he loves display, magnificence, poses as a fine man and a wit, and always takes pleasure in acting, in creating. He seeks to adorn, to win the hearts of his subjects and to secure the attention of posterity. To satisfy his ambition or even his vanity, he spares no reforms or expenditure, without calculating the consequences or repercussions, because his decisions, for the most part, are sudden. He is impulsive, yielding to influences, but also highly conscious of his mission. His passion for dominion is sustained and as it were magnified by his sense of duty and his confidence in his destiny” (J. R. Palanque).In a sense Constantine is the first true sovereign of the Roman Empire, whereas the emperors from Augustus to the whole of the 2nd century were rather supreme magistrates, and those of the 3rd were conciliators or dictators. The Byzantine emperors, as well as Charlemagne and the medieval emperors, felt themselves and were much more successors of Constantine than of Augustus or Trajan. Modern historians often treat Constantine with a certain ill-will, partly due to the legitimate tendency to reduce to proper proportions the enormous enthusiasm of his contemporaries, but more than anything because of his religious policy.
III. ECCLESIASTICAL POLICY
When Constantine took power, the persecution had long since ceased in the West in fact, in the East it had done so since 311 thanks to Galerius’s edict. Arguing from Eusebius (Hist. eccl., IX, 9, 12), some (Burckhardt, Boissier; against: K. Bihlmeyer, Das angebl. Toleranzedikt K. von 312, in Theol. Quartalschr., 96 [1914], pp. 65–100) have supposed that Constantine issued a toleration edict before the battle of the Milvian Bridge. It is certain that at the meeting with Licinius at Milan (February 313) the norms to be followed in the matter of the Christians were established, from which resulted the edict issued by Licinius in the name of both emperors at Nicomedia on 13 June 313 (full text in Lactantius, De mort. pers. 58; excerpt in Eusebius, Hist. eccl., X, 5, 2–3), briefly called the “Edict of Milan,” of which here is the summary: 1) The Christians, like all others, may follow their own religion. 2) The laws issued in the past against the Christians are abolished. 3) Places of worship must be restored to the Christians without obligation of ransom: if after confiscation they have passed into private hands, these may claim compensation from the treasury.Among the laws subsequently issued by Constantine in favour of the Church, the principal ones are: in 313 or 315 immunity from tributum and from munera (Cod. Theod., XI 1, 1); exemption for clerics from “public munera.” In 321 Sunday is recognized as a holiday; churches are declared capable of accepting testamentary legacies (Cod. Theod., XVI 2, 4). In 321 and 333 the arbitration of bishops (audientia episcopalis) is made obligatory even if invoked by only one of the two parties (this last clause was abolished by Arcadius in 398 and Honorius in 408); from the arbitration of bishops there is no appeal to civil judgment.
Besides this Constantine enriched the churches, especially those of
Rome, gifts and benefactions (on Constantine’s buildings in Rome, Constantinople, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, see individual entries, and below)
and his representatives, and desired the propagation of the faith (on Constantine’s letter to Shapur, king of the Persians, cf. N. H. Baynes, *Constantine the Great and the Christian Church*, p. 26).
There was certainly an evolution in his religious thought. Modern authors have sought to establish the stages: solar syncretism, philosophical monotheism, superstitious Christianity (cf. J. R. Palanque, in Fliche-Martin-Frutaz, III, pp. 30-34); however, one must take into account that Constantine does not seem to have been a thinker capable of subtle distinctions, but rather a practical realist. On the other hand, the expressions of pagan panegyrists, the fact that pagan emblems still appeared on Constantine’s coins for years, the title *Pontifex Maximus* (which was suppressed only by Gratian in 382), cannot be decisive in judging his religious stance. Likewise, the conviction that had taken root in him of a divine vision or manifestation granted to him before the victory over Maxentius, and the dream that led him to choose Byzantium as his new capital (Cod. Theod., XIII, 5, 7; Sozomen, *Hist. eccl.*, II, 3), are not sufficient to make of him a habitual dreamer or a mystic.
The Vision of 312. — A panegyric of 313 (Kirch, *Enchirid.* n. 363) and another of 321 (ibid., n. 392) allude to the vision; Lattanzio (*De mort. pers.*, 4), Eusebius (*Hist. eccl.*, IX, 9, 1-11; *De vita Const.*, I, 27-29), Socrates (*Hist. eccl.*, I, 2, 5-10), Sozomen (*Hist. eccl.*, I, 3), Philostorgius (*Hist. eccl.*, fragm. 6), Gelasius of Cyzicus (*Hist. conc. Nicaeni*, I, 4, 1) recount it, differing on details: according to Lattanzio, the vision would have occurred in a dream on the night before the Battle of the Milvian Bridge; according to Eusebius (*De vita Const.*), much earlier, when Constantine was still on the march, and in broad daylight, he shared it even with his soldiers; according to Philostorgius, it was a vision of stars. Since these accounts must derive from Constantine’s own testimony, it is possible that he himself varied the details, as often happens when someone repeatedly and complacently recounts an episode from his youth. The substance of the event cannot reasonably be doubted.
V. POLITICAL MOTIVES FOR CONSTANTINE’S CONVERSION
When Constantine assumed power, the general situation, especially in the West, was not such as to demand a Christian-friendly policy. Christians were still a minority (not much more than 10% of an empire estimated at 50 million) and had never formed a political party nor taken part in the internal struggles for the conquest of the empire. The prejudices of the masses and the educated classes against them still persisted. Constantine would have had reason, especially in the West, not to introduce changes that would have shocked public opinion and to continue the administrative direction given to the empire by Diocletian. By taking up the cause of the Christian God, Constantine could not have expected to derive any advantage from them in the struggle against Maxentius, since the latter did not persecute Christians but had even begun to restore their confiscated goods (Optatus, *Contra Parmenianum*, I, 18). Just as the campaign against Maxentius had no religious character, so too Constantine’s conversion, if it occurred during this campaign, could not have been purely political in nature. One can speak of political motives only in the sense that Constantine, having well perceived the disastrous consequences for the empire of Diocletian and Galerius’s persecutory policy, must have felt compelled not to repeat their error; but this is rather a commitment to govern the state well than a political calculation.VI. CONSTANTINE’S CAESAROPAPISM
In a certain respect, Constantine can be considered the first representative of the system that modern historians call caesaropapism, that is, the system that regards the prince as the head, in a certain sense, of the Church as well. Constantine considered it his duty to promote the interests of the Church, and for this purpose he convened councils, issued laws, and made provisions concerning ecclesiastical matters, to such an extent that one might think he was little concerned with the primacy of the Roman Pope. “The disproportion is extraordinary between his magnificence toward the Roman Church and the small place he grants to the pope in his ecclesiastical policy” (Batiffol). Certain of his dispositions after the Council of Nicaea, when under the influence of his sister Constantia and Eusebius of Nicomedia he lent himself to the intrigues of the Arians, were very harmful to the Church. Nevertheless, it can be said that Constantine, rather than governing the Church, intended to be its great benefactor; not to regulate the “creed” of his subjects, as his son and successor Constantius did, but to remove the divisions that heretics were creating within it, thus in a way anticipating the theory of the secular arm of the medieval Empire. And the bishops, especially in the East, dazzled by this unexpected benevolence following the most atrocious persecution, considered themselves bound by an unlimited devotion to him, imagining that every good for the Church would henceforth come from the Emperor. In all the acts that appear to us as caesaropapist, Constantine was induced by the prayers of the bishops. Thus, without being a caesaropapist by principle, he inaugurated this system in the Byzantine Church.VII. CONSTANTINE IN LEGEND AND CULT
Constantine, it seems, was not, like so many other great figures, the subject of popular legends, but rather of literary ones. The most important is that of his baptism by the hands of Pope Sylvester and his healing from leprosy; it appears in the 6th century in the *Liber Pontificalis*, but may date back to the second half of the 5th century (on the *Donatio Constantini*, see below). Such legends were also the subject of artistic representations, such as Giulio Romano’s *Donatio Constantini*, the 17th-century frescoes in S. Giovanni in Laterano, and especially the much older ones in the oratory of the SS. Quattro. The liturgical cult of Constantine, perhaps among the Arians (H. Leclercq, s.V. in DACL, III, col. 2688), spread throughout the Greek East, where Constantine was celebrated as “equal to the Apostles” and the “thirteenth Apostle” (feast on May 21, together with St. Helena, as well as among the Armenians). For isolated cults arising through relics in England, Bohemia, Sicily, and Calabria, see *Acta SS. Maii*, V, pp. 12-14. In Calabria, there still exists S. Costantino near Mileto and S. Costantino di Rivello near Sapri.
V. NAME, pp. 399-417; A. Kurfess, in Zeitschr. f. Neustet. Wissenschaft., 1919-20, pp. 72-81. Leggi di C.: Cod. Theodos., Constr. Sirmondi, Cod. Iust. Fonti epigrafiche: H. Dessau, Inser. Lat. selectae, I, n. 68; sgg. Fonti numismatische: J. Maurice, Numismatique constantinienne, 3 voll., Parigi 1906-13. Bibliografia assai completa fino al 1914 in H. Leclercq, s. V. in DACL, III, col. 2522-95. Fino al 1930 in Norman H. Baynes, Con-stantini the Great and the Christian Church (Proceedings of the British Academy, 15), Londra 1931, opera scritta con molto criterio, assai pregevole; Konstantin d. Gr. und seine Zeit (Gesammelte Studien, herausg. V. F. J. Dolger), in Röm. Quartalschr., suppl. 19 (1913); Ed. Schwartz, Kaiser Konstantin u. d. christl. Kirche, 5° ed. Lipsia 1913; O. Seeck, Regesten der Kaiser und Papste, Stoccarda 1919, pp. 159-84; E.Stein, Gesch. d. spätromischen Reiches, I, Vienna 1928, pp. 125-201; P. Batiffol, La paix constantinienne et le catholicisme, 4° ed., Parigi 1929; A. Piganiol, L'empereur Constantin, Parigi 1932; J.R. Palanque, Constantin (Hommes d'Etat, 1), ivi 1936, pp. 340-426; W. Seston, Recherches sur la chronologie du règne de C. le Grand, in Revue des études anciennes, 39 (1937), pp. 197-218; J. R. Palanque, in Fliche-Martin-Frutaz, III, pp. 17-100; J. Ortiz de Urbina, La politica di C. nella controversia ariana, in Atti del V Congr. internazionale di studi bizantini, Roma 1939, pp. 284-68. Per il 16° centenario della morte di C. (1937) apparvero molti articoli commemorativi: A. Ferrúa, in Circ. Catt., 1937, IV, pp. 385-94; H. Lietzmann, Der Glaube Konstantins d. Gr., in Sitzungsb. d. Preuss. Akademie d. Wiss. Phil. hist. Kl., 20 (1937); H. Grégoire, La conversation de Constantin, in Revue de l'Univ. de Bruxelles, 36 (1930-31), Der Reichsgedanke K. s., Kais. Reichsgedanke zur religiösen Haltung des Kaisers (Breslauer hist. Forschungen, 18), Breslavia 1941.
On the vision: The sources collected in Kirch, Enchiridion, nos. 363, 365, 391, 392, 453, 457, 716, 843, 915, 953. Special studies: H. Schroers, K.s. d. Gr. Kreuzerscheinung, Bonn 1913; id., in Zeitschr. f. kath. Theol., (1916), pp. 238-57, 485-533; F. Savo, in Civ. Catt., 1913, II, pp. 11 sgg.; Pio Franchi de Cavalieri, Il labaro descritto da Eusebio, in Studi romani, 1 (1913), pp. 61-86; Alcino del labaro descritto da Eusebio, ibid., 2 (1913), pp. 161-231; A. Albidoli, in Prisciani (Miscellanea Dolger), Münster 1939, pp. 1-18; J. Zeiller, in Byzantin, 14 (1939), pp. 329-39; H. Grégoire, La vision de C. liquide, ibid., 14 (1939), pp. 341-51; L. ABARO.
On the legend of Constantine’s leprosy and his baptism by Sylvester, cf.: J. Döllinger, Papstfabeln, 2° ed., Monaco 1890, p. 61; sgg.: F. J. Döller, in Röm. Quartalschr., suppl., 19 (1913), pp. 377-447; W. Levison, Konstantinische Schenkung und Sivete-legend (Miscell. Ehrle, II, in Studi e Testi, 38). Roma 1924, pp. 159-247; G. B. Giovenale, Il Battistero lateranense, 1929. Ludovico Herding
VIII. CONSTANTINIAN BUILDINGS IN ROME AND PALESTINE
I. General Overview
The grand design of CONSTANTINE the Great was to reunite the Roman Empire and to rebuild it upon the foundations of Christian doctrine, ethics, and discipline. The Emperor sought to promote the Christian Church and to enhance its prestige. A fitting means to this end appeared to him in the construction of monumental buildings for the worship of the new religion.
This activity manifested itself in three ways: 1) in restoring places of assembly to private individuals and Christian communities in accordance with the Edict of Milan (313); 2) in elevating, enlarging, and extending existing places of worship; 3) in constructing new sacred buildings both in the West and in the East.
2. Places of Worship in the West
In the West, this activity began after the victory over MAXENTIUS at the Milvian Bridge (28 October 312), and according to the Liber Pontificalis, eleven places of worship are attributed to the Emperor’s personal initiative. Perhaps immediately after taking possession of the Urbs, the Basilica dedicated to the Saviour was erected as the episcopal church for the Bishop of Rome, together with a baptistery and a papal palace (Lib. Pont., I, p. 176). The entire structure was built on imperial property in the Lateran (domus Faustae), extending over a road and the demolished barracks of the Equites singulares (E. Josi, Scoperte nella basilica costantiniana al Laterano, Roma 1934). In the same city, though later in date, a church dedicated to the Holy Cross was constructed in the Sessorium, as this was the property of HELEN Augusta (ibid., I, p. 179).
Outside the walls, five cemeterial churches arose, either directly over the tombs of martyrs or in the area above the crypts of cemeteries along the consular roads. Yet the most important structure was undoubtedly the basilica of St Peter over the tomb of the Prince of the Apostles, which was built by cutting into the Vatican hill down to the level of the tomb, filling in the pagan cemetery with its monuments and constructing above it a five-aisled basilica (ibid., I, p. 176). Simpler and more modest in scale was the small basilica of St Paul over the tomb of the Apostle in the marshy region of the Tiber between the Iter Vetus and the Via Ostiensis (ibid., I, p. 178). Likewise modest in scale were the basilica of St Lawrence “super arenario cryptae” in the cemetery of Ciriaca on the Via Tiburtina (ibid., I, p. 181) and the Basilica dedicated to the martyrs Marcellinus the Presbyter and Peter the Exorcist on imperial land at Ad Duas Laureas, connected with the mausoleum of the Empress HELEN (ibid., I, p. 182). Similarly modest in proportions was the church dedicated to St Agnes, virgin and martyr, on the property of the imperial princesses on the Via Nomentana (ibid., p. 180).
Four further churches were of a more administrative character, arranged with a military perspective in mind: one at Ostia (ibid., p. 183), the port linking with Spain and Africa, and a baptismal site; one at Naples (ibid., p. 186), a station of the fleet for the East; another at Albano Laziale (ibid., p. 184), together with an episcopal residence, utilizing the “scheneca deserta” of the Legio II Parthica; and a fourth at Capua on the Via Appia (ibid., p. 185).
Based on the data of architectural history from this period, the Basilica Apostolorum on the Via Appia and the Basilica of Theodorus in Aquileia may also be attributed to Constantine. In addition, the Liber Pontificalis presents detailed lists of donations (liturgical furnishings, decorations) and foundations (money, land, and supplies).
3. Places of Worship in the East
In the East, Constantine began to build Christian churches after defeating LICINIUS, his rival, in 324. Eusebius, the imperial historian, records eight churches explicitly attributed to Constantine. The church most likely built first was the Octagon in Antioch (v.), serving as a kind of commemorative church of the victory of 324 and the unification of the Roman Empire.
Almost a trilogy in glorification of the divine manifestations of the Lord’s Nativity, Resurrection, and Ascension, the Constantinian cult buildings at Bethlehem, Jerusalem, and the Mount of Olives were constructed. The complex at Bethlehem comprised a five-aisled longitudinal basilica, with an octagonal structure replacing the apse over the cave of the Nativity (Eusebio, Vita Constantini, III, 43). That at Jerusalem included a five-aisled basilica, the Martyrium, and a central edifice above the cave of the Sepulchre and the Resurrection, the Anastasis (Eusebio, op. cit., III, 30–40). The third, on the Mount of Olives, consisted of a three-aisled oratory above the cave of the Teaching, connected with a sanctuary at the precise spot of the Ascension on the mountain’s summit (Eusebio, op. cit., III, 43). The basilical structure at Mambre, surrounding the altar, the well, and Abraham’s terebinth, is likewise reckoned of this type (Eusebio, op. cit., III, 51). In addition, the Constantinian churches enumerated include a basilica at Heliopolis on the site of the Temple of Jupiter (Eusebio, op. cit., III, 65), a basilica at Tyre in compensation for another destroyed (Eusebio, op. cit., X, 4, 25), and above all the Apostoleion at Constantinople, linked to the emperor’s own mausoleum (Eusebio, op. cit., IV, 58).
Eusebius subsequently provides special descriptions of the churches at Tyre, Jerusalem, Antioch, and Constantinople. To the account of the basilica at Tyre he appends an interpretation of the Christian place of worship in a liturgical and mystical sense.