THE successors of Justinian had to face tasks of great difficulty: above all, that of combining under a single rule the two halves of the empire. The oriental provinces, in the matter of culture and society, belonged more to Asia than to Europe, in spite of their Greco-Roman government and their Christian faith, and after the Arab onslaught they were to be swept again under Asiatic rule. But on Justinian’s death in 565 the Asiatic danger still came from Persia.
Justinian’s successors were left to deal with a heavily taxed empire, an uncertain defence against the Persians and the objections of the east to Chalcedon. Justin II (565–578), who had married the niece of Theodora, appears to have been mentally unstable, but he put an end to short-term borrowing by the court, a measure helpful to the imperial treasury, and was bold enough in 572 to refuse subsidies to Persia, preferring to incur the certainty of border warfare. He was succeeded by the emperors Tiberius (578–582) and Maurice (582–602), both of whom ruled with discretion. Tiberius acquired a reputation for generosity, but Maurice an evil name for avarice, through his policy of economy, and that though he was a good soldier, well-educated and charitable to the poor.
In the task of imperial defence, Justinian had thrown his greatest effort into the recovery of the west, and had to content himself in the east by fighting two frontier wars with Persia, and regaining control of Lazica. This district, to the eastern end of the Black Sea, was of moment for military reasons as well as those of trade, was much desired by Persia, and had recently been under her control. Otherwise, Justinian’s frontier policy was that of fortifying the limes and distributing presents in gold that were really tribute to the border tribes, and to the kingdom of Persia.
Tiberius and Maurice, however, maintained a passive defence in the west and, on the other hand, took up the task of active military defence in the east. They stopped the tributes and sought to acquire military supremacy in Armenia and the Caucasus: their aim was to make these hill countries their own recruiting grounds rather than those of Persia.
The need of defending the eastern frontier in the seventh century led both to a reorganization of the army and, eventually, to a change in provincial government. In Justinian’s day, though the general obligation to military service still remained in force, the main strength pf the army lay in mercenary troops (bucellarii) and federates; many of the former were barbarians, voluntarily enlisted, while the federate bands fought under their own leaders. The penetration of the Balkans by Avars and Slavs, however, made it increasingly difficult for Justinian’s successors to obtain mercenaries, and the army with which Maurice fought was raised mainly by conscription. He began the practice of settling his troops in the provinces most threatened by the Persians,1 notably in Asia Minor: he settled a large army group, a ‘theme’ in a district, and gave to its general, the strategos, both military and civil command. Asia Minor had the three themes of the Anatolikon, the Opsikion and the Armeniakon. Later, the themes were subdivided according to their military composition, and became units of local government; the other provinces of the empire were also eventually reorganized as themes. The change was of considerable social importance, for the soldier in the recruiting province was a small peasant farmer who held his land on condition of military service. Eastern ‘feudalism’ differed however from the later form in the west, in that the strategos, as imperial commander, dealt directly with the peasant. The measure helped to inaugurate and protect a healthy rural society of small-holders, and though the great landowners ceaselessly sought to increase their estates at the expense of the peasants, it was to the government’s interest to protect them.
Maurice’s attempt to deal with the problem of recruiting was proved vital in the fifty years war with Persia which began in 570 and was to end with the victories of Heraclius. Maurice’s most notable early campaign he led himself as strategos autocrator under Tiberius. Chosroes invaded Roman Armenia in 578, and Maurice drove him and his Persians back to Lake Van, and in 581 saved Edessa by another victory. When emperor himself, he had the double task of safeguarding the eastern and the Danube frontier, now threatened by Lombards, Gepids and Avars. In the east, a disputed succession gave him the opportunity of success even after a mutiny of the Roman army in 588, due to a reduction of military pay. A Persian chief, Bahraam, rebelled against the claim of Chosroes II to succeed Chosroes I and started a civil war in Persia: Chosroes II fled for refuge to east Rome, was restored by a Roman army, and ceded to Rome, as a price for the recovery of his kingdom, the fortresses of Dara and Martyropolis. This was a notable strengthening of the Roman frontier in Armenia.
Maurice’s success in the east was balanced by misfortunes in the west. The Gepids had established themselves as a strong tribal state in the great southern bend of the Danube, with the Lombards to the west of them, and the Avars between the Theiss and the Danube. It would have been wise to treat them as federates and use them to check the Lombards and Avars: but they had taken Sirmium (Mitrovica, Yugoslavia) and Justin II had desired its recapture. After negotiating and failing to bring about its return, he had allowed the Lombards and Avars to conquer the Gepid lands. The Avars proved more dangerous than the Gepids: they took Sirmium, claimed east Roman tribute and ravaged Dalmatia and Thrace. As akin to the Huns and near-nomads they commanded great stores of horses and proved brutal and dangerous raiders. At the same time, the Lombards, who had shared the destruction of the Gepids, were prevented from settling there by the Avars, and pushed on towards Italy. In 568, while the imperial army was engaged with the Avars, the Lombard people migrated, as once the Ostrogoths had done, to Italy. There were no imperial troops there to stop them, and only local troops and the garrisons of a few great towns held out. Nevertheless, their progress was slow, and Maurice did not at first fear the loss of Italy or a permanent Lombard settlement there. He could not however spare an army to drive them out: he was fighting too hard against the Avars and in Persia. He could only entrust the defence of the west to new officers, the exarchs of Africa and of Italy, giving them civil and military powers to act as vice-emperors in his stead. He also negotiated an alliance with the Franks of Austrasia, by which they promised to attack the Lombards: there were five Frankish expeditions to Italy between 584 and 591, but none with decisive results. Nevertheless, the policy of Maurice, and the efforts of the Italian cities themselves, prevented the Lombards from gaining the whole of Italy: that the Lombard kingdom in the north never gained effective control of the separate Lombard duchies may be ascribed to the efforts of Maurice and his successors.
None the less, the not unsuccessful work of the dynasty of Justinian and Maurice himself, did not save it from an inglorious end. As the winter of 602 approached, Maurice ordered the army that had been fighting the Avars on the Danube to remain encamped beyond the river; the army mutinied, raised the rough and brutal centurion, Phokas, on the shield, proclaimed him exarch, and marched on Constantinople. Maurice fled, Phokas was proclaimed emperor, and Maurice and his five sons were taken and executed.
The seventh century, beginning with the unfortunate reign of Phokas, saw the eastern empire in very grave danger: but also saw it survive the danger. Avars, Persians, Arabs seemed about to submerge Romanitas and the Greco-Roman state: the century was a prolonged crisis or day of judgment. To the east as well as the west it seemed that ’the day of the Lord, of the King all just, is at hand, a day of wrath and vengeance, of clouds and thick darkness’: but in the end the judgment was favourable and the clouds passed. The empire lost its outlying provinces, was restricted to the east Balkans and Asia Minor, was further Grecized and half orientalized: but found within itself the moral strength to adapt its institutions to its changed circumstances, and to become the medieval state of Byzantium.
For eight years (602–610) Phokas ruled with the support of the inferior ranks of the Army, and the town mobs. Maurice’s wish to prevent peaceable acceptance of the Lombards had made him unpopular in Italy and with Gregory the Great: to the latter, Phokas’ orthodoxy and disinterest in Italy was highly acceptable. In his own capital however there were revolts, and after the second of these, in 603, Phokas put to death certain leaders and court dignitaries, together with Maurice’s widow Constantina and all her daughters. In the provinces government subsided in anarchy: Jews and Christians, Monophysites and orthodox, fought in Syria what amounted to a civil war. In Antioch the Jews massacred the patriarch Anastasius; and across the eastern frontier the Persians under Shahrbaraz gathered their forces to take advantage of the undefended, leaderless empire.
But the generals who had fought with Maurice, the patriarch of Constantinople, whom Phokas had offended, and a number of state officials, looked for help to Heraclius, exarch of Africa, asking him to organize an expedition, seize Alexandria, and save the state. In 610 Heraclius, son of the exarch, brought a fleet to Constantinople, was welcomed and, as Phokas had fled, crowned by the patriarch.
Heraclius’ coronation was too late to stop the invasion of the Persians. They took Antioch in 611, spread over Syria, taking Damascus in 613, and in May 614 they captured Jerusalem. They led its patriarch and its inhabitants into captivity, and, to the horror of Christendom, carried off the relic of the true cross, veneration for which had spread from one end of Europe to another in the preceding century: veneration that had inspired the Vexilla regis prodeunt of Fortunatus in Gaul, and covered remote Ireland with the early stone crosses. In 619 the Persians took from Heraclius Alexandria, Egypt and the future grain supply. They were ravaging Asia Minor and the Avars pressed down against Constantinople.
Heraclius prepared to regain the lost provinces and the lost treasure with valour and with prudence. He reorganized the army and the imperial finances, the patriarch Sergius aiding him: but all was subordinated to the future attack on Persia. His proclamation to the army represented the future expedition as a holy war, indeed, in one sense, as a first crusade, and by 622 his long preparations were complete. After religious ceremonies imploring a Christian victory over the Persian fire worshippers, Heraclius embarked for Asia Minor, which he liberated from Shahrbaraz, and sought to pass through Armenia to strike at the heart of Persia; he won a victory over Chosroes’ generals in the neighbourhood of Lake Van, and one over Shahrbaraz himself. The climax of the campaign came in 626, while Avars and Bulgars were besieging Constantinople.
To leave the capital in face of dangers from these barbarians had been indeed bold. There was a Persian army at Chalcedon, just across the Straits, and the Avar khagan, with his Slav and Bulgarian contingents, concerted with the Persians a double attack. The city was saved by the inspiring leadership of the patriarch Sergius, the prayers and processions of the citizens imploring the help of the holy Mother of God, the city’s protectress, and the presence of the Byzantine fleet in the Straits.
In 627 too Heraclius, fighting on the Perso-Armenian border, was enabled to press on into the Persian motherland. He won a victory at Mosul, but could not reach Ctesiphon the capital before winter. In the spring however news came of the collapse of the Sassanids: the Great King was murdered in a palace revolution. His successor made peace, restored Roman Armenia, Egypt, Syria and Asia Minor to the empire in a peace treaty, and allowed the True Cross to be restored to Jerusalem. Holy Cross Day, 14 September, is the liturgical commemoration of ’the Lord’s holy cross, found by Helena on Mount Calvary, borne thence by Chosroes king of Persia, and received again by the emperor Heraclius after three victories in Persia’.
The first and glorious period of Heraclius’ reign was marked not only by the salvation of the capital and the victory in Persia, but by an effort to reform the empire as important as either. In view of the ills brought on the empire by the army’s elevation of Phokas to the throne, Heraclius sought to found a dynasty, associating his two sons with himself from their birth, and giving office to his brothers and cousins. His second marriage to his niece Martina in 614 was however disallowed by the canons and caused difficulty with the patriarch. For strategic reasons, Heraclius considered taking up his residence, at least for a time, in Carthage where his father had been exarch: but the alarm of the citizens of Constantinople, and the distance of Carthage from Persia, made him give up the scheme. That he entertained it at all shows that, while forced to give up Maurice’s hope of regaining Italy, he did so reluctantly. His measures to raise funds, to restore order, and above all to create and himself train an army which he could use against Persia were also notable.
But while the age-old empire of Persia was brought by his efforts to crashing defeat, away on the Arabian coast of the Red Sea a new power was rising (see p. 197). When Heraclius was in 622 preparing to lead his army to Persia, Muhammad with a few followers fled from Mecca to Medina. Heraclius lived till 641: and before then, in 634, Arab forces had entered Palestine, routed the soldiery hastily employed by Sergius, governor of Caesarea, and defeated and killed him. They took Jerusalem in 637 and the caliph ’Umar entered in 638. By 639 the Arabs had taken Antioch, Edessa, Roman Mesopotamia and penetrated Egypt. Wasted by illness, Heraclius could only remain inactive at Constantinople. In contrast to the toilsome years he had once spent training his army, he had hoped to promote union and loyalty in Syria, and in Armenia, by conciliating the Jacobites (the followers of the Monophysite leader, Jacobus Baradaeus (d. 578)). The religious prestige which he had gained by restoring the True Cross seemed to promise success to his efforts at conciliation: he and the patriarch Sergius strove to render the doctrine of the Two Natures acceptable by affirming that in Christ there was but one ‘energy’. The teaching was developed in a doctrinal statement, the Ekthesis, of 638: the human will in Christ was declared to be so in harmony with the divine will, that He had, in fact, but one will, and that divine. This monothelite doctrine did nothing to unite Christendom against Islam, for it failed to conciliate the Monophysites, enraged the orthodox, caused strife between Rome and Constantinople, and even led to a pope falling a prey to heresy (see p. 258).
The Arab invasion followed no systematic plan: its success was conditioned, no doubt, by the explosive force of a new religion, but above all by the weakness of the resistance encountered by the raiders. Egypt was a province vital strategically to the empire, and vital also to its revenue and food supply: and its conquest by the Arabs, the unpremeditated result sequence to a raid, took less than three years (December 639–July 642). Away in Constantinople, Heraclius was dying, and seeking to provide for the succession; but his second wife Martina and her son Heracleonas were put to death by their rivals.
Constans II succeeded and ruled till 668: he could not halt the Arab advance through north Africa nor the gradual building up of an Arab fleet that took from Byzantium the mastery of the east Mediterranean. But his energetic campaigns in the Balkans secured that when the attack on Constantinople did come, there was no accompanying menace from the Slavs. Meanwhile, the Arab fleets raided Rhodes, Crete, Cos and the Syrian coasts, once even defeating Constans himself in a naval battle: but Constans in the Balkans was strong enough to take up his residence at times in Thessalonica and Athens, to visit pope Vitalian in Rome, to consider an effort to retake either Africa or the Lombard settlements in Italy (he took Benevento in 663). He even resided for five years in Syracuse: but in 668 he was murdered in his bath.
His son, Constantine IV, succeeded: and two years later, in 670, the amir Phandelas led the Arab fleet across the Straits for the attack on Constantinople. But he found the walls of Constantinople restored, and the citizens in possession of a military device just bought from a Syrian architect, Callinicus, the famous Greek fire. Burning naphtha, launched from tubes, was propelled through the air and would even burn on the surface of the water: and it gave the imperial fleet a decisive advantage. Between 672 and 677 the Arabs made an attack on the walls of Constantinople every spring, an attack fruitless and ending finally in a disastrous rout during a storm. The Arab leader Mu‘awiya made a peace treaty with the empire for thirty years: a limit had been set to Arab penetration of the northern Mediterranean.
Constantine IV also defended the empire with some success (668–685). He aspired to share the military glories of Heraclius and to restore the empire like his great namesake. In addition, he called his wife Theodora, founded towns called by his own name, restored peace to the church by abandoning the policy of conciliating the eastern sects (whose provinces were now lost to the Arabs) and entering into friendly relations with popes Donus and Agatho. The oecumenical council of Constantinople of 680 restored peace to the church: it was held in the domed palace of the emperor (in truth), presided over by him, and attended by envoys from pope Agatho. In this council, which ranks as the sixth and the last oecumenical, the doctrines of Chalcedon were reaffirmed and the teaching of the one nature, one energy and one will freshly condemned.
Justinian II (685–695: banished ten years and restored from 705 to 711) sought to strengthen the frontiers and to protect Constantinople by defending Thrace, the coast facing her across the Aegean sea: the Slavs and Bulgars (see p. 485) were by now settled in numbers in the Balkans and the country barbarized. To support an army and maintain order, he extended and regularized the organization of the themes, and protected the small, military landowner. Good relations with the papacy were hindered however by his claim that a new council, held in 692 to pass canons dealing with matters of ecclesiastical discipline, and attended only by Greek bishops, should be held oecumenical. The harshness and brutality of Justinian’s ministers, and the eccentricities of Justinian himself, led in 695 to revolution: Leontius, the reconqueror of Armenia, was recognized as emperor for three years, and Tiberius III, the choice of the imperial fleet and army after the loss of Carthage to the Arabs, for seven. He too was unsuccessful against the Arabs, and Justinian II was restored to Constantinople by the help of a small Bulgarian force. He was taken and beheaded by revolutionaries in 711: and with him the dynasty of Heraclius ended. Three emperors elected in revolt ruled from 711 till 717: a period of near anarchy had persisted for twenty-two years, from the banishment of Justinian II.
The eastern empire then had from the days of Heraclius to the first fall of Justinian II fought a battle for its very existence. It had lost rich provinces to the Arabs. Its metropolitan lands, however, had defended themselves and barred the ingress of Islam to Europe: the defence of Constantinople in her two sieges were as important to European defence as Charles Martel’s victory over the Saracens at Tours. The empire had built up for itself a new army and a new provincial government, and it was this reorganization that eventually held the Arabs and the Bulgars. The emperors led this new army personally in the field, their own position the stronger in the vicissitudes of the empire. In spite of the lost provinces, the Heraclian dynasty clung ever more firmly to the concept of Roman imperial rule as universal, and that though from the age of Heraclius Byzantium was a purely Greek state, using the very title Basileus for emperor. ‘Heraclius was the creator of medieval Byzantium, whose political thought was Roman, whose speech and culture Greek, whose faith Christian’ (Ostrogorsky).
But in this century Byzantium was as poor in literature and the arts as her history was rich in heroic wars and creative political reform. Byzantine life became precarious and its outlook other worldly. The imperial titles used were no more the terse, geographical adjectives of conquest: Heraclius was now the ‘Deliverer of the holy land’ and the ‘Enlightener of the true faith’: Justinian II, the ‘servant of God’ The clergy and the patriarch played great parts in the life of the state, and that at a time of increasing militarization. ‘It was a land of fighters and a land of monks,’ writes Ostrogorsky; but, since armies feed on revenue, and the Arabs never got the northern shores of the east Mediterranean, it was also a land of merchants and foreign refugees.