History Study Sheet 12 IDs

Athanasius

His episcopate lasted 45 years (c. 8 June 328 - 2 May 373), of which over 17 were spent in five exiles ordered by four different Roman emperors. Athanasius is a renowned Christian theologian, a Church Father, the chief defender of Trinitarianism against Arianism, and a noted Egyptian leader of the fourth century. Conflict with Arius and Arianism as well as successive Roman emperors shaped Athanasius's career. In 325, at the age of 27, Athanasius began his leading role against the Arians as a deacon and assistant to Bishop Alexander of Alexandria during the First Council of Nicaea. Roman emperor Constantine the Great had convened the council in May-August 325 to address the Arian position that the Son of God, Jesus of Nazareth, is of a distinct substance from the Father.

consistorium

1. a place of assembly 2. the emperor's cabinet

Maximian

Born 250 AD. Emperor with Diocletian. Made Caesar (versus Augustus). Assigned the government of the West, Maximian defeated native revolts and a German invasion in Gaul, but he failed to suppress the revolt of Carausius in Gaul and Britain; after the institution of the tetrarch system (i.e., two augusti, each with one caesar under him), Constantius Chlorus, appointed caesar under Maximian. Committed suicide after the revolt he raised against Constantine was suppressed.

Galerius

Roman Emperor from 305 to 311.[12] During his reign he campaigned, aided by Diocletian, against the Sassanid Empire, sacking their capital Ctesiphon in 299. He also campaigned across the Danube against the Carpi, defeating them in 297 and 300. Although he was a staunch opponent of Christianity, Galerius ended the Diocletianic Persecution when he issued an edict of toleration in 311.

Maximin Daia

Roman Emperor from 308 to 313. He became embroiled in the Civil wars of the Tetrarchy between rival claimants for control of the empire, in which he was defeated by Licinius. A committed pagan, he engaged in one of the last persecutions of Christians.

Diocletian

Roman emperor (284-305 ce), who restored efficient government to the empire after the near anarchy of the 3rd century. His reorganization of the fiscal, administrative, and military machinery of the empire laid the foundation for the Byzantine Empire in the East and temporarily shored up the decaying empire in the West. His reign is also noted for the last great persecution of the Christians.

Constantius Chlorus

Roman emperor and father of Constantine I the Great. As a member of a four-man ruling body (tetrarchy) created by the emperor Diocletian, Constantius held the title caesar from 293 to 305 and caesar augustus in 305-306. Campaigned extensively along the Rhine. Significance? His death sparked the collapse of the tetrarchic system of government inaugurated by the Emperor Diocletian.

Maxentius

Roman emperor from 306 to 312. His father, the emperor Maximian, abdicated with Diocletian in 305. In the new tetrarchy (two augusti with a caesar under each) that was set up after these abdications, Maxentius was passed over in favour of Flavius Valerius Severus, who was made a caesar, and then, in 306, an augustus. But discontent with the policies of Severus at Rome caused Maxentius to be proclaimed princeps there on Oct. 28, 306, by the Praetorian Guard. In 307 he took the title augustus.

Tetrarchy

Tetrarchy refers to the establishment by the Roman Emperor Diocletian, in 293, of a 4-part division of the empire. Diocletian continued to rule in the east. He made Maximian his equal and co-emperor in the west. They were each called Augustus which signified that they were emperors. Subordinate to them were the two Caesars: Galerius, in the east, and Constantius in the west. An Augustus was always emperor. Sometimes the Caesars were also referred to as emperors. This method of creating emperors and their successors bypassed the need for approval of emperors by the Senate and blocked the power of the military to elevate their popular generals to the purple.

Edict of Toleration

The Edict of Toleration by Galerius was issued in 311 in Serdica by the Roman emperor Galerius, officially ending the Diocletianic persecution of Christianity. The Edict implicitly granted Christianity the status of "religio licita", a worship recognized and accepted by the Roman Empire.

Carausius

When? (died ad 293, Britain) Where? Roman empire but specifically Britain. Who? officer in the Roman military service What? created a short-lived independent state in Britain.

Donatism

a Christian sect within the Roman province of Africa that flourished in the fourth and fifth centuries among Berber Christians.

Libanius

a Greek teacher of rhetoric of the Sophist school. During the rise of Christian hegemony in the later Roman Empire, he remained unconverted and in religious matters was a pagan Hellene.

Constantine

a Roman Emperor from 306 to 337 AD. Constantine was the son of Flavius Valerius Constantius, a Roman army officer, and his consort Helena. His father became Caesar, the deputy emperor in the west in 293 AD. Constantine was sent east, where he rose through the ranks to become a military tribune under the emperors Diocletian and Galerius. In 305, Constantius was raised to the rank of Augustus, senior western emperor, and Constantine was recalled west to campaign under his father in Britannia (Britain). Acclaimed as emperor by the army at Eboracum (Modern-day York) after his father's death in 306 AD, Constantine emerged victorious in a series of civil wars against the emperors Maxentius and Licinius to become sole ruler of both west and east by 324 AD.

Licinius

a Roman emperor from 308 to 324. For most of his reign he was the colleague and rival of Constantine I, with whom he co-authored the Edict of Milan that granted official toleration to Christians in the Roman Empire. He was finally defeated at the Battle of Chrysopolis, before being executed on the orders of Constantine I.

Council of Nicaea

a council of Christian bishops convened in Nicaea in Bithynia by the Roman Emperor Constantine I in AD 325. This first ecumenical council was the first effort to attain consensus in the church through an assembly representing all of Christendom, although previous councils, including the first Church council, the Council of Jerusalem, had met before to settle matters of dispute. It was presided over by Hosius of Corduba, a bishop from the West who followed the Pope who was the bishop of Rome and the Patriarch of the West. Its main accomplishments were settlement of the Christological issue of the nature of the Son of God and his relationship to God the Father, the construction of the first part of the Creed of Nicaea, establishing uniform observance of the date of Easter, and promulgation of early canon law

Arianism

a nontrinitarian belief that asserts that Jesus Christ is a Son of God, created by God the Father, distinct from the Father and therefore subordinate to the Father. It denies that Jesus is God the Son. It was proposed early in the 4th century by the Alexandrian presbyter Arius and was popular throughout much of the Eastern and Western Roman empires, even after it was denounced as a heresy by the Council of Nicaea (325).

Jerome

a priest, confessor, theologian and historian, who also became a Doctor of the Church. He was the son of Eusebius, born at Stridon, a village near Emona on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia, then part of northeastern Italy. He is best known for his translation of most of the Bible into Latin (the translation that became known as the Vulgate), and his commentaries on the Gospels. His list of writings is extensive. The protégé of Pope Damasus I, who died in December of 384, Jerome was known for his teachings on Christian moral life, especially to those living in cosmopolitan centers such as Rome. In many cases, he focused his attention to the lives of women and identified how a woman devoted to Jesus should live her life. This focus stemmed from his close patron relationships with several prominent female ascetics who were members of affluent senatorial families.

Edict of Milan

a proclamation that permanently established religious toleration for Christianity within the Roman Empire. It was the outcome of a political agreement concluded in Milan between the Roman emperors Constantine I and Licinius in February 313.

solidus

a relatively pure gold coin issued in the Late Roman Empire. Under Constantine, who introduced it on a wide scale, it had a weight of about 4.5 grams.

Coloni

a tenant farmer from the late Roman Empire and Early Middle Ages. Known plurally as coloni or colonate, these farmers were sharecroppers, who paid back landowners with a portion of their crops, in exchange for use of their farmlands. The coloni's tenant-landlord relationship eventually degraded into one of debt and dependence. As a result, the colonus became a new type of land tenancy, in which the occupants were placed in a state between freedom and slavery.

Augustine

an early Christian theologian and philosopher[6] whose writings influenced the development of Western Christianity and Western philosophy. He was the bishop of Hippo Regius (modern-day Annaba, Algeria), located in Numidia (Roman province of Africa). He is viewed as one of the most important Church Fathers in Western Christianity for his writings in the Patristic Era. Among his most important works are The City of God and Confessions.

foederati

any one of several outlying nations to which ancient Rome provided benefits in exchange for military assistance. The term was also used, especially under the Roman Empire for groups of "barbarian" mercenaries of various sizes, who were typically allowed to settle within the Empire.

Prince Edict

in 301 by Roman Emperor Diocletian. Attempted to set prices. Was virtually ignored.

limitanei

meaning respectively "the soldiers in frontier districts" (from the Latin phrase limes, meaning a military district of a frontier province) or "the soldiers on the riverbank" (from the Rhine and Danube), were an important part of the late Roman and early Byzantine army after the reorganizations of the late 3rd and early 4th centuries. The limitanei, unlike the comitatenses, palatini, and scolae, garrisoned fortifications along the borders of the Roman Empire and were not normally expected to fight far from their fortifications.

Diocese

one of the administrative divisions of the later Roman Empire, starting with the Tetrarchy. It formed the intermediate level of government, grouping several provinces and being in turn subordinated to a praetorian prefecture.

monophysitism

the Christological position that, after the union of the divine and the human in the historical Incarnation, Jesus Christ, as the incarnation of the eternal Son or Word (Logos) of God, had only a single "nature" which was either divine or a synthesis of divine and human. Monophysitism is contrasted to dyophysitism (or dia-, dio-, or duophysitism) which maintains that Christ maintained two natures, one divine and one human, after the Incarnation.

Constantinople

the capital city of the Roman/Byzantine Empire (330-1204 and 1261-1453), and also of the brief Latin (1204-1261), and the later Ottoman (1453-1924) empires. It was reinaugurated in 324 AD at ancient Byzantium, as the new capital of the Roman Empire by Emperor Constantine the Great, after whom it was named, and dedicated on 11 May 330.

iugatio/capitatio

the tax collection system developed by Diocletian, which determines the amount of food administration.

comitatenses

the units of the field armies of the late Roman Empire.

B of Milvian Bridge

took place between the Roman Emperors Constantine I and Maxentius on 28 October 312. It takes its name from the Milvian Bridge, an important route over the Tiber. Constantine won the battle and started on the path that led him to end the Tetrarchy and become the sole ruler of the Roman Empire. Maxentius drowned in the Tiber during the battle.