How did the Byzantine Empire start to expand?

Answer 1

Its actually a slightly tricky question. I think that the best answer is that the Byzantine Empire is essentially the successor state to the Roman Empire. Emperor Constantine, feeling the Empire was too large to govern, split the empire into East and West. After the Roman Empire fell, the remnant, the Eastern Empire came to be known as the Byzantine Empire. The Byzantine emperors called themselves Emperors of the Romans.

**Actually the answer above is a bit off the mark. Constantine was the Emperor who reunited the Empire. Diocletian was the one who split it into western and eastern sections. Diocletian was also the one who set up a Tetrarchy (meaning there were four rulers). Each part of the Empire had an Augustus, or senior Emperor, and a Caesar, or junior Emperor. Diocletian rules in the east, Maximian took the west and ruled from Mediolanum (now known as Milan). Galerius was placed as Caesar in the Balkans, and Constantius Chlorus (Constantine's father) was given the area Gaul and Britain to rule.

Different historians place the "beginning" of the Byzantine Empire at different dates according to which event they consider more important. There are 3 candidates for the beginning of the Empire:

1. 285 AD, when Diocletian split the Empire.

2. 324 AD, when Constantine started building the new capital.

3. 330 AD, when this new capital (Constantinople) was dedicated.

One of the best books on The Byzantine Empire is a 3-volume set written by John Julius Norwich:

Volume I - Byzantium: The Early Years

Volume II - Byzantium: The Apogee

Volume III - Byzantium: The Decline and Fall

There are many others, but this series should be an excellent introduction.

Answer 2

Hello everybody. The Byzantine Empire was started by emperor Constantine. It actually started when he moved the capital to a city of Byzantium after becoming a sole ruler in 324. He changed the capital's name to Constantinople. Constantinople was a great place for a capital. Constantinople had a good harbor and also, it was easy to defend because it was surrounded by water. Constantinople became the center of the trade and that made the capital rich. After few years after emperor Constantine died, the empire was split into the Eastern and the Western empire. In 476, the Western empire fell but the Eastern empire survived. Then, emperor Justinian started to rule. He was the first great Byzantine emperor. In 532, an urban revolt in Constantinople challenged Justinian's power. The revolt destroyed much of the city so Justinian launched a grand rebuilding program. While he was rebuilding the city, he built some more buildings. The greatest of the new buildings was Hagia Sophia, or Holy Wisdom. Hagia Sophia was a dome church. I think the beginning of the Byzantine empire was good. I hope this helped you. :)

Answer 3

The Byzantine Empire, was originally known as the "eastern roman empire" when Julius Caesar threw th nation into chaos without naming an heir the nation was first split up, west, east and south. By the time Constantine (300 years after Julius Caesar) the west and east were distinct regions. The West used more Latin, and economically was becoming stagnant, while the east was thriving under the new Roman Capital of Constantinople, and the Greek trading side. In 741AD a barbarian hord destroyed and took control of the city of Rome and the west fell into the dark ages of Western Europe. The East kept the Roman Empire Allive, but changed their name to the Byzantine Empire, named after the city that once stood on the sight of Constantinople, paying heed to their Greek ethnicities.

The Byzantine Empire under Justinian and Theodora attempted in reconquering the "Roman Lake" the idea of the entire mediteranean beloning to one nation. They launched a sierries of building campagnes and military units to reclaim the Mediterranean Sea as their Roman Lake. They conquered all of Southern Italy, south eastern Europe, the Middle East, Egypt, and North Africa, but the coudn't take over moorish controlled Spain nor Catholic Italy or France, ending the idea of a Roman Lake...

Answer 4

Remains of the Roman empire. The Western Roman Empire fell in 476 AD. The Byzantine Empire is really the Eastern Roman Empire which did not fall until 1453 AD. The Byzantine Empire is just a name of modern convenience to distinguish it from the Eastern Roman Empire prior to the fall of the West.

Answer 5

The Byzantine Empire was the Roman Empire.

Byzantine Empire is a term which has been coined by historians to indicate the eastern part of the Roman Empire after the fall of the western part of this empire. The eastern part of the Roman Empire continued to exist for nearly 1,000 years after the fall of the western part of the Roman Empire. The people in question did not use this term. They called their empire Roman Empire or Romania (this referred to this empire and not the country which was later called Romania).

The bulk of the eastern part of the Roman Empire had been conquered by the Romans between 146 BC and 30 BC, centuries before the fall of the western part of the Roman Empire. The emperor Augustus annexed some parts of the east which had been Roman client kingdoms: Judea in 10 BC, Galatia (in present day Turkey) in 25 BC and Moesia (in the lower Danube area) in 6 BC. Augustus also conquered Pannonia (western Hungary and eastern Austria) in 9 AD. The emperor Tiberius annexed the client kingdom of Cappadocia (in Turkey) in 17. The emperor Claudius annexed two more client kingdoms: Lycia (in Turkey) in 43 and Thrace (eastern Bulgaria and north-eastern Greece) in 46. Armenia was the only Roman client kingdom left in the east. In 387 the Romans ceded most of Armenia to the Persians and annexed its western part to their empire.

The term Byzantine is derived from Byzantium, the Greek city which was redeveloped, turned into the imperial capital of the eastern part of the Roman Empire and renamed Constantinople by the emperor Constantine the Great in 330. It is used to indicate the fact that not long after the fall of the west, this empire became centred on Greece and Greek in character after it lost most of its non-Greek territories. Greek replaced Latin as the official language of this empire in 620, some 150 years after the fall of the west.

Answer 6

What is now called the Byzantine Empire was a continuation of the Roman Empire. (The term Byzantine Empire was invented by historians and dates from around 1800).