What did emperor justinian do-?

Answer 1

Historians see the Reign of Justinian I (or the Great) reign as a distinct period of Byzantine history. It was a period of conquest, splendour, great prosperity, important public works, administrative and religious reforms and imperial unity.

Justinian I wanted to 'restore' the Roman Empire by reconquering the lands lost by the Western Roman Empire as a result of the Germanic invasions. He succeeded in retaking Dalmatia, Italy, Tunisia,, eastern Algeria, and southern Spain. This gave him control of the western basin of the Mediterranean as well as the eastern one. The large revenues the conquests generated (they increased by 20%) helped him with an ambitious programme of public works. He rebuilt two badly damaged churches in Constantinople, the Church of the Holy Apostles and the Hagia Sophia, and built the church of San Vitale in Ravenna (the centre of Byzantine rule in Italy). He built underground cisterns to secure water supply for Constantinople, including the massive Basilica Cistern (453 by 212 feet and 30 ft. high). He built a dam is south-western Turkey to prevent floods and the Sangiarius bridge in north-western Turkey to secure a supply route to the east for the army. He built border fortifications from Africa to the East. He restored towns damaged by an earthquake and built a new city, Justiniana Prima, as the new capital of the province of Illyria. He built a massive granary on an island near Constantinople to make the grain traffic form Egypt more efficient. He also established diplomatic relations with Ethiopia to bypass the land Silk Road through Persia because there were wars with Persia and managed to establish a local production of silk.

Justinian I was one of the most important emperors in the history the Orthodox Church, official church of the empire. He was described as a nursing father of the church. He put the church on a more solid footing and redefined its structure. He wanted to protect its purity and persecuted dissident Christian sects. He secured the rights of the church and the clergy and protected and expanded the monastic orders. He granted the monks the right to inherit property from private individuals and to receive annual gifts for the state and banned the confiscation of monastic property. He gave the canons of the church legal force and issued laws regarding the administration of church property, the elections, rights and obligations of the clergy, the conduct of service and episcopal jurisdiction.

Justinian I took measures to tackle corruption in the provinces and made tax collection more efficient by increasing its professionalization. Justinian's rule was quite despotic. He regulated everything in administration, law and religion tightly. It was said that the church could do nothing contrary to his will. He started the byzantine tradition of the emperor being in charge of the church.

Justinian I commissioned a collection of books called Corpus Juris Civilis (Body of Civil Law), which was also dubbed Justinian Code in the 16th century. It was a very comprehensive digest of centuries of Roman civil law. It also included collections of essays by famous Roman jurists in two student textbooks.

The Corpus Juris Civilis came in four parts:

1) The Codex (book) Justinianus, which was a review of imperial laws going back 400 years (to the time of Hadrian). It scrapped obsolete or unnecessary laws, made changes when necessary and clarified obscure passages. Its aim was to put the laws in a single book (previously they were written on many different scrolls), harmonise conflicting views among jurists which arose from centuries of poorly organised development of Roman law and have a uniform and coherent body of law. It consists of 12 books, 1 book covers ecclesiastical law, the duties of high officers and sources of law, 7 cover private law, 1 criminal law and 3 administrative laws.

2) The Digesta is a collection of fragments taken from essays on laws written by jurists (mostly from the 2nd and 3rd centuries) which express the private opinions of legal experts. Most were from Ulpian (40%) and Paulus (17%). It was a large amount of writing which was condensed in 50 books. It was used as an advanced law student textbook.

3) The Institutionesis a textbook for first year law students written by two professors. It was a series of extracts from statements on the basic institutions of Roman law from the teaching books by 'writers of authority.' In was largely based on the texts of Gaius, a jurist of the 2nd century AD.

4) The Novellae Constitutiones, which contained laws recently issued by Justinian.

Answer 2

He gathered a panel of experts to regulate the increasingly complexed society. His wife, Theodora, was a big influence on his policies, though- changing taxes, for example.