Constantine I The Great 323AD Ancient Roman Coin Victory over Sarmatia i34561

Constantine I ‘The Great’- Roman Emperor: 307-337 A.D.
Victory over Sarmatia.

 Bronze AE3 19mm (2.46 grams) Struck at the mint of Londinium 323-324 A.D. 

Reference: RIC 289 (VII, London)
CONSTANTINVSAVG – Laureate head right.
SARMATIADEVICTA Exe: PLON – Victory advancing right, stepping on captive,
holding trophy and palm.

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Constantine the Great (Latin:
Flavius Valerius Aurelius Constantinus Augustus; 
27 February c. 272 – 22 May 337), also known as Constantine I or Saint 
Constantine, was
Roman Emperor
from 306 to 337. Well known for 
being the first Roman emperor to
be converted
to
Christianity
, Constantine and co-Emperor
Licinius
issued the
Edict of Milan
in 313, which proclaimed
tolerance of all religions
throughout the 
empire.

Constantine defeated the emperors
Maxentius
and
Licinius
during civil wars. He also fought 
successfully against the
Franks
,
Alamanni
,
Visigoths
, and
Sarmatians
during his reign – even resettling 
parts of Dacia
which had been abandoned during the 
previous century. Constantine built a new imperial residence at
Byzantium
, naming it
New Rome
. However, in Constantine’s honor, 
people called it
Constantinople
, which would later be the 
capital of what is now known as the
Byzantine Empire
for over one thousand years. 
Because of this, he is thought of as the founder of the Byzantine Empire.

Flavius Valerius Constantinus, as he was originally named, was born in the 
city of Naissus,
Dardania
province of
Moesia
, in present-day
Niš,
Serbia
, on 27 February of an uncertain year, 
probably near 272.
His father was
Flavius Constantius
, a native of
Dardania
province of Moesia (later
Dacia Ripensis
). Constantius was a tolerant and 
politically skilled man. Constantine probably spent little time with his father. 
Constantius was an officer in the Roman army, part of the Emperor
Aurelian
‘s imperial bodyguard. Constantius 
advanced through the ranks, earning the
governorship
of
Dalmatia
from Emperor
Diocletian
, another of Aurelian’s companions 
from
Illyricum
, in 284 or 285.Constantine’s mother 
was
Helena
, a
Bithynian
woman of low social standing.It is 
uncertain whether she was legally married to Constantius or merely his concubine

Helena gave birth to the future emperor
Constantine I
on 27 February of an uncertain 
year soon after 270 (probably around 272). At the time, she was in
Naissus
(Niš,
Serbia
). In order to obtain a wife more 
consonant with his rising status, Constantius divorced Helena some time before 
289, when he married
Theodora
, Maximian’s daughter.(The narrative 
sources date the marriage to 293, but the
Latin panegyric
of 289 refers to the couple as 
already married). Helena and her son were dispatched to the court of
Diocletian
at Nicomedia, where Constantine grew 
to be a member of the inner circle. Helena never remarried and lived for a time 
in obscurity, though close to her only son, who had a deep regard and affection 
for her.

She received the title of
Augusta
in 325 and died in 330 with her son 
at her side. She was buried in the
Mausoleum of Helena
, outside
Rome on the
Via Labicana
. Her
sarcophagus
is on display in the
Pio-Clementine Vatican Museum
, although the 
connection is often questioned, next to her is the sarcophagus of her 
granddaughter Saint Constantina (Saint Constance). The elaborate reliefs contain 
hunting scenes. During her life, she gave many presents to the poor, released 
prisoners and mingled with the ordinary worshippers in modest attire.

Constantine received a formal education at Diocletian’s court, where he 
learned Latin literature, Greek, and philosophy.

On 1 May 305, Diocletian, as a result of a debilitating sickness taken in the 
winter of 304-5, announced his resignation. In a parallel ceremony in Milan, 
Maximian did the same. Lactantius states that Galerius manipulated the weakened 
Diocletian into resigning, and forced him to accept Galerius’ allies in the 
imperial succession. According to Lactantius, the crowd listening to 
Diocletian’s resignation speech believed, until the very last moment, that 
Diocletian would choose Constantine and
Maxentius
(Maximian’s son) as his successors. 
It was not to be: Constantius and Galerius were promoted to Augusti, while
Severus
and
Maximin
were appointed their Caesars 
respectively. Constantine and Maxentius were ignored.

Constantine recognized the implicit danger in remaining at Galerius’ court, 
where he was held as a virtual hostage. His career depended on being rescued by 
his father in the west. Constantius was quick to intervene. In the late spring 
or early summer of 305, Constantius requested leave for his son, to help him 
campaign in Britain. After a long evening of drinking, Galerius granted the 
request. Constantine’s later propaganda describes how he fled the court in the 
night, before Galerius could change his mind. He rode from
post-house
to post-house at high speed,
hamstringing
every horse in his wake.By the 
time Galerius awoke the following morning, Constantine had fled too far to be 
caught. Constantine joined his father in
Gaul
, at Bononia (Boulogne) 
before the summer of 305.

From Bononia they crossed the
Channel
to Britain and made their way to
Eboracum
(York), 
capital of the province of
Britannia Secunda
and home to a large military 
base. Constantine was able to spend a year in northern Britain at his father’s 
side, campaigning against the
Picts
beyond
Hadrian’s Wall
in the summer and autumn. 
Constantius’s campaign, like that of
Septimius Severus
before it, probably advanced 
far into the north without achieving great success. Constantius had become 
severely sick over the course of his reign, and died on 25 July 306 in
Eboracum
(York). 
Before dying, he declared his support for raising Constantine to the rank of 
full Augustus. The
Alamannic
king
Chrocus
, a barbarian taken into service under 
Constantius, then proclaimed Constantine as Augustus. The troops loyal to 
Constantius’ memory followed him in acclamation. Gaul and Britain quickly 
accepted his rule; Iberia, which had been in his father’s domain for less than a 
year, rejected it.

Constantine sent Galerius an official notice of Constantius’s death and his 
own acclamation. Along with the notice, he included a portrait of himself in the 
robes of an Augustus. The portrait was wreathed in
bay
. He requested recognition as heir to his 
father’s throne, and passed off responsibility for his unlawful ascension on his 
army, claiming they had “forced it upon him”.Galerius was put into a fury by the 
message; he almost set the portrait on fire. His advisers calmed him, and argued 
that outright denial of Constantine’s claims would mean certain war.Galerius was 
compelled to compromise: he granted Constantine the title “Caesar” rather than 
“Augustus” (the latter office went to Severus instead). Wishing to make it clear 
that he alone gave Constantine legitimacy, Galerius personally sent Constantine 
the emperor’s traditional
purple robes
. Constantine accepted the 
decision. Constantine’s share of the Empire consisted of Britain, Gaul, and 
Spain.

Because Constantine was still largely untried and had a hint of illegitimacy 
about him, he relied on his father’s reputation in his early propaganda: the 
earliest panegyrics to Constantine give as much coverage to his father’s deeds 
as to those of Constantine himself.
Constantine’s military skill and building projects soon gave 
the panegyrist the opportunity to comment favorably on the similarities between 
father and son, and Eusebius remarked that Constantine was a “renewal, as it 
were, in his own person, of his father’s life and reign”. Constantinian coinage, 
sculpture and oratory also shows a new tendency for disdain towards the 
“barbarians” beyond the frontiers. After Constantine’s victory over the 
Alemanni, he minted a coin issue depicting weeping and begging Alemannic 
tribesmen-“The Alemanni conquered”-beneath the phrase “Romans’ rejoicing”.There 
was little sympathy for these enemies. As his panegyrist declared: “It is a 
stupid clemency that spares the conquered foe.”

In 310, a dispossessed and power-hungry Maximian rebelled against Constantine 
while Constantine was away campaigning against the Franks. Maximian had been 
sent south to Arles with a contingent of Constantine’s army, in preparation for 
any attacks by Maxentius in southern Gaul. He announced that Constantine was 
dead, and took up the imperial purple. In spite of a large donative pledge to 
any who would support him as emperor, most of Constantine’s army remained loyal 
to their emperor, and Maximian was soon compelled to leave. Constantine soon 
heard of the rebellion, abandoned his campaign against the Franks, and marched 
his army up the Rhine. At Cabillunum (Chalon-sur-Saône), 
he moved his troops onto waiting boats to row down the slow waters of the
Saône
to the quicker waters of the
Rhone
. He disembarked at
Lugdunum
(Lyon).Maximian 
fled to Massilia (Marseille), 
a town better able to withstand a long siege than Arles. It made little 
difference, however, as loyal citizens opened the rear gates to Constantine. 
Maximian was captured and reproved for his crimes. Constantine granted some 
clemency, but strongly encouraged his suicide. In July 310, Maximian hanged 
himself.

The death of Maximian required a shift in Constantine’s public image. He 
could no longer rely on his connection to the elder emperor Maximian, and needed 
a new source of legitimacy.In a speech delivered in Gaul on 25 July 310, the 
anonymous orator reveals a previously unknown dynastic connection to
Claudius II
, a third-century emperor famed for 
defeating the Goths and restoring order to the empire. Breaking away from 
tetrarchic models, the speech emphasizes Constantine’s ancestral prerogative to 
rule, rather than principles of imperial equality. The new ideology expressed in 
the speech made Galerius and Maximian irrelevant to Constantine’s right to rule. 
Indeed, the orator emphasizes ancestry to the exclusion of all other factors: 
“No chance agreement of men, nor some unexpected consequence of favor, made you 
emperor,” the orator declares to Constantine.

The oration also moves away from the religious ideology of the Tetrarchy, 
with its focus on twin dynasties of
Jupiter
and
Hercules
. Instead, the orator proclaims that 
Constantine experienced a divine vision of
Apollo
and
Victory
granting him
laurel wreaths
of health and a long reign. In 
the likeness of Apollo Constantine recognized himself as the saving figure to 
whom would be granted “rule of the whole world”, as the poet Virgil had once 
foretold. The oration’s religious shift is paralleled by a similar shift in 
Constantine’s coinage. In his early reign, the coinage of Constantine advertised
Mars
as his patron. From 310 on, Mars was 
replaced by
Sol Invictus
, a god conventionally identified 
with Apollo.

By the middle of 310, Galerius had become too ill to involve himself in 
imperial politics. His final act survives: a letter to the provincials posted in 
Nicomedia on 30 April 311, proclaiming an end to the persecutions, and the 
resumption of religious toleration. He died soon after the edict’s proclamation, 
destroying what little remained of the tetrarchy. Maximin mobilized against 
Licinius, and seized Asia Minor. A hasty peace was signed on a boat in the 
middle of the Bosphorus. While Constantine toured Britain and Gaul, Maxentius 
prepared for war.He fortified northern Italy, and strengthened his support in 
the Christian community by allowing it to elect a new
Bishop
of
Rome
,
Eusebius
.

Constantine’s advisers and generals cautioned against preemptive attack on 
Maxentius; even his soothsayers recommended against it, stating that the 
sacrifices had produced unfavorable omens. Constantine, with a spirit that left 
a deep impression on his followers, inspiring some to believe that he had some 
form of supernatural guidance, ignored all these cautions. Early in the spring 
of 312,Constantine crossed the
Cottian Alps
with a quarter of his army, a 
force numbering about 40,000.The first town his army encountered was Segusium (Susa,
Italy
), a heavily fortified town that shut its 
gates to him. Constantine ordered his men to set fire to its gates and scale its 
walls. He took the town quickly. Constantine ordered his troops not to loot the 
town, and advanced with them into northern Italy.

At the approach to the west of the important city of Augusta Taurinorum (Turin, 
Italy), Constantine met a large force of heavily armed Maxentian cavalry. In the 
ensuing
battle
Constantine’s army encircled Maxentius’ 
cavalry, flanked them with his own cavalry, and dismounted them with blows from 
his soldiers’ iron-tipped clubs. Constantine’s armies emerged victorious. Turin 
refused to give refuge to Maxentius’ retreating forces, opening its gates to 
Constantine instead.
Other cities of the north Italian plain sent Constantine 
embassies of congratulation for his victory. He moved on to Milan, where he was 
met with open gates and jubilant rejoicing. Constantine rested his army in Milan 
until mid-summer 312, when he moved on to
Brixia
(Brescia).

Brescia’s army was easily dispersed, and Constantine quickly advanced to
Verona
, where a large Maxentian force was 
camped. Ruricius Pompeianus, general of the Veronese forces and Maxentius’ 
praetorian prefect, was in a strong defensive position, since the town was 
surrounded on three sides by the
Adige
. Constantine sent a small force north of 
the town in an attempt to cross the river unnoticed. Ruricius sent a large 
detachment to counter Constantine’s expeditionary force, but was defeated. 
Constantine’s forces successfully surrounded the town and laid siege. Ruricius 
gave Constantine the slip and returned with a larger force to oppose 
Constantine. Constantine refused to let up on the siege, and sent only a small 
force to oppose him. In the desperately fought
encounter
that followed, Ruricius was killed 
and his army destroyed.Verona surrendered soon afterwards, followed by
Aquileia
, Mutina (Modena),
and
Ravenna
. The road to Rome was now wide open to 
Constantine.

Maxentius prepared for the same type of war he had waged against Severus and 
Galerius: he sat in Rome and prepared for a siege. He still controlled Rome’s 
praetorian guards, was well-stocked with African grain, and was surrounded on 
all sides by the seemingly impregnable
Aurelian Walls
. He ordered all bridges across 
the Tiber
cut, reportedly on the counsel of the 
gods, and left the rest of central Italy undefended; Constantine secured that 
region’s support without challenge. Constantine progressed slowly along the
Via Flaminia
, allowing the weakness of 
Maxentius to draw his regime further into turmoil. Maxentius’ support continued 
to weaken: at chariot races on 27 October, the crowd openly taunted Maxentius, 
shouting that Constantine was invincible. Maxentius, no longer certain that he 
would emerge from a siege victorious, built a temporary boat bridge across the 
Tiber in preparation for a field battle against Constantine. On 28 October 312, 
the sixth anniversary of his reign, he approached the keepers of the
Sibylline Books
for guidance. The keepers 
prophesied that, on that very day, “the enemy of the Romans” would die. 
Maxentius advanced north to meet Constantine in battle.

Maxentius organized his forces-still twice the size of Constantine’s-in long 
lines facing the battle plain, with their backs to the river. Constantine’s army 
arrived at the field bearing unfamiliar symbols on either its standards or its 
soldiers’ shields.  Constantine was visited by a dream the night before the 
battle, wherein he was advised “to mark the heavenly sign of God on the shields 
of his soldiers…by means of a slanted letter X with the top of its head bent 
round, he marked Christ on their shields.” Eusebius describes the sign as
Chi
(Χ) traversed by
Rho
(Ρ): ☧, a symbol representing the first two 
letters of the Greek spelling of the word Christos or Christ.

Constantine deployed his own forces along the whole length of Maxentius’ 
line. He ordered his cavalry to charge, and they broke Maxentius’ cavalry. He 
then sent his infantry against Maxentius’ infantry, pushing many into the Tiber 
where they were slaughtered and drowned. The battle was brief: Maxentius’ troops 
were broken before the first charge. Maxentius’ horse guards and praetorians 
initially held their position, but broke under the force of a Constantinian 
cavalry charge; they also broke ranks and fled to the river. Maxentius rode with 
them, and attempted to cross the bridge of boats, but he was pushed by the mass 
of his fleeing soldiers into the Tiber, and drowned.

In Rome

Constantine entered Rome on 29 October.He staged a grand
adventus
in the city, and was met with 
popular jubilation. Maxentius’ body was fished out of the Tiber and decapitated. 
His head was paraded through the streets for all to see. Unlike his 
predecessors, Constantine neglected to make the trip to the
Capitoline Hill
and perform customary 
sacrifices at the
Temple of Jupiter
. He did, however, choose to 
honor the
Senatorial
Curia
with a visit, where he promised to 
restore its ancestral privileges and give it a secure role in his reformed 
government: there would be no revenge against Maxentius’ supporters.In response, 
the Senate decreed him “title of the first name”, which meant his name would be 
listed first in all official documents, and acclaimed him as “the greatest 
Augustus”. He issued decrees returning property lost under Maxentius, recalling 
political exiles, and releasing Maxentius’ imprisoned opponents.

In the following years, Constantine gradually consolidated his military 
superiority over his rivals in the crumbling Tetrarchy. In 313, he met
Licinius
in
Milan
to secure their alliance by the marriage 
of Licinius and Constantine’s half-sister
Constantia
. During this meeting, the emperors 
agreed on the so-called
Edict of Milan
,officially granting full 
tolerance to Christianity and all religions in the Empire.The document had 
special benefits for Christians, legalizing their religion and granting them 
restoration for all property seized during Diocletian’s persecution.

In the year 320,
Licinius
reneged on the religious freedom 
promised by the
Edict of Milan
in 313 and began to oppress 
Christians anew, generally without bloodshed, but resorting to confiscations and 
sacking of Christian office-holders.That became a challenge to Constantine in 
the West, climaxing in the great civil war of 324. Licinius, aided by
Goth
mercenaries
, represented the past and the 
ancient Pagan
faiths. Constantine and his
Franks
marched under the standard of the
labarum
, and both sides saw the battle in 
religious terms. Outnumbered, but fired by their zeal, Constantine’s army 
emerged victorious in the
Battle of Adrianople
. Licinius fled across the 
Bosphorus and appointed
Martius Martinianus
, the commander of his 
bodyguard, as Caesar, but Constantine next won the
Battle of the Hellespont
, and finally the
Battle of Chrysopolis
on 18 September 
324.Licinius and Martinianus surrendered to Constantine at Nicomedia on the 
promise their lives would be spared: they were sent to live as private citizens 
in Thessalonica and Cappadocia respectively, but in 325 Constantine accused 
Licinius of plotting against him and had them both arrested and hanged; 
Licinius’s son (the son of Constantine’s half-sister) was also killed. Thus 
Constantine became the sole emperor of the Roman Empire.

Foundation of 
Constantinople

Licinius’ defeat came to represent the defeat of a rival center of Pagan and 
Greek-speaking political activity in the East, as opposed to the Christian and 
Latin-speaking Rome, and it was proposed that a new Eastern capital should 
represent the integration of the East into the Roman Empire as a whole, as a 
center of learning, prosperity, and cultural preservation for the whole of the
Eastern Roman Empire
. Among the various 
locations proposed for this alternative capital, Constantine appears to have 
toyed earlier with
Serdica
(present-day
Sofia
), as he was reported saying that “Serdica 
is my Rome“. Sirmium
and
Thessalonica
were also considered. Eventually, 
however, Constantine decided to work on the Greek city of
Byzantium
, which offered the advantage of 
having already been extensively rebuilt on Roman patterns of urbanism, during 
the preceding century, by
Septimius Severus
and
Caracalla
, who had already acknowledged its 
strategic importance. The city was then renamed Constantinopolis 
(“Constantine’s City” or
Constantinople
in English), and issued special 
commemorative coins in 330 to honor the event. The new city was protected by the 
relics of the
True Cross
, the
Rod of Moses
and other holy
relics
, though a cameo now at the
Hermitage Museum
also represented Constantine 
crowned by the tyche
of the new city. The figures of old gods 
were either replaced or assimilated into a framework of
Christian symbolism
. Constantine built the new
Church of the Holy Apostles
on the site of a 
temple to Aphrodite
. Generations later there was the 
story that a
divine vision
led Constantine to this spot, and 
an angel
no one else could see, led him on a 
circuit of the new walls. The capital would often be compared to the ‘old’ Rome 
as Nova Roma Constantinopolitana, the “New Rome of Constantinople”.

 

Constantine the Great, mosaic in
Hagia Sophia
, c. 1000

Religious policy

Constantine is perhaps best known for being the first “Christian” Roman 
emperor. Scholars debate whether Constantine adopted his mother
St. Helena
‘s 
Christianity in his youth, or whether he adopted it gradually over the course of 
his life.
Constantine was over 40 when he finally declared himself a Christian, writing to 
Christians to make clear that he believed he owed his successes to the 
protection of the Christian High God alone.Throughout his rule, Constantine 
supported the Church financially, built basilicas, granted privileges to clergy 
(e.g. exemption from certain taxes), promoted Christians to high office, and 
returned property confiscated during the Diocletianic persecution.His most 
famous building projects include the
Church of the Holy Sepulchre
, and
Old Saint Peter’s Basilica
.

However, Constantine certainly did not patronize Christianity alone. After 
gaining victory in the Battle of the Milvian Bridge (312), a triumphal arch-the
Arch of Constantine
-was built (315) to 
celebrate his triumph. The arch is most notably decorated with images of the 
goddess
Victoria
and, at the time of its dedication, 
sacrifices to gods like
Apollo
,
Diana
, and
Hercules
were made. Most notably absent from 
the Arch are any depictions whatsoever regarding Christian symbolism.

Later in 321, Constantine instructed that Christians and non-Christians 
should be united in observing the venerable day of the sun, referencing 
the sun-worship
that
Aurelian
had established as an official cult. 
Furthermore, and long after his oft alleged “conversion” to Christianity, 
Constantine’s coinage continued to carry the symbols of the sun. Even after the 
pagan gods had disappeared from the coinage, Christian symbols appeared only as 
Constantine’s personal attributes: the
chi rho
between his hands or on his
labarum
, but never on the coin itself. Even 
when Constantine dedicated the new capital of Constantinople, which became the 
seat of Byzantine Christianity for a millennium, he did so wearing the
Apollonian
sun-rayed
Diadem
; no Christian symbols were present at 
this dedication.

Constantine made new laws regarding the
Jews. They were forbidden to own Christian slaves or to
circumcise
their slaves.

Administrative reforms

Beginning in the mid-3rd century the emperors began to favor members of the
equestrian order
over senators, who had had a 
monopoly on the most important offices of state. Senators were stripped of the 
command of legions and most provincial governorships (as it was felt that they 
lacked the specialized military upbringing needed in an age of acute defense 
needs), such posts being given to equestrians by Diocletian and his 
colleagues-following a practice enforced piecemeal by their predecessors. The 
emperors however, still needed the talents and the help of the very rich, who 
were relied on to maintain social order and cohesion by means of a web of 
powerful influence and contacts at all levels. Exclusion of the old senatorial 
aristocracy threatened this arrangement.

In 326, Constantine reversed this pro-equestrian trend, raising many 
administrative positions to senatorial rank and thus opening these offices to 
the old aristocracy, and at the same time elevating the rank of already existing 
equestrians office-holders to senator, eventually wiping out the equestrian 
order-at least as a bureaucratic rank-in the process. One could become a 
senator, either by being elected
praetor
or (in most cases) by fulfilling a 
function of senatorial rank: from then on, holding of actual power and social 
status were melded together into a joint imperial hierarchy. At the same time, 
Constantine gained with this the support of the old nobility, as the Senate was 
allowed itself to elect praetors and
quaestors
, in place of the usual practice of 
the emperors directly creating new magistrates (adlectio).

The Senate as a body remained devoid of any significant power; nevertheless, 
the senators, who had been marginalized as potential holders of imperial 
functions during the 3rd century, could now dispute such positions alongside 
more upstart bureaucrats. Some modern historians see in those administrative 
reforms an attempt by Constantine at reintegrating the senatorial order into the 
imperial administrative elite to counter the possibility of alienating pagan 
senators from a Christianized imperial rule.

Constantine’s reforms had to do only with the civilian administration: the 
military chiefs, who since the
Crisis of the Third Century
had risen from the 
ranks, remained outside the senate, in which they were included only by 
Constantine’s children.

Monetary reforms

After the
runaway inflation of the third century
, 
associated with the production of
fiat money
to pay for public expenses, 
Diocletian had tried unsuccessfully to reestablish trustworthy minting of silver 
and
billon
coins. The failure of the various 
Diocletianic attempts at the restoration of a functioning silver coin resided in 
the fact that the silver currency was overvalued in terms of its actual metal 
content, and therefore could only circulate at much discounted rates. Minting of 
the Diocletianic “pure” silver
argenteus
ceased, therefore, soon after 
305, while the billon currency continued to be used until the 360s. From the 
early 300s on, Constantine forsook any attempts at restoring the silver 
currency, preferring instead to concentrate on minting large quantities of good 
standard gold pieces-the
solidus
, 72 of which made a pound of gold. New 
(and highly debased) silver pieces would continue to be issued during 
Constantine’s later reign and after his death, in a continuous process of 
retariffing, until this billon minting eventually ceased, de jure, in 
367, with the silver piece being de facto continued by various 
denominations of bronze coins, the most important being the
centenionalis
. Later emperors like
Julian the Apostate
tried to present themselves 
as advocates of the humiles by insisting on trustworthy mintings of the 
bronze currency.

Constantine’s monetary policy were closely associated with his religious 
ones, in that increased minting was associated with measures of 
confiscation-taken since 331 and closed in 336-of all gold, silver and bronze 
statues from pagan temples, who were declared as imperial property and, as such, 
as monetary assets. Two imperial commissioners for each province had the task of 
getting hold of the statues and having them melded for immediate minting-with 
the exception of a number of bronze statues who were used as public monuments 
for the beautification of the new capital in Constantinople^.

Later campaigns

Constantine considered Constantinople as his capital and permanent residence. 
He lived there for a good portion of his later life. He rebuilt Trajan’s bridge 
across the Danube, in hopes of reconquering
Dacia
, a province that had been abandoned under 
Aurelian. In the late winter of 332, Constantine campaigned with the
Sarmatians
against the
Goths
. The weather and lack of food cost the 
Goths dearly: reportedly, nearly one hundred thousand died before they submitted 
to Rome. In 334, after Sarmatian commoners had overthrown their leaders, 
Constantine led a campaign against the tribe. He won a victory in the war and 
extended his control over the region, as remains of camps and fortifications in 
the region indicate.Constantine resettled some Sarmatian exiles as farmers in 
Illyrian and Roman districts, and conscripted the rest into the army. 
Constantine took the title Dacicus maximus in 336.

Sickness and death

Constantine had known death would soon come. Within the Church of the Holy 
Apostles, Constantine had secretly prepared a final resting-place for himself.It 
came sooner than he had expected. Soon after the Feast of Easter 337, 
Constantine fell seriously ill. He left Constantinople for the hot baths near 
his mother’s city of Helenopolis (Altinova), on the southern shores of the Gulf 
of İzmit. There, in a church his mother built in honor of Lucian the Apostle, he 
prayed, and there he realized that he was dying. Seeking purification, he became 
a catechumen
, and attempted a return to 
Constantinople, making it only as far as a suburb of Nicomedia. He summoned the 
bishops, and told them of his hope to be baptized in the
River Jordan
, where Christ was written to have 
been baptized. He requested the baptism right away. The bishops, Eusebius 
records, “performed the sacred ceremonies according to custom”. He chose the 
Arianizing bishop
Eusebius of Nicomedia
, bishop of the
city
where he lay dying, as his baptizer. In 
postponing his baptism, he followed one custom at the time which postponed 
baptism until after infancy. Constantine died soon after at a suburban villa 
called Achyron, on the last day of the fifty-day festival of Pentecost directly 
following Pascha (or Easter), on 22 May 337.

Following his death, his body was transferred to Constantinople and buried in 
the 
<=”” font=”” color=”#000000″>
<=”” font=”” color=”#000000″> there. He was 
succeeded by his three sons born of Fausta,
Constantine II
,
Constantius II
and
Constans
. A number of relatives were killed by 
followers of Constantius, notably Constantine’s nephews
Dalmatius
(who held the rank of Caesar) and
Hannibalianus
, presumably to eliminate possible 
contenders to an already complicated succession. He also had two daughters,
Constantina
and 
Helena
, wife of
Emperor Julian
.

<=”” font=”” color=”#000000″>

Legacy

The Byzantine Empire considered Constantine its founder and the
Holy Roman Empire
reckoned him among the 
venerable figures of its tradition. In the later Byzantine state, it had become 
a great honor for an emperor to be hailed as a “new Constantine”. Ten emperors, 
including the last emperor of Byzantium, carried the name. Most Eastern 
Christian churches consider Constantine a saint (Άγιος Κωνσταντίνος, Saint 
Constantine). In the Byzantine Church he was called isapostolos 
(Ισαπόστολος Κωνσταντίνος) -an
equal of the Apostles
.
Niš airport
is named Constantine the Great in 
honor of his birth in Naissus.

The Iron Age
Sarmatians (Latin Sarmatæ 
or Sauromatæ, Sanskrit
Sakas
Greek
Σαρμάται, 
Σαυρομάται) were an
Iranian people
in
Classical Antiquity
, flourishing from about the 
5th century BC to the 4th century AD.

Their territory was known as Sarmatia to
Greco-Roman ethnographers
, corresponding to the 
western part of greater
Scythia
(modern
Southern Russia
,
Ukraine
, and the eastern
Balkans
). At their greatest reported extent, 
around 100 BC, these tribes ranged from the
Vistula River
to the mouth of the
Danube
and eastward to the
Volga
, bordering the shores of the
Black
and
Caspian
seas as well as the
Caucasus
to the south.

The Sarmatians declined in the 4th century with the incursions connected to 
the
Migration period
(Huns,
Goths
). The descendants of the Sarmatians 
became known as the Alans
during the Early Middle Ages, and 
ultimately gave rise to the modern
Ossetic
ethnic group.

Name

Sarmatae is in origin probably just one of several tribal names of the 
Sarmatians which came to be applied to the entire group as an
exonym
in
Greco-Roman ethnography
.
Strabo
in the 1st century names as the main 
tribes of the Sarmatians the
Iazyges
, the
Roxolani
, the
Aorsi
and the
Siraces
.

The Greek name Sarmatai derives from the shortening of Sauromatai 
apparently by association with lizards (sauros). Suggestions for the 
reason the Sarmatians were associated with lizards include their reptile-like 
scale armour and their dragon standards.^[5]

Both
Pliny the Elder
( book ivNatural 
History) and
Jordanes
are aware that the names in Sar- 
and in Sauro- are interchangeable variants, referring to the same people.

Greek authors of the 4th century (Pseudo-Scylax,
Eudoxus of Cnidus
) mention Syrmatae as 
the name of a people living at the Don, perhaps reflecting the ethnonym as it 
was pronounced in the final phase of Sarmatian culture. The
Avesta
mentions Sairima as a region “in 
the west”.

Origins

The Sarmatians emerged in the 7th century BC in a region of the steppe to the 
east of the Don River
and south of the
Ural Mountains
in Eastern Europe. For centuries 
they lived in relatively peaceful co-existence with their western neighbours the
Scythians
. Then in the 3rd century BC they 
spilled over the Don to attack the Scythians on the
Pontic steppe
to the north of
the Black Sea
. The Sarmatians were to dominate 
these territories over the next five centuries.^[6]

Archaeology

Great steppe
of Kazakhstan in early 
spring.

A Sarmatian
diadem
, found at the Khokhlach
kurgan
near
Novocherkassk
(1st century AD,
Hermitage Museum
).

Sarmatian cataphracts during
Dacian Wars
as depicted on
Trajan’s Column
.

Sarmatia Europea in map of
Scythia
, 1697.

“Sarmatia Europæa” separated from “Sarmatia Asiatica” 
by the Tanais
(the
River Don
), based on Greek literary 
sources, in a map printed in London, ca 1770.

Soviet archaeologist
Boris Grakov
in 1947^{[citation 
needed]} defined a culture flourishing from the 6th 
century BC to the 4th century AD, apparent in late
Kurgan
graves, sometimes reusing part of much 
older Kurgans. It is a nomadic steppe culture ranging from the
Black Sea
to beyond the
Volga
, and is especially evident at two of the 
major sites at
Kardaielova
and
Chernaya
in the trans-Uralic steppe. Grekov 
defined four phases:

1. Sauromatian, 6th-5th centuries BC
2. Early Sarmatian, 4th-2nd centuries BC
3. Middle Sarmatian, late 2nd century BC to late 2nd century AD
4. Late Sarmatian: late 2nd century AD to 4th century AD

It is important to note that while “Sarmatian” and “Sauromatian” are 
synonymous as ethnonyms, they are given different meanings purely by convention 
as archaeological technical terms.

In Hungary
, a great Late Sarmatian pottery center 
was reportedly unearthed between 2001-2006 near
Budapest
, in
Üllő5
archaeological site. Typical gray, 
granular Üllő5 ceramics forms a distinct group of Sarmatian pottery found 
everywhere in the northcentral part of the
Great Hungarian Plain
region, indicating a 
lively trading activity. A 1998 paper on the study of glass beads found in 
Sarmatian graves suggests wide cultural and trade links.^[7]

Archaeological evidence suggests that Scythian-Sarmatian cultures may have 
given rise to the myth of
Amazons
. Graves of armed females have been 
found in southern Ukraine and Russia. David Anthony notes, “About 20% of
Scythian
-Sarmatian 
“warrior graves” on the lower
Don
and lower
Volga
contained females dressed for battle as 
if they were men, a phenomenon that probably inspired the Greek tales about the
Amazons
.”^[8]

Language

The numerous Iranian personal names in the Greek inscriptions from the
Black Sea
Coast indicate that the Sarmatians 
spoke a
North-Eastern Iranian
dialect ancestral to
Ossetic
(see
Scytho-Sarmatian
).^[9]

Appearance

Like the Scythians, Sarmatians were of a
Caucasoid
appearance, and before the arrival of 
the Huns
(4th century AD) it is thought that few 
had Asiatic or turco
-Mongol 
features. Sarmatian noblemen often reached 1.70-1.80m (5ft 7ins-5ft 10ins) as 
measured from
skeletons
, and they had sturdy bones, they wore 
long hair and beards.

The Alans
who were a group of Sarmatian tribes 
according to the
Roman
historian
Ammianus Marcellinus
“Nearly all the Alani are 
men of great stature and beauty , their hair is somewhat
yellow
, their eyes are frighteningly fierce”.^[6]

Greco-Roman 
ethnography

Herodotus
(Histories 
4.21) in the 5th century BC placed the land of the Sarmatians east of the
Tanais
, beginning at the corner of the
Maeotian Lake
, stretching northwards for 
fifteen days’ journey, adjacent to the forested land of the
Budinoi
. Herodotus describes the Sarmatians’ 
physical appearance as blond, stout and tanned, in short, pretty much as the
Scythians
and
Thracians
were seen by the other classical 
authors.^[who?]

As seen in Roman depictions of Sarmatians they are of caucasian types^[10]

Herodotus (4.110-117) gives a story of the Sauromatians’ origin from an 
unfortunate marriage of a band of young Scythian men and a group of
Amazons
. In the story, some
Amazons
were captured in battle by Greeks in
Pontus
(northern
Turkey
) near the river
Thermodon
, and the captives were loaded into 
three boats. They overcame their captors while at sea, but were not able 
sailors. Their ships were blown north to the
Maeotian Lake
(the
Sea of Azov
) onto the shore of
Scythia
near the cliff region (today’s 
southeastern Crimea
). After encountering the Scythians and 
learning the Scythian language, they agreed to marry Scythian men, but only on 
the condition that they move away and not be required to follow the customs of 
Scythian women. According to Herodotus, the descendants of this band settled 
toward the northeast beyond the
Tanais (Don)
river and became the Sauromatians. 
Herodotus’ account explains the origins of the Sarmatians’ language as an 
“impure” form of Scythian and credits the unusual freedoms of Sauromatae women, 
including participation in warfare, as an inheritance from their supposed Amazon 
ancestors. Later writers^[who?] 
refer to the “woman-ruled Sarmatae” (γυναικοκρατούμενοι). However, Herodotus’ 
belief that the Sarmatians were descendants of mythological Amazons is very 
likely a fictional invention designed to explain certain idiosyncrasies of 
Sarmatian culture.

Hippocrates

^[11]
explicitly classes them as Scythian 
and describes their warlike women and their customs:

Their women, so long as they are virgins, ride, shoot, throw the javelin 
while mounted, and fight with their enemies. They do not lay aside their 
virginity until they have killed three of their enemies, and they do not 
marry before they have performed the traditional sacred rites. A woman who 
takes to herself a husband no longer rides, unless she is compelled to do so 
by a general expedition. They have no right breast; for while they are yet 
babies their mothers make red-hot a bronze instrument constructed for this 
very purpose and apply it to the right breast and cauterize it, so that its 
growth is arrested, and all its strength and bulk are diverted to the right 
shoulder and right arm.

Strabo
^{[citation 
needed]} mentions the Sarmatians in a number of 
places, never saying very much about them. He uses both Sarmatai and Sauromatai, 
but never together, and never suggesting that they are different peoples. He 
often pairs Sarmatians and
Scythians
in reference to a series of ethnic 
names, never stating which is which, as though Sarmatian or Scythian could apply 
equally to them all.

In Strabo, the Sarmatians extend from above the Danube eastward to the Volga, 
and from north of the
Dnepr
into the
Caucasus
, where, he says, they are called 
Caucasii like everyone else there. This statement indicates that the
Alans
already had a home in the Caucasus, 
without waiting for the Huns to push them there.

Even more significantly, he points to a Celtic admixture in the region of the
Basternae
, who, he says, are of
Germanic
origin. The
Celtic
Boii,
Scordisci
and
Taurisci
are there. A fourth ethnic element 
being melted in are the
Thracians
(7.3.2). Moreover, the peoples toward 
the north are Keltoskythai, “Celtic Scythians” (11.6.2).

Strabo also portrays the peoples of the region as being nomadic, or 
Hamaksoikoi, “wagon-dwellers” and Galaktophagoi, “milk-eaters” referring, no 
doubt, to the universal
koumiss
eaten in historical times. The wagons 
were used for porting tents made of
felt, which must have been the
yurts used universally by Asian nomads.

Pliny the Elder
writes (4.12.79-81):

From this point (the mouth of the
Danube
) all the races in general are 
Scythian, though various sections have occupied the lands adjacent to the 
coast, in one place the
Getae
… at another the Sarmatae … Agrippa 
describes the whole of this area from the Danube to the sea … as far as the 
river Vistula in the direction of the Sarmatian desert … The name of the 
Scythians has spread in every direction, as far as the Sarmatae and the 
Germans, but this old designation has not continued for any except the most 
outlying sections ….

According to Pliny, Scythian rule once extended as far as Germany.
Jordanes
supports this hypothesis by telling us 
on the one hand that he was familiar with the Geography of
Ptolemy
, which includes the entire Balto-Slavic 
territory in Sarmatia^{[citation 
needed]}, and on the other that this same region was 
Scythia. By “Sarmatia”, Jordanes means only the Aryan territory. The Sarmatians 
therefore did come from the Scythians.

Tacitus
‘
De Origine et situ Germanorum
speaks of 
“mutual fear” between
Germanic peoples
and Sarmatians:

All Germania is divided from Gaul, Raetia, and Pannonia by the Rhine and 
Danube rivers; from the Sarmatians and the
Dacians
by shared fear and mountains. The 
Ocean laps the rest, embracing wide bays and enormous stretches of islands. 
Just recently, we learned about certain tribes and kings, whom war brought 
to light.^[12]

According to Tacitus, like the
Persians
, the Sarmatians wore long, flowing 
robes (ch 17). Moreover, the Sarmatians exacted tribute from the
Cotini
and
Osi
, and iron from the Cotini (ch. 43), “to 
their shame” (presumably because they could have used the iron to arm themselves 
and resist).

By the 3rd century BC, the Sarmatian name appears to have supplanted the 
Scythian in the plains of what is now south
Ukraine
. The geographer,
Ptolemy
,^{[citation 
needed]} reports them at what must be their maximum 
extent, divided into adjoining European and central Asian sections. Considering 
the overlap of tribal names between the Scythians and the Sarmatians, no new 
displacements probably took place. The people were the same Indo-Europeans they 
used to be, but now under yet another name.

Later,
Pausanias
, viewing
votive offerings
near the Athenian Acropolis in 
the 2nd century AD,^[13] 
found among them a Sauromic breastplate.

On seeing this a man will say that no less than Greeks are foreigners 
skilled in the arts: for the Sauromatae have no iron, neither mined by 
themselves nor yet imported. They have, in fact, no dealings at all with the 
foreigners around them. To meet this deficiency they have contrived 
inventions. In place of iron they use bone for their spear-blades, and
corneal-wood
for their bows and arrows, 
with bone points for the arrows. They throw a lasso round any enemy they 
meet, and then turning round their horses upset the enemy caught in the 
lasso. Their breastplates they make in the following fashion. Each man keeps 
many mares, since the land is not divided into private allotments, nor does 
it bear any thing except wild trees, as the people are nomads. These mares 
they not only use for war, but also sacrifice them to the local gods and eat 
them for food. Their hoofs they collect, clean, split, and make from them as 
it were python scales. Whoever has never seen a python must at least have 
seen a pine-cone still green. He will not be mistaken if he liken the 
product from the hoof to the segments that are seen on the pine-cone. These 
pieces they bore and stitch together with the sinews of horses and oxen, and 
then use them as breastplates that are as handsome and strong as those of 
the Greeks. For they can withstand blows of missiles and those struck in 
close combat.

Pausanias’ description is well borne out in a relief from Tanais.^{[citation 
needed]} These facts are not necessarily incompatible 
with Tacitus, as the western Sarmatians might have kept their iron to 
themselves, it having been a scarce commodity on the plains.

In the late 4th century,
Ammianus Marcellinus
^[14] 
describes a severe defeat which Sarmatian raiders inflicted upon Roman forces in 
the province of Valeria in
Pannonia
in late 374 AD. The Sarmatians almost 
destroyed 2 legions: one recruited from
Moesia
and one legion from Pannonia. The last 
had been sent to intercept a party of Sarmatians which had been in pursuit of a 
senior Roman officer named Aequitius. The two legions failed to coordinate, 
allowing the Sarmatians to catch them unprepared.

Decline in the 4th 
century

The Sarmatians remained dominant until the
Gothic
ascendancy in the
Black Sea area. Goths attacked Sarmatian tribes on the north of the 
Danube in Dacia
, what is today
Romania
. The Roman Emperor
Constantine
called
Constantine II
up from Galia to run a campaign 
north of the Danube. In very cold weather, the Romans were victorious, killing 
100,000 Goths and capturing
Ariaricus
the son of the Goth king.^[15][16][17]

In their efforts to halt the Gothic expansion and replace it with their own 
on the north of Lower Danube (present-day Romania), the Sarmatians armed their 
captives. After the Roman victory, however, the local population revolted 
against their Sarmatian masters, pushing them beyond the Roman border. 
Constantine, on whom the Sarmatians had called for help, defeated
Limigantes
, the leader of the revolt, and moved 
the Sarmatian population back in. In the Roman provinces, Sarmatian combatants 
were enlisted in the Roman army, whilst the rest of the population was 
distributed throughout
Thrace
, Macedonia and Italy.
Origo Constantini
mentions 300,000 refugees 
resulting from this conflict. The emperor Constantine was subsequently 
attributed the title of
Sarmaticus Maximus
.

In the 4th and 5th centuries, the
Huns expanded and conquered both the Sarmatians and the Germanic 
Tribes living between the Black Sea and the borders of the Roman Empire. From 
bases in modern day Hungary, the Huns ruled the entire former Sarmatian 
territory. Their various constituents enjoyed a
floruit
under Hunnish rule, fought for the Huns 
against a combination of Roman and Germanic troops, and went their own ways 
after the
Battle of Chalons
, the death of
Attila
and the disappearance of the
Chuvash
ruling elements west of the Volga.

In
Roman mythology
, Victoria was the personification/Goddess of victory. 
She is the Roman version of the
Greek goddess
Nike
, and was associated with
Bellona
. She was adapted from the
Sabine
agricultural goddess
Vacuna
and had 
a
temple
on the
Palatine Hill
. Her name (in Latin) means victory. Unlike the Greek Nike, Victoria (Latin 
for “victory”) was a major part of Roman society. Multiple temples were erected 
in her honour. When her statue was removed in 382 AD by emperor
Gratianus
there was much anger in Rome. She was normally worshipped by
triumphant
generals returning from war. Also unlike the Greek Nike, who was known for success in athletic games such 
as chariot races, Victoria was a symbol of victory over death and determined who 
would be successful during war. Appearing on Roman coins, jewelry, architecture, and other arts, Victoria is 
often seen with or in a
chariot
. An 
example of this is her place upon the
Brandenburg Gate
in Berlin, Germany.