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Licinius I –
Roman Emperor 308-324 A.D.
Billon Argenteus 16mm (2.08
grams) Arles mint, struck 319 A.D.
Reference: RIC VII 196
IMP
LICINIVS AVG, Laureate, cuirassed bust right.
IOVI CONSERVATORI AVG /
TARL, Jupiter riding eagle standing right, holding thunderbolt.
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Licinius I –
Roman Emperor 308-324 A.D.
| Husband of
Constantia | Father of
Licinius II | Son-in-law of
Theodora and (posthumously)
Constantius I | Uncle of
Delmatius,
Hanniballianus,
Constantius Gallus,
Julian II and
Nepotian | Half-brother-in-law of
Constantine the Great |
Licinius I (Latin: Gaius
Valerius Licinianus Licinius Augustus; c. 263-325) was 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.
Sculptural portraits of Licinius (left) and his rival Constantine I
(right).
Born to a Dacian peasant family in Moesia Superior,
Licinius accompanied his close childhood friend, the future emperor
Galerius, on the Persian expedition in 298. He was trusted enough by
Galerius that in 307 he was sent as an envoy to Maxentius in Italy to
attempt to reach some agreement about the latter’s illegitimate
political position. Galerius then trusted the eastern provinces to
Licinius when he went to deal with Maxentius personally after the death
of Flavius Valerius Severus.
Upon his return to the east Galerius
elevated Licinius to the rank of Augustus in the West on November 11,
308. He received as his immediate command the provinces of Illyricum,
Thrace and Pannonia. In 310 he took command of the war against the
Sarmatians, inflicting a severe defeat on them and emerging victorious.
On the death of Galerius in May 311, Licinius entered into an agreement
with Maximinus II (Daia) to share the eastern provinces between them. By
this point, not only was Licinius the official Augustus of the
west but he also possessed part of the eastern provinces as well, as the
Hellespont and the Bosporus became the dividing line, with Licinius
taking the European provinces and Maximinus taking the Asian.
An
alliance between Maximinus and Maxentius forced the two remaining
emperors to enter into a formal agreement with each other. So in March
313 Licinius married Flavia Julia Constantia, half-sister of Constantine
I, at Mediolanum (now Milan); they had a son, Licinius the Younger, in
315. Their marriage was the occasion for the jointly-issued “Edict of
Milan” that reissued Galerius’ previous edict allowing Christianity to
be professed in the Empire, with additional dispositions that restored
confiscated properties to Christian congregations and exempted Christian
clergy from municipal civic duties. The redaction of the edict as
reproduced by Lactantius – who follows the text affixed by Licinius in
Nicomedia on June 14 313, after Maximinus’ defeat – uses a neutral
language, expressing a will to propitiate “any Divinity whatsoever in
the seat of the heavens”.
Daia in the meantime decided to attack
Licinius. Leaving Syria with 70,000 men, he reached Bithyniaa, although
harsh weather he encountered along the way had gravely weakened his
army. In April 313, he crossed the Bosporus and went to Byzantium, which
was held by Licinius’ troops. Undeterred, he took the town after an
eleven-day siege. He moved to Heraclea, which he captured after a short
siege, before moving his forces to the first posting station. With a
much smaller body of men, possibly around 30,000, Licinius arrived at
Adrianople while Daia was still besieging Heraclea. Before the decisive
engagement, Licinius allegedly had a vision in which an angel recited
him a generic prayer that could be adopted by all cults and which
Licinius then repeated to his soldiers. On 30 April 313, the two armies
clashed at the Battle of Tzirallum, and in the ensuing battle Daia’s
forces were crushed. Ridding himself of the imperial purple and dressing
like a slave, Daia fled to Nicomedia. Believing he still had a chance to
come out victorious, Daia attempted to stop the advance of Licinius at
the Cilician Gates by establishing fortifications there. Unfortunately
for Daia, Licinius’ army succeeded in breaking through, forcing Daia to
retreat to Tarsus where Licinius continued to press him on land and sea.
The war between them only ended with Daia’s death in August 313.
Given that Constantine had already crushed his rival Maxentius in 312,
the two men decided to divide the Roman world between them. As a result
of this settlement, Licinius became sole Augustus in the East, while his
brother-in-law, Constantine, was supreme in the West. Licinius
immediately rushed to the east to deal with another threat, this time
from the Persian Sassanids.
Conflict with Constantine I
In
314, a civil war erupted between Licinius and Constantine, in which
Constantine used the pretext that Licinius was harbouring Senecio, whom
Constantine accused of plotting to overthrow him. Constantine prevailed
at the Battle of Cibalae in Pannonia (October 8, 314). Although the
situation was temporarily settled, with both men sharing the consulship
in 315, it was but a lull in the storm. The next year a new war erupted,
when Licinius named Valerius Valens co-emperor, only for Licinius to
suffer a humiliating defeat on the plain of Mardia (also known as Campus
Ardiensis) in Thrace. The emperors were reconciled after these two
battles and Licinius had his co-emperor Valens killed.
Over the
next ten years, the two imperial colleagues maintained an uneasy truce.
Licinius kept himself busy with a campaign against the Sarmatians in
318, but temperatures rose again in 321 when Constantine pursued some
Sarmatians, who had been ravaging some territory in his realm, across
the Danube into what was technically Licinius’s territory. When he
repeated this with another invasion, this time by the Goths who were
pillaging Thrace, Licinius complained that Constantine had broken the
treaty between them.
Constantine wasted no time going on the
offensive. Licinius’s fleet of 350 ships was defeated by Constantine’s
fleet in 323. Then in 324, Constantine, tempted by the “advanced age and
unpopular vices” of his colleague, again declared war against him and
having defeated his army of 170,000 men at the Battle of Adrianople
(July 3, 324), succeeded in shutting him up within the walls of
Byzantium. The defeat of the superior fleet of Licinius in the Battle of
the Hellespont by Crispus, Constantine’s eldest son and Caesar,
compelled his withdrawal to Bithynia, where a last stand was made; the
Battle of Chrysopolis, near Chalcedon (September 18), resulted in
Licinius’ final submission. While Licinius’ co-emperor Sextus
Martinianus was killed, Licinius himself was spared due to the pleas of
his wife, Constantine’s sister and interned at Thessalonica. The next
year, Constantine had him hanged, accusing him of conspiring to raise
troops among the barbarians.
Character and legacy
After
defeating Daia, he had put to death Flavius Severianus, the son of the
emperor Severus, as well as Candidianus, the son of Galerius. He also
ordered the execution of the wife and daughter of the Emperor
Diocletian, who had fled from the court of Licinius before being
discovered at Thessalonica.
As part of Constantine’s attempts to
decrease Licinius’s popularity, he actively portrayed his brother-in-law
as a pagan supporter. This was not the case; contemporary evidence tends
to suggest that he was at least a committed supporter of Christians. He
co-authored the Edict of Milan which ended the Great Persecution, and
re-affirmed the rights of Christians in his half of the empire. He also
added the Christian symbol to his armies, and attempted to regulate the
affairs of the Church hierarchy just as Constantine and his successors
were to do. His wife was a devout Christian. It is even a possibility
that he converted. However, Eusebius of Caesarea, writing under the rule
of Constantine, charges him with expelling Christians from the Palace
and ordering military sacrifice, as well as interfering with the
Church’s internal procedures and organization. According to Eusebius,
this turned what appeared to be a committed Christian into a man who
feigned sympathy for the sect but who eventually exposed his true
bloodthirsty pagan nature, only to be stopped by the virtuous
Constantine.
Finally, on Licinius’s death, his memory was branded
with infamy; his statues were thrown down; and by edict, all his laws
and judicial proceedings during his reign were abolished.
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