Talk:Justinian I

GA Pass
I am glad to report that this article nomination for good article status has been promoted. This is how the article, as of May 9, 2008, compares against the six good article criteria:


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 * 5. Article stability? Pass
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If you feel that this review is in error, feel free to take it to Good article reassessment. Thank you to all of the editors who worked hard to bring it to this status, and congratulations. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Climie.ca (talk • contribs)

RE/BE/ERE?
The change from "Eastern Roman Emperor" to "Byzantine Emperor" by the alphabetically challenged 74.72.11.32 (yes, that is his/her WP name :-) in the very first sentence seems gratuitous.

The primary readers of this WP article are, I suspect, not professional historians. Justinian accomplished several notable projects and he represents an important evolutionary figure in his empire's history. So one might sensibly first regard him as an emperor of the RE, or perhaps more precisely of the ERE.
 * But to most readers, Justinian is singularly significant for reorganizing Roman law, reconquering the (Mediterranean portions of the) western lands of the Roman Empire, and thereby exporting that law westward.
 * He did so from the RE's traditional eastern capital.

But how does identifying him as "Byzantine" help such readers? To me, this change illuminates very little, and it obscures the most important connection of the time: Justinian thought of himself and his empire as Roman, as did virtually everyone else in both his empire and the reconquered lands. 24.63.96.35 (talk) 03:06, 15 September 2008 (UTC)
 * Agreed.--79.111.92.19 (talk) 15:40, 11 November 2008 (UTC)


 * Perfect! --deguef (talk) 20:34, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Someone changed this again recently, from ERE to BE (July 2020). I changed it back. My change is justified since both Justinian's predecessor Justin I and his successor Justin II are identified as ERE, not BE. It would, indeed, be better to have a consistent policy regarding this. If we name all post-476 Emperors as Byzantine, that is debatable but would be better than the alternating titles we have now. A better cut-off might be the rule of Emperor Heraclius, after whom the Empire was largely restricted to its medieval territories in Anatolia and the Balkans, as opposed to a Mediterranean-wide empire. Diegojosesalva (talk) 20:10, 23 July 2020 (UTC)


 * I changed the description in the top paragraph from "Byzantine" back to "Eastern Roman", to align with what Wikipedia currently uses for all other ERE/BE emperors until after Heraclius. There is no reason why Justinian should be an exception to that convention. Heraclius makes a lot more sense as the dividing line, if we have to draw it somewhere. Diegojosesalva (talk) 18:29, 17 February 2023 (UTC)
 * Makes sense to me. I agree with this rendition. LVDP01 (talk) 19:04, 17 February 2023 (UTC)

Why Does Wikipedia Gloss Over The Illyrians?
It can be proved easily that Jutinian was an illyrian by looking at the way he behaved and the way the Illyrian Emperors of Rome behaved. In the time of Diocletian all emperors were Illyrian and would only choose one of their own because they simply wanted to keep the reigns of empire in Illyrian hands. The illyrian emperor Anastasius would not have choose a non-Illyrian as his successor. This would be well understood by any albanian of today.

Justinian and fifteen other Roman emperors were Illyrian, including Diocletian and Constantine the Great, yet mention of this and explicit statements which can clarify that they were all born in ILLYRIA (Illyricum) are strictly prohibited here. Dardania: does this ring a bell? The Dardanii were an Illyrian tribe who inhabited much of present-day Kosovo. We mustn’t offend the Serbians and the Greeks, I suppose. Need I remind anyone that there were no Slavs in the Balkans at the time? And the Greeks desire to claim all Byzantine rulers as theirs. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.243.34.108 (talk) 05:49, 23 March 2010 (UTC)


 * well, at least according to Norwich he was Thracian, not "Illyrian". I apologize to the Albanian nationalists for this (not that they should care, since the equation Illyrians = Albanians is not accepted by anyone outside Albania) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.1.221.177 (talk) 23:56, 14 June 2010 (UTC)
 * I had to do a double-take - how he BEHAVED determined that he was an Illyrian, ethnically? Wow. 104.169.39.45 (talk) 03:58, 22 January 2018 (UTC)


 * Anastasius didn’t choose Justinian as his successor, Justin I placed the dynasty into power through a coup as Anastasius had lacked the influence needed to secure the throne for his preferred successor Hypatius. Justin and Justinian were of Thracian origins. At least if Ian Hughes and Peter Heather are to be trusted. Dorromikhal (talk) 01:10, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
 * All we know is that Constantine and his father were born in Illyria - that doesn't mean that the family wasn't a Roman-Italian transplant, as is claimed by the suspicious Historia Augusta. Lost in the depths of time ... -HammerFilmFan

Overhauling Results Section
The current results section does quite a bit of speculative history. Specifically: "The greater part of Italy would be lost to the invading Lombards three years after Justinian's death (568), the newly founded province of Spania was completely recovered by the Hispanian Visigoths in 624 under the leadership of Suintila, and within a century and a half Africa would be forever lost for the empire to the Rashidun and Umayyad Caliphates during the Muslim conquests.

Events of the later years of the reign showed that Constantinople itself was not safe from barbarian incursions from the north, and even the relatively benevolent historian Menander Protector felt the need to attribute the Emperor's failure to protect the capital to the weakness of his body in his old age.[59] In his efforts to renew the Roman Empire, Justinian dangerously stretched its resources while failing to take into account the changed realities of 6th-century Europe.[60] Paradoxically, the grand scale of Justinian's military successes probably contributed in part to the Empire's subsequent decline.[61]"

There are plenty of issues to critique Justinian, or to show the multifaceted dimensions of his foreign wars. Antioch was sacked because of a weakened frontier army owing to their redeployment to the west. We also see economic stagnation because of heavy tax rates. Furthermore there is the fact that the coffers were empty after Justinian's reign leaving Justin the Younger with a number of Barbarian invasions; these are all real results. However currently, these paragraphs we really begin going down the timeline. The conquests of the caliphates for instance, the article seemingly infers that Justinian's western conquests were at least partially for this, but the Battle of Yarmouk wasn't for 71 years after Justinian's death. To give a modern parallel to this timeline, this is like saying Franklin Delano Roosevelt's policies were partially responsible for, I don't know, Obamacare, or Justinian thus the Loss of Africa is like saying Abe Lincoln's policies were partially responsible for the Iraq war; sounds absurd doesn't it? This section makes some pretty tenuous propositions with little to back them up. If there were some ironclad sources, then maybe we could talk but the last quote: "Paradoxically, the grand scale of Justinian's military successes probably contributed in part to the Empire's subsequent decline." Uses pohl, never bothers with a first name, a year, or a name of a paper so I'm left searching to try and figure out who this guy is, and the best I can find is an expert in Carolingian history. So my request is to clean. I have access to an academic library so I can go back over the articles cited by Haldon et alii and give more contemporary results. Or if there is iron clad consensus against this, then why not also credit Justinian with Maurice's and Tiberius' successes? (Alcibiades979 (talk) 13:05, 21 December 2016 (UTC))

I agree with you. There are actually several things in the current narrative that go beyond my suspension of disbelief.:
 * The invasion of the Lombards was a setback for the Empire, but not an overwhelming success for the invaders. The Kingdom of the Lombards (568-774) never had full control of the Italian Peninsula and actually lacked several of its key areas. The Byzantines maintained control of the Duchy of Rome (533-751), the Exarchate of Ravenna (584-751), and later the Catepanate of Italy (965-1071). And naturally the Republic of Venice (697-1797). started out as a subordinate state of the Byzantine Empire and gained independence in later centuries. The Byzantines remained one of the powers in Italy until the 11th century, when the Normans started controlling much of Italy. The Byzantine Papacy (537-752) was depended on the imperial appointment of the Popes.
 * Spania (552-624) seems to have declined in size and population before it fell. But they actually withstood several wars with the Visigothic Kingdom and fell 59 years following the death of Justinian I. Even then, the Byzantines remained in control of the Balearic Islands until the 8th century.
 * The Exarchate of Africa (c. 585-698) only fell to the Umayyad Caliphate in 698, 133 years following the death of Justinian I. The Rashidun Caliphate (632-661) was only a short-lived opponent and never held Carthage.
 * Menander Protector is a great source and often an eye-witness to what he records. But his history only covered the period from 558 to 582, and does not even give a full picture of the Justinian dynasty. The barbarians mentioned above are probably the Kutrigurs, which started invading the Empire in the last years of Justinian's reign. Justinian I manipulated them into starting a war with the Utigurs. The two nomadic people decimated each other, making them easy prey for the Pannonian Avars and the Turkic Khaganate.
 * The narrative entirely fails to mention the Plague of Justinian and its effects on the Empire. The Empire faced demographic decline, with the plague killing an estimated 25 million people. The reduced number of farmers led to the decline of both agriculture and trade, and a declining tax revenue. And while the main event took place in the 540s, "The plague returned periodically until the 8th century". Dimadick (talk) 18:10, 25 December 2016 (UTC)


 * I agree also. Despite seizing control of much of Italy, the Lombards merely represented a regional problem at best and were unable to become much of a naval threat. It could be said that the conquests of Italy, Africa, and southern Hispania secured the Mediterranean again. Let's not forget that the western Mediterranean was a real thorn in the empire's side while the Vandals had a free hand navally. Retaking these areas is what allowed Maurice to focus on the Danube and Eastern frontiers – Justinian's conquests were obviously requisite for his stunning defeats of the Sassanids and Avars. As such, I'd sooner blame Phocas for the success of the Muslim invasions than blame anything Justinian did. Besides, without Justinian's reconquest of Africa, Heraclius wouldn't have been around to bring an army to bear upon Phocas to give the empire a fighting chance in the early 7th century. I'd say the two main factors from Justinian's reign that subsequently "weakened" the empire would be the Plague and the lack of money – of which only the latter could be partially blamed on Justinian. I say "partially" because the plague no doubt exacerbated financial issues as Dimadick said. I think the article should reflect these basic facts as opposed to making sweeping generalizations about Justinian's reign and blaming him for events that happened several decades later.--Tataryn (talk) 20:17, 25 December 2016 (UTC)
 * Personal opinions about the validity of Reliable Sources matter not a whiff - all that matters is what the SOURCES state, and properly summarizing/paraphrasing them. 50.111.14.1 (talk) 20:09, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Justinian's Greek name Part II
Okay, so it is settled that Greek was the dominant language of the Eastern Empire. I am wondering about the transliteration of Φλάβιος Πέτρος Σαββάτιος as Flávios Pétros Sabbátios, which implies a fricative /v/ pronunciation of β ('v' as in victor) for flavius but a stop consonant /b/ pronunciation ('b' as in boy) for Σαββάτιος. Although maybe not everyone here comes from a historical linguistic background, is it being claimed that the Latin-derived word was pronounced /v/ (having changed from /w/) but the Greek β remained /b/ when it is probable that β had become /v/ by the Early Byzantine period, see Koine Greek phonology?Iotacist (talk) 05:30, 19 March 2017 (UTC)Iotacist
 * Yes, that was settled over 1,500 years ago. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.111.19.34 (talk) 17:09, 7 December 2021 (UTC)

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"temporal schism"
"Religious relations with Rome" "However, the condemnation was received unfavourably in the west, where it led to new (albeit temporal) schism"  Should this say "temporary" rather than "temporal"?--Richardson mcphillips (talk) 18:58, 12 April 2019 (UTC)

Justinian’s reconquest - preplanned or not?
Ian Hughes claims in his book on Belisarius that the motivation for the reconquest was the internal chaos in the victim nations not some kind of grand plan Justinian made beforehand. Peter Heather in his book on the empire’s recovery under Justinian states that Justinian was probably partly responsible for causing Byzantine-Persian relation to sour. It seems illogical for someone to provoke their most powerful neighbour with the intention of soon moving their resources to the other end of his empire. The hasty peace with Khosrow can be explained by saying he wanted to focus on freeing Hilderic but the rest seems still seems illogical. In the article the claim that Justinian considered it his duty as a Christian emperor to restore the empire to its ancient borders is unsourced. Dorromikhal (talk) 01:24, 22 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Unsourced material can be immediately deleted - you can tag it an notify the editor that a source is required in 24/48/72 hours, whatever. I sometimes give seasoned editors time to perhaps correct an oversight.50.111.14.1 (talk) 20:12, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Map Using the Wrong Language
In the section titled "War in Italy, first phase, 535–540", the map titled "Justinian's conquests" is not in English. Neither the small descriptive texts under some of the territory names, nor the map key, is written in English. I don't know enough about the language to translate it, and I'm not confident about my knowledge in Copyright law, so I cannot (Or should not) correct it.

Section of the article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justinian_I#War_in_Italy,_first_phase,_535%E2%80%93540

The map: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Emp%C3%A8ri_Bizantin_-_R%C3%A8ine_de_Justinian.png — Preceding unsigned comment added by 114.142.233.38 (talk) 09:06, 6 May 2022 (UTC)


 * I completely agree with you. I am trying to research and I can’t understand the maps. Poppyway (talk) 17:37, 22 March 2023 (UTC)