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Jovian (Flavius Jovianus Augustus; Ἰοβιανός; 331 – 17 February 364) was Roman Emperor from 363 to 364. Upon the death of emperor Julian during his campaign against the Sasanid Empire, Jovian was hastily declared emperor by his soldiers. He sought peace with the Persians on humiliating terms and reestablished Christianity as the state church. His reign lasted only eight months.

Rise to power
Jovian was born at Singidunum (today Belgrade in Serbia) in 331 AD, the son of Varronianus, the commander of Constantius II's imperial bodyguards (comes domesticorum). He also joined the guards and by 363 had risen to the same command that his father had once held. In this capacity, he escorted Constantius' remains to the Church of the Holy Apostles. Jovian accompanied the Emperor Julian on the Mesopotamian campaign of the same year against Shapur II, the Sassanid king. After the Battle of Samarra, a small but decisive engagement, the Roman army was forced to retreat from the numerically superior Persian force. Julian, mortally wounded during the retreat, died on 26 June 363. The next day, after the aged Saturninius Secundus Salutius, praetorian prefect of the Orient, had declined the purple, the choice of the army fell upon Jovian. His election caused considerable surprise: Ammianus Marcellinus suggests that he was wrongly identified with another Jovianus, chief notary (primicerius notariorum), whose name also had been put forward, or that during the acclamations the soldiers mistook the name Jovianus for Julianus, and imagined that the latter had recovered from his illness.

Rule
On the very morning of his accession, Jovian resumed the retreat begun by Julian. Though harassed by the Persians, the army succeeded in reaching the city of Dura on the banks of the Tigris. There the army came to a halt, hoping to cross the Tigris to reach the Empire on the western bank. When the attempt to bridge the river failed, he was forced to sue for a peace treaty on humiliating terms. In exchange for an unhindered retreat to his own territory, he agreed to withdraw from the five Roman provinces, Arzamena, Moxoeona, Azbdicena, Rehimena and Corduena, and to allow the Persians to occupy the fortresses of Nisibis, Castra Maurorum and Singara. The Romans also surrendered their interests in the Kingdom of Armenia to the Persians. The king of Armenia, Arsaces II (Arshak II), was to receive no help from Rome. The treaty was widely seen as a disgrace.

With the treaty signed, Jovian and his army marched to Nisibis. The populace of Nisibis, devastated by the news their city was to be given to the Sasanids, were given three days to leave.

Upon Jovian's arrival at Antioch in October 363, his treaty with the Sasanids had enraged the populace causing offensive graffiti and insulting authorless bills(famosi) throughout the city, which, in turn, caused him to order the Library of Antioch to be burned down. Jovian left Antioch in November 363, making his way back to Constantinople. By December Jovian was at Ancyra having his infant son proclaimed consul. While en route from there to Constantinople, Jovian was found dead in his tent at Dadastana, halfway between Ancyra and Nicaea. His death, which went uninvestigated, was possibly the result of poisonous fumes seeping from the newly painted bedchamber walls by a charcoal warming fire.

Restoration of christianity
Jovian, a Christian, reestablished Christianity as the state church, ending the brief revival of paganism under Julian. Upon arriving at Antioch, he revoked the edicts of Julian against Christians. The Labarum of Constantine the Great again became the standard of the army. He issued an edict of toleration, to the effect that, while the exercise of magical rites would be punished, his subjects should enjoy full liberty of conscience. On 11 September those who worshiped ancestral gods would be subjected to the death penalty.

He extended the same punishment on 23 December to participation in any pagan ceremony (even private ones). Jovian entertained a great regard for Athanasius, whom he reinstated on the archiepiscopal throne, desiring him to draw up a statement of the orthodox faith. However, Jovian did not display the single-minded zeal of his Flavian predecessors in the cause of either heresy or orthodoxy, but was content to recommend moderation to the contending factions in the ongoing Arian controversy. In Syriac literature, Jovian became the hero of a Christian romance.

Jovian was buried in the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople, along with his Christian predecessors.