Theodosius II

Flavius Theodosius II (April, 401 – July 28, 450 ). The eldest son of Eudoxia and Arcadius who at the age of 7 became the Roman Emperor of the East.

He was heavily influenced by his eldest sister Pulcheria who pushed him towards orthodox Christianity. Pulcheria was the primary driving power behind the emperor and many of her views became official policy. These included her anti-Semitic view which resulted in the destruction of synagogues.

On the death of his father Arcadius in 408, he became Emperor. In June 421 Theodosius married the poet Aelia Eudocia.

The Theodosian Code

In 429 Theodosius appointed a commission to collect all of the laws since the reign of Constantine, the first Christian emperor, and create a fully formalized system of law. This plan was left unfinished, but the work of a second commission that met in Constantinople, assigned to collect all of the general legislations and bring them up to date was completed, and their collection published as the Codex Theodosianus in 438. The law code of Theodosius II, summarizing edicts made since the first Christian emperor Constantine, provided a basis for the law code of Justinian in the following century. Roman intolerance of impiety with respect to ritual was now extended to crimes of conscience and of thought.

During this time he was responsible for the creation of the Constantinople University.

He died in 450 as the result of a riding accident.

External links

• Reign of Theodosius II (chapter of J. B. Bury's History of the Later Roman Empire)
• Theodosian Code: Sections concerning religious observances (English)
• George Long, "Codex Theodosianus"