Brianna Castillo
Professor Chrissanthos
History 010
5 December 2018
Was Diocletian a Good Emperor or a Bad Emperor?
The Roman emperor Diocletian, born Diocles, lived from December 22, 245 C.E. through December 3, 311 C.E. Diocletian was born in the province of Dalmatia to a poor, low-class family. Joining the army, he quickly rose through the ranks eventually becoming an imperial guard to the emperor Carus. Carus passed away and the throne was then passed to his son Numerian who was then found dead. Rumors suggested that Numerian was killed by his father-in-law, Aper, who claimed that Numerian was suffering from a severe eye infection. This was later on confessed by Aper himself admitting that he wanted to rule for himself. Diocletian killed Aper for the assassination of Numerian and proudly accepted the throne to be the new emperor of Rome. His reign lasted from 284 C.E. through 305 C.E. He also changed his name to Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletian.
Diocletian, as emperor of Rome, achieved great things. He established a tetrarchy that would prevent Rome from falling apart, he established different rulers to rule different parts of the Roman Empire, and he greatly reduced the amount of internal affairs. On the other hand, because of his big ego, Diocletian did many dishonorable things in the attempt to keep Rome sane and secure such as persecuting the Christians and trying to demolish their religion. Furthermore, he established the Edict of Maximum prices, also known as the Edict of Diocletian which was supposed to be a good thing for Rome, but his approach was proved to be very ineffective.
Once Diocletian officially became the emperor of Rome, he realized that it would be hard and almost impossible for himself to rule all of Rome on his own and keep it under control. This is when Diocletian had the idea of installing a tetrarchy in Rome in 293 B.C. A tetrarchy is a form of government where the power is divided between four different rulers. At first, it began as a diarchy, ruled by two, Diocletian on the East and Maximian on the West. Once the tetrarchy was established, Diocletian wanted two Augusti and two caesars. Diocletian became the augustus on the East side, Maximian became the augustus on the West side. The caesar on the East side was granted to Galerius, Diocletian’s son-in-law and the caesar on the West side was Constantius Chlorus. To keep a uniformed office and a line of succession, Constantius Chlorus, the father of Constantine, had to divorce his wife Helena and marry Maximian’s daughter. Diocletian believed that if he split up the roman empire into four and each ruler had a quadrant to rule, that this would restore and keep peace in the Roman Empire. This idea of the tetrarchy continued after Diocletian retired in 305 C.E. When he stepped down, so did Maximian. Now, Galerius became the augustus in the East, and Constantine became the augustus in the west. They both passed over their sons and gave the caesar title to Maximianus II on the East and Severus on the West. So this tetrarchy continued for decades after Diocletian decided to start it.
Diocletian and Galerius campaigned around the Eastern Empire attacking the Sarmatians in 294 C.E. where they were victorious. Because they won, the Sarmatians stayed far away from Danube and at the end of their journey, they were able to conquer all of Danube. This made the Roman Empire more powerful.
Diocletian wanted to restore the peace and order of the Roman Empire and would do just about anything to get it. He wanted to create a stable empire that would continue even if something were to happen to him. In order to reduce the number of internal affairs, Diocletian doubled the number of provinces from 50 to 100 so that it was easier to shutdown any uprising because the population of any given province would be smaller. Because of this, there were now a greater number of governors that were in charge of controlling smaller regions with less amount of people. Diocletian’s administrative office helped him maintain a good civil authority amongst the empire. He had legal advisors that would help him run juridical affairs. Under the new government that he created, the governors were responsible for the taxing system and the justice system. Diocletian later instituted the Edict of Maximum Prices, also known as the Edict of Diocletian. The Edict of Maximum Prices was an attempt to control runaway inflation and poverty in the Empire. People that didn’t abide to the Edict of Maximum Prices were penalized to death. This taxation that the Edict of Maximum Prices installed didn’t work well in the empire because it ignored the law of “supply and demand.”
The persecution of the Christians was one of the evil things that Diocletian is known for. Although he was running a successful empire, his only flaw was his hatred and borderline fear of Christianity. He believed that Christians disrupted their ability to connect with their Roman Gods. In one occasion, one of the Pagan Priests saw a Christian make the sign of the cross and ir has been said that that completely ruined everything. It is also said that two men received a great word in the Temple of Apollo where an oracle said that Diocletian would not be successful until the just were taken care of. Right away, Diocletian assumed that the “just” meant the Christians because the Christians referred to themselves as the justified. Diocletian was a religious conservative meaning that he wanted to keep the original religion of Rome alive. Eusebius, Lactantius and Constantine state that it was in fact Galerius that wanted the persecution of Christians to remain, but since ultimately Diocletian called the rules, it fell into his hands. Diocletian saw the problem that Christianity was a religion practiced by both the rich and the poor. This meant that there was a chance at having a high number of christians, and for Diocletian, this meant there would be more problems. Diocletian was a hard-headed and egotistical man, therefore he wanted to keep the religion of Rome stable to limit the amount of civil wars that could happen in the future. In order to do achieve this, Diocletian enforced a new focus on the Pagan religion; Diocletian wanted to be praised as well. On February 23, 303 Diocletian issues an edicts that all the Christians are to be persecuted. Moreover, Diocletian began persecuting other minority religions such as Manichaeism. Diocletian goes to Nicomedia and demanded that the scriptures were burned, the churches were raised and their sacred goods were confiscated. Also, any Christian practicer was to be executed. The Great Persecution was one of the most widespread persecutions ever. It was happening in areas all over the East and some in the West. Christians that wanted to live had the chance to apostatize, and those that refused were killed. And although the persecution of Christians continues to take place, many Christians escaped making his Edict against the Christians successful. Within 25 years, after the reign of Diocletian, Constantine I was the ruler of the Roman Empire, and he established the Edict of Milan. The Edict of Milan was stated that Christians should be allowed to follow their faith without oppression. But, the Edict of Milan came years after the Edict of the persecution of Christians meaning that the Christians had to endure decades of suffering and pain, trying to hide away their religion in order to survive all due to Diocletian's Edicts.
Diocletian did great things in the Roman Empire while he was emperor. Some of his hard work successfully carried on past his legacy which kept the empire stable in its position. Diocletian ultimately wanted the best for the Roman Empire. He implemented systems to keep it fixed in case anything were to happen to him. He revised the economy, administration, and limited the amount of possible suspicions of law-breaking. He was not hesitant to split the power amongst different rulers, therefore he gave ranks such as Augustus and Caesar to people that were worthy and capable of handling it. Diocletian reinforced the Roman Empire. On the other hand, Diocletian was also very full of himself; egotistical. Because he wanted to be worshiped like a god, He wanted to enforce the old religion of Rome. This lead to the persecution of my Christians. To this day, Diocletian has crucified the most amount of Christians in the history of the world. The Great Persecutions have been some of the most painful times in Christian history as well. These persecutions were some of the worst, most extensive permanent persecutions exceeding those of Trajan and Valerian. Diocletian did a lot of wicked things for the sake of Rome.