Family and Authority: Reflections on the dynastic policy of Constantine I

Abstract

The article is a polemical review of I.A. Mirolyubov’s monograph “Dynastic Policy of Emperor Constantine the Great”. The book brings to the academic discussion several topics, including the thesis that the dynastic policy of Constantine sharply breaks with the practices of Diocletian’s tetrarchy and the hypothesis that during the reign of the first Christian Augustus, the state authority laid not in the hands of one person, but in the entire imperial family. The review examines the general structure of the work, analyzes the main arguments of the author, and outlines some promising directions for further research into the process of the transformation of the Roman Empire at the dawn of Late Antiquity.

Keywords

• latу antiquity
• early byzantium
• constantine i
• the tetrarchy
• dynastic politics