Thursday, December 22, 2005
This Day in Ancient History
On this day in 244 AD the Emperor Diocletian is born in modern Split, Croatia (I'm not making that up). He stabilized, for a time, the near chaos caused by the choosing of a new Emperor. He brought England back into the Empire and defeated Rome's enemies far and wide. He also started a Christian persecution late in his 20 year reign as Emperor. His buildings of note were the palace in Split and his baths outside Rome. The lasting thing he did was to prepare the way for splitting off the Eastern Empire and thus continue the Roman Empire there for nearly 800 years after Rome fell. Under his reign, the once vaunted Senate became merely the local council of Rome and all vestiges of the Republic disappeared in Diocletian's second wind for the Empire.
# posted by Roger Fraley @ 7:39 AM 
