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Flavius Mauricius Tiberius Augustus or '''Maurice''' ( 539 - November, 602 ) was the emperor of the Byzantine Empire ( August 5 582 - 602 ). A Greek Cappadocia n general, he was appointed as imperial heir by Tiberius II Constantine . He married Tiberus' daughter Constantina, and became emperor when his father-in-law died a week later. While the historian C.W. Previte-Orton admits Maurice was "an experienced and sometimes victorious general who possessed insight, public spirit and courage", he lists a number of character flaws in the Emperor's personality: : His fault was too much faith in his own excellent judgement without regard to the disagreement and unpopularity which he provoked by decisions in themselves right and wise. He was a better judge of policy than of men. 1 The reign of Maurice was troubled by almost unending wars on all frontiers, and despite his excellent ruling qualities he could only temporarily prevent the disintegration of the great empire of Justinian I . Shortly after his accession, in 590 he effectively intervened in a Persian war of succession, helping the young Chosroes II to regain his throne. In return, Armenia and eastern Mesopotamia returned to Byzantine Empire. Chosroes also married a certain Maria, possibly Maurice's daughter. The Balkan provinces were thoroughly devastated by the Slavs in his days, not to recover for several hundred years. The Slavs penetrated all the way into Peloponnesus , and several successful but exhausting campaigns had to be directed against them. In the west, he organized the threatened Byzantine dominions in Italy and Africa into exarchates, ruled by military governors or Exarch s. In 597 , an ailing Maurice wrote his last will, in which he described his ideas of governing the Empire. His eldest son, Theodosius, would be a ruler of the East from Constantinople , the second one, Tiberius, of the West with the capital in Rome . Some historians believe that two youngest sons were supposed to gain Illiricum and North Africa . In 600 he refused to pay a very little ransom to deliver thousands of byzantine soldiers taken prisoners by the Avars. The prisoners were killed and a military delegation, headed by an officer named Phocas was humiliated and rejected in Constantinople. In 602 Maurice, always dealing with the lack of money, decreed that army should stay for winter beyond the Danube , which would prove to be a serious mistake. The exhausted troops mutinied against the Emperor, proclaimed Phocas their leader and demanded Maurice to abdicate and proclaim the successor either his son either general Germanus, Theodosius' father-in-law. Both men were accused of treason, but the riots broke out in Constantinople and the Emperor with his family left the city for Nicomedia . Theodosius headed east to Persia, but historians are not sure whether he had been sent there by his father or if he had fled there. Phocas entered Constantinople where he was crowned Emperor while his troops captured Maurice and his family. It is said that the deposed Emperor was forced to watch his three sons executed before his eyes, before he was beheaded himself. Empress Constantina and her three daughters were spared and sent to a monastery. Maurice is the traditional author of the military treatise '' Strategikon '' which is praised in military circles as the first and only sophisticated Combined Arms theory until World War II . However, some historians now believe the ''Strategikon'' is the work of his brother or another general in his court. NOTES # C.W. Previte-Orton, ''The shorter Cambridge medieval history'' (Cambridge: University Press, 1952), p. 203. |
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