The End of Constans

Constans II came to the imperial throne as a child, but upon gaining his majority he proved to be capable and even ambitious. His (fruitless) attempt to resolve the Monothelitism controversy has already been discussed, and how he had the Pope himself arrested and sent to Constantinople for trial.

Concerned about delays of traffic on the Silk Road, he sent emissaries to China to discuss with Emperor Taizong of Tang China how to better manage the tribal conflicts in the Turkic Khaganate that were causing disruption. Chinese histories talk of the meetings in which Constans II sent gifts such as red and green gems.

The same Chinese records that tell of emissaries from Constans also record that Arabs besieged Constantinople. History identifies the Arab leader as Muawiyah I, who became the first Umayyad caliph, starting a dynasty that replaced the Rashidun Caliphate. Constans had fought the Rashidun Caliphate for years, and might have lost the empire to the Umayyads completely except for a civil war in the Islamic community that disrupted their westward advance. Muawiyah made a truce with Constans (but would clash with his son, Constantine IV).

Constans wanted to re-establish the unity of the Western Roman and Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire. To that end, he visited Rome, the first emperor from Constantinople to do so since the fall of the Western Empire to the Goths. He also thought it a good idea to move the center of imperial power to a more central location.

Syracuse in Sicily would be his new home. Traveling to Italy, he fought with the Lombards who were all over much of the peninsula. Once in Rome, he started stripping buildings of their facades, sending sculptures of stone and bronze back to Constantinople. (This action would in some ways be reversed in 1204.) Understandably, this angered the Italians.

The illustration shows his end. He was killed by a chamberlain in Syracuse while taking a bath. He was either stabbed or beaten with a heavy object. Details are unclear.

As I mentioned, during this time the Umayyad Caliphate was created, starting with Muawiyah I. Let's learn more about him tomorrow.

Constans and Monothelitism

So Constans II survived the attempt by Valentinus to become emperor in 644, and ruled for another 22 years, accomplishing a few "firsts" for an eastern Roman (Byzantine) Emperor. 

He was the first Byzantine Emperor to visit Rome (in 663) since the fall of the Western Empire in 476. Pope Vitalian greeted him warmly (since 476, the emperor in Constantinople was also the emperor of the entire Roman Empire, west as well as east, and so the pope's secular lord). Constans, however, did not respect Rome: he took (stole) treasures from several buildings, including the Pantheon, to be sent back to Constantinople.

Three years later, he declared that the pope did not have authority over the Archbishop of Ravenna, since Ravenna was the city of Constans' representative, the Exarch. The Exarchate of Ravenna was an administrative district that owed allegiance to Constantinople, not Rome. It was the Exarch Theodore I Calliopas in 652 who arrested Pope Martin I on Constans' orders, dragging him from the Lateran and putting him on a ship to Constantinople for trial, for daring to get involved in Constans' decree about Monothelitism.

The other victim of this move was Maximus the Confessor. Maximus had been an important figure in the administration of Constans' grandfather, Heraclius, rising to the position of protoasekretis (literally "first secretary"; the top notary in the government). Later in life he chose the contemplative lifestyle of a monk. He went to Rome to debate against Monothelitism. When Maximus' arguments helped 105 bishops in a synod to condemn Monothelitism, Constans order him arrested. Put on trial in Constantinople, he was convicted of heresy.

The aftermath was that his tongue was cut out and his right hand cut off so that he could neither speak nor write anything heretical. (The illustration shows his tongue being removed on the right while others on the left bow before the emperor.) Pope Martin and Maximus would both be vindicated by the Sixth Ecumenical Council in 680 that found that Christ had both a human and divine will.

By that time, however, the emperor that championed Monothelitism would be dead, and not of natural causes. I'll tell you about his untimely and ignoble death tomorrow.

Monothelitism

The Western Roman Empire and Eastern Byzantine Empire had many differences over the centuries. Some of the biggest differences were religious. One such was the Filioque controversy: did the Holy Spirit proceed from the father, or the Father and the Son? Another was the question of Monothelitism.

Monothelitism ("one will") had come up in the 600s in opposition to dyothelitism ("dual wills"), the doctrine that Jesus had two "wills": a divine aspect and a human aspect. Monothelitism was the opinion that he had one will, a single "energy."

The debates over this had started generations earlier. The Church had determined that Jesus was the Son of God, but exactly how a human could also be God was still being argued. The First Council of Nicaea had decreed that Jesus was fully divine, and any other thought was heretical (this was to combat Arianism; this is the council where Nicholas of Myra reportedly slapped Arius). By declaring that God's Son became a man, they opened the door to discussion (and debate) over how two different natures could combine in a human being.

The debates could be fierce, and fights broke out over them. Emperor Heraclius (610 - 641) suggested monothelitism in order to establish one unifying doctrine. Patriarch of Constantinople Sergius I wrote to Pope Honorius, arguing that the idea of two wills in Jesus could lead to the argument that his human and divine wills were opposed to each other. (Consider the scene in Gethsemane when Jesus asks if fate can be taken away.) Sergius wanted Honorius to agree that divisive arguments should be suppressed. Honorius went along at first, but arguments arose that monothelitism was inconsistent with orthodoxy.

When Constans II came to power in 641, the debate in the Eastern Mediterranean was still raging. Constans tried to suppress it by decree, which did not endear him to either faction. This decree, called the Type of Constans, made it illegal to discuss whether Christ had one or two natures or energies and the matter was to be forgotten. He was 17 years old at the time, and did not care much about religion.

When Pope Martin I wrote to him, telling him to condemn both monothelitism and his own decree, Constans had Martin arrested and brought to Constantinople for trial. Martin was exiled to Crimea. When Adrian of Canterbury—a monk and an acquaintance of Constans—was traveling through Gaul, he was detained by Frankish authorities (Ebroin, Mayor of the Palace) on suspicion of being there to create disruption. The only disruption I can imagine of which he might be accused is regarding monothelitism, which the Roman Catholic West opposed.

When Constans died, his son, Constantine IV, was asked to rule on the subject, but he refused, saying it should be determined by church synods. Several were held over the following years, and monothelitism was declared erroneous.

Before we leave Constans, however, I want to talk about the last years of his reign that did not have anything to do with religion, including his connections with China. See you next time.

Constans Moves Westward

Yesterday's post mentioned Ebroin, Mayor of the Palace under King Clotaire III, distrusting Adrian of Canterbury because of Adrian's connection to Byzantine Emperor Constans II. Ebroin worried that Adrian was in Gaul to create disruption on behalf of Constans. This raises the question: what would a ruler in Gaul fear from a ruler at the far eastern end of the Mediterranean, in Constantinople?

That was precisely the problem: Constans was no longer in Constantinople; he had moved his seat of power to Syracuse on the island of Sicily, much closer to Gaul. And he brought his military.

Constans II (630 - 668) was not particularly well-liked. He was crowned co-emperor at the age of 10 in 641 and became sole ruler after his brother Heraclonas was deposed on suspicion that he had poisoned their father to gain the throne. During his time, the Byzantines withdrew from Egypt in the face of Muslim approaches. He also refused to take sides in a ferocious religious debate over the nature of Jesus. He even decreed in 648 that there should be no discussion on the matter, which did not defuse the situation as he had hoped, nor did it endear him to either side.

The Rashidun Caliphate was moving across the eastern Mediterranean: Armenia, Cappadocia, Crete, Rhodes. Constans fought back, leading a fleet in the Battle of the Masts, in which 500 Byzantine ships were destroyed and Constans almost died. He traded clothes with a sailor to disguise himself and escape.

Besides Muslims, he was fearful of his younger brother Theodosius, whom he suspected of wanting to take over the throne. He pushed Theodosius into taking Holy Orders, but then had him killed in 660.

He finally decided to get involved in religious matters after all, because Pope Martin I had condemned Constans publicly for halting the debate. Constans actually had Martin arrested by the Exarch of Ravenna (a Byzantine representative) and brought to Constantinople where he was condemned and exiled to a Greek town on the Crimean peninsula, where he remained until his death.

After having inspired his subjects to hatred of his poor leadership, he decided to abandon Constantinople for Sicily, taking the military and attacking the Lombards who were threatening Rome from the north. Despite his treatment of Pope Martin, current Pope Vitalian was friendly with him. (After all, there was no emperor in Rome, so they had to look to Constantinople for the highest secular authority, and Vitalian knew what had happened to Martin.)

So, as far as Ebroin in Gaul was concerned, Constans' military aspirations and his proximity might have been a threat. To be fair, however, would a Benedictine like Adrian be the likeliest person sent by Constans to be a disruptive element? There was another aspect of Byzantine culture that Ebroin might have feared a Benedictine could be part of: the nature of Jesus that was such a hot topic between the East and West. Tomorrow I'll discuss the hot topic of Monothelitism.