Question

I need three things for law and politics under Justinian I. The chapter I'm doing is about the Byzantine Empire. The politics thing might have something to do with the Justinian Code of Law. Not sure. Please someone help me! :(

Answer 1

Not sure exactly which three things the question is asking for since it's pretty broad. The major points for Justinian's reign usually center around a few things, but here are three big ones:

1) He codified the laws of the empire into one system in order to promote unity within it. As he worked to reconquer the territories lost to the Roman Empire in the West, he needed to find a way to unify their laws into something that someone from Italy could depend on as well as someone from Egypt. That's his Justinian Code.

2) He managed to reconquer most (but not all) of the territory that had once been part of the Roman Empire of old dramatically expanding the Byznatine Empire.

3) The Nika riots. Senators who had schemed against Justinian hoped to incite and then use the rioters to elect their own emperor because they were unhappy with Justinian's rule (he didn't often play ball with the nobility).

However, Justinian managed to turn the situation around and defuse it (as well as bring in an army to slaughter the rest of the rebels). This secured his rule and also opened up Constantinople to his massive building projects (about half the city was destroyed in the riots).