History of the Constitution of the Late Roman Empire

Roman Emperor in 284 CE, he inherited a constitution that was no longer functioning, and so he enacted the most significant constitutional reforms in over 300 years. His reforms, much like those 300 years before, were intended to correct the errors in the previous constitution. Diocletian's specific reforms were less radical than was the reality that he exposed the state of government for what it had been for centuries: monarchy.^[1] With Diocletian's reforms the Principate was abolished, and a new system, the Dominate

Persians had overrun Syria, and captured Gallienus' father and co-emperor, Valerian, while in the north, the Goths invaded Roman territory, and sacked towns as far south as Athens and Corinth. Also in the north, the Alemanni penetrated deep into Roman territory, encountering no serious opposition until they reached Ravenna, while the Franks passed through Gaul, and sacked towns in Spain. These invasions were primarily raiding expeditions, and the invaders usually retreated back to their own territory after their lust for booty had been satisfied.^[3] While no major loss of territory resulted from these raids, the sacked towns were laid to waste, commerce throughout the empire was devastated, and entire economies collapsed. One consequence of this situation was the emergence of usurpers,^[4]

Probus drove her out of Egypt, and quickly reacquired the province of Palmyra.^[5]

Augusti. He then resurrected the precedent set by Hadrian, and ensured that each emperor named his successor early in his reign. Diocletian called that successor a Caesar.^[6] Diocletian then created a bureaucratic apparatus that was similar to the system that Hadrian had created, where each office had a defined set of responsibilities, a set rank, and a set path of promotion. In this administrative system, Diocletian followed the example that had been set by Domitian, and divided the empire into small administrative units.^[1] He also assigned to the four tetrarchs (the two Augusti and the two Caesares) honorary titles and insignia that had been used by Domitian.^[1] Diocletian simply took concepts that had either been developed, or were underdeveloped, and streamlined them into a single constitution.^[6] One important consequence of these reforms was the fact that the fiction of a free republic finally gave way to naked autocracy. The illusion of shared power between the emperor and Senate was finally extinguished and the centuries-old reality of monarchy became obvious.^[1]