• Through the military genius of Belisarius, Justinian gained back
territories that had been lost—especially in the west—through
defeats at the hands of barbarian tribes.
o The Persian army was first defeated at Dara in 530, but when
the Roman troops were subsequently defeated, Justinian
secured an “eternal peace” with the Sassanid Empire through
a tribute in gold. The breaking of the peace by the Sassanid
Empire in 540 led to more tribute, setting a practice followed
by successors. Security of the borders for the eastern Byzantine
Empire was won by tribute more than the prowess of armies.
o In 533–534, Belisarius defeated the Vandals in North Africa
and restored an African prefecture to the empire.o Between 533 and 554, in a protracted and difficult campaign,
Belisarius fought the Ostrogoths in Italy and won back much of
the Italian peninsula.• Justinian buttressed the security of the empire through the use of
mercenary armies and erected and interconnected fortifications
throughout the empire, including the city of Constantinople, which
he surrounded with a massive, impregnable wall.
• He dramatically increased the wealth of the court through the
cultivation of agriculture, trade, and industry. Finally, he imposed
taxes and collected them efficiently.
• Between 529 and 534, through the court official Tribonian, a legal
genius, Justinian undertook the codification and revision of the vast
and unwieldy body of Roman law that had accumulated over the
centuries and shaped it into the Corpus Juris Civilis.
o Consisting of the Codex, the Digest, the Institutes, and the
Novellae, the Justinian law collection provides irreplaceable
information about social processes and practices in the late
Roman Empire.