​Justinian

• ​Was one of the most powerful rulers of Byzantium.

• ​He was known as the "Just Emperor"

• ​He didn't come from family with money. His parents were farmers.

• ​He didn't want to be a farmer he learned how to read and spent every minute studying.

​Justinian cont.

• ​Justinian convinced his parents to allow him to go to school

• ​He studied very hard.

• ​When he finished school he joined the army.

• ​He spent all his energy and time helping the officers.

• ​A lot of people agreed that he would make a good emperor.

​Justinian cont.

• Justinian became emperor in the year 527

• The Byzantium wasn't very big yet.

• Justinian wanted the Roman Empire back and even bigger

• He grew his army so that he could conquer more

​Expanding

• ​He was able to take some parts of Rome from the barbarians who were living there.

• He was not able to recapture all the land. He did make the Byzantine empire bigger than it was.

​Problems

• ​One issue Justinian had was that each country had their own laws.

• ​He started to get confused with all the different laws.

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​Solution

• ​He decided to make one set of laws for everyone in his empire.

• ​He had hundreds of scholars help collect all the laws

• ​They finally came up with "The Code of Justinian."

• ​Everyone was supposed to follow these laws.