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Birth:          11 Jan  347 Cauca, Gallaecia, Spain
Death:          17 Jan  395 Milan, Italy
Burial:         Constantine II's Mausoleum, Constantinople

Notes
http://wc.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=GET&db=jweber&id=I04723
Theodosius I, byname Theodosius the Great, in full Flavius Theodosius (b. 11 Jan 
347, Cauca (Coca), Gallaecia - d. 17 Jan 395 Mediolanum (Milan)), Roman emperor of 
the East (379-392) and then sole emperor of both East and West (392-395), who, in 
vigorous suppression of paganism and Arianism, established the creed of the Council 
of Nicaea (325) as the universal norm for Christian orthodoxy and directed the 
convening of the second general council at Constantinople (381) to clarify the 
formula.

Theodosius was born in the province of Gallaecia in northwestern Spain. His father 
was to become the general Flavius Theodosius; his mother's name is unknown. His 
grandparents, like his parents, were probably already Christians. Theodosius, who 
grew up in Spain, did not receive an extensive education but was intellectually 
open-minded and acquired a special interest in the study of history.

While on his father's staff, he participated in his campaigns against the Picts and 
Scots in Britain in 368-373, against the Alemanni in Gaul in 370, and against the 
Sarmatians in the Balkans in 372-373. As a military commander in Moesia, a Roman 
provence on the lower Danube, he defeated the Sarmatians in 374. When his father 
was sentenced to death and executed as a result of political intrigues by enemies at 
court, Theodosius withdrew to his Spanish estates. At the end of 376, he married Aelia 
Facilla, also a Spaniard. His first son, the future emperor Arcadius, was born in 377, 
and his daughter Pulcheria in 378.

Immediately after the catastrophic defeat of the emperor Valens, who perished at the 
hands of the Visigoths and other barbarians on 9 Aug 378, near Adrianople, the 
emperor Gratian unexpectedly summoned Theodosius to his court. When Theodosius 
had once again proved his military ability by a victory over the Sarmatians, Gratian 
proclaimed him co-emperor on 19 Jan 379. His dominion was to be the eastern part of 
the empire, including the provinces of Dacia (present-day Romania) and Macedonia, 
which had been especially infiltrated by barbarians in the preceding few years.

[snip]

In 383, Maximus, a Spaniard who had been proclaimed emperor by the troops in Britain 
asserted himself as ruler in the Western provinces (praefectura Galliarum). Suspicions 
that Theodosius was in collusion with the usurper and thus implicated int he death of 
Emperor Gratian in August 282 are unfounded. Theodosius, who had to acknowledge 
the sovereignty of Gratian's stepbrother Valentinian II, born in 371 and the nominal 
ruler in Italy since the end of 375, could not interfere with Maximus, for he lacked both 
sufficient military strength and secure borders. Yet, when Maximus invaded Italy in 387 
and Valentinian was forced to flee to Thessalonica, Theodosius soon decided upon 
coutermeasures. His decision was perhaps hastened throught the influence of 
Valentinian's mother, whose daughter Galla he had married at the end of 387, having 
been a widower since 386.

Theodosius' position by that time had become stronger. Long-standing negotiations 
with the Persians over the division of power in Armenia had resulted in a treaty that 
was to become the basis for a long period of peace on the eastern border. Having 
ordered one army division from Egypt to Africa and sent Valentinian with a fleet to 
Italy, Theodosius set out in the spring of 388 with the main body of troops to move 
against Maximus' army, which had invaded Pannonia in the Balkans. By July the 
enemy was defeated. When Maximus surrendered at the end of August he was 
branded as a usurper, but his followers were generally treated with leniency.

In the same year, Theodosius again relinquished the West to his co-emperor Valetinian 
but secured his own influence by pacing the Frankish general Arbogast, a man he 
trusted, at Valentinian's side as general adviser. By remaining in Italy until the spring 
of 391, where he resided mostly in Milan, Theodosius emphasized his claim to supreme 
authority throughout the empire. In 389 he visitied Rome, where, accompanied by his 
four-year-old son Honorius, he mad a triumphant entry.

[snip]

A new crisis arose for Theodosius three months after Valentinian's death on 15 May 
392. Arbogast treacherously proclaimed as emperor of the West a former rhetoric 
teacher, Eugenius, who had close connections with the pagan aristocracy of the 
Senate. Theodosius, who did not yet dare risk a civil war, delayed reception of a 
legation requesting recognition of Arbogast's puppet. On 8 Nov 392, he made his 
edicts of 391 more stringent by completely prohibiting the worship of the pagan gods. 
He left no further doubts as to his position when he elevated his son Honorius to 
Augustus in January 393 and thereby demonstrated that he would no longer tolerate 
any emperor other than himself and his sons. Because he still refrained from military 
action, his enemies occupied Italy in the spring of 393. Led by Nicomachus Flavianus, 
the forces striving to preserve the pagan cults gathered around Eugenius.

The now inevitable struggle for power was thus at the same time a struggle that would 
decide whether pagan religions would once again be tolerated within the empire 
alongside Christianity. Theodosius did no set out from Constantinople until May 394. 
As in 388, he made his way toward Danube and then the Sava with his powerful army. 
His force consisted largely of barbarians and their allies, one of whose leaders was 
Stilicho, a Vandal who had been married since 384 to the Emperor's niece Serena. 
Theodosius' sons Arcadius and Honorius stayed behind in the capital. Arcadius, who 
had been given the right to promulgate laws independently, was supposed to direct 
the government in the East.

Theodosius first met the enemy at the Frigidus River on the eastern border of Italy. 
Although Theodosius' advance guard, comprised almost entirely of Visigoths, suffered 
heavy losses during an attempted breakthrough on 5 Sep 394, the emperor ventured 
to attack the following day and was victorious. Later Christian tradition, emphasizing 
Theodosius' piety and trust in God, essentially interpreted the victory as a divine 
judgement: the god of the Christians had triumphed over the old Roman gods. 
Following the deaths of Eugenius, Arbogast, and Nicomachus Flavianus, Theodosius 
showed himself lenient and strove to achieve the settlement between opposing forces 
that was necessary to strengthen imperial unity.

Probably as a result of the exertion of the campaign, Theodosius fell ill. He went to 
Milan, where he summoned Honorius in order to present him formally as Augustus of 
the West. Because Theodosius had appeared to recover, his death in January 395 
was generally unexpected. On his deathbed he had entrusted Stilicho, promoted to 
generalissimo after the victory at the Frigidus, with the care of his two sons. From 
Ambrose's funeral oration, filled with praise of the Christian ruler, it is evident that 
contemporaries had no doubt as to the continuing unity of the empire, for the question 
of succession seemed to have been settled in the best possible way. Yet, all too soon 
it was to become apparent that Theodosius had not chosen his advisers with sufficient 
care and that the men who were guiding the sickly Arcadius were unwilling to 
cooperate with Stilicho, who remained loyal to the dynasty. After his death, 
Theodosius' body was borne in state to Constantinople and interred in the mausoleum 
erected by Constantius II.

[Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995]

Parents
OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE Theodosius ("the Elder") (ABT  325 -  375)
____ Thermantia (ABT  325 - )

Siblings
____ Theodosius I ("the Great") (11 Jan  347 - 17 Jan  395)

Marriage To OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE Aelia Flacilla ( 355 -  386)
    m.  

Notes


Children by OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE Aelia Flacilla  355 -  386
____ Arcadius I (ABT  377 - May  408)

Marriage To OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE Galla (ABT  350 -  394)
    m.  

Notes

Parents
____ Valentinian I ( 321 - 17 Nov  375)
____ Justina (ABT  325 - )

Children by OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE Galla ABT  350 -  394
OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE Galla Placidia (ABT  389 - 27 Nov  450)

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