Maurice (Byzantine emperor)

Maurice, born in 539 at Arabissus in Cappadocia and dying on 27 November 602, was eastern Roman emperor from 582 to 602, the final member of the Justinian dynasty, chosen as heir and son-in-law by his predecessor Tiberius II. His reign involved nearly constant warfare: he successfully concluded the Byzantine-Sasanian conflict and significantly expanded the empire's eastern border in the South Caucasus, so that for the first time in nearly two centuries the Romans were no longer obliged to pay the Persians thousands of pounds of gold annually for peace, and his Balkan campaigns pushed the Avars back across the Danube by 599, the first Roman emperor to do so in over two centuries. He established the Exarchate of Italy in 584 and the Exarchate of Africa in 591, creating semi-autonomous provinces governed by viceroys. His fiscal policies alienated both the military and the population, and in 602 dissatisfied soldiers proclaimed Phocas emperor; Phocas subsequently ordered Maurice's execution along with his six sons, a catastrophic event that triggered a devastating twenty six year war with Persia. The Strategikon, a military treatise, is traditionally attributed to him and influenced military strategy for more than a millennium.