Phocas - Reign

Reign

The Column of Phocas was the last Imperial monument ever to be erected in the Roman forum. In Phocas's reign, the Byzantines were sovereign over the city of Rome, although the Pope was the most powerful figure resident in the city. Phocas tended to support the popes in many of the theological controversies of the time, and thus enjoyed good relations with the papacy. Phocas gave the Pantheon to Pope Boniface IV for use as a church and intervened to restore Smaragdus to the Exarchate of Ravenna. In gratitude Smaragdus erected in the Roman Forum a gilded statue atop the rededicated "Column of Phocas", which featured a new inscription on its base in the Emperor's honour. The fluted Corinthian column and the marble plinth on which it sits were already standing in situ, scavenged previously from yet other monuments.

Despite popularity Phocas enjoyed early on during his reign, it was during his reign that the traditional frontiers of the Byzantine Empire began to collapse. The Balkans had been pacified under Maurice, the Avars and Slavs having been kept at bay. With the removal of the army from the Danube after 605, the way was paved for new attacks which were to put an end to the Byzantine Balkans. In the east, the situation was grave. The Persian King Khosrau II had been helped onto his throne years earlier by Maurice during a civil war in Persia. Now, he used the death of his erstwhile patron as an excuse to break his treaty with the Empire. He received at his court an individual claiming falsely to be Maurice's eldest son and co-emperor Theodosius. Khosrau arranged a coronation for this pretender and demanded that the Byzantines accept him as emperor. He also took advantage of the difficulties in the Byzantine military, coming to the aid of Narses, a Byzantine general who refused to acknowledge the new Emperor's authority and who was besieged by troops loyal to Phocas in Edessa. This expedition was part of a war of attrition Khosrau waged against Byzantine forts in northern Mesopotamia, and by 607 or so he had advanced Persian control to the Euphrates.

The reign of Phocas is also marked by the change of Imperial fashion set by Constantine the Great. Constantine and all his successors, except Julian the Apostate, were beardless. Phocas again introduced the wearing of the beard.