ABSTRACT
No history of ancient Rome can end without a chapter on Constantine, and no history of Byzantium can begin without such a chapter. In this we may see a measure of the man’s historical importance, of his position at a critical juncture in history. A history of the early Christian church that neglects to include him is equally unthinkable. And thus it is that both secular and ecclesiastical histor ians have accumulated a vast secondary
literature on our subject, so vast indeed that no scholar can claim to control it.
