The Byzantine Empire in the late 6th Century was reeling from many crises. Justinian had brought the empire to the heights of its imperial control; however, it was a tough act to follow. Many in the elite wanted to reel in Justinian’s empires after his reign ended in 565 AD with his passing. Justin II and Tiberius II would be Emperors that would inevitably be in the shadows of said Emperor Justinian. They were not non-entities unlike the emperors of the Late Han Dynasty. In that Chinese Empire, many eunuchs were literally using infants and invalids to move the chess pieces in their own petty struggles. These two emperors were trying to steer the ship but did not have the strength that Justinian had to do so. It would take the rise of Emperor Maurice to start the regeneration of the Empire.
Emperor Maurice is an interesting man in the history of the Byzantine Empire. He seems almost like a latter version of Marcus Aurelius, much as the Emperor Julian had been in the 360s AD. However, Maurice was of a military man than a philosopher according to the sources that we have. We was responsible for the commissioning and the writing of the Strategikon, the equivalent of Sun Tzu’s Art of War but in the context of the West. The Emperor Maurice clearly had some interest in reviving the Byzantine military and be able to create an army that would be able to stand toe to toes with the Sassanid Persians the Avars.
However, Maurice, much like Emperor Julian, would see that the army would manipulate the situation to overthrow him. Maurice, who was leading a great revival of the Roman Empire, was overthrown by his own troops in the time-honored tradition. His soldiers, while they have had their reasons for being angry with him for wanting to negotiate with the Avars and other rampaging groups, they did not understand that getting Phocas on the throne would severely damage the whole empire.
This shows something very important in Byzantine History; The army was moving chess pieces just like eunuchs were in the later Byzantine era.
Emperor Maurice was actually colleagues with the great Sassanid Emperor, Khosrow II, who he helped in his conflict with Bahram Chobin. However, his killing by the Emperor Phocas led to a great conflict between the two great empires.
This titanic struggle between the Byzantines and the Sassanids would help the Muslims in their conquests in the 7th Century.
Maurice was a man of age. However, his overthrow would lead to many issues down the line and really hurt the conduct of the empire, overall. I think that the Roman Army was really its own worse enemy. When they were fighting for the empire, they were able to bring their enemies to heel. However, on the other side of this was that the Roman Army could be a kingmaker in choosing the emperor.
Emperor Maurice seemed like he could have been the Heraclius of the 6th Century. However, his army had other ideas and ultimately proved to destabilize the Roman Empire and cause chaos when the Muslims came knocking at the door of two great Empires. This is why the Byzantines needed to take the armies under their control and reform them into more durable and answerable institutions.
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