The work of art that I chose for my assignment is known as Justinian as Conqueror. It was created during the early Byzantine Empire in honor of his military campaign's victories across Italy, North Africa, and Asia. The dating of this beautiful carved ivory sculpture goes back to roughly 525-50 CE. Emperor Justinian I, sometimes known as "Justinian the Great" or by his Latin name Flavius Petrus Sabbatius Iustiniaus Augustus, was a Byzantine (East Roman) emperor from 525-565. He was a brilliant emperor who when his reign began, territories that had once belonged to the Roman Empire were lost and he is now remembered today as one of the last true Roman emperor by historians because of his military campaigns that sought to bring these historically Roman territories back under the rule of the Empire. He was also known as the last roman emperor who spoke Latin as a first language and also for his efforts to reform Roman Law that resulted in Corpus Juris Civilis, a legal science that is still the basis of civil law used to this day by governments and states around the world (Fergus, 26).
Before the rule of Justinian the grandiosity of the Roman Empire was incomparable to what it had once been but by the time of his death in 565, he had conquered the Ostrogothic kingdom thus restoring Dalmatia, Sicily, Italy, and Rome back to the Empire after about half a century of Ostrogothic rule. Other military victories that he commanded over were during conflicts with the Sassanid Empire in which he destroyed a Persian army thus securing his Eastern borders allowing him to focus on the west. He also defeated the Vandals in North Africa which brought Carthage back to the control of the Empire. Justinian is also remembered for establishing control over the western Mediterranean and the eastern part of the black sea which opened more trade routes and increased the Empires total annual revenue significantly (Wikipedia.