His two great masters of war, foreigners in origin like himself,
were Belisarius the Thracian and Narses the Armenian. Africa was
wrested from the Vandals; Italy from the successors of Theodoric;
and much of Spain from the Western Goths. Under Justinian the
Byzantine or Eastern Empire resumed much of the majesty and power
of ancient Rome. But the crowning glory of his career was the
Code. One of the greatest historians says of his reign: "Its most
instructive lesson has been drawn from the influence which its
legislation has exercised on foreign nations. The unerring instinct
of mankind has fixed on this period as one of the greatest eras in
man's annals."
The Code was a digest of the whole mass of Roman law literature,
compiled and annotated at the command of Justinian, under the
supervision of the great lawyer Tribonian, who, with his helpers,
reduced the chaotic mass to a logical system containing the essence
of Roman law. The first part of the _Codex Constitutionem_,
prepared in less than a year, was published in April, 529.
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