Magister militum (Latin for "master of soldiers";pl.:magistri militum) was a top-level military command used in thelate Roman Empire, dating from the reign ofConstantine the Great. The term referred to the senior military officer (equivalent to a war theatre commander, the emperor remaining the supreme commander) of the empire.[1] The office continued to exist and evolve during the earlyByzantine Empire. InGreek sources, the term is translated either asstrategos or asstratelates (although these terms were also used non-technically to refer to commanders of different ranks).
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The office ofmagister militum was created in the early 4th century, most likely when the Western Roman emperorConstantine the Great defeated all other contemporary Roman emperors, which gave him control over their respective armies. Because thePraetorian Guards and their leaders, thePraetorian Prefects, had supported Constantine's enemy,Maxentius, he disbanded the Guard and deprived the Prefects of their military functions, reducing them to a purely civil office. To replace them, he created two posts: a commander of theinfantry, themagister peditum ("master of foot"), and a more prestigiouscavalry commander, themagister equitum ("master of horse"). These offices had precedents in the immediate imperial past, both in function and idea;[2] the latter title had existed sincerepublican times, as the second-in-command to aRomandictator.
Under Constantine's successors, the titles were also established at a territorial level:magistri peditum andmagistri equitum were appointed for everypraetorian prefecture (perGallias,perItaliam,perIllyricum,perOrientem), and, in addition, forThrace and, sometimes,Africa. On occasion, the offices would be combined in a single person, then styledmagister equitum et peditum ormagister utriusque militiae ("master of both forces"). Overall, lower-levelmagistri were assigned according to circumstances, with varying numbers employed in a given area.[3] Some were directly in command of the local mobile field army of thecomitatenses, which acted as arapid reaction force. Othermagistri remained at the immediate disposal of the emperors, and by the late fourth century or early fifth century were termedin praesenti ("in the presence" of the emperor).
Over the course of the fourth century in theWestern Roman Empire, the system of two imperialmagistri remained largely intact, with usually onemagister having paramount authority (such as Bauto or Merobaudes, the main power behind the appointment of emperor Valentinian II.) This tendency culminated inArbogast, who inherited the position of westernmagister militum and used it to functionally usurp emperor Valentinian II, either killing him or driving him to suicide before appointing his own puppet emperor, Eugenius. In the west, the position (often under the title ofmagister utriusque militiae or MVM) remained very powerful until the formal end of the empire, and was held byStilicho,Aetius,Ricimer, and others.
In the east, emperor Theodosius I (379–395) expanded the system of twomagistri militum to include an additional threemagistri. For a long time these generals were used in an ad hoc manner, being employed wherever they were needed. Eventually in the fifth century their positions became more firmly established, and there were two senior generals, who were each appointed to the office ofmagister militum praesentalis.
After the finalpartition of the Roman Empire in 395, the office continued to exist both in theWestern andEastern parts of the divided Empire. One of the most notable examples of prominence and increasing importance of that military office occurred withMarcellinus, who wasmagister militum inDalmatia, acting not only as regional military commander, but also as effective governor in the entire region, from 454 to 468.[4]
The office ofmagister militum consequently evolved in nature and scope during the earlyByzantine period.[5][6][7]
During the reign of EmperorJustinian I (527–565), with increasing military threats and the expansion of the Byzantine Empire, the posts of the eastern generals were overhauled: themagister militum per Armeniam in the Armenian and Caucasian provinces, formerly part of the jurisdiction of themagister militum per Orientem, themagister militum per Africam in the reconqueredAfrican provinces (534), with a subordinatemagister peditum, and themagister militumSpaniae (c. 562).
In the course of the 6th century, internal and external crises in the provinces often necessitated the temporary union of the supreme regional civil authority with the office of themagister militum. In the establishment of theexarchates ofRavenna andCarthage in 584, this practice found its first permanent expression. In various provinces of the Exarchate of Ravena, fromVenetia toNaples,magistri militum were appointed both as local military commanders and provincial governors. For example, such was Mauricius, who wasmagister militum ofByzantine Venetia in 639.[8][9][10]
After the loss of the eastern provinces to theMuslim conquest in the 640s, the surviving field armies and their commanders formed the firstthemata.
In later periods, various military commanders sometimes also took this title inmedieval Italy, for example in thePapal States and in theRepublic of Venice, whoseDoge claimed to be the successor to theExarch of Ravenna.
The term is referred to by EmperorConstantine VII in hisDe Administrando Imperio in a digression on 6th century Italian history, where he refers tomastromilis meaning 'captain-general of the army' in the 'Roman tongue'. By the time of writing in the mid-10th century working knowledge of Latin was mostly absent in the Byzantine imperial court.
By the 12th century, the term was being used to describe a man who organized the military force of a political or feudal leader on his behalf. In theGesta Herwardi, the hero is several times described asmagister militum by the man who translated the originalOld English account intoMedieval Latin. It seems possible that the writer of the original version, now lost, thought of him as thehereward' (Old English:here,lit. 'army' and no:weard,lit. 'guard') – the supervisor of the military force. That this later use of these terms was based on the classical concept seems clear.[11]
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