Who Was Empress Theodora?

Empress Theodora (c. 500–548) was the wife of the Byzantine emperor Justinian I and one of the most influential women in the early Middle Ages. She was born into the lowest social class in the eastern Roman Empire, the daughter of a bear keeper at the hippodrome in Constantinople, and she worked in the early part of her life as a performer, actress, and possibly prostitute. She met Justinian, at that time the heir apparent, around 520, and the two were married in 525, just before Justinian’s accession to the throne. As empress, Theodora exercised substantial power: she signed official documents, received foreign envoys, addressed the senate, and was, on several critical occasions, an important influence on imperial policy. She is especially remembered for the role she is reported to have played in persuading Justinian to remain in Constantinople during the Nika riots of 532, and for the legal reforms that improved the status of women, the protection of children, and the rights of actresses in the empire.

The narrative below is part of the reign of Justinian and is set in the broader history of the Byzantine Empire.

Early Life

Theodora was born around 500, the daughter of Acacius, a bear keeper (arktarios) at the hippodrome of Constantinople, and a mother whose name is not certainly known. Her father died when she was young, and her mother, finding herself unable to support the family, took Theodora to the hippodrome to perform. The career of an actress in the late Roman world was not respectable: actresses, like the women who worked in the brothels of the capital, were under various legal disabilities, were excluded from marriage with members of the senatorial class, and were considered the lowest class of citizens.

Theodora worked as an actress in her youth, traveling with her colleagues throughout the eastern Mediterranean, including Antioch and possibly other cities. She is reported to have been beautiful, witty, and quick-witted, and she developed a reputation as a performer and as a mistress to several wealthy men. The court historian Procopius, who admired Theodora but was also, in his Secret History, fiercely critical of her, records various aspects of her early career, some of which may be slander.

The legal reforms that Theodora would later help to pass — extending rights to actresses, to illegitimate children, and to women in general — were a partial repudiation of the disabilities of her own early life.

Marriage to Justinian

Around 520, Theodora met Justinian, who was the heir presumptive to his uncle, the emperor Justin I. According to one well-known tradition, Justinian wanted to marry her but was prevented by a law forbidding members of the senatorial class from marrying actresses. Justin, however, repealed the law in 525, and the couple were married soon after, in time to be crowned as co-augusta when Justinian himself was crowned co-emperor in 527.

The marriage appears to have been an unusually strong one. Theodora was a much younger woman than Justinian, and the two were constant companions throughout his reign. Justinian’s other advisors included Tribonian, the quaestor who directed the legal compilation described in the Code of Justinian; the general Belisarius; the historian Procopius; and the patriarch of Constantinople, Epiphanius. But Theodora was an especially intimate advisor, and the couple had no children from the marriage; this last fact was a recurring difficulty in the succession of Justinian’s dynasty.

The empress’s role in the government was real. Theodora was crowned as co-augusta in 528, and she was entitled to address the senate, receive foreign envoys, and sign imperial documents. She had a substantial personal retinue, including eunuchs, ladies-in-waiting, and a palace household. Several imperial officials were closely associated with her, and the Secret History reports — with what measure of truth is unclear — that she was a behind-the-scenes power in the imperial government, especially in matters of patronage, marriage, and religious policy.

The Nika Riots

The moment at which Theodora’s reputation was most clearly demonstrated was the Nika riots of January 532. The riots, in which the Blues and Greens of the hippodrome united in revolt against Justinian, nearly toppled the imperial government. For five days, the imperial court lost control of Constantinople, and Justinian’s advisors urged him to flee.

By the account of Procopius, in the Secret History, Theodora addressed the imperial council on the fifth day. Her speech, as preserved in the Secret History (perhaps in somewhat stylized form), includes the famous line: “If now it were possible to escape by flight, death would be far better. But I think that for one who has reigned, an escape is impossible. … If you wish to save yourself, O emperor, that is easy. We have plenty of money, the sea is at hand, and the ships are ready. But consider whether, after you have been saved as a refugee, you will not sooner regret that you did not choose death.”

Whether or not Theodora’s actual words were exactly as Procopius records, the effect of her defiance is well documented. Justinian resolved to remain in Constantinople. The general Belisarius and his mercenaries launched a surprise attack on the rioters in the hippodrome, killing some 30,000 of them. The riot was suppressed, the proclaimer Hypatius was executed, and Justinian emerged with absolute power. The construction of the new Hagia Sophia, which the riots had made possible, was the immediate consequence of the suppression.

Religious Policy

Theodora played an important role in the religious controversies of the reign, especially in the Monophysite controversy. The Monophysites of Egypt and Syria, who rejected the Chalcedonian formula of two natures in one person in Christ, were a substantial minority of the eastern empire’s population. Justinian himself was a Chalcedonian, and he attempted to suppress the Monophysites; Theodora, by contrast, was sympathetic to them, possibly from her early experiences among the lower classes of the empire.

The empress protected Monophysite leaders, sheltered them in the palace, and used her influence to soften Justinian’s anti-Monophysite policy. She was closely associated with figures such as Severus of Antioch, who had been deposed from his see but was allowed to live in Constantinople under Theodora’s protection, and Jacob Baradaeus, who organized the Monophysite church in Syria under her patronage. The relationship between the orthodox establishment and the Monophysite minority, and the religious compromises attempted by the imperial government, are examined in the Byzantine religion and the Orthodox Church.

Theodora was also instrumental in the protection of the Manichaeans and other religious minorities, and she is reported to have been an advocate for the charitable institutions of the church. She died in 548, twelve years before Justinian, and was buried in the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople. Her memory was preserved in the foundation of the Xenon Theodoras, a major hospital in Constantinople, and in the considerable artistic and architectural patronage that she exercised during her lifetime.

Laws Concerning Women and the Family

Theodora’s influence can be seen in several legal reforms of Justinian’s reign. The most famous is a law of 528, passed in Theodora’s name, that established the principle that a woman should be considered the head of a household if she had no husband or other male head. The law gave women substantial rights to own and dispose of property, to enter into contracts, and to have their own households. Other reforms gave rights to illegitimate children, limited the abuses of guardianship, and prohibited the abduction of women for the purpose of forced marriage. The reforms concerning the legal status of women were, for the late Roman world, remarkably progressive, and they were a partial reflection of Theodora’s own experience and influence.

Reputation

Theodora has been remembered, in equal parts, as a powerful and capable ruler, as a defender of religious minorities and the rights of women, and as the former actress of whom Procopius recorded various unflattering details. The contrast between the two views of Theodora is one of the most striking in Byzantine historiography. Procopius’s official Wars and Buildings present her as an ideal empress, a pious Christian and a capable administrator; his Secret History, probably not intended for publication, presents her as scheming and ambitious. The historical Theodora, who emerges from the surviving legal and administrative record, appears to have been a powerful and effective ruler whose personal influence and religious sympathies left a substantial mark on Justinian’s reign. The legal context of her reforms is treated in the Code of Justinian.