. son of Justin the elder, was made Cæsar and Augustus in 527, and soon after emperor. He conquered the Persians by Belisarius his general, and exterminated the Vandals; regained Africa; subdued the Goths in Italy; defeated the Moors; and restored the Roman empire to its primitive glory. See (History of) Constantinople, no 93—97. and Italys, no 12, &c.

The empire being now in the full enjoyment of a profound peace and tranquillity, Justinian made the best use of it, by collecting the immense variety and number of the Roman laws into one body. To this end, he selected ten of the most able lawyers in the empire; who, revising the Gregorian, Theodosian, and Hermogenian codes, compiled one body, called Codex Justinianus. This may be called the statute law, as consisting of the rescripts of the emperors. But the reduction of the other part was a much more difficult task; it was made up of the decisions of the judges and other magistrates, together with the authoritative opinions of the most eminent lawyers; all which lay scattered, without any order, in no less than 2000 volumes and upwards. These were reduced to the number of 50; but ten years were spent in the reduction. However, the design was completed in the year 553, and the name of Digests or Pandects given to it. Besides these, for the use chiefly of young students in the law to facilitate that study, Justinian ordered four books of institutes to be drawn up, containing an abstract or abridgement of the text of all the laws; and, lately, the laws of modern date, posterior to that of the former, were thrown into one volume in the year 541, called the Nouvelle, or New Code.

This emperor died in the year 565, aged 83, in the 39th of his reign, after having built a great number of churches; particularly the famous Sancta Sophia at Constantinople, which is esteemed a masterpiece of architecture.