Edict of Milan
Legalization of Christianity in the Roman Empire, 313 / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The Edict of Milan (Latin: Edictum Mediolanense; Greek: Διάταγμα τῶν Μεδιολάνων, Diatagma tōn Mediolanōn) was the February 313 AD agreement to treat Christians benevolently within the Roman Empire.[1] Western Roman Emperor Constantine I and Emperor Licinius, who controlled the Balkans, met in Mediolanum (modern-day Milan) and, among other things, agreed to change policies towards Christians[1] following the edict of toleration issued by Emperor Galerius two years earlier in Serdica. The Edict of Milan gave Christianity legal status and a reprieve from persecution but did not make it the state church of the Roman Empire, which occurred in AD 380 with the Edict of Thessalonica.[citation needed]
The document is found in Lactantius's De mortibus persecutorum and in Eusebius of Caesarea's History of the Church with marked divergences between the two.[2][3] Whether or not there was a formal 'Edict of Milan' is no longer really debated among scholars, who generally reject the story as it has come down in church history.[4][1]
The version found in Lactantius is not in the form of an edict.[3] It is a letter from Licinius to the governors of the provinces in the Eastern Empire that he had just conquered by defeating Maximinus[5] later that same year and issued in Nicomedia.[1][6]