Constantine: Victory at Verona
The battle of the Milvian Bridge in October 312 has attained legendary status as the moment when the Emperor Constantine secured the future of Christianity in Europe. But the real turning point, argues Michael Mulryan, took place a few months earlier.
In history it is often events on the battlefield that mark decisive turning points. Kings and emperors die or establish or destabilise their regimes to the detriment or betterment of those living under them. More recently, in the last century, social change was a consequence of the two most destructive wars ever fought. Today we see civil war in the Arab world threatening the status quo. Such a paradigm was never more evident than at the beginning of the fourth century ad when an increasingly popular new eastern religion achieved respectability and an emperor’s patronage. With the benefit of hindsight the year 312 marked the turning point for Christianity and world history. The battle associated with this decisive moment has always been that of the Milvian Bridge, when Constantine (c. 272-337) and Maxentius (c.
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