# Constantinian constitutions in later codes restrict Jewish slaveholding and conversion-adjacent acts

Date: 315

## The fact

Later imperial codes preserve constitutions in Constantine’s name that penalised Jewish ownership of Christian slaves and conversion of Christians, a legal disability cluster conventionally dated from 315 onward.

It is one event.

## Context

This is not medieval expulsion. It is a privileging of the newly favoured cult against a named minority. Medium confidence on exact wording versus later compilers.

[Constantine the Great](/people/constantine-the-great)’s documented role is bounded by other offices and collaborators named in the sources below. Sharing a field with them is not a reason to drop a documented act, and it is not a reason to assign later consequences done in the name after death.

Codex Theodosianus is a 438 compilation. Constitutions under Constantine’s name against Jews converting Christians or holding Christian slaves are later-copied law, not a 315 autograph plaque.
Named person as heading of the dated public instrument. Later editors, museums, printers, or offices share publication. Complex where later carriers date the row.

## Evidence and sources

Grenoble’s Roman-law pages and Britannica independently treat Constantinian-era Jewish disabilities in the codes as received law.

Official or archival record: Roman law texts including Codex Theodosianus extracts — Grenoble (https://droitromain.univ-grenoble-alpes.fr/; Université Grenoble Alpes / Droit romain).

## Significance

Named religious-legal disabilities are a minority-rights harm even when compiled a century later.

A code heading is not a pogrom count.

Named religious-legal disabilities are a minority-rights harm even when compiled a century later.

## What is established and what is not

Established: codes transmit Constantinian constitutions disadvantaging Jews on slaves and conversion. Not established: a 315 synagogue census, or that he drafted every later anti-Jewish line in the Theodosian book.

What would change the picture: a contradictory original with a different date or name, or a measured series that can be argued, with lag and alternatives, as a consequence of this instrument rather than of later institutions.

The date is the date of this instrument, not a licence to back-date every later harm or benefit.

Established here: a sourced, dated public instrument with a named contribution by Constantine the Great.

What would change the picture: a contradictory original with a different date, signatory, or non-occurrence; a demonstrated forgery; or a measured series that can be argued, with lag and alternatives, as a consequence of this instrument rather than of other causes.

## People

- Constantine the Great: https://factrail.ai/people/constantine-the-great

## Drivers

- Protection of Minority Rights: https://factrail.ai/drivers/protection-of-minority-rights

## Sources

- https://droitromain.univ-grenoble-alpes.fr/
- https://www.britannica.com/biography/Constantine-I-Roman-emperor

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/facts/co-jewish-legal-disabilities