Chapter 58 - The Gilded Cage

The year 326 AD marked the twentieth anniversary of Constantine's acclamation in Eboracum—his Vicennalia. The Roman world was at peace, a state achieved and maintained by the edge of his legions' swords. The Emperor, now a man of thirty-four, divided his time between overseeing the administration of his unified empire and his grandest obsession: the construction of his new capital. On the peninsula of Byzantium, an army of laborers and artisans worked under his direct command, raising the walls and palaces of Constantinople. He would walk the dusty grounds with his architects, his single eye taking in every detail, issuing orders with a foresight that baffled them. He spoke of deep-water ports, strategic sea walls, and vast underground cisterns with the certainty of a man who saw not just a city, but a fortress, a new center for a world he was forging in his own image.