what was milan edict?
Answers
February AD 313 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 a legal status, but did not make Christianity the state church of the Roman Empire; this took place under Emperor Theodosius I in AD 380 with the Edict of Thessalonica.
The document is found in Lactantius' De Mortibus Persecutorum and in Eusebius of Caesarea's History of the Church with marked divergences between the two.[2] Whether or not there was a formal 'Edict of Milan' is debated by some.[who?][1]
The version found in Lactantius is not in the form of an edict.[2] It is a letter from Licinius to the governors of the provinces in the Eastern Empire he had just conquered by defeating Maximinus[3] later in the same year and issued in Nicomedia.[1]