Emperor Maurice succeeds in winning over the Avars to Byzantine rule, but his campaigns against the Avars, Lombards, Persians and Slavs drain the imperial treasury, requiring an increase in taxes. He orders the troops to stay for winter beyond the Danube, but a mutiny breaks out under Phocas. He brings the Byzantine forces back over the Danube and marches on to Constantinople.[1]
November 27 – A civil war breaks out and Phocas enters Constantinople. Maurice is captured trying to escape; he is forced to witness the slaughter of his five sons and all his supporters, and is then executed (beheaded) after a 20-year reign. His wife, Constantina, and his three daughters are spared, and sent to a monastery. Phocas is proclaimed the new emperor of the Byzantine Empire.
Byzantine–Persian War: King Khosrau II launches an offensive against Constantinople, to avenge Maurice's death, his "friend and father", and tries to reconquer Byzantine territory. Narses, governor of Upper Mesopotamia, rebels against Phocas at the city of Edessa and requests aid from the Persians. Khosrau sends an expeditionary force to Armenia and crosses the Euphrates.
