Emperor Constantine was the key to major religious change in the Roman Empire. Paganism was the religious practice of the early empire, and while paganism was expressed publicly, those who followed Christianity were persecuted. These Christians would have their possessions and pride stripped away if they did not recant their religious views. This was a hard life for those who followed Christianity until the emperors Constantine and Licinius met in Nicomedia to issue the Edict of Milan. The edict, issued in the year 313, proved to be a major change in the religious culture of the Roman Empire by guaranteeing religious freedom to Christians and all other religions practiced in the empire; not only could Christians now practice their beliefs freely, but all property, land, and possessions that had once been stolen from them had to be returned. Given their new freedom, Christians began to become more public and have different branches, all with separate opinions on how religion should be practiced. The Edict of Milan gave rise to the freedom of Christianity, however what was not foreseen by the Edict was that as the popularity and diversity of Christianity increased this gave rise to the beginning of the Christian Wars; the first war was that of the Christians against the pagans and the second, more violent, was that of the Christians among themselves. The first thoughts of the Edict of Milan were preserved with the Emperor Constantine. The conclusion of the battle at the Milvian Bridge between Constantine and his rival emperor Maxentius had shown Constantine's strong opinions towards Christianity as it was when he won the battle that the emperor attributed the victory to the God of the Christians. Between this and Constantine's construction and financing... middle of paper ......The Christian Wars were the result of the Edict of Milan which allowed such broad religious freedom and had no way to protect oneself from It. With a large number of religions, all with different views, in the same area it is inevitable that there will be disagreements between different factions. These disagreements are what prevented the different groups from coexisting peacefully together and also what caused the period of self-destruction in Rome among all the different Christian groups. The edict was a good plan created by Emperor Constantine; however he and Emperor Licinius were supposed to create a section of the edict to standardize how Christian practices would take place. Having been standardized, fighting between different factions would not have happened, because all the extra factions would not have had the power to exist..