Flavius Mauricius Tiberius Augustus (Maurice; 539–602 CE) was Byzantine emperor from 582 to 602 CE. He was born in Arabissus in Cappadocia to a certain Paul. He did not start his career in the army, but in the imperial bureaucracy as a notarius (“notary”) in the reign of Justinian. Maurice soon secured the patronage of the future emperor Tiberius II. Shortly before Tiberius II, then comes excubitorum (“commander of the imperial bodyguard”), was elevated to the rank of Caesar, Maurice himself t…