540

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Calendar year

title: "540" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["540"] description: "Calendar year" topic_path: "general/540" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/540" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Calendar year ::

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f1/Britain.circa.540.jpg" caption="Britain]] in the time of [[Gildas]] (c. 540)"] ::

NOTOC Year 540 (DXL) was a leap year starting on Sunday of the Julian calendar. In the Roman Empire, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Iustinus without colleague (or, less frequently, '*year 1293 *Ab urbe condita'''''). The denomination 540 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.

Events

By place

Byzantine Empire

Emperor Justinian I offers to make peace with Vitiges, but Belisarius refuses to transmit the message. The Ostrogoths then offer to support Belisarius as emperor of the West.
May – Gothic War: Belisarius conquers Mediolanum (modern-day Milan) and the Gothic capital Ravenna. Vitiges and his wife Matasuntha are taken as captives to Constantinople.
Belisarius consolidates Italy and begins mopping-up operations, capturing the Gothic fortifications. The cities Ticinum and Verona north of River Po remain in Gothic hands.
Ildibad succeeds Vitiges as king of the Ostrogoths, and installs his nephew Totila as commander of the Gothic army. He recaptures Venetia and Liguria in Northern Italy.

Europe

King Custennin ap Cado is deposed, and returns to Dumnonia in the south-west of Great Britain.

Persia

King Khosrow I breaks the "Eternal Peace" treaty with the Byzantine Empire after eight years. Responding to an embassy from the Ostrogoths urging action against Emperor Justinian I's expanding power, he leads the Persian army up the River Euphrates. Extracting tributes from towns along the way, Khosrau I besieges and captures Antioch. He plunders the city extensively, transporting valuable artworks, including marble statues and mosaics, back to Persia.

Africa

Solomon captures the Aurès Mountains from the Moors and extends Byzantine authority over Numidia and Mauretania Sitifensis. The city of Theveste (Algeria) is restored and fortified.

Asia

Jinheung becomes king of the Korean kingdom of Silla.

By topic

Religion

Cassiodorus, former Roman statesman, establishes a monastery at his estate in Italy. The Vivarium "monastery school" is for highly educated and sophisticated men, who copy sacred and secular manuscripts, intending for this to be their sole occupation (approximate date).
Pope Vigilius rejects Monophysitism in letters to Justinian I and patriarch Menas of Constantinople.
Benedict of Nursia writes his monastic rules, containing precepts for his monks (approximate date).

World

Global environmental cooling occurs, due either to a comet impact or volcanic eruption in Central America, evidenced by global tree ring growth diminution. Recent evidence from Swiss ice core points to volcanic eruptions in Iceland. Historical evidence records this earlier as the Extreme weather events of 535–536.

Births

October 12 – Yōmei, emperor of Japan (d. 587)
Authari, king of the Lombards (approximate date)
Columbanus, Irish missionary (or 543)
Galswintha, Neustrian queen, married to Chilperic I (d. 568)
Garibald I, duke of Bavaria (d. 591)
Pope Gregory I ("the Great") (d. 604)
John of Biclaro, Visigoth chronicler (approximate date)
Myrddin Wyllt, Welsh legend (approximate date)

Deaths

Dignāga, Buddhist founder of Indian logic
Dionysius Exiguus (approximate date)
Fridolin of Säckingen Irish missionary
Vedast, Frankish bishop
Vitiges, king of the Ostrogoths
Yifu, empress of Western Wei (b. 510)
Yujiulü, empress of Western Wei (b. 525)

References

[[Herwig Wolfram]], ''History of the Goths'' (University of California Press), 1990
Rome at War (p. 56). Michael Whitby, 2002. {{ISBN. 1-84176-359-4
Graham, Alexander. (2002). "Roman Africa". Ayer Publishing, Incorporated.
"List of Rulers of Korea".
"In 1986 I discovered that a series of Irish oaks exhibited their narrowest rings in the immediate vicinity of..".
Baillie, M.G.L. (2007). Tree-Rings Indicate Global Environmental Downturns that could have been Caused by Comet Debris, Chap. 5 in Bobrowsky, Peter T. and Hans Rickman (eds.), ''Comet/Asteroid Impacts and Human Society: An Interdisciplinary Approach'', Springer-Verlag, Berlin. {{ISBN. 3-540-32709-6, pp. 105–122.
(9 Sep 2000). "Comet caused Dark Ages, says tree ring expert". Daily Telegraph.
(April 20, 2016). "El Chichon eruption implicated in Mayan upheaval - BBC News". BBC News.
Gibbons, Ann. (November 15, 2018). "Why 536 was 'the worst year to be alive'".
R.A. Markus, ''Gregory the Great and his World'' (Cambridge: University Press, 1997), p. 3 {{ISBN. 0521586085

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