384

By place

Roman Empire

• Magnus Maximus elevates his son Flavius Victor to the rank of Augustus.
• Magnus Maximus returns to Britain, to aid the Roman army with the barbarian raids triggered by Maximus' withdrawal of troops to the continent.
• The Forum of Theodosius is built in Constantinople.
• Quintus Aurelius Symmachus becomes urban prefect of Rome.
• An edict of Theodosius I closes pagan temples in the Nile Valley.
• Flavius Stilicho marries Serena, adopted niece of Theodosius I.

  Persia

• King Shapur III signs a treaty with Theodosius I. Armenia is divided in two kingdoms, and becomes a vassal state of the Roman Empire and Persia. The friendly relations survive for 36 years.

  Asia

• King Chimnyu ascends to the throne of Baekje ; he welcomes the Indian Buddhist monk Marananta into his palace, and later declares Buddhism the official religion.
• Gogugyang becomes ruler of the Korean kingdom of Goguryeo.

  China

• The Battle of Fei River - Former Qin forces are defeated by the numerically inferior Eastern Jin army, preserving the Jin state in the south and precipitating the destruction of Former Qin in the north.

  By topic

Religion

• December 17 - Pope Siricius succeeds Damasus I as the 38th pope. He takes the title Pontifex Maximus, after it is relinquished by the late emperor Gratian.
• Jerome, Christian prophet, writes his celebrated letter "De custodia virginitatis" to Eustochium, daughter of the ascetic Paula. He has by this time completed his Vulgate translation of the Gospels.
• Ambrosius refuses the request of Empress Justina for a church in Milan, where she can worship according to her Arian belief.
• A synod is held in Bordeaux.
• The Gallaeci or Gallic woman Egeria concludes her Christian pilgrimage to the Holy Land at about this date; her narrative of it, the Itinerarium Egeriae, may be the earliest surviving formal writing by a woman in western European culture.