was much interested in jurisprudence. Following the legislative work of his father he decided to elaborate and translate into Greek Justinian's system. The new code was named Basilika (Imperial Laws), because it contained the Basilikos Nomos (Royal Law), but was described also as Exabiblos, because the manuscripts were divided into 6 issues, or Exekontabiblos because it contained sixty books. It was compiled in the first years of Leo´s reign (possibly in 889-890), by a committee under the presidency of the protospatharios Sabbatios or Symbatios. The text of Basilika does not survive in its entirety. Its method of composition and the fact that it was written in Greek show its importance for Byzantine law.Apart from the Basilika Leo VI issued a collection of 113 Novels, the most important being numbers 46, 47 and 109, which limited the jurisdiction of the senate and the curiales to a minimum, thus reinforcing the authoritarian power of the emperor. Equally important was the Leo´s Novel concerning landed property which set limitations on the right of protimesis (preemption). According to this Novel the sale of rural estates to large-scale landowners was prohibited. With this Novel, Leo VI restricted the expansion of the dynatoi (powerful landowners), who, whether by legal or illegal means, had taken over the bulk of the rural communities and turned formerly independent peasants and military landowners into mere paroikoi.
This trend was very dangerous for the economic and military power of Byzantium, which was based on the existence of free smallholders. With the reduction of the estates belonging to the peasants the state was gradually losing its taxpaying base and though the limitation of its military estates, its soldiers. Leo´s successors understood the danger very well and continued his policy of trying to protect the smallholders from the expansive aspirations of the dynatoi, Leo´s VI Novel constituting the beginning of a series of Novels covering the regulation of these vital issues.