Were it not for his religious policies and the increasing persecution of iconodules throughout his reign, Constantine might have been remembered as an extremely effective emperor. Though chronically sickly and prone to serious bouts of depression, in the military field he proved a masterful general. Constantine smashed the fledgling Bulgar state and capitalized on the civil war among the Muslims to push back the Arabs on land and sea. His allies credited his victories to a display of divine pleasure at the banishment of idolatory.
Despite these victories, his religious persecutions and confiscation of monastic properties made Constantine deeply unpopular beyond the ranks of those who had seen him on a battlefield. His monetary hoarding led to cash shortages and resultant deflation. (During his reign, we know a solidus could purchase sixty bushels of wheat, or seventy of barley.)
Whilst campaigning in 775, the fifty-seven year old emperor's limbs swelled and he was forced to lead his army from a litter. His condition worsened, and on 14th September, 775 he died at Strongylon. He was succeeded by his son Leo IV, known as "The Khazar" due to his mother, Irene's, being a Khazar princess. (She was second Khazar Empress, Justinian II also having married a princess of that tribe.) Constantine was buried with the emperors in the Church of the Holy Apostles, but his bones were disinterred in the 9th century, burned and thrown into the sea.
