century believed the conversion of Constantine showed that Christianity had triumphed over paganism (in Heaven) and little further action besides such rhetoric was necessary: everything was done but the sweeping up in the Christian view. As a result, the fourth century included a focus on heresy as a higher priority than paganism. According to Peter Brown, "In most areas, polytheists were not molested, and apart from a few ugly incidents of local violence, Jewish communities also enjoyed a century of stable, even privileged, existence". There were anti-pagan laws, but they were not generally enforced. Thus, up through the sixth century, there still existed centers of paganism in Athens, Gaza, Alexandria, and elsewhere. According to recent Jewish scholarship, the approach of toleration that the 'permitted religious' status of the Jews implied was maintained under Christian emperors. This did not extend to heretics. By the time of Theodosius I, there was still no requirement for pagans or Jews to convert to Christianity, but as a devout Nicene Christian, Theodosius made multiple laws and acted against all alternate forms of Christianity. Christian heretics were subject to persecution, coercion and death by both the Roman government and the church throughout Late Antiquity, however, non-Christians were not subject to exclusion from public life or persecution until the sixth century reigns of Justin and Justinian I. Rome's original religious hierarchy and many aspects of its ritual influenced Christian forms, and many pre-Christian beliefs and practices survived in Christian festivals and local traditions. Legacy Several states claimed to be the Roman Empire's successors after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. The Holy Roman Empire, an attempt to resurrect the Empire in the West, was established in 800 when Pope Leo III crowned Frankish King Charlemagne as Roman emperor on Christmas Day, though the empire and the imperial office did not become formalized for some decades. It maintained its title until its dissolution in 1806, with much of the Empire reorganized into the Confederation of the Rhine by Napoleon Bonaparte: crowned as Emperor of the French by Pope Pius VII. Still, his house would also lose this title after Napoleon abdicating and renouncing not only his own rights to the French throne and all of his titles, but also those of his descendants on 6 April 1814. After the fall of Constantinople, the Russian Tsardom, as inheritor of the Byzantine Empire's Orthodox Christian tradition, counted itself the