Download or read book Byzantium in the Ninth Century Dead or Alive written by Leslie Brubaker and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-12-05 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 9th-century Byzantium has always been viewed as a mid-point between Iconoclasm and the so-called Macedonian revival; in scholarly terms it is often treated as a ’dead’ century. The object of these papers is to question such an assumption. They present a picture of political and military developments, legal and literary innovations, artisanal production, and religious and liturgical changes from the Anatolian plateau to the Greek-speaking areas of Italy that are only now gradually emerging as distinct. Investigation of how the 9th-century Byzantine world was perceived by outsiders also reveals much about Byzantine success and failure in promoting particular views of itself. The chapters here, by an international group of scholars, embody current research in this field; they recover many lost aspects of 9th-century Byzantium and shed new light on the Mediterranean world in a transitional century. The papers in this volume derive from the 30th Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies, held for the Society for the Promotion of Byzantine Studies at the University of Birmingham in March 1996.
Download or read book Vision and Meaning in Ninth Century Byzantium written by Leslie Brubaker and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1999-02-25 with total page 592 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Byzantines used imagery to communicate a wide range of issues. In the context of Iconoclasm - the debate about the legitimacy of religious art conducted between c. AD 730 and 843 - Byzantine authors themselves claimed that visual images could express certain ideas better than words. Vision and Meaning in Ninth-Century Byzantium deals with how such visual communication worked and examines the types of messages that pictures could convey in the aftermath of Iconoclasm. Its focus is on a deluxe manuscript commissioned around 880, a copy of the fourth-century sermons of the Cappadocian church father Gregory of Nazianzus which presented to the Emperor Basil I, founder of the Macedonian dynasty, by one of the greatest scholars Byzantium ever produced, the patriarch Photios. The manuscript was lavishly decorated with gilded initials, elaborate headpieces and a full-page miniature before each of Gregory's sermons. Forty-six of these, including over 200 distinct scenes, survive. Fewer than half however were directly inspired by the homily that they accompany. Instead most function as commentaries on the ninth-century court and carefully deconstructed both provide us with information not available from preserved written sources and perhaps more important show us how visual images communicate differently from words.
Download or read book Byzantine Military Rhetoric in the Ninth Century written by Georgios Theotokis and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-04-27 with total page 129 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Byzantine Military Rhetoric in the Ninth Century is the first English translation of the ninth-century Anonymi Byzantini Rhetorica Militaris. This influential text offers a valuable insight into the warrior ethic of the period, the role of religion in the justification of war, and the view of other military cultures by the Byzantine elite. It also played a crucial role in the compilation of the tenth-century Taktika and Constantine VII’s harangues during a period of intense military activity for the Byzantine Empire on its eastern borders. Including a detailed commentary and critical introduction to the author and the structure of the text, this book will appeal to all those interested in Byzantine political ideology and military history.
Download or read book Images of the Byzantine World written by Angeliki Lymberopoulou and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-12-05 with total page 269 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The main themes of this volume are the identification of 'visions', 'messages', and 'meanings' in various facets of Byzantine culture and the possible differences in the perception of these visions, messages and meanings as seen by their original audience and by modern scholars. The volume addresses the methodological question of how far interpretations should go - whether there is a tendency to read too much into too little or whether not enough attention is paid to apparent minutiae that may have been important in their historical context. As the essays span a wide chronological era, they also present a means of assessing the relative degrees of continuity and change in Byzantine visions, messages and meanings over time. Thus, as highlighted in the concluding section, the book discusses the validity of existing notions regarding the fluidity of Byzantine culture: when continuity was a matter of a rigid adherence to traditional values and when a manifestation of the ability to adapt old conventions to new circumstances, and it shows that in some respects, Byzantine cultural history may have been less fragmented than is usually assumed. Similarly, by reflecting not just on new interpretations, but also on the process of interpreting itself, the contributors demonstrate how research within Byzantine studies has evolved over the past thirty years from a set of narrowly defined individual disciplines into a broader exploration of interconnected cultural phenomena.
Download or read book Rome in the Ninth Century written by John Osborne and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2023-09-30 with total page 339 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Integrates the evidence for ninth-century Rome derived from standing remains and their decorations, objects in museum and library collections, contemporaneous documents, and recent archaeology in order to create an interdisciplinary space defined as 'history in art'. A sequel to the author's Rome in the Eighth Century (Cambridge, 2020).
Download or read book Saints and Spectacle written by Carolyn Loessel Connor and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2016 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Saints and Spectacle explains, for the first time, how the spectacurlar gold ground mosaics of the Middle Byzantine period were likely conceived. Through a recreation of the circumstances of this time, Saints and Spectacle brings the Middle Byzantine church to life as the witness to a compelling and fascinating drama.
Download or read book Literary Circles in Byzantine Iconoclasm written by Óscar Prieto Domínguez and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-02-04 with total page 557 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Iconoclasm was the name given to the stance of that portion of Eastern Christianity that rejected worshipping God through images (eikones) representing Christ, the Virgin or the saints and was the official doctrine of the Byzantine Empire for most of the period between 726 and 843. It was a period marked by violent passions on either side. This is the first comprehensive account of the extant contemporary texts relating to this phenomenon and their impact on society, politics and identity. By examining the literary circles emerging both during the time of persecution and immediately after the restoration of icons in 843, the volume casts new light on the striking (re)construction of Byzantine society, whose iconophile identity was biasedly redefined by the political parties led by Theodoros Stoudites, Gregorios Dekapolites and Empress Theodora or the patriarchs Methodios, Ignatios and Photios. It thereby offers an innovative paradigm for approaching Byzantine literature.
Download or read book Italy and Early Medieval Europe written by Ross Balzaretti and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018-07-26 with total page 592 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A comprehensive survey of recent work in Medieval Italian history and archaeology by an international cast of contributors, arranged within a broader context of studies on other regions and major historical transitions in Europe, c.400 to c.1400CE. Each of the contributors reflect on the contribution made to the field by Chris Wickham, whose own work spans studies based on close archival work, to broad and ambitious statements on economic and social change in the transition from Roman to medieval Europe, and the value of comparing this across time and space.
Download or read book Leo VI and the Transformation of Byzantine Christian Identity written by Meredith L. D. Riedel and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-08-23 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Analyses the ideological writings of a scholarly and unusual Byzantine emperor dedicated to distinctively Orthodox Christian principles.
Download or read book Papers from the First and Second Postgraduate Forums in Byzantine Studies written by Savvas Neocleous and published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing. This book was released on 2009-10-02 with total page 301 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sailing to Byzantium brings together ten probing and pertinent critical papers, presented at the First and Second Postgraduate Forums in Byzantine Studies, held at Trinity College Dublin on 17-18 April 2007 and 15-16 May 2008 respectively. These essays engage with various facets of Byzantine history and culture. Many of them seek to shed new light on frequently controversial subject matters relating to history, historiography, and religion (the contentious nature of Jerusalem in Byzantine imperial ideology; medieval Western attitudes and perceptions of the Byzantine Empire; and the translation and use of Greek theologians in the West). Elsewhere, there are papers that tackle aspects of Byzantine literature (Encyclopaedism; the circulation of poetry; and a case study of political rhetoric in Manuel II’s Dialogue with the Empress-Mother on Marriage). Finally, history of art and cult come under the microscope in the last two essays of the volume (the meaning of the eight-century apsidal conch at Santa Maria Antiqua in Rome and the origins of the cult of Saint Martin in Dalmatia). Sailing to Byzantium is a provocative, wide-ranging collection and a must for students and academics who wish to broaden their understanding of one of history’s most fascinating civilizations.
Download or read book The Encounter of Eastern Christianity With Early Islam written by Emmanouela Grypeou and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2006 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The contributions in this volume deal with crucial subjects of political and theological dialogue and controversy that characterized the varying responses of the Christian communities in the Byzantine Eastern provinces to the Islamic conquest and its subsequent impact on Byzantine society and history.
Download or read book Islamic Imperial Law written by Benjamin Jokisch and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2011-12-01 with total page 769 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Die bisherige Forschung geht davon aus, dass das islamische Recht von unabhängigen Juristen entwickelt wurde. Dabei sind mitunter Einflüsse aus fremden Rechtssystemen eingeräumt worden, doch eine gezielte Rezeption galt stets als ausgeschlossen. In einer Vergleichsanalyse, die auf der Prämisse einer massiven Interaktion der Kulturen in jener Zeit basiert, lässt sich nun nachweisen, dass das erste monumentale Rechtswerk im Islam, die Zāhir ar-riwāya des Šaybānī, strukturell und inhaltlich auf dem Rhēton beruht – einer griechischen Version jenes Regelwerkes, das später in Europa als Corpus Iuris Civilis Verbreitung fand. Inspiriert durch die byzantinische Reichsrechtsidee kodifizierten muslimische Staatsjuristen in Bagdad das islamische „Reichsrecht“, das aber angesichts der Opposition frommer Überlieferer durch Traditionen legitimiert werden musste. Nachdem sich das Reichsrecht in weiten Teilen des Kalifats etabliert hatte, bewirkte der revolutionäre Triumph der Orthodoxie Mitte des 9. Jahrhunderts dessen Übergang in ein Juristenrecht, das nun in den Händen unabhängiger Gelehrter lag.
Download or read book The Occult Sciences in Byzantium written by Paul Magdalino and published by La Pomme d'or. This book was released on 2006 with total page 469 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume represents the first attempt to examine occult sciences as a distinct category of Byzantine intellectual culture. It is concerned with both the reality and the image of the occult sciences in Byzantium, and seeks, above all, to represent them in their social and cultural context as a historical phenomenon. The eleven essays demonstrate that Byzantium was not marginal to the scientific culture of the Middle Ages, and that the occult sciences were not marginal to the learned culture of the medieval Byzantine world.
Download or read book Women in Purple written by Judith Herrin and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2021-09-14 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the eighth and ninth centuries, three Byzantine empresses—Irene, Euphrosyne, and Theodora—changed history. Their combined efforts restored the veneration of icons, saving Byzantium from a purely symbolic and decorative art and ensuring its influence for centuries to come. In this exhilarating and highly entertaining account, one of the foremost historians of the medieval period tells the story of how these fascinating women exercised imperial sovereignty with consummate skill and sometimes ruthless tactics. Though they gained access to the all-pervasive authority of the Byzantine ruling dynasty through marriage, all three continued to wear the imperial purple and wield tremendous power as widows. From Constantinople, their own Queen City, the empresses undermined competitors and governed like men. They conducted diplomacy across the known world, negotiating with the likes of Charlemagne, Roman popes, and the great Arab caliph Harun al Rashid. Vehemently rejecting the ban on holy images instituted by their male relatives, Irene and Theodora used craft and power to reverse the official iconoclasm and restore icons to their place of adoration in the Eastern Church. In so doing, they profoundly altered the course of history. The art—and not only the art—of Byzantium, of Islam, and of the West would have been very different without them. As Judith Herrin traces the surviving evidence, she evokes the complex and deeply religious world of Constantinople in the aftermath of Arab conquest. She brings to life its monuments and palaces, its court ceremonies and rituals, the role of eunuchs (the "third sex"), bride shows, and the influence of warring monks and patriarchs. Based on new research and written for a general audience, Women in Purple reshapes our understanding of an empire that lasted a thousand years and splashes fresh light on the relationship of women to power.
Download or read book Travel in the Byzantine World written by Ruth Macrides and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-07-05 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The contributions to this volume have been selected from the papers delivered at the 34th Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies at Birmingham, in April 2000. Travellers to and in the Byzantine world have long been a subject of interest but travel and communications in the medieval period have more recently attracted scholarly attention. This book is the first to bring together these two lines of enquiry. Four aspects of travel in the Byzantine world, from the sixth to the fifteenth century, are examined here: technicalities of travel on land and sea, purposes of travel, foreign visitors' perceptions of Constantinople, and the representation of the travel experience in images and in written accounts. Sources used to illuminate these four aspects include descriptions of journeys, pilot books, bilingual word lists, shipwrecks, monastic documents, but as the opening paper shows the range of such sources can be far wider than generally supposed. The contributors highlight road and travel conditions for horses and humans, types of ships and speed of sea journeys, the nature of trade in the Mediterranean, the continuity of pilgrimage to the Holy Land, attitudes toward travel. Patterns of communication in the Mediterranean are revealed through distribution of ceramic finds, letter collections, and the spread of the plague. Together, these papers make a notable contribution to our understanding both of the evidence for travel, and of the realities and perceptions of communications in the Byzantine world. Travel in the Byzantine World is volume 10 in the series published by Ashgate/Variorum on behalf of the Society for the Promotion of Byzantine Studies.
Download or read book Byzantium in Dialogue with the Mediterranean written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2019-03-25 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Byzantium in Dialogue with the Mediterranean. History and Heritage shows that throughout the centuries of its existence, Byzantium continuously communicated with other cultures and societies on the European continent, as well as North Africa and in the East.
Download or read book Social Change in Town and Country in Eleventh Century Byzantium written by James Howard-Johnston and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-09-10 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The history of Byzantium pivots around the eleventh century, during which it reached its apogee in terms of power, prestige, and territorial extension, only then to plunge into steep political decline following serious military defeats and extensive territorial losses. The political, economic, and intellectual history of the period is reasonably well understood, but not so what was happening in that crucial intermediary sphere, the social order, which both shaped and was shaped by contemporary ideas and brute economic developments. This volume aims to deepen understanding of Byzantine society by examining material evidence for settlements and production in different regions and by sifting through the far from plentiful literary and documentary sources in order to track what was happening in town and country. There is evidence of significant change: the pattern of landownership continued to shift in favour of those with power and wealth, but there was sustained and effective resistance from peasant villages. Provincial towns prospered in what was an era of sustained economic growth, and, through newly emboldened local elites, took a more active part in public affairs. In the capital the middling classes, comprising much of officialdom and leading traders, gained in importance, while the twin military and civilian elites were merging to form a single governing class. However, despite this social upheaval, careful analysis of these various factors by a range of leading Byzantine historians and archaeologists leads to the overarching conclusion that it was not so much internal structural changes which contributed to the vertiginous decline suffered by Byzantium in the late eleventh century, as the unprecedented combination of dangerous adversaries on different fronts, in the east, north, and west.
