Download or read book Byzantium Pliska and the Balkans written by Joachim Henning and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2009-05-05 with total page 764 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: MILLENNIUM pursues an interdisciplinary approach transcending historical eras. The editorial board and the advisory board represent a wide range of disciplines - contributions from art and literary studies are just as welcome as historical, theological and philosophical contributions on both the Latin and Greek and the Oriental cultures. The STUDIES present relevant monographs or collections of papers from across the whole range of topics. The YEARBOOK contains authoritative articles. As the links between the various articles are sketched out in a comprehensive editorial, their diversity is intended to encourage dialogue between the disciplines and national research cultures. MILLENNIUM does not publish individual reviews, but does on occasions produce literature surveys. The languages of publication are principally English and German, but articles in French, Italian and Spanish can also be accommodated.

Download or read book Post Roman Towns Trade and Settlement in Europe and Byzantium Byzantium Pliska and the Balkans written by Joachim Henning and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2007 with total page 765 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this collection leading international authorities analyse the structures and economic functions of non-agrarian centres between ca. 500 and 1000 A.D. - their trade, their surrounding settlements, and the agricultural and cultural milieux. The thirty-one papers presented at an international conference held in Bad Homburg focus on recent archaeological discoveries in Central Europe (Vol. 1), as well as on those from southeastern Europe to Asia Minor (Vol. 2).

Download or read book The Bulgarian Byzantine Wars for Early Medieval Balkan Hegemony written by Dennis P. Hupchick and published by Springer. This book was released on 2017-07-10 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides an interpretive narrative of the wars fought by Bulgaria against the Byzantine Empire for dominant control of the Balkan Peninsula during the early medieval era. Over a span of two centuries, from the early ninth through the early eleventh, and under the leadership of the Bulgarian rulers Krum, Simeon I, and Samuil, those conflicts evolved from simple confrontations for territorial possession into a life-or-death struggle for imperial precedence within the Orthodox world then emerging in Eastern Europe—a struggle that the Bulgarians ultimately lost. The primary focus is on Bulgaria, rather than Byzantium, and an effort is made to provide a historically reliable chronology of the assorted campaigns. The various belligerents’ military organizations, defensive technologies, armaments, and tactics are surveyed in an introduction to the main narrative. A prelude chapter sets the stage for the hegemonic conflict, which was divided into three distinct phases by interludes of relative peace between the contending parties, during which Bulgaria’s domestic, foreign, and cultural developments shaped the nature and conduct of the fighting in each successive phase.

Download or read book Byzantium and the Pechenegs written by Mykola Melnyk and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2022-02-28 with total page 410 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author traces 150 years of the study of relations between Byzantium and various North Pontic nomads, with particular attention to how colonialist or national aspirations often triggered, hampered, biased, or otherwise influenced scholarship.

Download or read book Post Roman Towns Trade and Settlement in Europe and Byzantium Byzantium Pliska and the Balkans written by Joachim Henning and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2007 with total page 1388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this collection leading international authorities analyse the structures and economic functions of non-agrarian centres between ca. 500 and 1000 A.D. - their trade, their surrounding settlements, and the agricultural and cultural milieux. The thirty-one papers presented at an international conference held in Bad Homburg focus on recent archaeological discoveries in Central Europe (Vol. 1), as well as on those from southeastern Europe to Asia Minor (Vol. 2).

Download or read book Medieval Trade in Central Europe Scandinavia and the Balkans 10th 12th Centuries written by Piotr Pranke and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2020-08-10 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The aim of this work is to attempt to verify the theoretical concepts associated with the idea of trade and merchants activities in the 10th - 12th century within the extensive body of written sources available. The main case study is trading within the range of the influence of the Ottonian Empire and Byzantium.

Download or read book Eastern Medieval Architecture written by Robert G. Ousterhout and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2019-08-26 with total page 810 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Aside from Hagia Sophia, the monuments of the Byzantine East are poorly understood today. This is in sharp contrast to the well-known architectural marvels of Western Europeâs Middle Ages. In this landmark survey, distinguished art historian Robert Ousterhout introduces readers to the rich and diverse architectural traditions of the medieval Eastern Mediterranean. The focus of the book is the Byzantine (or East Roman) Empire (324-1453 CE), with its capital in Constantinople, although the framework expands chronologically to include the foundations of Christian architecture in Late Antiquity and the legacy of Byzantine culture after the fall of Constantinople in 1453. Geographically broad as well, this study includes architectural developments in areas of Italy, the Caucasus, the Near East, the Balkans, and Russia, as well as related developments in early Islamic architecture. Alternating chapters that address chronological or regionally-based developments with thematic studies that focus on the larger cultural concerns, the book presents the architectural developments in a way that makes them accessible, interesting, and intellectually stimulating. In doing so, it also explains why medieval architecture in the East followed such a different trajectory from that of the West. Lavishly illustrated with hundreds of color photographs, maps, and line drawings, Eastern Medieval Architecture will establish Byzantine traditions to be as significant and admirable as those more familiar examples in Western Europe, and serve as an invaluable resource for anyone interested in architectural history, Byzantium, and the Middle Ages.

Download or read book The Archaeology of Byzantine Anatolia written by Philipp Niewohner and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017-03-17 with total page 481 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book accounts for the tumultuous period of the fifth to eleventh centuries from the Fall of Rome and the collapse of the Western Roman Empire through the breakup of the Eastern Roman Empire and loss of pan-Mediterranean rule, until the Turks arrived and seized Anatolia. The volume is divided into a dozen syntheses that each addresses an issue of intrigue for the archaeology of Anatolia, and two dozen case studies on single sites that exemplify its richness. Anatolia was the only major part of the Roman Empire that did not fall in late antiquity; it remained steadfast under Roman rule through the eleventh century. Its personal history stands to elucidate both the emphatic impact of Roman administration in the wake of pan-Mediterranean collapse. Thanks to Byzantine archaeology, we now know that urban decline did not set in before the fifth century, after Anatolia had already be thoroughly Christianized in the course of the fourth century; we know now that urban decline, as it occurred from the fifth century onwards, was paired with rural prosperity, and an increase in the number, size, and quality of rural settlements and in rural population; that this ruralization was halted during the seventh to ninth centuries, when Anatolia was invaded first by the Persians, and then by the Arabs---and the population appears to have sought shelter behind new urban fortifications and in large cathedrals. Further, it elucidates that once the Arab threat had ended in the ninth century, this ruralization set in once more, and most cities seem to have been abandoned or reduced to villages during the ensuing time of seeming tranquility, whilst the countryside experienced renewed prosperity; that this trend was reversed yet again, when the Seljuk Turks appeared on the scene in the eleventh century, devastated the countryside and led to a revival and refortification of the former cities. This dynamic historical thread, traced across its extremes through the lens of Byzantine archaeology, speaks not only to the torrid narrative of Byzantine Anatolia, but to the enigmatic medievalization.

Download or read book Trends and Turning Points written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2019-05-15 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Trends and Turning Points presents sixteen articles, examining the discursive construction of the late antique and Byzantine world, focusing specifically on the utilisation of trends and turning points to make stuff from the past, whether texts, matter, or action, meaningful. Contributions are divided into four complementary strands, Scholarly Constructions, Literary Trends, Constructing Politics, and Turning Points in Religious Landscapes. Each strand cuts across traditional disciplinary boundaries and periodisation, placing historical, archaeological, literary, and architectural concerns in discourse, whilst drawing on examples from the full range of the medieval Roman past. While its individual articles offer numerous important insights, together the volume collectively rethinks fundamental assumptions about how late antique and Byzantine studies has and continues to be discursively constructed. Contributors are: David Barritt, Laura Borghetti, Nikolas Churik, Elif Demirtiken, Alasdair C. Grant, Stephen Humphreys, Mirela Ivanova, Hugh Jeffery, Valeria Flavia Lovato, Francesco Lovino, Kosuke Nakada, Jonas Nilsson, Theresia Raum, Maria Rukavichnikova, and Milan Vukašinović.

Download or read book The New Cambridge History of Islam Volume 1 The Formation of the Islamic World Sixth to Eleventh Centuries written by Chase F. Robinson and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2010-11-04 with total page 1057 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Volume One of The New Cambridge History of Islam, which surveys the political and cultural history of Islam from its Late Antique origins until the eleventh century, brings together contributions from leading scholars in the field. The book is divided into four parts. The first provides an overview of the physical and political geography of the Late Antique Middle East. The second charts the rise of Islam and the emergence of the Islamic political order under the Umayyad and the Abbasid caliphs of the seventh, eighth and ninth centuries, followed by the dissolution of the empire in the tenth and eleventh. 'Regionalism', the overlapping histories of the empire's provinces, is the focus of Part Three, while Part Four provides a cutting-edge discussion of the sources and controversies of early Islamic history, including a survey of numismatics, archaeology and material culture.

Download or read book Iconophilia written by Francesca Dell'Acqua and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-05-07 with total page 505 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Between the late seventh and the mid-ninth centuries, a debate about sacred images – conventionally addressed as ‘Byzantine iconoclasm’ – engaged monks, emperors, and popes in the Mediterranean area and on the European continent. The importance of this debate cannot be overstated; it challenged the relation between image, text, and belief. A series of popes staunchly in favour of sacred images acted consistently during this period in displaying a remarkable iconophilia or ‘love for images’. Their multifaceted reaction involved not only council resolutions and diplomatic exchanges, but also public religious festivals, liturgy, preaching, and visual arts – the mass-media of the time. Embracing these tools, the popes especially promoted themes related to the Incarnation of God – which justified the production and veneration of sacred images – and extolled the role and the figure of the Virgin Mary. Despite their profound influence over Byzantine and western cultures of later centuries, the political, theological, and artistic interactions between the East and the West during this period have not yet been investigated in studies combining textual and material evidence. By drawing evidence from texts and material culture – some of which have yet to be discussed against the background of the iconoclastic controversy – and by considering the role of oral exchange, Iconophilia assesses the impact of the debate on sacred images and of coeval theological controversies in Rome and central Italy. By looking at intersecting textual, liturgical, and pictorial images which had at their core the Incarnate God and his human mother Mary, the book demonstrates that between c.680–880, by unremittingly maintaining the importance of the visual for nurturing beliefs and mediating personal and communal salvation, the popes ensured that the status of sacred images would remain unchallenged, at least until the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century.

Download or read book Routledge Handbook of the Global History of Warfare written by Kaushik Roy and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2024-01-23 with total page 654 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This handbook examines key aspects of the development of the global history of warfare and the changing patterns of warfare over time. Although scholarship has long eschewed a chronological narrative of the evolution of warfare that privileges the Western experience, global histories of warfare have had difficulty avoiding an overemphasis on the West. The present volume is a collection of themes rather than a history per se; it provides important perspectives on the emergence of warfare as a global historical experience from the ancient past to the present day. Drawing together numerous experts, it tells a broader, more inclusive story of the global, human experience with wars and warfare. The 35 cahtpers are organised in eight thematic parts: Part I: Origins of Warfare Part II: Polities and Armed Forces in the Pre-Modern Era Part III: Steppe Nomads of Eurasia Part IV: Naval Warfare and Piracy in the Pre-Industrial World Part V: The Impact of Gunpowder Part VI: Transition from Industrial to Total War Part VII: Wars of Decolonisation and Cold War Part VIII: Postmodern/New Wars These Parts offer an overview of the global experience of warfare to help readers understand how the wars and the militaries we see today have been shaped by historical developments across the globe. This handbook will be of great interest to students of military history, naval history, strategic studies and world history in general.

Download or read book Byzantium written by James Howard-Johnston and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2024-07-15 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Byzantium was a strange entity--a relic of classical antiquity which survived deep into the Middle Ages. Drawing on a lifetime's work in the field of Byzantine studies, James Howard-Johnston aims to explain Byzantium's longevity, first as a state geared to fighting a two-centuries long guerrilla war of defence, then as an increasingly confident regional power. It is only by analysing its economic, social, and institutional structures that this strange medieval afterlife of the rump of the Roman empire can be understood. This collection of linked essays outlines the fundamental features of Byzantium, with a focus on the seventh to eleventh centuries. The essays delve below the agitated surface of political, religious, and intellectual history to home in on (1) alterations in economic conditions; and (2) structural change in the social order and apparatus of government. The economic foundations of society and state are examined over the long term, with emphasis placed on mercantile enterprise throughout. Howard-Johnston identifies warfare as the prime driver of social and institutional change in a first phase (seventh to eighth centuries), when the peasant villager rose to a dominant position in the collective mindset and the administration was centralised and militarised as never before. A second phase of change is then highlighted, after the mid-ninth century when Byzantium's security was assured. Military and administrative arrangements were adapted as the empire expanded. The service aristocracy which had developed in the dark centuries began to assert itself to the detriment of the peasantry, but was, Howard-Johnston argues, countered reasonably effectively by new legislation. There was a renaissance in cultural life, most marked in the intellectual sphere in the eleventh century. Finally, the sharp decline in Byzantium's military fortunes from the mid-eleventh century is attributed to external factors rather than internal weakness.

Download or read book The Routledge Handbook of the Byzantine City written by Nikolas Bakirtzis and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2024-01-31 with total page 719 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Byzantine world contained many important cities throughout its empire. Although it was not ‘urban’ in the sense of the word today, its cities played a far more fundamental role than those of its European neighbors. This book, through a collection of twenty-four chapters, discusses aspects of, and different approaches to, Byzantine urbanism from the early to late Byzantine periods. It provides both a chronological and thematic perspective to the study of Byzantine cities, bringing together literary, documentary, and archival sources with archaeological results, material culture, art, and architecture, resulting in a rich synthesis of the variety of regional and sub-regional transformations of Byzantine urban landscapes. Organized into four sections, this book covers: Theory and Historiography, Geography and Economy, Architecture and the Built Environment, and Daily Life and Material Culture. It includes more specialized accounts that address the centripetal role of Constantinople and its broader influence across the empire. Such new perspectives help to challenge the historiographical balance between ‘margins and metropolis,’ and also to include geographical areas often regarded as peripheral, like the coastal urban centers of the Byzantine Mediterranean as well as cities on islands, such as Crete, Cyprus, and Sicily which have more recently yielded well-excavated and stratigraphically sound urban sites. The Routledge Handbook of the Byzantine City provides both an overview and detailed study of the Byzantine city to specialist scholars, students, and enthusiasts alike and, therefore, will appeal to all those interested in Byzantine urbanism and society, as well as those studying medieval society in general.

Download or read book Late Antique Responses to the Arab Conquests written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2021-12-13 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Late Antique Responses to the Arab Conquests is a showcase of new discoveries in an exciting and rapidly developing field: the study of the transition from Late Antiquity to Early Islam. The Arab conquests are shown to have changed both the Arabian conquerors and the conquered.

Download or read book Asia Minor in the Long Sixth Century written by Ine Jacobs and published by Oxbow Books. This book was released on 2018-10-18 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Asia Minor is considered to have been a fairly prosperous region in Late Antiquity. It was rarely disturbed by external invasions and remained largely untouched by the continuous Roman-Persian conflict until very late in the period, was apparently well connected to the flourishing Mediterranean economy and, as the region closest to Constantinople, is assumed to have played an important part in the provisioning of the imperial capital and the imperial armies. When exactly this prosperity came to an end – the late sixth century, the early, middle or even later seventh century – remains a matter of debate. Likewise, the impact of factors such as the dust veil event of 536, the impact of the bubonic plague that made its first appearance in AD 541/542, the costs and consequences of Justinian’s wars, the Persian attacks of the early seventh century and, eventually the Arab incursions of around the middle of the seventh century, remains controversial. The more general living conditions in both cities and countryside have long been neglected. The majority of the population, however, did not live in urban but in rural contexts. Yet the countryside only found its proper place in regional overviews in the last two decades, thanks to an increasing number of regional surveys in combination with a more refined pottery chronology. Our growing understanding of networks of villages and hamlets is very likely to influence the appreciation of the last decades of Late Antiquity drastically. Indeed, it would seem that the sixth century in particular is characterized not only by a ruralization of cities, but also by the extension and flourishing of villages in Asia Minor, the Roman Near East, and Egypt. This volume's series of themes include the physical development of large and small settlements, their financial situation, and the proportion of public and private investment. Imperial, provincial, and local initiatives in city and countryside are compared and the main motivations examined, including civic or personal pride, military incentives, and religious stimuli. The evidence presented will be used to form opinions on the impact of the plague on living circumstances in the sixth century and to evaluate the significance of the Justinianic period.

Download or read book Cyprus Between Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages ca 600 800 written by Luca Zavagno and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-05-18 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cover -- Half Title -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Dedication -- Table of Contents -- List of figures -- Preface -- Abbreviations -- 1. Mattia Pascal and the name of Cyprus -- Notes -- 2. Seeing the unseen: a brief overview of Cypriot historiography -- Notes -- 3. The mousetrap of methodology -- Act I: General problems of method -- Act II: Literary and material sources for early medieval Cyprus -- Notes -- 4. A history of Cyprus in the early Middle Ages -- Cyprus from the sixth to the ninth century -- The power of the Cypriot Church -- Notes -- 5. Urban versus rural: the many sides of the Cypriot coin -- Overcoming the caesurae -- Surveying the Cypriot countryside -- Salamis-Constantia and its sisters: Cypriot urbanism in transition -- Notes -- 6. An insular economy in transition -- The economy of early medieval Cyprus -- In a league of their own: ceramics in early medieval Cyprus -- Notes -- 7. Aftermath and conclusions -- Cyprus in the ninth and tenth centuries -- Concluding remarks -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index