Byzantine News

From the latest issue of Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies Alwis, Anne P, Men in pain: masculinity medicine and the Miracles of St. Artemios The Miracles of St Artemios, which reveal a catalogue of men who are in severe pain and who express their anguish volubly, are analysed to provide two methodological frameworks (anthropological and medical), within which to investigate the masculinity of these ‘ordinary’ Byzantine men. Nikolaos G. Chrissis, The City and the Cross: the image of Constantinople and the Latin empire in thirteenth-century papal crusading  rhetoric This paper examines the way papal rhetoric made use of the image and reputation of the city of Constantinople in order to legitimise and incite support for its crusading calls for the defence of the Latin empire after 1204. A number of relevant themes that reflect the city’s temporal and religious importance are explored, such as its wealth, its relics, its imperial past and its patriarchal status as New Rome. Th...

Neil MacGregor's world history as told through objects is describing how people expressed devotion and connection with the divine in the 14th and 15th centuries. Today he is with an icon from Constantinople that looks back in history to celebrate the overthrow of iconoclasm and the restoration of holy images in AD 843 - a moment of triumph for the Orthodox branch of the Christian Church. This icon shows the annual festival of orthodoxy celebrated on the first Sunday of Lent, with historical figures of that time and a famous depiction of the Virgin Mary. The American artist Bill Viola responds to the icon and describes the special characteristics of religious painting. And the historian Diarmaid MacCulloch describes the often troubled relationship between the Church and the images it has produced. Listen here for the programme from the BBC 4.

The Cyrus Cylinder: The Cyrus Cylinder is an ancient clay cylinder, now broken into several fragments, on which is written a declaration in Akkadian cuneiform script[3] in the name of the Achaemenid king Cyrus the Great. It dates from the 6th century BC and was discovered in the ruins of Babylon in Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) in 1879.[3] It is currently in the possession of the British Museum, which sponsored the expedition that discovered the cylinder. It was created and used as a foundation deposit following the Persian conquest of Babylon in 539 BC, when the Neo-Babylonian Empire was invaded by Cyrus and incorporated into his Persian Empire. The text on the Cylinder praises Cyrus the Great, sets out his genealogy and portrays him as a king from a line of kings. The Babylonian king Nabonidus (see earlier Cylinder of Nabonidus), who was defeated and deposed by Cyrus, is denounced as an impious oppressor of the people of Babylonia and his low-born origins are implicitly contrasted to...

The Ashgate Research Companion to Byzantine Hagiography Volume I: Periods and Places ed. by Stephanos Efthymiades, Open University of Cyprus Hagiography is the most abundantly represented genre of Byzantine literature and it offers crucial insight to the development of religious thought and practice, social and literary life, and the history of the empire. It emerged in the fourth century with the pioneering Life of St Antony and continued to evolve until the end of the empire in the fifteenth century, and beyond. The appeal and dynamics of this genre radiated beyond the confines of Byzantium, and it was practised also in many Oriental and Slavic languages within the orbit of the broader Byzantine world. This Companion is the work of an international team of specialists and represents the first comprehensive survey ever produced in this field. It will consist of two volumes and is addressed to both a broader public and the scholarly community of Byzantinists, Medievalists, historian...