Byzantine News

"Intelligible Beauty" recent research on Byzantine jewellery. Edited by Chris Entwistle and Noël Adams Click here to read

The Harbour of Eleutherios (Greek: λιμήν Ἐλευθερίου), later known as the Harbour of Theodosius (Greek: λιμήν Θεοδοσίου, Latin: Portus Theodosiacus) was one of the ports of ancient Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire, located beneath the modern Yenikapi neighbourhood of Istanbul, Turkey. The harbour was located on the south side of the peninsula where the city is built, facing towards the Sea of Marmara. The other harbours of the city were the Harbour of Julian and the small harbour of the Boukoleon Palace, likewise on the southern shore, and the harbours of Neorion and Prosphorion on the northern side. The harbour was built in the late 4th century during the reign of Theodosius I, and was the city's major point of trade in Late Antiquity. The area was later transformed for agricultural use due to the effects of erosion and silting. In Ottoman times, the area was built over. Here is a video about the harbour:

The TLG project has recently added 30 more Byzantine texts: 0545 Claudius AELIANUS Soph. (1 work) 0674 AELIUS PROMOTUS Med. (1 work) 2042 ORIGENES Theol. (1 work) 3013 Andronicus CAMATERUS Scr. Eccl. (1 work) 3085 NEOPHYTUS INCLUSUS Scr. Eccl. (6 works) 3157 THEODORUS Scutariota Hist. (1 work) 3251 PHILOTHEUS COCCINUS Theol. (4 works) 4028 STEPHANUS Byzantius Gramm. (2 works) 4457 THEOGNOSTUS Theol. (1 work) 5026 SCHOLIA IN HOMERUM Schol. (1 work) 5327 ACTA MONASTERII VAZELON Acta et Eccl. (1 work) 5357 TIPUKEITUS Jurisprud. (1 work) 9023 Thomas MAGISTER Philol. (8 works) 9030 Constantinus HARMENOPULUS Legal. (1 work) Click here for more

Dumbarton Oaks has made available I .Shahid's  book on Rome and the Arabs. Click here to download The Arabs played an important role in Roman-controlled Oriens in the four centuries or so that elapsed from the Settlement of Pompey in 64 B.C. to the reign of Diocletian, A.D. 284–305. In Rome and the Arabs Irfan Shahîd explores this extensive but poorly known role and traces the phases of the Arab-Roman relationship, especially in the climactic third century, which witnessed the rise of many powerful Roman Arabs such as the Empresses of the Severan Dynasty, Emperor Philip, and the two rulers of Palmyra, Odenathus and Zenobia. Philip the Arab, the author argues, was the first Christian Roman emperor and Abgar the Great (ca. 200 A.D.) was the first Near Eastern ruler to adopt Christianity. In addition to political and military matters, the author also discusses Arab cultural contributions, pointing out the role of the Hellenized and Romanized Arabs in the urbanization of the regio...

Editors: T. Shawcross & I. Toth From Cambridge University Press: Offering a comprehensive introduction to the history of books, readers and reading in the Byzantine Empire and its sphere of influence, this volume addresses a paradox. Advanced literacy was rare among imperial citizens, being restricted by gender and class. Yet the state's economic, religious and political institutions insisted on the fundamental importance of the written record. Starting from the materiality of codices, documents and inscriptions, the volume's contributors draw attention to the evidence for a range of interactions with texts. They examine the role of authors, compilers and scribes. They look at practices such the close perusal of texts in order to produce excerpts, notes, commentaries and editions. But they also analyse the social implications of the constant intersection of writing with both image and speech. Showcasing current methodological approaches, this collection of essays ai...

Audio lecture by Sharon Gerstel: Witnessing Byzantium: The Greek Perspective

Articles from the latest issue of Dumbarton Oaks Papers , no 71: Maya Maskarinec, “Saints for All Christendom: Naturalizing the Alexandrian Saints Cyrus and John in Seventh- to Thirteenth-Century Rome”;  Joseph Glynias, “Prayerful Iconoclasts: Psalm Seals and Elite Formation in the First Iconoclast Era (726–750)”;  Jordan Pickett, “Water and Empire in the De Aedificiis of Procopius”;  Florin Leonte, “Visions of Empire: Gaze, Space, and Territory in Isidore’s Encomium for John VIII Palaiologos (1429)”;  Anastasia Drandaki, “Piety, Politics, and Art in Fifteenth-Century Venetian Crete”; Julian Baker, Filippo Dompieri, and Turan Gökyildirim, “The Reformed Byzantine Silver Based Currencies (ca. 1372–1379) in the Light of the Hoards from the Belgrade Gate”;  Vasileios Marinis, “The Vision of Last Judgment in the Vita of Saint Niphon (BHG 1371z)”;  Daniel Reynolds, “Rethinking Palestinian Iconoclasm”;  Athanasios Vionis, “Understanding Settlemen...

From Haaretz: While digging to lay a cable network by the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem's Old City, workers uncovered an intact mosaic with Greek writing on what seems to have been the floor of an ancient version of a boutique hotel 1,500 years ago. The writing reads: "In the time of our most pious emperor Flavius Justinian, also this entire building Constantine the most God-loving priest and abbot, established and raised, in the 14th indiction," according to Leah Di Segni, of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, an expert on ancient Greek inscriptions. "'Indiction' is an ancient method of counting years, for taxation purposes. Based on historical sources, the mosaic can be dated to the year 550 or 551 C.E.," Di Segni says. Both she and David Gellman, the director of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority believe the mosaic decorated the floor of what had probably been a hotel for pilgrims flocking to Jerusalem as Christianity t...

The Throne of Maximian (or Maximianus) is a throne that was made for Archbishop Maximianus of Ravenna and is now on display at the Archiepiscopal Museum, Ravenna. It is generally agreed that the throne was carved in the Greek East of the Byzantine Empire and shipped to Ravenna, but there has long been scholarly debate over whether it was made in Constantinople or Alexandria. Maximianus, Portrait, Ravenna The style of the throne is a mixture of Early Christian art and that of the First Golden Age of Byzantine art. It is made of carved ivory panels, with frames of winding vines and grapevines, on a wooden frame. The throne itself is large with a high semi-circular back and may have held a jewelled cross or Gospel book for some of the time. The ivory carvings are done in relief and the panels depict important biblical figures. The back of the throne shows scenes of the Life of Christ, the sides include scenes of the Story of Joseph from the Book of Genesis, and on the front of ...

Here is a list: 0645 JUSTINUS MARTYR Apol.   1389 HARPOCRATION Gramm.   1595 PHILODEMUS Phil.   2042 ORIGENES Theol.   2130 ARETHAS Scr. Eccl. et Philol.   2642 <ASTRAMPSYCHUS Magus> Onir.   2702 Michael PSELLUS Epist., Polyhist., Phil., Hagiogr. et Theol.   2721 Theodorus PRODROMUS Poeta et Polyhist.   2738 CHRONOGRAPHIAE ANONYMAE Chronogr.   2772 ACTA TIMOTHEI Hagiogr., Apocryph. et Acta   2933 GERMANUS I Scr. Eccl.   3010 Theodorus BALSAMON Scr. Eccl.   3024 Constantinus STILBES Poeta et Rhet.   3036 EUTHYMIUS Scr. Eccl.   3053 JOANNES II Scr. Eccl.   3054 JOANNES IV (vel V) Oxeïtes Scr. Eccl.   3059 JOANNES X CAMATERUS Scr. Eccl.   3073 Euthymius MALACES Scr. Eccl., Rhet. et Theol.   3077 MICHAEL I CERULARIUS Theol. et Scr. Eccl.   3078 MICHAEL III Epist., Theol. et Rhet.   3085 NEOPHYTUS INCL...

From the editors: This volume brings into being the field of Byzantine intellectual history. Shifting focus from the cultural, social, and economic study of Byzantium to the life and evolution of ideas in their context, it provides an authoritative history of intellectual endeavors from Late Antiquity to the fifteenth century. At its heart lie the transmission, transformation, and shifts of Hellenic, Christian, and Byzantine ideas and concepts as exemplified in diverse aspects of intellectual life, from philosophy, theology, and rhetoric to astrology, astronomy, and politics. Case studies introduce the major players in Byzantine intellectual life, and particular emphasis is placed on the reception of ancient thought and its significance for secular as well as religious modes of thinking and acting. New insights are offered regarding controversial, understudied, or promising topics of research, such as philosophy and medical thought in Byzantium, and intellectual exchanges with the...

Author: Houze, Antoine Philippe Date: 1844 Short Title: Empire Grec et Royaume d'Italie 774 a 900 Publisher: Chez P. Dumenil Publisher Location: Paris Type: Atlas Map  Source Link Author:Spruner von Merz, Karl Date:1855 Short Title:Das Byzantinische Reich bis in das XIte. Jahrhundert. Publisher:Justus Perthes Publisher Location:Gotha Type:Atlas Map  Source Link

A recipe of delicious Byzantine vegan food from a manuscript at the British Library: One of our Byzantine Greek service books, a collection of lessons for the Saturdays and Sundays of Lent, contains a very special recipe: not only is it completely vegan, it is said to have been received directly from Heaven. The short note is preserved in a lection for the first Saturday of the Great Lent which records the miraculous revelation of the new recipe as follows.  “Koliva is wheat kernels boiled soft and sweetened with honey, sesame seeds, almonds, ground walnuts, cinnamon, pomegranate seeds, raisins and anise.' When the archbishop inquired who is the provider of the new recipe , his visitor simply answered, 'I am Theodore the Martyr of Christ whom he has now sent to you to reveal this and provide new food for his people.' Read here the whole story

From the editors: A distinctive feature of Christian culture in early Islamic Syria and Palestine was a renewed interest in literature on martyrs, which represented a potential reaction among some Christian communities to the rise of Islam in the region. The adaption of this early Christian genre to the new circumstances of political domination during the early Middle Ages offers a revealing, yet until now largely unexplored, window onto how Christians responded culturally to Islamic imperialism. This bilingual edition of three martyrdoms provides a new opportunity to understand this historical phenomenon. These writings, composed at the Mar Saba monastery in the Judean Desert and attributed to famous members of that community, share a common high literary style, although each portrays Christian martyrdom at the hands of the Muslims very differently. This parallel-text edition offers the only English translations available of these important works, making it an invaluable resou...

Author: A. Beihammer The arrival of the Seljuk Turks in Anatolia forms an indispensable part of modern Turkish discourse on national identity, but Western scholars, by contrast, have rarely included the Anatolian Turks in their discussions about the formation of European nations or the transformation of the Near East. The Turkish penetration of Byzantine Asia Minor is primarily conceived of as a conflict between empires, sedentary and nomadic groups, or religious and ethnic entities. This book proposes a new narrative, which begins with the waning influence of Constantinople and Cairo over large parts of Anatolia and the Byzantine-Muslim borderlands, as well as the failure of the nascent Seljuk sultanate to supplant them as a leading supra-regional force. In both Byzantine Anatolia and regions of the Muslim heartlands, local elites and regional powers came to the fore as holders of political authority and rivals in incessant power struggles. Turkish warrior groups q...

Some interesting articles: PATRICK ANDRIST: Literary distance and complexity in late antique and early Byzantine Greek dialogues Adversus Iudaeos PÉTER TÓTH: New wine in old wineskin: Byzantine reuses of the apocryphal revelation dialogue   FLORIN LEONTE: Dramatisation and narrative in late Byzantine dialogues:Manuel II Palaiologos’s On Marriage and Mazaris’ Journey to Hades   NIELS GAUL: Embedded dialogues and dialogical voices in Palaiologan prose and verse   From the editors (Niels Gaul and Averil Cameron): Dialogues and Debates from Late Antiquity to Late Byzantium offers the first overall discussion of the literary and philosophical dialogue tradition in Greek from imperial Rome to the end of the Byzantine empire and beyond. Sixteen case studies combine theoretical approaches with in-depth analysis and include comparisons with the neighbouring Syriac, Georgian, Armenian and Latin traditions. Following an introduction and a discussion of Plutarch...

From NY Times: All images of public-domain artworks in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s collection — about 375,000 — are now free for anyone to use however they may please.The museum announced on Tuesday that it had changed its open access policy to allow free, unrestricted use of any images of artworks in the public domain, using the license designation Creative Commons Zero, known as CC0. Click here to access the collection

  The so-called 'Nestorian' Church (officially known as the Apostolic Assyrian Church of the East, with its See in Baghdad) was one of the most significant Christian communities to develop east of the Roman Empire. In its heyday the Church had 8 million adherents and stretched from the Mediterranean to China. Christoph Baumer is one of the very few Westerners to have visited many of the most important Assyrian sites and has written the only comprehensive history of the Church, which now fights for survival in its country of origin, Iraq, and is almost forgotten in the West. He narrates its rich and colorful trajectory, from its apostolic beginnings to the present day, and discusses the Church's theology, christology, and uniquely vigorous spirituality. He analyzes the Church's turbulent relationship with other Christian chuches and its dialogue with neighboring world religions such as Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, Islam, Buddhism, and Taoism. Richly illustrated with...

The billon (roughly 25% percent silver) coin was the first appearance of VLPP type. Circa 313 A.D., Trier.

Often simply called the Holy Mountain, Mount Athos was the most famous center of Byzantine monasticism and remains the spiritual heart of the Orthodox Church today. This volume presents the Lives of Euthymios the Younger, Athanasios of Athos, Maximos the Hutburner, Niphon of Athos, and Philotheos. These five holy men lived on Mount Athos at different times from its early years as a monastic locale in the ninth century to the last decades of the Byzantine period in the early fifteenth century. All five were celebrated for asceticism, clairvoyance, and, in most cases, the ability to perform miracles; Euthymios and Athanasios were also famed as founders of monasteries. Holy Men of Mount Athos illuminates both the history and the varieties of monastic practice on Athos, individually by hermits as well as communally in large monasteries. The Lives also demonstrate the diversity of hagiographic composition and provide important glimpses of Byzantine social and political history.All t...