Byzantium : the surprising life of a medieval empire
Byzantium was one of the greatest civilisations the world has ever seen. Judith Herrin tells its extraordinary story afresh, exploring aspects familiar and unfamiliar, from the glorious church of Hagia Sophia to the secret of Greek Fire, from iconoclasm to eunuchs, from the historian Anna Komnene to the humble fork
History
1 online resource (xxiii, 391 pages, 24 unnumbered pages of plates) : illustrations (some color), maps
9780141911366, 9781400832736, 0141911360, 140083273X
688614721
List of illustrations
List of maps
Introduction : a different history of Byzantium
I. FOUNDATIONS OF BYZANTIUM
1. The city of Constantine
2. Constantinople, the largest city in Christendom
3. The East Roman Empire
4. Greek Orthodoxy
5. The church of Hagia Sophia
6. The Ravenna Mosaics
7. Roman law
II. THE TRANSITION FROM ANCIENT TO MEDIEVAL
8. The bulwark against Islam
9. Icons, a new Christian art form
10. Iconoclasm and icon veneration
11. A literate and articulate society
12. Saints Cyril and Methodios, 'apostles to the Slavs'
III. BYZANTIUM BECOMES A MEDIEVAL STATE
13. Greek fire
14. The Byzantine economy
15. Eunuchs
16. The imperial court
17. Imperial children, 'born in the purple'
18. Mount Athos
19. Venice and the fork
20. Basil II, 'the bulgar-slayer'
21. Eleventh-century crisis
22. Anna Komnene
23. A cosmopolitan society
IV. VARIETIES OF BYZANTIUM
24. The fulcrum of the crusades
25. The towers of Trebizond, Arta, Nicaea and Thessanlonike
26. Rebels and patrons
27. 'Better the Turkish turban than the Papal tiara'
28. The siege of 1453
Conclusion : the greatness and legacy of Byzantium
Further reading
List of emperors named in the text
Chronology
Maps
Acknowledgments
Index
Originally published: London: Allen Lane, 2007