Transcript Document
The Commonwealth of Byzantium
Tracy Rosselle, M.A.T.
Tampa Bay Technical High School
The paradox of east and west
You’ll recall that Byzantium – the eastern portion of the Roman Empire headquartered in Constantinople – inherited the richness of late Roman society and continued on as an empire long after the western half of the Roman Empire fell into complete disarray in the 5th century.
But we’ll see that despite the disparity in these regions by 600, the two sides of Christian Europe would follow much different historical trajectories over the next six centuries and beyond: the East would weaken and eventually fall, in 1453, to Muslims while the West would one day rise to dominate the world.
The Byzantine Empire
Byzantine emperors established Christianity as their official religion, and the realm inherited Rome’s imperial law intact … and this made for an easy transition to all-powerful Christian monarchy.
Prior to 600, the emperor
Justinian
(r. 527-565): set up a panel of legal experts to sift through centuries of Roman law to establish a single, uniform code – the
Justinian Code
– for regulating Byzantium’s increasingly complex society. This code laid the foundation for modern European legal systems.
embarked on a massive public building program, constructing and repairing fortifications and erecting numerous churches, including the rebuilding of the
Hagia Sophia
world.
(HAY-ee-uh soh-FEE-uh), an enormous cathedral hailed as the most glorious in the Christian
The Church of the Holy Wisdom The Hagia Sophia (“Holy Wisdom”) still stands today, but as a mosque (the Turks converted it in the 15th century). The designers may have been influenced by the dome-and-arch architecture of the Sassanid Persians.
The Byzantine Empire
Lost territories
Although Justinian re-conquered North Africa, most of Italy and parts of Spain, by the 7th century Byzantine power was being sapped with the loss of sizable provinces to rival Arab armies in Egypt, Syria and Tunisia.
It never regained the lost lands, though it did recover militarily to resist further Muslim encroachments by using the
theme system
imperial provinces placed under jurisdiction of an appointed general in charge of military and civil bureaucracy.
When Crusaders from western Europe helped re-establish Christian principalities in the 11th century, the Byzantines viewed them almost as problematic as the Muslims (who eventually toppled the Byzantine Empire with the capture of Constantinople in 1453).
The Byzantine Empire
A study in contrasts
The Byzantine Empire vacillated between extremes: During Justinian’s reign and more than a hundred years following his death, Constantinople was hit repeatedly with instances of
bubonic plague
(probably brought from India on ships infested with rats), which greatly reduced the Byzantine population.
Emperors became absolute rulers of a highly centralized state, administered by a large and complex bureaucracy (
byzantine
came to mean unnecessarily convoluted), at the center of which was the court, where high officials kissed the hands and feet of the regally dressed emperor.
The Byzantine Empire
A study in contrasts (cont.)
Bezant Constantinople was a major center of crafts and industry, where value was added to imported commodities and re-exported elsewhere.
Beneath the glitter of the royal court and the grandiosity of the public buildings of Constantinople, some visitors noticed Byzantium’s slow deterioration: the squalid, crime-ridden underbelly of the city and its poor inhabitants living in darkness.
Large wealth was generated by strictly controlling trade and levying customs duties on merchandise passing through the centrally located empire, where the gold
bezant
became the standard coin used in the Mediterranean basin from the 6th to the 12th centuries.
The Byzantine Empire
Religious disputes with the West
The emperor was considered a friend and imitator of Christ, and as the head of the Church appointed the
patriarch
(or leading bishop of the East).
In 1054, differences between Christianity in the West and East reached a breaking point, with the pope in Rome and patriarch in Constantinople excommunicating each other resulting
schism
produced the Roman Catholic Church in the West and the Eastern Orthodox Church in the East .
Differences stemmed from various religious doctrine (e.g., whether priests should be allowed to marry, the use of local languages in church, the nature of God [as a trinity, whether the Spirit proceeds from the Father alone or from Father and Son]), especially the use of icons, or religious images, used by Eastern Christians to aid their devotions.
Christianity splits
An 11th-century comparison
Roman Catholic Services are conducted in Latin.
The pope has authority over all other bishops.
The pope claims authority over all kings and emperors.
Priests may not marry.
Divorce is not permitted.
Similarities
They base their faith on the gospel of Jesus and the Bible.
They use sacraments such as baptism.
Their religious leaders are priests and bishops.
They seek to convert people.
Eastern Orthodox Services are conducted in Greek or local languages.
The patriarch and other bishops head the Church as a group.
The emperor claims authority over the patriarch and other bishops of the empire.
Priests may be married.
Divorce is allowed under certain conditions.
The Byzantine Empire
Cultural developments
Most subjects spoke Greek, but it was not forced on people.
Social mobility was rare but possible through bureaucracy, army, trade or service to the Church.
Society was strongest when free peasants owned small plots of land (distributed to them for military service), but over time this class lost ground to owners of increasingly large estates.
Brothers Cyril and Methodius led a successful mission to the Slavs of Moravia (part of modern-day Czech Republic) preached in the local language, and followers perfected a writing system called
Cyrillic
(sih-RIL-ik) that came to be used by Slavic Christians adhering to the Orthodox rite.
The Byzantine Empire
The battle for Slav allegiance
The careers of Cyril and Methodius gave birth to the competition between Greek and Latin Christianity for the allegiance of the Slavs.
Evidence of the east-west tension in the Christian realm of this region can be seen in languages: the Cyrillic alphabet remains in use today among Russians and other Slavic peoples while the Roman alphabet is used by Poles, Czechs and Croatians.
The modern Russian alphabet is a variant of the Cyrillic alphabet.
Byzantium and Russia
In the mid-ninth century north of Bulgaria, a Slavic people known as Russians organized principalities along thriving trade centers between Scandinavia and Byzantium.
Most notable was Kiev , which emerged as the most wealthy and powerful center from the 10th to the 13th century.
Kiev ● Byzantine Empire
Byzantium and Russia
Prince Vladimir of Kiev converts
Byzantine influences flowed rapidly into Russia after Prince Vladimir of Kiev converted to Orthodox Christianity around 989 CE and ordered his subjects to follow suit.
Byzantine teachers traveled north to establish schools Cyrillic writing and literacy spread, as did other cultural influences (e.g., religious images became main form of Russian art; Russian churches with onion domes were architects’ attempts to copy the domed structures of Constantinople using wood).
Byzantium and Russia From Rome to Russia, and beyond
Russians eventually claimed to inherit the imperial mantle of Byzantium, claiming in the 16th century Moscow had become the world’s third Rome (after the original fell in 476 and Constantinople, the so-called second Rome, fell in 1453).
Russian Orthodox missionaries thereafter took their faith to lands as distant as Siberia, Alaska and even California!
Sources
The Earth and Its Peoples: A Global History
(Bulliet et al.)