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The Concept of the Elect Nation in Byzantium
In The Concept of the Elect Nation in Byzantium, Shay Eshel shows how the Old Testament model of the ancient Israelites was a prominent factor in the evolution of Roman-Byzantine national awareness between the 7th and 13th centuries. The Byzantines' interpretation of the 7th century epic events as manifestations of God's wrath enabled them to incorporate the events into a paradigm which they now embraced: the Old Testament paradigm of the Israelite Elect Nation's complex relationship with God, a cyclic relation of sin, wrath, punishment, repentance and salvation. The Elect Nation concept enabled the Byzantines to express the shift in their collective identity toward a shrunken, yet more clearly defined, national awareness.
Inventing Slavonic
In this meticulously researched study, Mirela Ivanova offers a new critical history of the invention of the Slavonic alphabet. Showing how the alphabet was not invented once, but rather continually contested and redefined in the century following its creation, Ivanova challenges the prevalent nationalist historiography that has built up around it.
The Collapse of the Eastern Mediterranean
As a 'Medieval Warm Period' prevailed in Western Europe during the tenth and eleventh centuries, the eastern Mediterranean region, from the Nile to the Oxus, was suffering from a series of climatic disasters which led to the decline of some of the most important civilizations and cultural centres of the time. This provocative study argues that many well-documented but apparently disparate events - such as recurrent drought and famine in Egypt, mass migrations in the steppes of central Asia, and the decline in population in urban centres such as Baghdad and Constantinople - are connected and should be understood within the broad context of climate change. Drawing on a wealth of textual and archaeological evidence, Ronnie Ellenblum explores the impact of climatic and ecological change across the eastern Mediterranean in this period, to offer a new perspective on why this was a turning point in the history of the Islamic world.
Windows into the Medieval Mediterranean
This book reveals the medieval Mediterranean region as a richly nuanced space of places and peoples connected by a body of water, but far from unified—and seeks to challenge what we think we know about the medieval Mediterranean and the world it influenced. Reflective of the diversity of the Mediterranean region, the contributors are an international body of scholars that bring together topics that are seemingly disparate but are in fact in a vibrant conversation with one another. The volume seeks to shed new light and perspectives on familiar topics. Each chapter begins with secondary commentary for context, and is followed by primary sources comprised of images and texts that invite care...
Religious Rites of War beyond the Medieval West
This is Volume One of a two-volume collection that brings together contributions from cultural and military history to offer an examination of religious rites employed in connection with warfare as well as their transformative and power- and identity-building potential across political communities of medieval Northern, Central, and Eastern Europe. Covering the period ca. 900 and 1500, the work takes theoretical, textual and practical approaches to the research on religious warfare, and investigates the connections between, and significance and function of crucial war rituals such as pre-, intra- and postbellum rites, as well as various activities surrounding the military life of individuals, polities, and corporates. Contributors are Robert Antonín, Robert Bubczyk, Dariusz Dąbrowski, Jesse Harrington, Carsten Selch Jensen, Sini Kangas, Radosław Kotecki, Gregory Leighton, Kyle C. Lincoln, Jacek Maciejewski, Yulia Mikhailova, Max Naderer, László Veszprémy, and Dušan Zupka.
The Chronographia of George the Synkellos and Theophanes
The ninth-century Chronographia of George the Synkellos and Theophanes is the most influential historical text ever written in medieval Constantinople. Yet modern historians have never explained its popularity and power. This interdisciplinary study draws on new manuscript evidence to finally animate the Chronographia’s promise to show attentive readers the present meaning of the past. Begun by one of the Roman emperor’s most trusted and powerful officials in order to justify a failed revolt, the project became a shockingly ambitious re-writing of time itself—a synthesis of contemporary history, philosophy, and religious practice into a politicized retelling of the human story. Even through radical upheavals of the Byzantine political landscape, the Chronographia’s unique historical vision again and again compelled new readers to chase after the elusive Ends of Time.
1 Maccabees
A new translation and commentary on I Maccabees that offers a fresh interpretation of the author's values and purpose First Maccabees, composed in the second century BCE, chronicles four decades of clashes between Hellenistic Syria and Judea, from Antiochus Epiphanes's ascent to the throne in 175 BCE to the Hasmoneans' establishment of an independent Judean state, ruled by Simon and his sons. In this volume, Daniel R. Schwartz provides a new translation of the Greek text and analyzes its historical significance. In dialogue with contemporary scholarship, the introduction surveys the work's themes, sources, and transmission, while the commentary addresses textual details and issues of historical reconstruction, often devoting special attention to the lost Hebrew original and its associations. Schwartz demonstrates that 1 Maccabees, despite its Hebraic biblical style and its survival within the Christian canon, deviates from biblical and Judaic works by marginalizing God, evincing scorn for martyrs, and ascribing to human power and valor crucial historical roles. This all fits its mandate: justification of the Hasmonean dynasty, especially the Simonides.
Empire and Legal Thought
Together, the chapters in Empire and Legal Thought make the case for seeing the history of international legal thought and empires against the background of broad geopolitical, diplomatic, administrative, intellectual, religious, and commercial changes over thousands of years.
The Byzantine Warrior Hero
Chrysovalantis Kyriacou examines how memories of the pre-Christian past, Christian militarism, power struggles, and ethnoreligious encounters have left their long-term imprint on Cypriot culture. One of the most impressive examples of this phenomenon is the preservation and transformative adaptation of Byzantine heroic themes, motifs, and symbols in Cypriot folk songs. By combining a variety of written sources and archaeological material in his interdisciplinary examination, the author reconstructs the image of the Byzantine warrior hero in the songs, recovering the mentalities of overshadowed social protagonists and stressing the role of subaltern communities as active agents in the shaping of history.
Mobility and Migration in Byzantium: A Sourcebook
Mobility and migration were not uncommon in Byzantium, as is true for all societies. Yet, scholarship is only beginning to pay attention to these phenomena. This book presents in English translation a wide array of relevant source texts from ca. 650 to ca. 1450 originally written in medieval Greek: from administrative records, saints’ lives and letters by churchmen to ego-documents by ambassadors and historical narratives by court historians. Each source text is accompanied by a detailed introduction, commentary and further bibliography, thus making the book accessible to both scholars and students and laying the groundwork for future research on the internal dynamics of Byzantine society.
