Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
PowerBlog Redux: How the Byzantines saved Europe
PowerBlog Redux: How the Byzantines saved Europe
Apr 27, 2025 2:53 AM

A really interesting chat about the Roman Empire on this week’s podcast with Samuel Gregg and Larry Reed (register for Reed’s talk today here). Gregg helped expand the scope of the discussion by noting that the Roman Empire actually lasted for more than 1,000 years — in the East. In Constantinople, they understood themselves as Ρωμαίοι, Romans.

Image: The Hagia Sophia; mons

[Originally published August 2009]

The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Studies. Edited by Elizabeth Jeffreys, John Haldon, Robin Cormack. Oxford University Press (2008)

Byzantium: The Surprising Life of a Medieval Empire by Judith Herrin. Princeton University Press (2008)

Ask the average college student to identify the 1,100 year old empire that was, at various points in its history, the mercial, artistic and ecclesiastical center of Europe and, indeed, was responsible for the very survival and flourishing of what we know today as Europe and you’re not likely to get the correct answer: Byzantium.

The reasons for this are manifold but not least is that as Western Europe came into its own in the later Middle Ages and Renaissance, Byzantium gradually succumbed piecemeal to the constant conquering pressure of Ottomans and Arabs. When Constantinople finally fell in 1453 (two years after the birth of the Genoese Christopher Columbus), Europe, now cut off from many land routes to Asian trade, was already looking West and South in anticipation of the age of exploration and colonization. Byzantium, and the Christian East, would fall under Muslim domination and dhimmitude for centuries and its history would fade away before the disinterest, or ignorance, of the West.

This “condemnation to oblivion” as the editors of The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Studies, describe it, is “no longer quite so true as it once was.” New exhibitions of Byzantine art in Europe and America have been hugely successful in recent years and travel to cities with Byzantine landmarks and archeological sites in Greece, Turkey and the Balkans is easier than ever. Academic centers throughout western Europe and the United States host Byzantine Studies departments, scholarly journals proliferate, and a new generation of scholars has elevated the field from what once was a narrow specialty.

The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Studies is a useful, one volume reference work that would well serve both the scholar and general reader with an interest in Byzantine culture. The editors have prefaced the volume with a detailed assessment of the Discipline, the state of scholarly learning on everything from art history to weights and measures. Other sections examine Landscape, Land Use, and the Environment; Institutions and Relationships (including the economy); and The World Around Byzantium. Each of the nearly two dozen subheadings include concise chapters with references and suggestions for further readings.

For those interested in the economic life of Byzantium, the Handbook offers an account in Towns and Cities that describes mercial and industrial activity, and charts a decline in these areas during periodic invasions by various waves of Slav, Avar, Persian and Ottoman peoples, or bouts of the plague. Where political and military fortunes turned favorable, as in the 8th and 9th centuries, economic life enjoyed a parallel revival. Regional cities became economic centers, places like Thessalonike, Thebes (silk textiles) and Corinth, where glass, pottery, metals and textiles were produced. In his chapter on the Economy, Alan Harvey relates how Constantinople, in the 12th Century, “was clearly a bustling city with a wide range of skilled craftsmen, merchants, artisans, petty traders. There was also a transient population of various nationalities, in addition to the more settled presence of Italian merchants.”

And, because it was a Christian empire, the Handbook has a lot to say about the Byzantine Church, its relations with the Empire, and its developing rivalry with Rome, especially as the papal reform movement took hold in the 11th century. The Emperor and Court chapter in the Handbook should also go some way toward a better understanding of “late ancient state formation,” a subject the editors say has received “remarkably little attention” by historians and political theorists.

Writing in the Handbook’s summary chapter, Cyril Mango catalogs the achievements of Byzantium but also adds that historians have not “credited [the empire] with any advance in science, philosophy, political theory, or having produced a great literature.” Maybe the Byzantines had other ambitions. James Howard-Johnston asserts that the “ultimate rationale” of Byzantium’s existence was its “Christian imperial mission.”

That conviction, widely shared in a thoroughly Orthodox society, was the shaping influence on its foreign policy. It provides the basic, underlying reason for Byzantium’s tenacious longetivity, for its stubborn resistance in the opening confrontation with Islam, and, even more extraordinary, for the resilience shown in the last three and half centuries of decline.

For the general reader, perhaps a better place to begin to illuminate the “black hole” of Byzantine history is Judith Herrin’s fine book, Byzantium: The Surprising Life of a Medieval Empire. A senior research fellow in Byzantine Studies at King’s College London, Herrin sets out to trace the period’s “most significant high points as clearly pellingly as I can; to reveal the structures and mentalities which sustained it.” Her aim is to help the reader understand “how the modern western world, which developed from Europe, could not have existed had it not been shielded and inspired by what happened further to the east in Byzantium. The Muslim world is also an important element of this history, as is the love-hate relationship between Christendom and Islam.”

Byzantium’s ability to conquer, Herrin writes, and “above all, to defend itself and its magnificent capital was to shield the northwestern world of the Mediterranean during the chaotic but creative period that followed the collapse of the Roman Empire in the West. Without Byzantium there would have been no Europe.”

Her organizational scheme begins with Foundations in Byzantium, which looks at the cultural roots in the East Roman Empire (indeed, citizens down to the end routinely referred to themselves as Romans or Orthodox Christians, never Byzantines). This section also includes discussions of Greek Orthodoxy, religious architecture and art (including Hagia Sophia and Ravenna) and Roman Law. The other main sections of Herrin’s book examine the transition to and establishment of a Medieval period, when the great theological battle with iconoclasts was waged and the missionary work to the Slavic peoples by Sts. Cyril and Methodius was plished. She ends with the tragic sacking and desecration of Constantinople and its churches by Latin crusaders in 1204, the last desperate attempts by Constantinople to enlist the aid of Rome and western nobles as the Ottomans slowly tightened the noose around the empire, and the fall of the Queen City in 1453.

Herrin has a particular gift for the personal anecdote and psychological insight, as when she is writing about court intrigues, the institution of being “born in the purple,” and Byzantine women, including the remarkable 12th century princess Anna Komnene. Her Alexiad, an account of the reign of her father the emperor Alexios I posed in classical Attic Greek, was a significant work of history. “No other medieval woman, East or West, had the vision, confidence and capacity to realize and equally ambitious project,” Herrin writes.

Readers interested in the soundness of money — a problem that has been around as long as there has been money, it seems — will take note of the lasting value that the Byzantine gold coin, known as the “bezant” in the West, famously retained among traders for centuries. This reputation for value remained even after a devaluation in the 11th century. In the 6th century, a Byzantine merchant noted that “there is another mark of power among the Romans, which God has given them, I mean that every nation conducts merce with their nomisma [gold coin], which is acceptable in every place from one end of the earth to the other … In no other nations does such a thing exist.”

As she concludes, Herrin reveals that she hoped to show that “far from being passive, Byzantium was active, surprising and creative, as it reworked its prized traditions and heritage. It bequeathed to the world an imperial system of government built upon a trained, civilian administration and tax system; a legal structure based on Roman law; a unique curriculum of secular education that preserved much of the classical, pagan learning; orthodox theology, artistic expression and spiritual traditions enshrined in the Greek Church; and coronation and court rituals that had many imitators.”

She succeeds and, in doing so, sheds light on an amazing European culture that for too long in the West has been cast into the shadowy recesses of history.

This review will appear in the next issue of Religion & Liberty.

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
Anti-Catholicism As The Driving Force Behind The Mexican-American War
John C. Pinheiro, Professor of History and Chair Director of Catholic Studies at Aquinas College in Grand Rapids, Mich. and Acton Lecture Series lecturer, has written a new book, recently reviewed at First Things. Missionaries of Republicanism: A Religious History of the Mexican-American Warargues that virulent anti-Catholicism was the “defining attitude undergirding the early Republic and antebellum years.” Alan Cornett of First Things calls Pinheiro’s book “fresh” and “convincing.” Pinheiro asks his reader to recall that Catholics were seen as...
The Importance of Freedom of the Church
The first kind of religious freedom to appear in the Western world was “freedom of the church.” Although that freedom has been all but ignored by the Courts in the past few decades, its place in American jurisprudence is once again being recognized. Notre Dame law professor Richard Garnett explains how we should think about and defend the liberty of religious institutions: To embrace this idea as still-relevant is to claim that religious institutions have a distinctive place in our...
Wilhelm Röpke: An Economist for Our Time
Wilhelm Röpke is one of the most important 20th century economists that almost no Americans know anything about. Fortunately, that may soon change asRöpke’s classicworkon economics,A Humane Economy,is being republished by ISI Books with an introduction by Samuel Gregg,director of research at the Acton Institute. Intercollegiate Review has posted an excerpt from Gregg’s introduction: The current world crisis could never have grown to such proportions, nor proved as stubborn, if it had not been for the many forces at work...
U.S. Supreme Court Reverses Autocam Ruling
A few weeks ago, Hobby Lobby made waves when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the arts and crafts chain in its lawsuit against the Health and Human Services Contraception Mandate. West Michigan manufacturer, Autocam, has been engaged in a similar legal fight. John Kennedy, owner of Autocam, stated that his and his family’s Roman Catholic faith “is integral to Autocam’s corporate culture” and the Affordable Care Act’s requirement to provide contraceptives andabortifacients was a violation of their...
Social Justice: ‘Checking on my Privilege’
Peter Johnson, External Relations Officer at Acton, recently wrote an article for the Institute for Religion and Democracy’s series mentaries on social justice. This series explains what social justice is and examines what it means for Christians in light of the Gospel and natural law. Acton’s Dylan Pahman wrote the first article in this series by defining social justice. Johnson’s piece, Checking On My Privilege (And, Yes, It’s Still There) is the second in the series: The suggestion that the...
Get a Free Rental of ‘The Economy of Wisdom’
For the Life of the World: Letters to the Exilesisa 7-part series from the Acton Institute that seeks to examine the bigger picture of Christianity’s role in culture, society, and the world. Each Monday until August 18 The Gospel Coalition (TGC) ishighlighting one episode and sharing an exclusive codefor for a free 72-hour rental of the full episode. Here’s the trailer for episode 5,The Economy of Wisdom. Visit TGC to get the code for the free rental (you have to...
Defining Social Justice
What is social justice? How should Christians advocate an effectual social justice rooted in Gospel and natural law? The Institute for Religion and Democracy is hosting a blog symposium in which millennial Christians examine those and other questions related to social justice. In their first entry, Acton’s Dylan Pahman attempts to define social justice: The term social justice, for many Christians today, e to be synonymous with correcting economic inequalities (usually through the apparatus of the state) out of solidarity...
Human Trafficking To Blame For Surge Of Children At U.S. Border, Says Bishop
Bishop Romulo Emiliani Sanchez says the lies and lures of human traffickers are the root cause of the surge of illegal immigrant children at the U.S. southern border. Emiliani, an auxiliary of the Catholic Diocese of San Pedro Sula in Honduras, decried the tactics of organized crime and human traffickers for tricking parents and children into thinking that a warm e and easier life awaits them in the U.S. It is unfortunate that the illusion and mirage that the U.S....
Why It’s Time to Defend the Religious Freedom Restoration Act
Before I try to convince you that Katha Pollitt is dangerously wrong, let me attempt to explain why her opinion is significant. Pollitt was educated at Harvard and the Columbia School of the Arts and has taught at Princeton. She has won a National Magazine Award for Columns and Commentary, an NEA grant, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a National Book Critics Circle Award. She is, in other words, the kind of politically progressive pundit whose opinions, when originally expressed, are...
Revising American History For Our Best And Brightest Students
What do these things have mon: Gloria Steinem, Yiddish theater, Gospel of Wealth, U.S. Fish Commission, the cult of domesticity and smallpox? They are all highlights of American history for Advanced Placement (AP) high school students. AP classes are typically for college-bound students, and considered to be “tougher” classes. The College Board administers AP classes in high schools, and is releasing its American history framework effective this fall. Here are some things students won’t see: the Founding Fathers, Abraham Lincoln...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved