The World of Late Antiquity

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The World of Late Antiquity

• Byzantium The New Rome

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Walls of Constantinople Built by Theodosius II
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Since everything was going according to his
wishes, and he had by wars and treaties settled
his relations with the barbarians, Constantine
decided to found a city having the same name as
himself and the same rank as Rome.Sozomen,
Ecclesiastical History, 2.3
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The Western Empire

• Decline and Transformation

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When Rome was sacked in 410, three days of
public mourning were declared at Constantinople.
The eastern emperor, Theodosius II, did little
else to help the western capital but his
ministers soon took good care to surround
Constantinople with great walls. Throughout the
Middle Ages, the Theodosian Wall, which still
towers above the outskirts of modern Istanbul,
summed up the impregnable position of
Constantinople as the surviving capital of the
Roman empire. It was not breached by an enemy
until 1453.Peter Brown, The World of Late
Antiquity
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The Western Empire Weakening of Secular Authority

• Division of Empire between Constantines Three
  Sons (337 CE)
• Invaders Alamanni, Visigoths, Vandals, Huns
• Increasing Importance of Bishop of Rome
• Altar of Victory Removed from Senate House (382
  CE)
• Official Division of Eastern and Western
  Provinces upon the Death of Theodosius I the
  Great (395 CE)

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Cataclysm in the West

• Visigoths Capture Rome (410 CE)
• Attila and the Huns terrorize Italy (451-452 CE)
• Deposition of the Last Legitimate Roman Emperor
  Romulus Augustulus
• Germanic Chieftain Odovacer Becomes King of Italy
  (476 CE)

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The Eastern Empire

• The Rise of the Church State

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Empress Ariadne, Wife of Anastasius. Ca. 500 CE
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It was not enough that the empire of
Constantinople should be a Greek empire it had
also to embark on the delicate quest for an
identity as an eastern empire in the true sense.
The cultural and theological storms that bulk so
large in the ecclesiastical history of the late
fifth and sixth centuries were part of the
attempt of the cosmopolitan society of the
eastern empire to find its balance.Peter
Brown, The World of Late Antiquity
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Barbarian Invasions Contrast Between East and
West

• Eastern Empire Relatively Unscathed by Barbarian
  Onslaughts
• Theodosius IIs Great Defensive Wall (after 410
  CE)
• Strong Natural Defensive Position of
  Constantinople (Byzantium)

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Constantinople

• Alliance of Emperor and Church
• The Rise of Greek Orthodoxy
• The Patriarch of Constantinople
• Byzantine Emperors and Top-Heavy Bureaucracies
• The Art of Byzantine Diplomacy (masterly use of
  power, not force)

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Reliquary Casket of Pepin of Aquitaine
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Religious Disputes and Doctrinal Heresies

• Monophysites, Hesychasts, Iconodules,
  Iconoclasts, Stylites
• Council at Chalcedon (451 CE) and the Patriarch
  of Constantinople
• Great Schism (1054 CE) Formal Separation of the
  Eastern and Western Christain Churches (Roman
  Catholicism and Greek Orthodoxy)

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Reconquista Justinian I (527-565 CE)

• Belisarius in the West (530s)
• Nika Riot and the Autocracy (532)
• Persian Challenge from 540 Khusro I Anoshirwan
• Diplomatic sleights of hand
• Military efficiency and research (Greek fire)
• Justinianic Law Code Transmitter of Roman Law
• The Religious Emperor Hagia Sophia

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The emperor gained a position that he was to
hold throughout Byzantine and early Russian
history he was the keystone of the great vault
of the peace of the Church.Peter Brown, The
World of Late Antiquity
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The New Leaders Of the Byzantine
Town Bishop/Governors
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After Justinian The Greek Empire

• Greek becomes the spoken and official language of
  the Empire (Rhomaioi)
• Byzantium as an island of civilization in a sea
  of barbarism (transmitter of the classical
  literatures of Greece and Rome)
• Apostles to the Slavs Constantine-Cyril and
  Methodius (9th century CE). Christianizing Russia
  (Eastern Orthodox Church, Russian alphabet,
  CzarCaesar cf. German Kaiser
• Byzantium as the Final Irony The Triumph of
  Hellenism and Christianity

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A Study in Contrasts East and WestHere we
have a parting of the ways western Europe in the
Middle Ages was dominated by the idea of the
Church Militant Byzantium, a stable and united
empire beneath its apparent disagreements, long
skilled in the politics of consensus, stuck to
the grand ideal of the peace of the
Church.Peter Brown, The World of Late
Antiquity
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A Golden and Bejeweled Gospel, Ca. 600 CE