BYZANTINE EMPIRE: HEIR TO ROME

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BYZANTINE EMPIRE HEIR TO ROME

• P.O.I. Chapter 11
• Bentley Chapter 13

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Questions to consider

• Why was the Byzantine Empire the heir to Rome?
• Who was Justinian and what were his
  accomplishments?
• What events led to the division between east and
  west?
• How did the Orthodox Church differ from Roman
  Catholicism and why?

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Byzantine Empire

• Rome fell in 476 Byzantium 1453
• Constantinople Constantines capital since 330
• Very Greek, advanced, cosmopolitan, and proud.
• Became the true keeper of classical learning and
  texts
• Heavily influenced Eastern Europe and Russia

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Justinian (527)

• Most accomplished Byzantine Emperor
• Very close to wife Theodora (scandalous)
• Chief goal was restoration of Roman glory

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Theodora

• Actress - Prostitute?
• Early Womens Liberation Proponent?
• Est. laws against forced prostitution
• Est. homes for prostitutes
• Est. laws giving women rights in divorce cases
• Est. death penalty in rape cases

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Justinian (527)

• 3 Goals
• Expansion Belisarius briefly reconquered North
  Africa and Italy
• Justinians Code Compilation of 400 years of
  Roman Law
• The Code 5000 Roman Laws
• The Digest Quotes from the greatest legal
  scholars
• The Institutes Textbook for law students
• The Novellae (New Laws) after 534
• The law code was used for the next 900 years

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Justinian (527)

• 3 Goals
• 3. Restore the Capital
• Fortified city walls and moats
• Hagia Sophia rebuilt (Holy Wisdom)
• Built baths, aqueducts, law courts, schools, and
  hospitals
• Built Hippodrome (chariot race track that seats
  60,000)

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Hagia Sophia
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Eastern Orthodox Church

• Geography, culture, and government began to
  separate Rome and Constantinople
• The west was led by the Pope, but in the east by
  the emperor and patriarchs.
• The east remained more mystical and nationalistic

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Eastern Orthodox Church

• Iconoclastic Controversy
• 730 Emperor Leo III forbids the use of icons as
  heresy
• The people rebel and Rome sides with them further
  alienating them

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Icons
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Eastern Orthodox Church

• Schism
• 1054 the east and west split over the nature of
  the trinity and each church excommunicates the
  leader of the other
• The Crusades
• Crusader armies pillaged Constantinople in 1204
  even though it was a Byzantine emperor who asked
  for help in the first place

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Byzantines on Defense

• Avars, Slavs, and Bulgars frequently raided from
  the north.
• Sassanid Persians attacked from the east.
• Muslims proved the most formidable by reducing
  Byzantium to a small outpost surrounding
  Constantinople.
• It was governed along military lines with
  provinces called themes.
• In 1453 the Ottoman Turks finally took the city.

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Influence

• Crusaders took back classical learning to western
  Europe which would eventually spark the
  Renaissance.
• Cyril and Methodius as missionaries to the Slavs
  convert an entire people and create a written
  language (Cyrillic)
• Russia would also convert and would become the
  stepchild of the Byzantine World

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