Or movie

From what it looks like, Michael, John V, VIII and Thomas are often portrayed as redheads. Do we have any insight on the appearance of some of the members of their family?

I really got interested in the life and theology centered around Pope Martin I, the Lateran Council of 649, being abducted by Constans II, and his fight against monotheletism. However, outside of several articles that I read, they are not going into the depth I prefer, and they repeat the same basic facts I'm familiar with. Is there a good book or article recommendations, primary or secondary in English, that I can explore more of this niche topic around this time period?

Thanks.

What’s a lesser known fact concerning Byzantium that you think deserves more attention?For me it‘s the circumstance that the fall of Constantinople ( as sad as it is ) greatly sped up the age of discovery since the Ottomans were famously tough to negotiate with leading the rest of Christian Europe to increase their efforts in finding other routes to India.

I've heard claims that Iranian Composite arrows could go through a Roman soldiers' shield and still retain enough power to pierce his Chainmail and kill the soldier, but I feel this is an exaggeration. Does anyone know if this was the case?

Don't get me wrong, but the coins of Byzantium, especially during the late eras (1100-1453) look rough and low on detail, as if they were bootlegged. When you take a look at a coin of Constantine I for example, it looks crisp. I have heard somewhere that people in the middle ages refused to draw things as they were as to not upset god? Am I correct? The coins look particularly off during the age of Komnenoi. I know the empire was in rough shape, but they still managed to recover and turn it into a regional power, so it would make sense that their coins would have a fitting look to them.. As for the later periods, it is perfectly understandable why the coins looked as they were.

Hello and good morning!

As I have been listening and searching some stuff about Assyrians, I found out that many aspects of their governance were inherited - many ages later - by Persians and Byzantines.

For example, it's been suggested that they were among the first to implement a road system or mass relocation of inhabitants or paid tributes and so on.

So my question is this. What's the importance of Assyrians or their legacy overall in Byzantine history? Could one suggest that that even exists and if so why?

As we all know, Emperor Anastasius II was unjustly deposed by his troops and replaced by a tax collector named Theodosius because he priortized defending Constantinople from the potential attack by the Umayyad Caliphate over paying them. At least, that is how I see it. So you all can take it with a grain of salt.

But that is not the point here. The point is how much different his reign will be from that of Emperor Leo III? Obviously, the Second Siege of Constantinople by the Arabs will happened no matter what, especially if Leo didn't betray the Imperator in Constantinople. After all, it was Anastasius who appointed Leo to the position of the Strategos of Thema of Anatolics. But after he successfully endured the siege, what's next for him?

How will he conducted his foreign policy? What will be his policies regarding the Jews, the Montanists and the Paulicians in the Empire? Will he caused the controversy that is the Iconoclasm? What kind of civil reforms will he passed? Will he attempted to reconcile with the Papacy in Rome? And who will be his Caesar, aka the Junior Imperator?

For instance there's two times (to my knowledge) where it splits from the Eastern Roman identity

1. When West Rome fell this would make it so the classification Eastern was obsolete

Or 2. After Heraclitus hellenized the empire

An 'actress' married to an heir. Lets just hope we dont get Emporer Hank!

It certainly has for me, in a number of different ways:

• East Roman history made me realise that the Romans lack of a succession system was a feature, not a bug, of the empire. Something like the Crisis of the Third Century was probably bound to happen.

• I think it's led to me understanding the role of the emperor better and the power the people had in relation to him. The role of the Basileus was seen as a public office and the emperor could easily be pushed aside by the army/senate if there was enough support in the capital. The same is true for the Principate system.

• The fact that the East Romans were able to justify their claim to the Roman identity due to Constantinople being founded as 'Nova Roma' really put into perspective how much the old city of Rome had decline during the 3rd century. The western half of the empire was a sinking ship compared to the power of the east, and by the 5th century was the junior partner.

• The western and eastern empires of the 5th century should NOT be seen as separate, sovereign entities as they're often made out to be (fuelled by the pop culture notion that West Rome= red and East Rome = purple). The citizens were all part of the same empire, just with two emperors instead of one governing it.

• Most obviously it's dispelled this notion that 476 was 'the fall of Rome'. The end of Roman authority in the western provinces was a catastrophic and traumatic event for many, no doubt, but the barbarian successor kingdoms still recognised the eastern empire as the Roman empire, and maintained their own political fiction about governing on their behalf (as exemplified in the way that Odoacer addressed Zeno as the sole emperor and set himself up as the easts deputy over Italy)

How much longer would the empire have lasted if the successor states united and took Constantinople together and came under one leadership

So I have found something about urban administration of cities in the Roman Republic and the feudal kingdoms. But how were cities administered in the Middle Byzantine Empire? Did they have Imperial governor, or only city's own government? What was the nature of said government? Could there be a city ruled by a single ruler and then another city ruled by a republican system? Were officials appointed by the Emperor, hereditary, elected, or any of the previous depending on the city? What rights and obligations did a city have towards the central government? What about areas where there were no significant urban settlements - could a group of villages gain status of a city? Was there a division of administrative, legal and judicial power? Could cities make their own laws or were governed solely according to the Imperial law?

Edit: Thank you all.

Let's assume that history progresses the way it did, but minus the Sack of Constantinople in 1204, would it have affected Byzantine history in any meaningful way?

Siri typo created the best idea for our romantic comedy in years. Premiering this fall the antics of Julie and her neopagan apostate neighbor.

As I am currently reading "How the World Made the West: A 4,000-Year HistoryBook by Josephine Crawley Quinn", I came across the following statement:

"The study of antiquity gives the lie to the idea that everyone is born with a natural, fixed ethnic identity, tied to specific other people by ancestry or ancestral territory" (p. 165)

I would like your opinion on this.

I really want to find evidence of Anatolian or Istanbul greeks still identifying as Romans in video or from a quote.

This has become a bit of an obsession at the moment. I feel like you could compare what I have to philhellenism but for the Romans. In a strange twist of fate we are focusing on the greeks again but this time on an endangered minortiy.

On recent conversations on this sub, I was sent 2 mostly turkish/english documentaries on the 20th century history of Istanbul greeks. It was mostly in turkish but they also made a clear distinction between 'Greek'/ 'Yunan' (from the ioanians) and 'Roman' or 'Rum'. So the turkish language uses 'Roman' as an exonym for their greek subjects still.

Now I just need to hear the endonym used by these greeks themselves, is this important? Well I truly believe it is interesting anthropologically to be certain that there people who hold the 2000+ year old identity. At the moment, my fun fact is the anecdote from the roman children on Lemnos who came to see the hellenes at the start of the 20th century, but this would bring it into the 21st century.

I also think with a bit of education, it would not be difficult to drum up support for the last of the romans (who would identify as such primarily, I guess). Especially as the documentaries really highlight how endangered they are.

Edit: the aforementioned documentaries.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?si=hFwvxI9KB1JitioW&v=JxyCW69NQH0&feature=youtu.be

https://youtu.be/e0s8Cg7nRN4?si=XeFy7ab86bpPJDlQ

....Then that explains why the 1920's and 30's were such a mess of politics. It was just the usual case of generals rebelling against the state to seize power lol

Some things never change I guess.

Yes I know this sub is about the eastern Roman Empire, but asking about a Roman state in the medieval age seemed more appropriate for this sub rather than any other.

So my question here is, after the fall of the west, if Syagrius has beaten Clovis, would it have been possible for the Roman gaulic rump state to survive long enough to reconnect with Justinian’s armies?

And if it did indeed survive, how would Justinian react to a Roman realm still alive in Gaul, perhaps small, or massive? Would he attempt to integrate it with the rest of the empire, or would he see it as a rival and not recognize its legitimacy?

Additionally, assuming the lombards still invade, and the Arabs still invade, and eastern Rome loses its touch with the west, would this gaulic realm be able to fill the niche that the franks filled in the Middle Ages, or would having Gaul at all help prevent the Lombard and Arab invasions somehow?

Lots of questions, I know, but the realm of soissons is a big “what if” for me and I’d love to hear some opinions about it! Thx!

He's an interesting emperor imo who seems to have been pretty great internally but less so externally.

Theophilos took a great interest in the common people by using much of the revenue garnered from the reforms of Nikephoras to show off the empires power and prestige in an attempt to rival the Abbasid Caliphate.

Speaking of the Caliphate though, that brings me to the foreign policy of Theophilos and the sack of Amorium. While he had managed to score some decent victories against the Arabs beforehand, the sack of Amorium was nothing short of a disaster. It was, in a sense, a second Pliska that partly influenced the the decision to end iconoclasm under Michael III.

Despite this, Amorium wasn't devastating in the long term and was effectively the last major victory the Arabs scored against the East Romans on the eastern frontier, opening the way for the Romans to begin their own offensives under the Macedonian dynasty.

I don't think Theophilos can be credited with this positive development though in the same way that Constantine V reorganized the Theme system or Nikephoras revived the Balkan economy, both of which were consequential for allowing the later Macedonian Restoration to occur.

On the whole, Theophilos strikes me as similar to most of the other members of the Amorian dynasty (excluding the quite successful Michael III). Life was pretty secure and decent within the empire internally but there were quite harsh blows being struck against it externally.

(Oh, and as a side note, I absolutely love the exchange Theophilos had with his potential bride to be Kasia:

"The worst evil came into the world through woman."

"And so did the best of the best.")