The Byzantine Republic: People and Power in New Rome - Hardcover

Kaldellis, Anthony

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0674365402 ISBN 13: 9780674365407

Publisher: Harvard University Press, 2015

Synopsis

Although Byzantium is known to history as the Eastern Roman Empire, scholars have long claimed that this Greek Christian theocracy bore little resemblance to Rome. Here, in a revolutionary model of Byzantine politics and society, Anthony Kaldellis reconnects Byzantium to its Roman roots, arguing that from the fifth to the twelfth centuries CE the Eastern Roman Empire was essentially a republic, with power exercised on behalf of the people and sometimes by them too. The Byzantine Republic recovers for the historical record a less autocratic, more populist Byzantium whose Greek-speaking citizens considered themselves as fully Roman as their Latin-speaking “ancestors.”

Kaldellis shows that the idea of Byzantium as a rigid imperial theocracy is a misleading construct of Western historians since the Enlightenment. With court proclamations often draped in Christian rhetoric, the notion of divine kingship emerged as a way to disguise the inherent vulnerability of each regime. The legitimacy of the emperors was not predicated on an absolute right to the throne but on the popularity of individual emperors, whose grip on power was tenuous despite the stability of the imperial institution itself. Kaldellis examines the overlooked Byzantine concept of the polity, along with the complex relationship of emperors to the law and the ways they bolstered their popular acceptance and avoided challenges. The rebellions that periodically rocked the empire were not aberrations, he shows, but an essential part of the functioning of the republican monarchy.

About this title

About the Author:

Anthony Kaldellis is Professor and Chair of the Department of Classics at The Ohio State University. He is the author of many books, including The Christian Parthenon, Hellenism in Byzantium, and The Byzantine Republic, which have been translated into French, Greek, and Russian.

Review:

“This is a path-breaking book that will change the discussion on the political structure of the later Roman Empire―Byzantium―and put it, finally, on a proper course.”―Dimitri Gutas, Yale University

“This is an important book that establishes beyond a doubt that the image we have of Byzantium, the Roman Empire in the East, is in need of revision. Kaldellis breaks down the artificial and damaging divide between Roman and Byzantine studies with his encyclopedic knowledge of the full run of Byzantine historiography.”―Paul Stephenson, Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands

“Any student of political science will find this study of interest because of its discussions of both theory and specific historical documents...Byzantine specialists will find intriguing the author’s remarks about continuity, and nonspecialists will appreciate his discussion about the legitimacy of power in a medieval context.”―J. W. Nesbitt, Choice

About this edition

• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 0674365402
• ISBN 13: 9780674365407
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 312