Aural Architecture: Music, Acoustics, and Ritual in Byzantium
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Emerging from the challenge to reconstruct sonic and spatial experiences of the deep past, this multidisciplinary collection of ten essays explores the intersection of liturgy, acoustics, and art in the churches of Constantinople, Jerusalem, Rome and Armenia, and reflects on the role digital technology can play in re-creating aspects of the sensually rich performance of the divine word. Engaging the material fabric of the buildings in relationship to the liturgical ritual, the book studies the structure of the rite, revealing the important role chant plays in it, and confronts both the acoustics of the physical spaces and the hermeneutic system of reception of the religious services. By then drawing on audio software modelling tools in order to reproduce some of the visual and aural aspects of these multi-sensory public rituals, it inaugurates a synthetic approach to the study of the premodern sacred space, which bridges humanities with exact sciences. The result is a rich contribution to the growing discipline of sound studies and an innovative convergence of the medieval and the digital.
Byzantine Sources for the Crusades, 1095-1204
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"the Christian, Greek-speaking Byzantine empire was placed rather uneasily between western Christendom and the Islamic world during the Crusade era. the texts translated here include selections from Anna Komnene's description of the passage of the First Crusade in 1096-8 but also the less well-known one by Zonaras and the contemporary letters of the archbishop of Ohrid. the accounts of the Second Crusade by John Kinnamos and Niketas Choniates are translated as well as a contemporary letter and two poems. There are first-hand reminiscences of visits to the Latin East and a number of speeches in which the policies of Emperors John II and Manuel I are explained and extolled. Choniates' recollections of the passage of the German emperor, Frederick I Barbarossa, in 1189-90 as part of the Third Crusade are translated, as well as a curious account of an incident that supposedly occurred when King Philip II Augustus was travelling back to France. the Fourth Crusade had the greatest impact. Originally intended as an expedition to Egypt, it diverted to the Byzantine capital of Constantinople to restore Emperor Isaac II to the throne. Choniates, an eye-witness to these events, recounted how good relations broke down when the Byzantines proved unable to pay the promised reward. on 12 April 1204, the crusaders captured Constantinople and sacked the city. Later, as a refugee in Nicaea, Choniates wrote a series a speeches looking back on the disaster and rallying the Byzantines to recover the city"-- Provided by publisher.
Emotions and Gender in Byzantine Culture
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This book examines the gendered dimensions of emotions and the emotional aspects of gender within Byzantine culture and suggests possible readings of such instances. In so doing, the volume celebrates the current breadth of Byzantine gender studies while at the same time contributing to the emerging field of Byzantine emotion studies. It offers the reader an array of perspectives encompassing various sources and media, including historiography, hagiography, theological writings, epistolography, erotic literature, art objects, and illuminated manuscripts. The ten chapters cover a time span ranging from the early to the late Byzantine periods. This diversity is secured by an expanded and enriched exploration of the collection's unifying theme of gendered emotions. The scope and breadth of the chapters also reflect the ways in which Byzantine gender and emotion have been studied thus far, while at the same time offering novel approaches that challenge established opinions in Byzantine studies.
The New Roman Empire
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A major new history of the eastern Roman Empire, from Constantine to 1453.In recent decades, the study of the Eastern Roman Empire, also known as Byzantium, has been revolutionized by new approaches and more sophisticated models for how its society and state operated. No longer looked upon as a pale facsimile of classical Rome, Byzantium is now considered a vigorous state of its own, inheritor of many of Rome's features, and a vital node in the first truly globalized world, with far-flung connections to the Carolingians, Vikings, Arabs, Ethiopians, Indians, and Chinese. The New Roman Empire is the first full, single-author history of the eastern Roman empire to appear in over a generation. Covering political and military history as well as all the major changes in religion, society, demography, and economy, Anthony Kaldellis's volume is divided into ten chronological sections which begin with the foundation of Constantinople in 324 AD and end with the fall of the empire to the Ottoman Turks in the fifteenth century. The book incorporates new findings, explains recent interpretive models, and presents well-known historical characters and events in a new light.
Palgrave Advances in Byzantine History
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Over the past fifty years, the history and culture of the Byzantine empire has ceased to be the preserve of a few scholars and is now taught and debated in universities all over the world. This book provides an introduction to the source material and to the very best recent writing on the empire's political history (306-1453), its art, army, religion, literature and economy. Recent developments in gender studies and archaeology are also explored. The book will be of interest to university students and anyone interested in understanding the ongoing debates about this mysterious and perplexing yet fascinating society.
