The Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire stood at the geographical and cultural
centre of the European and Middle-Eastern world for more
than one thousand years.
For much of that time, and over several cycles of decline and
recovery - from inception as the eastern half of the
partitioned Roman Empire in the fourth century AD through to
final disappearance in the fifteenth century - Byzantium
played the role of an economic, political, and cultural
superpower.
Able to play the role of a superpower for over seven hundred years, Byzantium retained a level of
cultural and social refinement far in advance of anything else in mediæval Europe and more
comparable with the great Islamic civilisations of North Africa and the Middle East.
Byzantium was able to maintain a literate population, a well organised central government, and a
monetary economy. The Byzantine gold coin, the Nomisma, was the international currency of its
day; recognised from India to Spain and trusted for its stability.
Byzantine diplomatic and cultural influence spread across south eastern Europe, to Italy, to Russia
and also to the Middle East. The Byzantines' diplomatic skill, and a preference for avoiding full
scale warfare wherever possible, earned them a reputation in Western Europe as limp wristed
double dealers, to be scorned in preference for the supposed simplicity and moral superiority of
the feudal west.
This difference in approach was drastically exposed when the two competing sister civilisations of
mediæval Europe; the Latin speaking Catholic west, and Byzantium, the Greek speaking Orthodox
east, came into violent face to face contact during the Crusades.
Despite a constant level of conflict with their Arab and Turkish neighbours, the Byzantines had
never fully developed the concept of holy war and recognised Islamic rulers as cultural equals.
Byzantine attitudes were incomprehensible to the Crusaders, who were resentful of Byzantine
cultural superiority and who furthermore suspected the Byzantines of treachery against the rest of
the Christian world. In return, the Byzantines treated most westerners with condescension and
failed to fully appreciate the threat they posed to Byzantium.
The rest of Europe proceeded to forget about Byzantium. Even today the Byzantine role in
maintaining an unbroken line of civilisation throughout Europe's "dark ages" is minimised: a legacy
of 18th and 19th Century historians who treated Byzantium as pale and unworthy reflection of
Imperial Rome.
In fact a huge and until recently unrecognised cultural debt is owed to Byzantium for its role in
preserving the legacy of Classical Greece; which in turn contributed to the Italian Renaissance and
the cultural and scientific development of modern Europe.
But the Byzantine inheritance also stands on its own terms, particularly in the fields of law,
diplomacy, historiography, architecture, religion and, especially, in art. Abstract and intense,
Byzantine religious art closely reflects the Byzantine self image: spiritual, melancholic and
compassionate.
#1 Justinian and the Emperors
Meet the People: Imperial Court and Aristocracy
The Byzantine Empire was an autocracy: In principle the Emperor maintained complete control
over all branches of government, finance and administration, the judiciary and armed forces, as
well as wielding enormous influence over the Orthodox church and the financial life of the
empire.
The office of Emperor (known by the Greek word for 'King': Basileus) was inviolable, no Byzantine
ever seriously thought about any other form of government until the Empire's last days. But there
was a very real difference between theories about the Basileus in general and the actual position
of individual emperors. Byzantium continued with the Roman idea of an elective monarchy:
Emperors were subject to the Empire's laws and even the Emperor Justinian I, an arch-autocrat,
recognised in his legal codes that the people had in fact simply transferred their sovereignty to
the Emperor - he did not rule in his own right.
Although several families managed to establish ruling dynasties, Byzantium did not fully develop
the notion of hereditary rule. Many able and ambitious men (and at least one woman) from very
humble beginnings managed to rise to the top over those who had a 'better' claim in terms of their
family background. The Byzantine idea that the Emperor was ultimately selected by God also,
perversely, helped successful rebels and usurpers: If you were able to depose the existing Emperor
and rule in his place you obviously had God's approval - otherwise He would never have allowed
you to succeed.
#2 Society
Meet the People: Byzantine Women
Byzantium: A Medieval Patriarchy, with Exceptions
Almost inevitably given it’s time and place, Byzantium was a patriarchal society. Despite this,
women certainly participated in some way in many of the aspects of Byzantine society covered by
this site: They ran businesses, participated in the church as nuns or deaconesses, and from time to
time took an active role in political affairs. It is also readily apparent that the middle-period
Byzantine military structure, based a round the participation of 'part-time' thematic soldiers,
could not have functioned without the participation and forbearance of women. Certain elite
Byzantine women, such as the 8th Century Empress Irene or her 14th century namesake, Irene
Kantakouzena, even found themselves acting as military commanders.
Although generally discriminatory, certain aspects of Byzantine legal practice also favoured a
degree of female economic independence which is striking in the context of a pre-modern society:
Women had equal rights to bequeath and inherit property, and married women maintained
ultimate ownership over their dowries. One of the best known Byzantine business empires, for
example, belonged to Danelis - an extremely wealthy widow, and benefactor of the future
Emperor Basil I. Other women are attested as owners of small shops and manufacturing concerns.
Social status could also be transmitted through both male and female lineage: Byzantine
aristocrats, for example, often preferred their mother's surname if it offered greater social
prestige.
Nevertheless, the ability of Byzantine women to participate in public life was restricted in
comparison with their male counterparts. Byzantium's comparatively literate society did ensure
that many girls learned to read and write, but more advanced learning opportunities were limited
for most women, albeit with some very notable exceptions such as the historian-princess Anna
Komnena and the 13th Century scholar Theodora Raoulaina. Girls were encouraged instead to
develop their domestic skills in preparation for marriage.
Arranged marriages were regarded as normal at all levels of Byzantine society. Byzantine women
tended to marry early, often in their mid-teens, and generally expected to have a large number of
children in a relatively short space of time. Childhood mortality was very high by modern
standards, and parents did not expect all of their offspring to survive early childhood.
Byzantine attitudes particularly favoured the role of mother: cultural and legal practice
maintained primacy for the Byzantine mother as head of the household and protector of her
childrens' interests, especially if she had been widowed whilst her children were still young.
Meet the People: Peasants and Farmers
Rural Byzantium: The Engine of Empire
Constantinople, that great city at the heart of the Byzantine Empire, naturally dominates the
historical record as a political centre and cultural power-house. However, like all medieval
societies, Byzantium was overwhelmingly agrarian in nature; the Empire's sophisticated state
apparatus and cultural production was dependent upon the labour of millions of rural people
across the Empire. A high proportion of Byzantine soldiers were also part-timers, reliant upon land
holdings which they held in return for military service.
Perceptive Byzantine rulers recognised this dependence and attempted through legislation and
sometimes direct intervention to protect the state's direct relationship with peasant farmers and
small-holders against competing demands of the Dynatoi (the 'powerful') - the provincial land-
holding aristocracy which became a major feature of Byzantine society from the 10th century on.
The struggle between central government and provincial aristocracy for control of rural labour and
the fruits of surplus agricultural production is one of the major background stories of middle-
Byzantine history.
Patterns of settlement
Rural people in Byzantium tended to live in small settlements of up to a few hundred people,
rather than isolated farmhouses. The poorer houses of a typical village, or Chorion, would
generally consist of two or three rooms, with a hammered earth floor and thatched roof. More
well-off villagers would perhaps live in a two-storey house, with the ground floor given over to
storage, housing for animals, or an animal-driven mill. Around these houses would be land given
over to vineyards, vegetable gardens, orchards, or olive groves. A belt of generally small fields,
scattered between different owners, would be sown with wheat, barley, or rye. Further away
from the village, flocks of sheep or goats or cattle herds would be pastured.
#3 the Military
Meet the People: The Byzantine Military
Byzantine Armed Resistance
Throughout its existence the Byzantine Empire faced constant military pressure on all sides, from
such diverse and dangerous adversaries as the Sassanid Persians, the Arab Ummayad and Abbasid
Caliphates, the Seljuk and Ottoman Turks, the Bulgars, Normans, Franks, Russians and Serbians, as
well as nomadic peoples such as the Avars and Pechenegs.
Byzantium did engage in expansionist wars of conquest of its own from from time to time:
Justinian's reconquest of Italy and North Africa or the much later wars of Nikephoros Phokas and
John Tzimiskes on the eastern frontier for example, but in general Byzantine military doctrine was
defensive in nature. It is testimony to the effectiveness of these tactics that Byzantium was able
to ultimately prevail against the power of the Arab Caliphate: A state which far exceeded
Byzantium in terms of wealth, population and land area.
It is difficult to make generalisations about Byzantium's military over the whole period of the
Empire's existence. This short essay will concentrate upon distinctive features of the Byzantine
army from the late seventh century through to the end of the eleventh century although it will
also deal briefly with the later developments.
The Thematic System
The seventh century Arab conquest of Egypt, North Africa, Palestine and Syria/Mesopotamia was a
severe shock to the Byzantine-late Roman military system. The Arabs were inspired by their new-
found faith (The Prophet Mohammed had only died recently, in 632) and were determined to
pursue their fight for Islam across the entire Middle East and beyond. By way of contrast, after a
gruelling though ultimately successful fight for survival against the Sassanid Persians, the
Byzantine military was severely disrupted and not in a particularly good state for dealing with the
Arabs. In 636 a large Byzantine army was destroyed by the Arabs at the River Yarmuk, in Syria,
and by the early 640s the Byzantines had been pushed back into Asia Minor, beyond the Taurus
and Anti-Taurus mountains.
Things were not looking good for the Empire. Byzantium had lost over half of its territory in less
than thirty years, to an adversary which had also invaded and completely taken over the Sassanid
Persian Empire.
Clearly radical defensive measures were called for - in particular the much reduced Empire could
no longer afford the large late Roman army of paid professionals and mercenaries. At some stage
in the 650s or 660s a system of regional defence in depth was established, organised around
territorial army units known as Thema
It is not clear whether the Thematic system was an organised development by central government
or an ad-hoc response to events on the ground. In any case the Thematic armies proved to be
extremely resilient, providing the backbone of Byzantine resistance to Arab attack over the next
three hundred years.
The professional status of Thematic soldiers is still controversial amongst Byzantinists. The
traditional view is that Thematic soldiers were part-timers: although it appears that a
supplemental salary was paid, a Thematic soldier may have derived most of his financial support
from his own land holding. Members of his local community were also expected to contribute to
the expense of his weapons and equipment. A small farmer and land holder in time of peace, the
thematic soldier was expected to turn out armed and equipped for training and combat duty when
required by his Strategos - a Thema's overall commander.
As time wore on, the military rank of Strategos was developed into a dual purpose office,
incorporating civil as well military authority within each Thema. In this way the provincial
government of Byzantium was "militarised": a sharp contrast to the civilian central government in
Constantinople. Tension between civil and military elements within Byzantium's ruling class is a
distinctive feature of Byzantine history, particularly in the turbulent eleventh century.
The regional basis of the Thematic system held certain advantages: resistance to attack could be
organised quickly on a local level and soldiers were motivated by the fact they were often fighting
for their own towns, farms and families. On the down side there were efficiency problems,
soldier-farmers often became more farmer than soldier, and local loyalties sometimes took
precedence over duty to the central government - several large scale rebellions were sustained by
the efforts of thematic troops based in Asia Minor, often led by their Strategos.
The Tagmata
Although reliant upon thematic troops for regional defence, the Byzantine Emperor also managed
to retain a central collection of professional army regiments, known collectively as the Tagmata.
The Tagmata had developed from Palace bodyguard units, maintained more for show than actual
fighting and staffed largely by social climbers. The Emperor Justinian, for example, is reputed to
have amused himself by including one of these regiments, the Scholai, in mock active deployment
lists, thus causing a panic amongst their upper class gentlemen-soldiers, who had no desire to
leave the safety of Constantinople for the discomfort and danger of an actual military campaign.
By the eighth century however, these 'toy soldier' units had evolved into an elite army corps. With
substantial salaries paid in full by the Imperial government, the Tagma included crack cavalry and
infantry regiments with a combined strength, by one estimate, of more than 20,000 men.
The Tagmata campaigned with the Emperor and formed the spearhead of Byzantine counter
offensive action against invading armies worn down by the hit and run tactics of defending
thematic soldiers.
The Empire's strategic and economic position gradually improved through the ninth and tenth
centuries. Throughout this period the Tagmata were developed into a fully fledged professional
army, which employed sophisticated infantry tactics combined with the shock effect of heavily
armoured cavalry. A series of soldier-emperors such as Nikephoros Phokas, John Tzimiskes and
Basil Bulgaroctonos were able to undertake significant offensive campaigns and to turn the tables
in particular against the Bulgars in the west and the Arab "raiding emirates" in the east. The
pursuit of military glory consequently became an important component of Byzantine imperial
propaganda.
The decline and destruction of the Byzantine Army
In many respects the Byzantine military system was a victim of its own success. By pushing back
the border regions and reducing danger from constant hostile raiding parties, the successful
campaigns of the ninth to early eleventh centuries reduced the need for local defence of the type
supplied by Thematic troops. The Thematic armies grew steadily less efficient and came to be
regarded as surplus to needs by the Byzantine government. In the meantime, the professional
army was also run down - it apparently having no dangerous adversaries left to fight.
Unfortunately a new set of formidable enemies appeared towards the end of the eleventh
century. In 1071 the Empire suffered a double blow: the Byzantine city of Bari, in south eastern
Italy, fell to the Normans and the Emperor Romanos Diogenes suffered a catastrophic defeat at
the hands of the Seljuk Turks. The Byzantine army was still large, on paper at least, but
inefficient and disaffected: within ten years most of Asia Minor had been over-run by the Turks
and the Normans had established a beachhead in the Greece and the Balkans. The Emperors
Alexios, John, and Manuel Komnenos, all able and determined men, were able to deal with both
the Seljuk Turks and Normans through a mixture of diplomacy and military force. But the army
they employed, increasingly made up of mercenaries and "barbarian" (ie non-Byzantine) soldiers,
bore little relation to the old military establishment which had served the empire so well.
#4 Government Structure
Meet the People: Officials and Bureaucracy
Byzantium’s semi-professional administrator class had no direct equivalent in any contemporary
western royal court or government. The civil service constituted a distinct and semi-independent
element within Byzantine political culture, along with the provincial and military aristocracy, the
Orthodox Church and, of course, the Emperor himself.
Belying an image of inflexibility and conservatism the Byzantine bureaucracy, in a similar manner
to the Byzantine military, reinvented itself several times in order to cope with the changing
circumstances of the Empire. Both institutions, the administration and the military, exacted a
considerable burden on state finances which only a centralised tax-gathering state like Byzantium
could even begin to cope with. But in return they ensured Byzantium’s survival in the face of
formidable external pressure.
The Byzantine civil service can be roughly categorised into three major groupings: the palatine
administration, living and working within the emperor’s great palace; the provincial government,
with strong links to the military Thematic structure; and the subject of this essay: the central civil
service, responsible for affairs of state policy and finance.
The Byzantine Civil Service: Staff and Structure
In terms of staff numbers the Byzantine bureaucracy was relatively small: a recent estimate for
the ninth century central civil service places the number of core staff at five to six hundred men,
split between thirteen different bureaux or departments of state.
The most important distinction within the civil administration was made between Kritai, or
judicial officers, and Sekretikoi, or financial officers. The Sekretikoi were overseen, in formal
terms at least, by a general controller known as the Sakellarios. Chief amongst the Sekretikoi
were departmental directors known by the general term Logothete (literally "Accountant"): The
Logothetes tou Genikou, for example, was a finance minister in charge of raising taxes and
accounting for revenue from state enterprises, whilst the Logothetes tou Stratiotikou had overall
responsibility for army pay and general supplies. In political terms though, the most important
departmental head was the Logothetes tou Dromou. The Logothetes tou Dromou supervised the
government’s postal service and diplomatic corps, and acted as foreign minister and personal
advisor to the emperor. Unsurprisingly, given it's potential for great power and influence, the
holder of this post become known as the Great Logothete.
Other Sekretikoi included supervisors for state factories and the emperor’s estates as well as the
Orphanotrophos, who administered a large orphanage in Constantinople as well as other social
welfare institutions: At least one Orphanotrophos, the eunuch John in the eleventh century, was
able to wield political power far beyond the boundaries of his official position.
The highest official amongst the Kritai was the Prefect of Constantinople: the Eparchos. The
Eparchos was the head of Constantinople after the emperor himself and comprised one of the few
official posts in Byzantium that a eunuch could not hold. The Eparchos was in charge of law and
order within the city, with responsibility for the police force and fire brigade as well as the
supervision of trade guilds and foreigners engaged in trade within Constantinople. He worked
alongside the Quaestor, who drafted legislation, maintained an appeals court and acted as public
trustee for wills and guardianship. An office also existed for petitions to the emperor.
#5 Orthodox Church
Meet the People: The Orthodox Church
The God-Protected Empire
The adoption of Christianity as the Roman state religion in the 4th Century AD transformed both
the Empire and the Christian Church.
Christians were no longer members of a minority sect, persecuted with varying degrees of
enthusiasm by Roman authorities. Instead they found themselves the subject of official favour -
The Emperor Constantine I was convinced the Christian god had promoted him in his rise to power
and was determined to ensure on-going divine protection for his empire.
Constantine ensured that the interests of Church and State were closely identified with each
other, in a symbiotic relationship that remained a defining characteristic of the Byzantine Empire.
The church received numerous legal and financial dispensations and was permitted to play an
active role in the Byzantine political and administrative framework. In return the Church was able
to confer spiritual authority upon the Emperor and his government: No longer regarded as a demi-
God himself, as in the old pagan Empire, the Emperor instead became God’s chosen
representative on earth, guiding his people according to divine will.
The special metaphysical status of Byzantium, as part of of God’s overall design for humanity, was
a vital component of the ideological glue which held the Empire together, sometimes in the face
of extreme adversity. The special status of Christianity in the Empire also placed a premium upon
the importance of "right" belief. Byzantines passionately debated the dual, human and divine,
nature of Christ, the procession of the Holy Spirit, the status of religious icons as objects of
devotion or worship, or whether it was possible achieve direct communion with God through
meditation. Beginning with the Council of Nicaea, Ecumenical Church Councils were convened to
pronounce upon such matters of religious controversy. Orthodoxy was defined according to the
decisions and religious formulations made by these councils.
The Orthodox Church imitated early the organisation of the secular Empire. The Patriarch of
Constantinople was the Church’s formal leader. He was also quite literally the Emperor’s next
door neighbour - the Patriarchal residence was situated near the Great Palace. Throughout the
Empire every provincial city or town possessed a bishop who was ultimately answerable to the
Patriarch and who ran an adminstrative and judicial framework which paralleled the state
bureaucracy.
Significant numbers of Byzantine men and women became monks and nuns, either as a lifetime
vocation, as a retirement option, or as a sometimes forced refuge from political disgrace.
Monasteries became powerful institutions in their own right, with significant land holdings and
social prestige. Leading monks, such as Theodore of Studios, were sometimes able to organise
resistance against the Imperial Government on political or religious matters. Although Byzantium
maintained a strong secular educational tradition, some monks and nuns were also noted for their
devotion to learning - monasteries maintained "Scriptoria", where skilled writers and copyists
produced books, the most precious of all medieval commodities.
From a late twentieth-century perspective it is difficult to fully understand the pervasive
influence of religion upon the Byzantine thought-world. Byzantines did not conceive of God and
the supernatural world as something remote or unreal: the reality of God and His intercessors,
Christ, the Virgin Mary, the Archangels, the Saints, was taken for granted and readily assimilated
by even the most worldly and rational members of Byzantine society. Byzantine religious devotion
consequently placed a premium upon direct personal contact with the supernatural world and
possessed a mystical, meditative quality that set it apart from Western forms of worship.
#6 Strengths and Weakness of the Economy
Meet the People: Financial pressures, taxation, and alienation of land
The rural economy was heavily influenced by the need to participate in the Empire's cash
economy, if only for the purpose of paying taxes. It is no surprise that all Byzantines complained
about taxation. However, the burden of taxation fell most heavily upon the peasantry.
Failure to raise enough money for tax features as one of the chief catastrophes to befall a
Byzantine small-farmer. Tax default, or default upon cash loans raised to pay tax could mean loss
of livelihood and land, which was usually the only form of collateral against which loans could be
raised.
The position of small farmers in Byzantium, appears to have been relatively stable, and even
prosperous in good times, but vulnerable when under pressure from the effects of warfare,
unfavourable climatic conditions, acquisitive action from larger landlords, or tax pressure from
central government. From the tenth-century onwards a process of land sale and alienation from
small holders to large scale monastic or aristocratic estates appears to have gathered pace,
despite sporadic attempts by central government to grant financial relief or to legislate against
the sale of land to dynatoi. People who once were land owners and tax payers in their own right
found themselves dependent and obliged to local lords, abbots and and other notables.
The Byzantine peasantry were never reduced to serfdom in the same sense as in the medieval
west, but by the 12th century the state had largely lost its direct relationship with the main body
of people who had hitherto paid the bulk of its taxes, produced its food and other other
agricultural goods, and served in its armed forces. Whether this was a uniformly negative
development for the people involved is a moot point: freedom from the obligation to pay a heavy
tax burden, even at the cost of loss of land and independence, may have been a trade worth
making. There is no doubt though that this process led to a loss of strength for the Byzantine state
and compromised its survival.