Between Classical antiquity and the Middle Ages: new evidence of economic change

Antiquity ◽  
1990 ◽  
Vol 64 (242) ◽  
pp. 122-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
Klavs Randsborg
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Economic Change ◽  
Classical Antiquity ◽  
Rural Settlements ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
Economic Background ◽  
New Evidence ◽  
North And South ◽  
The Middle Ages

New archaeological evidence, principally from rural settlements, questions previous conceptions of the economic background to the transition from the Roman Empire to the Middle Ages. In particular, finds from the Balkans, a geographical ‘hinge’ between North and South and East and West, is discussed. The major periods of change are both the 5th and the 7th centuries AD.

scholarly journals The terminology of kinship and hierarchy of rulers in the writings of Constantine the Philosopher and his contemporaries

2001 ◽  
pp. 225-235 ◽  
Author(s):  
Milos Blagojevic
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Holy Roman Empire ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
Eastern Christianity ◽  
Present Concept ◽  
The World ◽  
Father And Son ◽  
The Middle Ages

According to the simplified Byzantine idea, which was never discarded, the Byzantine basileus is the God's elected ruler. He is the only legitimate emperor in the world because he is the legitimate heir of Roman emperors. Apart from Byzantium, a series of other sovereign states existed throughout the Middle Ages on the territory of the former Roman Empire. That condition lead to the formulation of a sustainable interpretation of the conjured hierarchy of rulers and states. At the top of the fictitious ladder stood only the Byzantine emperor, and, at its bottom, rulers of the lowest rank to whom the emperor issued "orders". All other rulers were distributed between these two instances along the fictitious ladder of hierarchy, depending on their power and the esteem they enjoyed. At the same time, the Byzantine basileus was also perceived as the "spiritual parent" of the Christian nations and rulers who, on the otherhand, depending on their esteemed, boasted varying degrees of "spiritual kinship" with the emperor. These Byzantine concepts were adopted by Stefan Nemanja and his heirs, so that, at times, in medieval Serbia they were real and not fictitious. In the last decades of the XIV century, the power and esteem of Byzantium waned rapidly. The Empire had to take on difficult obligations towards the Ottoman Turks of which she was freed only after the Battle of Ankara (1402). The liberation from demeaning commitments brought on a revival of the ever present concept of ideal supremacy of the Byzantine emperor, especially among rulers in the Balkans. Such ideas were adopted by Constantine of Kostenec, the author of the Vita of Stefan Lazarevic, who, however, added certain corrections, conforming them to the views of the Serbian spiritual elite. According to the treaty of Gallipoli, sultan Suleiman accepted (1403) emperor Manuel II Palaiologos as his "father", a fact known also to Constantine the Philosopher, as was later also repeated by sultan Mehmed I. At the time when, in 1410, Stefan Lazarevic received for the second time the crown of despots from Manuel II, relations between the Byzantine basileus and the Serbian despots were defined as those of "father and son". By those means, Constantine the Philosopher elevates the position of the Serbian ruler to the level once held by king Milutin following his marriage to Simonis. The author of the Vita of Stefan Lazarevic took strict care to state the noble rank of the Serbian despots and thus matched it with those of sultan Mehmed I and the contender to the throne, Musa, who addressed the despots as "brother". Constantine the Philosopher makes no mistake either when referring to the king of Hungary and emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, Sigismund, whose vassal Stefan was. Regardless, of such ties between the two rulers, Sigismund is never mentioned as the despots' "parent" but solely as his "comrade"(ally), probably because the Hungarian king belonged to the oicumene of Western and not Eastern Christianity and could thus by no means have been a "spiritual parent" to the Orthodox Serbian despots.

scholarly journals I.—Antiquarian Researches in Illyricum, III, and IV

Archaeologia ◽  
1885 ◽  
Vol 49 (01) ◽  
pp. 1-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur John Evans
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Administrative District ◽  
North East ◽  
The North ◽  
East Region ◽  
Parallel Lines ◽  
North And South ◽  
Uncertain Boundary ◽  
The Middle Ages

Hitherto we have been concerned with the Dalmatian coast-cities and the great parallel lines of road that traversed the length of the Province from the borders of Pannonia and Italy to those of Epirus. From Salonæ there were, in addition to these highways to the North and South, at least two main-lines of Roman Way that traversed the interior ranges of the Dinaric Alps and led to the Mœsian and Dardanian borders that lay to the East and South-East. Milliary columns have been found at Salonæ, one recording the completion by Tiberius' Legate Dolabella of a line of road leading from the Colony of Salonæ to a mountain stronghold of the Ditiones—an Illyrian clan probably inhabiting what is now the North-East region of Bosnia; another, also of Tiberius' time, referring to the construction of a line, 156 miles in extent, from Salonæ to aCastellumof the Dæsitiates, an Illyrian clan belonging to theConventusor administrative district of Narona, and whose stronghold, according to the mileage given, must be sought somewhere on the Upper Drina, towards the Moesian and Dalmatian confines. This latter line may very well be that represented in theTabula Peutingerianaas leading from Salonæ to Argentaria, a name which seems to connect itself with the silver-bearing ranges lying on the uncertain boundary of the ancient Dalmatia and Dardania, and which, from its mineral riches, was still known in the Middle Ages asMonte Argentaro.

WESTERN EUROPEAN AND BYZANTINE SOURCES OF THE MIDDLE AGES ABOUT THE RELATIONS BETWEEN WESTERN AND EASTERN CHRISTIANS AND THE CAPTURE OF CONSTANTINOPLE BY THE CRUSADERS IN 1204

2021 ◽  
pp. 60-73
Author(s):  
Dmitriy M. Abramov ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Historical Sources ◽  
The Cross ◽  
Western European ◽  
The Military ◽  
Detailed Picture ◽  
The Middle Ages

Historical sources and evidence of the eyewitnesses of the 4th crusade in many respects reflect the complexity and sharpness of the contradictions between the Western and Eastern Christendom at the turn of the 12th – 13th centuries. The evidence and narrations proceed from the most direct participants in the military events, broke out on the shore of the Bosporus in 1203–1204. The authors of those materials belonged to the two opposing camps, and therefore the analysis of those sources represents a sufficiently complete and detailed picture of the occurred tragedy. A thorough analysis of the sources makes it possible to at least partially see and comprehend the causes of the military confrontation between the Western and Eastern Christians, who represented – just a while ago, in the first half of the 11th century – the united Ecumenical Church. The sources vividly reflect the mood that prevailed in the crusaders’ encampment in April, 1204, hesitation and doubt of the bulk of the Cross Warriors who were not sure of the rightness of their actions in the preparation for the assault of Constantinople. Many of them understood that they would have to raise the sword against their fellow believers – the Christians of the East. But the most tragic outcome of the 1202–1204 Crusade was the crushing defeat of Constantinople by the Cross Warriors. For the Romans (Byzantines) that became the reason for the disintegration of the Roman Empire. For all Eastern Christians it indicated the demise of the capital of the Orthodox Christendom.

Regional Identities and Cultures of Medieval Jews

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
North Africa ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Regional Identity ◽  
Asia Minor ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
Rich Variety ◽  
Regional Cultures ◽  
The Rich ◽  
The Middle Ages

Though the existence of Jewish regional cultures is widely known, the origins of the most prominent groups, Ashkenaz and Sepharad, are poorly understood, and the rich variety of other regional Jewish identities is often overlooked. Yet all these subcultures emerged in the Middle Ages. Scholars contributing to the present study were invited to consider how such regional identities were fashioned, propagated, reinforced, contested, and reshaped — and to reflect on the developments, events, or encounters that made these identities manifest. They were asked to identify how subcultural identities proved to be useful, and the circumstances in which they were deployed. The resulting volume spans the ninth to sixteenth centuries, and explores Jewish cultural developments in western Europe, the Balkans, North Africa, and Asia Minor. In its own way, each chapter considers factors — demographic, geographical, historical, economic, political, institutional, legal, intellectual, theological, cultural, and even biological — that led medieval Jews to conceive of themselves, or to be perceived by others, as bearers of a discrete Jewish regional identity. Notwithstanding the singularity of each chapter, they collectively attest to the inherent dynamism of Jewish regional identities.

Mandelstam: The Realm of Unexpectedness

2021 ◽  
Vol 64 (2) ◽  
pp. 62-83
Author(s):  
Svetlana S. Neretina
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Speech Act ◽  
Classical Antiquity ◽  
Logical Framework ◽  
Creation Process ◽  
The Real ◽  
Logical Construction ◽  
The World ◽  
The Creation ◽  
The Middle Ages

In the essay “Conversation about Dante,” Mandelstam described logic, which he defined as the “realm of unexpectedness,” which is unlike any everyday logical construction. Based on the analysis of Mandelstam’s text, it is assumed that we are talking about a tropology that arose in the Middle Ages, the principles of which can be derived from studies of St. Augustine’s treatise De Dialectica and Petrus Сomestor’s Historia Scholastica. It is this triple commonwealth (Augustine – Comestor – Dante, read by Mandelstam) that creates the multilayered logical framework of the work. Augustine created a completely different dialectic than in classical antiquity. Augustine considers dialectics as an art of discussion and describes the real steps that contribute to the emergence of speech, which corresponds to Mandelstam’s concept of conversation. According to Augustine, at the basis of any speech, is a trope-turn. In the article, attention is drawn to the sound nature of creation process. This logic, used in explaining the creation of the world according to the logos/word (tropology), assumes that, at the basis of the speech act, there is no the word as a unit of speech, but the sound itself – the sound, which was considered initially equivocal (ambiguous). In the process of pronounciation, the sound could turn into its opposite and could change the meaning of speech if the context has been changed. Dante expressed the meaning of tropology in practice. Mandelstam wrote that he had chosen Dante for the conversation (between poet and poet) “because he is the greatest and indisputable master of reversible and reversing poetic substance.” Mandelstam saw Dante as the Descartes of metaphor.

scholarly journals Life and activity of Nasir al-Din al-Tusi

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 353-367
Author(s):  
Maryam Seyidbeyli
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Arabic Language ◽  
Political Life ◽  
Scientific Center ◽  
North West ◽  
Entire Complex ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Republic ◽  
The Middle Ages

At the beginning of the VII century in the political life of the Near and Middle East, fundamental changes have taken place. The Arabs conquered a colossal territory, which included the lands of Iran, North Africa, North-West India, the Asian provinces of Byzantium, most of the former Roman Empire. In the conquered cities of the caliphate, observatories, madaris, libraries were built. At the end of VII century, the first scientific center, an academy, the House of Wisdom, was founded in Baghdad, in which scholars who spoke different languages were assembled. Here the translation and commentary activity were very developed, the main works of ancient thought, such as the writings of Aristotle, Ptolemy were published in the 9th century in the Arabic-speaking world. For two centuries from 750 to 950 years, the works of ancient authors on philosophy, mathematics, medicine, alchemy, and astronomy were translated into Arabic, which indicates the high scientific potential of that time in the East. At the same time, in the XII century, Ibn Rushd composed 38 commentaries on the works of Aristotle, the “Republic” of Plato, the treatise “On the Mind” of Alexander of Aphrodisias, which subsequently had an important influence on the work of Nasir al-Din al-Tusi. Thus, this period in the history of Eastern scientific thought is marked by high intellectual potential. To this day, historians of medieval Arabic literature face a sufficient number of difficulties, since the vast majority of manuscripts remain inaccessible to them. The works of many renowned Arab authors of the middle Ages are more than 1000 years old, so it seems obvious that the manuscripts of the vast majority of authors have not survived to this day. The researchers of the history of Azerbaijan and neighboring countries in the middle Ages, with all the variety of available sources on which they rely, still attract little factual material related to the Arabic-language works of the historical and scientific genre. Undoubtedly, a comprehensive study of the entire complex of information of Nasir al-Din al-Tusi on the history of science in Azerbaijan is of great importance.

scholarly journals The Middle Ages are not enough: the fourth paradox and the marginalization of the Roman Empire

2017 ◽  
pp. 335
Author(s):  
Francesc Morales
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Nationalist Movements ◽  
Complex Problems ◽  
The Common ◽  
Siglo Xix ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
The Middle Ages

Abstract: The palates of the nationalist authors of the 19th century found the common past exemplified by the Roman Empire to be too homogeneous a taste. Although this premise may be valid for all European nationalist movements of the 19th and early 20th centuries, the discussion here is limited to Spain’s problematic national construction during the 19th century and the group formed by Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. Spain and ‘Benelux’ were chosen because they represent complex problems in the construction of a key dynamic of European nationalism: a political contemporary diversity linked to pre-Roman and post-Roman pasts. Despite these political and historical connections, the paths taken by these nationalisms are significantly different.Key words: Rome, Netherlands, Spain, nationalism, EuropeResumen: Un pasado común ejemplificado por el Imperio Romano pasa por ser demasiado homogéneo para el gusto de los autores nacionalistas en el siglo XIX. Esta premisa puede ser válida para todos los movimientos nacionalistas europeos, pero voy a limitarme a la problemática de la construcción nacional en España durante el siglo XIX y al grupo formado por Bélgica, los Países Bajos y Luxemburgo. Ambas regiones representan similares complejidades en la construcción de un nacionalismo europeo: una diversidad política contemporánea enlazada con un pasado prerromano y post-romano. A pesar de tener conexiones políticas e históricas, el camino de estos dos nacionalismos es significativamente diferente.Palabras clave: Roma, Países Bajos, España, nacionalismo, Europa  

Muslim Roma in the Balkans

2000 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-128 ◽  
Author(s):  
David M. Crowe
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Word Meaning ◽  
Ninth Century ◽  
Byzantine Empire ◽  
Wild Animals ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
The Middle Ages

The Roma entered the Balkans from India during the Middle Ages. They reached Persia sometime in the ninth century and by the eleventh century had moved into the Byzantine Empire. According to the eleventh-century Georgian Life of Saint George the Athonite, the Emperor Constantine Monomachus asked the Adsincani to get rid of wild animals preying on the animals in his royal hunting preserve. Adsincani is the Georgian form of the Greek word Atsínganoi or Atzínganoi, from which the non-English terms for Roma (cigán, cigány, tsiganes, zigeuner) are derived. Adsincani means “ner-do-well fortune tellers” or “ventriloquists and wizards who are inspired satanically and pretend to predict the unknown.” “Gypsy” comes from “Egyptian,” a term often used by early modern chroniclers in the Balkans to refer to the Roma. Because of the stereotypes and prejudice that surround the word “Gypsy,” the Roma prefer a name of their own choosing from their language, Romani. Today, it is preferable to refer to the Gypsies as Rom or “Roma,” a Romani word meaning “man” or “husband.” Byzantine references to “Egyptians” crop up during this period as Byzantine political and territorial fortunes gave way to the region's new power, the Ottomans. There were areas with large Roma populations in Cyprus and Greece which local rulers dubbed “Little Egypt” in the late fourteenth century.

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