Medieval Greece

This paper examines the processes of settlement and abandonment of the medieval countryside as revealed by archaeological surveys undertaken in southern Greece. The Nemea region, the focus of an intensive archaeological survey, serves as a case study. Early archaeological surveys approached this time period primarily from a historical point of view. Political history provided the textual frame while the archaeological data were expected to "fill in" the gaps of the historical record. In contrast, in the last twenty-five years the second generation of surveys has taken an active interest in the archaeological documentation of the medieval countryside. The settlement trends observed in Nemea are viewed as manifestations of a variety of political, social, and economic processes.

The Patria is a fascinating four-book collection of short historical notes, stories, and legends about the buildings and monuments of Constantinople, compiled in the late tenth century by an anonymous author who made ample use of older sources. It also describes the foundation and early (pre-Byzantine) history of the city, and includes the Narrative on the Construction of Hagia Sophia, a semi-legendary account of Emperor Justinian I’s patronage of this extraordinary church (built between 532 and 537). The Patria constitutes a unique record of popular traditions about the city, especially its pagan statues, held by its medieval inhabitants. At the same time it is the only Medieval Greek text to present a panorama of the city as it existed in the middle Byzantine period. Despite its problems of historical reliability, the Patria is still one of our main guides for the urban history of medieval Constantinople. This translation makes the entire text of the Patria accessible in English for the first time.

The modelling and visualisation of networks is based on the material in: M. Mullett, Theophylact of Ochrid. Reading the Letters of a Byzantine Archbishop. Birmingham 1997.

The first graph is a visualisation of the connections between letters in localities between which these letters were exchanged (" 2mode network").

The second graph is a visualisation of the weighted network of localities on the basis of Theophylact´s correspondence; two localities are connected if letters of Theophylact were exchanged between them. Links are scaled according to the number of letters within Theophylact´s collection documenting exchanges between them.

The third graph visualises these connections between localities on a map. Links are again scaled according to the number of letters within Theophylact´s collection documenting exchanges between them. The size of nodes is scaled according to their number of connections within the network ("degree").

The fourth graph is a "zoom" into these geographical visualisation of the network for the Western Balkans; links are again scaled according to the number of letters within Theophylact´s collection documenting exchanges between them.

For the localisation of sites within the historical region of Macedonia cf. also the upcoming volumes on Macedonia (Southern Part) by Peter Soustal and on Macedonia (Northern Part) by Mihailo Popovic within the series "Tabula Imperii Byzantini" (http://www.oeaw.ac.at/imafo/die-abteilungen/byzanzforschung/communities-landscapes/historische-geographie/)

For any further questions, please contact [email protected].

Kenneth M. Seeton, a distinguished American historian and researcher of Mediterranean history from the Middle Ages until the 17th century, is best known for his monumental work "The Papacy and the Levant (1204-1571)" and for his research on Catalan presence in southern Greece in the 14th century, presented in his "Catalan Domination of Athens, 1311-1388" and in a number of articles. His original work and in depth analyses earned him the respect of his American colleagues and recognition from many academic institutions. However, the general public still remains largely unaware of his contribution, in sharp contrast with the cases of similar researchers, as Fernand Braudel (article published in Greek, in the Journal Βυζαντινός Δόμος, vol. 13, 2002-2003, pp. 191-199.

This paper deals with the origins of the despotate of Epirus and the Empire of Trebizond comparing them with the fate of other Byzantine splinter-states of the XIIth and XIIIth century and tries to draw some outlines of a future  comparison with the realities of Medieval Western Europe.

The Red Apple Tree: the Tree of Life
Analysis and interpretation of Greek and Turkish legends relating to the Holy Tree and its Eschatological, Messianic Role and Importance (in Greek)
First published on 27th January 2018 here: https://profmegalommatistextsingreek.wordpress.com/2018/01/27/η-κόκκινη-μηλιά-δέντρο-μυστικό-του-παρ/

The motive for a detailed presentation of this book comes as a necessity for me, first because the finds from the Velestino hoard have been a subject of research literally during my whole professional career. The second reason is that my articles i.e. the interpretations presented within them take on a prominent place in this publication, with the authors repeatedly mentioning them, discussing them and giving their own thoughts and opinions. In this article I will try to express my thought and remarks on this book and the insights presented within it, which, given the breadth and importance of the topic, will certainly not be the last. I hope that my research so far on the specific objects from this hoard, presented in different separate publications, will soon be rounded up in one monograph, directed primarily towards their mythological-religious aspects. An important part of it will certainly be the new and very valuable information and thoughts by Curta and Szmoniewski presented in this book. The remarks I direct towards them will also be explained and argumented in more detail within it, but also my own interperations on the content and meaning of the objects that comprise the Velestino hoard.

The year 927 brought a peace treaty between Byzantium and Bulgaria, which ended many years of military struggle between both the states. On this occasion, Theodore Daphnopates, a prominent representative of the intellectual elite of Constantinople of the first half of X century, delivered a speech praising the newly concluded agreement. By means of a variety of hints not only to ancient history and literature but also to the Bible, the speaker explained reasons which led the conflict between both the states, lamented sad consequences of numerous military operations conducted over the years of the past war, as well as elaborating on the importance of the newly established peace. Daphnopates wanted to convince those who heard his declamation that these were only the Byzantines who made up the new nation chosen by God and the new spiritual “House of Israel”. On the other hand, the Bulgarians were compared to a mere scion, which only recently had been grafted onto the stock of the vine tree of Jesse. The Byzantines were pictured as fathers and teachers in faith of the Bulgarians and the speaker wanted to imply that the latter would remain blessed by the Lord and their state would flourish only on condition that they remained faithful by the side of the empire and in unity with it. It is essential, however, that by means of the statement, the speaker included the Bulgarians into the hierarchic order established on Earth by God himself. On the other hand, he also pointed clearly that it was their fidelity to Byzantium that enabled them to enjoy the wise lead and firm protection of the empire. In orator’s opinion the peace concluded in 927 was a genuine miracle sent from God, which by no means should be disregarded, and any attempt to diminish its importance has to be condemned as a heavy sin. The speaker maintained that the survival of this peaceful coexistence was an important task to which both the involved parts were obliged to apply themselves seriously in the future. Since peace was always an eternal attribute of God himself, the establishment of this hopefully ever-lasting treaty, which was supposed to entirely eliminate war from the relations between the Byzantines and Bulgarians, was an actual act of imitation of the Lord’s activities, and by virtue of that achievement both the states moved closer to become similar to God.

In the field of Byzantine studies, epistolography was the first phenomenon ever to be analysed within the framework of (social) network analysis in the pioneer study of Margaret Mullett on the letter collection of Metropolitan Theophylact of Ohrid in 1997. In these and other following studies, concepts reflecting on the qualitative character of social connections were more frequently used than quantitative tools of structural analysis.  Thus, the main aim of this chapter is the presentation of basic concepts of this aspect of network research and the demonstration of the application of some of these tools on a case study for Byzantine epistolography. At the same time, the potential for a future combination of structural and qualitative concepts of relational analysis for research in the field is outlined.

Immediately after the death of tsar Stephen IV of Serbia (1355), the empire he had forged quickly split in a number of autonomous principalities, which were ruled by his former generals and by prominent member of the Serbian aristocracy. Although most of the territories formerly held by Stephen IV followed approximately the same pattern when the secession from the Serbian mainland occurred, Epirus was a special case. Epirote events traced their roots deeply in the history of the region and can be explained only by a comparison with the period of the independent local despotate (1204-1337). In fact, in 1367 Epirus had reverted to its former condition, since three lordships were installed along its borders. Though it was not until 1416 that the old principality was restored under the government of a single ruler, the separation of the region from the body of the successor states of the Serbian empire was permanent. Local elites had gradually developed separatist feelings during the years of the despotate and a revival of the old political traditions was simply the most natural outcome when the strong leadership of Stephen IV was replaced by the feeble government of his son Stephen V.

Ce colloque consacré au Péloponnèse était le sixième d'une série de rencontres organisées par les Amis du Musée numismatique, autour d'une province particulière de l'espace grec, en collaboration avec les Éphories locales et les Centres de recherche qui y sont actifs. Puisque le colloque s'est tenu à Argos, l'École française d'Athènes s'y est tout naturellement investie et assume aujourd'hui la coédition des Actes. Le nombre des ateliers péloponnésiens autant que l'importance historique de la péninsule, à toutes époques, font de cet Obolos10 l'un des projets les plus ambitieux de la collection. Par commodité, l'ample matière a été répartie en deux volumes, consacrés le premier à la période antique, le second aux époques postérieures, de Byzance jusqu'à la fondation de l'État grec moderne. La production locale ou l'approvisionnement de la Péninsule en espèces monétaires à l'époque byzantine paraissent pauvres, si on les compare aux très abondantes émissions antiques, locales ou importées. Cette relative pénurie documentaire n'en rend que plus insignes tous les témoins retrouvés et patiemment enregistrés, qu'il s'agisse d'émissions impériales, de sceaux, de productions monétaires des Latins ou des Vénitiens, jusques et y compris la médaille du premier gouverneur de l'État grec moderne, IoannissKapodistrias. Par l'ampleur de la moisson ici engrangée et la qualité des contributions, ce volume constitue un apport décisif pour l'histoire des périodes médiévales et modernes dans le Péloponnèse, de nature à stimuler durablement la recherche dans les domaines concernés. Το Συνέδριο, αφιερωµένο στην Πελοπόννησο, είναι το έκτο (ΣΤ΄) στη σειρά των «Επιστηµονικών Συναντήσεων» που έχουν διοργανώσει µέχρι σήµερα «Οι Φίλοι του Νοµισµατικού Μουσείου», οι οποίοι επιλέγουν κάθε φορά µια διαφορετική περιφέρεια της ελληνικής επικράτειας προκειµένου να εξετασθεί η νοµισµατική παραγωγή και κυκλοφορία σε αυτήν, διαχρονικά. Οι διοργανωτές, κατά πάγια τακτική τους, συνεργάζονται µε τους τοπικούς επιστηµονικούς φορείς, όπως Εφορείες Αρχαιοτήτων, Πανεπιστήµια ή Ερευνητικά κέντρα. Στην προκειµένη περίπτωση, καθώς το Συνέδριο πραγµατοποιήθηκε στο Άργος, ήταν απολύτως φυσικό να αναλάβει και η Γαλλική Αρχαιολογική Σχολή Αθηνών το δικό της ρόλο και σήµερα τον εκπληρώνει ως συνεκδότης των Πρακτικών. Το πλήθος νοµισµατοκοπείων της Πελοποννήσου και η ιδιαίτερη ιστορική σηµασία της διαχρονικά, αναδεικνύουν τον Οβολό 10 ίσως το πιο φιλόδοξο πόνηµα της σειράς. Για πρακτικούς λόγους το πλούσιο συγγραφικό υλικό που συγκεντρώθηκε, µοιράστηκε σε δύο τόµους: ο πρώτος αφορά τους αρχαίους χρόνους, ο δεύτερος τις µεταγενέστερες εποχές, από το Βυζάντιο ως το νεώτερο Ελληνικό κράτος. Οι «Μέσοι χρόνοι» –βυζαντινή περίοδος και δυτικός µεσαίων– στην Πελοπόννησο, αποδεικνύονται πτωχοί, αναφορικά µε τις τοπικές νοµισµατικές εκδόσεις, αλλά και µε τις αντίστοιχες εισηγµένες, σε σύγκριση µε τους αρχαίους χρόνους, και τις ιδιαίτερα πλούσιες νοµισµατικές εκδόσεις, προϊόντα των οποίων, τοπικά ή εισηγµένα, κυκλοφόρησαν στην Πελοπόννησο. Ωστόσο, η γνωστή και περιορισµένη αριθµητικά παρουσία των παραπάνω εκδόσεων των «Μέσων χρόνων», αναδεικνύει σε αξιοπρόσεκτη και πολύ ενδιαφέρουσα µαρτυρία, τα νέα ευρήµατα που έρχονται στο φως, και τα οποία εξετάσθηκαν µε την ευκαιρία του παρόντος Συνεδρίου. ∆ιαχρονικά, αυτά τα ευρήµατα είναι αυτοκρατορικές κοπές, µολυβδόβουλλα, εκδόσεις της βενετοκρατίας και λατινοκρατίας, αλλά και ένα µετάλλιο του κυβερνήτη της Ελλάδας Ιω. Καποδίστρια. Η συλλογή των άρθρων του δεύτερου τόµου, µε σηµαντικό θεµατικό εύρος και ιδιαίτερη ποιότητα, αποτελεί αναµφίβολα αξιόλογη συµβολή στη µελέτη των «Μέσων χρόνων» για την Πελοπόννησο.

Т.нар. „гръцки” проект на суверенния католически военномонашески орден на св. Йоан Йерусалимски, известен още като орден на хоспиталиерите, е отдавна познат на историческата наука. Неотдавна  френският историк Ален Демюрже го нарече „неудачната гръцка авантюра на хоспиталиерите”. Въпреки категоричността на това изказване, изненадващо голям брой други съвременни историци (като например Норман Хаузли или Христо Матанов) оценяват твърде положително значимостта на някои от политическите аспекти на „гръцкия” проект на хоспиталиерите, като например ролята му за спирането на турското настъпление срещу п-в Пелопонес през периода 1397-1402 г. В съвременната медиевистика липсва обобщителен труд по проблемите, свързани с този т.нар. от мен „гръцки проект” на ордена, поради което неговите политически аспекти (и дори самото му съществуване!) остават недостатъчно изяснени. Тази студия представлява опит да се хвърли светлина върху споменатия проект, причините за неговото възникване и връзката му с няколко по-големи проблеми на средновековната политическата история, като например завладяването на територията на дн. Гърция от османските турци, кръстоносните походи в Леванта през XIV в. или политическата раздробеност на Балканите в навечерието на османското нашествие.

“Most cultural theorists saw network analysis as located squarely in the positivist camp, reducing cultural richness to 1s and 0s and lacking attention to processes of interpretation and meaning-construction.”; thus Ann Mische in 2011 summed up attitudes towards network analysis which are still strong also in many circles of historical studies.  Of course, these verdicts were not entirely unfounded, as Mustafa Emirbayer and Jeff Goodwin pointed out in 1994 in their influential paper on „Network Analysis, Culture, and the Problem of Agency“: “despite its powerful conceptualization of social structure, network analysis as it has been developed to date has inadequately theorized the causal role of ideals, beliefs, and values, and of the actors that strive to realize them; as a result, it has neglected the cultural and symbolic moment in the very determination of social action.”  Although meanwhile various theoretical concepts and models of “relational sociology” have been developed , the cultural dimension is still underrepresented in many works of quantitatively oriented social and also historical network analysis. In this paper, I will present the explanatory value of some of these relational approaches to social reality for historical research and their combination with quantitative network analysis. For various case studies, the actual interplay between the structural and the cultural dimension of social, religious, economic, political or intellectual linkages between individuals, groups, communities, but also cultural concepts will be demonstrated.

The title of the article runs in English “The Chronicle of Morea – A Mystery from the Crusade era”. It was intended for a book about Byzantine literature for a wider audience that developed into a more scholarly one. Nevertheless, the article introduces the Chronicle of Morea mainly on a very general level in Finnish.

‘The correspondence of Pope Gregory XI for the defence of Latin Greece: The Duchies of Athens and Neopatras in the face of the Ottoman peril’

In November 1372, responding to a dramatic appeal made by Franciscus, the Latin archbishop of Neopatria, Pope Gregory XI (1370-1378) addressed a bulla to a series of Christian kingdoms, feudal states and cities. The main goal in the papal correspondence was to call a Council next year (1 October 1373) at Thebes, in an attempt to deal with the Ottoman threat.
This was a turning point in the history of the Catalan Duchies of Athens and Neopatras, as well as of the broader area. Viewed through time, the policy of the Holy See towards the Catalan Company started gradually to change already during the 1340s. A decisive factor for this development was the impact of the increasing Turkish attacks in the Aegean. After the crossing of the Ottomans to Europe (Gallipoli, 1354) it would shortly become evident that haphazard efforts by Christian forces could not repel the menace coming from the East. The Ottoman successes in Thrace (from 1361 onwards) made clear that they constituted a permanent danger, while the Turkish infiltration in Greece made quite an impression in the West. Gregory XI followed the steps of his predecessors and made several attempts to orchestrate a crusade which might be able to restrain the Turkish flood, however during that period the resources of Papacy and of the Christian Levant were quite limited; a glance is also taken at the cost of crusading for the Holy See.
Regarding Franciscus of Neopatras, the person responsible for the "lamentable report" of the situation, only a few pieces of information can be gathered. The study of certain letters of Gregory XI ― among else a formerly unpublished letter from the Vatican Archive (Reg. Vat. 264, ff. 76v-77r; 17 November 1372) ― yields more clues for persons and events of that time, for the innate weaknesses of the papal plans, as well as for the reasons that led to the failure of the strategy of the Avignon Papacy. By 1393, within twenty years, many of the Latin strongholds in Greece (Neopatras included) had eventually collapsed under the Ottoman offensive.
A posteriori, the efforts of Gregory XI can be viewed within the ‘failure of tradition’ of the papal strategy of that period.

Παρουσίαση στο πλαίσιο του μεταπτυχιακού σεμιναρίου «Αραγώνιοι και Καταλανοί στην ανατολική Μεσόγειο. Πολιτική, κοινωνία, οικονομία» (Καθηγήτρια Μαρία Ντούρου-Ηλιοπούλου).
Presentation given within the postgraduate seminar "The Aragonese and the Catalans in the eastern Mediterranean. Policy, society, economy" (Professor Maria Dourou–Eliopoulou).

The so called chronicles of Ioannina and of the Toccos were written by two anonymous Greek citizens of Ioannina and report the history of the city and of Epirus from the second half of the 14th century until the first quarter of the 15th century. The first one, which was compiled during Esaù de’ Buodelmonti’s reign, could be described as a typical ‘city-cronicle’ and recounts the events of Thomas II Preljubović’s government on Ioannina and the first years his successor Esaù. The second one was written by an official of Charles I Tocco and is a sort of small ‘dinastic epopee’, having the members of the Tocco family and their struggle to reunite the former Despotate of Epirus as its main subjects. Although very different in the language, both chronicles barely arise some interest as literary pieces since they were probably meant to circulate only among the Greek archons of Ioannina and the courts of the Italian rulers of Epirus. As it is common for byzantine historiography, the chronicles strictly reproduce the political horizons of their potential readers and because of that they are an extraordinary historical document to understand the mentality of the Epirote ruling classes. The judgements given by the authors to the populations fighting for the supremacy in the region are the most significant in this perspective inasmuch they give us a clear picture of how local élites felt towards their masters and their opponents. The Italians are always praised as respectful of the Church and of the Epirote notables and their heresy is simply concealed, since they were perceived as the instrument to restore the former unity and authonomy of the Despotate. Preljubović and his fellow Serbians are inevitably evil and only useful to repel and massacre the infamous Albanians, who, being the principal opponents of the Italian lords, are denoted as a receptacle of every human basesness. Even the Turks are sometimes eulogised when their intervention is helpful to the despots’ plans and their Islamic faith is noticed solely whenever they act hostilely or supporting the Albanian chiefs.

Immediately after the death of tsar Stephen IV of Serbia (1355), the empire he had forged quickly split in a number of autonomous principalities, which were ruled by his former generals and by prominent member of the Serbian aristocracy. Although most of the territories formerly held by Stephen IV followed approximately the same pattern when the secession from the Serbian mainland occurred, Epirus was a special case. Epirote events traced their roots deeply in the history of the region and can be explained only by a comparison with the period of the independent local despotate (1204-1337). In fact, in 1367 Epirus had reverted to its former condition, since three lordships were installed along its borders. Though it was not until 1416 that the old principality was restored under the government of a single ruler, the separation of the region from the body of the successor states of the Serbian empire was permanent. Local elites had gradually developed separatist feelings during the years of the despotate and a revival of the old political traditions was simply the most natural outcome when the strong leadership of Stephen IV was replaced by the feeble government of his son Stephen V.

S'examinen els arguments que han portat Miquel Crusafont i Sabater a atribuir a la Gran Companyia Catalana algunes de les peces que corregueren en els territoris grecs durant la seva dominació durant l'edat mitjana. La majoria d'aquests arguments s'han extret d'un article d'A.J. Seltman, publicat el 1971. Aquest treball sorgí d'un treball que contradeia aquesta atribució.

Published in: Islam and Christianity in Medieval Anatolia, ed. by A.C.S. Peacock, Bruno De Nicola and Sara Nur Yıldız, all at the University of St Andrews, UK. Ashgate 2015 (http://www.ashgate.com/default.aspx?page=637&calcTitle=1&isbn=9781472448637&lang=cy-gb)

The ports and coastal zones constituted the most important points of interaction between the interior of Anatolia and the Mediterranean world; only along the 600 km long coast of Lycia and Pamphylia, for instance, medieval sources list almost 100 ports and landing places.  With the (anew) advance of the Seljuks towards the coast (conquest of Attaleia/Antalya in 1207, conquest of Sinope in 1214) and the increasing presence of Italian merchants in the harbours of the Aegean, the Black Sea and the Levant, maritime Asia Minor became a zone of intensive contacts between Byzantines (after 1204 in the exile realms of Nicaea and Trebizond), Armenians (in the Kingdom of Cilicia), Turks, Persians and Arabs (in the Sultanate of Konya) and “Latins” respectively “Franks”, thus also between Orthodox, Oriental and Western Churches as well as Islam (in its various denominations). With the fragmentation of Seljuk central power after the defeat against the Mongols in 1243 into various Emirates and their expansion especially into Western Asia Minor towards the Aegean and the establishment of Italian colonies (including “Catholic” bishoprics) in coastal towns and offshore islands (e. g. the Genoese on Chios and in Phokaia/Foça) and of the Knights Hospitallers on Rhodes, the number of zones of interaction, but also conflict increased (relocation of crusading efforts towards the Aegean in the 14th century, for instance). At the same time, Venetians and Genoese integrated all these locations and regions as hubs and nodes into their commercial networks and into the late medieval “World System”.  With the Ottoman Expansion, these territories were absorbed into one imperial framework once more (as it has existed under Byzantine rule until the 11th century), which finally also included the remaining western colonies (Rhodes in 1522/1523, Chios in 1566, Cyprus in 1571). During this period, “no other region of Europe or the Mediterranean became a cynosure of so many ethnicities in such a small place”.
Some of these aspects, such as the intensive trade between Venetian Crete and the Emirates in South-western Anatolia or the Genoese and the Turks in the 14th and 15th century , the military conflict between Crusaders and Turks in the Aegean  or the establishment of Latin monastic communities and bishoprics in the region  have already been analysed in greater detail. The same is true for aspects of religious transformations (especially conversions to Islam) in the region in the early modern period  as well as in late medieval centuries, but less so for maritime aspects of the organisation, identity and dynamics of various religious groups.  A view from the sea towards the coasts of Anatolia also opens a new perspective away from a “continental” overlapping of competing territorial claims towards a sum of potential nodal points within the late medieval network of socioeconomic interactions, which often modified or even overcame lines of religious, ethnic or political differentiation.
As we demonstrate in this paper, there existed various and manifold channels of encounters across religious border in maritime Asia Minor; their systematic survey and mapping contributes to a further embedding of the processes of political, economic and religious transformation in Anatolia in these centuries within the late medieval Mediterranean and Islamic world, complementary to already existing projects just as “The Islamisation of Anatolia” (https://www.islam-anatolia.ac.uk/).