Byzantine

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 * 1) How did Constantinople's location (current day Istanbul) contribute to the spread of Islam?**
 * Constantinople was, in comparison, a fortified Athens. It was an entrepot that monopolized the Strait of Bosphorus, controlling and taxing all maritime trade going to and from the Mediterranean. Since Constantinople, on both sides of the strait, was a peninsula port with an undefeatable fleet until Uthman of the Islamic empire, the capital was nigh inconquerable. The durability of thecapital and the prosperous trade allowed Byzantine to flourish and thrive. It's location also permitted dominance of the coastal areas since its fleet empowered the armies.


 * 2) Outline Byzantine's Foundation and the Achievements of Justinian**
 * 1) Origins of the Empire
 * Began when **Constantine** established Constantinople as the eastern capital of the declining Roman empire
 * Controlled the Balkan peninsula, the Levant (northern Middle East), and northern Africa, and the Mediterranean
 * Latin was the court language and Greek was the common tongue pre-Justinian
 * Greek > Latin
 * Greek permitted Byzantines to study Hellenistic doctrines and treatises
 * Conquered and Hellenized the Egyptians and Syrians
 * Bureaucratic with a remote emperorship and elaborate procedure
 * Warded off attacks from East (Sasanid) and West (Germanic Tribes
 * 1) Justinian's Achievements (527 - 575)
 * Official Greek language
 * Crushed an insurgence with the help of his wife, **Theodora**, and his general, **Belisarius**
 * **Conquered old territories of the Roman Empire**
 * ** Belisarius' famous crossing of the Strait of Gibraltar**
 * Procopius voiced the beliefs of the public: Justinian was sly and a moron at the same time
 * Systemized Roman legal code
 * Strengthened the bureaucracy
 * Extended Roman architecture
 * Brilliant dome on top of the buildings
 * **Hagia Sophia**
 * [[image:http://www.awesomeplanet.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/hagia-sophia-02.jpg caption="The Hagia Sophia, the first domed building in which the base wasn't circular. One of the greatest Byzantine achievements of architecture."]]


 * 3) Justinian Code Mark-up.**

Summary: Justice is the desire for fair treatment and karmic rewards/punishment. The pursuit of justice is a science beyond morality, an art of principles that has to be studied and mastered. Law, a vehicle to pursue justice, is broken into three parts: Law of Nations, which is characteristic laws of a state, Law of Nature, natural rights, and Civil law, laws characteristic to a certain state. According to natural law, all men are born free and equal, but due to the natures of the laws of nation and civil law, the deprivation of freedom is permitted. Thusly, despite the divinity and finality of natural law, civil laws, of nations and state, supersede natural laws and men can only exist either free or not. In regards to the applications of natural laws, matrimony extends to civil laws. To promote the patriarchal society, the blessing and consent of the parents. In the case of eloping, the child is illegitimate and all rights extended by law from ancestry is denied. Past that, in society, by religion, incest and polygamy is immoral and sinfully thus punishable by law. In regards to non-free men, the lack of freedom is inherited but at any point, for any generation, emancipation and enfranchisement is achievable. Ultimately, there are rights not mentioned in the law code, but in the constitutio, which outlines rights and has the power in some cases to supersede these laws.


 * Byzantines were Roman, tried to assimilate/continue the fallen western culture.**
 * Justinian was the 7th emperor of 12.**
 * The chruch split can be tied with the drift from Latinate ideals.**
 * Document 2:**
 * Pertains to objects
 * A river is public but parts of it belong to people; expands to other objects
 * Using a public item, one reaps and owns those rewards
 * Religious areas belong to no one
 * Property is sacred/religious if you bury people


 * 4. Byzantine ESPIRIT**
 * E || * Would largely trade with the Mediterranean and the Middle East
 * Trade and commerce depended on Constantinople’s control of the Bosporus Strait and the bureaucracy’s ability to regulate prices
 * Food prices were generally low
 * The peasantry provided the bulk of the goods and tax revenues
 * Cities, like Athens, decreased in size due to the emphasis and needs of Constantinople
 * Established trade routes to China, Russia, Scandinavia, North Africa, the Western Kingdoms, and the Muslims
 * Began a lucrative silk industry from imported techniques
 * Other textiles -- carpets, cloths -- along with spice were large industries as well ||
 * S || * Greek was the common language, then official language post-Justinian.
 * Social unrest prior Justinian due to oppressive taxes
 * Suppressed by Belisarius and Theodora
 * Merchant class never flourished due to government constrictions ||
 * P || * Latin was the court language until the Justinian
 * Bureaucratic emperorship; allowed formerly disallowed peoples, like the Egyptians and Syrians, to participate in the Byzantine administration.
 * Anyone, from any station, could be a scholar- bureaucrat; primarily aristocratic - Similar to China's scholar bureaucracy
 * Justinian codified the Roman law
 * The emperor was believed to be ordained by God - Mandate of Heaven
 * Basically a theocracy because the emperor appointed church bishops.
 * Used spies to preserve loyalty and weed out subversion
 * Local recruitment of troops who were compensated with land grants that could be inherited if military service was continued
 * Localization increased as hereditary military leaders displaced the aristocracy
 * The military system (the two above-mentioned points)was effective in repelling attacks from Muslims and Huns ||
 * I || * Inherited Hellenistic and Roman doctrines and treatises and Roman architecture ||
 * R || * Christian
 * **Eastern Orthodox**
 * believed in the use of **icons** (challenged some of the acceptances of the Roman Catholics)
 * They allowed their priests to marry (breaking celibacy)
 * Did not believe in the ceremonial “breaking of the bread”
 * Recognized the Pope but refused to be under his rule as it would represent a separation from God.
 * Missionaries were sent throughout the land
 * ** Cyril ** and ** Methodius ** in 864 were able to convert a great number in the Balkans and south Russia
 * Devised a Slavic alphabet - **Cryllic**
 * Developed literature and literacy in eastern Europe outside of Byzantine ||
 * I || * The location of Constantinople (the entrepot of the Black Sea and the Mediterranean) put it into position to be influenced by Persians, Arab, and Western European influences.
 * **Hagia Sophia** was built as a church but Arab conquest would turn it into a mosque.
 * Conquered the Egyptians and the Levant
 * Warded off attacks
 * Originally from the Germanic warriors and Sasanian encroachments
 * Then Arabs during after mid-7th century
 * **Bulgaria** (defeated in 1014 by Basil II) and other Slavic kingdoms
 * Intermarriages and cultural diffusion from Byzantine eroded these kingdoms away
 * I n the 10th century, a Bulgarian king was called **tsar**, (czar, Russian) while a Slavic king was called Caesar (Kaiser, German)
 * Reconquered old Roman territories and parts of Spain
 * Established a naval supremacy of the Mediterranean that was defeated by the Arabs in the mid-7th century
 * Wars with the Arabs caused economic strains that empowered the aristocracy
 * The Seljuk Turks conquered most of their Asiatic provinces in the lath 11th century
 * Cut off the bulk of the tax revenues and food supply
 * **Battle of Manizkert** in 1071 destroyed the Byzantine's army
 * Decline allowed Slavic kingdoms to rise again, like Serbia
 * Conquered Byzantine in 1461
 * Western powers slowly conquered Byzantium
 * ** Fourth Crusade, ** funded by Venetian merchants, sacked Constantinople, undermined its bureaucratic emperorship ||
 * T || * Reintroduced the early Roman imperial architecture, while also incorporating new features like the large dome. (Ex. Hagia Sophia) - no one before ever had the technology to build supports for a dome its size
 * **Greek Fire**, an explosive that prevented Arab ships from capturing Constantinople ||

>> >> >> >> >>
 * 5. Questions on reading pg. 203-209**
 * 1) Who were Cyril and Methodius? What did they accomplish?
 * Cyril and Methodius were missionaries sent by Byzantine in 846 to convert the East Central borderlands. They failed but continued in the Balkans and South Russia where they won converts and created a Slavic alphabet, **Cyrillic**, that introduced literacy to the area.
 * 1) How did events in the Middle East affect the demographics of the East Central borderlands?
 * Jews fled the Middle East due to the Muslim surge and combined with the Jews fleeing western intolerance, a large Jewish community built up in the East Central borderlands, especially Poland. The Jews eventually became a prominent culture in Eastern Europe renown for their emphasis on education and literacy.
 * 1) Outline the development of the Kievan Rus.
 * During the Roman Empire, Slavic people migrated from Asia to the Russian plains
 * Assimilated and incorporated the indigenous people and invaders like Bulgarians //who assimilated Slavic culture//
 * Norse traders flowed through Slavic lands throughout the 6th and 7th century exchanging crude Slavic products and Byzantium and Arabic luxuries along the Russian rivers
 * **Kiev** was established
 * **Rurik** becomes the first prince in 855 C.E.
 * Thrived alongside the loosely organized principalities and land-owning aristocracies of Poland, Bohemia, Lithuania and other Balkan kingdoms
 * 1) What important decision was made by Vladimir I?
 * Vladimir, who riled from 980 - 1015, decided to adopt Orthodox Christianity as the official religion of Kiev. He coerced conversions and established a separate church, the **Russian Orthodox.**
 * 1) What were some of the major similarities and differences between Byzantium and the Kievan Rus?
 * Kievans adopted Christianity, developed an educated clergy, and the idea of religious officials appointed by the state. A formal law code was instated and codified, state-run courts were established, and Hellenistic knowledge was transfered into Slavic. However, the Kievan Rus did not a scholarly-bureaucratic emperorship in which the emperor exercised great, widespread power. This inability to exercise unquestionable power prevented the Russian state and church from restricting oral traditions, street performances, and other forms of entertainment deemed pagan.
 * 1) What factors led to the decline of the Kievan Rus?
 * Rivalries among the princes and succession quarrels
 * Asian invaders
 * Mongols/**Tatars** from 1237-1238 and 1240-124 captured Russian cities
 * Remained under Tatar control for over two centuries
 * Russian literature declined
 * Trade declined in all four directions and never recovered
 * Decline of Byzantium trade
 * Decline of their own reciprocally


 * 6. Summary of "Eastern and Western Europe: The Problem of Boundaries" p.208**
 * A number of states exist as border/buffer areas
 * Political disputes and nationalism also attributed to difficulties
 * To disseminate by mainstream culture, which includes religion, several Baltic and Borderland kingdoms would be Western while the Slavs and Russians were primarily Orthodox
 * Disseminations by politics was made difficult by loose states
 * Trading patterns also conflict the mainstream cultural tie

The Byzantine Empire was a pivotal force in the postclassical era because of its position, domain, and culture. Byzantine succeeded Rome as the principal European force with Constantinople as an entrepot between various cultures. Since they adopted Hellenistic and Roman ideas, classical knowledge was revived and expanded throughout the world -- the Arabs made huge strides from the Hellenistic doctrines. Since Bynzaintes were also Christians, the world saw a surge in Christianity, but due to the differences between the Byzantium and Western views, the church split into two sects. Ultimately, the trade patterns established by the Byzantines helped neighboring kingdoms, like Kievan Rus, to develop and added to the synergism and dynamsim of the world. As Byzantine fell, the last Eastern European stronghold against the surge of Islam fell and the continued exposure is critical to later civilizations.
 * 7. Summary**