1st Edition
The Emperor in the Byzantine World Papers from the Forty-Seventh Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies
List of figures; Foreword; List of contributors; List of abbreviations; Note on spelling of names; Introduction, Shaun Tougher; Part I: Dynasty: Imperial families; 1. Family, dynasty, and the construction of legitimacy from Augustus to the Theodosians, Mark Humphries; 2. The shifting importance of dynasty in Heraclian ideology, Mike Humphreys; 3. Revisiting the bachelorhood of Basil II, Mark Masterson; 4. Byzantine emperors and sultans of Rūm: Sharing power?, Dimitri Korobeinikov; Part II: The emperor’s Men: Court and empire; 5. Celibacy and survival in court politics in the fifth century AD, Meaghan McEvoy; 6. The emperor’s ‘significant others’: Alexios I Komnenos and his ‘Pivot to the West’, Jonathan Shepard; 7. Who was who at the court of Constantine XI, 1449-1453, Jonathan Harris; Part III: The emperor as ruler: Duties and ideals; 8. ‘Law is king of all things’? The emperor and the law, Bernard H. Stolte; 9. The emperor at war: Duties and ideals, Frank R. Trombley and Shaun Tougher; Part IV: Imperial literature: Emperor as subject and author; 10. Imperial panegyric: Hortatory or deliberative oratory?, John Vanderspoel; 11. The iconoclast saint: Emperor Theophilos in Byzantine hagiography, Oscar Prieto Domínguez; 12. Splendour, vigour, and legitimacy: The prefaces of the Book of Ceremonies (De cerimoniis) and Byzantine imperial theory, Prerona Prasad; 13. Ideological and political contestations in post-1204 Byzantium: The orations of Niketas Choniates and the imperial court of Nicaea, Nikolaos G. Chrissis; 14. The emperor in the History of John VI Kantakouzenos (1347-1354), Savvas Kyriakidis; Part V: The material emperor: Image, space and empire; 15. The emperor at the threshold: Making and breaking taxis at Hagia Sophia, Alicia Walker; 16. Taking it on the road: The palace on the move, Lynn Jones; 17. Unveiling Byzantium in Wales: Connections and collections, Mark Redknap; Index
Biography
Shaun Tougher is Reader in Ancient History at Cardiff University. He specialises in late Roman and Byzantine political and social history. His publications include The Reign of Leo VI (886–912) (1997), Julian the Apostate (2007), The Eunuch in Byzantine History and Society (2008), Emperor and Author: The Writings of Julian the Apostate (2012, co-edited with Nicholas Baker-Brian), and Approaches to the Byzantine Family (2013, co-edited with Leslie Brubaker). He is a Series Editor for Palgrave Macmillan’s New Approaches to Byzantine History and Culture.
"The Emperor in the Byzantine World is coherent and mostly quite readable... it is a welcome contribution" - Mike Markowitz, The NYMAS Review
"This book is very useful, as it allows us to draw up an idea of the functioning of the State around the emperor. What remains to be studied is who was the emperor himself, but further research will certainly help us understand more in the future."- Paolo Odorico, Sehepunkte
