Byzantine Childhood: Representations and Experiences of Children in Middle Byzantine Society by Oana-Maria Cojocaru (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Byzantine Childhood: Representations and Experiences of Children in Middle Byzantine Society by Oana-Maria Cojocaru Despoina Ariantzi Byzantine Childhood: Representations and Experiences of Children in Middle Byzantine Society. By Oana-Maria Cojocaru. New York: Routledge, 2022. vii + 249 pp. Cloth $170.00, paper $52.95, e-book $39.71. In the past few decades, there has been growing interest in research on childhood and adolescence in Byzantium, as demonstrated by numerous publications, conferences, and research projects. The present book is the most recent example of the undiminished interest in this field. It is a reworked version of the author's PhD dissertation, which was defended at the University of Oslo in 2016. The study consists of a concise introduction, eight chapters, and a brief presentation of conclusions. Chronologically, the author concentrates on the period between the mid-ninth to the mid-eleventh centuries. In so doing, she relies primarily on fifty-four saints' lives (only nine of them dealing with female saints) along with other hagiographical genres, such as encomia. Inevitably, boys' childhoods feature much more prominently than those of girls. Wherever it is relevant and yields additional information, she also uses legal and medical texts, as well as integrating historical writings into her analysis. The author seeks to reconstruct a picture of Byzantine children's everyday life. This includes the ideals and concepts surrounding childhood, the daily experiences of children, and the life courses of Byzantine children. Crucial is the question of how Byzantine society perceived and treated children according to societal, religious, and cultural expectations surrounding age, gender, and status. Chapter 1 deals with the conception of childhood as a separate stage of life. Chapter 2 explores the demographic factors concerning Byzantine families. Chapter 3 focuses on the early stages of a child's life, such as birth, breastfeeding, and baptism. Chapter 4 discusses children's socialization in the domestic sphere through play, education, and work. Chapter 5 presents children's agency in religious rituals and the role of religious practices in the formation of child identity. Chapter 6 deals with family networks and the social life of the household. Chapter 7 examines aspects of a child's life within a monastic community. Chapter 8 attempts to describe a day in the life of four fictional children. [End Page 497] Unfortunately, the author does not explain the criteria for the chronological limits she chose for her study. Which sociopolitical or religious changes had an impact on childhood experiences and perceptions of childhood during the period in question, in comparison to the previous and following centuries? This methodological question remains unanswered. The book's structure follows almost faithfully an earlier study on childhood in Byzantium.1 Hence, of the eight chapters, seven have already been the subject of a systematic examination covering the period from the fourth to the twelfth century. Only the fictional reconstructions in Chapter 8, two of them about children growing up with their parents and the other two about children living in monasteries, can be regarded as innovative. Apart from that, experts familiar with studies of childhood in Byzantium will find relatively few new results or original approaches in this book. For the most part, it repeats and summarizes the conclusions of previous research, which are often not even referenced. Another problem has to do with the use of primary sources. The author relies heavily on texts that have been translated into modern languages, mainly English. However, in the vast field of Byzantine hagiography, there are still numerous untranslated and hitherto neglected texts that may yield new information (for this period: Gregory Akritas, Eustratios of Agauros, Demetrianos, Athanasios of Paulopetrion, Hilarion of Dalmatos, John of Kathara, Johv Psichaites, Makarios of Pelekete, Theodora of Kaisaris, Theodoros of Kythera, etc.). Most importantly perhaps, there are a number of French, German, and Greek publications on Byzantine childhood that are not listed in the bibliography or discussed in the various chapters (see, for instance, the studies by H. Antoniadis-Bibicou, E. Antonopoulos, D. Ariantzi, P. A. Giannopoulos, A. Kiousopoulou, A. Laiou, and Sp. Troianos). Overall, there is a strong preponderance of English publications with only a few titles in French and German. Older and more recent studies...