{"title":"Maximos the Confessor as a Letter Writer: Genre Etiquette in the Letters of the Seventh-century Byzantine Theologian","authors":"D. Chernoglazov","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2022.50.013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2022.50.013","url":null,"abstract":"So far, the collection of letters of Maximos the Confessor (580–662) has not been studied from the point of view of philology. The purpose of this article is to analyse Maximos’ letters as examples of epistolary prose and to find out the extent to which the author follows the etiquette norms of letter writing developed in the Early Byzantine Period. The attention is focused on three motifs related to the theme of friendship: the illusion of friend’s presence; unity of souls; reproach for the lack of letters. It has been shown that Maximos was aware of the letter etiquette norms, and that his letters contained a number of motifs and formulae belonging to the Early Byzantine tradition, but at the same time, Maximos rethought and transformed some already established commonplaces, sometimes entering into a dispute with the previous tradition. In addition, it has been demonstrated that Maximos’ letters contain motifs and clichés correlating with not the Early Byzantine tradition, but rather the letters of later authors, such as Michael Psellos, Theodore Prodromos, and others. It has been supposed that Maximos’ letters influenced later authors, thus forming a link between the Early and Middle Byzantine epistolography.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67248254","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Ottoman Presence in Thessalonike in 1387–1402: The View of Late Byzantine Intellectuals","authors":"N. Zhigalova","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2022.50.020","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2022.50.020","url":null,"abstract":"This article addresses the views of Late Byzantine writers on the problem of the Ottoman presence in Thessalonike in 1387–1402. Taking the materials from the works of the archbishops of the city Isidore Glabas (1380–1396) and Symeon (1416/17–1429), as well as Manuel Palaiologos, the governor of Thessalonike in 1382–1387, into account, this study analyses the circumstances that preceded the surrender of the city to the Ottomans, as well as the reasons that led to the transfer of Thessalonike under the rule of the Turks. The author concludes that the lack of assistance from Constantinople, the hardships of the siege (1383–1387), and the flight from the city of Despot Manuel and Archbishop Isidore Glabas led to the voluntary surrender of Thessalonike to the Turks. There were no significant changes in the city administration, and the city council continued working. However, in defiance of the agreement providing the Christian population of Thessalonike with a number of tax benefits and religious immunity, many churches in the city were looted, and the townspeople soon lost the previously promised tax privileges and were obliged to pay the “blood tax,” i. e. to participate in the devşirme system. Trying to turn their flocks away from cooperation with the Ottoman conquerors, the archbishops in their sermons urged the townspeople to avoid contact with the Turks and condemned marriages with Muslims contracted in Thessalonike as these, in their opinion, threatened the Romaioi’s religious identity. However, under the conditions of Thessalonike being under the rule of the Ottomans, the Turkish settlers actively developing the nearby lands, and the Romaioi having to interact with the Turks, the exhortations of church hierarchs did not find a response from the population wanting calm and peaceful life.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67248736","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Visualization of the Image of the Nile: Cultural and Geographical Environment of Nilotic Scenes fromthe Julio-Claudian Period","authors":"M. S. Chistalev","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2022.50.001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2022.50.001","url":null,"abstract":"This article addresses the problem of the cross-cultural dialogue between Egypt and Rome on the example of the image of the Nile, visually embodied in the Nilotic scenes. The geographical scope of the research is limited to the territory of Italy, since this region most accurately reflected the Roman perception of Egyptian culture and was least dependent on the historical prejudices of inhabitants of other provinces of the Roman Empire. It is emphasized that the particularity of the Nilotic scenes is that they are based not on a set of predetermined illustrations of the daily life of the Egyptians, but on a stylistic image that unites the themes of the Nile Flood. Simultaneously, the Nilotic scenes under study have several common features. First, there always is an image of the water element, which in most cases is quite accurately identified as a river valley. Second, there is a typical Nilotic flora and fauna. Third, images of river vessels often occur: from single reed shuttles to ships with deck superstructures and a crew of several people. Fourth and finally, the inhabitants of the Nile Valley are represented as dwarfs. The conclusion is that the political component, which was supposed to remind of the events of the late first century BC, was embodied in special ways of artistic expression of Egyptian realities, particularly in the appearance of dwarfs in the Nilotic scenes. In certain cases, the political context could also be highlighted with colour, such as in the frescoes from the cubicula of the House of Livia on the Palatine Hill, where the yellow frame symbolizes the Golden Age and the glory of Augustus, recalling his victory over Egypt. Generally, the given research suggests that, from the reign of the Julio-Claudians on, the image of the Nile gradually became involved in the process of transformation of the topoi of the Egyptian civilization into symbols of the new Roman imperial culture. Egypt became a part of the Roman world, and the empire accepted and accommodated cultural diversity of the new province.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67247310","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Early Palaiologan Hagiography: “Old” and “New” Saints under the Shadow of Symeon Metaphrastes","authors":"L. Lukhovitskiy","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2022.50.017","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2022.50.017","url":null,"abstract":"This article focuses on the hagiographical rewriting from the Palaiologan Period. Having outlined the corpus of relevant texts, the author discusses the two paradigms that currently permeate the scholarship dealing with the Late Byzantine hagiography, the “old saints” paradigm and the “metaphrasis” paradigm. Both approaches, despite their indisputable heuristic value, do not take into consideration all aspects of hagiographical rewriting in the period in question. The first paradigm is not adequate because, first, it is virtually impossible to determine how great the chronological distance between the hero and the text must be to make him or her “old”, and, second, because the life of old saint does not amount to a rewriting; vice versa, a rewritten text does not necessarily mean that we are dealing with the life of old saint. Regarding the second approach, the term “metaphrasis” inevitably creates an association with the metaphrastic Menologion, which is not entirely justifiable because the early Palaiologan hagiographic corpus differs from it minimum in four important ways: these texts are often transmitted in authorial collections (instead of menologia); they were composed on occasion (instead of being part of a prearranged program); they have individual (instead of collective) authorship; the rewriting techniques allow for major alterations in the contents and are rarely limited to passage-for-passage transposition.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67248189","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"New Byzantine Lead Seal from the Area of the Medieval Fortress of Rusokastro (South-Eastern Bulgaria)","authors":"N. Kanev","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2021.49.009","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2021.49.009","url":null,"abstract":"This paper analyses a Byzantine lead seal discovered in 2019 and now residing in the Regional Historical Museum in Burgas (Bulgaria). According to the legend, it belonged to a Byzantine official Michael by name, who held the position of (imperial) protonotarios and judge. This seal originates from the area of the medieval fortress of Rusokastro located in south-eastern Bulgaria. The obverse depicts facing bust of St. Archangel Michael, nimbate, wearing mail armour, which is encircled with the border of dots. The image is framed with a partially preserved continuous circle. Archangel Michael holds a spear in his right hand, with its top part partially worn off by mechanical damage. To the right of the spear is well legible letter M, and to the left of the image, at the worn off flattened area of the field, there is a relatively well-preserved letter X, i. e. abbreviations of the name of St. Archangel Michael. On the reverse is an inscription in four lines reading: “+ Lord help Michael, (imperial?) protonotarios and judge.” The seal dates from the tenth to the early eleventh century.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67246876","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Winegrower’s Knives in the Mediaeval Crimea","authors":"V. Gantsev","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2021.49.011","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2021.49.011","url":null,"abstract":"This paper addresses the archaeological evidence of the development of viticulture in the mediaeval Crimea as a specialized branch of agriculture. Although the scholarship mentions the areas where vines were planted (Dimitraki hollow, the vicinity of the castle of Siuiren’, Mangup, etc.), these publications do not provide any appropriate descriptions or illustrations. Therefore, reliable archaeological sources include primarily the finds of special winegrower’s knives with a curved (crescent-shaped) blade. There are three zones of their distribution in the south-western (vicinity of Cherson, Eski-Kermen, Mangup, and the vicinity of the castle of Siuiren’), south-eastern (Tepsen’ and Kordon-Oba), and southern Crimea (Isar-Kaia and the vicinity of the castle of Funa). Their chronology covers the period from the eighth to thirteenth centuries. There are two main groups of winegrower’s knives determined according to their morphological features: group 1 comprises tanged knives and group 2 socketed knives. Each group is divided into two subgroups, depending on the presence or absence of a special trapezoidal protrusion, or “axe”, on the back of the blade. The iconographic materials demonstrate that winegrower`s knives of subgroup 1B occurred in the Late Byzantine Period (tanged winegrower’s knife with a sub-rectangular “axe” on the back of the blade). Western European Late Mediaeval miniatures demonstrate the functional use of winegrower`s knives of subgroup 1A (small tanged knives with no “axe”) intended for cutting bunches of grapes.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67247090","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Sasanian Pseudo-Signet-Ring Excavated at the Palace of Mangup: The Aspects of Its Attribution and Interpretation","authors":"V. Naumenko, A. G. Gertsen","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2021.49.007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2021.49.007","url":null,"abstract":"In 2006, the excavation of the palace of the rulers of the Principality of Theodoro (1425–1475) in the central area of the ancient town of Mangup (south-western Crimea) uncovered a unique at this site signet-ring of yellowish chalcedony made in the sixth or early seventh century in Sasanian Iran. This find belongs to a group of the so-called pseudo-signet-rings (muhr); it shows an ellipsoidal shape (flattened hemisphere) with a narrow channel for hanging on the neck, wrist, or belt. On the shield of the signet-ring there is an image of a mountain sheep (аrhar) with steeply curved horns, lying to the left, with the legs tucked. It was accompanied with a number of official symbols of the ruling dynasty in the Sassanian State: the royal bow ashkharavand (of a ribbon tied round a front leg of the animal), a crescent with the horns upward (a young Moon, one of the symbols of the dynasty), and atashdan (Zoroastrian temple altar with burning fire). The composition of this image goes back to the legend about the founder of the Sassanian dynasty King Ardashir I (224–240), who defeated the last Parthian ruler Artaban V (213–224) and ascended the throne with the help from the deity of royal power, victory, might, luck, and glory Farr embodied in the mountain ram. Therefore, the first owner of the signet-ring was a member of the privileged part of the Sassanian society, using the ring to make signature or as a sign of ownership when sealing personal documents and items of trade transactions. Considering the circumstances of the discovery of the Sassanian ring in the cultural layer of one of the largest Byzantine fortresses in Taurica obviously constructed at the end of the reign of Emperor Justinian I (527–565), it is hardly worth thinking of direct official correspondence between the local Byzantine administration and someone from Iranian correspondents or the presence of the military contingents from Persia. Most likely, the find in question was simply a trophy of a Byzantine officer who took part in one of the many Byzantine-Sassanian military campaigns of the second half of the sixth or the first third of the seventh centuries and then continued his service in the garrison of Mangup-Doros.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67247002","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Some Elements of Communication Theory in Theodore Metochites’ Memorable Notes (Ch. 1–26, 71)","authors":"Dmitri I. Makarov","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2021.49.017","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2021.49.017","url":null,"abstract":"This paper is aimed at the complex investigation of the communication and its ontological basis in Theodore Metochites’ (1270–1332) Memorable Notes (Semeioseis gnomikai). In the Memorable Notes Metochites oriented himself toward those authors who, like Plutarch, tried to discuss everything, including history, culture, and the being in general, in a philosophical manner. The speechlessness as the subject matter of Ch. 1 and 9 is compensated, according to Theodore, with a creative liberty and the possibility to discuss every topic, which is inherent to everybody, but, first and foremost, members of the intellectual elite. The conflict of these two ideas, i. e., of the speechlessness and of the liberty to think and speak, forms the antinomy of communication, being of importance for Theodore’s thought. Similar opinions of late medieval authors seemed to pave the way for Kant’s third antinomy. Moreover, the theme of the lack of something new to discuss and talk over continued the Aristotelian topics. Finally, in Metochites’ thought, the life of a human being, like those of society and cosmos as a whole, passes through the same stages as a person’s utterance: the cosmos history in its dynamics reminds speech or, more specifically, conversation or dialogue. This intertwinement of Aristotle’s ideas from De interpretatione with those from St. John’s Gospel prologue is a hallmark of that Byzantine-Christian Hellenism which was discussed in Antonio Garzya’s seminal paper of 1985. Besides, Theodore also discussed the unity of the notion of number among all the people. It means that it is the mathematical knowledge which can get a basis for a “conciliarity”, or “all-unity”, at least for the thinking part of the humankind. It is particularly important since the ultimate goal of communication is, therefore, a revealing of the ontological truth of things and events.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67247025","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Byzantine Elements of the Material Culture of the Thirteenth-Fourteenth Century Bosporos (On the Example of 2018 Excavation Trench)","authors":"V. Maiko","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2021.49.013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2021.49.013","url":null,"abstract":"This paper is the first to address the problem of the presence of Byzantine imports in the material culture of Bosporos from the second half of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. So far the degree of “Byzantinization” of the coastal towns in the eastern Taurica, which were finally absorbed by the Golden Horde in the third quarter of the thirteenth century and remained in its structure to the mid-fifteenth century, is a topical issue in the mediaeval Crimean studies. Although the greatest part of the artefacts made in Byzantium, represented mostly by ceramic ware and discovered in the thirteenth-fourteenth century horizons and buildings of Sougdaia, has already been introduced into the scholarship, parallel finds from Bosporos never became the subject of analysis. The reason is the poor studying of the latter and almost complete absence of published materials. The materials of large-scale protective excavations conducted in Kerch in 2018 certainly deserve attention. The vast majority of these finds date from the seventh to twelfth centuries. However, the materials from the second half of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries stand out to become the subject of this paper. Unfortunately, they are highly fragmented, but allowing the one to determine Byzantine imports and to compare their composition and quantity with similar products of Sougdaia.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67247290","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"On the History of the Soviet Byzantine Studies: The Correspondence of M. Ja. Sjuzjumov to Z. V. Udal’tsova","authors":"T. Kushch","doi":"10.15826/adsv.2021.49.020","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.15826/adsv.2021.49.020","url":null,"abstract":"This publication comprised the letters of Mikhail Jakovlevich Sjuzjumov, the founder of the Ural school of Byzantine Studies, to Zinaida Vladimirovna Udal’tsova, the head of the Soviet Byzantinology, with appropriate comments. The traces of their long-lasting epistolary communication reside in the Russian Academy of Sciences Archive and the State Archive of the Sverdlovsk Region as 55 letters by M. Ja. Sjuzjumov and 6 letters by Z. V. Udal’tsova. This almost 30-year-long correspondence enabled the Ural scholar to keep abreast of all what happened in the Soviet Byzantinology and to deal efficiently with organisational matters. The correspondence in question covered various topics related to Sjuzjumov’s scholarly and educational works: the organization of the defence of his doctoral dissertation, the preparation and publication of his articles and books, the discussion of his published academic works, the organization of conferences and his participation in them, the work in the editorial boards of Vizantiiskii Vremennik and collective volumes of the History of Byzantium, relations with colleagues, patronage of students, current university matters, etc. These letters also uncover Sjuzjumov’s concept of the genesis of feudalism and his position related to some disputable issues of the Byzantine and Mediaeval Studies. The publication of the main body of correspondence of the two twentieth-century Byzantologists sheds additional light on many pages in the history of Soviet Byzantine studies.","PeriodicalId":33782,"journal":{"name":"Antichnaia drevnost'' i srednie veka","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"67247113","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}