The New Roman Empire

At New Years, a friend gave me a copy of The New Roman Empire: A History of Byzantium by Anthony Kaldellis. Having read through it, I have a considerably clearer notion of that empire, as regards its periodic contraction and growth, the dynasties that ruled it, and the management of the church councils that established dogma. Considerably clearer, but only so clear: the alternation of Palaiologos and Kantakouzenos, the despots of Epeiros and the Morea, and many other details remain vague. I suppose that a second reading would clear this up, but since the book has 918 pages, not counting end matter, a second reading will have to wait for a while.

I wonder about a number of points, including the account given of theological developments. To take an example from late in the book, Kaldellis makes Gregory of Palamas sound less serious than Jaroslav Pelikan does in The Spirit of Eastern Christendom.

 And Kaldellis is out to vindicate the eastern empire against the sins and biases of the West. No doubt the West has much of it coming. Still, he writes

The Latinization of Greek names ("Comnenus") and worse, their Anglicization ("John") is an offensive form of cultural imposition. It is practiced for no other culture except the "Byzantines," whose very name as a people ("Romans") has been deemed inadmissible for centuries.

(page 7). Here one recalls Frederick the Great, Philip II, the Archduke Charles, assorted Saints Francis and so on among those with Anglicized names. Didn't the Romans use the term "Scythian" rather loosely?

The index is imperfect, which is not surprising in a book of this length, but can be confusing. As an example, consider the entry for "Scholarios, Georgios Gennadios". The first four entries are for pages 327, 332, 898, and 901. Pages 327 and 332 refer to a magister militum and an exarch in sixth-century North Africa, who I suppose could be the same person. Page 898 speaks of "Gennadios, the first patriarch of Constantinople after the fall". Page 901, more satisfactorily, has "Georgios Scholarios (the later patriarch Gennadios II)".

 

 But most of this is quibbling. I am grateful to have received the book and glad to have read it. I will certainly read at least parts of it again.