Between Byzantium and Outremer: considerations on leprosy in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem
Esteban Augusto GREIF
Original title: Entre Bizancio y Outremer: consideraciones sobre la lepra en el Reino Latino de Jerusalén
Published in Society and Culture in Portugal
Keywords: Byzantium, Continuity, Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, Leper.
In the last years, the comprehension and understanding of leprosy and the social place of the leper as a rejected and stigmatized subject from society during the Middle Ages, have change. In this way, had come to light a new interpretation that detached the integration of those who suffer this disease. Similarly, the view of the leprosarium as spaces of social segregation was revised. Besides, new investigations about the treatment of this disease in the world of the Eastern Mediterranean started to appear. However, the analysis of the circulation of knowledge and practices between the East and the West were not frequent. Thus, our proposal, it is located into this space and tries to comprehend which was the social treatment of leprosy and lepers from the byzantine world that impacted in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem.
Perception of otherness in the Chronikè Diéghesis of Niketas Choniates (c.1155-1217)
Marica COSTIGLIOLO
Original title: Percezione dell’alterità nell’opera Chronikè Diéghesis di Niceta Coniata (c.1155-1217)
Published in Intercultural Mediterranean
Keywords: Byzantium, Mediterranean, Niketas Choniates, Otherness.
Language:
The Mediterranean and Byzantium are crucial for understanding the cultural interactions between different peoples and different traditions. In this paper I will examine the work Chronikè Diéghesis by Niketas Choniates (c. 1155-1217) to highlight the profound cultural exchange in the Eastern Empire. These exchanges occurred in the most disparate ways, and with trade and military apparatus. Therefore, I will trace a theoretical paradigm for the analysis of otherness, throughout the works of contemporary philosophers, to highlight the salient characteristics of Chronikè Diéghesis in relation to the perception of cultural difference.
The Hagiographical Relations between Byzantium and the West during the Middle Byzantine Period
Spyros P. PANAGOPOULOS
Original title: Las relaciones hagiográficas entre Bizancio y Occidente durante el período bizantino medio
Published in War and Disease in Antiquity and the Middle Ages
Keywords: Byzantium, Hagiography, Middle Byzantine Period, Pilgrimage-relics, West.
In the present study a special reference is made to the hagiographical relations between Byzantium and the West. The first part is dedicated to the “communication” of Byzantium with the West, on the role played by the Lives of Byzantine Saints, the transfer and honor of their relics and pilgrimages. The phenomenon developed after the 4th century, when an attempt was made to create a liturgical and worship communication between the two Churches and the Roman Martyrologium was formed in the West. The second part is dedicated to the “communication” of the West in Byzantium through the honor of the western Saints. In the next paragraph, we talk about "communication" through the holy relics of the Saints, and it is found that the phenomenon mainly concerned Saints of the East. The paper closes with some introductory notes on translators’ translation options and techniques.
The church of San Marco in the eleventh century
Elena Ene D-VASILESCU
Published in Mirabilia Journal 31 (2020/2)
Keywords: Byzantium, Dominico Selvo, Emperor Henry IV, St Mark’s church, The eleventh century, Venice.
In 1084 the most important of the few consecrations of St Mark’s church in Venice – that which solemnized the completion of its largest altar – took place. It is assumed that Doge Dominico Selvo (1071-1084) assigned Byzantine mosaicists to finish the decorative programme in time for the respective event. In part because of the beauty and the remarkable quality of the works they created, the eleventh century saw the prestige of this Venetian shrine increase. Also what in the popular imagination was the miraculous appearance of the relics of its patron saint from a pillar (either in 1084 or 1094, depending on the source employed) further augmented it. The article attempts to prove that the eleventh century was the most important period in the existence of the medieval Venetian church which much later became the cathedral San Marco. It will venture a description of this shrine not only on the basis of its similarities, claimed by most scholars, with the Apostoleion church in Constantinople, but also using information from extant documents as well as results of new scientific and archaeological discoveries, especially those published in the catalogue of the exhibition organised by its Procuratoria between July and November 2011, in Ken Dark and Ferudun Özgümüş’s works, in the reports concerning the research undertaken by the British Museum, and in other sources.
Women and the supreme power in Byzantium (5th-11th centuries). Numismatic approach
José María de FRANCISCO OLMOS
Original title: Las mujeres y el poder supremo en Bizancio, siglos V-XI. Aproximación numismática
Published in Mulier aut Femina. Idealism or reality of women in the Middle Ages
Keywords: 5th-11th centuries, Byzantium, Empresses, Numismatics.
This paper studies the evolution of the role of Byzantine women in relation to the Empire government, with special attention to the numismatic evidence. The analyzed period goes from the beginning of the Empire in the 5th century to the middle of the 11th, with a detailed analysis of those reigns that seem most significant in the evolution of this issue, that is those of Pulcheria, Irene and the sisters Zoë and Theodora, with whom women finally became able to assume the government in their own names, without any shade of fiction, as seen on the previous cases.
