Byzantine Knowledge of Roman History

[@pinchevulpes]

‘Men destroyed those cities, but time took their names.’ What a haunting anecdote that spans the ages

[@jakegarvin7634]

But we know now he was in Pompeiopolis. We clawed it back from oblivion, if only for a little while. Goddammit there is hope

[@danielcuevas5899]

I’ve had this question in mind over the last week or so, and pop comes this video. Thanks man!

[@williamboisdenghien2849]

@@jakegarvin7634 and the site itself is very interesting. I attended a lecture about the digging there during my studies and it was quite revealing about the transformation of late antiquity with building being reused. Building new walls to make large monumental building smaller and changing their function all while a large part of the outskirts was abandonned due to population decline.

[@jakegarvin7634]

@@williamboisdenghien2849 reminds me of post roman lutetia parisiorum

[@billbauer9795]

@@jakegarvin7634 For our cities, there is no hope now.

[@yeetusvanitas9800]

People are always curious about what historical civilizations knew of their distant contemporaries, but their knowledge about their own predecessors is even more fascinating. Thank you for making a video on this!

[@byzansimp]

Very interesting video! You could have also mentioned how a 15th century manuscript version of Ioannes Zonaras' "Epitome of Histories" included portraits for almost every Roman Emperor from Augustus to Konstantinos XI Palaiologos, even though some of the earlier portraits lacked accuracy.

[@DeoVindice999]

Love your channel! Keep up the great work

[@byzansimp]

@@DeoVindice999 Thank you!

[@toldinstone]

Glad you enjoyed it! Yes, I could definitely have mentioned those portraits; it's fascinating to think of the models the artist might have been using.

[@byzansimp]

@@toldinstone Indeed. I've heard that most of the portraits for earlier Roman Emperors were imagined, but when the artist got to around Emperor Herakleios they started having more references: coins, miniatures, and the like, thus many of the later portraits can look surprisingly accurate facially.

[@carter18352]

@@toldinstonei would be worried that those models could be restored or remade over time and therefore potentially less accurate than what early emperors like augustus and tiberius really looked like but i really dont know anything about the portraits

[@TetsuShima]

"If it isn't written, then it did not exist" *Michael Psellus' phylosophy about the Fall of the Western Empire*

[@clarencetaylor7455]

Sounds like the star wars library

[@DonariaRegia]

I find it remarkable how much history can be reconstructed, even without written accounts, based on the discovery of artifacts. The still buried structures of the Campania region will give us a wealth of knowledge, or more accurately our descendants. And from the city of Rome itself there are still secrets, the imperial regalia of Maxentius came to light only a few years ago, remaining undisturbed in their hiding place since Constantine conquered the city.

[@tvre0]

@@DonariaRegia Although the language of reconstructed Proto Indo-European is likely very very wrong and just an educated guess of how such a language sounded like, we can reconstruct parts of the language, and the existence of some words can help us reconstruct their society, which is extremely fascinating to me.

[@Af-ei7lh]

It’s because the Western Roman Empjre technically didn’t fall but was instead Reabsorbed into the East

[@tvre0]

@@Af-ei7lh I read somewhere the imperial court of the west survived, and then Justinian made it eastern

[@416dl]

I've long harbored the hope that somewhere is stashed a great library that remains untouched, and heartened to know that the Byzantines were at least keeping some of it. Also note: subs at 333K...wow. a third of a million subscribers, and I would fully expect it to continue to grow as our fascination about history when revealed as you so artfully do it is without end. Cheers.

[@QuantumHistorian]

Check a video called "The villa of the papyri" on this channel for some hope about lost books being found

[@416dl]

@@QuantumHistorian I think I know about that and the hopes of using modern computers and something like MRI tech to peer into those burned scrolls, and yeah it does give some hope and yet it's only a fraction of what has been lost, and maybe what's waiting in the rest of Pompeii or Heruculaneum...or maybe in one of the many forgotten and unknown cities across what we know was a vast landscape undisturbed beneath a layer of thousand year old dust. cheers.

[@histguy101]

Can you read Greek? There's a ton of Byzantine works that have never been translated

[@416dl]

@@histguy101 I can't though the more I find out about the Greeks the more I wish I could. I did not know that so much of the classical Greek had not been translated and would have rather thought that since it's been a part of classical academia for so long that most if not all would have been translated. I'll look forward to finding out more. Cheers.

[@paulmayson3129]

@@histguy101 Most of them are in the Athos Peninsula. Good luck accessing them.

[@williamharris8367]

1:44 -- This in an excellent example of how Medieval legal texts were structured. There is the main text itself, the commentary (gloss) about the text in the margins, and then additional layers of commentary in the margins of the first commentary, and so forth.

[@Gorboduc]

I'm told the Talmud is still laid out in this way.

[@nullifye7816]

It's actually a neat visual presentation system for a cohesive body of knowledge, up to a point.

[@danielcuevas5899]

So it was comment inception

[@Orbixas]

@@danielcuevas5899 So it was comment inception

[@lelagrangeeffectphysics4120]

@@Orbixas So it was comment inception

[@tdpay9015]

In the early years of this century, I lived across the river from Detroit. One night, a Detroit news reporter was standing in front of a handsome church that was burning. No one came to put out the fire. Neither the reporter, nor any of the passersby she interviewed, knew anything about the church, not even its name. I was shocked, but if classics teaches anything, it's that there's nothing new under the sun. Manuel II looking on Pompeiopolis described what I was feeling six hundred years later.

[@georgebozhidarov4067]

It's so beautiful that you included Emperor Manuel II's letters in the end! Great video as always :)

[@SplendidFellow]

Your book is great, Garrett! Loving it. Everyone who watches these should get a copy!

[@ZxZ239]

Oh man, to me this is probably one of the best video you ever made. I have always wondered about this topic and now I know, its just mind boggling to think that your civilization has lasted for sooo long to the effect that you have forgotten your own history!!! That abandon city part was nuts! Its one thing for us to do archeology on a long dead ancient civilization's cities, buts its another to do it on your own cities! This just shows you that how crazy how long the unbroken the Roman lineage lasted. And just to think, if the Osman family didn't exist it would very much be possible for the Byzantine to have anothier resurgence and lasts till this day, wouldn't that be something!!

[@Montezuma03]

Plenty of Americans have forgotten or never learned our own very short history, it can all be gone in a few generations.

[@ZxZ239]

@@Montezuma03 I doubt we will forget an entire city soon

[@histguy101]

@@ZxZ239 it's not like the city was long abandoned, but had been abandoned in the previous century. He undoubtedly could've gone home and figured out what city it was. It's like Troy. The city of Troy wasn't abandoned until the late 13th/early 14th century. It was continually inhabited from the bronze age all the way until the late Byzantine era. It continues to appear on maps into the 17th century. Then in the 19th century, it's been "lost" and enlightenment scholars start claiming it's mythological

[@RabbiSpruceTech]

Sometime I would really love for you to explore is the view that medieval Europeans - pre-sack of Constantinople by the Venetians - had of the Eastern Roman Empire? How did Western europe turn away from Constantinople, so to speak, whereas before they may have felt like they were part of a Roman commonwealth?

[@hachibidelta4237]

Plenty of that on other channel, just search Liutprand of Cremona. For example. They didn't turn away from Constanrinople, they were always not friendly to the Romans. Language and cultural barrier cause mutual distrust. The great schism also played some role, although most of the time they accepted both as same Christians.

[@histguy101]

@@hachibidelta4237 There are two Liutprand reports, one where he was treated very well, and another where he wasn't because of the outrageous nature of his visit.

[@wpjohn91]

The huge influx of peoples into central and western europe. The frankish conquest. The Goths, the lombards.

[@thedemonhater7748]

I’ve done a little bit of research on this topic, but believe it or not, I think the final nail in the coffin came with the reign of Justinian. In the immediate decades after the fall of the western empire, many didn’t really view it as a “fall” whatsoever. Most people simply thought that, while there was no longer an emperor in the west, they were still in the Roman Empire- under the protection of barbarian generals who’d been granted their status by the roman emperors. The barbarians themselves eventually started viewing *themselves* as romans. Headstones throughout northern France after the conquest of the Franks sees Frankish soldiers called “Frank and Roman” and the like. Both the ostrogothic and vandal royal families were considerably influenced by Roman culture. And then, Justinian invaded. He didn’t view the foreign kings as generals ruling the west in his name- he viewed them as foreign occupiers, and he treated them as such. He forced these nominally loyal barbarians to fight him, their supposed emperor. So the barbarians who would later become the various Western European peoples had to ask, “what are we? We thought we were romans, but here’s the Roman emperor- telling us we arent.”

[@RabbiSpruceTech]

@@thedemonhater7748 Wow thank you so much for that reply, it was a pleasure to read! That makes sense.

[@tomahawkgaming5226]

These videos answer questions I never even knew I wanted to know the answer to, and I can’t get enough of them

[@thessop9439]

Why do you always have to open this wound. It hurts so much make it stop

[@Michael_the_Drunkard]

Wound?

[@johnniemac173]

@@Michael_the_Drunkard I think he means Byzantium’s fall.

[@thessop9439]

@@Michael_the_Drunkard the deepest wound. Living to see the ruins of the greatest empire mankind has seen.

[@northatlanticcommonwealth1188]

@@thessop9439 good 💪🏿🇹🇷🇹🇷🇹🇷🇹🇷

[@LordWyatt]

@@Michael_the_Drunkard referring to the Romans as Byzantines😎

[@joshperry2710]

That quote is chilling

[@Jesse_Dawg]

I love your videos! The Emperor Manuel II quote seriously hit hard at the end of the video. I need more, please

[@NoWayHaze]

I've wondered, is basic knowledge of the coloration of Roman statues lost by the late Byzantine Empire? In Western Europe, renaissance artists clearly had no idea the Classical statues and buildings were originally painted and not just uncolored marble. Did the eastern empire retain this knowledge? If so, why was this simple fact not re-conveyed to the west?

[@hexapodc.1973]

Tbh I’m kinda glad that this wasn’t conveyed west, assuming it was known at all. The painting was tacky as hell, the fine marble detail underneath is breathtaking and you’d think the paint would be applied skillfully and subtlety, but nah it just looked awful

[@bartolomeothesatyr]

@@hexapodc.1973 Modern reconstructions of classical statue painting are based on analysis of the minute traces of pigment that are left on extant artifacts, but the minute traces of pigment that remain are, obviously, only from the base coat of primer that was in direct contact with the marble, upon which were almost certainly laid multiple layers of blended colors to achieve more naturalistic shading, layers which have been lost to time. It is ludicrous to assume that classical sculptors made their statues look like comic strip characters when we know classical-era painters of interior frescoes in the Roman villas at Pompeii and Herculaneum were entirely capable of tasteful and surprisingly photorealistic depictions in paint.

[@hexapodc.1973]

@@bartolomeothesatyr yea u right u right

[@josemanuelvarelapuig5064]

@@bartolomeothesatyr damn bro , you killed him

[@Sputnikcosmonot]

@@hexapodc.1973 some of the paintings in Pompeii show garden scenes with statues and the statues aren't painted in tacky bright colours like we often see in reconstructions. They're painted quite realistic. Tacky brigt styling definitely existed in the medieval period though lol.

[@karlmezo8554]

The images in the video are as interesting as the narration. Great work all around.

[@SobekLOTFC]

Love it- keep up the great work, Garrett!

[@perceivedvelocity9914]

This is a very interesting topic that I've never really thought about.

[@Mmu12059]

Why do I feel like Masterworks is shaping up to be the next Established Titles?

[@jmitterii2]

Because it is. Some youtubers did an expose on the scam. Stay away. Let the youtubers collect their goofy ad money from these hucksters... but don't bother "patronage" these huckster companies they're pimping... you like the man's work, buy his book and other stuff directly from him.

[@davidlelivelt]

Perfect listening for my walk to my lecture on Roman history

[@TaeSunWoo]

I’m so ready to watch this during my lunch breaK and get into my feels

[@SlaveofGod777]

Nice work man

[@jkader1987]

Your video concepts are brilliant!

[@highviewbarbell]

as an american orthodox christian it would truly be a blessing to get even more content on the East!

[@ianhoyle6132]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/goXPnXZticeAbq8

[@TaeSunWoo]

This

[@nickc3657]

Thanks so much for the captions, they’re appreciated

[@Matts_Ancient_Coins]

great video, very interesting! although that was a long long ad for an 8 min video.

[@DC-hy2rg]

This was wonderful, specially that quote from Manuel. Thank you Garrett.

[@TaeSunWoo]

This vid has unlocked a craving for more like it. I just want more stuff now from an eastern Roman’s POV

[@tomalexander2710]

Great to see!

[@t.robinson4774]

Good video. I took it not as a summary of the empire’s demise but a catalogue of those attempting to preserve the relevance and narrative of the Roman Empire.

[@lhistorienchipoteur9968]

Actually, the Greeks referred to themselves as « romaioi » even after the fall of Constantinople, up to the 19th century for most of them.

[@paulmayson3129]

We still do sometimes.

[@TaeSunWoo]

Some still do today 🙏🇬🇷🏛️

[@e.battraw3934]

You’re such a great narrator you made me watch your advertisement

[@jimmydesouza4375]

4:20 The patriarch seems embarrassed and the guy in the back pew seems furious :D. Everyone else just looks bored.

[@ruzy2639]

Could you do a video explaining the involvement of church hierarchy(pope's, bishops, priests, monks) in government, and politicians (emperors, governors) in the church? And if there was a difference in east and west, and if the relationship changed over time.

[@diktatoralexander88]

History is only as strong as the people willing to keep it alive. It is a common misconception that those who embrace the past will prevent the future, but many don't realize that the past is only a instruction on what to avoid, and what to repeat if we are to have a future. You can't know where you're heading tomorrow if you don't know why you're here today.

[@shushir2672]

"Do you know of the Romans?" "Of course I know of them, they're us"

[@fredl4173]

Is it possible to get a list of sources for this video? Not that I doubt the information, but I hope to research a similar topic on my own time and am very interested in further reading on this.

[@toldinstone]

Sure - on the statues of Constantinople, see Cyril Mango's excellent article - available on JSTOR - "Ancient Statuary and the Byzantine Beholder." Photius' "Bibliotheca" is available in translation online, as is Michael Psellus' "Historia Syntomos." The Letters of Manuel II can be found in George Dennis' "The Letters of Manuel II Palaeologus." I quoted from letter 16 in Dennis' edition.

[@cgavin1]

"A few words from this video's sponsor.." Seriously once? Twice? Irrumabooff.

[@deltadom33]

I am interested in the library at hernaculuim/ Pompeii and because now they can use techniques to see the ancient literature there I know the Byzantine pottery is very different from Roman pottery I would love a time machine to see how much we got wrong

[@Michael_the_Drunkard]

There is no Roman/Byzantine distinction, both are pottery from different periods of Roman history.

[@deltadom33]

@@Michael_the_Drunkard have you done archaeology

[@duckling3615]

@@deltadom33 He is saying that Roman and Byzantine pottery is like calling like saying that US clothes made before a particular year should be called "Columbian (old name for America) clothes" and after "American clothes". When the USA has always been the USA and as such, any distinction in clothes should be made by describing the type and style of clothes. The same is true with Roman pottery; there is no Byzantine pottery, just Classical and Medieval Roman pottery. Honestly, I think he is being pedantic. Byzantium as a term while misleading is useful and trying to not use it this must is annoying. Maybe we should just use a new term like "Rhomani".

[@shadowbanned1999]

@@duckling3615 the USA wasn't always the USA, before the traitors got uppity it was part of the British empire

[@KevinJohnson-cv2no]

@@duckling3615 By this logic, Germany should still be called the Holy Roman Empire, and Turkey should still be called The Ottoman Empire. Different language, religion, cultural values, political structure, geography, capital, architectural identity, art, etc. Byzantines will never be Roman.

[@crowonawirehome]

Another great video.

[@evermay1582]

I always wondered

[@yves7476]

so is masterworks just NFTs for boomers? otherwise great video, I like hearing about the less talked about greek and roman history

[@michealpulkka6809]

I missed the sponsor announcement, so I started scratching my head when he brought up the 2008 financial crisis lol

[@acolyte1951]

I wonder if Manuel II forsaw the collapse of the empire and most importantly, the eventual disappearance of Roman legacy 7:10

[@EricZucchini]

Doing ads for masterworks impacts your credibility

[@maratinus]

Thanks!

[@sleepygrumpy]

Outstanding

[@johnkeck]

Garrett, what equipment was in a Greek gymnasium? Just wondering what form the physical training of Greeks (and Romans) took. Did ancient warriors and athletes (not just Greeks and Romans) lift weights, do calisthenics, or both?

[@raffriff42]

Start with his video, "An Afternoon at the Baths of Caracalla" and also anything having to do with gladiators.

[@silverchairsg]

So how did we manage to fill in the gaps that the Byzantines didn't know? I guess we found more primary sources and remains via modern archeology?

[@toldinstone]

We have Latin sources that they didn't and - as you suggest - a lot of archaeological evidence.

[@histguy101]

@@toldinstone They must have had Latin sources for some time. When the Pandidacterium was founded in the 5th century, it had an equal number of Latin and Greek teachers. John Lydus in the 6th century quotes from Latin sources, including Cato the censor, now entirely lost to us. They also had the entirety of Dio Cassius, Dionysius of Helicarnassus, Plutarch, Josephus, etc, some of which are heavily relied upon, but only survive in part today.

[@zippyparakeet1074]

I always wonder if the Byzantines were aware of the venerable age of their Empire, Manul II, for example, seems to be aware.

[@notsamhoward]

A lot of this reminds me how most people know the classical romans

[@HobbesTWC]

very small absolutely tiny nitpick but Rhomaioi/Ῥωμαῖοι would have been pronounced /roˈmɛ.y/ or /roˈmɛ.i/ as all the diphthongs would have collapsed by the end of the Hellenistic period.

[@toldinstone]

A fair point! I defaulted to the classical / Attic pronunciation without thinking about it.

[@HobbesTWC]

@@toldinstone makes sense for a classical scholar! I love your channel, please keep these videos coming!

[@utubrGaming]

Latins: "We are the descendants of Rome! We speak the language of Constantine, and we pray at the seat of Peter, the Rock!" Also Latins: *loots, burns, and ransacks one of the most continuously-surviving Roman cities*

[@vericulum6810]

Tbh the greeks did the same to Italy during the ghotic wars so Nova Roma had it coming. It took 700 years but Italians got their revange on the treacherus greeks.

[@SpartanLeonidas1821]

@@vericulum6810 Mussolini is Crying still 😃…🤣

[@histguy101]

@@vericulum6810 Was Belisarius a Greek? Did the Byzantines sack and destroy Rome? no, and no.

[@davidantoniocamposbarros7528]

​@@histguy101Rome was heavily depopulated and ruined following the Gothic Wars,so there was big damage alright

[@histguy101]

@@davidantoniocamposbarros7528 The most widely accepted estimate for the population of Rome in the year 500 is 100,000. Estimates for Rome immediately following the Gothic Wars are as low as 30,000, but were back up to 90,000 in the time of Pope Gregory. Rome's misfortunes weren't only the result of the Gothic Wars, but the plague of 542, the Lombard invasions in the 570s(the Lombards themselves were already granted land as Foederati which had been invaded by Avars and Slavs), and the plague of 590. The Persian wars and invasions of the Balkans prevented aid from coming to Italy in that period. And it wasn't just Italy that suffered during that time, but all of Greece, Illyricum, Thrace, etc. In fact, masses of refugees from Greece were fleeing to Italy and Sicily between 550-650, and Constantinople would become just as depopulated at Rome within a century of the Gothic Wars. The difference is that Constantinople slowly recovered, where as Rome was more or less abandoned between 800-1000.

[@theholyschois7477]

I was reading about the Codex Mutinensis graecus 122 which copies much of its literary content from a 12th century Joannes Zonaras. Somethings noted about the portraits of the emperors that are sketched- was that there were supposedly no reference material available for the portraits of the early emperors and the pictures/portraits in the document does not even show early roman imperial regalia correctly. I find this strange as we have a lot of numismatic evidence of what the emperors looked like- especially prior to the crisis of 3rd century. Yet these scholars used pure imagination in crafting pre- Heraclii emperors portraits- even giving Constantine a moustache!

[@histguy101]

Perhaps the portraits were added by a later author copyist

[@karlpoppins]

0:08 They certainly did not pronounce it like that. By the turn of the 2nd millennium Greek had reached a point where its phonology was nearly identical to that of Modern Greek. Thus, "roméy" would be a more appropriate way to pronounce that word in English. Your pronunciation echoes the Erasmian, which is intended to describe Classical Greek, two millennia before the final days of the Eastern Roman Empire.

[@maxmad4957]

Erasmian by the way is totally wrong.

[@karlpoppins]

@@maxmad4957 Not _totally_ wrong, but it misses the mark on some features that reconstructed attic Greek captures better.

[@jakegarvin7634]

I can't help but wonder if we all call them byzantine in part to help try heal the trauma of those godforsaken ottomans killing a 2000+ year old state

[@KevinJohnson-cv2no]

We call them Byzantines because they had a different language, religion, culture, political structure, geography, capital, architectural identity, art, etc. and failed to live up to the legacy of conquest laid out by Rome. The Byzantine Empire was a rotting carcass of a state, from the moment it was cemented in 330 A.D by Constantine. Good riddance.

[@TheDanEdwards]

​@@KevinJohnson-cv2no "Good riddance." - well, we can mark you down as not an objective reviewer of history. What did the Romans called "Byzantines" ever do to you?

[@minutemansam1214]

@@KevinJohnson-cv2no There is no such thing as the 'Byzantine' empire. It was the Roman Empire, the same state that has existed since the founding of the republic in 509 BC. Deal with it.

[@KevinJohnson-cv2no]

@@minutemansam1214 The Byzantine Empire is the successor state of Rome. The Roman Empire ended on 330 A.D. upon Constantine's proclamation of a "New Rome" on the soil of Byzantium; christening the birth of The Byzantine Empire. He would later make Jesus the patron saint of the army, and pass the Edict of Nicaea legalizing Christian worship; cementing the Byzantine state.

[@KevinJohnson-cv2no]

@@TheDanEdwards How is it not objective to state that the Byzantines existed in a perpetual pool of stagnation and decline from the very beginning of their existence? It's factual lol. The only worthwhile conquests of the age, the crusades, were failures; the state was constantly subject to religious upheaval and constantly fighting defensive wars. I dislike the Byzantines, sure, but tbh most people do; it doesn't change the fact that what I say is historical fact. I may be biased, but am I wrong?

[@cameron8772]

I am working on a video for school comparing Roman and Byzantine art, this essay is super helpful, do you mind if I cite it?

[@ale_s45]

So fascinating

[@mattbyrne8202]

Can anyone recommend a comprehensive history of the Byzantine church for the general reader?

[@georgeoldsterd8994]

Gotta love videos that are 1\5 advertisement.

[@patrickroe2240]

Don't mind me. I'm just taking a break from a book about naked statues I've been reading.

[@dumoulin11]

I think pushing investment in artwork (Masterworks) is really cheap. It cheapens art when you treat it as merely an object that one can make money off. Art has more to offer.

[@antoniopacelli]

Why Anyone would Need Anyway...? Before Greeks Rome was justa Group of Hills with Villagers Fighting Each others in the Mud...they Even made a Blockbuster Movie about it.. go See it ! 100% Historically Accurate! There is a reason if they have called it Greco-Roman Culture. They took To Greeks whatever they could... As Much as Greek Took Everything from Byzantine Ideas... That coherently were also taken by the Mixage of Cultural Heritage that Passed for their Shores... Basically THE connection between Western and Eastern World.

[@stingerkendris]

Guys you really must check your pronunciation of Greek words, term "Ρωμαιοι" ( Romaioi is pronounced as ...Romei...ai=e...oi=i)...for us Greeks sounds so funny the way you do it (no offence). Btw Great Job as always!

[@TheHylianBatman]

Ancient historiography is so, SO interesting!

[@TheRealForgetfulElephant]

What did early Christian’s think of Julius Caesar? For example Caesar was a pagan but his initials are also JC same as Jesus Christ. Maybe just a coincidence but it makes me think. By early Christians I mean the Christian’s after the fall of pagan Rome.

[@i_likemen5614]

Their initials were only the same in Latin. In Greek they were different (IX for jesus IK for caesar)

[@TheRealForgetfulElephant]

@@i_likemen5614 interesting what is Caesars Greek name?

[@i_likemen5614]

@@TheRealForgetfulElephant Ιούλιος Καίσαρας

[@flamencoprof]

The nearest I have gotten to Byzantine works was a day in Ravenna, Italy. I was greatly impressed, used words like "stunning" in my diary, and my artist wife said if you only see one place in Italy, it should be this. It showed the Byzantines wanted to keep alive their connection with their origins.

[@ChronosHellas]

That being their Greek origins 🤡

[@SpartanLeonidas1821]

🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷🇬🇷

[@chipwalter4490]

A topic for a possible future video could be giving more information on the history of the language difference between Constantinople and Rome. I have to say it is kind of confusing to place a few moving targets within this grey era of history.. Constantinople became the “new Rome” but didn’t end up sticking with Latin at court. This is the city named after Constantine. This is the emperor who officially established Christianity as the state religion. This is the religion in Western European which kept the Latin language continuing. It can be so confusing and obviously there’s centuries and centuries and huge other cultural factors involved but thank you for at least sparking this curiosity by making this video.

[@histguy101]

Constantine didn't establish Christianity as the state religion. He just legalised it. Constantinople began probably as a largely Latin speaking city and that gradually shifted to Greek, as more people moved to the city, and new blood climbed the ranks.

[@JessmanChicken86]

this channel is epic.

[@omgwtfbbqownage]

3 mins out of the 8 of the video are ads. Amazing

[@oniondesu9633]

in all of this guys videos ive seen, more of the comments are about the sponsors than the actual content, interesting

[@ArcherWest-yk7no]

I miss the longer videos.

[@Maurice599]

Rome lives on in all of us scholars of its history

[@etholus1000]

Amen 🙏🏻

[@pisse3000]

There's no way Masterworks doesn't turn out to be a scam

[@joebombero1]

You could say the same thing about the United States today. The youth today have no understanding of American history or identity.

[@fandangofonteinskalita1333]

The effects of Lead in the roman world!

[@midshipman8654]

i dont think its warented to say that calling the medieval eastern roman empire the byzantine as “nothing more then a traditional and sometimes misleading convention” is fair. Especially in light of the numerous elements that distinguish it as a descete entity, many of which you mention in this very video. It still very much being a political continuation of the roman state is true, but it is very much descriptive to refer to it as an empire cebtered around Byzantium or Constantinople as a distinguishing element (greek speaking, seat of power, and cultural center).

[@histguy101]

Many historians use both Byzantine and Roman interchangeably. There's nothing wrong with calling it Byzantine, but most of the elements people use to create some distinction were already in place when the whole Roman empire was still intact.

[@midshipman8654]

@@histguy101 I agree, I think they should be used interchangeably, I more took umbrage with the implication that it isnt a useful term, when I think it evidently is. its “the roman polity based around Byzantium”. Either, or both, the roman part or the byzantine part can be used as descriptive of its particular nature. And like you said, even near its inception, the eastern roman empire was a distinct entity rather than just being rome but east.

[@mercster]

Very interesting, thank you. It's probably common to believe that history has always been a sequential series of ages, which always carried forward what had come before. I never thought that the people of the eastern Roman empire were so disconnected from their roots.

[@mercster]

Although, I guess if we consider that it was the general populace that was ignorant, and not necessarily the scholars... hell, today in America I'm sure we can find people who have no idea about the founding of this nation. And back then opportunities for literacy and education weren't a 10th of what we have now.

[@studiosbonsoir]

Why do you never include a works cited in your videos? It's kind of alarming for someone supposedly teaching history

[@MrHamtits]

can anyone name the image at 6:30 ?

[@yoavsnake]

Is there research on the history of the history of knowledge?

[@Game_Hero]

and an history of these histories of the history of knowledge too!

[@mvwil]

where do you find these pictures bro. they're so captivating. also you need music

[@m.e.345]

Wikipedia says that the Roman emperors built palaces on the Palatine Hill.. What happened to them? Are there any remains of the palaces that the emperors lived in in Istanbul? Do any descriptions survive as to what the palaces in Rome or Constantinople were like?

[@davidantoniocamposbarros7528]

There's only 3 palaces that survive in Istanbul,and there's some descriptions of both Roman and Constantinopolitan palaces (big,luxurios,Y'know usual palace stuff)

[@i-never-look-at-replies-lol]

- think about wherever you are now - think about it's history & figureheads from hundreds or even thousands of years ago - think about how much you and your society/culture currently really thinks about any of that history from hundreds of years ago or pays homage to its leaders back then it's no different than us now or anyone else anytime ever; not really thinking any less, more, or any differently of the past before them. most people really just don't care. but then again, why bother when nothing really changes either?

[@andreakopyan9714]

and this is just our knowledge of the byzantines knowledge on the romans ;)

[@MaRaX93]

Byzantine Greek isn't pronounced like classical Greek btw. Save for the υ, the pronunciation was the same as Modern Greek by late Byzantium. So it would be Romei

[@John.B.Jenkins]

@2:57 See: Money Laundering

[@PrincipledUncertainty]

It can difficult, when dealing with such spans of time, to fathom the implications of a century of rapid decline and cultural collapse. That's generations on the backfoot with no time to relish their heritage or indulge in new research. Even keeping up basic standards of literacy amongst the elites is a way down the list of priorities.

[@jakegarvin7634]

Makes it so much more poignant when you find out that Manuel the second was the 3rd to last byzantine empire and the first to enter into Ottoman Vassalage

[@robbabcock_]

Great episode!

[@goldenfiberwheat238]

Destruction of knowledge makes me sad and angry

[@RPe-jk6dv]

In byzantium all latin literature Got lost and in the west all greek literature got lost. No byzantine scolar after ca. 600 had knowledge of tacitus for example. No western scolar knew cassius dio for example.

[@T4vion]

What was ancient to the Roman’s

[@davidantoniocamposbarros7528]

Egypt and Babylon were considered old as fuck even for the Romans,so that counts

[@Amaryllis1961]

Your book will be published in Poland soon.

[@Casmaniac]

You can usually tell how much someone is into history by seeing how upset they get about the whole "do you refer to them as Romans or Byzantines" issue lol

[@leonardoferrari4852]

Not really, even Ostrogorsky called them byzantines. One can still know that they considered themselves romaioi and call them byzantines. It's a sterile controversy at best.

[@batminton7467]

That would be me hahahah😂, you can’t refer to them as byzantines if I am around. They are Romans, period. Hahahahaha.

[@leonardoferrari4852]

@@batminton7467 a great deal of historians that studied the subject call them byzantines

[@batminton7467]

@@leonardoferrari4852 a great deal of scholars believed all kind of things that weren’t true because it fit their narrative. Calling them Byzantine was in favor of the second German reich who called themselves the holy roman empire. But I agree completely with Voltaire. It was not holy, nor roman nor an empire. I call them the german douchebag federation, predecessors of the third reich who, as we all know, know what they thought of other people’s history. So, no they are Romans even if a lot of historians really want to call them byzantines. And the reason they started to call them byzantines is to project, the schism break of catholicism from the orthodox church, on to a further past. Thus claiming that the Roman empire broke into two parts, a western and an eastern one. And you guessed it, both churches claim to be the rightful inheritors of the two halves.

[@leonardoferrari4852]

@@batminton7467 the vast majority of what you said has nothing to do with the topic. If you actually read books about the roman empire instead of watching youtube videos you would know that most scholars know perfectly well that the byzantine called themselves "romaioi". Most scholars, while knowing this, still use "byzantines" because it's convenient. The roman empire had a long run and so for us it's convenient to talk about the roman repubblic, the roman empire, and the byzantine empire. The people who lived in the middle ages did not use the term "medieval" or "middle ages". Even the term "crusade" is a modern invention, but we use them because it's easy. One of the greatest historians of byzantium, Georg Ostrogorsky, wrote a "history of the byzantine empire" but he knows perfectly well that they are the romans. And he knows more about the topic then a rando online

[@patrick5768]

With the ad read and the plugs at the end, this video is ~30% advertisement

[@cryofsolace4840]

Really disappointed to see you host ads for masterworks

[@garyfrancis6193]

When I look at that simple map of northern Greece Thessaloniki Θεσσαλονικι( not Thessalonika), Adrianopolis ( now Edirne) and Constantinople ( Istanbul) I have been to them many times. That was my life for over 8 years. It’s “ home” of a sort. Unless you have lived there day after day, month after month, year after year you don’t really know it or what was under my feet every day. Sometimes you see it or discover an abandoned Byzantine church out in a flooded field or an ancient Macedonian tomb and go inside at night like I did or a small aqueduct hidden from view by a mass of brambles or as I did the life size head of a horse made of white marble buried in the dirt in the brambles. I just left it there. There is so much there buried in the ground and in olive groves or below the tide line and only visible at low tide. I could show you but I won’t and some places can’t as those places since the 90’s have been closed off probably for good reason. If anything at least try to get the pronunciation right.

[@bellatordei3440]

I think the had all the knowledge of ancient rome even greater because how otherwise these texts will survive to modern times

[@LongGamingSessions]

a large chunk of this 8 minute video is an ad. Yuck.