Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-vdxz6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-25T23:59:26.479Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

11 - The Byzantine empire in the seventh century

from PART II - THE SEVENTH CENTURY

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

Paul Fouracre
Affiliation:
University of Manchester
Get access

Summary

Most centuries can be claimed to have been, in one way or another, a watershed for Byzantium, but the case for the seventh century is particularly strong. At the beginning of the century, the Byzantine Empire was part of a political configuration focussed on the Mediterranean world, that had been familiar for centuries and was characterised by two factors, one external and the other internal. Internally, the basic economic unit of that world was the city and its surrounding territory, which, although it had by now lost much of its political significance, still retained much of its social, economic and cultural position. Externally, however, it was a Mediterranean world: bounded to the east by the Persian Empire, most of the regions that surrounded the Mediterranean formed a single political entity, the Roman (or Byzantine) Empire. At the beginning of the seventh century, this traditional configuration was already being nibbled away: much of Italy was under Lombard rule, Gaul was in Frankish hands, and the coastal regions of Spain, that had been the final acquisition of Justinian’s reconquest, were soon to fall to the Visigoths. But by the end of the century, this whole traditional configuration had gone, to be replaced by another, which was to be dominant for centuries and still marks the region today. The boundary that separated the Mediterranean world from the Persian Empire was swept away: after the Arab conquest of the eastern provinces in the 630s and 640s, that boundary – the Tigris–Euphrates valley – became one of the arteries of a new empire, with its capital first in Damascus (660–750) and then in Baghdad (from 750), which by the middle of the eighth century stretched from Spain in the west to the valleys of the Oxus and the Indus in the east.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2005

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Alexander, P. J. (1985), The Byzantine Apocalyptic Tradition, Berkeley, Los Angeles and London
Angold, M. (1995), Church and Society in Byzantium under the Comneni, 1081–1261, Cambridge
Brock, S. (1984), Syriac Perspectives on Late Antiquity, London
Brown, P. (1976), ‘Eastern and Western Christendom in late antiquity: a parting of the ways’, in The Orthodox Churches and the West (Studies in Church History 13)Google Scholar
Brown, P. (1976), ‘Eastern and Western Christendom in late antiquity: a parting of the ways’, in Baker, D. (ed.), The Orthodox Churches and the West (Studies in Church History 13), Oxford; repr. in Brown, (1982)Google Scholar
Brown, P. (1982), Society and the Holy in Late Antiquity, London
Cameron, A. (1996), Changing Cultures in Early Byzantium, Aldersho,
Cameron, A. (1991), ‘The eastern provinces in the seventh century ad: Hellenism and the emergence of Islam’, in Said, S. (ed.), Hellenismes: quelques jalons pour une histoire de l’identité grecque, StrasbourgGoogle Scholar
Cameron, A. (1991), ‘The eastern provinces in the seventh century: Hellenism and the emergence of Islam’, in Said, S. (ed.), Hellenismes: quelques jalons pour une histoire de l’identité grecque, Actes du Colloque de Strasbourg, 25–27 octobre 1989, LeidenGoogle Scholar
Cameron, A. (1992), ‘Byzantium and the past in the seventh century: the search for redefinition’, in Fontaine, and Hillgarth, (1992); repr. in Cameron, (1996b), V
Cameron, A. (1996a), ‘Byzantines and Jews: some recent work on early Byzantium’, Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 20Google Scholar
Cameron, A. (1996b), Changing Cultures in Early Byzantium, London
Cameron, A. and Conrad, L. I. (eds.) (1992), The Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East, I: Problems in the Literary Source Materials (Studies in Late Antiquity and Early Islam I), Princeton
Conrad, L. I. (1992), ‘The conquest of Arwad: a source-critical study in the historiography of the early medieval Near East’, in Cameron, and Conrad, (1992)
Cook, M. and Crone, P. (1977), Hagarism: The Making of the Islamic World, Cambridge
Crone, P. and Cook, M. (1977), Hagarism: The Making of the Islamic World, Cambridge
Crone, P. (1980), Slaves on Horses: The Evolution of the Islamic Polity, London and New York
Crone, P. (1987), Meccan Trade and the Rise of Islam, Princeton, NJ
Déroche, V. (1991), ‘La polémique anti-judaïque au VIe et VIIe siècle, une mémoire inédite: Les Kephalaia’, Travaux et Mémoires 11Google Scholar
Devreese, R. (1937), ‘La fin inédite d’une lettre de saint Maxime: un baptême forcé de Juifs et de Samaritains à Carthage en 632’, Revue des Sciences Religieuses 17Google Scholar
Ditten, H. (1993), Ethnische Verschiebungen zwischen des Balkanhalbinsel und Kleinasien vom Ende des 6. bis zur zweiten Hälfte des 9. Jahrhunderts (Berliner Byzantinische Arbeiten 59), Berlin
Donner, F. M. (1981), The Early Islamic Conquests, Princeton, NJ
Flusin, B. (1992), Saint Athanase le Perse et l’histoire de la Palestine au début du VIIe siècle, 2 vols., Paris
Fontaine, J. and Hillgarth, J. N. (eds.) (1992), The Seventh Century: Change and Continuity, Proceedings of a Joint French and British Colloquium at the Warburg Institute, 8–9 July 1988, London
Foss, C. (1975), ‘The Persians in Asia Minor and the end of antiquity’, EHR 90; repr. in Foss, (1990), IGoogle Scholar
Foss, C. (1977), ‘Archaeology and the “Twenty Cities” of Byzantine Asia’, American Journal of Archaeology 81; repr. in Foss, (1990), IIGoogle Scholar
Foss, C. (1990), History and Archaeology of Byzantine Asia Minor, London
Haldon, J. (1992), ‘The works of Anastasius of Sinai: a key source for the history of seventh-century east Mediterranean society and belief’, in Cameron, and Conrad, (1992)
Haldon, J. F. (1997), Byzantium in the Seventh Century: The Transformation of a Culture, rev. edn, Cambridge
Howard-Johnston, J. (1994), ‘The official history of Heraclius’ campaigns’, in Daçbrowa, E. (ed.), The Roman and Byzantine Army in the East, Cracow, , 1994Google Scholar
Humphries, R. S. (1991), Islamic History: A Framework for Inquiry, rev. edn, London and New York
Köpstein, H. and Winkelmann, F. (eds.) (1976), Studien zum 7. Jahrhundert in Byzanz: Probleme der Herausbildung des Feudalismus, Berlin
Kaegi, W. E. (1992), Byzantium and the Early Islamic Conquests, Cambridge
Leder, S. (1992), ‘The literary use of the Khabar: a basic form of historical writing’, in Cameron, and Conrad, (1992)
Louth, A. (1996a), Maximus the Confessor, London
Louth, A. (1996b), ‘A Christian theologian at the court of the caliph: some cross-cultural reflections’, Dialogos, Hellenic Studies Review 3Google Scholar
Louth, A. (2000), ‘Arab Palestine 650–750: the crucible of Byzantine Orthodoxy’, in Swanson, R. (ed.), The Holy Land, Holy Lands and Christian History (Studies in Church History 36), OxfordGoogle Scholar
Mango, C. (1985), Le Développement urbain de Constantinople (VIe–VIIe siècles), Paris
Mango, C. (1989), ‘Greek culture in Palestine after the Arab Conquest’, in Cavallo, G., Gregorio, G. and Maniaci, M. (eds.), Scritture, libri e testi nelle aree provinciali di Bisanzio, Atti del seminario di Erice, 18–25 settembre 1988, SpoletoGoogle Scholar
Meyendorff, J. (1989), Imperial Unity and Christian Divisions: The Church 450–680 AD (The Church in History 2), Crestwood, NY
Ostrogorsky, G. (1958), ‘Die Entstehung der Themeverfassung’, Korreferat zu A. Pertusi, ‘La formation des thèmes byzantins’, Akten des XI. Internationalen Byzantinisten-Kongresses, Munich; repr. in Ostrogorsky, (1973)Google Scholar
Ostrogorsky, G. (1962), ‘La commune rurale byzantine’, Byzantion 32; repr. in Ostrogorsky, (1973)Google Scholar
Ostrogorsky, G. (1969), History of the Byzantine State, trans. and rev. Hussey, Joan, New Brunswick
Ostrogorsky, G. (1973), Zur byzantinischen Geschichte: Ausgewählte kleine Schriften, Darmstadt
Riedinger, R. (1982), ‘Die Lateransynode von 649 und Maximos der Bekenner’, in Heinzer, F. and Schönborn, C. (eds.), Maximus Confessor, Actes du Symposium sur Maxime le Confesseur, Fribourg, 2–5 septembre 1980 (Paradosis 27), Fribourg, SuisseGoogle Scholar
Treadgold, W. (1990), ‘The break in Byzantium and the gap in Byzantine studies’, Byzantinische Forschungen 14Google Scholar
Treadgold, W. (1997), A History of the Byzantine State and Society, Stanford, CA
Whitby, M. (1992), ‘Greek historical writing after Procopius’, in Cameron, and Conrad, (1992)
Whitby, Ma. (1995), ‘The devil in disguise: the end of George of Pisidia’s Hexaemeron reconsidered’, Journal of Hellenic Studies 115Google Scholar
Young, F., Ayres, L. and Louth, A. (2004), The Cambridge History of Early Christian Literature, Cambridge

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×