Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-v9fdk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T17:25:01.966Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Old age in Byzantine society

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 August 2007

CHRIS GILLEARD
CHRIS GILLEARD
Affiliation:
Centre for Behavioural and Social Sciences in Medicine, University College London.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This paper examines the status afforded old age in the Byzantine Empire. Frequently neglected in accounts of state formation or comparative history, this Christian imperial state transformed the moral ordering of the lifecourse. In contrast to both classical Greek and Roman society, old age acquired a distinct moral authority in Byzantine society. This status was not confined to a few members of the elite as in Sparta or Rome. The economic vulnerability, physical frailty and social marginality accompanying old age conferred an equal moral claim upon society that the state actively addressed. A mix of institutionalised and individual charities created a prototype ‘welfare state’ within which provision for old age played a significant part. Despite its neglect by most social historians of old age, the Byzantine Empire is of considerable historical significance in the development of the contemporary constructions of old age. Just as the Byzantine Empire helped erode the practice of slavery that had been widespread in the ancient Greek and Roman societies, so too did it help to create a prototype welfare state in which individual enterprise was tempered by a collective sense of inclusive Christian responsibility. The consideration extended by Byzantine society, to old age, to its weakness as well as to its wisdom and authority, instituted a step change from earlier classical traditions.

Keywords

old ageByzantine societyiconographychurch and statecharitable institutions
Type
Research Article
Information
Ageing & Society , Volume 27 , Issue 5 , September 2007 , pp. 623 - 642
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2007

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

Anderson, J. C. 1978. Cod. Vat. Gr. 463 and an eleventh century Byzantine painting center. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 32, 175, 177–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, P. 1975. Passages from Antiquity to Feudalism. New Left Books, London.Google Scholar
Arnason, J. 2000. Approaching Byzantium: identity, predicament and afterlife. Thesis Eleven, 62, 39–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burrow, J. A. 1988. The Ages of Man. Oxford University Press, Oxford.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cameron, A. 1979. Images of authority: elites and icons in late sixth century Byzantium. Past and Present, 84, 3–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Charanis, P. 1973. Social, Economic and Political Life in the Byzantine Empire, Variorum Reprints, London.Google Scholar
Clark, G. 1994. Women in Late Antiquity: Pagan and Christian Lifestyles. Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Cokayne, K. 2003. Experiencing Old Age in Ancient Rome. Routledge, London.Google Scholar
Cole, T. R. 1993. The Journey of Life: A Cultural History of Aging in America. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Constantelos, D. J. 1968. Byzantine Philanthropy and Social Welfare. Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, New Jersey.Google Scholar
Constantelos, D. J. 1991. Byzantine Philanthropy and Social Welfare. Second revised edition, Aristide D. Caratzas, New Rochelle, New York.Google Scholar
Cormack, R. 2000. Byzantine Art. Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Crislip, A. T. 2005. From Monastery to Hospital: Christian Monasticism and the Transformation of Healthcare in Late Antiquity. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, Michigan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Croke, B. 2002. Justinian's Constantinople. In Maas, M. (ed.) The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Justinian. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 60–86.Google Scholar
Daley, B. E. 1999. Building a new city: the Cappadocian fathers and the rhetoric of philanthropy. Journal of Early Christian Studies, 7, 432–3.Google Scholar
Dagron, G. 1991. Holy images and likeness. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 45, 23–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dölger, F. 1967. Byzantine literature. In Hussey, J. M. (ed.) The Cambridge Medieval History: Volume IV, The Byzantine Empire: Part II Government, Church and Civilisation. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 207–64.Google Scholar
Ehrhard, E. 1897/2001. Prose literature: theology. In Krumbacher, K. (ed.) Geschichte der byzantinischen litteratur von Justinian bis zum ende des Oströmischen reiches (527–1453) [The History of Byzantine Literature: From Justinian to the End of the Eastern Roman Empire (527–1453)]. Beck, Munich. Second edition, translation by D. Jenkins and D. Bachrach, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana. Available online at http://www.byzantine.nd.edu/krumbacher.htm [Accessed 13 February 2005].Google Scholar
Eyben, E. 1980–81. Family planning in Greco-Roman antiquity. Ancient Society 11/12, 60–7.Google Scholar
Falkner, T. M. 1995. The Poetics of Old Age in Greek Epic, Lyric and Tragedy. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Oklahoma.Google Scholar
Finley, M. 1984. The elderly in classical antiquity. Ageing & Society, 4, 3, 391–408.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garland, R. 1990. The Greek Way of Life. Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York.Google Scholar
Gibbon, E. 1896. The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. EditorBury, J. B., Volume 3, Methuen, London (First published 1781).Google Scholar
Grigg, R. 1987. Byzantine credulity as an impediment to antiquarianism. Gesta, 26, 3–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Horden, P. 2005. The earliest hospitals in Byzantium, Western Europe and Islam. Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 35, 3, 361–89.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hughes, P. 1979. A History of the Church. Three volumes, Sheed and Ward, London.Google Scholar
Jenkins, R. J. H. 1967. Social life in the Byzantine Empire. In Hussey, J. M. (ed.) The Cambridge Medieval History: Volume IV, The Byzantine Empire: Part II Government, Church and Civilisation. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 79–104.Google Scholar
Johnson, P. and Thane, P. (eds) 1998. Old Age from Antiquity to Post-Modernity. Routledge, London.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kazhdan, A. 1993. State, feudal and private economy in Byzantium. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 47, 83–100.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kazhdan, A. P. 1998. Women at home. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 52, 1–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kazhdan, A. and Constable, G. 1982. People and Power in Byzantium: An Introduction to Modern Byzantine Studies. Dumbarton Oaks Center for Byzantine Studies, Trustees for Harvard University, Washington DC.Google Scholar
Kazhdan, A. P. and Epstein, A. W. 1990. Change in Byzantine Culture in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries. University of California Press, Berkeley, California.Google Scholar
Laiou-Thomadakis, A. E. 1977. Peasant Society in the Late Byzantine Empire: A Social and Demographic Study. Princeton, New Jersey.Google Scholar
Laiou, A. E. 2002. The human resources. In Laiou, A. E. (ed.) The Economic History of Byzantium: From the Seventh Through the Fifteenth Century. Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Washington DC, 47–55.Google Scholar
Lascaratos, J. and Poulacou-Rebelacou, E. 2000. The roots of geriatric medicine: care of the aged in Byzantine times (324–1453 AD). Gerontology, 46, 1, 2–6.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lascaratos, J., Kalantzis, G. and Poulacou-Rebelacou, E. 2004. Nursing homes for the old (gerocomeia) in Byzantium (324–1453 AD). Gerontology, 50, 2, 113–7.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lascaratos, J., Tsiamis, C., Lascaratos, G. and Stavrianeas, G. 2004. The roots of cosmetic medicine: hair cosmetics in Byzantine times (AD 324–1453). International Journal of Dermatology, 43, 5, 397–401.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Lassen, E. M. 1997. The Roman family: ideal and metaphor. In Moxne, H. (ed.) Constructing Early Christian Families. Routledge, London, 103–20.Google Scholar
Lefort, J. 1993. Rural economy and social relations in the countryside. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 47, 101–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Litavrin, G. G. 1990. Family relations and family law in the Byzantine countryside of the eleventh century: an analysis of the prakitkon of 1073. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 44, 187–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Maguire, H. 1989. Style and ideology in Byzantine imperial art. Gesta, 28, 217–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mango, C. 1994. Byzantium: The Empire of the New Rome. Phoenix, London.Google Scholar
Marx, K. 1965. The German Ideology. Lawrence and Wishart, London.Google Scholar
MacCormack, S. 1997. Sin, citizenship and the salvation of souls: the impact of Christian priorities on late Roman and post-Roman society. Journal of Comparative Research in Society and History, 39, 4, 644–73.Google Scholar
Miller, T. S. 1984. Byzantine hospitals. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 38, 53–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Minois, G. 1989. History of Old Age. Polity, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Morris, R. 1976. The powerful and the poor in 10th century Byzantium: law and reality. Past and Present, 73: 3–27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morrisson, C. and Sodini, J.-P. 2002. The sixth century economy. In Laiou, A. E. (ed.) The Economic History of Byzantium. Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Washington DC, 171–220.Google Scholar
Neville, L. 2004. Authority in Byzantine Provincial Society, 950–1100. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Norwich, J. J. 1998. A Short History of Byzantium. Penguin, Harmondsworth, Middlesex.Google Scholar
Ostrogorsky, G. 1968. History of the Byzantine State. Second edition, Translation J. Hussey, Oxford University Press, Oxford.Google Scholar
Parkin, T. G. 2003. Old Age in the Roman World: A Cultural and Social History. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, Maryland.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Patlagean, E. 1977. Pauvreté économique et pauvreté sociale à Byzance, 4e–7esiècles [Economic and Social Poverty in Byzantium: Fourth to Seventh Centuries]. Mouton, Paris.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Psellus, M. 1966. Fourteen Byzantine Rulers. Translator E.R.A. Sewter, Penguin, Harmondsworth, Middlesex.Google Scholar
Richardson, B. E. 1969. Old Age Amongst the Ancient Greeks. Greenwood, New York.Google Scholar
Rigby, S. A. 1998. Marxism and History: A Critical Introduction. Manchester University Press, Manchester.Google Scholar
Runciman, S. 2003. The Byzantine Theocracy. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Runciman, W. G. 2004. The diffusion of Christianity in the third century AD as a case study in the theory of cultural selection. Archives of European Sociology, 65, 3–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scheltema, H. J. 1967. Byzantine law. In Hussey, J. M. (ed.) The Cambridge Medieval History: Volume IV, The Byzantine Empire: Part II Government, Church and Civilisation. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 55–78.Google Scholar
Stephenson, P. 2004. Byzantium transformed, circa 950–1200. Medieval Encounters, 10, 185–210.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Szucs, J. 1988. Three historical regions of Europe. In Keane, J. (ed.) Civil Society and the State. Verso, London, 291–332.Google Scholar
Talbot, A.-M. M. 1984. Old age in Byzantium. Byzantinische Zeitschrift, 77, 267–78.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Talbot, A.-M. 1990. The Byzantine family and the monastery. Dumbarton Oaks Papers, 44, 119–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thane, P. (ed.) 2005. The Long History of Old Age. Thames and Hudson, London.Google Scholar
Tredgold, W. 2001. A Concise History of Byzantium. Palgrave, Basingstoke, Hampshire.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wickham, C. 1984. The other transition: from the ancient world to feudalism. Past and Present, 103, 3–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar