The Medieval Balkans as Mirror: Byzantine Perceptions of the Balkans and the World Beyond
Sponsoring Organization(s)
Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies, Univ. of Florida; Research Group on Manuscript Evidence
Organizer Name
Mildred Budny, Florin Curta
Organizer Affiliation
Research Group on Manuscript Evidence, Univ. of Florida
Presider Name
Mildred Budny
Paper Title 1
"Wild Sprout Grafted into the Excellent Olive Tree of the New Israel": Byzantine Views of the Bulgarians after Their Conversion
Presenter 1 Name
Kirił Marinow
Presenter 1 Affiliation
Univ. of Łódź
Paper Title 2
"More Savages than Nature Itself": The Image of the Nomads in the Byzantine Historiography of the Tenth-Twelfth Centuries and the Political Practice of the Constantinopolitan Court
Presenter 2 Name
Aleksander Paroń
Presenter 2 Affiliation
Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology, Wrocław
Paper Title 3
The Image of Peter I in Bulgarian Historiography: Interpretations by Petăr Mutafčiev
Presenter 3 Name
Jan Mikołaj Wolski
Presenter 3 Affiliation
Univ. of Łódź
Paper Title 4
Byzantine Perceptions of the Bulgarian Economy as a Distorted Mirror
Presenter 4 Name
Elisaveta Todorova
Presenter 4 Affiliation
Univ. of Cincinnati
Start Date
12-5-2016 1:30 PM
Session Location
Schneider 2345
Description
Recent Byzantine Studies have placed much emphasis on the “image of the Other,” especially on the use of the Empire’s neighbors in the Balkans or the Caucaus region, as a foil for the construction of the Self in works by the educated elites in Constantinople. Given the long conflict between Bulgaria and Byzantium between the late 8th and the early 11th centuries, the landscape in the central and eastern Balkans, as well as all manner of things Bulgarian (from dress to military skills), played a significant role in the works of Byzantine historians preoccupied with the definition of an imperial, Byzantine identity. A similar tension pertained in the 12th century, as Byzantine intellectuals (especially Anna Comnena) began to reflect upon the relation between the Empire and the world beyond the Balkans, namely the nomads in the steppe lands north of the Black Sea (Pechenegs, Oghuz, Cumans). This session aims to showcase contributions to the study of the fascinating “mirror image” of Byzantine intellectuals gazing across the Balkans.
The Medieval Balkans as Mirror: Byzantine Perceptions of the Balkans and the World Beyond
Schneider 2345
Recent Byzantine Studies have placed much emphasis on the “image of the Other,” especially on the use of the Empire’s neighbors in the Balkans or the Caucaus region, as a foil for the construction of the Self in works by the educated elites in Constantinople. Given the long conflict between Bulgaria and Byzantium between the late 8th and the early 11th centuries, the landscape in the central and eastern Balkans, as well as all manner of things Bulgarian (from dress to military skills), played a significant role in the works of Byzantine historians preoccupied with the definition of an imperial, Byzantine identity. A similar tension pertained in the 12th century, as Byzantine intellectuals (especially Anna Comnena) began to reflect upon the relation between the Empire and the world beyond the Balkans, namely the nomads in the steppe lands north of the Black Sea (Pechenegs, Oghuz, Cumans). This session aims to showcase contributions to the study of the fascinating “mirror image” of Byzantine intellectuals gazing across the Balkans.