This historical website is dedicated to the study of the establishment, history and subsequent collapse of the Byzantine Empire. The transitional periods that marked the reigns of Tiberius II Constantine (578-582 CE) and Flavius Heraclius Augustus (610-641 CE) will be assiduously studied. Discussions of the Byzantine state will fit into a timeline beginning with the foundation of the Tetrarchic system (293-313 CE) by the Roman Emperor Diocletian (284-305 CE) and extending to the collapse and subjugation of the Byzantine successor state of the Trapezuntines (The Empire of Trebizond was ruled by the Megalokomnenoi Dynasty) in 1461 CE to the Mahometans (Ottoman Turks). This research website will offer detailed information concerning the apogee of medieval Byzantium. The reign of Basil Porphyrogenitus (1025 CE) was marked by military subjugation, the ruthless expansion of Byzantium's frontier provinces, and a rapid succession of territorial acquisitions. The reconstitution of the territorial extent of Byzantium and the restoration of its hegemonic status in the Eastern Mediterranean occurred during the reigns of the Roman autocrats Nicephorus II Phocas, John I Tzimisces and Basil Porphyrogenitus. In addition, the period of the Comnenian Restoration (1081-1185 CE) which oversaw the territorial and political consolidation of the Byzantine Empire will be discussed.
Another topic that will be featured to the viewers of this historical website concerns the Occidental European construction of the inappropriate appellation of Imperium Graecorum (Empire of the Greeks). This research website will delve into the cultural, political, economic, diplomatic and military relations between Occidental Europe and the Oriental provinces of the Roman Empire in a period spanning from the collapse of the Roman Principate (235 CE) to the Turkish capture of Constantinople (1453 CE) and the inexorable Ottoman advance. In addition, the commercial routes and the diplomatic relations between the Byzantine Empire and the Sassanians (Sassanid Persia) will be explored.
(Mission Statement): This historical website is dedicated to the study of the political structure, administrative divisions, territorial composition, and the cultural and philosophical history of the Byzantine Empire. This research website intends to portray the Byzantine Empire as the direct successor to the ancient Hellenic people and the Roman autocracy or the Roman imperial administration. The denizens of Constantinople (Constantinopolitans) safeguarded their Romano-Hellenistic tradition despite the incessant depredations of the barbarians. The departure of the Byzantine scholars of Palaeologan Byzantium (1261-1453 CE) from the isolated enclaves of Roman authority resulted in the interspersion of Byzantine philosophy and the Greek language with the philosophical outlook that was autochthonous to the Italian intellectual tradition. In the cultural and intellectual lampadephoria (torch-bearing race), the tottering Oriental Empire of the Romans bequeathed to the communities of the Italian Peninsula the intellectual and philosophical material of the ancient Hellenes and Romans.