Women, Family and Society in Byzantium

Women, Family and Society in Byzantium PDF Author: Angeliki E. Laiou
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 9781409432043
Category : Byzantine Empire
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Angeliki Laiou (1941-2008), one of the leading Byzantinists of her generation, broke new ground in the study of the social and economic history of the Byzantine Empire. This is the first of three volumes to be published posthumously in the Variorum Collected Studies Series and brings together eight articles published between 1993 and 2009. The first five articles concern the status of women as evidenced through legal, narrative, hagiographical and archival sources, while the final three investigate conceptions of law and justice, the vocabulary and typology of peasant rebellions, and the form of political agreements in Byzantine society.

Women, Family and Society in Byzantium

Women, Family and Society in Byzantium PDF Author: Angeliki E. Laiou
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 9781409432043
Category : Byzantine Empire
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Angeliki Laiou (1941-2008), one of the leading Byzantinists of her generation, broke new ground in the study of the social and economic history of the Byzantine Empire. This is the first of three volumes to be published posthumously in the Variorum Collected Studies Series and brings together eight articles published between 1993 and 2009. The first five articles concern the status of women as evidenced through legal, narrative, hagiographical and archival sources, while the final three investigate conceptions of law and justice, the vocabulary and typology of peasant rebellions, and the form of political agreements in Byzantine society.

Unrivalled Influence

Unrivalled Influence PDF Author: Judith Herrin
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691153213
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 350

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Book Description
Explores the exceptional roles that women played in the vibrant cultural and political life of medieval Byzantium. Drawing on a diverse range of sources, this title focuses on the importance of marriage in imperial statecraft, the tense coexistence of empresses in the imperial court, and the critical relationships of mothers and daughters.

Gender, Society, and Economic Life in Byzantium

Gender, Society, and Economic Life in Byzantium PDF Author: Angeliki E. Laiou
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 360

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Book Description
The studies in this volume reflect the author's interest in history as it was lived: not only the social and economic structures, but the men and women, collectively and individually, who made them function. The role of women in Byzantine economy and society is found to be much more important than had been believed; their participation in trade and manufacturing is established, as is the role of aristocratic women in the economic affairs of the household; the question of female literacy is also discussed. Two studies on the Byzantine family, based in large part on the legal sources, examine the formation of matrimonial ties as well as the practice of divorce and concubinage in the 13th century. The second part of the volume is focused on the economy of exchange in Byzantium between 1204 and the fall of the Empire. Byzantine trade and manufacturing are placed in the context of the economic developments of the eastern Mediterranean, with the conclusion that, whereas the activities of Byzantine and Greek merchants were much more considerable than scholars had thought, they were subordinated to the needs of the Italian-dominated trade system, while Byzantine manufacturing declined. Les etudes assemblées dans ce volume reflètent l'intérÃat de leur auteur pour l'histoire telle qu'elle était vécue; non seulement en ce qui concerne les structures sociales et économiques, mais aussi les hommes et les femmes, collectivement et individuellement, qui permettaient à celles-ci de fonctionner. Le rà ́le des femmes dans la société et l'économie byzantine se révèle comme ayant beaucoup plus d'importance qu'on ne le pensait auparavant; leur participation au commerce et à l'industrie est un fait établi, tout comme l'est le rà ́le des femmes aristocrates dans les affaires économiques du foyer. Le thème de l'alphabétisation des femmes est aussi souevé. Deux études sur la famille byzantine, se basant en grande partie sur des sources légales, exa

Questions of Gender in Byzantine Society

Questions of Gender in Byzantine Society PDF Author: Dr Bronwen Neil
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
ISBN: 1409474496
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 341

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Book Description
Gender was a key social indicator in Byzantine society, as in many others. While studies of gender in the western medieval period have appeared regularly in the past decade, similar studies of Byzantium have lagged behind. Masculine and feminine roles were not always as clearly defined as in the West, while eunuchs made up a 'third gender' in the imperial court. Social status indicators were also in a state of flux, as much linked to patronage networks as to wealth, as the Empire came under a series of external and internal pressures. This fluidity applied equally in ecclesiastical and secular spheres. The present collection of essays uncovers gender roles in the imperial family, in monastic institutions of both genders, in the Orthodox church, and in the nascent cult of Mary in the east. It puts the spotlight on flashpoints over a millennium of Byzantine rule, from Constantine the Great to Irene and the Palaiologoi, and covers a wide geographical range, from Byzantine Italy to Syria. The introduction frames the following nine chapters against recent scholarship and considers methodological issues in the study of gender and Byzantine society. Together these essays portray a surprising range of male and female experience in various Byzantine social institutions - whether religious, military, or imperial -- over the course of more than a millennium. The collection offers a provocative contrast to recent studies based on western medieval scholarship. Common themes that bind the collection into a coherent whole include specifically Byzantine expectations of gender among the social elite; the fluidity of social and sexual identities for Byzantine men and women within the church; and the specific challenges that strong individuals posed to the traditional limitations of gender within a hierarchical society dominated by Christian orthodoxy.

Byzantine Women

Byzantine Women PDF Author: Lynda Garland
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing, Ltd.
ISBN: 9780754657378
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
This volume brings together a group of international scholars in new explorations of the world of Byzantine women in the period 800-1200. The specific aim of this collection is to investigate the participation of women - non-imperial women in particular - in supposedly 'masculine' fields of operation. Contributions focus on women's participation in the street life of Constantinople, their appearance in Byzantine fiscal documents, their monastic foundations, their costume and engagement with entertainment at the imperial court, and the way heroines are portrayed in the Byzantine novels.

Questions of Gender in Byzantine Society

Questions of Gender in Byzantine Society PDF Author: Lynda Garland
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317072332
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 265

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Book Description
Gender was a key social indicator in Byzantine society, as in many others. While studies of gender in the western medieval period have appeared regularly in the past decade, similar studies of Byzantium have lagged behind. Masculine and feminine roles were not always as clearly defined as in the West, while eunuchs made up a 'third gender' in the imperial court. Social status indicators were also in a state of flux, as much linked to patronage networks as to wealth, as the Empire came under a series of external and internal pressures. This fluidity applied equally in ecclesiastical and secular spheres. The present collection of essays uncovers gender roles in the imperial family, in monastic institutions of both genders, in the Orthodox church, and in the nascent cult of Mary in the east. It puts the spotlight on flashpoints over a millennium of Byzantine rule, from Constantine the Great to Irene and the Palaiologoi, and covers a wide geographical range, from Byzantine Italy to Syria. The introduction frames the following nine chapters against recent scholarship and considers methodological issues in the study of gender and Byzantine society. Together these essays portray a surprising range of male and female experience in various Byzantine social institutions - whether religious, military, or imperial -- over the course of more than a millennium. The collection offers a provocative contrast to recent studies based on western medieval scholarship. Common themes that bind the collection into a coherent whole include specifically Byzantine expectations of gender among the social elite; the fluidity of social and sexual identities for Byzantine men and women within the church; and the specific challenges that strong individuals posed to the traditional limitations of gender within a hierarchical society dominated by Christian orthodoxy.

Coming of Age in Byzantium

Coming of Age in Byzantium PDF Author: Despoina Ariantzi
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN: 3110576600
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 387

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Book Description
The various phases of life and their manifestations in theory and social reality constitute a well-established area of research in the fields of western medieval studies and ancient history. In this respect the Byzantine East has been widely neglected. This volume will focus on the Byzantine experience of adolescence, which may be defined as the biological transition from childhood to adulthood as well as the social and psychological experience of leaving the care of parents, guardians and family groups and the gradual integration into adult society. The contributions gathered therein treat seven subtopics that correspond to crucial questions in the current research on adolescence: the legal status of adolescents; the mechanisms of transition from childhood to adolescence; the socialisation and gradual integration into adult society; adolescents in Byzantine art; psychological aspects of adolescence from medieval to modern times; illnesses of adolescents; adolescents in the western medieval world.The focus is on the Middle and Late Byzantine Period, where historical, hagiographical,legal and medical sources offer rich material for an investigation of these aspects. The book contributes to a better understanding of all these questions and to show future trajectories for research.

Women and Religious Life in Byzantium

Women and Religious Life in Byzantium PDF Author: Alice-Mary Maffry Talbot
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 336

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Book Description
After an introductory general essay on the life cycle and status of women in Byzantine society, this volume focuses on female religious life, with particular emphasis on the role of convents - as spiritual sanctuary, refuge for women in need, or provider of charitable services. Several essays compare Byzantine nunneries with male monasteries, pointing out the relatively small size and lack of intellectual and artistic activity in convents, and more rigorous rules of enclosure and stability. Such phenomena as double monasteries, the conversion of a monastery to a nunnery, and women's economic and spiritual ties with Mount Athos are also examined. Other articles investigate issues of female sanctity and sanctification, analyzing types of women saints, women during the era of iconoclasm, and the role of the family in promoting the cult of a holy woman. In addition there are studies on healing shrines in Constantinople in the middle Byzantine and Palaiologan periods, and the resurgence of hagiographical writing in the late Byzantine era, particularly the reworking of the vitae of older saints.

The Perfect Servant

The Perfect Servant PDF Author: Kathryn M. Ringrose
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226720160
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 309

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Book Description
The Perfect Servant reevaluates the place of eunuchs in Byzantium. Kathryn Ringrose uses the modern concept of gender as a social construct to identify eunuchs as a distinct gender and to illustrate how gender was defined in the Byzantine world. At the same time she explores the changing role of the eunuch in Byzantium from 600 to 1100. Accepted for generations as a legitimate and functional part of Byzantine civilization, eunuchs were prominent in both the imperial court and the church. They were distinctive in physical appearance, dress, and manner and were considered uniquely suited for important roles in Byzantine life. Transcending conventional notions of male and female, eunuchs lived outside of normal patterns of procreation and inheritance and were assigned a unique capacity for mediating across social and spiritual boundaries. This allowed them to perform tasks from which prominent men and women were constrained, making them, in essence, perfect servants. Written with precision and meticulously researched, The Perfect Servant will immediately take its place as a major study on Byzantium and the history of gender.

The Byzantine Lady

The Byzantine Lady PDF Author: Donald M. Nicol
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521576239
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
What kind of lives did women in the Byzantine empire lead? Just how subservient were they in so male-dominated a society? In this collection of biographies Donald M. Nicol uncovers the unexpected fact that in the later years of the empire, at least, some aristocratic women enjoyed influence and exercised initiative. The ten ladies whose lives are described here did not complain of male oppression: instead, despite the conventions of caste and court, they found an outlet for their talents in religion, patronage, friendship and scholarship. They left a lasting influence on the society in which they lived. The story of their achievements offers new perspectives on the Byzantine empire, and a fascinating insight into the lives of women in past times.