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Early Byzantium
Byzantine Empire under the Constantinian and Valentinianic dynasties was the earliest period of the Byzantine history that saw a shift in government from Rome in the West to Constantinople in the East within the Roman Empire under emperor Constantine the Great and his successors. Constantinople, formally named Nova Roma, was founded in the city of Byzantium ( grc, Βυζάντιον, Byzántion), which is the origin of the historiographical name for the Eastern Empire, which self-identified simply as the "Roman Empire". Prelude to the creation of the Byzantine Empire Economic strife In the 3rd century, the Roman Empire suffered troubling economic difficulties that spread over a wide portion of its provinces. Drastic decreases in population throughout the western parts of the empire, along with a general degradation of society within the cities, exacerbated the crisis leading to a shortage of labor. The '' latifundia'', or great estates, added to the troubles by forcing many ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Labarum
The labarum ( el, λάβαρον) was a ''vexillum'' (military standard) that displayed the "Chi-Rho" symbol ☧, a christogram formed from the first two Greek letters of the word "Christ" ( el, ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ, or Χριστός) – ''Chi'' (χ) and ''Rho'' (ρ). It was first used by the Roman emperor Constantine the Great. Ancient sources draw an unambiguous distinction between the two terms "labarum" and "Chi-Rho", even though later usage sometimes regards the two as synonyms. The name labarum was applied both to the original standard used by Constantine the Great and to the many standards produced in imitation of it in the Late Antique world, and subsequently. Etymology Beyond its derivation from Latin ''labarum'', the etymology of the word is unclear. The Oxford English Dictionary offers no further derivation from within Latin. Some derive it from Latin /labāre/ 'to totter, to waver' (in the sense of the "waving" of a flag in the breeze) or ''laureum exillum' ("laurel st ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Valens
Valens ( grc-gre, Ουάλης, Ouálēs; 328 – 9 August 378) was Roman emperor from 364 to 378. Following a largely unremarkable military career, he was named co-emperor by his elder brother Valentinian I, who gave him the eastern half of the Roman Empire to rule. In 378, Valens was defeated and killed at the Battle of Adrianople against the invading Goths, which astonished contemporaries and marked the beginning of barbarian encroachment into Roman territory. As emperor, Valens continually faced threats both internal and external. He defeated, after some dithering, the usurper Procopius in 366, and campaigned against the Goths across the Danube in 367 and 369. In the following years, Valens focused on the eastern frontier, where he faced the perennial threat of Persia, particularly in Armenia, as well as additional conflicts with the Saracens and Isaurians. Domestically, he inaugurated the Aqueduct of Valens in Constantinople, which was longer than all the aqueducts of R ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Augusti
''Augustus'' (plural ''Augusti''; , ; "majestic", "great" or "venerable") was an ancient Roman title given as both name and title to Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus (often referred to simply as Augustus), Rome's first Emperor. On his death, it became an official title of his successor, and was so used by Roman emperors thereafter. The feminine form '' Augusta'' was used for Roman empresses and other female members of the Imperial family. The masculine and feminine forms originated in the time of the Roman Republic, in connection with things considered divine or sacred in traditional Roman religion. Their use as titles for major and minor Roman deities of the Empire associated the Imperial system and Imperial family with traditional Roman virtues and the divine will, and may be considered a feature of the Roman Imperial cult. In Rome's Greek-speaking provinces, "Augustus" was translated as ''Sebastos'' (Σεβαστός, "venerable"), or Hellenised as ''Augoustos'' (); these tit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tetrarchy
The Tetrarchy was the system instituted by Roman emperor Diocletian in 293 AD to govern the ancient Roman Empire by dividing it between two emperors, the '' augusti'', and their juniors colleagues and designated successors, the '' caesares''. This marked the end of the Crisis of the Third Century. Initially Diocletian chose Maximian as his ''caesar'' in 285, raising him to co-''augustus'' the following year; Maximian was to govern the western provinces and Diocletian would administer the eastern ones. The role of the ''augustus'' was likened to Jupiter, while his ''caesar'' was akin to Jupiter's son Hercules. Galerius and Constantius were appointed ''caesares'' in March 293. Diocletian and Maximian retired on 1 May 305, raising Galerius and Constantius to the rank of ''augustus''. Their places as ''caesares'' were in turn taken by Valerius Severus and Maximinus Daza. The orderly system of two senior and two junior rulers endured until Constantius died in July 306, and his ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diocletian
Diocletian (; la, Gaius Aurelius Valerius Diocletianus, grc, Διοκλητιανός, Diokletianós; c. 242/245 – 311/312), nicknamed ''Iovius'', was Roman emperor from 284 until his abdication in 305. He was born Gaius Valerius Diocles to a family of low status in the Roman province of Dalmatia. Diocles rose through the ranks of the military early in his career, eventually becoming a cavalry commander for the army of Emperor Carus. After the deaths of Carus and his son Numerian on a campaign in Persia, Diocles was proclaimed emperor by the troops, taking the name Diocletianus. The title was also claimed by Carus's surviving son, Carinus, but Diocletian defeated him in the Battle of the Margus. Diocletian's reign stabilized the empire and ended the Crisis of the Third Century. He appointed fellow officer Maximian as ''Augustus'', co-emperor, in 286. Diocletian reigned in the Eastern Empire, and Maximian reigned in the Western Empire. Diocletian delegated further on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Barter
In trade, barter (derived from ''baretor'') is a system of exchange in which participants in a transaction directly exchange goods or services for other goods or services without using a medium of exchange, such as money. Economists distinguish barter from gift economies in many ways; barter, for example, features immediate reciprocal exchange, not one delayed in time. Barter usually takes place on a bilateral basis, but may be multilateral (if it is mediated through a trade exchange). In most developed countries, barter usually exists parallel to monetary systems only to a very limited extent. Market actors use barter as a replacement for money as the method of exchange in times of monetary crisis, such as when currency becomes unstable (such as hyperinflation or a deflationary spiral) or simply unavailable for conducting commerce. No ethnographic studies have shown that any present or past society has used barter without any other medium of exchange or measurement, and an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Latifundium
A ''latifundium'' (Latin: ''latus'', "spacious" and ''fundus'', "farm, estate") is a very extensive parcel of privately owned land. The latifundia of Roman history were great landed estates specializing in agriculture destined for export: grain, olive oil, or wine. They were characteristic of Magna Graecia and Sicily, Egypt, Northwest Africa and Hispania Baetica. The ''latifundia'' were the closest approximation to industrialized agriculture in Antiquity, and their economics depended upon slavery. During the modern colonial period, the European monarchies often rewarded services with extensive land grants in their empires. The forced recruitment of local labourers allowed by colonial law made these land grants particularly lucrative for their owners. These grants, ''fazendas'' (in Portuguese) or '' haciendas'' (in Spanish), were also borrowed as loanwords, Portuguese ''latifúndios'' and Spanish ''latifundios'' or simply ''fundos''. Agrarian reforms aimed at ending the dominanc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roman Province
The Roman provinces (Latin: ''provincia'', pl. ''provinciae'') were the administrative regions of Ancient Rome outside Roman Italy that were controlled by the Romans under the Roman Republic and later the Roman Empire. Each province was ruled by a Roman appointed as governor. For centuries it was the largest administrative unit of the foreign possessions of ancient Rome. With the administrative reform initiated by Diocletian, it became a third level administrative subdivision of the Roman Empire, or rather a subdivision of the imperial dioceses (in turn subdivisions of the imperial prefectures). Terminology The English word ''province'' comes from the Latin word ''provincia''. In early Republican times, the term was used as a common designation for any task or set of responsibilities assigned by the Roman Senate to an individual who held ''imperium'' (right of command), which was often a military command within a specified theatre of operations. In time, the term became t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Byzantium
Byzantium () or Byzantion ( grc, Βυζάντιον) was an ancient Greek city in classical antiquity that became known as Constantinople in late antiquity and Istanbul today. The Greek name ''Byzantion'' and its Latinization ''Byzantium'' continued to be used as a name of Constantinople sporadically and to varying degrees during the thousand year existence of the Byzantine Empire. Byzantium was colonized by Greeks from Megara in the 7th century BC and remained primarily Greek-speaking until its conquest by the Ottoman Empire in AD 1453. Etymology The etymology of ''Byzantium'' is unknown. It has been suggested that the name is of Thracian origin. It may be derived from the Thracian personal name Byzas which means "he-goat". Ancient Greek legend refers to the Greek king Byzas, the leader of the Megarian colonists and founder of the city. The name ''Lygos'' for the city, which likely corresponds to an earlier Thracian settlement, is mentioned by Pliny the Elder in his '' Natu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New Rome
New Rome (Greek: Νέα Ῥώμη, ''Nea Rhomē''; ; Latin: ''Nova Roma''; ) was the original name given by the Roman emperor Constantine the Great in 330 CE to his new imperial capital, which was built as an expansion of the city of Byzantium on the European coast of the Bosporus strait. The city was founded as Byzantion ( grc-gre, Βυζάντιον) by Megarian colonists in 657 BCE. It was renamed by Constantine the Great first as "New Rome" (''Nova Roma'') during the official dedication of the city as the new Roman capital in 330 CE, which he soon afterwards changed to Constantinople (''Constantinopolis''). The city was officially renamed as Istanbul in the 20th century, after the establishment of the Turkish Republic in 1923. Constantine essentially rebuilt the city on a monumental scale from 326 to 330, partly modeling it after Rome. Names of this period included , "the New, second Rome"; , ; , "Byzantine Rome"; , "Eastern Rome"; and ''Roma Constantinopolitana''. The ter ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediterranean Sea in Europe, North Africa, and Western Asia, and was ruled by emperors. From the accession of Caesar Augustus as the first Roman emperor to the military anarchy of the 3rd century, it was a Principate with Italia as the metropole of its provinces and the city of Rome as its sole capital. The Empire was later ruled by multiple emperors who shared control over the Western Roman Empire and the Eastern Roman Empire. The city of Rome remained the nominal capital of both parts until AD 476 when the imperial insignia were sent to Constantinople following the capture of the Western capital of Ravenna by the Germanic barbarians. The adoption of Christianity as the state church of the Roman Empire in AD 380 and the fall of the Western ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Constantinople
la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه , alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya (Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis ("the Great City"), Πόλις ("the City"), Kostantiniyye or Konstantinopolis ( Turkish) , image = Byzantine Constantinople-en.png , alt = , caption = Map of Constantinople in the Byzantine period, corresponding to the modern-day Fatih district of Istanbul , map_type = Istanbul#Turkey Marmara#Turkey , map_alt = A map of Byzantine Istanbul. , map_size = 275 , map_caption = Constantinople was founded on the former site of the Greek colony of Byzantion, which today is known as Istanbul in Turkey. , coordinates = , location = Fatih, İstanbul, Turkey , region = Marmara Region , type = Imperial city , part_of = , length = , width ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
