The ''epi tes katastaseos'' ( el, ἐπὶ τῆς καταστάσεως) was a court office of the

Byzantine Empire The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

, attested in the 9th–10th centuries. The origin and exact nature of the office are unclear.

J. B. Bury John Bagnell Bury (; 16 October 1861 – 1 June 1927) was an Anglo-Irish historian, classical scholar, Medieval Roman historian and philologist. He objected to the label "Byzantinist" explicitly in the preface to the 1889 edition of his ''Lat ...

translated the title as "master of ceremonies" since may be interpreted as "order", and derived its origin from the late Roman , the head of the , a department under the authority of the .

George Ostrogorsky Georgiy Aleksandrovich Ostrogorskiy (russian: Георгий Александрович Острогорский; 19 January 1902 – 24 October 1976), known in Serbian as Georgije Aleksandrovič Ostrogorski ( sr-Cyrl, Георгије Алекс ...

and

Ernst Stein Ernst Edward Aurel Stein (19 September 1891, in Jaworzno – 25 February 1945, in Fribourg) was an Austrian-Jewish Byzantinist and a historian of Late Antiquity. Ernst was the son of Ernst Eduard Stein and Henrietta Rosalie (née Hein) and the ...

on the other hand pointed out that the ceases to be mentioned after 534, and suggested that the was a descendant of the , attested from the time of

Justinian I Justinian I (; la, Iustinianus, ; grc-gre, Ἰουστινιανός ; 48214 November 565), also known as Justinian the Great, was the Byzantine emperor from 527 to 565. His reign is marked by the ambitious but only partly realized ''renovat ...

(reigned 527–565) on. The mid-9th century ''

Taktikon Uspensky The ''Taktikon Uspensky'' or ''Uspenskij'' is the conventional name of a mid-9th century Greek list of the civil, military and ecclesiastical offices of the Byzantine Empire and their precedence at the imperial court. Nicolas Oikonomides has dated ...

'' is ambiguous as to its role, placing the office first among the civil officials (between the and the ) and then among the lower-ranking courtiers. The of 899 records the office as one of the "special dignities" (), and records that his staff comprised the orders () of , , , the , and the ("senators",which Bury suggests might be emended to ), although most of them were ranks of dignitaries rather than court functionaries. The ''

De Ceremoniis The ''De Ceremoniis'' (fully ''De cerimoniis aulae Byzantinae'') is the conventional Latin name for a Greek book of ceremonial protocol at the court of the Byzantine emperors in Constantinople. Its Greek title is often cited as ("Explanation of th ...

'', compiled in the later 10th century, on the other hand, places the office firmly among the court officials, usually in conjunction with the .

References

Sources

* * {{Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, ref={{harvid, ODB Byzantine palace offices Byzantine court titles Ceremonial occupations