Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik, Band 70/2020

πτερόν, πτέρυξ and πτερύγιον all stem from the same root, and their primary meaning is connected to birds: “feather”,“wing”, “shoulder blade”. The history of these words is worthy of note for they came into use in the description of Graeco-Egyptian temple complexes and in the nomenclature of Classical architecture. In order to observe the semantic import of theseand related words and expressions across various cultural contexts (Graeco-Egyptian, Classical and Byzantine) this articlepresents and discusses a range of ancient, late antique and Byzantine literary, erudite, archaeological and iconographic sources.This study aims at giving the reader a glimpse into the Greek lexical domain of architecture, by providing insights into some ofthe general mechanisms of its construction, and specifically to illuminate, by way of a cultural-historical investigation of theseterms, ideas of appearance and significance inherent in the Graeco-Egyptian and Classical and Byzantine worlds. This surveysuggests lexical forms as a key research domain for the understanding of the intellectual, social and cultural life of societies.

Schlagworte: Wavy Enclosure Wall, Wings of Canopus, Ptolemy, Classical Temple Pediment, Zeus Kasios, Eagle

This historic-topographical study discusses aspects of the spatial relationships of some monuments and monasterieswithin the urban fabric of Constantinople. An attempt is made to determine their locations more precisely based on an examinationof the written sources. In particular, the recently published critical edition of the Kniga Palomnik of Antonij of Novgorodprovides new topographical information and hagiographic insights. Former errors of the author and some mistakes in currentresearch may be corrected in this way.

Schlagworte: St Anne at the Deuteron, Column of Michael VIII, Convent of St Nicholas, Double Monastery of Theotokos Kecharitomene and Christ Philanthropes, Anthony of Novgorod, Relics

This article proposes a study of a major philosophical claim made by the great figure of the second period of iconoclasm,John the Grammarian. According to John, since the essential properties as well as many of the accidental properties ofa given individual cannot be represented in visual form, an accurate depiction of that individual is impossible. The in-depthanalysis of this claim allows a re-evaluation of John’s logical culture, which turns out to be much more well developed thanhas been argued to date. The second part of the article defends the hypothesis that Photius’s Homily XVII is, in part, a responseto the position of John the Grammarian. The question of visual perception according to Photius is also revisited.

Schlagworte: Iconoclasm, John the Grammarian, Individuality, Photius, Vision

The 1430s are best documented for the correspondence of the Byzantine emperor and the patriarch of Constantinoplewith the West. Due to several embassies to the Council of Basel and Pope Eugenius IV, a lot of respective documentsissued by the emperor and the patriarch were copied in the acts and document collections of the council, alongside only a feworiginal ones. This extraordinary accumulation of preserved texts allows us to study the language policy of the two chanceries,which generally differs in many regards, but underwent a significant development in the preparation of the Church Unionunder Emperor John VIII Palaeologus who supervised and controlled the outgoing documents of the patriarch. The investigationof the manuscript tradition could reveal new texts of the two chanceries, among them even one original sigillion of thepatriarch. These (and some already—uncritically—published) texts are presented here in a new critical edition.

Schlagworte: Council of Basel, Emperor John VIII Palaiologos, Patriarch Ioseph II, Byzantine chancery, Latin Language

The text presents, in elementary astronomical terms, a clearer picture of what Synesius describes in the passage.Although the comet cannot be pinpointed chronologically, it is quite likely hitherto unregistered cometographically. Its terminusante quem is the year 404.

Schlagworte: Synesius, Comets, Cometography, Calvitii Encomium, In Praise of Baldness

This article contributes to scholarly discussion on the relationship between the Life and Passion of Saints Galaktionand Episteme (VGE) and the ancient Greek novel, especially with respect to the first part of the VGE, which is dedicated toSaint Galaktion’s parents, (G)leukippe and Kleitophon. To this effect, it discusses a number of common motifs and themes inthe VGE and the ancient novel tradition. A special point of interest is the relationship between the VGE and Achilles Tatios’novel, in particular the homonymity of the novel’s main heroes, Leukippe and Kleitophon, and Saint Galaktion’s parents. Thisarticle offers support to the view that the VGE, despite its debts to Achilles Tatios’ novel, should not be regarded as the latter’s‘continuation’; it also suggests an alternative way of viewing the relationship between the two texts.

Schlagworte: Saints Galaktion and Episteme, Hagiography, Achilles Tatios, Ancient Greek Novel

Cerbanus’ translation of Maximus Confessor’s Capita de caritate, written between 1130 and 1150 in Hungary,almost immediately reached the Austro-Bavarian region and was copied in several monasteries during the 12th century. Out ofnine early copies of the text, only three, neither the earliest nor the best manuscripts, were investigated in any detail in earlierpublications. Bringing together palaeographical, codicological and philological information, this paper argues for a reevaluationof the textual transmission and of Cerbanus’ work as a translator. It also draws attention to a late example of Greekminuscule in Latin manuscripts.

Schlagworte: Textual Transmission, Manuscript Networks, palaeography, Greek in Latin Manuscripts

The article consists of three among them thematically independent sections, which deal with A) the meaning ofhierochomium in a letter (XI 2) of Gregory the Great, a hapax legomenon due to his meagre knowledge of Greek, B) the fate ofthe Orobiotae (a group of migrants from Argos, who—according to the Chronicle of Monemvasia—had left the Peloponnese inthe late 6th or early 7th century), mentioned in the Annales regni Francorum ad annum 809, and C) the duration of a journeyundertaken by Liutprand, bishop of Cremona and western ambassador to the Byzantine court, according to his Antapodosis VI4. The sea-voyage is said to have lasted 24 days, which cannot be true. A possible explanation of this error is offered.

Schlagworte: Gregory the Great, philanthropic institutions, knowledge of Greek, Chronicle of Monemvasia, migration, Liutprand of Cremona, duration of sea-travels

This article offers an interpretation of Nicholas Mouzalon’s eulogy of Patriarch Nicholas III Grammatikos. Fromthis text we learn that Nicholas’ election differed radically from traditional practice. Three sealed chits were deposited on thealtar from which Emperor Alexius was to choose one. Yet the election did not proceed according to plan because Alexiusdeclared that he had found a fourth chit, which had miraculously appeared, with Nicholas’ name on it.

Schlagworte: Nicholas Mouzalon, Nicholas III Grammatikos, Alexius Komnenos, Patriarchal Election, Kaiserkritik

The article focuses on the historical semantics of the Greek noun πειθανάγκη. It is a postclassical creation with the earliest attestation in Polybius and the earliest conscious usage as an oxymoron in Cicero. In Late Antiquity and Early Byzantium it occurs rarely and means “coercion” or “extortion”—a device used by those in power to force their will under the pretense of giving their victims freedom of choice. This meaning became proverbial and found its way into modern dictionaries. After a long period of dormancy, the word became popular under the Komnenoi, but the shades of meaning changed drastically. Whereas initially the compound derived its meaning from its second part (ἀνάγκη), in the 12th century the stress shifted to the first element (πειθ-) and the idea of a half-hinted-at threat of violence gave place to deception or bewitchment. As a practical device, some writers placed πειθανάγκη within the domain of rhetoric; others, within that of syllogistic reasoning. In the rarest cases πειθανάγκη was associated with the highest philosophy and Platonic truth. It is worth noting that these texts are specimen of Manuel I Komnenos’ imperial propaganda. The survey ends with a discussion of the subversive πειθανάγκη as an essential characteristic of Emperor Andronikos Komnenos in Niketas Choniates’ History.

Schlagworte: Komnenoi, persuasion, Philosophy, rhetoric, Historical Semantics

It has been widely agreed that the manuscript Basel, UB, AN I 8, featuring the second part of Elias of Crete’scommentary to the “unread” homilies of Gregory Nazianzen, was decorated with an impressive set of full-page illuminationsserving as frontispieces to each commentary in a second phase, sometime after the text and initial portraits had been copied.Karin Krause’s recent and well-documented article called for a re-examination of this book’s genetic history. The study herefocuses on several of its most surprising features, offering a fresh look and a hopefully more plausible explanation for theorigin and production process of these images.

Schlagworte: Byzantine Book Production, Book Illustration, Elias of Crete’s Commentary, Gregory Nazianzen’s Representations, Christ Emmanuel

In 1217 William of Rouen, archbishop of Philippi in the kingdom of Thessaloniki, was brutally murdered. Thisincident is taken as the starting point for an investigation into the realities of Latin rule in the region. The geographical scopeincludes the lordship and diocese of Philippi and to some extent also various surrounding localities (Christoupolis, Branokastron,Drama, Serres, Zichna, and Melnik under Alexios Sthlabos). The career of William of Rouen is reviewed, along with possibleidentifications of the mysterious lord of Philippi (‘S.’). With respect to Latin-Byzantine relations the Valley of Philippi mayserve as an example of the complex situation that developed in many parts of Latin Romania or the post-1204 Byzantine spacein general.

Schlagworte: Frankokratia, Macedonia, Church history, Local History

The following paper will endeavour to show how much the poetic style of George of Pisidia in the Bellum Avaricumis linked to his political involvement and to the purpose he gave to his poem. Besides, through the use of specific poeticdevices, which will be presented and analysed here in detail, he not only seeks to celebrate the victory after the siege of Constantinoplebut also to introduce a poetry more understandable and more audible for its public, certainly informed and sensitiveto his complex poetic devices, but also more and more familiar with a new poetry, closer to the spoken language. Therefore,the poetry of George of Pisidia appears both as a means and an end, and expresses well the strong awareness of his own creativeprocess, especially through the notion of eumetria which saturates the whole poem and represents well everything involvedin the poet’s σκοπός.

Schlagworte: Harmony, Poetical Involvement, Seventh-Century-Byzantine Audience, Rhetorical Poetry, Orpheus

The paper deals with the linguistic and stylistic reception of George of Pisidia’s poetic work by Leo Choirosphak-tes in his didactic poem Thousand-Line Theology (Chiliostichos Theologia), offering a short overview of cases that reveal the close connection between these two authors. Choirosphaktes composed his poem “by means of” Pisides, a master carefully read and studied, whose poems he reworked with a cento technique for his selected readers, in the choice and disposition of the words into the verses, in the search for technical effects, eminently acoustical and structural, but mostly without constructing a literary allusive game with Pisides’ texts.

Schlagworte: George of Pisidia’s Nachleben, Leo Choirosphaktes, Thousand-Line Theology (Chiliostichos Theologia), Cento Technique, Verse-Structural Correspondences, Wordplays

After more than two centuries of sedentary monarchy, Heraclius (r. 610–641) was the first Eastern Roman emperorto leave Constantinople and personally go to war. This paper interprets Heraclius’ decision as an attempt to regain control overthe unruly military sector and traces how the emperor’s campaigns were perceived by the metropolitan public which struggledwith this change of imperial habit. In this context, the poetic oeuvre of George of Pisidia offers an insight into processes ofcommunication and negotiation between the emperor and his subjects. George’s panegyrical poems served the purpose offraming Heraclius’ controversial endeavours with a positive narrative and thus played a major role in strengthening his rule:By using specific terminology, George modelled Heraclius’ engagement as supreme commander on the ascetic practice ofHoly Men. The public impact of George’s panegyric rose from the fact that his innovative portrait of the warring emperorrelated to features of the Zeitgeist governing Constantinople in the early seventh century, which included the increasing sacralisationof war and the rise of Marian devotion.

Schlagworte: Heraclius, George of Pisidia, Panegyric, Monarchy, sacralisation

This paper examines, in four overlapping sections, George of Pisidia’s presentation of the relationship between hispatron, the patriarch Sergius, and the Theotokos or Virgin Mary. It first shows how the imagery of childbirth, articulated in theprologue of George’s Avar War, is part of a larger nexus of fertility imagery that the poet regularly associates with Sergius.The main narrative of the Avar War is next considered. The third section discusses three epigrams by George on Constantinopolitanchurches dedicated to the Virgin that connect her with the Avar victory, two of which explicitly mention Sergius. Thefourth analyses a sequence of epigrams composed by George in honour of a chapel of the Theotokos in the patriarchate built orrestored by Sergius. In a coda, I interrogate the epigram that follows this sequence, considering its relationship to the precedingpoems. The study highlights key aspects of George’s technique and suggests that his epigrams benefit from study alongside thepanegyrical works. In these poems the Theotokos is presented both as saviour and as intercessor.

Schlagworte: George of Pisidia, Sergius, Theotokos, Virgin Mary, Patriarchate, Avar, Paris, suppl. gr. 690

This article is an attempt to evaluate and define the modes of appropriation of Aristotelian logic, ontology and metaphysicsin two little-heralded Armenian texts, namely the Book of Beings and the Questions Addressed to the Heretical Diophysites,redacted between the seventh and eighth centuries. In its essence, the paper has three goals: first, to illustrate the understandingof some logical terms that came to be of crucial importance in the development of Eastern (and Western) theologicalreasoning, such as indivisible substances and indivisible non-substances, and essential and accidental properties. Second, toreconstruct the theoretical framework of the texts under examination by analysing several fundamental terms, such as ‘being’,‘existence’, ‘nature’, ‘person’ and ‘form’. The theoretical framework of these texts turned out to be a source for the Armeniantheologians from the eighth century onward, particularly in the confessional confrontation with the Chalcedonians. Third, toshow that a whole body of pseudepigraphic texts allegedly ascribed to David the Invincible by the Armenian tradition, is ofmajor importance for its contribution to the rethinking of Armenian conceptual history (Begriffsgeschichte) in the context of itscultural relations with Byzantium, and beyond.

Schlagworte: Being and Existence, Indivisible Substance and Indivisible non-Substances, Theory of Individuality, Personhood, Confessional Polemics in Seventh-Century Armenia, Byzantine-Armenian Intellectual Exchanges

This article traces the evolution of grammatical study in Greater Armenia over the transition from the Late Antiqueto the early Medieval period (6th–9th cc.). It argues for the movement’s origins in a lay scholarly elite in contact with Alexandriathat conceived of its task as expanding the discipline through the judicial consideration of Armenian linguistic data. Diversefactors then led to the tradition’s embrace by the upper clergy and its subsequent inclusion into the curriculum of monasticschools in a Christianized version.

Schlagworte: Dionysius Thrax,, Hemispheric Cultural Norms, Bilingual Scholarship, Lay Elite, Commentary Writing

At the end of the iconoclastic era, we find two distinct approaches to rhetorical argumentation in the commentarieson Hermogenes’ On Staseis. They indicate a high level of learning and suggest there was no radical break in the continuity ofrhetorical education. However, rhetorical argumentation itself came to be viewed with suspicion during the Byzantine “DarkAge” and may have been subsumed into the study of dialectic. It re-emerged after the second phase of iconoclasm; at the sametime, rhetoric changed its self-definition and began to identify with the practice of philosophy.

Schlagworte: rhetoric, Rhetorical Education, Stasis Theory, Syrianus – Sopatros – Marcellinus Commentary, P-Scholia