Author: Gavriil - Ioannis Boutziopoulos

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PROSOPON Workshop – ‘Entangled Prosopographies: Connecting the “Prosopographies of the Later Roman and Byzantine Worlds” across the Eastern Mediterranean and Beyond’

Prosopography of the Later Roman and Byzantine Worlds

The ‘Prosopography of the Later Roman and Byzantine Worlds’ (PLRBW) project unites two Academy projects under one umbrella: the recently revived Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire (PLRE) and the Prosopography of the Byzantine World (PBW), which arose from the former. PLRE was originally published in three seminal print volumes between 1971 and 1992 (with a fourth volume including addenda and corrigenda explicitly envisaged but never realised) and covers the governing class of the Roman Empire from 260 to 641. The Connecting Late Antiquities project is now updating it and making it more accessible, beginning with digitising PLRE and making it freely available on the Cambridge University Press website. From its inception, PBW has been a pioneering project in the Digital Humanities and is published online (currently in the 2016 version), with the technical responsibility for the site being undertaken by King’s Digital Lab (KCL). The project aims to record every individual mentioned in Byzantine sources during the period from 1025 to 1204, and every individual mentioned in non-Byzantine sources during the same period who is ‘relevant’ (on a generous interpretation) to Byzantine affairs; currently, coverage is near complete into the 1180s

PROSOPON-International Research Network

The PROSOPON-International Research Network is a collaborative network of prosopographical projects with a focus on the Eastern Mediterranean, 300–1600. Based at the Austrian Academy of Scienes, PROSOPON brings together prosopography-related projects, connects them to other initiatives with a similar scientific scope, and promotes the dialogue between prosopographical projects and the broader scientific community with a variety of communication opportunities and platforms for the exchange of ideas and knowledge.

The workshop will be held in hybrid format.

With any queries please contact the local member of the organising team and chair of the PLRBW project, Professor Niels Gaul.

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Call for Communications for the 55th SPBS Spring Symposium

The 55th Spring Symposium in Byzantine Studies will be held at the University of Kent (Canterbury, UK), from 13th-15th April 2024.

The topic is ‘Justice in Byzantium’.

Panels will cover aspects of social, civil, divine, and criminal justice, as well as concepts of revenge and unwritten/ written rules. Our keynote speaker is Daphne Penna (Groningen). Confirmed speakers include Dionysios Stathakopoulos (Cyprus), Carlos Machado (St Andrews), Arietta Papaconstantinou (Reading), Rosemary Morris (York), Anna Kelley (St Andrews), Lorena Atzeri (Milan), Mike Humphreys (Cambridge), Catherine Holmes (Oxford), Robert Wiśniewski (Warsaw), Caroline Humfress (St Andrews), Peter Sarris (Oxford), Matthijs Wibier (Cincinnati), Simon Corcoran (Newcastle), Dan Reynolds (Birmingham), Shaun Tougher (Cardiff), and Maroula Perisanidi (Leeds).

Those interested in presenting a Communication (15 mins max) should contact Laura Franco (laura.franco@libero.it) with a title and abstract by December 15th 2023. For any queries relating to the Symposium, please contact Anne Alwis (a.p.alwis@kent.ac.uk). Once the conference website with booking details is live, a further email will be circulated.

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Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies

The Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies, University of Birmingham, has announced the new Seminar Series for 2023/24. These will be hybrid events, so please feel free to join via zoom, or on the Birmingham campus.
Time: Wednesdays 1300-1430 (Greenwich Mean Time)
To sign-up for virtual access, please visit our Ticket Source page: http://www.ticketsource.co.uk/centre-for-byzantine…
Semester 1
  • 4 October: (Hybrid/Strathcona LT1) Pan-Mediterranean Dialogues of Power and Prestige: Byzantine Architecture in Context (1330-1500).
    Jessica Varsallona (Edinburgh)
  • 18 October CBOMGS (Hybrid/Arts 104) Byzantine Sicily and Sardinia
    Luca Zavagno (Bilkent)
  • 8 November (Hybrid/Strathcona LT1) Seeing Paintings with the Touch: Inclusion and Accessibility in the Church of S. Ambrogio.
    Flavia Vanni (Salerno) 
  • 22 November (Hybrid/Arts 104) Dictating and Interpreting of Greek Notarial Documents in Late Medieval Venetian Crete. The Case of Nicolaos Agiostefanitis Ryota Takada (Tokyo)
  • 6 December (Hybrid/Arts 104) Nature in Palaiologan Romances
    Foivi Georgiadi (Athens)
Semester 2
  • 24 January Commerce & Crisis in the Eleventh-Century Empire of New Rome: The View from Ani
    Nik Matheou (Edinburgh)
  • 7 February Keeping Time: Temporal Imagery and Thought in the Calendars of Later Byzantium
    Peter Boudreau (Yale)
  • 28 February The Legacies of Ancient Theatre in Middle Byzantium
    Elena Gittleman (Bryn Mawr)
  • 13 March (NB. This seminar will begin at 1700) The Meaning of Jewellery in Byzantium: An Archaeological Perspective
    Georgios Makris (British Columbia)
  • 24 April Speech Difference and Disability Gain in Byzantium, c. 1000-1200
    Maroula Perisanidi (Leeds)
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Elizabeth Jeffreys


On behalf of Michael Jeffreys and his family the SPBS is sorry to report that Elizabeth Jeffreys died painlessly early on the morning of 12.09.2023.  She was recovering well after a stroke two months ago, but had to go back to hospital on Sunday.

The world of Byzantine studies has lost a great scholar and a wonderful friend who was an inspiration to us all.

Continue reading “Elizabeth Jeffreys”

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Updated version of the 1st Circular, Vienna Congress

On behalf of Christos Stavrakos, Secretary of the AIEB (Association Internationale des Études Byzantines), please find below an updated version of the First Circular of the 25th International Congress of Byzantine Studies (Vienna 2026), including a language update.

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Dear Colleagues,

Following the online meeting of the Organizing Committee of the 25th International Congress of Byzantine Studies -Vienna 2026 with the members of the AIEB Bureau on 16 March 2023, we would like to inform you about the preliminary profile and structure of the Congress program and to appeal to all National Committees to send us their proposals for Round Tables by 31 December 2023. The call for Free Communications will be sent in spring 2025. You may find below the main theme of the Congress, the themes of six Plenary Sessions, as well as the timetable and procedures for Round Tables, to be confirmed and approved at the Inter Congress meeting in Athens on 12 April 2024.

INFORMATION ON THE PROFILE AND STRUCTURE OF THE 25th CONGRESS OF BYZANTINE STUDIES, Vienna 2026

Date: The 25th International Congress of Byzantine Studies will be held on 24 to 29 August 2026 in Vienna, Austria.

Main Theme: “Byzantium beyond Byzantium”, “Byzance au-delà de Byzance”, “Byzanz jenseits von Byzanz”, “Bisanzio oltre Bisanzio”, “Το Βυζάντιο πέρα από το Βυζάντιο”

General Rule: Scholars can participate in no more than two sessions throughout the Congress. (i.e., as speaker in two sessions, or as speaker in one session plus as convener, or as convener in two sessions).

Plenary Sessions: There will be six Plenary Sessions. The list of Plenary Session themes and speakers will be approved at the Inter-Congress meeting in Athens on 12 April 2024. National Committees will be informed about the details shortly before the meeting.
The themes for Plenary Sessions are:

1. Byzantium lost and found

2. Romanitas beyond Byzantium. Diffusion and impact of ideas of Rome in a „post-Roman” world

3. The beasts, the crops and the bones. Biological perspectives on the Byzantine world

4. Byzantine Diversities

5. Reading Byzantine literature across the centuries

6. Byzantium in Central Europe

Round Tables:

General rules

1. Round Tables must be proposed through the National Committee of the proposer. There is also the option of joint proposals by more than one National Committee.

2. Round Tables are allocated 90 minutes. They should consist of no fewer than four and no more than six speakers, plus the convener(s), in order to ensure adequate time for discussion.

3. The professional affiliation of the speakers should represent at least two countries. We particularly encourage the inclusion of young researchers.

4. We strongly encourage those who propose Round Tables to follow the Congress main theme.

5. The most important criterion for accepting a Round Table proposal will be its innovative scholarly contribution.

6. The number of proposals, including joint proposals by each National Committee is limited to ten.

7. Proposals should include a title, an abstract of 250 words, 5 key words, the names of the convener(s) and speakers as well as the name of the person sending the proposal, his/her affiliated institution and his/her mail address.

8. Proposals should be written in English, French, German, Italian, or Modern Greek.

Timetable

– The deadline for submission of Round Table proposals by National Committees to the Organizing Committee is 31 December 2023. Any Round Table proposal sent after the deadline will not be accepted. The proposals should be sent to program.ICBS2026@univie.ac.at.

– Conveners of Round Tables will be informed about the decision of the Program Committee (in accordance with the Bureau of the AIEB) in mid-February 2024. Proposed Round Tables will either be accepted or rejected or the option of an Organized Session will be offered.

– Conveners of accepted Round Tables will be asked to confirm their participation and the organisation of their Round Tables by 31 March 2024. – The list of Round Tables will be presented at the Inter-Congress meeting in Athens on 12 April 2024.

Vienna, March 2023
The Organizing Committee

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THE INTERNATIONAL BYZANTINE GREEK SUMMER SCHOOL

THE INTERNATIONAL BYZANTINE GREEK SUMMER SCHOOL, hosted by Trinity College Dublin, is being held entirely online again this year, though we hope to offer at least some courses face-to-face in Dublin in 2024.

We are happy to confirm that the 2023 International Byzantine Greek Summer School will take place in the weeks of 17-28 July (Beginners) and 31 July-11 August (Intermediate and Advanced). All courses will run online in small groups led by experienced teachers. Each level comprises two weeks of full-time study, with two two-hour teaching sessions daily

Byzantine Greek is the dominant form of Greek written during the Byzantine Empire (AD 330–1453). The spoken language changed significantly in this period and came close to Modern Greek, but most Byzantine authors use conservative forms of Greek that looked back to Classical Attic, the Hellenistic Koine and Biblical Greek. Therefore much of the vocabulary, morphology and syntax of Byzantine Greek are not significantly different from Classical Greek, which makes this course a suitable preparation also for reading Classical literature and the New Testament.

The International Byzantine Greek Summer School (IBGSS), directed by Dr Anthony Hirst, moved to Dublin in 2016 after many years of success at Queen’s University Belfast (2002-11) and the University of Birmingham (2012-15). The course teaches Byzantine Greek at Beginners, Intermediate and Advanced level and allows early learners to engage with original texts from the start. Each level comprises two weeks of full-time study.


Although the original application deadline for 2023 was the 5th of May, it has been extended to the 31st of May (ten days from now). There are still a limited number of places available at all levels: Beginners, Intermediate, Higher Intermediate and Advanced Reading.

If you wish to apply go to www.tcd.ie/Classics/byzantine for details and the application form.

Funding applications, however, can no longer be accepted.