Ideologies under scrutiny
Differentiated perceptions of Roman imperial ideals in Byzantine society
(7th- 12th c.)
(7th- 12th c.)
Project team:
Supervisors: Johannes Koder, Claudia Rapp, John
Haldon
Project coordinator: Yannis Stouraitis
Research associate: Olof
Heilo
Our research project
focuses on the exploration of an ideology of the ‘subaltern’ within Byzantine
society in the period from the reign of Heraclius (610-641) to the conquest of
Constantinople by the crusader armies (1204). The period under scrutiny has
been singled out due to certain geopolitical and cultural developments such as
the de-Latinization of Roman imperial culture and the confinement of Roman
territorial rule to the empire’s eastern parts, the geopolitical core of which
consisted of Asia Minor and the Balkan Peninsula and in which the Hellenic
language and culture were predominant, thus favouring greater political
cohesion and cultural – religious homogeneity within the empire’s territories.
The research aim is to
scrutinize the lower strata’s assimilation to, or deviation from, the ruling
ideology of the imperial government, that is, the common people’s perceptions
of and attitudes towards the centralized imperial power and its ideals, with
particular focus on the population of the provinces. The study will deal with
core questions such as the image of the imperial office among the mass
population, the common people’s perceptions of the imperial ‘state’ apparatus,
of the Roman political and legal order, and the political and cultural content
of Romanness as a collective identity.
Our working hypothesis is
that the empire’s population was not characterized by a high degree of
ideological coherence as conveyed to us through the historiographical sources
compiled in Constantinople. There was ideological differentiation, i.e.
deviation and discrepancy with regard to the ruling imperial ideals, which has
to be further scrutinized on the basis of certain dichotomies, such as ruling
class vs. lower strata, centre (Constantinopolitan population) vs. periphery
(provincial population), ruling ideology vs. oppositional ideologies,
monolithic identity vs. discrepant identity.
Our method is based on an
understanding of ideology as an analytical concept which refers to sets of
ideas and beliefs of a society as a whole, not simply of a society’s ruling
group or class, and that it is interrelated with power relations and social
divisions. The research foresees a close reading of various sources, with
primary focus on hagiographical and other similar texts, which allow insights
into the social action and concerns of the common people on the periphery. The
material provided by the systematic scrutiny of these texts will serve as a
basis for a comparative analysis with the material from historiographical and
other sources that primarily reproduce imperial ideology.
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