unknowndarth posted:

---

Ki_Undi_Mundi posted:

---

The Byzantine Empire, is the name of the Eastern Empire.

---

Nobody in the Empire or abroad used the term,it was invented by 19th century historians.

---

• Lack of religious unification (various stresses between the Antiochene, Carthaginian, and Alexandrine sees)


• Financial difficulties associated with Justinian's attempted reconquest of the West and the subsequent Persian and Slavic invasions of the East


• The wars against the Goths in Italy actually served to further de-Romanize Italy and help papal independance, as the Goths were still nominally acknowledging the supremacy of the Eastern Emperor while they created a Romano-Gothic culture


• The massive Arab conquests following right after the Empire just been exhausted from pounding the Sassanids into dust


• More religious problems that led the Christian "heretics" of the Levant and North Africa to feel more comfortable under Arab rule than Roman governance


• The loss of the exarchates of Carthage and Alexandria leading to massive food shortages


• The loss of the Levant leading to trade shortages and naval weakness (later made up by the further development of Constantinopolis)


• Consistent backstabbing in the imperial court and frequent changes in state policy


• The disasterous defeat at Manzikert, sending the Empire's prime recruitment area (Anatolia and some of Ionia) to the Turks. Notably, this loss was directly due to backstabbing in the court.


• The loss of the exarchate of Ravenna to papal forces and the loss of Southern Italy and Sicily to the Normans


• The loss of southern Spain to the Moors, though at least they destroyed the Visigoths in the process


• Imperious dealings with western European monarchs left them unwilling to aide the Empire when necessary


• The rift with the papacy also allowed western powers to start setting their eyes on Constantinopolis, directly leading to...


• The Fourth Crusade


• The Latin Empire and the dismantling of the Greek themes


• The incomplete restoration of the Empire under the Palæologui with rivals in Morea and elsewhere


• Yet more religious issues: the unwillingness of the Greek populace to submit to papal authority in order to safe the Empire. They would prefer their orthodoxy under the rule of another rather than political freedom and reunification with the Catholic Church


• Generally being too good a price to warrant any peace from the Ottomans as well as being too important a symbol to spare in Trebizond

Katana_Geldar posted:

---

Anna Commana was the daughter of Alexis I, wasn't she, during the first Crusade of 1097? That book was on my toget list when I was planning on researching the First Crusade.

---

GrandAdmiralJello posted:

---

It's worth noting that the city was still called Constantinopolis subsequent to the Ottoman capture of it, and the city wasn't renamed Istanbul until the Turkish Republic was created in the 1920s. But even that name still comes from a common Greek phrase "In the City". Constantinopolis, of course, was commonly referred to as "The City" (Polis) just as Roma was commonly referred to by the same in Latin (Urbs).

---