Imagine yourself crossing the threshold of Hagia Sophia as a random tourist visiting Istanbul. You’re wearing your blue jeans, white sneakers, and a t-shirt…
history
Book notes
The City
"You may imagine how they gazed, all those who had never before seen Constantinople... and the splendid palaces and soaring churches – so many…
Book notes
Books: Byzantium | The Apogee | John Julius Norwich
After three decades of war, he annihilates the Bulgars and extends the dominion of the Empire from Iberia (eastern shore of the Black Sea)…
Book notes
The tragic figure of Michael IV the Paphlagonian
Then the final time arrived. He had himself carried to his own monastery of SS Cosmas and Damian, stripped off his imperial clothes and…
Book notes
Michael Psellus | ‘Basileus’ of modesty
"The Nile may water the land of the Egyptians, but it is my golden words that nourish their spirit. Ask the Persians and the…
Book notes
Books: Byzantium | The Early Centuries | John Julius Norwich
The terrified boy was clutching the altar with one hand and a fragment of the True Cross with the other. One of the agents,…
Book notes
Books: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
The Greeks thought of themselves of a more refined and superior tradition than the Romans. “The east was in the immemorial possession of arts…
Book notes
Books: The Crusades, so much devotion and so little understanding | S. Runciman
I never liked history. How was I to make sense of the humongous data dump that we were subjected to during so many years…