BYZANTINE AND MODERN GREEK STUDIES
Instructions for Contributors (revised June 2021)
Byzantine submissions will be assessed by
Professor Ingela Nilsson ( ingela.nilsson@lingfil.uu.se )
Post-Byzantine submissions will be assessed by
Professor David Ricks ( david.ricks@kcl.ac.uk )
General
1. The maximum length of an article should be 8000 words, including footnotes; for critical studies, 3500 words; for reviews 1000 words.
Authors should ensure that all diacritics in all languages are correctly placed.
The editors reserve the right to reject unread any submission which is not presented in competent academic English, irrespective of the quality of the content. Authors who are not native speakers should consider employing a competent native speaker of English to check and correct their text before it is submitted.
BMGS does not publish texts that have already been published, whether in English or in any other language.
2. An ABSTRACT of not more than 100 words, outlining the contents and argument of the article, should be provided during the submission process. A list of four or five keywords should also be submitted, eg:
Keywords: Byzantine court ceremonial; Greek history; literary translation; urban settlements
3. ILLUSTRATIONS. BMGS is unable to publish colour illustrations in the print version (unless paid for by the author), but they will appear in the online version. Authors should ensure that colour images, to a normal maximum number of five, are supplied in such a form that they will print clearly in black and white. Articles that require copious illustration are perhaps better submitted to other journals.
Cambridge University Press to receive figures in the following electronic formats. TIFF or JPEG files are preferred for halftones, at a resolution of 300 dpi at their final published size and EPS or PDF formats for files containing original line work (vector info) or a mixture of line work and halftone. For full information on supply of illustrations and permission to reproduce them please visit the following page on the Cambridge website: https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/authors/journals/journals-artwork-guide
If in doubt please contact byzproduction@cambridge.org
Please note that authors are responsible for securing copyright permissions. Authors should also supply a list of figures with their accompanying captions.
4. GREEK TYPE. Greek should be supplied in a Unicode font such as Times New Roman.
5. SPELLING. British spelling conventions should be followed. In words where there is a choice between ending in –ize and in –ise, –ize should be used. ‘Circa’ should be abbreviated as ‘c.’
APOSTROPHES. In the possessive case of Greek names ending in –s, s’ should be used, not s’s: thus Socrates’.
HYPHENS AND DASHES. Use hyphens for hyphenation (e.g. ‘re-use’) but use en-dashes for closed range of values (e.g. ‘1–15 and 25–9’). For interpolations stronger than those demarcated by parentheses, use space, en-dash, space (e.g. “A flock of sparrows – some of them juveniles – alighted and sang’).
GENERAL. Useful guidance on presentation is to be found in theModern Humanities Research Association Style Guide: http://www.mhra.org.uk/style/.
6. FOOTNOTES should generally be confined to necessary references. See para. 12.
7. ALTERATIONS IN PROOFS are expensive and should be kept to an absolute minimum. The journal reserves the right to charge authors the cost of making alterations and additions (other than corrections of typesetters’ mistakes).
8. QUOTATIONS. Verse quotations should be marked as such in the left-hand margin.
8.1 QUOTATIONS OF TEXTS IN FOREIGN LANGUAGES. Byzantine texts quoted in articles should be in the original, accompanied by an English translation. In other cases the inclusion of English translations of passages in Greek and other foreign languages into English is a matter for discussion between authors and the editors. Authors are advised to consult the editors about this matter when preparing their submissions.
9. ABBREVIATIONS should not be used in the body of the text, except for standard cases such as Dr, Mr, Mrs, Ms, St.
10. SINGLE INVERTED COMMAS should be used for quotations, for words or phrases used in a special or technical sense, and for titles of articles etc., but quotations over 50 words should be indented and single-spaced without inverted commas.
DOUBLE INVERTED COMMAS should be used only to indicate a quotation or title within another quotation or title.
11. NUMERALS. In ranges of numbers (e.g. years and page numbers), avoid repeating the same digits: thus, 1867–88 (not 1867–1888), 123–45 (not 123–145). Exceptions: (i) in years, repeat the thousand even if the hundred is the same (1867–1976, not 1867–976); (ii) in numbers from 10 to 19, the ten should always be repeated (11–19, not 11–9). Four-figure numbers (3000) should appear without a comma (not 3,000).
References
12. BMGS does not publish bibliographies (lists of works cited) at the end of articles. Instead, all references are given in footnotes. Superscript footnote numbers in the text should be placed after rather than before punctuation points. Titles of books and articles should be given in full on first reference, preceded by the author’s initial (or initials) and surname. For Greek titles, capitalize only those words that would be capitalized in normal discourse. For other languages, follow local rules.
12.1. The first time they are cited, references to BOOKS should be made thus (note absence of comma before, after and within the parenthesis containing place and year of publication; also omit publishers’ names. Where a book has two places of publication, e.g. ‘Ithaca, NY and London’, include only the first.
R. J. H. Jenkins, Byzantium: The Imperial Centuries: A.D. 610– 1071 (London 1966) 160–85.
C. Diehl, Manuel d’art byzantin, 2nd edn, II (Paris 1926) 552–3.
Syméon le Nouveau Théologien, Catéchèses, ed. B. Krivochéine, 3 vols [Sources Chrétiennes, 96, 104, 113] (Paris 1963–5).
D. Lodge (ed.), Modern Criticism and Theory (London 1988) 36–42.
For books published in English, initial capitals should be used for all major words in the main title. Where there is a subtitle, that should appear in lower case. For subsequent references to the same book the author’s surname (without initials) and the title of the work (abbreviated if necessary) should be used subsequently, with a comma separating the title from the page numbers. Op.cit. should be used only if the work has been cited in the immediately preceding footnote, and in the case of a work cited frequently an abbreviation may be used. Examples:
Jenkins, Byzantium, 160–85.
Diehl, Manuel d’art byzantin, II, 552–3.
Syméon, Catéchèses, II, 110–13.
Lodge (ed.), Modern Criticism and Theory, 36–42.
12.2. The first time they are cited, references to ARTICLES IN PERIODICALS AND CHAPTERS IN EDITED VOLUMES should be made thus; note absence of commas, as in 13.1:
M. Mullett, ‘The “disgrace” of the ex-Basilissa Maria’, Byzantinoslavica 45 (1984) 211–19.
P. Golden, ‘The peoples of the Russian forest belt’, in D. Sinor (ed.), The Cambridge History of Early Inner Asia (Cambridge 1990) 256–8.
For works published in English, initial capitals should be used only for proper names. Please note that all journal titles should be given in full, not abbreviated, every time they are referred to. Note also that the full page numbers of articles should be given on first appearance; where a specific page is cited for the purpose of the footnote in question it should appear in round brackets after the full page numbers.
On first reference to every article, contributors should give the full
title of the periodical cited.
For subsequent references to the same article or chapter, use the same
conventions as in 12.1.
12.3. Citations from BYZANTINE AUTHORS should be made by author’s name, transliterated from the Greek, title of the work as given by the editor, name of editor, volume number, place and date of publication, and page number. Thus
George Pachymeres, Relations historiques, ed. A. Failler, I (Paris 1984) 61. (Thereafter Pachymeres, I, 61).
Nikephoros Gregoras, Byzantina Historia, ed. L. Schopen, II (Bonn 1830) 1012. (Thereafter Gregoras, II, 1012).
12.4. REFERENCES TO PUBLICATIONS IN GREEK
Authors’ names should be transliterated, while titles of books and journals should be given in Greek characters. Capitals should be used in titles only where the word would be capitalized in ordinary discourse, or where the capitalizing of a book title is conventional. Places of publication and other information should be in English. Do not translate Greek titles into English:
A. Sikelianos, Λυρικός Βίος, 1 (Athens 1992) 56.
R. Beaton, ‘Ο Σικελιανός όπως τον γνώρισε ο Σεφέρης’, Αντί 235 (November 2001) 749.
Supplementary materials
Material that is not essential to understanding or supporting a manuscript, but which may nonetheless be relevant or interesting to readers, may be submitted as supplementary material. Supplementary material will be published online alongside your article, but will not be published in the pages of the journal. Types of supplementary material may include, but are not limited to, appendices, additional tables or figures, datasets, videos, and sound files.
Supplementary materials will not be typeset or copyedited, so should be supplied exactly as they are to appear online. Please see our general guidance on supplementary materials for further information.
Where relevant we encourage authors to publish additional qualitative or quantitative research outputs in an appropriate repository, and cite these in manuscripts.
Policy on prior publication
When authors submit manuscripts to this journal, these manuscripts should not be under consideration, accepted for publication or in press within a different journal, book or similar entity, unless explicit permission or agreement has been sought from all entities involved. However, deposition of a preprint on the author’s personal website, in an institutional repository, or in a preprint archive shall not be viewed as prior or duplicate publication. Authors should follow the Cambridge University Press Preprint Policy regarding preprint archives and maintaining the version of record.
ORCID
We encourage authors to identify themselves using ORCID when submitting a manuscript to this journal. ORCID provides a unique identifier for researchers and, through integration with key research workflows such as manuscript submission and grant applications, provides the following benefits:
- Discoverability: ORCID increases the discoverability of your publications, by enabling smarter publisher systems and by helping readers to reliably find work that you have authored.
- Convenience: As more organisations use ORCID, providing your iD or using it to register for services will automatically link activities to your ORCID record, and will enable you to share this information with other systems and platforms you use, saving you re-keying information multiple times.
- Keeping track: Your ORCID record is a neat place to store and (if you choose) share validated information about your research activities and affiliations.
See our ORCID FAQs for more information. If you don’t already have an iD, you can create one by registering directly at https://ORCID.org/register.
ORCIDs can also be used if authors wish to communicate to readers up-to-date information about how they wish to be addressed or referred to (for example, they wish to include pronouns, additional titles, honorifics, name variations, etc.) alongside their published articles. We encourage authors to make use of the ORCID profile’s “Published Name” field for this purpose. This is entirely optional for authors who wish to communicate such information in connection with their article. Please note that this method is not currently recommended for author name changes: see Cambridge’s author name change policy if you want to change your name on an already published article. See our ORCID FAQs for more information.
Authorship and contributorship
All authors listed on any papers submitted to this journal must be in agreement that the authors listed would all be considered authors according to disciplinary norms, and that no authors who would reasonably be considered an author have been excluded. For further details on this journal’s authorship policy, please see this journal's publishing ethics policies.
Author affiliations
Author affiliations should represent the institution(s) at which the research presented was conducted and/or supported and/or approved. For non-research content, any affiliations should represent the institution(s) with which each author is currently affiliated.
For more information, please see our author affiliation policy and author affiliation FAQs.
Competing Interests
All authors must include a competing interest declaration in their title page. This declaration will be subject to editorial review and may be published in the article.
Competing interests are situations that could be perceived to exert an undue influence on the content or publication of an author’s work. They may include, but are not limited to, financial, professional, contractual or personal relationships or situations.
If the manuscript has multiple authors, the author submitting must include competing interest declarations relevant to all contributing authors.
Example wording for a declaration is as follows: “Competing interests: Author 1 is employed at organisation A, Author 2 is on the Board of company B and is a member of organisation C. Author 3 has received grants from company D.” If no competing interests exist, the declaration should state “Competing interests: The author(s) declare none”.
Author Hub
You can find guides for many aspects of publishing with Cambridge at Author Hub, our suite of resources for Cambridge authors.
English language editing services
Authors, particularly those whose first language is not English, may wish to have their English-language manuscripts checked by a native speaker before submission. This step is optional, but may help to ensure that the academic content of the paper is fully understood by the Editor and any reviewers.
In order to help prospective authors to prepare for submission and to reach their publication goals, Cambridge University Press offers a range of high-quality manuscript preparation services, including language editing. You can find out more on our language services page.
Please note that the use of any of these services is voluntary, and at the author's own expense. Use of these services does not guarantee that the manuscript will be accepted for publication, nor does it restrict the author to submitting to a Cambridge-published journal.