Previous scholarship has maintained that icons of the Virgin were carried in procession during the Avar siege of Constantinople in A.D. 626. Based on a close reading of the primary sources from the seventh to the fourteenth centuries, this paper will argue in contrast that a tight linkage between Marian icons and protection of the Byzantine capital did not occur until after Iconoclasm. The larger implications of this conclusion concern the evolution of the cult of the Virgin in Constantinople from its initial focus on relics to a cult centered on icons and icon processions as it emerged in the second half of the tenth century.

A hitherto unpublished 10th-c. funerary (?) painted inscription from a rather remote middle Byzantine church in rural Cyprus provides unambiguous evidence of the impact of Bardas Skleros’ revolt in areas not directly affected by the rebel’s activities. It also yields information on the floruit of Epiphanius IV, a little known metropolitan of the island. Finally, and most importantly, it furnishes the earliest and most secure terminus ante quern for any medieval building on Cyprus and for the introduction of the cross-in-square church type and the elaboration of its local variant.

This article considers the conclusions that we can draw about the imperial governors of Dyrrakhion in the reign of the Emperor Alexios I Komnenos. It looks at why Dyrrakhion became increasingly important in the course of the 11th Century and, above all, after Alexios’ usurpation of the throne in 1081. Careful attention is paid to establishing the identity of the various individuals whom we know to have held the position of doux of the town in the period between 1081-1118, and the chronology of and context for the appointments looked at in detail. The significance of Dyrrakhion is further highlighted by drawing attention to the fact that only the very closest intimates of the Emperor — and indeed only senior members of the imperial family itself — were made governors of the town in this period. This study represents a fresh examination of Dyrrakhion, and establishes several new conclusions about the identities and careers of the imperial governors of the town in the reign of the Emperor Alexios I Komnenos.

The thirteenth-century manuscript Greek 1409 in the Vatican Library contains an anonymous Greek ekphrasis of the jousts of an unnamed Byzantine emperor. The text, which has interest for both historians and art historians, has been cited on several occasions in the scholarly literature, but never analyzed in detail. In the following pages we provide a translation of the text, together with a commentary upon the context of the piece. We will argue that the ekphrasis not only describes a specific work of art, depicting a specific event, but also gives valuable information about the visual language through which Byzantine emperors of the twelfth century expressed their power.

This essay considers the accounts of Athos by Joseph Dacre Carlyle, who visited Athos in 1801, and by John Palmer who was there four years later. The men were successive holders of the chair of Arabic at Cambridge. The study examines some of their impressions of Athos and compares their experiences with the well-known account of Philip Hunt who was Carlyle’s travelling companion. Appendices give tables of the numbers of monks in the Athonite houses; Palmer’s expenses; and a brief discussion of some related documents.

Nikos Skalkottas (1904-49), the Greek pupil of Schoenberg, was one of the greatest and most prolific atonal and twelve-note composers of the twentieth century, though unrecognised in Athens during his lifetime. The fifty-six letters that he wrote to his patron Manolis Benakis illuminate Skalkottas’s life and his music, the financial and emotional difficulties leading to his enforced departure from Berlin, his aesthetic viewpoint, his opinions on Greece and its musical life, and his reasons for composing the popular ‘36 Greek Dances’. This is the first published account of this important documentary source.

Cavafy’s overlooked poem ‘Dünya Güzeli’ reflects the seminal influence of folklore on the early writings of the poet, an influence which significantly shaped the contours of the Cavafy canon. The poem is a sophisticated attempt to synthesize the flourishing discourse of λαογραφία with the fashionable literary and painterly trends of Orientalism. It thus warrants a fuller appreciation as a complex text that documents Cavafy’s emerging craft and anticipates his poetic hybridisation of East and West which finds its fullest expression in Cavafy’s Orientalising Hellenism.

Researchers of the historical grammar of Modern Greek agree in general terms that the particle θά derives from an older construction which included the verb θέλω. In the past years, however, there has been some disagreement about the exact point of departure, and, consequently, the exact route (or routes) of the development of θά. In this article we present a straightforward account of θά, explicating several of the disputed aspects of its development, and comparing our account to other, recently published, views. In this way we try to set the record straight with respect to the history of this important element of the Greek verbal system.

Suddenly last summer, research on Byzantine Material Culture, la belle aux bois dormant, was awakened from a prolonged siesta. In the 20th International Congress of Byzantine Studies held in Paris two papers were given in an attempt to chart out the progress made in this particular field in the past decades. T. Kolias assembled the various projects undertaken by individuals or institutions dealing with the different aspects of Byzantine daily life and material culture. M. Mundell Mango focused more on the archaeological evidence at hand and illustrated through the examples of architecture and industrial products how these could be used to detect and explain the interaction between centre and periphery. Just two weeks later, in September 2001 a conference entitled ‘Material Culture and Well-Being in Byzantium (400-1453)’ was organised in Cambridge. A number of suggestions were made during the conference, as for example to initiate a website to host a continuously updateable bibliography and to act as a forum of scholarly exchange in the numerous fields covered by research on material culture.