Byzantium and the West (9th-15th c.)
| Title | Βυζάντιο και Δύση(9ος-15ος αι.) / Byzantium and the West (9th-15th c.) |
| Code | ΙΜΕ 704 |
| Faculty | Philosophy |
| School | History and Archaeology |
| Cycle / Level | 2nd / Postgraduate |
| Teaching Period | Winter/Spring |
| Common | No |
| Status | Active |
| Course ID | 600020114 |
Programme of Study: PMS stīn Istorikī Éreuna 2024-2025
Registered students: 1
| Orientation | Attendance Type | Semester | Year | ECTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| KORMOS | Compulsory Course | 1 | 1 | 15 |
| Vyzantinīs kai Mesaiōnikīs Istorías | Compulsory Course | 1 | 1 | 15 |
| Academic Year | 2025 – 2026 |
| Class Period | Spring |
| Faculty Instructors | |
| Weekly Hours | 3 |
| Total Hours | 39 |
| Class ID | 600275546
|
Course Type 2011-2015
Specific Foundation / Core
Mode of Delivery
- Face to face
Digital Course Content
- e-Study Guide https://qa.auth.gr/en/class/1/600275546
Erasmus
The course is also offered to exchange programme students.
Language of Instruction
- Greek (Instruction, Examination)
- English (Examination)
- French (Examination)
- German (Examination)
Prerequisites
Required Courses
- ΙΒΜ 701 Written sources of Byzantine and Medieval History
- ΙΒΜ 702 Research:Methodology and Practice
Learning Outcomes
Students who attend the course are expected to
a. become familiar with the analytical categories of space, travel writing, perception and identity as tools of historical research
b. comprehend the cultural encounters between the byzantine empire and the West, as well as similarities and diferrences in their historical evolution,
c. acquire in-depth knowledge in the research of medieval history, discussing critically the existing historiographical production and understanding the relation between historiography, present and past.
d. develop further their critical and synthetic abilities to produce a written essay with the use of sources and bibliography
e. become familiar with planning a research project
General Competences
- Retrieve, analyse and synthesise data and information, with the use of necessary technologies
- Work autonomously
- Work in teams
- Work in an international context
- Generate new research ideas
- Appreciate diversity and multiculturality
- Demonstrate social, professional and ethical commitment and sensitivity to gender issues
- Be critical and self-critical
- Advance free, creative and causative thinking
Course Content (Syllabus)
1st week: Travel writing: production of space and otherness, ethnographic discourse
2nd week: Travel writing: production of space and otherness, ethnographic discourse
3rd week: Latin dominions in the Greek lands. The concept of colonialism. Multiple identities and allegiances.
4th week: Latin dominions in the Greek lands: multiple identities and power strategies. The Tocco family
5th week: Kaleidoscopic views of Turks and Byzantines: Western economic interests in the eastern Mediterranean and the crusades in the 14th century
6th week: The crusading idea and the Church Union: the era of John VI Palaiologos. The role of humanism in shaping Western-Byzantine relations
7th week: Humanism and new conceptualization of the Western-Byzantine relations
8th week: The Mediterranean in the Florentine imaginary of the 14th century: Giovanni Boccaccio’s Decameron
9th week: The French kingdom’s perspective: crusade preaching and the images of the Byzantines and the Ottomans
10th week: Bertrandon de la Broquière’s travel to the East: production of space and ethnographic discourse
11th week: Multiple views of the eastern Mediterranean in the first half of the 15th century
12th week: Discussion on the written assignments
13th week: Oral presentation of the written assignments
Keywords
Medieval Europe, byzantine empire, crusades, crusading discourse, humanism, identities
Educational Material Types
- selected bibliography and sources
Use of Information and Communication Technologies
Description
e-learning
Course Organization
| Activities | Workload | ECTS | Individual | Teamwork | Erasmus |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seminars | 150 | ✓ | ✓ | ||
| Reading Assigment | 150 | ✓ | ✓ | ||
| Written assigments | 150 | ✓ | |||
| Total | 450 |
Student Assessment
Description
Studens will have to study weekly specific bibliography (in Greek or in English) and present, orally or in written, brief reports of their critical reading. they will also have to study and comment on specific sources. At the end of semester they have to present orally and then submit a written essay of ca. 4000-5000 words. Students' evaluation will depend on their weekly presentation and their final written essay.
Student Assessment methods
- Written Assignment (Formative, Summative)
- Performance / Staging (Formative)
- weekly study of bibliography and sources
Bibliography
Additional bibliography for study
Indicatively:
Bisaha, Nancy. Creating East and West. Renaissance Humanists and the Ottoman Turks. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004.
Carr, Mike. Merchant crusaders in the Aegean 1291-1352. Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2015
Jefferson, John. The Holy Wars of King Wladislas and Sultan Murad. The Ottoman-Christian Conflict from 1438-1444. Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2012.
Hankins, James. “Renaissance Crusaders: Humanist Crusade Literature in the Age of Mehmed II.” Dumbarton Oaks Papers 49, no. Symposium on Byzantium and the Italians, 13th-15th centuries (1995): 111–207.
Lammers, Han. Greece Reinvented. Transformations of Byzantine Hellenism in Renaissance Italy. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2016.
Rubiés, Joan-Pau. ‘Nature and Customs in Late Medieval Ethnography. Marco Polo and John Mandeville’. In La Nature Comme Source de La Morale Au Moyen Âge, edited by Maaike van der Lugt, 189–232. Micrologus’ Library 58. Firenze: SISMEL - Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2014.
Rubiés, Joan-Pau. ‘The Emergence of a Naturalistic and Ethnographic Paradigm in Late Medieval Travel Writing’. In Medieval Ethnographies. European Perceptions of the World Beyond, edited by Joan-Pau Rubiés, 43–64. London and New York: Routledge, 2016.
Ryder, Judith R. The Career and Writings of Demetrius Kydones. A study of fourteenth-century byzantine politics, religion and society. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2010.
Thompson, Carl. Travel Writing. London and New York: Routledge, 2011
Last Update
15-02-2024
