Re: Romaion (not "Byzantine") Coins and Culture

On Nov 29, 10:31 pm, Reid Goldsborough <reidgoldsboro...@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Still think "Byzantine Empire" was a term coined in the eighteenth
century?-

In my article on Harlan Berk's _100 Greatest Ancients_ in the current
CELATOR I cite his assertion that the term "Byzantine" was an artifact
of papal politics. It was the wars against the Turks in the 16th and
17th centuries that led to that propaganda. We can search the archives
for earlier or later references (the 4th Britannica was an interesting
point: as late as 1810.) That only goes to reinforce the assertion
that the term Byzantine is not appropropriate.

People who are eye-gnorant ask me if I am Eye-talian. I do not bother
to point out that Eye-taly is a peninsula while Sicily, from whence my
grandparents came, is an island. The distinction is lost on the eye-
gorant who think all Eye-talians are pretty much the same.

So, too, with "Byzantine." The term is an artifact of politics and it
is perpetuated by ignorance, including ignorance of Italian history.
Cite the 16th century or the 18th for this occurrance or some other.
The people of that earlier time and place never called themselves
anything else but Romans or Romaion, Romion: the nuances of accent
over time do not change the core truth.

Also, Greek was the lingua franca of the Roman empire. Latin was its
administrative language. Grafitti in Rome defamed Nero in Greek.
Marcus Aurelius wrote his Meditiations in Greek.

From the Book of John, John 19:19-21 --
19 Now Pilate wrote a title and put it on the cross. And the writing
was:
JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS.
20 Then many of the Jews read this title, for the place where Jesus
was crucified was near the city; and it was written in Hebrew, Greek,
and Latin.
21 Therefore the chief priests of the Jews said to Pilate, “Do not
write, ‘The King of the Jews,’ but, ‘He said, “I am the King of the
Jews.”’”
22 Pilate answered, “What I have written, I have written.”
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John+19:19-22;&version=50;

(and again from the Catholics at New Advent)
19 And Pilate wrote a title also: and he put it upon the cross. And
the writing was: JESUS OF NAZARETH, THE KING OF THE JEWS. 20 This
title therefore many of the Jews did read: because the place where
Jesus was crucified was nigh to the city. And it was written in
Hebrew, in Greek, and in Latin. 21
http://www.newadvent.org/bible/joh019.htm

We know that Hebrew was only the local language. However, the use of
both Greek and Latin is significant. Greek was widely used throughout
the Roman Empire. So, the fact that the people of Constantinople used
Greek in preference to Latin, even while calling themselves Romans is
not surprising.

Furthermore, we conflate ROMAN and LATIN but they were two different
people and to their own sensibilties they spoke two mutually
intelligible but distinct languages. After the Romans conquered the
Latins it was a moot point. But do not claim that "Latin" was the
language of the "Roman" empire unless you understand what you are
saying.

Furthermore, you could make a similar claim about ETRUSCAN a language
apparently known to Claudius (Tiberius Claudius, the son of Livia),
and likely to many other upper class Romans. It was not, however, the
language of the empire, any more than Hebrew was. It was known to a
small albeit elite circle. Greek, however, was a language of the
Empire, finally lost to common knowledge in the _West_ only about the
7th Century AD.

Among the great works of the Roman empire written in Greek were
Plutarch's biographies of Romans contrasted with Greeks, That pretty
much says it all.
.

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