Taking Byzantine coins as the core historical material, this project examines the characteristics of the “display of imperial power” in the design of Byzantine coins, and its evolution in the context of political and institutional history, so as to explain the interaction between Byzantine coins and imperial power.
The Byzantine Empire was a typical imperial autocratic state in the medieval Eastern Mediterranean world. Political identification with the emperor was one of the core elements that shaped the Byzantine state and the Byzantine civilization. Given the importance of the issue of Byzantine imperial power, the academia has made many efforts by mainly using the historical texts to explore it. However, due to the limitations of handed-down texts, some questions have not yet been well answered, and there are also some misunderstandings.
This study uses coins from the Byzantine period as the core historical material, and combines text materials and other physical evidence (such as mosaics, frescoes, manuscript illustrations, ivory carvings, metal products, glass products, seals, textiles, etc.), using the analytical methods of image history and political/institutional history to comprehensively interpret the imperial ideas and its practices displayed in the coin. The main issues to be explored: First, what are the similarities and differences in the display of imperial power in the coin designs of the early Byzantine period compared to the period of the ancient Roman Empire, and what inheritance and development of classical traditions are reflect? Second, what kind of stage changes did the coin iconography of the Byzantine period show? What was the historical background of the changes? Third, what information related to imperial power did the coin images of the Byzantine period carry? How to show the orthodoxy, sacredness and authority of imperial power? Fourth, what evolution and innovation of Byzantine imperial ideas and imperial system are revealed by the development of Byzantine coins?
This study focuses on the causes and motivations of Byzantine coin design, explains the Byzantine coins’ reception and rejection of ancient traditions and their response to social problems at that time, and explores how the Byzantine Empire’s ruling class used coins as a medium to build the political and cultural identity internally and spread its imperial system, orthodox Christian beliefs and ancient Greek culture externally. The views and results of this study may be inspiring for us to think about the multiple functions of coins in the ancient empires.
Pyrras 4
Athina 117 45, Greece
