Byzantine Vostitsa

A quick summary of Roman and Byzantine Vostitsa with some of the ups and downs ending with the state of the Peloponnese and Vostitsa c. 1000 CE.

Transcript

Jen: 0:00

Still more striking is the story of the rich widow, Danielis of Patras. About the time of the Byzantine expedition against the Slavs of Taygetos, the future emperor, Basil the first, then chief groom, in the service of a prominent courtier. Was at Patras in attendance on his master who had been sent there on political business. Shortly afterwards, he fell ill of a fever. Which by detaining him at Patras after his master's departure. Proved to be a blessing in disguise. Danielis took the sick groom into her house. Bade him, be a brother to her son. And when he had recovered from his illness, provided him with a train of 30 slaves to accompany him to Constantinople. And loaded him with costly presents. When in 867 Basil mounted the Imperial throne. He did not forget his benefactress. He not only promoted her son to a high position in his court. But invited the aged lady to Constantinople. In spite of her age and infirmities Danielis traveled in a litter accompanied by 300 slaves. As a gift to the emperor. She brought 500 more as well as 100 maidens chosen for their skill in embroidery. 100 purple garments, 300 linen robes. And 100 more of such fine material. That each piece could easily be packed away in a hollow cane. Every kind of gold and silver vessel completed the list of her presents. Once again on the death of her favorite she journeyed to Constantinople to greet his son and successor. Her own son was by that time dead so she devised the whole of her property to the young emperor, Leo, the sixth. At her request, a high official was sent to the Peloponnese to prepare an inventory of her effects. Her loose cash, her gold and silver plate, her bronze ornaments, her wardrobe and her flocks and herds represented a princely fortune. 80 farms formed the real property of this ninth century millionairess. Whose story throws light on the position of the Peloponnesian landed class at that period. This is a summary of a story from Constantine the seventh. Which is part of Essays on the Latin Orient by William Miller in 1921 pages 42 through 43. I'm Jen Glaubius. And this is the Helonaki deep dive. A podcast about mapping and analysis for historical and archeological research. In this episode, I'll start discussing the history of the Vostitsa area by looking at the long history of the Byzantine empire in the Peloponnese. Let's dive in. The year 146 BCE was huge for the Roman Republic. They defeated Carthage in the third and final Punic war and completely destroyed that city never to be threatened again by the power that Rome had fought three wars with over 120 years. 146 was also the year. When Rome gained most of Greece under its control under its defeat of the Achaean league. The city Aegio the Vostitsa area was a member of the Achaean league. From that time forward, the Peloponnese was basically a province of Rome. By the time the Roman empire was split into Eastern and Western parts in 395 C E. The Peloponnese had been ruled by the Romans for over five centuries. All of Greece fell within the Eastern empire. Which from this point forward, I'm going to refer to only as the Byzantine empire. along with the rest of the Balkans Asia minor The holy land, which was Syria and Palestine at that time and Egypt. Starting around 250 CE. There were raids and movements of peoples into the still undivided Roman empire, sometimes reaching the Peloponnese of Greece. So those raids started early before the division happened and continued onwards leading in part to that division. In 396, the Gothic leader Alaric invaded the Byzantine empire. Sacking cities in Greece, including Eleusis, Megara, and Corinth. And specifically in the Peloponnese sacking, Argos and Sparta. Alaric left the Peloponnese across the Gulf of Corinth into Epiros. After the Western Roman general Stilicho arrived in the area. Later. Alaric became commander in chief of Byzantine forces, They put them in that position to prevent him from conducting any further raids on their empire. So they put him in charge of the military. Incursions by various groups continued including coastal raids by Vandals from Africa in the four seventies. Raids by Ostrogoths in the late 400s, early 500s. And, both Huns and Slavs in the 500s. Movements of peoples into the Byzantine empire was an ongoing process. But let's look at the movement of the Byzantine empire outwards into other territories during the reign of emperor Justinian. Justinian ruled from 526 until 565 and expanded the Byzantine empire to its largest extent. Areas that had been part of the Western Roman empire, but taken by other groups as that empire fell such as Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Northern Africa, west of Egypt and Southern Spain were invaded by the Byzantines and brought under their control. Funding those invasions and other fighting on the Eastern borders required large amounts of money from the Byzantine treasury. Justinian tried to crack down on tax evasion by officials and landowners through reforms, but there was pushback and those reforms were later reversed. Large landowners were a growing problem across the Byzantine empire. Since they tended to bribe officials to work in their interests instead of the good of the empire. Large estates had been increasing in size for centuries. So Justinian issued edicts to try to halt the process of smaller landholdings being swallowed up by large estates. It became evident towards the end of his reign, that those measures were not working. And large estate holders actually, were still becoming more and more powerful. Adding to the empires woes. In the 540s. Bubonic plague ravaged the population, killing many. Including in the Peloponnese. The reduced population meant fewer people to sustain the economy and pay taxes while military threats around the expanded empire demanded more resources After the death of Justinian in 565. The Byzantine empire faced financial and military woes. And the newly gained territory. Reverted back to non Byzantine control. In the east and south threats from Persia chipped away at territory, including Syria, Palestine, and Egypt. And those areas later fell completely to Arab tribes that had converted to the new religion of Islam. In the Peloponnese Slavs raided the land in the 580s and then came to stay. At that time, Byzantine resources were focused more on the Persians in the east. Although it may have occurred earlier. We know that definitely around the year 641 the Byzantine empire had lost meaningful control. Over all, but a few coastal cities in the Peloponnese. Due to military defeats and political instability. Most of the land in the empire had been lost at this point. And the Byzantine empire contracted down to only Constantinople and the surrounding area in Anatolia. So during this period, Slavic peoples came into the Peloponnese and settled there. This means that some of the areas of the Peloponnese were under Slav control. But others, mostly coastal cities, but also a few other areas were still in local Greek hands. Although, not under Byzantine control. For areas under Slav control instead of paying taxes to the Byzantine empire. Local Greeks probably had to pay a tribute to the Slavs instead. This situation remained for over 100 years until in the late seven eighties, the Byzantine empire stabilized and started trying to regain control of the Peloponnese. Full Byzantine control didn't return until the early eight hundreds under Emperor. Nicephorus the first. When a province for the Peloponnese was established. Slavic peoples in the Peloponnese of course fought against the re-establishment of Byzantine control with revolts in the early eight hundreds. The Slavs were gradually incorporated into the population by converting them to Christianity. Promoting use of the Greek language and also adding more Greek speakers by moving them from Sicily and Asia Minor to Greece. The process was successful with only a few pockets of distinct Slav groups left in the Peloponnese a century later. the story of the rich widow, Danielis of Patras a summary of which I read in the intro. shows that although the Byzantine empire lost control of the Peloponnese for a century, while Slav settled in the area, Greeks remained and in the case of wealthy landowners probably kept their land and wealth during that time. The story of Danielis comes from a book about administering the empire that was written by emperor Constantine the seventh to his son in the mid 900s. The story itself takes place in the 860s. Which was only about 60 to 80 years after the Byzantine empire regained control of the Peloponnese. The wealth that Danielis had in that story is evident from the large number of people that she had enslaved and was giving away as gifts, The purple garments, linen robes, gold and silver vessels, flocks and herds. And that she possessed 80 farms. So on those 80 farms, Danielis' people probably cultivated wheat. Grapes for wine and olives. And probably had herds of sheep, goats, and possibly cattle to help with cultivation. The purple garments that Danielis had may have been local since production of purple dye was one of the industries of the Peloponnese along with production of parchment and silk. The position of wealthy elites, like Danielis would remain strong in the next few centuries. Although there were raids in the early 900s by Arab pirates along the coast and in the 980s, By Samuel of Bulgarias army. The Peloponnese was mostly stable in this time. And since the situation was stable. The Byzantine administration of the Peloponnese was mostly distant. And hands-off. By the early 1000s the Peloponnese had been combined into a province with central Greece, which means the area around Athens and Boeotia including Thebes, which was where the governor would reside when in the province. But the governor of the province was not local to the area. He was appointed by Constantinople. And he usually remained in Constantinople instead of actually governing from Greece. And at this time, the main thing that the governor did was collect taxes. Often through the practice of tax farming. The way tax farming worked is that individuals would bid for the job of collecting taxes. And the winner would pay the bid amount to the governor. So he'd already paid off that money. And then the tax farmer would go collect taxes from people trying to collect as much as he could. Since this person needed to regain the amount of their bid. Plus make extra money beyond their bid. Obviously corruption was rife through this system up and down. Since the tax farmers were trying to extract as much money as they could. And the governor also would keep extra money from the bid beyond what was sent to Constantinople. So that wasn't a great system. of the tax money that was collected and sent on to Constantinople, or that was actually collected and meant for the government. by this time, it really wasn't going into infrastructure or defense of the Peloponnese. Instead it was sent on to Constantinople. The few troops that the governor did have. were mostly used as his body guard. And so to defend their land, local land owning elites, those wealthy landowners who had been. a problem who had been building up power for centuries at this point. They also built up private armies to protect their extensive lands. So to summarize. The Byzantine empire after separating from the Western Roman empire experienced. Some ups and definite downs. But by around 1000 had stabilized. And what doesn't mean? That was really strong in some respects, but it was stable. The Peloponnese during that entire period had seen the influx of different peoples. Especially there was an influx flux of Slavs who settled while the Byzantine empire really wasn't in control of the area. But then there were also influxes of Greek speakers from elsewhere. The Imperial administration, since they didn't have many direct threats to take care of in the Peloponnese basically what they were doing was just tax collection. The imperial administration basically was only collecting taxes from the Peloponnese they weren't really investing anything into the local military or infrastructure by the 1000s. So definitely neglected. Hands-off. And this kind of played into the increased power of those large landowners. As exemplified by Danielis in the 860s. So she might've been an extreme example. But there were definitely these wealthy landowners who had so much power in the Peloponnese around the year 1000. And they wanted to keep their power. So the Byzantine empire in the Peloponnese stable around 1000 and prosperous. Things were good. But there were definite weaknesses. Those landowners were not beholden to the Byzantine empire. There was weak, local defense. There was corruption in the tax system and probably many, many other parts of the Byzantine administration. So this apparent stability and Byzantine control of the Peloponnese would not last. All right, let's talk a bit about some endnotes. This is not an exhaustive list of sources for this episode. Since I went over 1000 years of history I got information from many, many different places. But I want to tell you about three that were the most helpful. The Oxford history of Byzantium edited by Mango, which was published in 2002 was really good for getting a handle on the Byzantine empire. There's also the Early Medieval Balkans by Fine published in 1991. And he has a later book about the Later Medieval Balkans, which I'll definitely be referencing in the next episode. There's also Essays on the Latin Orient by Miller published in 1921. The entire list of sources is in the show notes, which I post on both the Helonaki website and on Patreon. I just want to end with a few words about word choice. Many of the sources that I read are somewhat older, cause that's what I can access. And they often talk about invasions of groups, whether they're Goths or Huns or Slavs into the Byzantine empire. Whereas when they talk about the Byzantine empire instead of saying that they invade other territories, they say that they're expanding their territory. I'm of course influenced by what I've read but I'm trying to recognize what I'm saying and use better wording. So I'm calling an invasion and invasion, even if it's by the Byzantines against other groups This is something to think about who was writing the history. Thanks for listening. Email questions or comments to deepdive@helonaki.com or ask them on the Helonaki Deep Dive Facebook page. Show notes with links to resources mentioned in this episode will be available at helonaki.com. That's H E L O N A K I.com. You can also find ways to support the show now, including merch such as t-shirts mugs and stickers with the Helonaki Deep Dive logo at helonaki.com/support. My thanks to Patreon supporters at the geospatial analyst level, Leah Varrell and Janice and Jerry Farrell. Your support keeps the Helonaki Deep Dive going. The Helonaki Deep Dive is written and produced by me, Jen Glaubius of the Helonaki. The theme music is Deep Ocean Instrumental by Dan-o of danosongs.com additional sounds from zapsplat.com. Thanks for listening.