Inspired by the questions of curious construction workers, Judith Herrin, professor of Byzantine studies at King's College, London, has written a “different” Byzantine history for readers seeking a first exposure to Byzantium. In the past two decades, Byzantine history has been transformed by a generation of scholars who have applied the perspectives of social and economic history, archaeology, material culture, and art history to emphasize its change over time and interconnection with other medieval societies. But to many, the image of Byzantium remains the unchanging, rigid, exotic, often effete and duplicitous stereotype developed during the Enlightenment, an image all too often reinforced in traditional narrative histories when it is portrayed as an incomprehensible parade of emperors, battles, and religious controversies. This work succeeds in blending contemporary scholarly reinterpretations of Byzantine historical development with engaging explorations of monuments, events, and unique topics like Greek fire and eunuchs to make a strong case for Byzantium as a resilient and creative civilization throughout its long history.

The work opens with Byzantine institutions foundational throughout its history: Constantinople, the imperial system and its court, orthodoxy, and Roman law, accompanied with special sections on the Hagia Sophia and the Ravenna mosaics, the latter introduced with a personal reminiscence of their impact on Herrin as a young viewer. Herrin's approach is clear and concrete, describing the appearance of Constantinople, the imperial court, citizen life, and the way the law worked in practice, and explaining theological differences between east and west in comprehensible terms. The second section, “The Transition from Ancient to Medieval,” introduces one of Herrin's strongest themes: that Byzantine success in resisting Arab conquest, especially of Constantinople in the sieges of 678 and 717, halted a probable Islamic expansion into Europe. Herrin argues that it was Byzantine survival against Arab invasions in the early Middle Ages that shielded Europe from Islamic conquest and allowed medieval development of the west: “Without Byzantium there would have been no Europe” (323). In addition to chapters on icons, iconoclasm, and the missions of Cyril and Methodius, this section also includes an excellent chapter, “A Literate and Articulate Society,” that describes education and learning from the survival of the classical schooling system to record keeping, oral and monastic learning, the transmission of Greek science and literature, and the project of copying ancient texts onto parchment codices in minuscule, which preserved them for posterity and allowed the Renaissance humanist recovery of Greek classics.

In section 3, “Byzantium Becomes a Medieval State,” Herrin hits her stride in producing a “different” history. Greek fire (including an account of a modern re-creation), Byzantium's secret weapon, provides an entrée into the military reconquests of the tenth century, and the porphyra (purple chamber) where empresses gave birth is the focus for a discussion of dynasticism and imperial marriages, domestic and foreign. Herrin includes an excellent chapter demystifying the roles and origins of eunuchs in the middle Byzantine period, followed by a “what you would have seen” description of the imperial court. She focuses a chapter on Venice as an economic and cultural bridge between east and west with the story of the golden fork introduced to the west by a Byzantine aristocratic bride. Herrin, who is the author of a recent book on Byzantine empresses, includes a persuasive portrait of Anna Komnene as writer, princess, and political actor, and emphasizes women's roles throughout the work. More general chapters in this section reflect recent reinterpretations of the eleventh and twelfth centuries as periods of intellectual and cultural growth, economic expansion, and cosmopolitanism despite military and political crises, rather than as centuries of decline inevitably leading to the 1204 conquest of Constantinople.

Herrin argues that modern negative stereotypes of Byzantium ultimately derive from the Crusaders themselves, who needed to justify their desecration of the Christian city of Constantinople: “The negative stereotype of the term ‘Byzantine,’ as if it characterizes a culture which does not deserve to exist, stretches back to the bad faith of the sack of 1204” (268). Instead of the expected “centuries of decline,” Herrin titles her section on the late empire “Varieties of Byzantium” to emphasize the vitality of provincial centers that allowed Byzantium to survive for 250 years after 1204 and which served as cultural centers, sometimes even beyond 1453. These are demonstrated not only in the “mini-empires” of Nicea, Epiros, and Trebizond, but in a portrait of Mistras, the hilltop fortress above Sparta, and its Platonist philosopher Gemistos Plethon. Her description of the convoluted negotiations over religious union with the west and the long process of Ottoman conquest are admirably comprehensible and nuanced, ending not with the heroic but doomed defense of the city, but rather with the heritage of Byzantium in cosmopolitan Istanbul, and of the transmission of its learning and culture to western humanism. Professor Herrin's “surprising” history concludes with a strong defense of Byzantium as a creative and resourceful society, based in its unique fusion of Christianity, classical Greek culture and education, Roman law and imperial government, and a cosmopolitan population.

How well does this work succeed in bringing Byzantium alive to the uninitiated but curious? Its engaging writing, down-to-earth explanations of difficult beliefs and controversies, and vivid portraits of a wide range of individuals make it accessible and compelling, and Herrin's arguments for Byzantium's significance and heritage are forceful. She conveys recent scholarship effectively to non-specialists and introduces them to a wide variety of source material. Byzantinists will certainly have wish lists of things that should have received more emphasis, and they may contest the positive interpretation. The work clearly sees the misrepresentation of Byzantium in the context of western civilization and emphasizes culture, classical institutions, and religion as its most significant heritage for the modern world. A different book could be written about Byzantium as a Mediterranean power, emphasizing its interactions with Islam, or as an overlooked civilization in premodern world history. Even in a book for beginners, should some still-contested issues and developing scholarship and methodology receive more focus, as, for example, the emerging contributions of archaeology to the history of cities and settlements? Perhaps, but Professor Herrin's choice of focus is compelling, and this excellent book is definitely the work I would recommend to friends as a first introduction to Byzantium. With additional materials to address the historiographical issues raised here, it should also work well in an introductory survey of Byzantium. Its affordability and well-selected illustrations add to the attractiveness of the work.