The Art of War in Byzantium
The "art" of Byzantine warfare including tactics, strategy, army structure, and equipment. Explore the 'war' ideology which was largely responsible for the Byzantine state's long-lasting power and development.
-
Course begins June 17, 2025
-
Course meets twice per week on Tuesday and Friday
-
Live sessions are 2 hours each
Session 1
This session Introduces the subject of military history - tools of interpretation and approaches - the development of research on warfare in the Middle Ages and Byzantium - the "culture" of medieval warfare - the meeting of the "warring" cultures of the Middle Ages in the Eastern Mediterranean (strategic principles).
Session 2
This week includes a broad survey of the military handbooks/manuals, also called (βιβλία) Strategika or (βιβλία) Taktika. This will be coupled with a detailed look into several critical issues, including: authorship, and the educational and professional background of the people who authored/compiled these manuals; audience, and those who collected and read them; the purpose of the manuals; the social and geo-political context behind their compilation; and, some of the literary topoi (or clichés) one can find in them.
Session 3
This week we cover the ‘grand strategy’ of the Byzantine Empire from the 3rd to the 12th centuries. We cover the evolution of the terms strategy and tactics, and then shift to asking how the Byzantine theorists and generals established their theoretical and practical ideas about warfare, and in what way can the Byzantine emperors be said to have pursued a ‘grand strategy’? Lastly, we discuss the importance of the four factors that shaped the Byzantine empire’s strategic thinking along the centuries.
Session 4
This week, how the Byzantine army fought its battles, deriving as much information as possible from both narrative sources and the military manuals. The focus of the analysis will be thematic, taking the description of four key battles as case studies to examine four main categories of battles. We will also cover the methods of organizing for and the means of controlling fighting, emphasizing the structural changes in the eastern Roman/Byzantine army.
Session 5
As the 11th century is a period of intense geo-political interaction between Byzantium and its neighbors, both in eastern Anatolia and in Italy and the Balkans, we will be discussing the different ways of making war applied by the empire’s enemies, and to what extend each side adjusted its tactics and strategies to those of its enemies.
Session 6
The last session sheds light on the important developments in the field of weapons and armour technology in the eastern Roman Empire, from the 3rd century to the period of the Fourth Crusade. Provided will be a brief but comprehensive picture of the place of weaponry in the society, including legislation and different customs surrounding them. The focus will also be on the changes and innovations in the design and manufacture of offensive and defensive equipment in the eastern Roman Empire and the influences from its neighbors.
Meet Your Instructor
George Theotokis
George Theotokis received his PhD in History from the University of Glasgow (2010), specializing in medieval military history. He has published numerous articles and monographs on the history of warfare in Europe and the Mediterranean in the medieval and early modern periods, including Norman Campaigns in the Balkans 1081-1108 (Boydell, 2014), Byzantine Military Tactics in Syria and Mesopotamia in the Tenth Century (EUP, 2018), Twenty Battles that Shaped Medieval Europe (Robert Hale, 2019), Bohemond of Taranto, Crusader and Conqueror (Pen and Sword, 2021), The Campaign and Battle of Manzikert, 1071 (Arc Humanities Press, 2024), and The Art of War in Byzantium (Arc Humanities Press, 2024). He works as an Assistant Professor of European history at Ibn Haldun University in Istanbul.