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This thesis examines the portrayal of outsiders in Michael Psellos's Chronographia, Anna Komnene's Alexiad, and Niketas Choniates's Narrative - using sociological theories of deviancy. The twofold aim is to "treat texts seriously", localized in Jakobson's speech-event nexus of addresser, context, content, contact, code and addressee; and secondly to understand the texts as statements of the ideology of the dominant elite. Outsiders are defined (using the labelling orientation) as people successfully defined as deviants; deviant behaviour is whatever they do. The dominant elite creates cultural boundaries, and places individuals in outsider roles on the other side of those boundaries. Outsiders can be understood only in terms of who defines them as deviant; there is no material reality to deviancy. Stereotypes, which identify social categories of people by evaluative trait-characteristics, are necessary elements of human cognition; they become prejudice only when they are overgeneralized, based on too limited data, applied too widely and maintained in the face of contrary empirical evidence. The analysis of the three texts in depth allows the identification of those groups labelled as outsiders by these expositors of the dominant ideology. My conclusion is that these authors portray a picture of the Byzantine outsider, which is coherent between this limited sample group, allowing for individual variation. These authors used stereotypes to conceptualize and encode in the linguistic and lexicographical complexities of their texts the outsiders they identified in their societies. Their presentation uses stereotypes, but does not descend to prejudice.

The present thesis analyzes the Byzantine mosaic pavements of Phoenicia and Northern Palcatine from a socio-economic perspective, primarily by examining the laying of pavements including technical aspects and bedding, the quality of decoration, the distribution of pavements in time and space, as well as inscriptions which provide names of donors and artists as well as dates. The approach adopted represents a novel alternative and complement to typical interpretations of mosaic floor decoration which overwhelmingly focus on the development and diffusion of style, or provide an exegesis of figurative iconography. Key aspects discussed include the extent to which chronological patterns of mosaic floor laying may be used to gauge economic conditions; the factors which determined the quality and distribution of technique and decoration in different building types; as well as the social mechanisms of patronage. Close scrutiny of the regional mosaic Corpus (which includes the total number of pavements) suggests that mosaic pavements provide a reasonable indication of economic conditions, especially in association with other media (coins, pottery, inscriptions). Together these media paint a historical picture of the economy of the period. Having graded according to four Levels of Complexity all the geometric designs in the Corpus after their codification following the rules devised by the Association Internationale pour l'Etude de la Mosaïque Antique (AIEMA), and with the support of the written ancient sources, it is demonstrated that quality and distribution of technique and style were governed by a combination of factors, notably function, financial expenditure, social use and various socio-economic categories of patrons, liturgy and liturgical level of participation. By building on the methodologies followed and the conclusions reached by other mosaic scholars, this innovative approach has attempted to reintroduce the human element into a discipline focused since the late 1960s on codification and descriptive precision. Revealing the hidden costs underlying the laying of mosaic pavements has presented a new insight into mosaic pavements as tri-dimensional products of team work. Likewise, stripping the literary language of dedicatory formulas down to essential information has challenged the misinterpreting of epigraphic evidence regarding donations and donors. In-depth analysis of Christian mosaic inscriptions has strengthened the pattern of changes plotted by historians of the Early Byzantine period and suggested that Christian patronage of mosaic art is to be equated with the local initiatives of the Church, ecclesiatics and wealthy laymen (or women) as private donors, and more rarely entire village communities. By contrast, scrutiny of the Jewish and Samaritan mosaic inscriptions has highlighted the fact that benefaction emanated from rich and poor alike, and was far more family and community oriented.

The subject for this dissertation is the study of Byzantine monetary affairs from the accesion of Leo III (717) up to the beginning of Alexius I's reign (1081). The work is divided into the following main chapters: I. Gold Coinage: Taking into account documentary and fragmentary numismatic evidence new chronologies and a few new attributions are attempted. A thorough survey of the recorded types and a detailed discussion of the relevant literature is included. References to iconography, monetary reforms and minting process are made. II.Silver Coinage: A similar study, including a separate section on metrology and valuation. III.Copper Coinage: The focus is concentrated in the coinages of Michael II, Theophilus and the anonymous folles of Class A. With the aid of detailed stylistic analyses, the study of dies and then the geographical distribution of the sylistic groups, the complex problem of provincial mints is discussed. The study is supplemented by four Appendices. Appendices I-III include a descriptive catalogue of 378 copper coins of Michael II and Theophilus upon which the stylistic analysis is based. Appendix IV contains catalogues of hoards and stray finds of Anonymous folles of Cl.A from Greece. Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Romania and Asia Minor. IV. Monetary Circulation. A detailed survey of the attested evidence from all the areas under Byzantine dominion is included. On the basis of hoards and stray-finds the trends of the circulation in Greece are described. This study is supplemented by Appendix V, where a corpus of 122 coin hoards is presented.

Thesis (M. Div.)--St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, 1981. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 149-151).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, San Diego, 2008. / Title from first page of PDF file (viewed Mar. 16, 2009). Available via ProQuest Digital Dissertations. Vita. Includes bibliographical references: P. 228-240.

Thesis (doctoral)--Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich, 1954. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 129-137).

Diss.--Urbana-Champaign--University of Illinois, 1982. / Bibliogr. p. 145-154. Index.

Ph.D. / This is the study of an unknown man's view of his contemporary Byzantine world how it was structured and functioned both socially and culturally. In other words, this is an attempt to reconstruct the world view of an unknown individual, through expression of his emotions, impressions, principles and norms in connection with various aspects of his environment. By this approach, I trust, the anonymous author's value system can be "re-created" and examined in association with the collective cultural norms, set and shared by his contemporary society. Thus, besides theauthor's aesthetic perception of the external, physical aspects of his environment, collective and individual stereotypes found in ideologies (such as ethnocentrism, provincialism, patriotism, and class differentiation), as well as religious and social moral values (such as piety, faith, sin, generosity, divine intervention) will be identified and analysed. Our author's perception of his world order may be seen "from the inside" through his concepts, opinions, impressions, criticisms and praises. These are expressed either directly or indirectly throughout his narrative, and refer to certain situations, events, characters and the human condition in general (such as the eternal question of life and death). Certain values, which are expressed by the author through his concepts and opinions, may appear as contradicting one another. These cases will be analysed according to the author's perception of a certain event and measured against related collective ideology, i.e. generally-held conceptions and values, as well as factual information. Thus, in order to realise the purpose of our study, we shall: • examine the relationship and interaction between individual and collective concepts in the Chronicle; • establish the Chronicle's value as a source of information g on the political, economic, social and cultural life in Western Greece during a significant section of the later Byzantine era (1375-1422); • try to reach a better understanding of the mentality of multi-ethnic Byzantine society, especially in Western Greece during the 14 th and 15th centuries.

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