The Reception of Digital Humanities in Chinese Byzantine Studies

Since the early twenty-first century, Digital Humanities methodologies—including network analysis, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), prosopography and other methodologies—have significantly advanced international Byzantine studies, influencing the field within China. Following over four decades of substantial development, Chinese Byzantinists at the Institute for the History of Ancient Civilizations (IHAC) and beyond have expanded their research focus beyond traditional textual analysis to encompass areas such as hagiography, while actively engaging with the digital humanities paradigm, evidenced by emerging Chinese-language scholarship. IHAC Byzantinists are pursuing a multi-faceted approach to digital humanities integration: (1) monitoring and synthesising international digital humanities trends for dissemination within China; (2) facilitating knowledge transfer through lectures, workshops, and training schools led by international scholars, alongside developing domestic teaching capacity; (3) constructing an open-access, bilingual (Chinese/English) XML-based database documenting Byzantine gold coins discovered in China; and (4) enabling the application of digital humanities methodologies in graduate student research, which has achieved rich academic results. The successful implementation of these digital humanities projects and their utilisation in graduate theses demonstrates the significant potential for digital humanities within Chinese Byzantine scholarship. In the future, on the basis of current active Byzantinists in China, we will progress in saint-network of Byzantium between the 8th and the 10th century, ancient Chinese texts about Byzantium (Fulin), and other potential programs about digital humanities.