The paper discusses the potentials and challenges of integrating the expanding body of archaeological evidence and insights from the natural sciences with the hitherto text-dominated research in the field of Byzantine Human Animal Studies. After an elaboration on the understanding of historically relevant actors that include autonomous humans, things and nonhuman animals, a first case…
This study examines the major crops and cropping systems of the Byzantine Empire from the seventh to the fifteenth centuries CE, focusing on agricultural continuity and change. Farming was the backbone of the Byzantine economy, sustaining at least 80% of the population throughout the empire’s history. By integrating textual sources, such as the Geoponika, with…
Middle and Late Byzantine amphorae are among the final examples of clayey containers used in maritime trade of food products (e. g., wine, oil) in the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. In the past fifteen years, four of their most widespread types were studied by archaeological scientists using chemical analyses and petrography. They identified two…