TAXIS
I
N
September 641 Constans II was crowned by the Patriarch of Constantinople in the ambo of St Sophia, ‘the Great Church’. The old Roman practice of acclaiming a new emperor in the Hippodrome was abandoned. The most important politico-religious ceremony in the Byzantine repertoire was finding its final form. Henceforth a diadem was laid on the Emperor’s head, instead of the traditional torque round his neck. Largesse was distributed; coins were struck. Co-emperors were crowned by emperors, empresses by their husbands. Conventional icono-graphic representations of the ceremony showed the emperors being crowned by Christ.
Political ritual played a central role in Byzantine life. Its aim was to reinforce the ideal of
taxis
, the changeless, harmonious, and hierarchical ‘order of things’. Elaborate spectacles were designed with immense concern for symbolic detail. Processions and public parades were organized on the slightest pretext, above all on Christian feast days. Imperial acclamations were accompanied by the chanting of Biblical texts and political slogans, by the declamation of poems and panegyrics, and by mighty shouts, which contrasted with the total silence that the Emperor’s presence otherwise required. Imperial bride-shows, weddings, and funerals were orchestrated with suitable shows of joy or lamentation. Imperial audiences were meticulously graded according to the status of the visitor. The exact distance between the throne and the prostrations of the visitor was prescribed in advance. The imperial
Adventus
or ‘arrival’ demanded calibration of the rank of the delegates sent out to meet him, the site and form of the greeting, the route into the city, the choice of church for the thanksgiving service, and the menu for the banquet. The imperial
Profectio
or ‘departure’, especially for battle, was marked by the distribution of alms, by the veneration of the Standard of the True Cross, and by the consecration of the army and the fleet. The
Thriambus
or ‘Imperial Triumph’, as inherited from Rome, involved displays of troops, captives, and booty, games and races in the Circus and Hippodrome, and the
tra-chelismos
or ritual trampling of the defeated enemy or usurper. The promotions of high officials were staged in a manner that left no doubt of the source of their success.
On all occasions, great attention was paid to clothing, to the insignia of office, to colour, and to gesture. Robing and disrobing ceremonies opened and closed all processions. The imperial crown, orb, sceptre, and
akakia
, the ‘pouch of dust’ symbolizing mortality, were always given prominence. The wearing of the purple was reserved for the Emperor and, in iconography, for Christ and the Virgin Mary. Byzantine body language stressed the ideal of
agalma
or ‘statuesque calm’.
1
The most complete compendium of Byzantine ritual is to be found in the tenth-century manuscript
De Ceremom’is aulae byzantinae
or ‘The Book of Ceremonies of the Byzantine Court’.
2
It contains 153 chapters or dossiers of instructions relating to practices and procedures over 600 years. It prescribes everything from the rules of dance and address to the length of the Emperor’s haircut.
3
Imperial ceremonial was imitated and adapted by Patriarchs, by provincial administrators, by generals, by bishops, and eventually by rulers throughout the Christian world. In time, it supplied the basis for all sorts of monarchical and ecclesiastical symbolism far beyond the Empire. Charlemagne, for example, copied much from Byzantium, just as other Western sovereigns copied much from Charlemagne.
3
[
KRAL
]
Not all, however, was one-way traffic. The practice of raising the Emperor aloft on the shields of his troops was borrowed from the Germanic tribes. It was first used by Julian in Paris in 361, and lasted, with intervals until the eighth century. The ceremony of
chrisma
, ‘anointment with holy oil’, seems to have been first adopted by the Franks and introduced to Constantinople by Crusaders in the thirteenth century.
4
By that time, the christianization of monarchical ritual in Europe was universal.
Byzantium, however, was primarily a naval power. Its navy of 300 biremes, armed with battering rams and the ‘Greek fire’, could hold its own against all comers. Despite the great battle with the Arabs off Phoenix in Lycia in 655, Byzantine sea-power continued to dominate the Aegean and the Black Sea.
The Byzantine state practised unremitting paternalism in social and economic affairs. Trade was controlled by state officials, who exacted a straight 10 per cent tax on all exports and imports. State regulations governed all aspects of guild and industrial life. State factories, such as the
gynaceum
, the women’s silk-works, guaranteed full employment within the walls. The imperial gold coinage—1
nomisma
= 12
milliaressia =
144
pholes
—supplied the main international currency of the East. Such was the abundance of the state-run fisheries in the Black Sea that the workers of Constantinople regularly ate caviar.
Under its mantle of Greek culture, Byzantium sheltered a multinational community of the most diverse ethnic origins. Imperial brides could be Khazars, Franks, Rus. The population was Graeco-Slav in the Balkans, post-hellenic and Armenian in the Asian provinces. Beyond the serf villages of the countryside, Byzantine society was highly educated and refined. There was provision for church schools, state universities, academies of law, and for female education. Devotional literature predominated. But the tenth-century
Digenis Akritas
has been described as ‘the most splendid
chanson de geste ever
written’, and Byzantine historians from Procopius to Anna Porphyrogeneta (1083–1154) as ‘the finest
school… between Ancient Rome and modern Europe’. Byzantine art and architecture developed absolutely inimitable styles. Despite or perhaps because of the iconoclastic restraints, the Byzantine icon made a lasting contribution to European art. Byzantium remained civilized, while most of the countries of the West were, in terms of formal culture, struggling in outer darkness.
11
The Rise of Islam, 622–778
On 20 September 622 an obscure Arab mystic called Muhammad reached safety in the city of Medina. He had been driven from his native Mecca. He asked that a temple be built on the spot where his anxious disciples had greeted him. Thus, on Day One of Year One of the new religion, the first Muhammadan mosque was erected.
For more than a decade, the former camel-driver had preached his radical ideas without success, having received a vision of his destiny from the archangel Gabriel in a cave on Mount Hira. ‘Muhammad, in truth, in real truth, thou art Prophet of the Lord.’ Later, after this first Night of Destiny, he had experienced another mystical vision, the Night Journey to Heaven. Riding on a magical steed, he was transported to Solomon’s temple in Jerusalem, and thence through the spheres of the sky to the threshold of the Unseen Infinite. In 624 Muhammad armed 300 of his followers and routed an army sent to suppress them. In 628 he rode unopposed into Mecca on his favourite camel, at the head of 10,000 faithful. He struck down the heathen idols in the shrine of the Kaaba, and transformed it into the holiest shrine of his own following. After four more years of teaching at Medina, where the main body of the Prophet’s wisdom was recorded for the Holy Book, the
Koran
, he set out once more on the Farewell Pilgrimage to Mecca. In the Valley of Arafat he delivered his last message:
Listen to my words, my people, for in the year to come I shall not be with you … Hold your goods, your honour and your lives as sacred… until the day you return to God. Aid the poor and clothe them… Remember that one day you will appear before the Almighty and that He will ask you the reason for your actions … It is true that you have certain rights with regard to your women, but they also have rights with regard to you. Treat them well, for they are your support… I have accomplished my mission, and I am leaving you a guide in the shape of the Lord’s Book and the example of His Messenger… You will not fail if you follow this guide.
As he fell to the ground, God spoke:
This day have I perfected for you your religion, and completed my Favour unto you, and chosen for you as your religion—Islam.
12
Back in Medina, the Angel of Death entered the Prophet’s chamber, and the Prophet said, ‘Oh Death, execute your orders’. It was, according to the Christian calendar, 7 June 632.
The desert land of Arabia forms a stepping-stone between the mainlands of Africa and Asia. It had always maintained a fierce independence from the
surrounding empires. It faced Egypt and Abyssinia to the west, Mesopotamia and Persia to the north, and India to the east. Notwithstanding its arid wastes and bedouin tribes, it participated in all the great civilizations of the region. The Kaaba at Mecca marked the spot where Adam came after his expulsion from the Garden of Eden and where Abraham rebuilt the sacred shrine. Mecca itself was a wealthy staging-post on the caravan route joining the Mediterranean with East Africa and India. In the early seventh century it was in close contact with the Roman Empire in Egypt and with the rival Sassanid Empire of Persia. It was an unexpected source for a new world religion; but it had many advantages as a secure base for Islam’s propagation.
Islam, meaning ‘submission’, was a universal religion from the start. Although it has always clung to Arabic as the sacred language of the Koran, it appeals to all nations, to all classes, and to both sexes. One of the most basic precepts is that all Muslims are brothers and sisters. In his lifetime Muhammad denounced the economic privileges of the ruling élite, the subordination of women, and the ‘blood laws’ of the semitic tribes. His call for social, economic, and political equality threatened the foundations of traditional societies. His insistence on the rights of the oppressed and of women, and on the duty of charity and compassion, spelled liberation for the masses. Here was a revolutionary creed, whose almost instantaneous military power derived from the fervent devotion of the faithful. It enjoined that soldiers were the equal of their generals, subjects of their rulers, wives of their husbands. ‘Better justice without religion than the tyranny of a devout ruler.’ Like Christianity, it professed ideals which often outstripped the practices of its adherents; but the force and purity of those ideals is manifest. ‘In the name of Allah, the all-Merciful, the Compassionate’, it spread and spread, like wildfire through the deadwood of a
wadi
.
Islam is said to rest on five pillars. The first, the confession of faith, consists of reciting the formula: ‘Lā ilāha illā Uãh, Muhammadu ‘rasūlu llāh’ (There is no God but Allah, and Muhammad is his Messenger). Whoever says these words before witnesses becomes a Muslim. The second, ritual prayer requires the faithful to wash and to touch the ground with their heads turned towards Mecca at daybreak, noon, sunset, and evening. The third, called
Zakat
, involves giving alms to the poor. The fourth is fasting. Every sane and healthy Muslim adult must refrain from food, drink, and sexual intercourse from dawn to dusk throughout the month of Ramadan. The fifth, the
Hadj
obliges every Muslim to make the pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in his or her lifetime. Above all, the loyal Muslim is enjoined to respect the teachings of the Koran, whose 114
suras
or chapters provide a source of law, a manual of science and philosophy, a collection of myths and stories, and an ethical textbook.
The caliphs, that is ‘the successors’ of the Prophet, quickly turned a united Arabia into the springboard for a theocratic world-empire. In their day they commanded unrivalled power, and wealth beyond tally, inspiring science, literature, and arts. Under Abu Bakr (r. 632–4), Omar (r. 634–44), and Othman (r. 644–56), their armies conquered Syria, Palestine, Persia, and Egypt in lightning succession.
A fleet was constructed to protect Alexandria, and the Arabs soon became the leading sea-power of the Mediterranean. Under Ali (r. 656–61), a cousin and son-in-law of the Prophet, civil and religious dissension broke out. But under the Omayyad dynasty unity was restored. Mo‘awiya (r. 661–80) established the capital in Damascus. Yazid I (r. 680–3) defeated Ali’s rebellious son Hussein—the seminal event in the history of the Shi‘ite sect. Abdulmalik (r. 685–705) suppressed an anti-Caliph in Mecca. Walid I (r. 705–15) saw the zenith of Omayyad power, before their long rivalry with the Abbasid dynasty ended in the bloodbath on the Zab in 750. Thereafter, under Al-Mansur (‘The Victorious’, r. 754–75) the Abbasids launched a 500-year reign. For a time, their capital in Baghdad was the centre of the world.
The transfer of Jerusalem from Christian to Muslim hands was an event of immense consequence. The city was, and is, sacred to all three monotheistic religions. But in the centuries since the Roman expulsion of the Jews, the Christians had guarded the Holy Places for themselves:
On a February day in the year
AD
638, the Caliph Omar entered Jerusalem riding on a white camel. He was dressed in worn, filthy robes, and the army that followed him was rough and unkempt; but its discipline was perfect. At his side rode the Patriarch Sophronius as chief magistrate of the surrendered city. Omar rode straight to the site of the Temple of Solomon, whence his friend Mahomet had ascended into Heaven. Watching him stand there, the Patriarch remembered the words of Christ and murmured through his tears: ‘Behold the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet.’
13
Henceforth the Holy City was to be held by Islamic authorities. The Patriarch became a hostage to fortune. Christian pilgrims could not easily reach their goal, and chose increasingly to visit Rome instead. Christianity’s centre of gravity shifted dramatically westwards.
In that century following the Prophet’s death, the armies of Islam marched on relentlessly. Byzantium was unsuccessfully besieged on two occasions, in 673–8 and 717–18. But Kabul, Bokhara, and Samarkand were captured in the East, Carthage and Tangier in the west. In 711 the crossing of the Pillars of Hercules by Al-Tariq—henceforth called Jebel al-Tariq, or Gibraltar—brought the Muslims into Europe, overwhelming Visigothic Spain and breaching the Pyrenees. In 732, on the centenary of Muhammad’s death, they reached Tours on the Loire, a few days’ ride from Paris, in the heart of the Frankish kingdom.