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Summary

Vlada Stankovi

Death in Byzantium. An Overview of Byzantine Notions on Death,

and Its Place in Byzantine Mentality/Identity

There are two phenomena in the Byzantine notions on death that attract our special at
tention, at the same time showing the directions for further, deeper research.
a) Byzantines had rarely spoken about death in public, suppressing general human
problems, which was clearly visible from their unwillingness to name death the right word,
using descriptive or indirect words. In the society they had lived, naming certain unpleasant
things was equally dangerous as their substance, in the same way as the verbal critic of the
emperor (authorities) was as strong as the deeds against the ruler themselves, since they
showed someones real standpoints, from which a real threat could originate. Similarly to
the political pressure from the state, emperor, ideology, there was social pressure, which in
Byzantine world had drawn clear limits to the acceptable views and behavior, with threats for
those who break them, forcing the Byzantine man to adhere to the social rules and attitudes
and giving him freedom to shape his intimate word according to his own will.
Death was a phenomenon which was isolated from life by conscious or semi-conscious
attitudes of the Byzantines, being something unavoidable, but which could be held off by
taciturnity or ignoring. Byzantines made a taboo out of death, thus trying to suppress the fear
from its fatality, in the similar way they made a taboo out of the deaths pair, passionate eros,
defending themselves from its destructive force.
b) Individuality of the Byzantines towards the death, direct relations between a person
and his destiny, remained untouched by the outer, unifying and partly collectivistic nature
of the centralized state and its ideology. In the Byzantine notions, or even fear of death, the
church was less important than it could have been expected in a medieval society. Aware
of the mundane nature of the Christs church, a Byzantine man could have not believed in
its divine almightiness, or completely submit his own life to it. Always having a dominant
authorities with numerous and ever-present bureaucratic apparatus, Byzantine church could
not have had such political and spiritual control of its believers, or impose its absolute aut
hority as the church in the West. Byzantine man died alone, no matter if it was an emperor,
a monk, an officer, a warrior, a scientist or a peasant, believing that he had a right to await a
just judgment in the other world and hoping kind God would show understanding and mercy
for his human weakness.