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Byzantine Identities A. Kaldellis Hellen PDF
Byzantine Identities A. Kaldellis Hellen PDF
texts might reveal a Chrysostom who more closely resembled Basil of Caesarea, or
even Libanius himself.
Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge RICHARD FLOWER
raf33@cam.ac.uk
BYZANTINE IDENTITIES
K ( A . ) Hellenism in Byzantium. The Transformations of
Greek Identity and the Reception of the Classical Tradition. Pp. xii +
468. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2007.
Cased, £65, US$125. ISBN: 978-0-521-87688-9.
doi:10.1017/S0009840X09001024
The Classical Review vol. 59 no. 2 © The Classical Association 2009; all rights reserved
544
of the world that accounts for the continuation and inconclusiveness of that
negotiation from Late Antiquity to late Byzantium.
It is hard to do justice to a volume of this erudition and extent that covers much
diverse and seriously understudied material. K. succeeds not only at showing the
ambiguities and di¶erent applications of the word Hellên in the Byzantine context(s),
but also at showing why the questions he asks matter according to his methodological
priorities. But the book is remarkably successful in another respect too: it makes the
reader genuinely interested in what Byzantine intellectuals like Psellus, Michael
Choniates, Ioannes Tzetzes, Eustathius of Thessalonike and other less well known
µgures really thought and felt about a problem as pertinent now as it was in their
times: identity. This, too, is no small accomplishment.
University of Cambridge NIKETAS SINIOSSOGLOU
sinios@cantab.net
ANCIENT ITALY
B ( G. ) , I ( E . ) , R (C. ) (edd.) Ancient Italy.
Regions without Boundaries. Pp. xviii + 334, ills, maps. Exeter: Exeter
University Press, 2007. Cased, £45, €67.50, US$85. ISBN:
978-0-85989-813-3.
doi:10.1017/S0009840X09001036
The Classical Review vol. 59 no. 2 © The Classical Association 2009; all rights reserved