In the sixth century, Byzantine emperors secured the provinces of the Balkans by engineering a frontier system of unprecedented complexity. Drawing on literary, archaeological, anthropological, and numismatic sources, Andrei Gandila argues that cultural attraction was a crucial component of the political frontier of exclusion in the northern Balkans. If left unattended, the entire edifice could easily collapse under its own weight. Through a detailed analysis of the archaeological evidence, the author demonstrates that communities living beyond the frontier competed for access to Byzantine goods and reshaped their identity as a result of continual negotiation, reinvention, and hybridization. In the hands of 'barbarians', Byzantine objects, such as coins, jewelry, and terracotta lamps, possessed more than functional or economic value, bringing social prestige, conveying religious symbolism embedded in the iconography, and offering a general sense of sharing in the Early Byzantine provincial lifestyle.
Author(s): Andrei Gandila
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Year: 2018
Language: English
Commentary: a lot of hyphens are missing in previous version
Pages: XX+376
Acknowledgments viii
Abbreviations xi
Figures xv
Illustration Credits xvii
Introduction 1
1. The Roman Frontier in Late Antiquity 10
2. Cultural Diversity in the Danube Region and Beyond: An Archaeological Perspective 33
3. Christianity North of the Danube [101]
4. Contact and Separation on the Danube Frontier 131
5. The Flow of Byzantine Coins Beyond the Frontier 154
6. Putting the Danube into Perspective: Money, Bullion, and Prestige in Avaria and Transcaucasia 191
7. Money and Barbarians: Same Coins, Different Functions 243
Conclusions 280
Bibliography 289
Index 363
