Germanic lands according to Cl. Ptolemaeus (2nd cent. CE)

A map of the Germanic lands according to Claudius Ptolemaeus (2nd cent. CE)

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Book Review: The Decline of Medieval Hellenism in Asia Minor and the Process of Islamization from the 11th through the 15th Century by S. Vryonis, University of California Press

 

The loss of Asia Minor is often seen as the most decisive factor in the fall of the Byzantine Empire. Asia Minor was the territorial core of the empire during the Middle Byzantine Era. It was a wealthy and populous country of many millions of inhabitants, the main source of resources, raw materials, human resources, employees and soldiers for the Byzantine Empire. Its loss was, indeed, a major cause for the collapse of the Empire. However, this collapse was due to higher and wider political, social, economic, military, religious, ethnological and other negative parameters which in the first place led to the fall of Byzantine Asia Minor and then to the fall of the other imperial territories and eventually of the capital itself.

City plan of Antioch, Seleucid capital (Syria)

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City plan of Antioch (Syria), the capital of the western part of the Seleucid Empire and then a very important metropolis of the Roman and the Byzantine empires. Also a location map of the city.

East-West Christian schism (1054)

A map of Christianity in Europe after the great schism of 1054 CE (Wikimedia commons) between Orthodox Christians in the East (Roman/Byzantine Empire and East Slavic principalities) and Catholic Christians in the West (Holy Frankish/Roman Empire, the other Frankish kingdoms and their satelite states). Five centuries later, a new schism took place between the Catholics of SW Europe and the Protestant Christians of NW Europe.
The following map is a political map of Europe around 1000 CE, just a few decades before the first Schism. The main state units, the Roman Empire and the Principalities of Kiev and Novgorod for the Orthodox, and the Holy Frankish/Roman Empire, France and Hungary for the Catholics are shown.

Forum Romanum: Architecture, part II

 

Architectural reconstruction of the Forum of Rome.
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Forum Romanum: Architecture

 

General reconstruction of the Forum Romanum with the temples of the Capitoline in the distant level.
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