The Podcast of the Lotus Eaters - PREVIEW： Epochs #236 ｜ The Fourth Crusade

00:00:00.000 Hello and welcome to this episode of Epochs where we shall be talking all about the Byzantine

00:00:24.780 Empire the Eastern Roman Empire and I am joined by a furious person X aka Marcus how are you sir

00:00:30.640 very good thank you thank you very much both much obliged yeah no no good to be back again yeah

00:00:34.520 great to have you on we've made lots of content before and your history of all things Rome but

00:00:40.220 particularly or not particularly but also even the Eastern Roman Empire have you noticed that

00:00:43.980 lots of people that know stuff about ancient Rome classical Rome sometimes don't have a great

00:00:48.620 knowledge of Eastern Rome so it's always great for me when you find someone that does yeah and it's

00:00:54.060 interesting you say that because one of my favorite documentaries and arguably like the documentary

00:00:57.820 that led to me on this path as a you know as a passion and as a area of study was um 1997 BBC's

00:01:06.680 I Caesar and it was a periodic sort of five episode series starting with Julius Caesar and it ends with

00:01:12.520 Const Justinian so the episodes were Caesar Augustus Julius Caesar Octavian Augustus episode three was

00:01:21.880 sort of in that period with Claudius Nero that you know because that's sort of a bit of a murky

00:01:28.680 period obviously Michael Sheen as Nero I don't I think it didn't really have much in the way of

00:01:33.780 actors it's more voice acting um all right but no no and anyway and then um episode of Hadrian

00:01:39.020 episode of Constantine sorry it must be six episodes then and then Justinian was the last one

00:01:43.380 right and it is narrated by Brian Cox though and not the scientist Brian Cox as in the Scotsman

00:01:49.060 Brian Cox and he actually does a fabulous job of it I've never heard the the city of Antioch

00:01:53.860 pronounced it quite the same pronounced quite the same way Brian Cox not to be confused with Brian

00:01:57.680 Cox correct correct yes the big burly Scotsman of the beard not the like ectomorphic skinny scientist

00:02:02.160 um but uh and it's interesting when you watch the the final episode on Justinian there's kind of a bit

00:02:08.920 of an you know an epilogue at the end right and as you know oh the you know after the death of

00:02:14.240 Wax and Wayne yada yada yada you know many centuries after Rome fell Constantinople didn't

00:02:19.940 fall until 1453 it's almost as if like an entire millennia of very interesting and in a civilizational

00:02:29.720 context quite consequential history is kind of just a 10 minute summary I I appreciate it it's not the

00:02:36.100 purview of the documentary but it's sort of just oh it just sort of happened you know you know it's like

00:02:41.700 oh wait when Constantinople was captured by the Ottoman Turks I will how did they get there how

00:02:46.020 did they materialize you know where are they from um and so for me as a and I mean you gotta think

00:02:51.240 1997 I was that's when I was very young back then um you know but I mean I've I've had VHS and DVD copies

00:02:59.140 of the documentary um it's often the way they're like Alaric sacks Rome yeah and then oh there is

00:03:04.920 another Rome out east for a thousand years but anyway yeah yeah you often get that and it's just like

00:03:10.260 it's just like a very a very brief sort of book bookend and there's nothing much to it um and the

00:03:17.080 more you get into it you realize what a roller coaster it is oh yeah fascinating and just an

00:03:21.520 endless stream of adventure ups and downs crazy stories it's great and also too um and funnily enough

00:03:29.600 it's something that's referenced in in I, Caesar and I can't remember I think it's in the Constantine

00:03:34.400 episode where the sort of part of the narration is sort of say that one of the things that made the

00:03:39.600 Romans very cynical about Constantine establishing his capital upon the ruins of all the ruins you

00:03:44.840 know upon the foundation of Greek Byzantion you know the old city as was because even though it was

00:03:51.000 an important city I mean Byzantion is referenced in the Peloponnesian war for instance you know

00:03:55.240 um you know it's an important place for Alcibiades to take refuge when he was kicked out of Athens for

00:03:59.820 instance um so you're talking you know circa 4th 5th century BC um it's mentioned in the

00:04:05.800 analysis isn't it exactly because well because when they pass through from when they make their

00:04:09.800 way yeah make their way back from um the Black Sea that's how they get home yeah um Xenophon is 10,000

00:04:16.420 um Constantine you know decides upon this place to construct a city and the point they make in the

00:04:25.820 documentary is you know but Romans by this point who live in the east have seen a dozen of these kind

00:04:32.540 pseudo-capitals rise up you know um Alexandria is a power base although always remains an important

00:04:38.700 city through this time same can be said for Antioch Antioch is and remains an important power center

00:04:44.700 in the east for you know before and after this time period Galerius is himself based in Nicomedeo

00:04:51.000 as an example yeah that is a very important city in the ancient world isn't it exactly um and so you

00:04:56.620 know and there are others that you know in terms of important provincial capitals

00:04:59.660 and of these Byzantion is a is a relatively minor place and then sort of Constantine you know if

00:05:07.760 you if you take to the story you know marches around the what he ends up being sort of the golden horn

00:05:13.120 um oh not the golden horn sorry but you know like from the golden horn to the to the across that

00:05:17.980 isthmus across this is the new boundary that peninsula with his spear you know puts in the ground

00:05:22.560 and then within what a generation um emperors arcadius and theodosius realize that oh okay

00:05:29.300 the city's a bit overgrown now and they had built then the theodosian walls but um but you know that's

00:05:34.460 the that's the origin of of the city and uh again it's it's it's one of those things where it almost

00:05:39.760 astonishes me that it that there becomes the genesis of something which as you've referenced is almost a

00:05:47.780 bookend it's almost just a an epilogue to classical Rome and i think it deserves a lot more than that

00:05:53.600 in my opinion i think maybe we suffer from anglosphere bias i think perhaps if you're greek or turkish

00:06:00.620 or anywhere from the balkans maybe maybe i don't know definitely like from the orthodox sphere so yeah

00:06:06.260 right yeah yeah absolutely yeah um then you it probably is a bit more in your sort of cultural

00:06:13.020 background or you're taught it a bit more at school or uni or something but where obviously you're

00:06:17.880 you're an aussie uh with italian heritage and i'm an englishman uh yeah we're interested in

00:06:25.140 the western rome right yeah we're interested in like things like the history of germany and france

00:06:32.120 and spain and italy and then like romania and hungary and bulgaria a bit less so kind of on the periphery

00:06:38.300 it's just yeah yeah it's just the way it is right the the interesting thing though is that you

00:06:42.580 could you mentioning italy is that there is a bit of a distinction as well because the southerners

00:06:47.820 who are who largely have a um it's probably safe to say that the southern italians are sort of a

00:06:54.680 an ethnogenesis of italic latins and of greeks you know has you know not to get into ancient history but

00:07:01.840 you know for the for the for a very long time in pre-modern history uh what is today modern day

00:07:07.900 sicily and modern day southern italy what the italians called the mezzo giordano but the you know

00:07:12.480 calabria uh campagna pulia etc um were part of this magna greca part of greater greece and so

00:07:19.660 if you go to turn back to like the 7th century bc correct going back to yeah deep in antiquity yeah i mean

00:07:26.520 like for instance you know cytochilza is older actually than you know half the greek settlements

00:07:32.020 in anatoleia as an example um but if you take away the ironing coast of course but um but the point

00:07:38.720 i'm making is that you know you go to places for example like um you know messina you go to places

00:07:43.580 such as um uh not a mouthy because obviously a bit more touristy but say like you know i'm familiar

00:07:48.960 with gaeta as an example uh they have an annual byzantine festival you know and they actually quite um

00:07:55.700 sort of in a way it still sits in their sort of memory their sort of their their cultural memory

00:08:00.520 whereas you know you've got a tuscany or you've got a liguria or you've got a lombardia the other

00:08:05.140 it's a different you know they're obviously because they're a bit more you know well hence the

00:08:10.720 provincial name lombardia they're more lombard they've been more orientated towards like the franks

00:08:14.740 and the north europeans i mean and that's fair enough but what i guess what i'm alluding to is in

00:08:18.440 the south there is that residual kind of civilizational memory of the greek east and the the

00:08:23.460 peasantian empire i mean i mean i mean let's not forget bari falls to the the normans and the

00:08:29.580 languobards um around the same time that manzikud happens right i mean well there's like belazarus's

00:08:35.800 reconquest of italy in like what the sixth century um and yeah just the cultural influence of byzantium

00:08:43.160 at least in the tiny drips and drabs makes its way to scandinavia and britain so the fact that uh

00:08:48.840 reconquered italy um it has got uh like fairly obvious sort of at a glance today byzantine some

00:08:57.720 you can find byzantine influences yeah it's sort of not surprising so it's such a big thing at least

00:09:02.560 at least culturally um so okay if we're going to have this conversation we thought we'd we'd uh end

00:09:08.660 with sort of 1204 and the fourth crusade because although everyone who knows their stuff i've even

00:09:14.880 made content about the fourth crusade before um everyone knows that the final mehmed the second

00:09:19.580 conquest is 1453 but people who really know their onions know that really it was issued with a death

00:09:28.920 blow in some sort of mortal wound in 1204 so hopefully it would become a mortal right at least

00:09:36.640 yeah so we'll try and get our conversation up to that point yeah yeah but i mean where do you think

00:09:41.820 we should even start such a well conversation well you well you and i um sort of thought about like

00:09:47.040 you know where do we begin this conversation do we sort of begin it with the the onset the

00:09:51.660 massaponian dynasty the survival of the arab conquests and the thing is if we're talking about the

00:09:56.900 um evolution of the state um it's kind of hard to at the very least probably start her at heraclius

00:10:04.740 um and i mean we have touched on justinian which is slightly very beginning of the seventh century

00:10:10.300 yeah well you know when you think of the conclusion of the last um roman persian war uh you know it's

00:10:15.980 the first decade of the 600s um and really because you're in that era it's sort of hard to ignore

00:10:23.560 what had occurred that previous century with justinian i mean you don't think justinian's emperor for

00:10:28.020 you know over half a century you know i mean he's probably one of the most long-lived emperors i

00:10:33.720 think he died at the age of 86 or something it was a fantastically long reign and pivotal and yeah

00:10:39.400 pivotal and despite himself having contracted the bubonic plague yeah as well a rare survivor of

00:10:45.220 plague yeah yeah remarkable you know it was like in a coma for a while wasn't it theodora's like

00:10:50.260 ruling semi-comatose yeah yeah yeah it's remarkable and everyone like all the senate and most of the

00:10:56.680 city thought that he was as good as gone you would think that he just he's got plague he's unconscious

00:11:01.220 end of story yeah and and and sort of in a strange twist of irony it's actually theodora who dies

00:11:08.660 relatively young yeah yeah he outlives her doesn't he yeah by years by cent by cent by cent by decades

00:11:14.180 by a couple decades he's he's a he's a widower for you know many years afterwards so if we don't

00:11:19.100 actually start the the full narrative at constantine the great constantine the first in the fourth

00:11:25.840 century then uh we have to at least uh mention justinia which we've done but you think heracrius

00:11:31.900 is probably a sensible place yes to actually begin well i think and i know i know as often happens

00:11:38.720 because i mean let's face it between yourself myself and our esteemed friend and colleague

00:11:42.600 apostolic majesty we have canvassed this topic quite a bit in our circles and heracrius does provide a

00:11:49.480 relatively um straightforward hinge point in history yeah you know when when heracrius the

00:11:57.060 older his father who's the exarch of of carthage of north africa dispatches his son to depose

00:12:02.400 phocas who is himself a usurper against maurice yeah right maurikios okay so there's this emperor

00:12:09.120 maurice there hasn't been a usurpation for like a century then he gets usurped by one of his generals

00:12:14.080 focus yes who then in turn is cooed yeah by you might say like a patriot faction all right within

00:12:22.260 the roman aristocracy and so is it as a historian looking back it's hard it's really hard not to

00:12:27.240 see um either maurice or certainly heracrius as this is a a nice breaking point because you mentioned

00:12:35.120 justinian rules for a long time heracrius rules for a really long time isn't it 25 it's well over 20

00:12:39.480 years isn't it well you've got to think he's emperor for the last you know or more or almost

00:12:44.140 decade of the persian war right and then there's almost 10 years before the beginning of the walls

00:12:49.640 with the caliphate with the russian caliphate right and then heracrius quite tragically lives just long

00:12:55.340 enough to see his eastern conquests lost to the arabs you know the the regions he fought so hard for to

00:13:02.240 to reclaim from the sassanids uh lost to the arabs you know there's that apophrical quote when he um

00:13:08.860 i don't know if it's after the battle of yarmulch itself or whether it's the retreat from

00:13:13.280 the capital of syria which is emezer uh he says you know farewell syria for you will be a fine

00:13:18.580 province to the enemy hmm yeah i think that summarizes um so to paint the picture just quickly

00:13:25.040 you've got the byzantine empire which is modern anatolyia modern turkey turkey sorry modern turkey

00:13:30.800 um but then beyond that to the east you've got the quote-unquote persians or the sassanid

00:13:36.120 persians okay and so at the beginning of um heracrius's reign which is the very turn

00:13:42.900 of the 7th century so the 600s like the first decade of the 600s uh so the

00:13:49.260 muhammad and his hordes haven't broken out of of uh of arabia at this point they're not a thing

00:13:56.320 on on the world stage at all well they haven't even had the rid of wars yet right okay so i mean

00:14:00.400 it really if you if you if you sort of delve into the nuts and bolts of it in the midst of the majority

00:14:05.340 of this the the sort of roman sassanid period and certainly the the span of the war um muhammad

00:14:12.620 is a a nobody and then towards the latter period he's like barely proselytizing you know because

00:14:18.600 as we know he bounces between medina and mecca he's kicked out of one city and takes refuge in the

00:14:22.120 other yeah and so i mean at this point this this and what's sort of particularly diabolical is that

00:14:27.540 this final war is actually cataclysmic for both empires all right yeah um just to talk about the

00:14:34.540 hinge point briefly um obviously the the empires in the conclusion of the struggle with the arabs

00:14:41.660 shorn of a lot of territory the romans are forced to reform themselves as they do frequently in their

00:14:47.120 history you know going all the way back to i think you and i discussed this last time you know

00:14:50.320 if you think of even how the republic restructured it's on you know the the polybian legion the the

00:14:55.040 marian legion you know the the you know going from maniples to cohorts and the post-marian reforms

00:15:00.720 and even you know in the imperial period this tradition still continues in the east you know

00:15:06.420 in the east roman byzantine army you know it evolves actually several times and also what heraclius does

00:15:11.560 do and i mean most people just quickly say maurice is famous for that isn't he yes maurice is for

00:15:16.780 reforming everything and writing a book about it yes so yeah no no absolutely yeah uh did he write

00:15:22.640 strategic on yeah he's supposed to have done yeah yeah some people claim he did it says he did

00:15:27.180 whether he really did is something else but yeah yeah that's him yeah because the thing is with this

00:15:30.900 period is that you have to realize that like there's a lot of manuals get written that's actually

00:15:34.100 it's hard to remember who who wrote we don't like a forest for cast rights one and you know there's a

00:15:39.100 few others that get written across time i think like one of the botaniates scions write ones or

00:15:44.440 brienios in in the east i can't remember but what what i'm alluding to is that um and also heraclius

00:15:50.640 from an administrative perspective also transforms or um ushers in the period whereby the official

00:15:58.120 language of the empire changes from latin to greek there's a recognition that the majority ethnic

00:16:03.360 group and the governing elite in the east roman empire is greek rather than sort of latin or italic

00:16:09.680 and so therefore greek becomes the official state language which for me sort of does provide that

00:16:14.820 sensible rational idea of the hinge point between what is the old you know remnant east roman part

00:16:24.640 of the imperial roman project and what is this new sort of more hellenic you know proto-medieval

00:16:33.040 east roman byzantine empire center and constantinople and that for me heraclius does provide that

00:16:38.560 and i suppose for most other people who would agree provides that pivot point a lot of their enemies or

00:16:43.680 even themselves would they call themselves greeks hellenicoi yeah yeah right and they're speaking

00:16:49.340 greek and their enemies often call them greek but they're also though at the same time they're

00:16:54.040 insisting they are romans they're insisting they are the direct they're the roman em it's the roman

00:17:00.580 empire and they're the roman em the roman emperor yeah and all that sort of thing because there's a

00:17:04.800 classic classic uh history nerds discussion is uh are the is the eastern roman empire

00:17:12.060 roman or greek and i always feel like the answer is without just being a complete cop-out

00:17:18.080 that the answer is it's a bit complicated it's a bit complicated it's sort of both at the same

00:17:22.680 time it depends what period you're talking about it's a bit complicated and it's elements of both

00:17:27.040 in different ways well that's the that's the true true answer because yeah because the thing is is

00:17:31.580 like from a standpoint of say ethanogenesis and you know that topic right is that you know obviously

00:17:40.660 the greeks as a populace and um as a as a as an elite that are present in the empire you know they are

00:17:49.840 the the majority by by some measure they you know they hold power in in the cities they're they're

00:17:56.500 for the most part the governing elite with the exception of anatoly you know you have the presence

00:17:59.820 of armenians and a few other disparate groups but you know uh the language is greek you know the

00:18:04.620 patriarch is a greek figure who governs essentially over a hellenized orthodox you know religious you

00:18:11.920 know body um and the you know medieval greek is an evolution of you know koine greek of um sorry not

00:18:19.620 common greek of you know the common um classical greek and so that's true so the people who make

00:18:25.520 that point are correct but then also they didn't stop being citizens of rome of the empire um the

00:18:32.720 capital moves from rome to i mean ravenna and milan but you know it does ultimately move to

00:18:37.740 constantinople and you know the senate relocates from rome to constantinople they don't stop being

00:18:44.140 citizens of that entity east rome as we understand that is the administrative political

00:18:49.500 bureaucratic governing and military continuation of that same entity so to be able to so to actually

00:18:57.020 have the goal to say they aren't romans yeah that's not it's incorrect to say that so really

00:19:02.180 both it's both are simultaneously true right that yeah that's sort of the real honest answer yeah

00:19:07.600 we hope you enjoyed that video and if you did please head over to lotusseaters.com

00:19:12.420 for the full unabridged video

The Podcast of the Lotus Eaters - November 09, 2025

PREVIEW： Epochs #236 ｜ The Fourth Crusade - Part I with Furius Pertinax

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