PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITIONxparticularly diffi cult of access. Luckily, a useful brief narrative is provided in
Roger Collins’s recent Early Medieval Europe 300–1000 (London, 1991). The
present book has a different and wider scope. I devote particular attention
to issues currently debated, such as urban change and patterns of settlement,
where much of the evidence is archaeological, partly in order to point up the
great change that has taken place in our approach to and understanding of
the period since Jones, fundamental though his work remains in many other
spheres. Cultural and social history occupy a large amount of space for similar
reasons. Ideally, too, a book of this kind would be much more fully illustrated
than has been possible here; however, there are fortunately many accessible
guides to hand, which I have indicated as often as possible in the notes. The
book’s main emphasis is on the empire rather than the periphery or the emer-
gent kingdoms of the west, and so it points towards the east, where the institu-
tions of Roman government survived at least until the seventh century when a
more ‘Byzantine’, that is ‘medieval’, state gradually emerged. There are many
excellent introductory works on the medieval west, and other areas given less
coverage here (Spain, Italy, the northern provinces, the Balkans) have been
treated in specialist works mentioned in the notes. But there are as yet fewer
recent books which do justice to the equally important history of the east-
ern provinces in the fi fth and sixth centuries. We still need a detailed history
even of the crucial reign of Justinian (AD 527–65). Finally, some parts of the
book necessarily have a certain provisional or exploratory character, precisely
because the necessary research is proceeding at very uneven rates, and many
questions are still without answers. That is of course also one of the greatest
attractions of the fi eld.
I wish to thank several friends and colleagues for spotting errors and pro-
viding advice, among them Lawrence I. Conrad, Han Drijvers and Bryan
Ward-Perkins, and especially Wolf Liebeschuetz. Ian Tompkins and Lucas
Siorvanes generously read the whole typescript, and Fergus Millar, the series
editor, was not merely encouraging but also patient. The book is meant as a
starting-point, not a terminus. If readers are annoyed by it or frustrated at not
fi nding what they want, I hope they will also be stimulated into pursuing it
somewhere else and fi nding the right answers for themselves.
Averil Cameron
London, July, 1992