Antique Constantinople (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), provides a catalogue
of known Hippodrome statuary at 212–32.
78 R. Cormack, ‘The wall-painting of St. Michael in the theatre’, in R.R.R. Smith, and Kenan T.
Erim, eds., Aphrodisias Papers 2 (Ann Arbor, Michigan: Dept of Classical Studies, University
of Michigan, 1991), 109–22.
79 Secret History, 26.8–9.
80 Liebeschuetz, Decline and Fall of the Roman City, 253–5; Blues and Greens continued to exist
in Byzantium, where they still played a role in the racing in the Hippodrome at Constanti-
nople, and came to be part of the ceremonial surrounding the emperors.
81 Bassett, The Urban Image of Late Antique Constantinople, chap. 6, ‘Justinian and antiquity’,
121–36, arguing for a progressive shift in patronage from a classical to an ecclesiastical
focus.
82 Patlagean, Pauvreté économique et pauvreté sociale, 215. Acclamations: C.M. Roueché,
‘Acclamations in the later Roman empire: new evidence from Aphrodisias’, Journal of
Roman Studies 74 (1984), 181–99; the reception of the Theodosian Code was greeted by
acclamations by the senate (all recorded), and the practice continued in Byzantine court
ceremonial.
83 End of the free bread distribution in Constantinople: Chron. Pasch. s.a. 617: ‘in this year the
recipients of the state bread were requested for 3 coins for each loaf as a levy. And after
everyone had provided this, straightway in the month August of the same indiction 6 the
provision of this state bread was completely suspended’.
84 Hirschfeld, The Judaean Desert Monasteries in the Byzantine Period; J. Patrich, Sabas, Leader of
Palestinian Monasticism: A Comparative Study in Eastern Monasticism, Fourth to Seventh Centuries
(Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1995); John Binns, Ascetics and Ambassadors of Christ.
The Monasteries of Palestine, 314–641 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994); Lives of the Monks of
Palestine by Cyril of Scythopolis (Kalamazoo: Cistercian Publications, 1991).
8 The eastern Mediterranean – a region in ferment1 From a large bibliography, see Fergus Millar, ‘Christian monasticism in Roman Arabia at
the birth of Mahomet’, Semitica et Classica 2 (2009), 97–115, at 105; ‘Arabs’ and ‘Saracens’: id.,
‘The Theodosian empire (408–50) and the Arabs: Saracens or Ishmaelites?’, in E. Gruen,
ed., Cultural Borrowings and Ethnic Appropriations in Antiquity (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 2005),
297–314.
2 A Byzantine embassy sent by Justinian to Himyar and to the Ethiopians (Axum) with a
similar aim in 531 is also mentioned by Proc., Wars I.19–20, and one to Axum by Mala-
las, Chon., XVIII.56. Given its strategic position, it is not surprising that both Byzantium
and Axum interested themselves in Himyar in the early sixth century. The literary sources
for Himyar are complex, but see the helpful collection of discussions in Joëlle Beaucamp,
Françoise Briquel-Chatonnet and Christian Julien Robin, eds., Juifs et chrétiens en Arabie aux
Ve et VIe siècles: regards croisés sur les sources (Paris: Association des amis du Centre d’histoire et
civilisation de Byzance, 2010), and further below.
3 See Greg Fisher, Between Empires. Arabs, Romans and Sasanians in Late Antiquity (Oxford:
Oxford University Press, 2011). A great deal has been written recently about Arabs and the
rise of Arabic in the Roman empire before Islam; see I. Shahid, Rome and the Arabs. A Pro-
legomenon to the Study of Byzantium and the Arabs (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1984);
Rome and the Arabs in the Fifth Century (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1989); Rome and
the Arabs in the Sixth Century, 2 vols. (Washington, DC: Dumbarton Oaks, 1995, 2002), with
M. Whittow, ‘Rome and the Jafnids: writing the history of a 6th-century tribal dynasty’, in
J.H. Humphrey, ed., The Roman and Byzantine Near East. Some Recent Archaeological Research 2
(Portsmouth, RI: Journal of Roman Archaeology, 2002), 207–24; R.G. Hoyland, Arabia and
the Arabs. From the Bronze Age to the Coming of Islam (London: Routledge, 2001), and further
below and Chapter 9.
NOTES TO CHAPTER 7