The poverty of the Patriarchate of Grado and the Byzantine–Venetian Treaty of 1082
The imperial chrysobull granted to the Venetian state in 1082 provided the Venetians with considerable economic advantages throughout the Byzantine Empire, and had a major impact on the political relationship of the two powers down to the Fourth Crusade. Yet the chrysobull also granted considerable monies to the metropolitan of Venice, the Patriarch of Grado. In the decades prior to 1082 Grado had suffered from systemic poverty, and various attempts by the Doge to solve this problem failed. The grant of large sums in gold in the chrysobull was aimed at solving this problem. Even this ultimately failed, and another proviso of the chrysobull, the grant of a merchant quarter in Constantinople to Venice, eventually became a funding tool for Grado and other Venetian ecclesiastical institutions.
Byzantine trade privileges to Venice in the eleventh century: the chrysobull of 1092
The question of the grant by the Byzantine Emperor Alexios I Komnenos of an extensive series of concessions to Venice in the late eleventh century has generated considerable attention among modern commentators. Of particular importance is the correct assessment of the date at which the generous privileges were awarded. Recent treatments of this subject have concluded that the traditional dating of 1082, which sets the Byzantine award in the context of the Norman attacks on Epirus of 1081–1085, is likely to be correct. This paper offers a rather different interpretation, arguing that the correct context for the concessions is in fact 1092. Moreover, it is stressed that this is the date provided on both the full versions of the chrysobull which survive in Latin translations. The paper sets out the case in support of this date on literary, palaeographical, numismatic and contextual grounds. Apart from having an impact on analysis of Byzantium’s relations with Venice in the eleventh century, this new interpretation also has important implications for our assessment of the Byzantine context for the First Crusade.
Iustitia Dei: A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification
Preface Acknowledgements 1. Prolegomena 2. The fountainhead: Augustine of Hippo 3. The development of the doctrine in the medieval period 4. The medieval schools of thought on justification 5. The transition from the medieval to the modern period 6. The development of the doctrine in the Reformation period 7. The Tridentine decree of justification 8. The legacy of the English Reformation 9. The modern period Appendix: a glossary of medieval soteriological terms Abbreviations Notes Bibliography Index.