Thus , although the Roman state continued and Roman state traditions were maintained , modern historians distinguish Byzantium from ancient Rome insofar as it was centred on Constantinople , oriented towards Greek rather than Latin culture , and characterised by Orthodox Christianity . Although the Byzantine Empire had a multiethnic character during most of its history and preserved RomanoHellenistic traditions , it became identified by its western and northern contemporaries with its increasingly predominant Greek element . The occasional use of the term Empire of the Greeks Latin Imperium Graecorum in the West to refer to the Eastern Roman Empire and of the Byzantine Emperor as Imperator Graecorum Emperor of the Greeks were also used to separate it from the prestige of the Roman Empire within the new kingdoms of the West .