Translations from Byzantine Sources

The following introductions and translated excerpts have been produced for students taking my classes in Byzantine and Medieval European History. To that effect, I have also provided links to other sites where important texts which we use are mounted or are available for sale. I claim neither credit nor responsibility for those, but welcome comments and criticisms of my own translations.

Eusebius, Life of Constantine (at Fordham University)

Procopius, Secret History (at Fordham University)

The Rule of the Stoudios Monastery (at Dumbarton Oaks)

Nikephoros, Short History (available from Dumbarton Oaks)

Theophanes the Confessor, Chronicle (available from Oxford University Press)

Iconoclasm: sources from the first period of Byzantine political iconoclasm

Parastaseis Syntomai Chronikai: brief historical expositions on Constantinople in the eighth century (published by Brill Academic Publishers)

Book of the Eparch: tenth-century guild regulations for Constantinople

De Administrando Imperio: Excerpts from  the text compiled by Constantine Pophyrogenitus

De Cerimoniis: Diplomatic Protocols, excerpted from the text compiled by Constantine Pophyrogenitus

Lives of Sts Cyril and Methodios: Slavic lives of the Apostles to the Slavs

Pope Nicholas I: Responses to Khan Boris of the Bulgarians (at Fordham University)

John Skylitzes: Excerpts from the Synopsis Historion

Theophanes Continuatus: Introduction and Excerpts

Symeon Logothete: Introduction and Excerpts

Michael Psellos: Chronographia (at Fordham University)

Anna Comnena: Alexiad (at Fordham University)

John Kinnamos, Niketas Choniates: Two accounts of John II's encounters with the Hungarians, 1127-29

Ljetopis Popa Dukljanina: Excerpts from the so-called Chronicle of the Priest of Duklja

Nicholas Mesarites: Ekphrasis on the Church of the Holy Apostles at Constantinople