Koubikoularios
''Cubicularius'', Hellenization, Hellenized as ''koubikoularios'' (), was a title used for the eunuch Chamberlain (office), chamberlains of the imperial palace in the later Roman Empire and in the Byzantine Empire. The feminine version, used for the lady-in-waiting, ladies-in-waiting of the empresses, was ''koubikoularia'' (κουβικουλαρία). History The term derives from their service in the ''sacrum cubiculum'', the emperor's "sacred bedchamber". In the late Roman period, the ''cubicularii'' or ''koubikoularioi'' were numerous: according to John Malalas, Empress Theodora (6th century), Theodora's retinue numbered as many as 4,000 ''patrikios, patrikioi'' and ''koubikoularioi''.. They were placed under the command of the ''praepositus sacri cubiculi'' and the ''primicerius sacri cubiculi'', while the other palace servants came either under the ''castrensis sacri palatii'' or the ''magister officiorum''.. There were also special ''cubicularii''/''koubikoularioi'' for the ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Parakoimomenos
The ''parakoimōmenos'' (, literally "the one who sleeps beside [the emperor's chamber]") was a Byzantine Empire, Byzantine Byzantine aristocracy and bureaucracy, court position, usually reserved for eunuch (court official), eunuchs. The position's proximity to the List of Byzantine emperors, emperors guaranteed its holders influence and power, and many of them, especially in the 9th and 10th centuries, functioned as the Byzantine Empire's chief ministers. History and functions The title was used anachronistically by various Byzantine writers for prominent eunuch court officials of the distant past, including Euphratas under Constantine the Great (reigned 306–337), the notorious Chrysaphius under Theodosius II (), or an unnamed holder of the office under Emperor Maurice (emperor), Maurice (). The position was probably created no later than the reign of Leo IV the Khazar (), when the chronicler Theophanes the Confessor mentions a "''koubikoularios'' and ''parakoimomenos”'' ser ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Nipsistiarios
The ''nipsistiarios'' () was a Byzantine court position and rank reserved for eunuchs. The office is first attested in a 7th-century seal, but was abandoned well before the 14th century, since it is not mentioned in the ''Book of Offices'' of pseudo-Kodinos.. As his name shows (from Greek νίπτειν, "to wash hands"), the ''nipsistiarios'' was tasked with holding a gold, gem-encrusted water basin and assisting the Byzantine emperor in performing the ritual ablutions before he exited the imperial palace or performed ceremonies. According to the '' Klētorologion'' of 899, his insigne of office was a ''kamision'' (tunic) embroidered with the figure of a basin in purple.. In the ''Klētorologion'', he ranks as the lowest in the hierarchy of the specifically eunuch dignities, below the ''koubikoularios ''Cubicularius'', Hellenization, Hellenized as ''koubikoularios'' (), was a title used for the eunuch Chamberlain (office), chamberlains of the imperial palace in the later Roman Em ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Spatharokoubikoularios
The ''spatharokoubikoularios'' (, "sword-chamberlain") was a Byzantine court dignity reserved for eunuch palace officials. He was a ceremonial sword-carrier assigned to the personal guard of the Byzantine emperor.. It later became a simple court rank, being the third-lowest dignity for eunuchs, coming after the '' ostiarios'' and before the ''koubikoularios''.. According to the '' Klētorologion'' of 899, the insigne of the rank was a gold-handled sword A sword is an edged and bladed weapons, edged, bladed weapon intended for manual cutting or thrusting. Its blade, longer than a knife or dagger, is attached to a hilt and can be straight or curved. A thrusting sword tends to have a straighter .... References Sources * * Byzantine palace offices Byzantine titles and offices reserved for eunuchs Swordfighters {{Byzantine-stub ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Epi Tes Trapezes
The () was a Byzantine court post, responsible for the imperial banquets. History The office, more fully known as the (, 'Domestic of the imperial table'), () or (, 'the one in charge of the lord's table'), is first mentioned as extant in the mid-7th century, but the source, a hagiography of Maximus the Confessor, is of much later date. It is, however, amply attested in seals from the 8th century on, often holding the offices of or as well.. The was responsible for introducing guests to the imperial banquets, waiting to the Byzantine emperor along with the , and carrying dishes from the imperial table to the guests. Historical sources, however, show that some holders of the post were entrusted with leading troops or various other special assignments. Like many palace posts involving close access to the Byzantine emperor, it was restricted to eunuchs. There was also the (, 'in charge of the table of the '), who filled the same duties for the Byzantine empress, and in addition ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hellenization
Hellenization or Hellenification is the adoption of Greek culture, religion, language, and identity by non-Greeks. In the ancient period, colonisation often led to the Hellenisation of indigenous people in the Hellenistic period, many of the territories which were conquered by Alexander the Great were Hellenized. Etymology The first known use of a verb that means "to Hellenize" was in Greek (ἑλληνίζειν) and by Thucydides (5th century BC), who wrote that the Amphilochian Argives were Hellenised as to their language by the Ambraciots, which shows that the word perhaps already referred to more than language.. The similar word Hellenism, which is often used as a synonym, is used in 2 Maccabees (c. 124 BC) and the Book of Acts (c. AD 80–90) to refer to clearly much more than language, though it is disputed what that may have entailed. Background Historical By the 4th century BC, the process of Hellenization had started in southwestern Anatolia's Lycia, Cari ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Byzantine Court Titles
The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th centuryAD, it endured until the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453. The term 'Byzantine Empire' was coined only after its demise; its citizens used the term 'Roman Empire' and called themselves 'Romans'. During the early centuries of the Roman Empire, the western provinces were Latinised, but the eastern parts kept their Hellenistic culture. Constantine I () legalised Christianity and moved the capital to Constantinople. Theodosius I () made Christianity the state religion and Greek gradually replaced Latin for official use. The empire adopted a defensive strategy and, throughout its remaining history, experienced recurring cycles of decline and recovery. It reached its greatest extent un ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Ancient Roman Titles
Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history through late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the development of Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient history covers all continents inhabited by humans in the period 3000 BCAD 500, ending with the expansion of Islam in late antiquity. The three-age system periodises ancient history into the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, and the Iron Age, with recorded history generally considered to begin with the Bronze Age. The start and end of the three ages vary between world regions. In many regions the Bronze Age is generally considered to begin a few centuries prior to 3000 BC, while the end of the Iron Age varies from the early first millennium BC in some regions to the late first millennium AD in others. During the time period of ancient history, the world population was exponentially increasing due to the Neolithic Revolution, which was in full prog ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Exoletus
''Exoletus'' is a Latin term, the perfect passive participle of the verb ''exolescere'', which means "to wear out with age". In ancient Rome the word referred to a certain class of homosexual males or male prostitutes, although its precise meaning is unclear to historians. In his essay on sexual morality, ''Offences Against One's Self'', the nineteenth-century English philosopher Jeremy Bentham provided the following definition of the term: :There was a particular name for those who had past the short period beyond which no man hoped to be an object of desire to his own sex. They were called ''exoleti''. No male therefore who was passed this short period of life could expect to find in this way any reciprocity of affection; he must be as odious to the boy from the beginning as in a short time the boy would be to him. The objects of this kind of sensuality would therefore come only in the place of common prostitutes; they could never even to a person of this depraved taste answer ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Imperial Purple
Tyrian purple ( ''porphúra''; ), also known as royal purple, imperial purple, or imperial dye, is a reddish-purple natural dye. The name Tyrian refers to Tyre, Lebanon, once Phoenicia. It is secreted by several species of predatory sea snails in the family Muricidae, rock snails originally known by the name Murex (''Bolinus brandaris'', ''Hexaplex trunculus'' and ''Stramonita haemastoma''). In ancient times, extracting this dye involved tens of thousands of snails and substantial labour, and as a result, the dye was highly valued. The chromophore, coloured compound is 6,6'-Dibromoindigo, 6,6'-dibromoindigo. History Biological pigments were often difficult to acquire, and the details of their production were kept trade secret, secret by the manufacturers. Tyrian purple is a pigment made from the mucus of several species of Hexaplex trunculus, murex snail. Production of Tyrian purple for use as a fabric dye began as early as 1200 BC by the Phoenicians, and was continued by ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Paenula
The ''paenula'' or ''casula'' was a cloak worn by the Romans, akin to the poncho (''i.e.,'' a large piece of material with a hole for the head to go through, hanging in ample folds round the body). The paenula was usually closed in the front but, occasionally, could be left with an open front; it could be also made with shorter sides to increase mobility for the arms. This was originally worn only by slaves, soldiers and people of low degree; in the 3rd century, however, it was adopted by fashionable people as a convenient riding or travelling cloak, and finally, by the sumptuary law of 382 (Codex Theodosianus xiv. 10, 1, ''de habitu'' . . . ''intra urbem'') it was prescribed as the proper everyday dress of senators, instead of the military chlamys. Thereafter, the toga was reserved for state occasions. According to early Christian leader Tertullian, pagans customarily took off their paenula when praying to their gods, and he criticised any Christian who also took off their paenu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Kletorologion
The ''Klētorologion'' of Philotheos () is the longest and most important of the Byzantine lists of offices and court precedence ('' Taktika'').. It was published in September 899 during the reign of Emperor Leo VI the Wise (r. 886–912) by the otherwise unknown '' prōtospatharios'' and '' atriklinēs'' Philotheos. As ''atriklinēs'', Philotheos would have been responsible for receiving the guests for the imperial banquets (''klētοria'') and for conducting them to their proper seating places according to their place in the imperial hierarchy. In the preface to his work, he explicitly states that he compiled this treatise as a "precise exposé of the order of imperial banquets, of the name and value of each title, complied on the basis of ancient ''klētοrologia''", and recommends its adoption at the imperial table.. Sections Philotheos's work survives only as an appendix within the last chapters (52–54) of the second book of a later treatise on imperial ceremonies known as ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rodolphe Guilland
Rodolphe Joseph Guilland (5 March 1888 – 5 October 1981) was a French Byzantinist. Life Born in 1888, he completed his thesis on Nicephorus Gregoras (a biography in 1926, and his edited correspondence in 1927), and succeeded his teacher Charles Diehl in the seat of Byzantine studies at the Sorbonne in 1934, which he held until his retirement in 1958. His chief interest was in the late Byzantine period (1204–1453), particularly the Palaiologan period, and his main areas of research were the history of the Great Palace of Constantinople The Great Palace of Constantinople (, ''Méga Palátion''; ), also known as the Sacred Palace (, ''Hieròn Palátion''; ), was the large imperial Byzantine palace complex located in the south-eastern end of the peninsula today making up the Fati ..., and of the offices, dignities, and administrative apparatus of the Byzantine state. Works He wrote 192 works on Byzantine subjects, spanning the years from 1921 to 1980. Many of his articles hav ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |