Lets see!! Its an undeniable fact that the official language of administration at the begining was the latin language, even though i have read people in their daily lifes were greek-speakers.

Afterwards, the official administratrion language was envolved from a kinda mixture of Latin and Greek during Justinianus to a fully adoption of greek language as predominant, during Heraclius time.

The people indeed were calling themselves Romaioi *Romans in greek language* which had already become a synonym for Hellene . The Franks from the 8th century, were calling the empire as "Greek empire" but its from around 11th century and afterwards, that even high rank officials were considering themselves as greeks. I do believe in the end, the empire had been transformed to a greek orthodox state.

I think byzantinologist Louis Berhier gave the best definition:

The Byzantine Empire was Roman in traditions, Greek in culture, and Oriental in the practice of power.

So 1/3 greek?

himmm

When you have a nation like Byzantium, which at its height ruled an area from Spain to the Euphrates and from the Crimea to the Upper Nile, then of course the Empire isn't going to be completely Greek. The British Empire in India made full use of existing Indian mediums of power and means of administration to rule their vast possession, but this hardly means the very ethos of that Empire did not centre on the cultural power of Britain. Likewise, while Byzantium was a multi-ethnic nation for much of its history it still centred on a Greek speaking Orthodox Christian ethos which saw its government as the legitimate successor of the previous Roman rulers.

For anyone to claim Byzantium was not at its core a Hellenistic or Greek Empire, especially from the 7th century onwards, is pure nonesense. The people of Byzantium called themselves Rhomaioi (Romans), not because they believed they were Italians but because they believed they belonged to a specific ideology, that of being a citizen of the legitimate Roman state. That they were citizens of such a state is true, they were the only nation in the world who had a direct line of rulers who traced their succession in unbroken lineage all the way to Augustus.

The Byzantine state was, of course, influenced by its Roman past. The lands of Byzantium were under Roman rule prior to Justinian for over 500 years, and yet this was not enough to change the language, culture and heritage of the Hellenic people in those lands. A Roman bureaucratic apparatus might be attached to these lands, the laws and language of government might be Latin, yet the Hellenic element of its culture persevered in spite of all that. From the time of Heraclius onwards Byzantium did not even put up the pretence of being culturally Roman (though it definitely preserved the ideology of the Roman Imperium, distinguish between the culture and ideology). It was a Greek speaking nation, it had its own original and distinct type of national organisation having replaced the Roman prefactures with Byzantine Themata, it had a national Orthodox Church which conducted liturgy in Greek. It also proudly drew its heritage from the Classical and Hellenistic age of Ancient Greece, one read of Anna Komnena's Alexiad and all the references to the classical Greek past will give you a good taste of what they considered their heritage.

From time to time non-Greeks would occupy positions of prominence (even Emperorship) within Byzantine society. Being at the cultural cross-roads of the world, it was also natural Byzantium engaged in much cultural exchange and interaction with their neighbours. OK, so Leo III was from as far away as Northern Syria. Because he sits on the throne does that mean the entire ethnic composition, religious structure, cultural heritage, spoken language, and every other facet of cultural identity is suddenly now Northern Syrian? Obviously not. Even Justinian, with his Roman mind and grandeur, still had to bow to the necessities of the day and learn to speak Greek (although rather badly according to Procopius). All in all, the very ethos and base of Byzantine society was Hellenic. From time to time a foreigner might be prominent in Byzantine society in this multi-ethnic Empire, but the true bulk of Byzantine heritage was a Hellenic one.

Byzantines were Greek (at least after the 7th century or so), just as the Ottomans were Turks.   

Of course the question is the same again. Who is Greek?

A population of the Byzantine Empire was culturaly hellenized. This sole fact is enough? (I use the term Byzantine Empire after the arab conquest, and Eastern Roman Empire before.)

I guess it's a matter of point of view. If you consider bloodlines as a mark of nationality (a term that was in any case not applicable back then) it's impossible to say for sure.

If "nationality" is an inherited, cultural characteristic, then probably yes.

Since the 6th century AD Greek was the official language of the Byzantine Empire. The culture was Greek and not Roman (which was formed by the Greek one). There are many references of the people called Greeks.

Constantinople was the cradle of Hellenism and The Fall of Constantinople was a Greek defeat by the Ottomans.

The fact that the Byzantine Empire was a Hellenic Empire is unquestionable amongst historians.

It was the second Greek Empire of history after the Macedonian Empire.

Anyway , what is this Greek - Roman dispute taking place for?

As far as i am concerned , even the original Roman Empire was infact a  " Greek" Empire aswell.

The Romans borowed our culture , religion , architecture e.t.c. The Romans where a continuation of the Greek civilization. They where " Greeks " in a way. Greek and Roman are the same thing.

Totally agreed

Besides the Ottoman Empire was Turkish although it was multi-ethnic and included the ex-Byzantine region.

"The Romans borowed our culture , religion , architecture e.t.c. The Romans where a continuation of the Greek civilization. They where " Greeks " in a way. Greek and Roman are the same thing."

I disagree. Romans borrowed many thing, but their culture diffred from the Greek's. This was one of the major problem of the empire. Romanisation in the west, and hellenization in the east. This eas the root of the eventual division of the empire.

We must remember that the term "Byzantine Empire" is really just an academic one, though undoubtably a useful one.

The way I discribe the Byzantine Empire is thus - it was the Greek Christian, Eastern Roman Empire.

Culturally and linguistically, the empire was very much Greek. It was also, however, Roman.

I dont want to repeat myself.

That's true for the name "Romans". But it was used basically for the Greeks "Romioi".

The region of modern Greece was not important for the Empire? It was one of the vital regions like modern Syria for example. Besides the suppositive Greek field extended to Constantinople and Minor Asia.

Again offensive language. "If you like it or not", "That's why we hired you in AE" etc    Everyone who claims to be an expert post something and considers himself undisputed. 

Of course the empire was multi-ethnic as one would expect given its size and location. To me this seems of very little importance. What is important is that the Roman Empire (for we must never forget that it was the Roman Empire) became linguistically and culturally Greek. Also, ethnicity is primarily defined by culture and languge anyway, so that seems a moot point. The aristocracy was Greek and the state became Greek, thus the Empire was Greek.

I have consulted this question in the book Byzanz by Peter Schreiner.

According to Schreiner the term rhomanoi was used independently from nationality or ethnic groups.  Schreiner states that orthodoxy was in close relation with this term. For example jews were always excluded.

Of course Byzantium saw itself as the direct continuation of the Roman State, rather than a purely Greek one. An enormous amounts of what made up the Byzantine Empire were Greek, I would argue the majority of what made up Byzantium what it was was Greek. Read the journey of Liutprand of Cremona (highly amusing). When he called the Byzantine Emperor Nikephoros II Phocas Emperor of the Greeks rather than Emperor of the Romans there was uproar in the court over the disrespect. The Byzantine court would not tolerate the usage of such a term, to them it was an insult. For the Emperor of Constantinople only Emperor of the Romans was a sufficiently worthy title.

 Also look at the treaty signed under the auspices of Nikephoros I and Michael I with Charlemagne over the appropriate imperial title to be used in the wake of Charlegmagne being crowned by the Pope. It specifically, because of the Byzantine drafting, allows the Frankish ruler to be called Emperor. However, the title of the Byzantines is not Emperor but Emperor of the Romans.

All this said, the idea of being a Byzantine had less to do with ethnicity than it had to do with your religious orientation and ideology. Byzantium, much like Rome, easily integrated many peoples because being a Byzantine meant you were an Orthodox Christian, typically spoke adequate Greek and acknowledged the ruler of Constantinople as the direct successor of the Roman Emperors and accepted his primacy in the world of man.

Wrong! Bulgarian christians , slavs or Armenian christians where not called Romans. Only Greeks where called like that.

During the Byzantine campaign in Italy in 535 AD, the habitants regarded the Byzantines as the brothers who came to join them to the Eastern Empire. The Ostrogoths who had conquered Italy tried to persuade the population not to help the Byzantines stating that  they were only Graekoi conquerors and they were not the prior Romans anymore. In my opinion this fact is another proof that the Byzantine Empire was considered as a Hellenic one early enough after the division of the united Roman Empire.

The Armenians were often also politically autonomous to Byzantium for much of their history. In a similar vein to the Bulgars, the Armenians had their own autonomous leaders, national army and language. I am speaking generally here, as for certain periods of history Armenia was annexed by Byzantium completely. But because the Armenians generally did not recognise the Byzantine Emperor as their political leader, and even at times fought against the Byzantine Empire, they could rightly be considered foreigners. Another important sticking point is that the Armenians were usually staunch monophysites, which further distinguished them from being called a people of Byzantium.

It's not the strongest proof but obviously it's a fact that indicates the greek character of the Empire even before the change of the official language which was such an important step toward the sanction of the Greekness of the Empire.

The region of Armenians sometimes was a part of the Byzantine Empire, but generally it wasn't given that the peoples of Caucasia (Armenians, Albanians, Georgians etc) were on the side of the Byzantines and the latter tried to ally with them specially against the Persians. So, Armenians had kinda of autonomy and they couldn't be described with the classic term "Romans" or "Byzantines" 

Btw, I don't think that any of these nations (Slavs, Bulgars, Egyptians, Syrians, Palaistines etc) were called Romioi. I'm not sure for that but maybe it explains the especial use of this term.

 Hi to every one , Im new to this forum, I can see that there are very interesting topics here.

 First at the topic at hand, as every one probably knows here the so called " Byzantine Empire " was called " The Eastern Roman Empire ", and reading some of these posts here, by naming this empire " Greek or Hellenic " is a false distinction, there isn't any " Byzantine"  texts claiming this empire being " Greek, Hellenic " or any other ethnic group, this empire wasn't owned by no ethnic group, espescially any modern group of people, the empire used Latin and Koine as it's standared language, it was a multi-ethnic empire, and i don't agree with the above post that Slavs, Bulgars or other groups were not included in this Empire. After the Slavic tribes settled through the Balkans including modern " Greece ", a lot of them were in service of this empire, later the Byzantines recruited Bulgars (Tatars- not to be confused with modern Bulgarians of mixed origin) in there army and settled them in the north of modern Bulgaria. On the language issue speaking Latin or Koine in this empire didn't mean that you were part of any ethnic group, all that were in service in this empire were called " good Romans" or " Romioi", even when the Turks held this region it was called " Rumelia" and its inhabitants " Rum",  even though there were various ethnic groups here they were still called by this name. Using the word "Rum" wasn't really an ethnic term but a religious one, the " Byzantine " empire was a Christian Orthodox empire, so anyone that was Christian was called a Rum, no matter there ethnic origin Serb, Greek (Romiosini), Macedonian, Bulgarian or Albanian. But from all these groups only the modern Greeks adopted it duiring Ottoman rule to be there ethnic origin. Above post stated there was " Greek " character to this empire, correct me if i'm wrong i do not remember reading the Greeks inventing the "Legion" because they were still in use duiring this empire, and the only thing left from ancient Hellas is the Koinon language, not it's ethnicity, Ethnic structure changed in the Balkans duiring the height of Roman power, a lot of modern countries in this region don't want to admit it.

I think it's the same with the Byzantine empire: the people considered themselves Roman before and after the conversion to christianity, so it's an evolution that involved the same people. After this conversion there may have been some fanaticism that opposed sience, but if I'm not wrong knowledge (even the ancient greek one) was very appreciated in the Byzantine empire. I don't know if we can say that it was an Hellenic state, but the Hellenic culture was not a stranger.

Every empire in the course of time is dominated by a culture (or many cultures as years pass by) and the Roman Empire (no "eastern" empire, it's THE Empire) is no exeption to that rule.

The Greek culture, beeing strong, vibrant and a more or less common ground for all people throughout the central and eastern mediteranean (as result of a process that started from the 8th century BC colonisation and culminated in the conquest of Alexander the Great and the hellenistic empires) and as far as the borders of India, was bound to dominate the "Roman" world.

The dominance of the Greek culture, besides the obvious loans to the Roman culture, is present in the hellenization of elites throughout the whole eastern mediteranean, even if they had nothing to do with Greeks to begin with (Pontians and Parthians for instance - the Pontians being an amalgam of Anatolians, the Parthians of Iranian origin, yet both elites became extremely hellenized - Thracian and most of the Anatolians like Karians, Lydians, Lykians had been hellenized more thoroughly, not only the elites).

Roman arms and administration, Greek culture and art - that's what the Graeco-Roman world was all about.

Later on, when the Roman arms became... not so Roman and the administration became more "Eastern" (imitating the hellenistic kingdoms who imitated the "real" easteners), there had to be a new "glue" to put everything under perspective. The Greek culture and tradition became that glue, but I guess it wasn't enough, so the Romans (practical, oh so practical) adopted Christianity as the "new" glue that would enforce the Roman bonds.

What resulted was a Greek-Christian culture, that was dominant in the "eastern" Empire long before the fall of Rome, and that resulted in the gradual adjustment of the (still Roman) administration over the ages.  In Heraclius' times this resulted to the sweeping of the last (alright, not "last", since several elements remained sort of Roman till 1204 but still)  strong "pure" Roman elements and the replacement with "Greek" elements - starting from the official titles, the official language and others.

Stating that Byzantium was a Greek empire is an oversimplification, really. It's not a lie and it's not distant from reality, but its way too simplifying. Surely, most emperors were Greeks, the administrative elite was predominatly Greek (the militaire elite, though, was mostly Isaurian, Armenian and only partially Greek). Most, not ALL.

 It would be much better (and accurate) to describe it as a multinational empire, based on the (orthodox) Christian religion and with a dominant Greek culture.

Scandinavian? Now that's something I've never heard before... Her father was Theophilos, and her mother was Theodora of Paphlagonia, and she was born in Constantinoupolis in 835... how could she have been Skandinavian?

Though we certainly agree on the notion that ancestry by blood of some specific ethnic group, was definitely not seen as important back in those times. A rather large number of emperors married with various non-byzantine princesses (Rus, Bulgarian, Khazar are mentioned among many others in the sources) and their progeny ruled the empire.

Indeed, Ingerina sounds Skandinavian (or Rus)  but seing as her parents were known and she was born in Constantinoupolis, I don't know how she could be half-skandinavian.

But truly, the emperors had wives from all around the (known at the time) world, that wouldn't be a novelty. I mentioned her because she was not of "noble" descent and because she was Michael's Drunkard mistress, before becoming Basil's wife.

Also, there is even more controversy concerning Basil, as I've seen a couple of sources claiming he was of a "noble Greek family"... maybe he fabricated (or obscured) his past, to facilitate (via a Greek "noble" family) a more appropriate claim on the throne? I wouldn't know...

One thing is certain.. Byzantines are distinct from the Greeks, they just used their language... thats all.. Same with the Ancient Macedonians (the inhabitants of today's Republic of Macedonia) - they just used the greek language and culture, and btw the greek language was second, an ancient macedonian language was the first spoken one.

greetings

No, it was actually a very good analogy.

True it was that the Byzantines in their devotion to Christianity destroyed many monuments from ancient Greece because of their pagan history.

i found it leo4

he was a khazar turks

Leo IV

He was not a Khazar, his mother was one and that's why people called him as such (Chazaros). It was common to distinguish Byzantium emperors on such characteristics, so we have emperors nicknamed by the people as:

"Sh*tnamed" -Kopronymos, "Gladiator" - Monomachos, slitnose - rinotmitos  etc... so Leo IV was nicknamed Chazaros.

.That was good!