The Ashgate Research Companion to Byzantine Hagiography - 9780754650331

The Ashgate Research Companion to Byzantine HagiographyVolume I: Periods and Places\nAuthor(s): Stephanos Efthymiadis\nFormat: Hardback\nPublisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd, United Kingdom\nImprint: Routledge\nISBN-13: 9780754650331, 978-0754650331\nSynopsis\nFor an entire millennium, Byzantine hagiography, inspired by the veneration of many saints, exhibited literary dynamism and a capacity to vary its basic forms. The subgenres into which it branched out after its remarkable start in the fourth century underwent alternating phases of development and decline that were intertwined with changes in the political, social and literary spheres. The selection of saintly heroes, an interest in depicting social landscapes, and the modulation of linguistic and stylistic registers captured the voice of homo byzantinus down to the end of the empire in the fifteenth century.\nThe seventeen chapters in this companion form the sequel to those in volume I which dealt with the periods and regions of.