Kiousopoulou Tonia. Emperor or Manager: Power and Political Ideology in Byzantium before 1453

La Pomme d’Or, 2011. — 216 p.Byzantium in the 15th century is too easily dismissed as the anachronistic tail end of an ancient ecumenical empire, whose only achievements, apart from the heroic last stand of Constantinople in 1453, were the contribution of literary Hellenism to Renaissance humanism, and the preservation of Orthodoxy from the encroachment of Catholicism. This book argues that in struggling to survive as a small fortified enclave at the heart of Ottoman territory, Byzantium adopted the social structure and political ideology of a secular, territorial city-state on the Italian model. It thus presents the empire of the last Palaiologoi in an entirely new light.