BYZANTIUM • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Byzantium

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/bəzˈæntiəm/ Listen

Byzantium

noun

An ancient city on the Bosporus founded by the Greeks; site of modern Istanbul; in 330 Constantine I rebuilt the city and called it Constantinople and made it his capital.

A continuation of the Roman Empire in the Middle East after its division in 395. Synonyms: Byzantine Empire, Eastern Roman Empire.

See more definitions of Byzantium...

See images of 'Byzantium'

Etymology of 'Byzantium'

Share |

Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar

"Byzantium" Quotes from Famous Books

... most perfect security." He fixed upon a cove "which I honoured with the name of Sydney." and decided that that was there he would "plant." Every writer of mediaeval history who has had occasion to refer to the choice by Constantine the Great of Byzantium, afterwards Constantinople, as his capital, has extolled his judgment and prescience. Constantine was an Emperor, and could do as he would. Arthur Phillip was an official acting under orders. We can never sufficiently admire ...

— Laperouse • Ernest Scott

... equality with the refined civilisation of ancient France; the barbarous Ottomans blended their equality with the refined civilisation of ancient Rome. Paris secured to the Jacobins those luxuries that their system never could have produced: Byzantium served the same purpose to the Turks. Both the French and their turbaned prototypes commenced their system with popular enthusiasm, and terminated it with general subjection. Napoleon and Louis Philippe are playing the ...

— Sketches • Benjamin Disraeli

... without, however, causing a gap, because before long the conquerors had succumbed to the lower Latin degeneration, remaining without strength, spending themselves in theological struggles and dynastic intrigues like those of Byzantium. The regeneration of Spain did not come from the north with the hordes of barbarians, but from the south with the invading Arabs. At first they were few, but they were sufficient to conquer Roderick and his corrupt ...

— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... is here what I suppose to be the most famous shrine in Romagna. I mean that of the Madonna degli Greci, a pompous image from Byzantium, which proceeded undoubtedly from the bottega of Saint Luke. If that Signore had been as indifferent a painter as he was great Saint (which is surely impossible), we should do well to visit his Madonna. Her holiness is past dispute; ...

— Little Novels of Italy • Maurice Henry Hewlett

... Byzantium, so widespread in its influence, was particularly strong in Venice, where mosaics adorned the cathedral of Torcello from the ninth century and St. Mark's became a splendid storehouse of Byzantine art. The earliest mosaic on the facade of St. Mark's was executed ...

— The Venetian School of Painting • Evelyn March Phillipps

More quotes...