1st Edition
East Rome, Sasanian Persia and the End of Antiquity Historiographical and Historical Studies
The last, longest and most damaging of the wars fought between East Rome and Sasanian Persia (603-628) brought the classical phase of west Eurasian history to a dramatic close. Despite its evident significance, not least as the distant setting for Muhammad's prophetic mission, this last great war of antiquity attracted comparatively little scholarly attention until the last decades of the twentieth century. James Howard-Johnston's contributions to the subject, most of which were published in out-of-the-way places (one, that on al-Tabari, is printed for the first time), are brought together in convenient form in this volume. They strive to root history in close observation of landscape and monuments as well as careful analysis of texts. They explore the evolving balance of power between the two empires, look at events through Roman, Armenian and Arab eyes, and home in on the climax of the final conflict in the 620s.
Biography
James Howard-Johnston is University Lecturer in Byzantine Studies and Fellow of Corpus Christi College, University of Oxford, UK.
’... [James Howard-Johnston] has provided a first-rate introduction to the period in the form of this collection of studies, published initially between 1983 and 2004, brought together now in the Variorum series. ... this work will be the basis upon which future studies of Byzantium and Iran in the early seventh century will proceed. The editors of the Variorum series have done scholarship a great service in bringing together nine tightly focused and intricately linked studies.’ Early Medieval Europe