Vasilief, A History of the Byzantine Empire

The fall of Byzantium

Learning, literature, science, and art

Page 4

In the fourteenth century also lived one of the greatest scholars and writers of the two last centuries of Byzantium, Nicephorus Gregoras, who participated in the Hesychast quarrel. In variety and extent of knowledge, in skill in dialectic, and in strength of character he was superior to almost all the eminent men in Byzantium of the Palaeologian epoch and may be freely compared with the best representatives of the western Renaissance. He received an excellent education, was familiar with classic literature, and was so enthusiastic about astronomy that he even proposed to the Emperor a calendar reform. Gregoras, after several years of successful teaching, took an active part in the stormy theological quarrels of the epoch and wrote many works, of which a considerable part are not yet published. He began as a violent opponent of the Calabrian monk Barlaam, but gradually came over to the side of union; for this he was severely persecuted by the authorities and even confined in prison. Gregoras ended his stormy life, in all probability, about 1360. He wrote in almost all fields of Byzantine scholarship theology, philosophy, astronomy, history, rhetoric, and grammar.

The most important is his large Roman history in thirty-seven books, covering the period from 1204 to 1359, the epoch of the Nicene and Latin Empires and the time of the first four Palaeologi and John Cantacuzene. The events previous to 1204 are sketched briefly, and the detailed account, especially of the dogmatic quarrel of his epoch, begins with this year. Gregoras could not help giving full details of the religious disputes in which he was one of the leading participants; therefore his history clearly reflects his sympathies and is not free from prejudice. Perhaps it is better classed as a sort of memoir than as a history. It may be called a subjectively painted picture of an imposing ecclesiastical process of fermentation. Scholars vary in their estimation of Gregoras' importance. Krumbacher called him the greatest polyhistor of the last two centuries of Byzantium; Montelatici described him as the greatest scholar of his time. The most recent biographer of Gregoras, Guilland, disagreed with Krumbacher. He wrote: Is Gregoras the greatest polyhistor of the time of the Palaeologi, as Krumbacher likes to call him? No. He is one of the most eminent writers of Byzantium in the fourteenth century, but he is not the greatest... Gregoras is not the greatest, but one of the greatest writers of the century, which is still too little known though very important in the history of Byzantine civilization and even of European civilization. In any event, the universality of Gregoras' knowledge is amazing, and it is difficult to find in Byzantium an adequate parallel to this brilliant representative of the Byzantine renaissance.

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