* The colloquium will be in English, the event is open to the public, light refreshments will be served after the talk.

Studies on the Byzantine world tend to overlook “the average” and the “everyday” in favor of more visible aspects of culture, such as works of art and ecclesiastical architecture. As a result, the investigation of daily life and living conditions experienced by the populations during the Byzantine era is a relatively unexplored subject, and only in the last decades the so-called bioarchaeological approach is applied. Bioarchaeology refers to the multidisciplinary study of human skeletal remains in their environmental and cultural context, combining biological data with archaeological and/or historical evidence. The human body, being a record of the different roles ascribed to an individual during life, can act as the nexus between biology and culture; thus, the analysis of the physical (skeletal) remains left behind upon the death of an individual, offer insights into lifestyle, demography, health and welfare, the development of diseases (paleopathology), particulars of different groups of the population such as men, women and children, and diet –to name but a few of these thematic studies. Until recently, thinking of the “Byzantine body”, included images of the ethereal bodies in the frescoes that grace the walls of churches, the emaciated bodies of the ascetic, or the bodies of members of the elite and the clergy. However, growing research on the field of Byzantine bioarchaeology, has shifted the focus from the church and crown to the dirt and dust of everyday life.

This lecture will present an overview of the current state of play and future perspectives on the bioarchaeology of Greek Byzantine populations (6th-12th centuries A.D.), tangling issues of demography, paleopathology and diet.  What was to be a Byzantine? Were people engaged in a strenuous and demanding lifestyle? Which factors enhanced or buffered the development of specific pathological conditions, and how these conditions inform us on a lifetime of encounters with the environment and fellow humans? Current studies on the adult and non-adult segments of the populations, as well as on their dietary patterns, shed light on living conditions in Byzantine Greece, reflecting the complex interaction between physiology, culture and the environment. The trends suggested by the available biocultural datasets for Greek Byzantine populations offer interesting insights: imprinted on their bones were signs of harmless pathological conditions, or clear evidence that they experienced demanding lifestyles; that they were prone to accidents or suffered violent attacks; that women gave birth under perilous conditions or that feeding practices must have played the role in the formation of non-adult mortality patterns.

In addition, the attempt to thoroughly investigate everyday life was possible through the application of innovative techniques, such as stable isotope analysis [carbon (δ13C) and nitrogen (δ15Ν)], on the interpretation of adult dietary patterns and weaning patterns in non-adults, and paleoparasitological analysis on parasitic infections.  Especially, when comes to Byzantine dietary habits, much of what was known was derived from documentary evidence, primarily referring to the socio-political and religious elite, while information about the general population was less readily available. To this extent, the contribution of stable isotope analysis has revealed interesting aspects about Byzantine dietary patterns, which documentary evidence alone could not provide.

Although the analysis of human skeletal remains from Byzantine contexts is more advanced –in comparison to the analysis of flora and fauna remains– there is still a long way to go before sufficient qualitative and comparative data will be accumulated. Studies published on Byzantine populations vary in quality, while still a large body of “grey literature” exists (unpublished skeletal reports or studies). Nevertheless, the accelerated interest in the study of Byzantine populations can only make us optimistic about future advances in the numerous questions we want to answer.

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