Projects
Byzantine culture and literature KU Leuven
The research of Peter Van Deun, Full Professor of Greek Studies, focuses on the literary production of the Patristic period and the Byzantine period (300-1453). More in particular he prepares text editions of works which remained unpublished or are only available in old, unreliable editions; moreover he concentrates on Byzantine strategies for preserving and transmitting the knowledge of the past, especially by compiling anthological ...
Marc and his princess. The spiritual legacy of the Byzantine monk Markus(13th century) KU Leuven
Byzantine literature has preserved some texts containing very concrete guidelines to empresses and princesses how to live a pious Christian life. An excellent example is the oeuvre of Markos the Monk, who was the spiritual director of Princess Irene-Eulogia Palaiologina (2nd half of the 13th century). Mark's oeuvre includes a monumental, unedited, spiritual anthology compiled for Irene (600 pages), which hasn't been studies hitherto; the work ...
Byzantine Book Epigrams: function and context of a genre in the margin Ghent University
This research project deals with Byzantine book epigrams. These are metrical paratexts, texts in verse that refer to a main text. This genre is
preserved in Medieval Greek manuscripts. The project aims at a better understanding
of Byzantine book epigrams, their characteristics, their function and their context.
Besides that the concept ‘poetry’ will be redefined. The concept ‘paratext’ will be
...
Poetry from the Margins. Literary, Philological, minguistic and historical analysis of a new corpus of byzantine Book Epigrams (800-1453) Ghent University
Literary, linguistic and historical analysis of a corpus of book epigrams from medieval Greek manuscripts. Unknown texts will be published with a commentary, both in paper version and on-line. The analysis will shed new light on the literary aesthetics of the Byzantine period, the evolution of medieval Greek language, orthography and verse forms, and the socio-historical context of the emergence of books and manuscripts.
Bible, Emperor, Jew. The interplay of biblical exegesis and anti-Judaism in imperial propaganda under Macedonian rule KU Leuven
This project will investigate the ideological outreach and function of Byzantine literature and the interplay between biblical exegesis and anti-Jewish politics in a crucial period of Byzantine history. (a) A post-doc researcher will document, interpret and explain the role of biblical exegesis in the process of justifying anti-Jewish measures that were undertaken not out of religious but out of ideological reasons by emperors of the ...
Biblical Exegesis in Byzantium KU Leuven
The research program I propose is to carry out a systematic study of all important and characteristic features of Byzantine exegesis. The development of exegesis in the Latin West has been recorded and studied but for Byzantium such research is completely lacking. I wish to further map out and open up the corpus of Byzantine exegetical literature and to examine its sources, methods, development and role in Byzantine society. In the end this ...
An Essay on the Twelve Labours of Herakles by John Pediasimos (ca. 1250-1314) Remnants of the Mythographical Genre in Byzantium. KU Leuven
Sabbatical Ceulemans Reinhart : Biblical Glossaries from Late Antiquity and Early Byzantium KU Leuven
I will conduct research into the largely unpublished corpus of lexica (glossaries) of the Greek Bible created in Late Antiquity and the Early Byzantine period. I focus on the following avenues: handwritten tradition (manuscripts of the direct and indirect tradition); its connection with Christian Greek lexicographical literature; indebtedness to Greek Biblical exegesis from the period in question; impact of the glossaries in Early Modern and ...