History RE-Summarized: The Byzantine Empire

The Byzantines (Blue's Version) – a project that took an almost unfathomable amount of work and a catastrophic 120+ individual maps. I couldn't be happier.

SOURCES & Further Reading:
"Byzantium" I, II, and III by John Julius Norwich, "The Byzantine Republic: People and Power in New Rome" by Anthony Kaldellis, "The Alexiad" by Anna Komnene, "Osman's Dream: The History of the Ottoman Empire" by Caroline Finkel, "Sicily: An Island at the Crossroads of History" by John Julius Norwich, "A History of Venice" by John Julius Norwich
I also have a degree in classical civilization.

Additionally, the most august of thanks to our the members of our discord community who kindly assisted me with so much fantastic supplemental information for the scripting and revision process: Jonny, Catia, and Chehrazad. Thank you for reading my nonsense, providing more details to add to my nonsense, and making this the best nonsense it can be.

MUSIC:
Courtesy of composer Austin Wintory
Tracklist, in order of appearance: I Know How It Feels To Be Lost, Mount Olympus, Reclamatino, Welcome to the Real Underworld, Threshold, The Decision, Temptations, The Reliquary – from the Stray Gods Pantheon Edition and Journey scores.

This video is a Remastered, Definitive Edition of three previous videos from this channel — "History Summarized: Byzantine Empire – Beginnings", "History Summarized: Byzantine Empire – The Golden Age", and "Fall of the Byzantine Empire – History Summarized". This video combines them all into one narrative, fully upgrading all of the visuals and audio, with edits and about one extra video's-worth of additions throughout the script.

TIMECODES:
0:00 1 – Rise
14:14 2 – Golden Age
27:45 3 – Fall

Our content is intended for teenage audiences and up.

[sparkygol]

"How often do you think about the Roman Empire?"

Blue: "Yes."

[RockyNotBalboa]

just want to say that your previous videos about the Byzantines helped me pass my exam about the Byzantine empire

[codeofclaw]

As tragic as it is, it’s kind of funny imagining the absolute chaos and terror of the sack contrasted with a group of Venetians going through the city like “ah yes, those would like good in St. Marks. Excuse me pillaging raider, I must bring this fine art back home.”

[Ruminations]

The "Khosrau's Better Antioch" thing was so funny to me that I immediately had to tab out of the video to check.
It's 100% legit.
After sacking Antioch, he named his new city "Weh Antioch Khosrau", which translates to "Better Than Antioch, Khosrau Built This".
That dude's meme game was absolutely unparalleled.

[Kantara]

I often don't think about how old some names are.

But hearing the phrase "Byzantine Emperor Maurice" completely knocked me for a loop...

[TetsuShima]

Eastern romans: "Could you please try to not invade our territory...FOR FIVE MINUTES!?"
Persians, ottomans, mongols, huns, barbarians, etc: "What an awesome capital you have, guys!" 😎

[DomyTheMad]

i absolutely love this thing where nearly every single person who learns about Theodora just goes
"wow. i like her. such a badass and capable queen."

[Kilthan]

Lets not forget that, at the council of Nicaea, Santa Claus (Saint Nickolas) punched out a heretic.

[kammieceleek]

I'd love to see you do a deep dive on Justinian and Theodora, it would be entertaining and interesting. Especially given the Secret History and geese.

[themannerchannel]

I want to thank Blue for introducing me to the glorious Byzantine Empire in the first videos several years ago. Since then it has become probably my favourite period/civilisation of history, and I was lucky enough to visit Istanbul earlier this year. Thank you so much for making me borderline obsessed with this niche but incredible part of history!

[sceptile]

Just as the Byzantines brought Rome back in a new form so too shall this video be enjoyed by us all.

[Penryck]

When Blue started going through the military units, I was getting Age of Empires flashbacks from my childhood and I LOVE IT!

[richeybaumann]

I love how your "resummarized" videos aren't just the original three videos clipped together into one track- they're nearly identical, but you've made corrections and changes. Like at 1:30, you corrected it from "the tried and true method of lions" to "the vivid but ultimately ahistorical method of lions". Small changes make a huge difference.

[foulplayer]

One truly remarkable thing about the ascension of Emperor Heraclius is that it actually ended with the successful usurper personally slaying the tyrant he deposed.
After Heraclius took control of Constantinople, a captured Phocas was brought before Heraclius. The triumphant Heraclius allegedly asked the usurper of Maurice, “Is this how you have ruled, scum?” Phocas reportedly replied, “And will you rule better?” Heraclius, rather than simply saying, “Yes, I’ll do a much better job. Thanks for asking, ” instead personally killed and even beheaded Phocas right on the spot.
We usually only see such things in fiction (ahem, Star Wars or Mortal Kombat). More often than not, only in books, movies, and video games do we have the protagonist and antagonist meet in a scenario in which only one walks away still alive. We did not, after all, have FDR personally fight and kill Hitler. Even in cases where an opponent did not commit suicide a la Hitler, the historic villain may have been dealt with by agents of the victor. In 610 A.D., however, the people’s champion indeed did not delegate to subordinates, but instead confronted and killed his adversary in person in one of only a handful of such instances in all of human history.

[BradyPostma]

"the Byzantines are really special to me, and I'll count myself satisfied if I was able to convey why."

"… at no point in Byzantine history was it too late to care."

Yeah, Blue. You conveyed why. The timeless beauty of that brought tears to this old man's eyes.

[michaelscott]

"So how much time do you want to spend talking about Byzantium--"
*_"YES."_*

[UrbanCohort]

"Hoplites & Horsemen" would be a good name for a tabletop game set in Ancient Greece.

[mark.mazzarella]

I find it very poetic that, at least from a mythological point of view, Rome sprouted from Greece and eventually returned to Greece.

[edim]

The Byzantine Empire was the embodiment of "I didn't hear no bell"

[ae]

This makes me incredibly happy to see Blue touch up on the Byzantine history videos, they alone are the reason I got hyper fixated on Greek/Byzantine history.