Ein Vortrag von Prof. Dr. Dimiter Angelov (Cambridge, MA) / A lecture by Prof. Dr. Dimiter Angelov (Cambridge, MA) — Wolfgang-Fritz-Volbach-Fellow
The paper gives an overview of a series of fascinating debates in Byzantium (fifth-fifteenth century) on the figure of the tyrant. Historians have long noticed that Byzantine authors consistently described as tyrants those rulers whom they viewed as illegitimate—both reigning emperors who crossed moral, legal, or political boundaries and would-be emperors who unsuccessfully claimed the imperial office. What has often been missed, however, is that tyranny was the subject of deeper interest, which sparked rich and lively discussions about the fundamentally ambivalent position of the tyrant. The stakes of the Byzantine debates on tyranny pertained to quasi-constitutional questions, contemporary constructions of legitimacy, the interpretation of ancient philosophical and rhetorical traditions, and the popular right of resistance.
