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Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

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Re: Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

#71

Post by nerdponx »

qwytw wrote: post #37
nerdponx wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing I learned recently is that 12th Century Fourth Crusade actually culminated in sacking Constantinople and establishment of the "Latin Empire", as the intended successor of the Byzantine Empire, which only existed for a brief time before it was recaptured by a rump state founded by exiled Byzantine aristocrats. Apparently (and understandably) this led to major deterioration in East-West Christian relations, a…

The Fourth Crusade was preceded by: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Latins which was a reaction to the empire becoming near completely dominated by westerns both economically and (to a lesser degree) politically. The last coup attempt/civil war (which was also a near permanent issue in the empire) before the massacre was between a French Princess ruling the empire as a regent for her underage son and he…

This is why it makes my blood boil when TV shows and movies that recount historical events try to dramatize everything and add their own silly unnecessary fictional touches. The actual events that happened are dramatic enough!

Re: Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

#72

Post by giraffe_lady »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #67
giraffe_lady wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm american and my parents were converts so I don't think of myself as being particularly affiliated with any of the ethnic jurisdictions. I usually just find a parish where I like the people and the services are in english. Often that's OCA (russian-tinged american) but in the past it has been serbian or greek. As you're probably aware it's all technically the same church so there's no barrier or ritual to changing…

Thanks, I don't really know the customs of the other Orthodox churches, but they are different organisations. I don't know them well, by any means. I'm reading about them on wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oriental_Orthodox_Churches Apparently there are six Oriental Orthodox churches that are all "autocephalous" (i.e. they do their own thing). I think the Russians and Serbians are closer to the Greek church…

Yeah the jurisdictions are an unbelievable mess you virtually need a degree in history to understand. Downside of not being under a single bishop like the catholics.

The oriental orthodox iirc reflect an even earlier schism than the one with rome, and aren't in communion with the eastern orthodox (despite those words meaning the same thing) which is the greek & russian churches mostly, plus a bunch of smaller slavic & balkan ones, plus some middle eastern churches. Within those bounds though it's different organizations but one communion eg I could receive eucharist at a greek church one week and be a godparent at a russian one the next without having to ask permission or even tell anyone.

In the US there seem to be a lot of converts recently, it's a big ongoing... thing... in american orthodoxy. Most ethnic churches just serve their communities and that's that. But the OCA and antiochian archdiocese specifically try to welcome converts with some success. Orthodox is liturgically and theologically the closest thing to catholicism, so we catch a lot of people leaving that church bc of child sex abuse scandal, anger at the liberalism of the pope, or whatever.

There are also a lot of ex-evangelicals but their reasons are incredibly varied in my conversations with them. Often they are extremely pious and it's part of a deep and sincere effort to connect with what they consider the true or original church founded by the apostles. Sometimes, less wholesomely, it's simply "trad" fetishism and our historical connections with slavic racial superiority movements and ethnonationalism.

In cities with multiple orthodox churches there is usually an informal "convert parish" made up of at least half americans who converted as adults.

My parents were devout southern baptists who left their church in disgust during the civil rights movement. Archbishop Iakovos famously marched with MLK, and I think became a sort of symbolic figure for white southern christian supporters of the civil rights movement. It's a much longer story than that but it was enough to get them to explore the greek church and eventually convert before I was born.

Re: Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

#73

Post by triceratops »

m00dy wrote: post #54
kmlx wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

one random tidbit that struck me was that the term "Byzantine Empire" was actually an invention from the 1500's. the "byzantine" people actually called themselves Romans, and the empire was called "Roman Empire".

and then the Ottomans came...

But also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ottoman_claim_to_Roman_success...

Re: Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

#74

Post by KoftaBob »

kmlx wrote: post #39
ptsneves wrote: post #21

Byzantine history is so important to understand the modern world. It gives us the context for the orthodox/west divide; it gives us an example of a economic and intellectual superpower needing to live with the realities of barbarian neighbors, and being destroyed! It shows us great statecraft lasting a thousand years. It even shows us why generals and senior civil servants were eunuchs and how the next best thing was…

one random tidbit that struck me was that the term "Byzantine Empire" was actually an invention from the 1500's. the "byzantine" people actually called themselves Romans, and the empire was called "Roman Empire".

Ironically, those outside of Byzantium (namely the Western Europeans) called them "the Greeks". The Byzantines in turn, called those Western Europeans "The Latins".

Re: Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

#75

Post by [deleted] »

exhilaration wrote: post #6

I'm curious, is there a list somewhere of these world-changing industrial espionage incidents? Here's two more I remember off the top of my head. Not sure why the top results are the Smithsonian Magazine but here are some links: Samuel Slater brings cotton mill technology to America in 1789: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/how-industrial-esp... Robert Fortune learns Chinese tea production methods and brings…

[deleted]

Re: Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

#76

Post by mr_toad »

nerdponx wrote: post #71
qwytw wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Fourth Crusade was preceded by: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_of_the_Latins which was a reaction to the empire becoming near completely dominated by westerns both economically and (to a lesser degree) politically. The last coup attempt/civil war (which was also a near permanent issue in the empire) before the massacre was between a French Princess ruling the empire as a regent for her underage son and he…

This is why it makes my blood boil when TV shows and movies that recount historical events try to dramatize everything and add their own silly unnecessary fictional touches. The actual events that happened are dramatic enough!

Andronikos Komnenos would not have been out of place in Game of Thrones.

Re: Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

#77

Post by selcuka »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #51
kmlx wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

one random tidbit that struck me was that the term "Byzantine Empire" was actually an invention from the 1500's. the "byzantine" people actually called themselves Romans, and the empire was called "Roman Empire".

A good compromise is to call it the Eastern Roman empire, though some folks in the Vatican would undoubtedly be annoyed.

Turkish people (as the successors of the Ottoman Empire) always call it the Eastern Roman Empire. Byzantine is almost exclusively used when talking about "Byzantine system" (i.e. intrigue, and plots).

Re: Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

#78

Post by cgio »

m00dy wrote: post #57

It is so fascinating that I can find "ottoman" keyword at least 6 times on this thread even-though this smuggling had happened way before the ottomans concurred the Byzantine.

Your comment would have upped the incidence of said keyword by 33% at the time it was published.

Re: Smuggling of silkworm eggs into the Byzantine Empire

#80

Post by mr_toad »

badpun wrote: post #56
mach1ne wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, Christianity is a big reason. It was so successful for so long in part because it aggressively repressed any ideologies which could have threatened its hegemony. Since the Church considered the ’scientific’ domain to be part of its curriculum, new science was generally a threat.

> Since the Church considered the ’scientific’ domain to be part of its curriculum, new science was generally a threat. I don't think that's true. Church only opposed science that was in contradiction with the Bible, which was a small minority of all science discoveries. Church never had any qualms with Newton laws or laws of conservation of mass (in chemistry) etc.

> Church never had any qualms with Newton laws or laws of conservation of mass (in chemistry) etc.

That was a much later church separated by more than one schism. The Orthodox Church of the Byzantine empire was much less tolerant of any thoughts that might contradict doctrine. More that one philosopher was convicted of heresy.

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