Uncovering the Forgotten Legacy of the Byzantine Empire: How Their Contributions Saved Western Civilization

Max Martini: Books that cover vast periods of history are often tedious, but not this one. The subject of this book is fascinating, the author’s command of the history is impressive, and the text is eminently readable. I am motivated to read more by this author.

United States on Sep 01, 2023

Philip Stoddart: This book is very interesting. Like most of the Western world, I knew little of the Byzantium history. This is a good introduction. However, it covers a time period of over 1000 (!) years. It can only skim the top of Byzantium history; but like a good appetizer, wets the taste for more.

Canada on Jul 13, 2021

Mark Mellon: My interest in the Byzantine Empire was piqued by the 11th Century chronicles of Michael Psellus (see the review in a previous post), so I ordered this relatively short, recent history of the Empire’s history from the founding of Constantinople by the eponymous Illyrian badass and ardent Christian convert, Constantine the Great, to the fall of the city in 1453, her mighty walls shattered by enormous Ottoman cannon. This is a lot of material to cover and the author does so briskly while also being careful to be thorough and accurately sourced. The back jacket of the book states that Mr. Brownworth is a former high school history teacher, but he shows as much flair for writing popular, accessible history as many other, more highly accredited authors.

Like all empires from Rome onward, there is a large focus in the book on the Byzantine emperors and their personalities, an unavoidable consequence of studying any autocracy where everything (at least supposedly) turns on the word of just one man. A parade of characters passes down through the long ages, some outstanding, many contemptible, and a great deal utterly mediocre. Brownsworth makes the interesting point that as long...

United States on Aug 02, 2019

James W. Derry: Well written, and easy to follow and read, (we are talking of covering 1000 years of history), Mr Brownworth does a good job of bringing Byzantium back from neglected history. This is a big chunk of time to deal with, and although dealt with clearly, most of the content is a rundown of the first emperor, Constantine I, to the last emperor, Constantine XI. It reads a bit too much like good emperor, bad emperor, terrible sons, wars, expansion, contraction, here we are back at the palace again.
Mr Brownworth's mission, it seems, is to inform us that the Roman Empire did not die with the sack of Rome in 476. It just moved to Constantinople, and survived as the old Eastern empire, with a Christian regime change. For another thousand years.
What is disappointing, and the reason I only give this book 3 stars, is the misleading subtitle: ..."that rescued western civilization". Very little is covered about what and how the old Roman civilization was rescued, other than saving the old Roman legal code under Justinian and then revised later under Basil, and some mention of art destroyed during the iconoclasts. Perhaps this was a decision of the publisher to make the book cover sell...

Canada on Oct 14, 2017

Kindle Customer: This book is an excellent corrective to the false images put out by Western Christianity about the church and empire started by Constantine. When the west was ravaged by barbarism the Byzantine Empire was a model of a sophisticated society. Much of the saving of ancient Greek and Eastern writings was because the Eastern Empire saved them. It becomes obvious also that much of the cant put out by the Church of Rome was of its own devising and not always in the best interests. Examples are priestly celibacy and the presumptive theories such as papal infallibility which were later reactive to the Reformation. Not that there weren't blemishes on the Eastern Church because there were. But it kept civilization going in the West until it was submerged by Islam in the 1400s. What surtvives in the Greek Orthodox and Russian Orthodox societies seems to me to be a pale reflection of the vitality of the Byzantine Empire. a

Canada on Sep 02, 2016

K Lee: First, the good. The book is accessible and clearly written. It covers an interesting subject, and, having set for itself the daunting task of summarizing a thousand years of tangled history in one volume, it mostly succeeds without confusing the reader.

Now, on to the flaws. A book titled "The Forgotten Byzantine Empire That Rescued Western Civilization" should make more of an effort to help readers understand what it means for an empire to have rescued a civilization, and not merely defended its petty ambitions to power. Civilization denotes a level of economic, cultural, and scientific development, not an emblem on a banner. Brownworth gives us little hint of what the Byzantine Empire's continued survival meant for Western civilization. For the most part, as readers, we do not understand what was taught to those who had access to education, nor what was built and what made such construction possible, nor how wealth was generated and distributed. Brownsworth's treatment of the Hagia Sophia is typical: he credits a couple of visionary architects and the largesse of the emperor Justinian, and is otherwise silent on the conditions that enabled its construction. He notes in...

United States on Aug 13, 2012

Strv 74: I just finishes "Lost to the West". It is very seldom that a book on ancient history captivates me as much as this one did. Lars Brownworth is an excellent writer that can make a story like this one so captivating and so much alive. Having been to Constantinople (Istanbul today) this book brought home so much more than just walking through the city did.

It is quite possible that as some reviewer have pointed out there are some minor facts that needs adjustment but the story of the Byzantine Empire comes alive in such a way that you just get caught up in the flow of the writing. Mr Brownsworth can really write! To compress more than a thousand years history into 300 pages is difficult but he pulled it of. It is like watching an action movie. Every fifth page the Empire is on top and every second fifth page it is at rock bottom only to be saved by the next hero.

Armed with this one I like to go back to Istanbul and see it all again.

United Kingdom on Jan 14, 2012

Constans: If you call yourself a Westerner, then you owe everything that you are to the West and East Roman empires. Lars Brownsworth reveals his passion for the wonderful 1000 year Byzantine empire.

In the UK and beyond most people have completely forgotten how, following the collapse of the West Roman Empire shortly before AD500, the East Romans shielded Europe and the nascent West from repeated attempts at its conquest and destruction by those who detested our Greco-Roman, Christian and ultimately free-thinking civilisation. Some of their heirs still do.

When Constantinople finally fell to the Turks in 1453, the Byzantines (who of course went down fighting) had already bought the West the necessary time - a thousand years - to recover its intellectual advantage and then to out-think and geographically to outflank its hereditary foes, many of whom remained mentally trapped in a counter-intuitive time warp.

This inspiring author in effect reminds us that intra-West conflicts such as Agincourt & Yorktown are a good deal less significant events than the very survival of the West itself - a near miracle made possible largely due to the incredible tenacity of the...

United Kingdom on Jun 29, 2010