Negotiating co-existence

Straddling Europe and Asia, the Byzantine Empire encompassed dozens of peoples and cultures. The essays in this volume, selected from a European Science Foundation Exploratory Workshop held at Trinity College Dublin in October 2010, apply the controversial concept of convivencia, borrowed from Iberian studies, to the traditional structure of the Byzantine Commonwealth. Their overall purpose is to challenge dominant perceptions defining the identity of and interaction among the cultures of the Byzantine Empire.