Libraries and Book Culture of the Byzantine Empire

This paper examines the libraries and book culture of the Byzantine Empire. It finds that the Imperial and Patriarchal Libraries enjoyed royal patronage from the empire’s very inception, and benefited from imperial largesse throughout its span. Private libraries and monastic libraries were also important; some private libraries rivaled their monastic and imperial counterparts. Another interesting find was that book ownership was reserved for the few; those in the practice of book production could derive a significant income from selling these items of luxury. Finally, devotion to the book assured that many works from antiquity and from the Byzantine period itself have survived until the present day. This devotion ranged from emperor to scribal monk, from calligrapher to scholar collector.