Byzantine Rome and the Greek Popes: Eastern Influences on Rome and the Papacy from Gregory the Great to Zacharias, A. D. 590-752 (review)

The title is misleading, suggesting a book on the Greek popes—that is, the popes from Agatho (678–81) to Zacharias (741–52), all of whom, with the exception of Gregory II, were native Greek speakers. In fact, it is not until page 200 that the Greek popes arrive, and only the last chapter and the epilogue (on Zacharias) really discuss them. The book is, in fact, about a broader theme, as the subtitle indicates: an exploration of the links between Rome and the Greek East from the end of the sixth to the middle of the eighth century. Ekonomou begins with Gregory the Great, who spent time as a papal apocrisiarius in Constantinople but never apparently achieved any facility in Greek and was defensive against seeming attempts by the patriarch of Constantinople to encroach on the privileges of Rome. Despite this, the author shows how deeply interested Gregory was in the Greek East, especially its ascetic traditions. The impact of the incursion into the Eastern Empire of Slavs and Avars, Persians and Arabs, led to the flight of many, especially monks, to Rome, which sets the scene for the rest of the book: the effect of the presence of Greeks in Rome. There emerged a tension between the papacy and the emperor, when the latter attempted to heal the divisions, which were part of the Chalcedonian heritage in the East, by the compromise doctrines of monenergism and monothelitism. Spurred on by Maximos the Confessor and other Greek monks, Pope Martin made a stand for Chalcedonian orthodoxy by calling what was regarded as an ecumenical synod at the Lateran in 649, thereby usurping what had become, and was to remain, an imperial privilege. Imperial revenge was savage: Martin died in the Crimea in 655, broken by his abandonment by a pliant Roman Church, while Maximos died in Lazica in 662, after a prolonged attempt to break his resolve. The author then turns to the Emperor Constans's visit to Rome and his murder in Sicily in 662, before addressing the Greek popes. He discusses the impact of the Greek popes in the realm of church music, with the abundant evidence of the adoption of Greek music and even Greek texts, and church architecture and religious art. He ends with a brief discussion of Zacharias, who translated Pope Gregory the Great's Dialogues into Greek, thereby making Gregory one of the few Latin Fathers well known in the East—as ho Dialogos. The author traces Greek influence far beyond Rome to England, through the appointment of the Greek monk Theodore of Tarsus as archbishop of Canterbury. In the course of his account, the author takes the opportunity to correct commonly held opinions: e.g., that Constans intended to abandon Constantinople and establish his capital in the West, and Bede's suspicion that Hadrian was sent, along with Theodore as a minder, to prevent his introduction of Greek customs.

From information tucked at the end of the book (there is no introduction), it would appear that the book is based on a thesis submitted in 2000, although it is much better written than the general run of theses. This explains why no account is taken of Pauline Allen and Bronwen Neil's edition (1999, 2002) of the dossier of contemporary materials concerned with Maximos's life and trials, although even in 2000 it was well known that much of the material in the Greek vita of the saint is purely legendary; Neil's Seventh-Century Popes and Martyrs (2006) clearly appeared too late. Ekonomou's account of the widespread destruction that accompanied the fall of Jerusalem in 614 seems to ignore Flusin's more sober account in his study of St. Athanasius the Persian (in the bibliography), and the...