Histoire de r Empire Byzantin. Par Charles Diehl. (Paris Picard.)—AL
Diehl, one of the brilliant band of French Byzantine scholars, has condescended to write a short history of the Byzantine Empire. It is a very able and stimulating little book. M. Diehl's standpoint is not that of Gibbon. To M. Diehl it seems absurd to regard the Byzantine Empire, which outlived the Roman Empire by a thousand years, as decadent and moribund throughout its history. He looks upon Con- stantinople, after Justinian's day, as the head of an Eastern State, essentially Greek, and expressing more or less fully the national ideas and ambitions of Hellenism in religion, polities, and the arts. M. Diehl emphasizes the importance of the national sentiment, hostile to Rome, which manifested itself re- peatedly in Byzantine history. He thus helps us to understand. not only the persistent vitality of the Empire, but also the survival of the Hellenic tradition, preserved by the Orthodox Church, to the present day. The Greek spirit was not killed on May 29th, 1453, when the last Emperor, Constantine, fell fighting against the Turkish besiegers and Constantinople was taken. Hellenism lay dormant for generations, but it has now revived, and must again play a great part in the Near East.
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