While the splendors of Constantinople often dominate our view of the Byzantine Empire, the vast majority of its population lived and worked in the countryside. To understand the foundation of the empire’s economy and society, we must explore what life was like in the Byzantine countryside. Life for the rural population was a world away from the imperial court, defined by the relentless cycle of the agricultural seasons, a close-knit village community, and a constant struggle for subsistence in the face of taxation and insecurity.
Table of Contents
🌾 The Village as the Center of Rural Life
The basic unit of rural society was the village, or *chorion*. These were typically small, nucleated settlements, surrounded by the fields that the villagers collectively farmed. The village community was the primary focus of social and economic life. It was here that peasants lived, married, and were buried. The village was also a legal entity, collectively responsible for paying imperial taxes. This created a strong sense of communal solidarity, but also a shared burden that could be crushing in times of bad harvest or war.
landowner and the Peasant
Byzantine rural society was highly stratified. At the top were the powerful landowners, known as the *dynatoi*, or ‘the powerful ones.’ This group included the state itself, the church, and wealthy aristocratic families who owned vast estates. The majority of the rural population were peasants, who existed in various states of dependency. Some were free smallholders who owned their own land, but many were tenant farmers (*paroikoi*), who were legally tied to the land they worked and owed a portion of their produce and labor to their landlord.
🌱 The Agricultural Economy: From Grain to Wine
The Byzantine economy was overwhelmingly agrarian. The primary crops grown around the empire were the Mediterranean staples: grain (primarily wheat), grapes for wine, and olives for oil. These were supplemented by a variety of vegetables, fruits, and legumes. The productivity of the land was the ultimate basis of the empire’s wealth, as the surplus produced by the peasants fed the cities and the army and generated the tax revenue that funded the state. Life was precarious and depended heavily on favorable weather, as a drought or a pestilence could quickly lead to famine and ruin.
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James, Liz, editor. A Companion to Byzantium. Wiley-Blackwell, 2010.
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