The Byzantine Turks, 1204-1461

In The Byzantine Turks, 1204–1461 Rustam Shukurov offers an account of the Turkic minority in Late Byzantium including the Nicaean, Palaiologan, and Grand Komnenian empires. The demography of the Byzantine Turks and the legal and cultural aspects of their entrance into Greek society are discussed in detail. Greek and Turkish bilingualism of Byzantine Turks and Tourkophonia among Greeks were distinctive features of Byzantine society of the time. Basing his arguments upon linguistic, social, and cultural evidence found in a wide range of Greek, Latin, and Oriental sources, Rustam Shukurov convincingly demonstrates how Oriental influences on Byzantine life led to crucial transformations in Byzantine mentality, culture, and political life. The study is supplemented with an etymological lexicon of Oriental names and words in Byzantine Greek.

Rustam Shukurov, D.Sc. in History (2012), is Professor of Byzantine studies at Moscow State University. He has published monographs, translations, and many articles on the Byzantine, Iranian and Turkic worlds, including The Grand Komnenoi and the Orient (1204–1461) (Moscow, 2001).

"This study offers for the first time a complete guide to interrelations between the Byzantines and the people of (mainly) Turkic origin who penetrated the Byzantine Empire from the eleventh century onwards. Shukurov presents rich historiographical and linguistic material on how the Turks acquired Byzantine identity through language and religion. The author supplements his Greek sources with Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Armenian and Georgian materials, which allows him to analyse the complex and multi-faceted cultural panorama of Asia Minor in the period. This study will clearly constitute a useful tool for those interested oin Byzantine-Turkic relations."
Spyros P. Panagopoulos, in: Al-Masaq XXIX (2017).