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At the origins of ephoreia*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 January 2016

Zachary Chitwood
Zachary Chitwood*
Affiliation:
Princeton University
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Extract

Ephoreia, one of the principal forms of monastic trusteeship in the Byzantine empire, appears for the first time in texts around the year 1000. Despite its prevalence, like many post-Justinianic legal developments, ephoreia is not mentioned in the normative legal codes of the Middle Byzantine period, including the Basilika. A previously overlooked passage from the eleventh-century casebook known as the Peira, which was compiled by an anonymous redactor from the verdicts and legal treatises of the jurist Eustathios Rhomaios, mentions ephoreia in the context of how much time must elapse before a possessor of property acquires ownership. This mention of ephoreia in the Peira is one of the earliest, if not the earliest, appearance of the term as describing monastic trusteeship. The reference is an important example of a contemporary legal development without a basis in Roman law which was accommodated within the contemporary legal regime.

Type
Articles
Information
Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies , Volume 37 , Issue 1 , 2013 , pp. 53 - 62
Copyright
Copyright © The Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies, University of Birmingham 2013

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Footnotes

*

I would like to thank John Haldon for looking over an early draft of this article. I am indebted as well to the invaluable criticism of the anonymous reviewers. At a crucial point in the writing of this article, Athanasia Katsiakiori–Rankl brought my attention to the Late Antique use of the term ephoreia.

References

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4 The references to the Basilika in the Peira were most likely added by the work’s anonymous redactor, who composed the work from Eustathios Rhomaios’ oeuvre, consisting of close to three hundred hypomnē-mata (‘verdicts’) as well as legal treatises devoted to special subjects (meletai): see D. Simon, ‘Peira’ in ODB.

5 Peira §9.

6 Kazhdan, A., ‘Do we need a new history of Byzantine law?’, JÖB 39 (1989) 1-28Google Scholar. Kazhdan had published a variation of this proposal a year earlier, but this essay did not have the same impact as ‘Do we need a new history of Byzantine law?’; see idem, ‘Che cosa chiede lo storico di Bisanzio allo storico del dritto?’, Κοινωνία 12 (1988) 129-44.

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10 Unfortunately, given the loosely-thematic way the Petra was organized by its anonymous redactor, there is no way to date the passage under question more precisely, given that the markers which sometimes allow a more precise dating such as names which might suggest a date via prosopography or a title of Eustathios Rho-maios at a particular point in his career are in this instance absent.

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20 The life says that Nikon wanted the thematic judge and the military governor to own (va τήν έξουσιάζη) his church.

21 Feissel, D. and Philippidis-Braat, A., ‘Inventaríes en vue d’un recueil des inscriptions historiques de Byzance. III. Inscriptions du Péloponnèse (à l’exception de Mistra)’, TM 9 (1985) 267–396 Google Scholar, text at 301-2. The krites and strategos, along with the emperor, are invoked as a counterweight to the power of the bishop: έν πρότης μέν βασηλέως то αύτεξούσηων, έπησκέπτεσθε δέ αΰτήν κ(αί) έπημελήστε παρά τοΰ κρητοΰ κέ (σ) στρατηγοΰ, τούς πράτουντα(ς) ίς то θέμαν, κέ μή έάν τον έπήσκοπ(ον) της ανής πόλ(εως) μα κέ τοΰ κ(λ)ήρου αύτοΰ έπεξουσηάζην έν τη έκλησία μήτε βήμα ποδος (11. 16-22).

22 Morris, R., ‘Legal terminology in monastic documents of the tenth and eleventh centuries’, JÖB 32/2 (1982) 281-90Google Scholar, 286; eadem, Monks and laymen in Byzantium, 843-1118 (Cambridge 1995) 159.

23 Both spellings (έφορεία and έφορία) are used in contemporary texts to describe the legal relationship of ephoreia, although of course έφορεία is much more common.

24 Kaser, M., Eigentum und Besitz im älteren römischen Recht, 2nd ed. (Cologne 1956)Google Scholar. For the Byzantine period, see von Lingenthal, K. E. Zachariä, Geschichte des griechisch-römischen Rechts, 3rd edition (Berlin 1892) 211-17Google Scholar.

25 Examples in Kazhdan, ‘Do we need a new history of Byzantine law?’ 19-21.

26 Nörr, D., Die Entstehung der longi temporis praescriptio: Studien zum Einfluss der Zeit im Recht und zur Rechtspolitik in der Kaiserzeit (Cologne 1969)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

27 Basilicorum libri LX, ed. Scheltema, H. J. and van der Wal, N., 17 vols (Series A = Text, 8 vols; Series B = Scholia, 9 vols) (Groningen 1953-88)Google Scholar.

28 = Nov. 111: ‘Every action pertaining to a reverend house, whether it is personal or for a pledge, may not exceed forty years, while the temporary regulations that are fitting to each such holy house maintain however their own intervals.’ (Πάσα άγωγή προσήκουσα σεπτω οϊκω, ειτε προσωπική ε’ίτε ύποθηκαρία έστίν, ούχ ύπερ-βαίνει τά τεσσαράκοντα ετη, τών άρμοζουσών έκάστφ οΐκφ τοιούτφ εύαγει προσκαίρων παραγραφών φυλαττουσών μέντοιγε τούς οίκείους χρόνους.)

29 = Nov. 131 c. 6: ‘Instead of the lengths of time of 10 and 20 and 30 years for holy churches and all other reverend places we decree to put in its place only a regulation of 40 years. This is also kept for the request of bequests and inheritances left to philanthropic institutions.’ (Avxi бе τών χρονίων παραγραφών τών δέκα καί ε’ίκοσι καί τριάκοντα ένιαυτών ταΐς άγίαις έκκλησίαις καί τοΐς αλλοις απασι σεβασμίοις τόποις μόνην τήν τών τεσσαράκοντα ένιαυτών παραγραφήν άντιτίθεσθαι προστάττομεν• τούτου αύτοΰ φυλαττομένου καί έν τη άποα-τήσει τών ληγάτών κοα τών κληρονομιών τών είς εύσεβεΐς αΐιίας κατοΛελειμμένων.)

30 Morris, Monks and laymen, 159.

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32 Basilika, books 37-8; Kazhdan, A., Herrin, J., ‘Guardianship’, ODB II, 886 Google Scholar; Zachariä, Geschichte des griechisch-römischen Rechts, 120-9.

33 Actes de Lavra, ed. Lemerle, P., Guillou, A., Svoronos, N., Papachryssanthou, D., 4 vols, I (Paris 1970-82) no. 33 Google Scholar.

34 Actes de Lavra, I, no. 31.

35 Meyer, Ph., Die Haupturkunden für die Geschichte der Athosklöster (Leipzig 1894) 123-30Google Scholar, here §7.

36 Gautier, P., ‘La diataxis de Michel Attaliate’, REB 35 (1981) 5-143CrossRefGoogle Scholar, lines 280-304, 348-53.