The Balkan Heritage Foundation and the Department of Archaeology at New Bulgarian University organized the BEMA Online Seminar  in Balkan and Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology on Saturday, March 05, 2022. Guest lecturer historian David Hendrix, founder of the Byzantine Legacy website, presented on the following topic: “The Byzantine Legacy”.

Abstract:

The Byzantine Legacy project was created with the aim of providing accessible information on the Byzantine monuments of Istanbul. It consists of a website, social media, and a photo archive.

In the beginning of the project in 2015-2016, most of the Byzantine monuments in Istanbul did not have information boards. Many other aspects of Byzantine heritage, such as numerous Greek and Latin inscriptions, were also not accessible to the public. The Byzantine Legacy project includes a website with individual web pages on the monuments of Istanbul, including its land and sea walls, individual churches, palace ruins, and many cisterns. Each page has texts summaries on individual monuments, primary sources, translations, recent photos, historic images, plans, and pictures of artifacts from the site. There are also numerous maps based on categories, such as the Byzantine churches of Istanbul, sites in the hinterland of Constantinople, sites in Bithynia, and so forth. While the project currently focuses on Istanbul, there are many other cities, sites, and monuments on the website as well, though much more work is needed to develop these aspects of the project.

In addition to the website, there is also an extensive photo archive on Flickr, which is constantly increasing in number. The Byzantine Legacy project also includes a social media dimension, with regular posts on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. The largest number of followers is on Twitter, now almost 70k followers. Future developments will require funding, an academic board, collaboration with scholars and organizations, and other organizational developments.

You can now watch the lecture online in the gallery bellow.