Product Description

From the accession of Alexius in 1081, through the disastrous Fourth Crusade - when an army destined for the Holy Land was diverted to Constantinople by the blind, octogenarian but infinitely crafty Doge of Venice - to the painfully protracted struggle against the Ottomans, the closing centuries of the Byzantine era are rich in pathos, colour and startling reversals of fortune. The terrible siege of Constantinople in 1453 ended the empire, founded in the year 330, which Lord Norwich has devoted many years to re-creating; this volume forms the climax to an epic sequence of books.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #17845 in Books
• Published on: 1996-10-31
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 488 pages

About the Author
John Julius Norwich was born in 1929. He was educated at Upper Canada College, Toronto, at Eton, at the University of Strasbourg and, after a spell of National Service in the Navy, at New College, Oxford, where he took a degree in French and Russian. In 1952 he joined the Foreign Service, where he remained for twelve years, serving at the embassies in Belgrade and Beirut and with the British Delegation to the Disarmament Conference at Geneva. In 1964 he resigned from the service in order to write. Byzantium: The Decline and Fall is the third in his three-volume history of the Byzantine Empire.

Customer Reviews

The bad thing is that this is the last volume....
This is another masterpiece of popular history (although based on serious research and rigorous)by Julius Norwich.

The book is actually the final volume of the Byzantium trilogy by the same author, which covers all the over 1000 years of history of the Byzantine empire.

Readers who have already read the previous volumes already know how enjoyable and informative they are: the third volume adds to the virtues of the first two parts a tragic - at times pathetic - tone: this is the history of an agony, starting with the fall of the Comneni dinasty and extending over two centuries, during which the Byzantine empire is progressively reduced in its size, depleted of its riches, divided by internal strifes. It is a sad history indeed: and Julius Norwich is a master in striking a perfect balance between the need to give a serious account of a decline which has manifold causes, and that of keeping the reader involved in the narration.

He succeeds perfectly: at the end of the book you will know why Byzantium fell, and at the same you will feel sorry for it, after having ventured into the captivating account of the last siege by Mehmet the Conqueror (although this part of the book is basically a summary of Professor Runciman's previous work, as acknowledged by Norwich himself).
Finally, as suggested by other reviewers, I would recommend if possible NOT to buy the one-volume synopsis of Norwich's trilogy: don't be put off by the size of the three volumes, they are thoroughly enjoyable! Go for the big read!

Heart rending history as the Roman Empire dies fighting
John Julius Norwich is a great author and historian. Here he is given one of the worlds great tradgedies as his background and he uses it to create a compelling history.

From it's opening through to Mehmet "The conqueror" praying in Hagia Sophia, the spiritual heart of the empire, the whole book brings to life the death of Byzantium. It should be read after savouring the previous two books in the trilogy. I enjoyed the sequence so much it led me to visit Istanbul which proved to be one of the best vacations I have had.

The account of the final fall on that fateful Tuesday is brilliantly created. The heroism of Constantine as he dies fighting on the walls sums up the life of an empire which bridged the classic, medieval and modern worlds.

Brings Byzantium to Life
This series of books (permit me to include mention of the other two in the trilogy here) is a great read, a telling of the complete saga of Byzantine history, covering a period of 1000 years. The author lays bare the facts about the various Emperors of Byzantium, the good, the bad, the incompetent and the heroic, giving as good idea as possible about each of their character, deeds and misdeeds, and the times and events in which they existed. He does it in a style that draws the reader in and captivates the interest which I find admirable. This is definately the way history should be written.

I was disappointed by the maps at the beginning of each book: they only give a very vague idea of where things are happening, and I would have loved to have seen what areas the Empire controlled at various points in its history. It seems a shame to have to look elsewhere for such maps, considering the quality of the writing.