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Churches and related buildings constitute the most significant surviving remains of Byzantine architecture. Numerous sources deal with the subject, including handbooks by Krautheimer (1986) and Mango (1976a), as well as monographs, regional surveys, and thematic studies. Kleinbauer's annotated bibliography (1991) includes an indispensable historiographic introduction, while Mathews addresses the role of liturgy in church design (1962, 1971, 1982). More recently, Ousterhout has attempted to interpret church architecture from the perspective of the builders (1999). Nevertheless, researchers tend to investigate church architecture out of context, without consideration for either its setting or its interior decoration. This article outlines the architectural history of churches and monasteries during the Byzantine Era, focusing on the pre-Constantinian (c.200-312), Constantinian (312-37), Early Christian (mid-fourth to fifth centuries), sixth century, transitional period (seventh to ninth centuries), Middle Byzantine (c.843-1204), and Late Byzantine (c.1204-1453) periods.

Numismatics is the study of coins and coin-like objects. The material of numismatics in the Roman Empire has chronological range of about eight centuries. Beginning in Italy in the late fourth century BCE, coinage came to be produced all around the Mediterranean basin, as far west as London and as far east as Alexandria. Until the end of the Republic, silver was coined almost continuously, copper intermittently down to the 80s BCE and hardly at all thereafter, and gold only in the Sullan and triumviral periods. As part of a reformed currency, a large orichalcum (copper + zinc) sestertius was introduced in 23 BCE. The denarius, the sestertius and its fractions (dupondius in orichalcum, as and occasionally semisses and quadrantes in copper), and a regularly produced gold aureus made up the currency of the next two-and-a-half centuries. While the denominations remained the same, their substance declined.

Numismatics is the systematic study of coins with cross-disciplinary connections, having found a central role in the interpretation of the history of art, religion, politics, political geography, and economy of the ancient and medieval world. It began as part of the philosophers' approach to political science and was later systematized as a collectors' discipline and antiquarian pursuit. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the rapid development and systematic study of Byzantine coins paralleled the emergence of specialized coin collections in Europe and the United States. These collections followed the already established trend of the rediscovery of Byzantium. This article focuses on the beginnings of numismatics, Byzantine coinage from the reign of Anastasios I to Constantine XI, and the role of coins in religion, political ideology, and art.

This article describes the origins of Greek numismatics, the emergence of the discipline, die study, hoards, and future trends. In discussing Greek coins, it presents a vivid case study of a trajectory in Hellenic scholarship observed similarly in archeology. In the early days, when artistic or iconographical interests dominated, coins were often thought of as ‘medals’; today more attention is paid to their social context, including not just their use in exchange, but also, for example, the circumstances of their production.