General Introduction

This belief in the practical value of learning and education, which is set out at full in the preface to the On Administering the Empire original Latin title: De Administrando Imperio and repeated in many subsequent parts of the book, was, of course, derived through Plutarch^24 from Aristotle; and the method of education through the early inculcation of precept teaching general rules of conduct or moral instruction, which is illustrated in a long series of medieval manuals of gnomic wisdom short, pithy sayings intended to teach a truth, goes back ultimately to the To Demonicus^25 original: Ad Demonicum of the Pseudo-Isocrates, which, with the Latin Distichs of Cato, formed the basis of primary education throughout later medieval and renaissance Europe. But to Constantine may be given the credit for its revival at Byzantium; for, to teach practical wisdom, the material for such teaching is required, and was in his time extremely scanty. With tireless zeal he set about the enormous task of creating such material, and set about it in three ways: first, by diligent search for and collection of books, of which the supply was quite inadequate^26; second, by the compilation of anthologies and encyclopedias from such books as existed but were too tedious or prolix for any but a scholar to read^27; third, by writing or causing to be written histories of recent events and manuals of technical instruction on the various departments of business and administration.^28 A school of historians wrote beneath his eye, sometimes at his dictation.^29 Documents from the files of every branch of the administration, from the foreign ministry, the treasury, the offices of ceremonial, were scrutinized and abstracted.^30 Provincial governors and imperial envoys wrote historical and topographical reports on the areas of their jurisdiction or assignment.^31 Foreign ambassadors were diligently questioned as to the affairs of their respective countries.^32 From every quarter the tide of information rolled in, was coordinated and written down. Learning became the key to worldly advancement.^33 The principle

^24 Plutarch, On Moral Virtue original: De Virtute Morali, (edited by Bernardakis, Leipzig, 1891), pp. 154, 155. For this technical usage of wisdom original: σοφία / sophia and practical wisdom original: φρόνησις / phronesis compare On Administering the Empire, Preface line 7; Romanus was of course to be wise original: σοφός / sophos as well as practically wise original: φρόνιμος / phronimos, but practical wisdom is the end of our treatise.
^25 Compare To Demonicus, p. 9 C, (taking examples into counsel original: βουλευόμενος παραδείγματα, etc.), with On Administering the Empire, 46_187 (for it is worthy, dearest son original: ἄξιον γάρ, φίλτατε υἱέ, etc.); ibid. p. 11 E (as if you were bringing forth from a storehouse original: ὥσπερ ἐκ ταμιείου προφέρῃς), with ibid. 13_13 (to bring forth as if from paternal treasures original: ὡς ἐκ πατρικῶν θησαυρῶν προφέρειν).
^26 On Ceremonies original: De Cer., I, p. 456; Theophanes Continued original: Theoph. Cont., p. 212; Preface to the Excerpts on Embassies original: Prooemium ad Excerpta de Legationibus (M. P. G., vol. CXIII), c. 633.; Excerpts on Embassies, ed. de Boor, I, p. 1.
^27 ibid. pp. 633, 636.
^28 Theophanes Continued, pp. 3, 4; On Administering the Empire, Preface line 25 (I have devised/contrived by myself original: ἐσοφισάμην κατ' ἐμαυτόν). For Constantine’s own works, see Rambaud, op. cit., p. 73, and for those compiled under his aegis, ibid., pp. 78ff.; also Moravcsik, in Proceedings of the 5th International Congress of Byzantine Studies original title in Italian, (Rome, 1939), I, pp. 514—516, and id., Byzantinoturcica, (Budapest, 1942), I, pp. 207ff. (2nd ed. pp. 358ff.).
^29 Rambaud, op. cit., p. 65.
^30 Bury, in Byzantine Journal original: Byzantinische Zeitschrift, XV, 1905, pp. 539ff.
^31 Theophanes Continued, p. 448.
^32 Bury, op. cit., pp. 553, 556.
^33 Theophanes Continued, p. 447.