Зборник радова Византолошког института LII, 2015 Zbornik radova Vizantološkog instituta LII, 2015 UDC: 821.14'04.09"08":94(495.02)"06/07": DOI: 10.2298/ZRVI1552009M DRAGOLJUB MARJANOVIĆ University of Belgrade – Faculty of Philosophy
[email protected] MODES OF NARRATIVITY IN THE SHORT HISTORY OF NIKEPHOROS OF CONSTANTINOPLE* Modes of narrativity applied in the Short history by Nikephoros of Constantinople are investigated on the basis of several key accounts which form a specific message of the author on the level of his entire work. This specific manner of literary presentation is particularly manifested in Nikephoros‘ original approach in portrayal of the Byzantine emperors and the patriarchs of Constantinople of the 7th and 8th centuries, thus embedding a specific idea of both imperial governance personalized in the reign of emperor Herakleios, and mutual rela- tions between the Empire and the patriarchs of the Church of Constantinople, as presented in the accounts of patriarchs Sergios and Pyrrhos. Keywords: Emperor, patriarch, peace and tranquility, narrative. An obvious need for writing about the past at the end of the 8th century, which was the time when new models where established in relations between the Empire and the Church of Constantinople after the first wave of iconoclasm, leads one to think that the historiographical production, clearly emerging from within a narrow circle of men gathered around the patriarch Tarasios, had the need to search for and offer to their con- temporaries models which they might imitate but which might also serve as recognition and legitimization of their own ideas.1 This was to be gained by appropriate historical writing, and shaping of history through literary modes of narration.