The Alexiad

The reviewer who cautions Comnena's readers to take her "with a grain of salt" should try to step out of his/her 20th-century shoes long enough to appreciate the astonishing accomplishment of this remarkable woman. As Emilie Amt says, "[M]edieval standards of truth, originality and accuracy were not the same as ours. Supernatural explanations of events were more widely accepted than they are today. Authors of literature and history borrowed freely from other works, and the boundaries between myth, story and history were not clear ones. Literary conventions can also distort the historical record; for example, the writers often invented dialogue freely. . . . One way to read such sources is to look for clues in accounts as to what might 'really' have happened. Another is to study the mind-set of the age, taking the belief itself as an important historical fact. A third is to enter into the mind-set of the age, taking the belief for granted. All three approaches can be illuminating for the student of medieval history."The literary convention of using archaic language is hardly new with Comnena, and although one might argue its effectiveness, one can hardly say that all books must be written in the "language . . . in common usage at the time."Personally, as a scholar in the field of medieval women writers, I found Comnena's epic, and especially her (inadvertant) revelations of her own personality so fascinating, that I wrote a young-adult novel based on her life (_Anna of Byzantium_). More than one teenage fan has written to tell me that reading the novel had inspired her to attempt to read the _Alexiad_. None of them made it very far, but several said they were going to try again when they were older!

Anna Comnena talks about her father's glorious administration of the Byzantine Empire in 1100's in this book. Thanks to her, we know what happened in those years in the Near East. The book is especially important for those interested in the conquest (or invasion) of Anatolia by the Turks and the subsequent Islamization process of it. She gives first-hand information on the nature of Turkic conquest and its effects on Hellen and Armenio-Syriac Anatolia.The book is also important for various reasons such as history of Byzantine Empire, Celtic, and Norman wars, the first Crusade.

Byzantine literature has been unfairly maligned in the West as uncreative and basically unreadable. Anna Comnena's gripping masterpiece reveals just how wrong this judgment is. If you are as impressed as I was, you might go on to read Michael Psellos (also in Penguin), Procopius, Saint Basil and the other Cappadocian fathers, the epic Digenes Akrites (Byzantium's answer to Beowulf and Roland), Barlaan and Josaphat (a novel presenting the life of the Buddha in Christianized form), the lyric poetry of Paul the Silentiary, and the host of other fine works produced over the 1100 years of this amazing civilization.

A very important product of the culture that Byzantium achieved during its long life (>1,000 years). This female author, most learned in the ancient literature and philosophy, decided to write a history of her father who refocused Byzantium prior to its decline and fall. <p>As with most historians in the era, Anna describes in detail the proceedings of her father's court. The reader will come face-to-face with the religous discord in the empire, medieval politics, and Anna's dislike of the "Franks," i.e., Latin forces of the First Crusade.

Alexiad is a very important historical primary source for the understanding of the Byzantine culture and history of the era. Eventhough, there are some subjective material, due to the fact the writer is infact the doughter of the emperor Alexius I. I highly recommend the book for those who are interested in the history of the Eastern Roman Empire and the imperial capital of Constantinople.