Western Civilization I / Unit 9 WC1 0813 short lesson, about 20 seconds
Piety Against Learning: Where Greek Thought Was Kept
Captions available
The idea
Constantinople's holiness, its relics and the Virgin as intercessor, made it a New Jerusalem, but piety undermined secular study. Greek learning stayed with a small elite and, the anchor says, was largely analyzed and recopied in the Arab kingdoms. Latin was lost by the ninth century.
In practice
Justinian's code read in Greek summary.
Where people slip
Preservation without progress: the anchor's verdict, attributed.
Your place on the trail
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