Devotion and Prayer in Byzantine Italy

Abstract

This synthesis addresses the issue of devotional practices, traditions of worship and forms of prayer – especially in private devotion – in Greek-speaking Italy of the Byzantine and post-Byzantine periods. In general, even from this point of view the Italo-Greek world displays a remarkable uniformity with the other areas of the Byzantine oecumene, if one disregards some small local peculiarities or emphases on particular aspects. The specific features are few in number and seem on the one hand to be a matter of close contacts, from the early Middle Ages on, with regions of the Eastern Mediterranean (Syria and Palestine) – contacts that leave important and lasting traces particularly in the liturgy – and on the other hand seem to be due to the influence of the traditions of liturgy, devotion and worship of the Latin West.