Byzantine studies

Byzantine studies or Byzantinology is an interdisciplinary branch of the humanities that addresses the history, culture, costumes, religion, art, such as literature and music, science, economy, and politics of the Byzantine Empire. The discipline's founder in Germany is considered to be the philologist Hieronymus Wolf, a Renaissance humanist. He gave the name Byzantine to the eastern Roman Empire that continued after the western part collapsed in AD 476. About 100 years after the final conquest of Byzantium by the Ottomans, Wolf began to collect, edit, and translate the writings of Byzantine philosophers. Other 16th-century humanists introduced Byzantine studies to Holland and Italy.