Introduction

The chronological boundaries of the study embrace the three centuries of medieval Byzantine prosperity from approximately the mid-tenth century to the Frankish occupation in 1204. In the case of certain monuments, reference will be made to earlier building phases, primarily after iconoclasm. Sources concerned with the metropolis of Athens, its metropolitans and other church officials in the Middle Byzantine period have also been published and commented upon. These sources are discussed as part of the investigation of the condition of the Church in Athens. In an overall picture of Athens in the Middle Byzantine period, as in the later years of foreign rule, the Acropolis fortress dominated the city. The part of the city that was fortified in Late Antiquity was extended slightly to the north and south, and in this new zone, across a relatively extensive area, the new Middle Byzantine residential neighborhoods spread out, but always within confines of the ancient city.