| Byzantine culture in the time of the Paleologi. The territorial and political decline of the empire was accompanied by an extraordinary cultural revival, analogous to the Renaissance in Italy. The schools of Constantinople flourished and produced a group of outstanding scholars (philosophy: Planudes, Plethon, Bessarion). In theology the dominant current was one of mysticism (Gregory Palamas and the hesychasts; George Scholarius). Historical writing reached a high plane in the work of John Cantacuzene, Nicephorus Gregoras, and, in the last years of the empire, Phrantzes, Ducas, and Chalcocondylas. Art, especially painting, was distinctly humanized, and three different schools (Constantinople, Macedonia, and Crete) cast a flood of splendor over the closing years of the empire. Mistra, the capital of the Morean province, became in the early 15th century the center of a revived Greek national feeling and a home of scholars and artists. | 3 |
