The Byzantine Imperial Chancery and its Language Policy from Justin II to Leo III (Sixth-Eighth Centuries): From Latin to Greek. Medieval Worlds|Ideologies of Translation I - Volume 11. 2020|

This article traces the development of language use in the imperial chancery of Constantinople. After Emperor Justinian I permitted Greek as the official language for documents concerning the Greek-speaking areas, his successors followed this path; Greek was increasingly preferred and started to replace Latin in documents that addressed the entire empire and, in a final stage, in imperial documents directed to Western addressees. To illustrate this process, the respective documents are discussed insofar as the preserved texts allow the drawing of safe conclusions about their original language and the stages of its development. For this reason, the texts are examined with regard to the target audience and, if Latin, to chancery or local translations