Founded in 324, Byzantium is also known as the Byzantine Empire, the Roman Empire in the East, a Greek Empire, and the heart of Orthodox Christianity. Byzantium began in antiquity, stretched through all thousand years of the Middle Ages, and ended where it touched the Renaissance. Byzantium sat between the Roman Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the Persian and Arab Empires, directly under the Russian Empire and among the contentious European powers that followed the Ottoman conquest of Byzantium's queen city of Constantinople in 1453. Rich in literary and artistic innovation (think mosaics and architectural treasures), brutal in devising singular methods of warfare (Greek Fire), the Byzantines were unmatched in commerce. Among its powerful leaders Byzantium also had its feminist moments. This class will help us understand how and why the West evolved as it has.