Acknowledgments
This book grew out of a suggestion from my friend and colleague John Nesbitt that a translation of the Continuation of the Chronicle of John Skylitzes would be a worthy addition to the growing number of Byzantine texts available in English or other modern languages. Now that our joint undertaking has come to fruition, we wish to thank the people who helped bring this book to publication.
It is a pleasure to begin by expressing our gratitude to Professor Anthony Kaldellis of The Ohio State University who generously read over the translation and made many helpful comments on the text and the questions arising from the Continuation. Dr. Jonathan Shea was also kind enough to read over the introduction and translation and to offer similarly helpful suggestions. We are especially grateful to the two anonymous readers engaged by Brill to evaluate the manuscript; both contributed prompt, perceptive, and constructive observations on the translation and commentary. We hope that the finished product represents a fair acquittal of the debt we owe to these scholars for the improvements they helped us to make. Any remaining errors or shortcomings must be inscribed on our charge sheet.
We reserve a special thanks for Professor Ian Mladjov of Bowling Green State University who prepared a set of detailed maps which readers will find most useful as they follow the historical narrative. With the courteous assistance of Mrs Joni Joseph, Museum Collections Manager and Registrar at the Dumbarton Oaks Research Center in Washington, DC, we have been able to reproduce photographs of lead seals relevant to the text from the Dumbarton Oaks Collection. Our thanks to the museum staff, notably Mr Joe Mills for his outstanding photography, are very much in order.
The inclusion of the Greek text of the Continuation has made this book a more useful tool for those who might wish to consult the original as they read the translation. For her collegiality in helping to secure permission to reproduce Eudoxos Th. Tsolakes’ 1968 edition of the Continuation, we express our deep gratitude to Professor Alexandra Wassiliou-Seibt of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki; for granting permission to reproduce the text, we owe a particular thanks to Professor Paroula Naskou-Perraki of the Institute of Balkan Studies (Ἴδρυμα Μελετῶν Χερσονήσου τοῦ Αἵμου), and to the Board of the Institute.
We have both enjoyed working with Marcella Mulder at Brill. With friendly efficiency she has coordinated the submission, review, and final publication of a book that was a little longer in arriving than at first envisioned. To her must go a most sincere hartelijk bedankt, and with it the hope that we may have the chance to work with her again. We are also very grateful that Brill put the layout of the manuscript in the capable hands of Lydia Bax and her colleagues at TAT Zetwerk, to whom we express our thanks for their care in arranging the text and illustrations in such an attractive format.
Finally, a word of thanks to our families—John Nesbitt to his wife Carla, Eric McGeer to his wife Sylvia and his children Sarah and Colin—for their much appreciated support and patience as we carried on to the finish line.