such as lordship emerged and the emphasis shifted to the nuclear family and the household, which were always the basic cell of life in the highly individualistic society of Byzantium.
Materialistic and hedonistic behaviour was completely at odds with prevailing Christian values, but does emerge in our sources. Kings and emperors such as Leo VI kept mistresses in spite of ecclesiastical strictures, monks such as the historian Paul the Deacon could delight in traditional tales of the prowess of their lay ancestors, and many Christian writers displayed a prurient interest in cases of debauchery and prostitution. Most striking of all is a ubiquitous fascination with treasure and riches, a preoccupation understandable in a world still dominated by poverty and famine.
Throughout the early Middle Ages in both east and west scholars and writers set themselves the aim of emulating the literary canons and educational norms inherited from antiquity. To see the cultural history of this period in terms of the fragile survival of a classical tradition is in some ways misleading as it overlooks its limited but significant original achievements, not to mention an immense oral tradition now virtually lost to us, but does reflect the priorities of early medieval intellectuals.
The start of our period was marked by an astonishing breadth and vitality in cultural life. Most parts of the Mediterranean retained a degree of stability and prosperity and the senatorial aristocracy continued to cultivate the ideal of otium (leisure) involving the composition and copying of traditional secular literature. At the same time the Christianization of the empire produced new genres such as theology, hagiography, and ecclesiastical history. The longest-lasting achievement was the moving dialogue of the liturgy, which was gradually assuming its rich medieval form in both east and west. In the fourth century controversy had raged over the Church's policy towards classical learning, but with time the moderate view proposed by St Augustine prevailed that 'pagan' learning should be tolerated as long as it was kept subordinate
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