Byzantine Empire Trivia
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70 free Byzantine Empire trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Byzantine Empire trivia quiz covers the eleven centuries of the Eastern Roman Empire, from Constantine's founding of New Rome on the site of Byzantium to the last stand of Constantine XI on 29 May 1453. It moves through the great reigns and crises: Justinian, Theodora and Belisarius, the Nika riots and Hagia Sophia, the plague and the Persian wars, Heraclius and the Arab conquests, Greek fire and the sieges of Constantinople, iconoclasm, the Macedonian renaissance, Basil the Bulgar-Slayer, Manzikert, the Komnenian restoration, the Fourth Crusade's sack of 1204, Nicaea and the Palaiologan twilight. There are also questions on how the empire worked and lived: the theme system and the Varangian Guard, the Corpus Juris Civilis, the solidus, the Hippodrome and its Blues and Greens, silk and imperial purple, the Theodosian Walls, the schism with Rome, Cyril and Methodius, and why the word 'Byzantine' was never used by the Byzantines themselves. Some questions suit anyone who has stood inside Hagia Sophia; others will test serious students of the medieval world. Every answer has been checked against primary sources, chiefly the Wikipedia articles on the empire, its emperors and its battles, and each explanation adds one further detail. For the successors, try our Ottoman Empire quiz.
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Q 01What did the citizens of the Byzantine Empire call themselves?
Romans
Romans they remained in their own eyes for over a thousand years; the label 'Byzantine' was coined by historians only after the empire had fallen.
Q 02'Byzantine' comes from Byzantion, which was what?
The Greek settlement on which Constantinople was built
The Greek settlement on which Constantinople was built lent its name only to that city's residents; nobody called the whole empire 'Byzantine' until after it had fallen.
Q 03What did Constantine I call his new eastern capital, rebuilt between 324 and 330?
New Rome
New Rome was his name for it, but the city soon became known by his own name instead: Constantinople, the city of Constantine.
Q 04Constantine legalised Christianity, but which later emperor made it the state religion and was the last to rule the whole empire?
Theodosius I
Theodosius I left the empire to his two sons when he died in 395, one ruling from each capital, and no single emperor ever held east and west together again.
Q 05Which emperor divided the Roman Empire into eastern and western halves under the Tetrarchy?
Diocletian
Diocletian judged the empire too big for one ruler and shared it among four; in 305 he became the first Roman emperor to step down of his own accord.
Q 06The eastern emperor Valens died at which battle in 378?
Adrianople
Adrianople cost Rome two-thirds of an army in an afternoon; Valens's body was never found, and his successor had to let the Goths settle inside the empire.
Q 07Which invader ravaged the Balkans in the 440s until Constantinople bought him off with a huge yearly tribute in gold?
Attila
Attila later turned on the weaker western empire instead, and his own realm broke apart within years of his death in 453.
Q 08Which warlord deposed the last western emperor Romulus Augustulus in 476?
Odoacer
Odoacer spared the boy-emperor and sent him to live in Campania on an allowance, then ruled Italy as king without naming a successor.
Q 09Which Ostrogothic king did Emperor Zeno encourage to take Italy from the warlord who had deposed the last western emperor?
Theodoric
Theodoric invited his rival to a banquet in Ravenna in 493 to seal a power-sharing deal, killed him with his own hands, and then ruled Italy for 33 years.
Q 10By what name is the imperial legal code rewritten and enacted between 529 and 534 now known?
Corpus Juris Civilis
Corpus Juris Civilis is a title given centuries later; studied in Europe's universities from the 11th century, Justinian's compilation became the basis of many modern legal systems.
Q 11Which two chariot-racing factions joined forces against Justinian in the Nika riots of 532?
Blues and Greens
Blues and Greens were usually bitter rivals, but they united after Justinian refused to pardon one man from each side; the week-long revolt ended with some 30,000 dead.
Q 12Which former actress became empress and urged Justinian to stand firm during the Nika riots of 532?
Theodora
Theodora. Roman law barred senators from marrying actresses, so Justinian's uncle, the emperor Justin I, changed it, and she was crowned beside her husband in 527.
Q 13Which general conquered the Vandal Kingdom of North Africa in 533?
Belisarius
Q 21Constantine IV repelled Arab attacks on Constantinople in the 670s using what weapon?
Greek fire
Greek fire. Sprayed from tubes on the ships' prows, it kept burning on water, and its recipe was guarded so closely that it has since been lost.
Q 22Which emperor repelled the great Arab siege of Constantinople in 717–718?
Leo III
Leo III. Crowned only months before the Arabs arrived, he held the walls while an unusually hard winter, famine and disease wore the besiegers down until they withdrew in August 718.
Q 23What name is given to the Byzantine emperors' 8th- and 9th-century drive to remove religious images from churches?
Iconoclasm
Iconoclasm. From 726 emperors feared that honouring icons had become idolatry, and the images returned for good only in 843, a restoration Eastern churches still celebrate each year.
Belisarius. He shattered the Vandals in two battles within months, then brought their king Gelimer back to Constantinople as a captive to walk in his triumph.
Q 14What brought down Hagia Sophia's first dome in 558, some twenty years after the church was finished?
An earthquake
An earthquake. The replacement dome was built taller and steeper, so more of its weight pressed straight down instead of pushing the walls outward.
Q 15What was Hagia Sophia's status between 1935 and 2020?
A museum
A museum. Atatürk's secular republic closed the mosque and reopened it as a museum, until a Turkish court annulled that decision in 2020 and it became a mosque again.
Q 16The pandemic that reached Constantinople in 542 and is named after Justinian was an outbreak of which disease?
Plague
Plague. DNA from 6th-century graves shows the same bacterium that later caused the Black Death, and Justinian caught it himself in 542 but recovered.
Q 17Which relic, seized by the Persians at Jerusalem in 614, did Heraclius later restore to the city?
The True Cross
The True Cross. The Persians carried it off when they took Jerusalem, and their collapse after his victory forced them to hand it back, so Heraclius restored it to the city.
Q 18Heraclius defeated the Sasanians decisively in 627 at which battle?
Nineveh
Nineveh. Heraclius is said to have killed the Persian general in single combat, and soon afterwards the Persian king was overthrown and killed by his own son, who sued for peace.
Q 19On which strait between Europe and Asia did Constantinople stand?
The Bosphorus
The Bosphorus. Constantine chose the site because it was almost surrounded by water and easy to defend, and every ship leaving the Black Sea had to pass beneath its walls.
Q 20Which Byzantine arrangement, begun in the 7th century, stationed armies in set districts under military governors?
The theme system
The theme system. Each district's general commanded its troops and governed it too, and that standing local defence let Anatolia outlast yearly Arab raids without being occupied.
Q 24Which empress ruled the Byzantine Empire alone when the pope crowned Charlemagne emperor in 800?
Irene
Irene. She had overthrown her own son to rule alone, and two years after the coronation a marriage between her and Charlemagne was reportedly discussed.
Q 25Which Greek mountain has been home to a self-governing republic of Orthodox monks since Byzantine times?
Mount Athos
Mount Athos. Its first great monastery was founded in 963 with an emperor's money, and its twenty monasteries still govern themselves and still bar women from the peninsula.
Q 26By which epithet is the long-reigning emperor Basil II, who died in 1025, remembered?
The Bulgar Slayer
The Bulgar Slayer. As a young emperor he was routed by the Bulgarians at Trajan's Gate, and he spent the following decades avenging it until their state was annexed in 1018.
Q 27What is Basil II said to have ordered done to thousands of prisoners after Kleidion?
They were blinded
They were blinded. Chroniclers, perhaps exaggerating, say one man in every hundred kept an eye to lead the rest home, and that their ruler Samuel died of shock at the sight.
Q 28The Varangian Guard, the Byzantine emperors' elite bodyguard, was first recruited mainly from which people?
Vikings
Vikings. The first 6,000 were Rus warriors sent from Kiev to help Basil II keep his throne, and Anglo-Saxons from England later filled the ranks beside them.
Q 29In modern English, what is a set of rules described as 'byzantine'?
Overly complicated
Overly complicated. English borrowed the empire's name for anything as intricate and scheming as the imperial court at Constantinople was reputed to be.
Q 30At which battle in 1071 did the Seljuk Turks capture the Byzantine emperor Romanos IV?
Manzikert
Manzikert. The sultan freed his captive within days in return for territory, but Romanos came home to find himself overthrown, and the Turks went on to take most of Anatolia.