Imperial Officials.—In the central administration, the general principles seem to have remained unchanged ; the heads of the great administrative bureaux in Constantinople retain the palatine character which belonged to most of them from the beginning. But there were many changes in these offices, in their nomenclature and the delimitation of their functions. There are great differ ences between the administrative corps in the 5th, in the loth and in the I 5th centuries. We can hardly be wrong in conjectur ing that, along with his provincial reform, Leo III. made a re arrangement of the central bureaux; the abolition of the praetorian prefecture of the East entailed, in itself, modifications. But minor changes were continually being made, and we may note the fol lowing tendencies: (I) Increase in the number of ministers directly responsible to the emperor, (a) subordinate offices in the bureaux being raised to the rank of independent ministries; (b) new offices being created and old ones becoming merely titular. (2) Changes in nomenclature; substitution of Greek for Latin titles. (3) Changes in the relative importance and rank of the high officials, both civil and military.
The prefect of the city (grapxos) controlled the police organ ization and administration of justice in the capital ; he was vice president of the imperial court of justice, and, when the office of prefect of the East was abolished, he inherited the functions of that dignitary as judge of appeals from the provinces. But the praefectus vigilum, commander of the city guards, who was sub ordinate to him, became an independent officer, entitled drungary of the watch, and in the i i th century superseded him as vice president of the imperial court. We are told that in the last years of the empire the prefect of the city had no functions at all ; but his office survives in the Shehr-imaneti, "city prefecture," of the Ottomans, in whose organization there are many traces of Byzan tine influence.
Instead of the quaestor of the sacred palace, whose duty was to draft the imperial laws and rescripts, we find in the 9th century a quaestor who possesses certain judicial and police functions and is far lower in the hierarchy of rank. It has been supposed that the later quaestor really inherited the duties of another officer, the quaesitor, who was instituted by Justinian. In the latest period the quaestor, if he still existed as a name, had no functions.
The master of offices, who supervised the bureaux in the palace and was master of court ceremonies, also performed many func tions of a minister of foreign affairs, was head of the imperial post (curses), and of the corps of agentes in rebus or imperial messengers. This ministry disappeared, probably in the 8th cen tury, but the title was retained as a dignity at all events till the end of the 9th. The most important functions, pertaining to foreign affairs, were henceforward performed by the logothete of the post (Xo-yoN-rns Tov 6„6,uov). In the 12th century this minister was virtually the chancellor of the empire; his title was changed to that of great logothete by Andronicus II.
The two financial ministers, comes sacrarum largitionum and comes rei privatae, continued to the end under the titles XoyoNsnr roi) -ye/Lica (general logothete) and 6 Toi) I&KOV (Anastasius added a third, the count of the sacred patrimony, but he was afterwards suppressed). But in the 9th century we find both these
ministers inferior in rank to the sacellarius, or private purse keeper of the emperor. Besides these there was a fourth im portant financial department, that of the military treasury, under a logothete.
The employment of eunuchs as high ministers of State was a feature of the Byzantine empire from the end of the 4th century. It is laid down as a principle (A.D. goo) that all offices are open to them, except the prefecture of the city, the quaestorship, and the military posts which were held by "domestics." There were then eight high posts which could only be held by eunuchs, of which the chief were the parakoimomenos and the protovestiarios (master of the wardrobe).
An emperor who had not the brains or energy to direct the affairs of the State himself, necessarily committed the task of guiding the helm to some particular minister or court dignitary who had gained his confidence. Such a position of power was out side the constitution, and was not associated with any particular office; it might be held by an ecclesiastic or a eunuch; it had been held by the eunuchs Eutropius and Chrysaphius in the reigns of Arcadius and Theodosius II. respectively. In later times, such a first minister came to be denoted by a technical term, 6 rapabv vaard.xty. This was the position, for instance, of Stylianus, the father-in-law of Leo VI. Most of the emperors between Basil II. and Alexius Comnenus were under the influence of such ministers.
The orders of rank (which must be distinguished from titles of office) were considerably increased in later times. In the 4th and 7th centuries there were the three great classes of the illustres, spectabiles and clarissimi; and above the illustres a small, higher class of patricians. In the 9th century we find an entirely differ ent system ; the number of classes being largely augmented, and the nomenclature different. Instead of epithets, like illustres, the names are titles which had designated offices; "patrician" alone survives. The highest rank is now (I) the magistroi; then come the patricians in two classes: (2) proconsular patricians, (3) re spectable patricians; below these (4) protospatharioi, (5) dishypatoi (=bis consules), (6) spatharokandidatoi, (7) spa tharioi, and other lower ranks. Particular ranks do not seem now to have been inalienably attached to particular offices. The strategos of the Anatolic theme, e.g., might be a patrician or only a protospathar. Whoever was promoted to one of these ranks received its insignia from the emperor's hand, and had to pay fixed fees to various officials, especially to the palace eunuchs. In the provinces ordinary justice was administered by judges (KpLral) who were distinct from the governors of the themes, and inherited their functions from the old provincial governors of Diocletian's system. In Constantinople higher and lower courts of justice sat regularly and frequently. The higher tribunals were those of the prefect and the quaestor, before whom different kinds of cases came. Appeals reached the emperor through the bureau of petitions beyricov); he might deal with the case immediately; or might refer it to the imperial court of appeal, of which he was president ; or else to the special court of the Twelve Divine Judges (OeIoL bucaural), which was instituted by Justinian.