The magnificence of Constantinople and the refined civilization of its empire excited the envy of many peoples and nations. Grandeur and dignity, security and ease, progress and glory wafted from every story, from every piece of   information coming from the Empire. The history of Byzantium is an uninterrupted tale of invasions by wild tribes and barbarous neighbors. Every foreigner dreamed of finding a place in the Kingdom of God, while the Byzantines were eager to absorb as many people as they could, employ them in the army or in civil government, and integrate them into their Church.

Many of the so-called barbarians, Slavs and Germans that manned the legions of the Byzantine state, had high rank at court and in public life. When the eighth-century plagues and epidemics decimated Greece, free access was opened to all. Slavs flooded the provinces. Their best and most educated elements came to stay. Thessalonika received a great share of their influx. Varangians, from the center valley of the Dnieper around Kiev, had furnished the Empire with its best soldiers – not only mercenaries but the most valiant and permanent elements of the Empire – the Pretorian guards. Slavs mixed with the Easterners and Romans and vied with the Greeks in the capital city of the Roman Empire and in its provinces. They lived side by side, grew to know each other and were fused into one nation under God and under the rule of the Gospel of Christ.

The Slavs who came to Byzantium were formed by it and they, in turn, helped in the formation of its culture. Their courage and endurance, generosity and faithfulness, left their mark on every aspect of life.

Were Cyril and Methodius, the apostles of the Slavs, true-blooded Byzantine Greeks? Or were they immigrants or descendants of immigrants whose Slavic origin fitted them to be missionaries to the land of their forefathers?

Byzantium was the real teacher of the Slavs. Even after its fall and after it had ceased to exist as an empire, it continued to influence them. All people of Eastern Europe have preserved a living memory of its traditions. “They all still live by its inspiration, deeply imprinted in trends of thought and in their politics.”

Each Eastern European nation that embraced the “Greek/Byzantine” faith, infused its rituals with unique cultural influences, especially in terms of music and chant.