Acknowledgments; Abbreviations; Introduction; Part 1: DISSENT AND CONSENT; Chapter 1: Voices of Dissent: Preaching and Negotiating Authority; Organization of the ecclesiastics' group; Major political and social themes in the ecclesiastics' writings; Chapter 2. Voices of Consent: Imperial Rhetoricians, Theatra, and Patronage; Theatra and imperial involvement; Profile and organization of the rhetoricians; Connections among the members of the literary court; Main themes in the rhetoricians' writings; Part Two: OTHER VOICES, OTHER APPROACHES: MANUEL II'S POLITICAL WRITINGS; Introduction; Chapter 3. The deliberative voice: The Dialogue with the Empress Mother on Marriage; Contents and structure; Genre; Chapter 4 The Didactic Voice: the Foundations of Imperial Conduct; Context of production; Contents and structure; Genre; Authorial voice; Chapter 5. The didactic voice: The Orations (Seven ethical-political orations); Introduction; The dramatic setting; Major themes in the Orations; The contents and form of the orations; Between teaching and preaching: constructing the genre of the Orations; Authorial voice: teaching the son and admonishing the emperor; Chapter 6. The narrative voice: The Funeral Oration on Brother Theodore, Despot of Morea; Contexts of production; The rhetorical template and the compositional structure of the Funeral oration; The narrator and the narrative; Authorial voice; Chapter 7. Towards a Renewed Vision of Imperial Authority; Society and social "classes"; Enemies and allies; Markers of Byzantine Identity; Renewal of imperial ideology in Manuel's texts; Manuel II's Imperial vision and Style of government; APPENDICES; Bibiliography; Index.