- ... that three Byzantine emperors in the 6th century served as commanders of the imperial guard, known as the Excubitors, prior to assuming the throne?
- ... that the great cathedral of Hagia Sophia has runic inscriptions left by Vikings who were serving in the Byzantine emperors' Varangian Guard?
- ... that after the destructive Byzantine civil war of 1341–47, the treasury of the Byzantine Empire contained "nothing but the atoms of Epicurus"?
