Rebecca West says in her bibliographical note that it's necessary to have "a clear picture of both the Byzantine Empire and its legacy to the modern world" if one wants to gain insight into the South Slav mind. I feel most fortunate then to have stumbled upon the Teaching Company's World of Byzantium series of lectures while assisting a patron a couple nights ago. Four lectures in, I'm weary of imperial Rome and ready for the non-Western Civ survey course material to begin. I should probably skip ahead to the second half of the series but somehow that feels like cheating.