Abstract

This article re-examines the profession of the late antique mechanikos, who is identified as a practising architect with a sound liberal arts education as well as practical training. Despite the practical orientation of his profession, the mechanikos was of high social standing. This was possible because the practical utility of a vocation was increasingly acknowledged favourably in late antiquity and is reflected in early Byzantine portrayals of patrons, who allegedly invested hard labour in prestigious building campaigns and posed as the supreme architects