The empire modern historians call Byzantine understood itself as the continuation of Rome. Constantinople was consecrated as New Rome in AD 330, at a strategic meeting point of trade and military routes. It became the Eastern Empire's capital after the partition in AD 395 and survived the collapse of western imperial power. In Anna Komnene's time, Alexios was the Roman emperor, his subjects were Romans, and their state was the Roman Empire or Romania. The Arabic name for the territory likewise identified it as the land of the Romans.
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Anna Komnene's Byzantium called itself Roman
The empire's Greek language and culture coexisted with a Roman political identity and Constantinople's founding as New Rome.