 Of the new eastern religions introduced into the Greek world, the most successful was Christianity. From the early centuries of the Common Era, the Greeks self-identified as Romaioi ("Romans"), as well as Graikoi ("Greeks"); by that time, the name Hellenes denoted pagans but was revived as an ethnonym in the 11th century. While ethnic distinctions still existed in the Roman Empire, they became secondary to religious considerations and the renewed empire used Christianity as a tool to support its cohesion and promoted a robust Roman national identity. Concurrently, the secular, urban civilization of Late Antiquity survived in the Eastern Mediterranean along with the Greco-Roman educational system; the Greeks' essential values were drawn from both Christianity and the Homeric tradition of their classical ancestors.
