Andronikos Dukas (General under Romanos IV.)

Andronikos Dukas , also Andronikos Doukas, Greek Ανδρόνικος Δούκας; (* after 1045 ; † October 14, 1077 ) was a Byzantine general and court dignitary who contributed to the defeat of the Byzantines in the Battle of Manzikert .

origin

Andronikos Dukas was a member of the Byzantine noble family Dukas , which with Constantine X. and Michael VII. Provided two emperors of the Byzantine Empire . He did not come from the imperial line, however, and is therefore to be distinguished from his eponymous cousin Andronikos Dukas , who was a younger son of Emperor Constantine X and a brother and co-emperor of Emperor Michael VII, called Parakinakes (1071-1078) as well of Konstantios Dukas was.

He was a son of Emperor ( Caesar ) Johannes Dukas († approx. 1088), who was only a younger brother of Emperor Constantine X , but after his death in 1067 was one of the most influential members of the Byzantine court for two decades 1074 appeared as a pretender to the crown. Andronikos' mother was Irene Pegonitissa, a daughter of General Nikolaos / Niketas Pegonites.

Life

Officer and courtier

Andronikos Dukas was born after 1045 as the eldest son of Emperor Johannes Dukas. The historian Anna Komnene also confirms that he was the oldest in her historical work on the life of her father, Emperor Alexios I Komnenos , the " Alexiade ".

The role given to him by his birth was limited, since the focus of life at the court of Constantinople naturally lay on the older imperial line and he himself was in the shadow of the dominant figure of his father. He followed the family tradition and began a military career through which he quickly rose to general and in the hierarchy of the court aristocracy to protoproedros ("chief president") and protobestiarios (about chamberlain). However, these were functions or honorary titles that were more or less automatically associated with belonging to the ruling family.

Fight against the Seljuks

Andronikos was to play his historical role in the context of the dangerous conflict between the Byzantine Empire and the growing power of the Seljuks . These were a Turkmen , Sunni dynasty who had built up the Great Seljuks Empire since the 11th century , which stretched across large parts of Central Asia , Iran , Iraq , Syria , Anatolia and the Arabian Peninsula . In Persia they had adopted the local language and were therefore able to develop their own remarkable Turkic-Persian culture.

In 1068 Alp Arslan , the Sultan of the Kingdom of the Great Seljuks (1063-1072), attacked the Byzantine Empire, but was finally defeated by Emperor Romanus IV. Diogenes after three battles in 1070 in Cilicia and pushed back behind the Euphrates . Andronikos should have gained important experience in the flexible combat tactics of the Seljuks.

Emperor Romanos IV wanted to finally end the permanent military threat from the Seljuks and their expansive settlement policy through a decisive battle, so in 1071 he advanced with a large army into Armenia , which had been occupied by the Seljuks since 1067 , after he had his troops from Frankish, Norman and Turkish (Cuman) mercenaries had reinforced.

General at the Battle of Manzikert

On August 26, 1071, north of Lake Van near Manzikert (now Malazgirt in Turkey) between the Byzantine army under Emperor Romanos and the Seljuk army under Sultan Alp Arslan , the historic battle of Manzikert took place , in which Andronikos Dukas was to play a fateful role .

Battle of Manzikert

Part of: Byzantine-Seljuk Wars

date	August 26, 1071
place	near Manzikert , north of Lake Van
output	Seljuk victory

The emperor personally commanded the center, on the right wing Theodor Alyates commanded, on the left Nikephoros Bryennios (general, statesman, historian and husband of the historian Anna Komnene ), while Andronikos Dukas commanded the strategically important rearguard. The battle ended with a crushing defeat for the Byzantines, with Emperor Romanos IV being captured by Alp Arslan. But he also showed himself to be a moral winner, as he treated Romanos much better than the latter would have done to him.

The indirect consequences of the battle were even more serious than the direct losses in soldiers and equipment: numerous internal conflicts and economic crises ensued, which permanently weakened the empire's ability to defend its borders. At the same time it came from 1073 through the establishment of the Sultanate of the Rum Seljuks under Suleiman ibn Kutalmiş († 1086) to territorial losses of the empire, which lost about 80,000 km² and led to a massive immigration of Turks in Central Anatolia. Only Emperor Alexios I Komnenus managed to stabilize the empire again.

Completely to blame for the defeat at Manzikert

For this momentous defeat Andronikos Dukas was blamed by the supporters of Emperor Romanos IV. He was accused of having withdrawn the rearguard early instead of covering the emperor's retreat. Or worse, that he had treacherously spread the rumor that the emperor had fallen and that the battle was therefore lost, thereby deliberately destroying the morale of the troops. Steven Runciman sees this as less dramatic: Since the Turkish troops had already deserted the day before and the elite troops - the Frankish and Norman heavy cavalry under the Norman Roussel de Bailleul († 1077) - had decided not to take part in the battle, Andronikos Dukas recognized that that the cause was lost and that the next act of the drama would be played in Constantinople. So he withdrew the reserve troops under his command from the battlefield and left the emperor to his fate.

A motive for this act was quickly found: Emperor Romanos IV owed his rule to a coup d'etat against the Dukas family by marrying his widow Eudokia Makrembolitissa after the death of Emperor Constantine X Dukas in 1068 and the emperor's successor sons Limited role of co-emperors without effective power. From Andronikos - as cousin of the repressed imperial heirs - a betrayal of the usurper Romanos IV was to be expected.

As serious as Andronikos' withdrawal of the reserve troops might have been, it was hardly the sole reason for the defeat: On the Byzantine side there were serious structural defects, such as the drastic reduction in military spending since Emperor Constantine IX. Monomachos or the growing dependence on heterogeneous contingents of foreign mercenaries, the Scandinavians of the Varägergarde, the Normans and Franks from Western Europe, the Slavs from the north and the Turks from the steppes of southern Russia, such as the Pechenegs, Cumans and Ghuzzen.

In addition, there were tactical errors: almost half the army under General Joseph Tarchaneiotes was absent during the battle, as they were on the way to the siege of the fortress of Ahlat on the shores of Lake Van in eastern Anatolia on the orders of the emperor . The reconnaissance by scouts was criminally neglected and the deployment of Turkish auxiliaries against the Turkish Seljuks made their defection predictable.

The decisive factor, however, must have been the superior strategy of Sultan Alp Arslan, who succeeded in enclosing the Byzantine army by feigning retreat. Emperor Michael VII probably saw the guilt of his cousin Andronikos in a different light, since he owed his coronation to the defeat and overthrow of Emperor Romanos IV and thus also Andronikos.

Political Consequences

After the peace conditions negotiated by Romanos IV became known, the father of Andronikos, the emperor Johannes Dukas - the senior of the house of Dukas - organized a popular uprising against Romanos. This was because the acceptance of the conditions through the high ransom would not only have been very expensive, but above all would have led to the fact that the Byzantine Empire would have sunk because of the planned annual tribute payments and the obligation to provide Byzantine auxiliary troops to a vassal state of the Seljuks. Romanos IV was therefore deposed in Constantinople and the contract declared invalid, while the displaced youthful co-emperor Michael VII Dukas was crowned sole emperor on October 24, 1071. The arrival of his cousin Andronikos Dukas with the remains of the army rescued by Manzikert naturally fortified his position.

When the defeated Emperor Romanos IV was released from captivity by Sultan Alp Arslan , Michael VII sent his cousins ​​Andronikos and Constantine to meet him. Not to receive him, but to take him prisoner. Andronikos succeeded in getting Romanus IV and his small troop in Cilicia . This was based on a letter of guarantee that was signed by three metropolitans in the name of the new Emperor Michael VII and promised him full personal security. Although Andronikos spoke out against it, Romanos was blinded with red-hot iron even before his arrival in Constantinople on June 29, 1072. Michael Psellos , monk, historian as well as educator and main advisor to Emperor Michael, sent the blinded ex-Emperor Romanos a letter in which he praised him, his victim, as a happy martyr : God had taken his sight because he had a higher light for worthy treasures. Nothing is reported about how Romanos received this "consolation", as he succumbed to his injuries shortly afterwards.

Domestics of the Orient

Andronikos was appointed in 1073 by his cousin, Emperor Michael VII., "Domestikos" of the Orient, ie the commander in chief of the imperial army in the east of the empire. In this capacity, Andronikos went out with his father, the Emperor Johannes Dukas, with the imperial army to fight the rebellious Frankish and Norman mercenaries under Roussel de Bailleul. However, the rebels who captured Andronikos and his father triumphed. While the seriously wounded Andronikos was being released by the rebels to heal his injuries, the rebels forced his father to declare himself counter-emperor and planned to march with him to Constantinople. Only with the help of Seljuk auxiliaries was General Alexios Komnenos finally able to defeat the rebels and capture the - not entirely voluntary - opposing emperor.

Andronikos Dukas died a few years later, on October 14, 1077, after he - according to Byzantine tradition - had entered a monastery shortly before as monk Antonius.

family

Andronikos Dukas married Maria Princess of Bulgaria before 1061 († as a nun Xene September 21, 1089/1118). She was a daughter of Trajan / Troianos Prince of Bulgaria († May 19…), son of Ivan Wladislaw , the last tsar of the First Bulgarian Empire (1015-1018) and his wife, who was a descendant of the Byzantine noble families Kontostephanos, Abalates and Phocas was.

Children: Andronikos Dukas had the following children from his marriage to Maria of Bulgaria.

• Michael Dukas, (* 1061; † January 19, 1108/18), Sebastos, 1083 protostrator

& Ne (he had offspring)

• Johannes Dukas (* 1064; † as monk Antonios v. 1136), before 1090 and after 1092/93 Megas Dux, 1090/92 Dux of Dyrrhachion
• Irene Dukaina (* 1066; † as a nun around February 19, 1123)

& 1078 Alexios Komnenos , Emperor of the Byzantine Empire (1081–1118)

Irene thus became the ancestress of Komnenen, the 1081-1185 Byzantine emperor and 1204-1461 Emperor of Trebizond were

• Anna Dukaina (* 1068; † 1110 / 18–1135)

& v. 1081 Georgios Palaiologos, imperial general, Sebastos, 1081 Strategos of Dyrrhachion . (Ref EST NF III. 1 plate 198)

Anna Dukaina became the ancestor of the dynasty of palaeologists , who were emperors of Byzantium in Nikaia from 1259 to 1261 and emperors of the Byzantine Empire from 1261 to 1453 and margraves of Montferrat from 1306 to 1533 .

• Theodora Dukaina, (* approx. 1070; † as a nun February 20, 1116)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Detlev Schwennike: European Family Tables, New Series , Verlag JA Stargardt Volume II, Plate 178
2. ↑ Charles Cawley, Medieval Lands , note 421 to chapter Byzantium (1057-1204)
3. ↑ Tamara Talbot Rice: The Seljuks. Cologne 1963, p. 22
4. ↑ Compare this to the article on Romanos IV where the related conversation is reproduced
5. ↑ Steven Runciman: History of the Crusades , 63
6. ↑ Steven Runciman: History of the Crusades , p. 62
7. ^ Ostrogorsky p. 291
8. ↑ Steven Runciman: History of the Crusades , 65
9. ↑ Steven Runciman: History of the Crusades , p. 291
10. ↑ European Family Tables, New Series , Volume II. Plate 177
11. ↑ Detlev Schwennike: European Family Tables, New Series , Verlag JA Stargardt Volume II, Plate 178

literature

• Alexios G. Savvides, Benjamin Hendrickx (Eds.): Encyclopaedic Prosopographical Lexicon of Byzantine History and Civilization . Vol. 2: Baanes-Eznik of Kolb . Brepols Publishers, Turnhout 2008, ISBN 978-2-503-52377-4 , p. 370.
• Georg Ostrogorsky : Byzantine History 324 - 1453 , Verlag CH Beck, Munich, second edition 2006, ISBN 978-3-406-39759-2
• Steven Runciman : History of the Crusades , (translation), DTV-Verlag Munich, 2nd edition 1997,
• John Julius Norwich : Byzantium: The Decline and Fall , Penguin Verlag, 1996, ISBN 0-14-011449-1
• Alexander Canduci: Triumph & Tragedy: The Rise and Fall of Rome's Immortal Emperors , Pier 9, 2010, ISBN 978-1-74196-598-8
• Alexander Kazhdan (Ed.): Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium Vol. I, Oxford University Press, 1991, ISBN 978-0-19-504652-6
• Demetrios Polemis: The Doukai: A Contribution to Byzantine Prosopography , published by Athlone Press, London 1968

Web links

• Charles Cawley: Medieval Lands . In: Foundation for Medieval Genealogy: Byzantium 1057-1204 ; Doukas
• A family tree of the Doukas family