Johannes Komnenos Dukas

Billon - Trachy coin of Johannes Komnenos Dukas as emperor of Thessaloniki

Johannes Komnenos Dukas ( Middle Greek Ἰωάννης Κομνηνός Δούκας ; † 1244 ) was ruler of Thessaloniki from 1237 until his death .

Life

Johannes was the eldest son of Theodoros I Komnenos Dukas and Maria Petraliphaina . Thus, on his father's side, he was a great-great-grandson of the Byzantine emperor Alexios I Komnenos and Irene Dukaina . His father ruled over the Byzantine successor state of Epirus since 1215 and claimed the imperial title in rivalry with John III after the conquest of the Latin kingdom of Thessaloniki in 1224 . Dukas Batatzes , the ruler of the Nikaia Empire .

After the devastating defeat in the Battle of Klokotnitsa on March 9, 1230, Johannes was captured by the Bulgarians together with his parents and siblings . When his sister Irene married the widowed Bulgarian Tsar Ivan Assen II in Tarnowo in 1237 , Johannes was released together with his father Theodoros, who had been blinded in the meantime, and his younger brother Demetrios . They returned to Thessaloniki, where they instigated a revolt against Theodoros' brother Manuel Komnenos Dukas , who had ruled the city as a de facto Bulgarian vassal since 1230 . Manuel was overthrown and John was installed as the new ruler of Thessaloniki by his father.

The deposed Manuel seized himself in 1239 with the support of the Nikaia Empire of Thessaly . To avoid a bloody fratricidal conflict, Johannes and Theodoros offered negotiations: Both parties agreed to share rule on the basis of the status quo . At the latest when Ivan Assen II died in 1241 and the resulting loss of Bulgarian suzerainty over Thessaloniki, John, like his father before him, assumed the title of basileus .

The resurgent imperial ambitions of the Epirot ruling dynasty evoked Emperor John III. on the plan whose policy was aimed at the restoration of the Byzantine Empire, which had been destroyed in the Fourth Crusade in 1204. He invited Theodoros to a conference, had him arrested and in 1242 put a siege army against Thessaloniki on the march. At the encouragement of his John III. As a negotiator to his father, Johannes Komnenos Dukas agreed to recognize the suzerainty of Nikaias, to abandon the title of emperor and to be satisfied with the despot dignity that his brother Demetrios received.

Johannes Komnenos Dukas showed little talent for government affairs; his inclination was rather religious, combined with the desire to become a cleric himself. After his death in 1244 Demetrios ruled over Thessaloniki until the city of John III in 1246. was incorporated into the expanding Nikaia Empire.

swell

• Georgios Akropolites 38-72 (ed. Peter Wirth , transl. Wilhelm Blum, BGL Vol. 28, 1989)
• Ephraim von Ainos 326–339 ​​(ed. Immanuel Bekker , CSHB Vol. 21, 1840)

literature

• Dimiter Angelov: Imperial ideology and political thought in Byzantium, 1204-1330. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2007, ISBN 978-0-521-85703-1 , p. 336.
• Κωνσταντίνος Βαρζός: Η Γενεαλογία των Κομνηνών. Τόμος Β ' (= Βυζαντινά Κείμενα και Μελέται. Τ. 20β , ISSN  1106-6180 ). Κέντρο Βυζαντινών Ερευνών - ΑΠΘ, Θεσσαλονίκη 1984 ( PDF file; 45.5 MB ), p. 616–625 passim , p. 884 No. 247.
• Божидар Ферјанчић: Деспоти у Византији и Јужнословенским земљама (= Посебна издања . Vol. 336; Византолошки институт Vol. 8.). Српска академија наука и уметности, Београд 1960, pp. 62–63, 87.
• John Van Antwerp Fine: The Late Medieval Balkans: A critical Survey from the late Twelfth Century to the Ottoman Conquest. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor MI 1994, ISBN 0-472-08260-4 , pp. 69, 134.
• Michael F. Hendy: Catalog of the Byzantine coins in the Dumbarton Oaks Collection and in the Whittemore Collection . Vol. 4: Alexius I to Michael VIII, 1081-1261 , Part 2: The Emperors of Nicaea and Their Contemporaries (1204-1261) . Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, Washington DC 1999, ISBN 0-88402-233-1 , pp. 578-596.
• Ruth Macrides, Joseph A. Munitiz, Dimiter Angelov: Pseudo-Kodinos and the Constantinopolitan Court: Offices and Ceremonies (= Birmingham Byzantine and Ottoman Studies . Vol. 15). Ashgate, Farnham 2013, ISBN 978-0-7546-6752-0 , pp. 43, 339, 343, 431.
• Donald M. Nicol : The Despotate of Epiros. Basil Blackwell, Oxford 1957, pp. 134-141, 206-207.

Web links

• Ioannes Komnenos (Angelos) on Medieval Lands

predecessor	Office	successor
Manuel Komnenos Dukas	Emperor of Thessaloniki 1237 / 1241–1242 to 1244 as despot under the suzerainty of the Nikaia Empire	Demetrios Komnenos Dukas