Constantine VIII

Histamenon of Constantine VIII.

Constantine VIII ( Middle Greek Κωνσταντῖνος Η ′ ; * around 960 ; † November 11, 1028 ) was Byzantine emperor from 1025 to 1028.

Life

Constantine was a son of Emperor Romanos II and the younger brother of Emperor Basil II , who died childless and left him the kingdom. He was appointed co-emperor when he ascended the throne in 976, but did not play a major role in his brother's 49 years of government activity, not even when Basil left Constantinople to go to war. Constantine passed his time in luxury and without any responsibility. In his youth he seems to have given off a physically imposing figure, which, however, dwindled over time due to years of depletion of his strength. When he became the sole ruler at the age of 65, he could hardly stand on his feet due to chronic gout , which did not prevent him from further feasts and orgies.

Since Constantine felt that he could not handle the immense power, but also to be able to continue indulging in his amusements, he transferred a large part of his power to various eunuchs. In addition, a notorious thug named Spondylos became prince of Antioch , the most important fortress in the east at that time. The Anatolian aristocracy took advantage of the weakness of the new government and persuaded the weak emperor to repeal the land laws passed by Basil II and rob thousands of peasant families of their livelihoods.

Like Basil, Constantine died without a male heir. The government went to his daughter Zoe , the long line of husbands and her sister Theodora III. over.

literature

• Ralph-Johannes Lilie , Claudia Ludwig, Thomas Pratsch, Beate Zielke, Harald Bichlmeier, Bettina Krönung, Daniel Föller, Alexander Beihammer , Günter Prinzing : Prosopography of the Middle Byzantine Period . 2nd department: (867-1025). Volume 3: Ignatios (# 22713) - Lampudios (# 24268). Created after preliminary work by F. Winkelmann . Published by the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences. De Gruyter, Berlin 2013, ISBN 978-3-11-016668-2 , pp. 531-535 No. 23735.
• 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 , pp. 251-252.

Web links

Commons : Constantine VIII.  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files

• Constantine VIII in the Prosopography of the Byzantine World

predecessor	Office	successor
Basil II	Emperor of Byzantium 1025-1028	Romanos III.