Leon Sgouros

Leon Sgouros († 1208 in Acrocorinth ) was an autonomous Byzantine ruler in Greece at the beginning of the 13th century. Before 1200 he inherited his father Theodoros Sgouros in the office of Archon of Nauplia .

Life

In 1201 Leon Sgouros revolted against the rule of Emperor Alexios III. and made himself an independent ruler. He started to establish his own principality in Greece; the local Greek Orthodox clergy, representing the central state, was his main competitor. He secured unrestricted rule in Nauplia by imprisoning the city's bishop. He then seized Argos and the strategically important city of Corinth by blinding the city's archbishop during a banquet and then overturning the Acrocorinth . Thereupon Sgouros intended the conquest of Athens , whose lower city he was able to take even with great devastation. The city's bishop, Michael Choniates , was able to defend himself successfully on the Acropolis . In 1202, Sgouros sealed off the city from the sea, thereby breaking its contact with Constantinople . During the further siege of Athens he made a successful conquest of Thebes . By 1203 Leon Sgouros had conquered a principality that included Attica , Boeotia and the Isthmus of Corinth .

The political situation in the Byzantine Empire changed fundamentally in the summer of 1203, when the army of the Fourth Crusade landed outside the walls of Constantinople. In April 1204 the "Latins" conquered the capital of the empire and founded a Latin empire . For Leon Sgouros the situation became increasingly threatening, as the Latins were militarily much stronger than the overthrown Byzantine emperor and made preparations to move to Greece. In the late year 1204 he met in Larissa with the fleeing emperor Alexios III., Whose daughter Eudokia he married. He took on the title of despotes . Following the historical model of the Spartan king Leonidas I , Sgouros intended to stop the approaching Latins under the leadership of Boniface von Montferrat at the Thermopylae bottleneck . But then the local Greek population denied him allegiance, who instead turned to the Latins because of his previous tyranny. One example of Sgouro's tyrannical leadership style was the treatment of one of the hostages placed by the Bishop of Athens, who was a young boy. Sgouros had him neutered in order to then serve as cupbearer for himself. When the boy broke a wine glass , Sgouros struck his skull in a rage with an iron rod.

With a few followers, Sgouros withdrew to the strong Akrokorinth Castle and holed up here against the Latins. They were therefore able to take Boeotia and Attica without a fight in the summer of 1205. These provinces were given by Boniface of Montferrat to his follower Otto de la Roche as a fief. While Montferrat turned himself against Nauplia, his subordinate Jacques d'Avesnes took up the siege of Acrocorinth. Sgouros defended himself successfully at this castle for the next few years, but after the years passed and the Byzantine despot of Epirus, Michael I Komnenos Dukas Angelos , rejected an alliance, he lost hope of rescue. In the autumn of 1208, Sgouros, riding a horse, threw himself down the rock of Acrocorinth. Acrocorinth surrendered to the Latin conquerors in 1209 and Nauplia in 1210/11.

literature

• Jean-Claude Cheynet: Pouvoir et contestations à Byzance (963-1210) (= Publications de la Sorbonne. Series Byzantina Sorbonensia. Vol. 9). Reimpression. Publications de la Sorbonne Center de Recherches d'Histoire et de Civilization Byzantines, Paris 1996, ISBN 2-85944-168-5 , pp. 138-199 No. 198.
• PE Niavi: Leon Sgouros: patriotes e tyrannos , in: Byzantinai Meletai. Diethnes Epistemonike Hepeteris Byzantines kai Metabyzantines Ereunes 4 (1993), pp. 333-357
• Alexis GC Savvides: A Note on the Death of Leo Sgurus an AD 1208 , in: Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies (BMGS) 12 (1988), pp. 289-295

Note and individual proof

1. ↑ other spellings: Leon Sguros, Leo Sgouros, Leo Sguros
2. ↑ Foteini Kolovou: Michaelis Choniatae epistulae , in: Corpus fontium historiae Byzantinae (CFHB) 41 (Berlin, 2001), pp. 100-101; Letter from Bishop Michael Choniates to his nephew, the sebastos Georgios, in which he expresses his indignation at the crime.